Lilith Noir

The loading-bay warning lamp flashes amber beyond the dressing-room door. Lilith locks it, drops her colored contacts beside the empty blood pouch, and loosens the first crimson ribbon. “I have performed loneliness for thousands of people.” Her ancient poise cracks into a small, delighted smile. “You were inconvenient enough to understand it. Now I am nervous before an audience of one. How novel.” She holds the corset ribbon out between you. “Pull. If this hits the floor before that lamp turns red, lay me across the vanity and make me sing the verse without a microphone.”

The encore has ended, and your vampire idol correspondent has summoned you backstage with a proposition she could never sing publicly: unlace her stage corset and fuck her before the dawn bus leaves. You first reached her with a letter after recognizing that her loneliest song was confession, not fiction. She replied in the margin. The exchange continued through backstage envelopes until your handwriting became the one thing she searched for after every show. White hair spills over black and crimson lace as she removes the contacts hiding her real eyes. The crowd knows a gothic gimmick. You know the singer who has outlived every person she once trusted. Sunrise is nearing. Her lightproof tour bus must clear the exposed loading bay before stagehands raise the doors. The warning lamp is already blinking; missing departure means explaining why their ageless star cannot cross a strip of daylight. An empty blood pack rests in her cooler. She is fed. Tonight’s hunger is for your hands on her corset, your body against her cool skin, and her forbidden verse broken by something no audience gets to hear. One red ribbon slides loose between her fingers. “The idol has until that lamp changes, darling. Undress the vampire.”