Tangled Tales: Callum

“Tell me about yourself Callum. I understand you changed your name a few years back.”

Callum sat across the table from the journalist. He wasn’t sure what to expect. At this point he was tired. He’d promised Vernon that he’d talk to him, after all Vernon had been a good neighbor and they’d even put in a garden together on their rural properties. 

“I used to go by Jonah but it never seemed to fit, plus the whale jokes got to be too much for me,” said Callum. 

“When did you change it?”

“Sometime in the 12th Century.” 

“I think you told me once that people would comment about your eyes,” said Vernon. Callum has heterochromia. Two eyes of a different color.

Callum took a sip of wine, then smiled. “People used to think it was mystical and that I could keep evil spirits away. It is funny now come to think of it. A simple genetic mutation and nothing more.”

“But they trusted you and thought you would bring them luck.”

“Little did they know I could drain their body of blood or give them nightmares for years.”

“Yet you never did that.”

“No. Well, not unless it was warranted. Occasionally someone thought I had an evil eye. Then Poe wrote that story about that blue eye staring out from wherever. On went the eye patch again.”

“I sort of liked the eye patch. It made you look mysterious.”

“And kind of sexy, or so my wife tells me.”

“Tell me about your family. Use your own words. Your own version.”

“My father was an intenerate preacher,” said Callum. “That is nothing I’d wish on any child.”

Vernon gave a supporting smile. “That was never easy for you or your family.”

“My father put his passion for God before his passion for his wife and his children. Any man of that time would have been over the moon with six sons, but not my father. Most people didn’t even know he had a wife or children. We’d show up at his sermons and people would shoo us away because they thought we were just there to beg. 

Of course we never begged. My grandparents were extremely devout and financially supported us. They knew their son, my father, was special. We never went hungry, but we weren’t exactly comfortable. I remember my dad as a kind and compassionate man, but he never treated my brothers and me any different from any other children. My mother would use the excuse that it was because there were six of us. Poor mother was the queen of excuses. 

Our dad was charismatic for sure. Do you remember Tellias how he’d give that look that would…I’m trying to describe it but I can’t think of the words.”

Their friend old Tellias sat at the table with them. “When your father looked a person in the eyes they thought they were looking at God.”

“You think?” Callum said with a bitter laugh. “The swooning and fainting. It was worse than Elvis or the Beatles. Only Elvis and the Beatles weren’t around back then. We didn’t have much music, or at least not in my family. My father didn’t allow it.”

“Every woman wanted him, even without a leather jacket or jiggling hips,” said Tellias.

“Yes they did,” said Callum.

“What religion was your father?” Vernon asked.

“We were Jews, or at least my father was. Us kids would show up but we never gave much of it a second thought. We liked to go watch Jesus better than our Dad.”

“You watched Jesus?” Vernon looked surprised. Callum guessed he’d never told that to Vernon.

“He was my cousin. Well, second cousin.”

“Callum’s father was John the Baptist,” said Tellias.

Vernon opened his eyes wide. “No way. He was married?”

“Men of my father’s class were expected to get married and have children. He did his duty. My mother was extraordinarily beautiful, and any man would have been proud to show her off. Not my father. He just didn’t care. He was proud of her devotion and of her piety. He also needed her to keep him organized, make appointments for his gatherings where he would preach, and make his fans happy. She did it all and had six sons. I think we were all his, but I was never quite sure. Somehow the timing didn’t work out with the middle two,” Callum said. “When my dad died you would have expected we’d be taken care of but my mother had to scramble to find someone who’d take us in.” 

“There were those who would have taken her in but she knew her life would have been misery with them. I introduced her to the man who would eventually be the love of her life,” said Tellias.

“Yes, you did. Thank God. Everyone else would have treated her like a pathetic charity case, never letting her forget it. She would have ended up being no more than a slave, or someone who could provide sex on demand and maybe a few more sons. My grandparents thought our father should have stayed single and pure. They saw my mother as an opportunistic temptress. Her only crime is that she had no family.  She also knew how to read and write. They considered that cunning since she was just a poor orphan. 

