Call of the Night – 12 – Part of the Ordinary

Nothing like watching a starving vampire die with your friends to put a damper on your fun, huh? That tension pervades this episode as well. While Mahiru speaks alone with Anko in her very classic noir detective office, Kou twists and turns in bed, and when he goes to Nazunas and she prepares to feed, he finds himself pushing her away.

After talking things out (she promises him she’s in no danger of becoming like that starving teacher) they go on a walk, and Kou feels a little better, especially after Nazuna sucks his blood. He was suddenly confronted with the dark side of vampirism, but feels now that he’s identified that fear he can manage it.

I also like the subtle ways Nazuna’s new maid café pay allows her to buy a new top and shoes, switching up her usual all-black style. Switching up her wardrobe makes her feel more, well, human, and less of the evil villainous monsters Anko believes all vamps to be, who would of course always wear the same outfit.

Either later that night or on another night, Kou and Mahiru hang out, Kou finally meets Mahiru’s older friend, and Kou can’t take his eyes of her, despite her not being a vampire (as far as we know). But Mahiru’s true reason is to get Kou to reconsider becoming a vampire, asking him to at least explain why he needs to be one so bad.

Hearing his old friend say these things, and bring up the very frightening prospect of either him or Akira getting hurt, sends Kou’s anxiety and doubt rushing back. He’s so out of sorts, when he next visits Nazuna, he simply needs her to hold him quietly for a bit. Sensing a change of scenery might help, she invites herself to his house, where his mom is out (and his dad’s been gone).

As Nazuna performs at thorough porn search, Kou realizes she’s the first girl he’s had in his room and on his bed; Nazuna notes how the bed smells like him, adding to the raunchiness. But then they turn to real talk, and she tells him it’d be weird if he wasn’t unsure about being turned after what he witnessed.

Kou says he wants to become a vampire because he loves the night and all its freedom and strangeness. He also likes Nazuna, who acknowledges all his emotions and is at the end of the night a decent person, vampire or no. But he can’t discount the potential for hurting his friends, so he wavers. When he then adds that Nazuna is “that eager” to make him her offspring, her resulting expression makes it feel like an uncalled-for low blow.

Nazuna expands on Kou’s love of the night, believing he truly loves it because it’s out of the ordinary. She asks him to compare his first night out to his latest, and Kou can’t deny the excitement has waned some. Then she says that she’s lived for decades as a vampire and felt nothing but boredom (or to be more precise, ennui*).

Rather than try to convince him to be a vampire, Nazuna can’t help but discourage him, since in her experience it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. She tried to make things as fun and exciting for him because that’s how she wanted to be, and how she wanted him to think vampires were like.

These two are no longer strangers to setting jokes aside and  saying what’s in their heart, but in this case, the truth hurts. It’s also not altogether surprising; immortality is bound to get dull once you’ve seen and done everything and nothing is new or exciting; when everything becomes ordinary.

Just as Nazuna turns to leave, Kou trips on his chair, drops the remote to the light, and falls onto the bed, on top of her. The bleak light of his room becomes a deep, dark purplish blue, and motes of dust sparkle in the moonlight. Just one little stumble, and suddenly things are exciting and extraordinary again.

Nazuna rises as if to kiss him, but her lips pass his and go to his ear, asking if he thought she was going to kiss him, then licking his neck marks and disappearing through the window.

One night, Kou decides to meet with Anko, curious about how exactly she kills vampires and why, and to basically learn more about her. But Anko isn’t the kind of person who is easy to get a read on, especially if you’re a middle school boy. She batters him with faux flirting and deductive reasoning. She messes with him the way a cat messes with a mouse.

And like a cat, her end goal is to destroy: not Kou, but Kou’s designs on becoming a vampire. In the beige, drab night (I love how the environment changes when she’s around) she offers him a stark black and white choice: abandon his plans, or be killed by her hand as soon as he becomes one.

His attempts to counter her arguments by describing the vampires he’s met fall on deaf ears; Anko doesn’t want to hear it. Vampires are evil and shouldn’t exist, period, and any human traits or behavior they adopt is in the service of feeding on and killing humans.

When Kou asks how he’ll avoid being killed by the other vampires if he decides not to become one, Anko simply says she’ll kill every last one. It’s chilling to hear someone with such resolve speaking Nazuna’s name. When he refuses to choose, she simply plays dirty, calling the police and reporting a middle schooler hanging out late at night.

Kou runs from Anko, but it will be hard to run away from her will, and now the night is tinged with that fear he thought he could control: the fear of losing the night where he feels most free. When a cop car turns on its lights and sirens, bathing him in red light, the paranoia briefly takes over, and he seeks shelter in a playground slide.

It’s here, where he wants nothing more than to be with Nazuna, talking with her about nothing of import, where he’s approached by Suzushiro Hatsuka. Hatsuka doesn’t seem there to threaten or hurt him, but simply to talk, having possibly smelled Kou’s fear and/or anxiety.

Don’t get me wrong: vampires shouldn’t be allowed to go around murdering people, or drinking their blood without consent. But the world has more than enough people out there who would gladly offer their blood to vampires, as Kou does with Nazuna.

Dismissing peaceful coexistence while shrugging over the awful things humans do to each other seems not only reductive but hypocticial. Then again, she could simply be an anti-vamp zealot, perhaps after losing a loved one. In any case, she’s definitely got her hooks at least partially in Kou (not to mention Mahiru), and is unlikely to loosen her grip anytime soon.