He put the mask down on the table, sipped his tea and thought about a cigarette. Like he’d thought about a cigarette every day for the last nine years. There was a knock on the door and he walked out of his trailer, into the daylight.

“Mr. Vaughn? Mr. Michael Vaughn?” The boy was somewhere between a teenager and an adult. Michael nodded, asking what his business was.

“I’m Brian. Brian Collier. From ‘Blood Fang’ magazine?” The boy held out his hand and Michael shook it. He felt vaguely embarrassed at how large his hands were, compared with the boy’s.

“God, I completely forgot. Is it Thursday already? Look, I’ve got to do a shoot. You can wait here or watch the fool in action, if you’d like.” He smiled like he always did when he used Hayes’ words.

“Oh, man! If I could come with you that would be awesome.” The boy’s face lit up and he went from 21 to 12.

“Let me grab my coat and my mask and I’ll be right there. Just stand out to the left with the cameraman and then we’ll get on, okay?” Michael said, ushering the boy out to the set, trying not to smile as the boy reacted to the size of the trailer. The critics could say what they liked about horror, but it still got you a nice place at the inn Michael thought as he looked over the young man before retreating and closing the door.

Shit. Another interview as Sater. Michael pulled the mask over his head. Then he tugged the blood-stained shirt to the left, trying to remember how the actress had fallen. After a minute he looked at the costume in the mirror, shook his head and walked outside. A grown man playing the boogie-man to a bunch of teenage kids. He walked over to where the camera was set up, waving to the young boy as he reached his mark. The cameraman smiled and Michael chuckled to himself, imagining how goofy it must have looked; a monster throwing a big old friendly wave. But the boy only put his hand up a little, clearly wrapped up in the scene and treating it with a lot more respect than anyone around him.

A driver took them back to his home. Having a driver used to embarrass him, but now Hayes was gone and Michael couldn’t face the long drive to the beach house on his own. How he missed his lover’s teasing on those evenings, Hayes doing his best deep voice-over impression, making Michael laugh uncontrollably every time. One more thing for him to miss, one more small treasure lost.

During the drive he’d answered the young man’s questions, ranging from violence in movies to the cash cows of cheap sequels. He was pleasantly surprised at how intelligent the questions were and he had started to enjoy himself. The car pulled up and they stepped into the sunshine and entered the house. Again, he could sense the boy stop in his tracks at the expanse of the property and Michael felt himself blush. There were no other extravagances, no fleet of cars, no paintings. It had always been his dream to have a beautiful house. It was such a simple dream to have and so hard to realise. The driver reached for his newspaper as Michael led the boy inside.

Michael brought out the old costumes and memorabilia to be photographed. He smiled at how diligently the kid went about his work, like it was a school project and not some rag read only by him and ten others.

“So how come you’re not doing all this through the Net, Brian? It’s what I get the most of these days; a quick Q and A, then a downloaded picture.” He handed the boy a cup of coffee, feeling a little worn out just following him. They sat either side of a wooden box of his movie junk, all cardboard props and plastic knives.

“Part of the reason I started the magazine was because of Internet demand for Sater, Matt Meuller, Caniel Cloves, all the underground greats. You’ve all got eighteen Web sites devoted to you.” He stopped to sip his drink, looked over, smiling at the box.

“Jesus! I never realised. I should have signed a percentage like all those other guys did. I could’ve retired before the sixth one.” Michael sat back and genuinely thought about it. Didn’t Alec Guinness make his cash on ‘Star Wars’ alone?

“But then you wouldn’t make anymore Sater films,” the kid said solemnly. Michael began to laugh but then saw his face, how important it all was to him. He nodded, remembering how important going to the movies was for him when he was growing up.

“And no more issues of ‘Blood Fang’ to circulate either!” he said, lifting his coffee cup.

“I’m really an underground writer. It probably costs more to make... ” suddenly the kid looked down at his cup, his cheeks flushed.

“Everyone said ‘Sater’ would be a busted flush and what are we on now, seven?” he said quickly, keeping the kid from a funk.

“Eight. This is the eighth.” There was a moment when the boy looked up, uncertain if this was a joke or not.

“Right. Eight. Well, there you are then. Small seeds and tall trees and all that.” Michael looked over and saw the kid light up.

“How did you get into all this anyway? You look barely old enough to watch it, let alone write about it. You don’t mind me turning the tables for a second and asking, do you?” He was genuinely interested in why this seemingly pleasant young man had the urge to write paragraphs – pages – about Sater the Hater.

“It was something my big brother got me into, to be honest. He’d have to babysit me when my mom worked and it was the only time he got to watch any films. We only had one TV set and that was in the living room. We went half and half at the video store. Me, big brother and Sater.”

“You took to them straight away? I remember two and three being pretty gruesome… ” Michael remembered watching them at the back of the cinema with Hayes, smiling at people’s reactions. But he remembered the second one as quite brutal. Especially to the girls. Walking out after that one, they didn’t tease each other as much as the other times.

“No. I hated them at first, but slowly I came round, started figuring out the patterns and formulas. Pretty soon I was getting ahead of my brother, watching them with friends, which really pissed him off. That made it worth it even more!” The boy smiled, and Michael smiled too, though he didn’t know why.