After my father died, thanks to Tellias, my mother was  reconnected with a well to do Roman who’d met her years before my father swept her off her feet.” 

“The Roman, Marcus adopted the boys and treated all six of them as if they were his own flesh and blood.”

“Wasn’t your father John considered a miracle baby?” Vernon asked.

“Some people say my grandparents were elderly when he was born. They like the idea that Grandma and Gramps spawned a miracle child. She was only 31 with a history of irregular periods, and premature gray hair. So, a grand myth is born. Gramps said she wasn’t attractive anymore and started to call her an old woman. He had affairs and brought in concubines. It made her angry, so she got her revenge and had her own affairs. That is how my father came about. He was the biological son of Elizabeth and a handsome neighbor. Gramps Zacharias didn’t know the difference, so she never told him. But mom was the first cousin of Mary, the mother of Jesus, so the two women raised their sons together. I still believe Joseph was the biological father because Jesus looks just like him. They were both handsome men with broad shoulders and a gorgeous smile that drew people in. Joseph, like Elizabeth, was not elderly as pictures depict. He wasn’t much older than Mary. The reason he is shown as being an old man is because it would fool people into thinking Mary was a virgin because Joseph was too old to function. The thought was that any man that age must be shooting blanks.”

“Nobody ever heard of John’s family or children because later on the church wanted everyone to believe saints were all celibate virgins, or that they’d abandoned the wonton pursuits of the flesh,” said Tellias.

“So my father, despite the fact that he wasn’t the greatest dad, hated to see greed or injustice. Tellias, tell them what happened. I still don’t like talking about it,” Callum added. 

“King Harod was tired of his wife and decided to trade her in for a younger woman, said Tellias. Harod was a horrible man. I believe it was one of the few times John thought of his own wife and held her up as an example of a good and faithful wife, and himself as a faithful husband. He told Harrod exactly what he thought but Harrod just shrugged it off. But Harrod’s daughter, who was as spoiled as any reality TV star decided she’d get revenge for her dear old dad.” 

“She was quite the brat,” said Callum.

“Quite the brat in all of the worst ways a brat can be. Her father would have married her if he could have. He was such a nasty awful vulgar man,” said Tellias.

“Wasn’t he murdered?” Vernon asked.

“Eventually but not soon enough in my opinion,” said Callum.

Tellias continued the story. “The daughter attempted to seduce Callum’s father John. After telling the girl that he was married and had no intention of cheating on his wife, the girl became angry. She told her father that John had tried to seduce her and laid hands on her. Even her father knew it was a lie, but she would not give up. She told her father that she would leave him if he didn’t give her one thing.”

“A horrible thing,” said Callum. “After all these years it still hurts to think about it.”

“Yes,” said Tellias,  “a horrible thing. If she couldn’t have my father’s body, then she would have his head. After he presented his daughter with the head Harod made his daughter kiss the dead lips before he closed the eyes. Then he told her, “You can have the rest of him if you want. I’ll have the slaves rub his body with scented oil, then heat him up with warm rocks covered in blankets, then they’ll lay him naked in your bed where he won’t be able to refuse you. You can slide all over him until your lust is satisfied, or until he starts to rot.”

“I became a Vampire a few years later. Tellias was going to Britain as an advisor to the Roman Army so I went with him. I was tired of the drama around my family,” Callum said to Vernon.

Vernon closed his laptop and stopped taking notes. Having ancient Vampire friends was always interesting and rewarding, but there were times when he had to stop asking questions. Sure, we all want answers, but sometimes it isn’t worth the nightmares one will have after learning the truth. 

“I think I’m going to shelve this story. Thank you for telling me, but…”

“I understand,” said Callum. “I appreciate your support and friendship.”

The three opened another bottle of wine. Their wives would be showing up soon. They’d all decided to watch a movie that night. Maybe a romantic comedy or a feel good movie was in order. Maybe they’d watch LA LA Land again. Vernon didn’t care, as long as it had a happy ending.

~end

~ Juliette aka Vampire Maman