Alfons Cervera, “Una historia de amor” [A Love Story] (1984)

Alfons Cervera has a prolific bibliography to his name, publishes in Catalan as well as Spanish, and has considerable mainstream standing, especially in the literary niche of cultural memory texts. This story recounts the midnight visit of a vampire attired in evening suit and black velvet cape to a woman who is asleep in her bed. He proceeds to bite her on the neck, which is presented as a wholly pleasurable and erotic experience for her. It is repeated nightly until the servants find out, whereupon she moves, but continues to enjoy the vampire’s midnight visits eternally, since she has gained immortality from the encounters. People instantly recognize the pallor of the luxuriously caped and dinner-jacketed vampire, the crocheted edging on the bed-linen which he draws back and the lace collar of the nightdress which hides the two red spots on the woman’s marmoreal neck. Cervera appears to devalue the importance of public reputation as far as the narrative voice is concerned.