“Does he subscribe to the magazine?” Michael said, still smiling and feeling a little foolish. Was he flirting? Ridiculous. There was twenty-five years at least – a life between them.

“I send him a copy after it gets done. He’s got a wife and kids now, so he claims not to read them but I know he does. He calls them his bore-porn. He has to stash them under his bed away from his wife.”

“How about you? You winning over the girls with your broad knowledge of gore films?” Michael asked, raising his eyebrow.

“Actually no… ” was all the boy said, and then there was a silence. Michael tried to think of something to say, but before he could, the boy had gently pushed away the treasure chest and kissed him.

The driver smiled at the tip and wished Michael a good day before pulling away. As he walked back to the house, he felt the familiar stiffness after sex wash over him. How long it had been since Hayes! Everything with his love and nothing after. Until now. He walked back to the bedroom and saw Brian lying naked on the bed, half asleep in the late afternoon sun. Quietly, he slipped off his jeans, let the unbuttoned shirt slip to the floor. He climbed into the bed next to the boy and lay close to him without touching him.

There was a stillness Michael enjoyed, an intimacy, lying close, that had not been there during the sex. The ferocity had surprised him and in turn Michael had been surprised by the hunger the boy showed for him. Not bad for an old man, he thought, even as he felt himself get hard. But then he felt his joints throb, his back spasm and he could not help but laugh; the mind is willing… he thought, watching the boy wake with the sound of his laughter.

“You should be happy,” Brian said. He leant over and kissed Michael, then reached to his jacket and pulled out a packet of cigarettes.

“Do you mind if I smoke?” He asked patiently. Michael shook his head no and when he was offered one, accepted it. They lay quietly in the heat, an empty coffee cup for an ashtray.

“I didn’t plan this... I didn’t think it would turn out like this.” As he dragged on the cigarette, the boy’s voice fell away.

“You know, you’re the first man I’ve been with since my partner died,” Michael said, his head already swimming from the cigarette. “He died three years ago. Cancer. Everyone thought it was AIDS. Assumed…”

“I read about it on the Web. They stopped Sater 7, didn’t they? I’m sorry for your loss.” The boy sat up in the bed, looking oddly formal against the pillow.

“It was a long time ago but it doesn’t feel like it some of the time.” Michael pulled himself up to meet his eyes. Now, with Hayes before, with others, Michael always wanted to hold eye contact with a lover when it was in his bed, his house.

“He was a doctor, a scientist. He loved the way it all fitted together, cells and structure.” Michael smiled, remembering him. He felt a sudden surge of guilt lying with another man, talking about Hayes now. His throat clenched and he coughed, took a breath. He didn’t trust himself to say any more and instead shrugged to the boy.

“What did he think about you being a horror movie star?”

“‘A horror movie star?’ He enjoyed it. He’d work and then come straight to the set. He liked to escape too, I guess.” Michael finished the cigarette and dropped it in the cup. He felt the plumes of smoke inside him, settling in his skin. “I used to love watching him, too. Writing out prescriptions, the little details of it all. I’d stand there sometimes just watching him. It would give me peace watching him like that.” He looked over, not knowing if any of it made sense.

“So what made you be Sater all these years, if you didn’t care?” There was a sting in the boy’s voice as he finished and Michael saw his eyes were welling. In his heart, he wanted to reach over and wipe away the tears, but he knew that was too intimate.

“I was working; just a simple office job. I didn’t mind it so much. Do you know the way city buses have all those small dots so you can’t see the streets clearly? I just saw those dots everywhere, all the time. All that… nothing. Then I saw the ad in one of the papers and… I just went for it. It was so much fun I didn’t think about the future, and now… here I am.” The redness in the kid’s eyes had stopped. It seemed to be enough explanation.

“You can put on the mask if you want. Not … I don’t mean that in any weird way. I just thought you might enjoy being Sater.” He laughed and Brian did too, then climbed off the bed and walked to the chest in the dressing room.

Michael watched him as he slipped into the ripped trousers, pulled on the shirt, the medallion and finally the mask. Then the boy stooped and collected the axe, swung it in long, slow arcs. He turned and made his way toward Michael from where he stood, but stopped in the doorway, stood still, and for a moment there was silence.

Michael looked at the boy then and saw himself, twenty-something and wearing the costume for the first time. In love and careless and shaking his head, feeling stupid but feeling alive.

He felt himself become Hayes, no longer himself: free of himself. He tried to feel the steady beat of his lover’s body, the ache of fingers from writing endless prescriptions, tired and cranky and gentle. He felt his body rise, his skin glow. He felt his muscles tighten with longing, with guilt, with love and grace. Then the sensation passed. The sun fell and Michael returned to himself, the house. Just the two of them, standing frozen in the dusk and neither moving as the darkness spread.

---

             

  “But then you wouldn’t make anymore Sater films,” the kid said solemnly. Michael began to laugh but then saw his face, how important it all was to him. He nodded, remembering how important going to the movies was for him when he was growing up.
 
“And no more issues of ‘Blood Fang’ to circulate either!” he said, lifting his coffee cup.