6
New vampires are discouraged from trying to return to their normal human routines. Especially if those routines include tanning or working as a fireman. Your day will not end well.
—From The Guide for the Newly Undead
Unless wrapped up in a good book, I was usually in bed at ten-thirty. I know, even I have a hard time separating my life from Paris Hilton’s.
So, imagine my shock after a very busy vampire day when I was still raring to go at two A.M. and bored out of my ever-loving skull. I hadn’t been unemployed since I started working at the Dairy Freeze when I was sixteen.
I’d always seen my week as a long hallway, a door opening on every new day. Doors leading to work, doctor’s appointments, housework, errands. Now that hallway seemed empty and dark. And since I would probably never die, it was stretching out forever.
In a rather manic effort to prove that I could entertain myself through eternity, I filled that first night by reorganizing the books in my collection, beating Zeb in three Scrabble games, bleaching every surface in my home, and rearranging my furniture. (Moving a couch is much easier when you can lift it with one arm.)
I spent about an hour carefully painting my toenails a glossy candy-apple red. I kept my fingernails short and naked for typing and shelving, but my toes were treated to an ever-changing rainbow of polishes. A woman puts on a new dress, eyeliner, lip gloss to please others. A woman paints her toes to please herself. And if there was one thing I was familiar with, it was pleasing…There’s no way to finish that sentence without embarrassing myself.
Zeb went home at around one A.M., when he nodded off and I threatened to paint his toes, too. He hates it when I do that. He reminded me that he still had to work in the morning but immediately realized that was a pretty insensitive thing to say. Zeb was a kindergarten teacher—a good one. I always thought it was because he was the same emotional age as his students. Plus, he had always loved working with construction paper and paste.
“Janie, you’ve got to find a job,” he told me as he hovered near the door. I think he was afraid to leave me unchaperoned. “Or one of us is going to go crazy. And it probably won’t be you.”
“I know,” I groaned. “I’ll have to find something before my savings and the good graces of Visa run out. But there are some financial advantages to all this. I don’t need to pay health or life insurance anymore. My grocery bills and medical expenses are practically nothing, even though my monthly sunscreen budget has increased astronomically.” Zeb did not seem convinced. “I’m trying, Zeb, really. I’ve looked in the want ads, online, and there’s nothing around here for me. Everything that I’m qualified for with night hours involves a paper hat or pasties.”
“And technically, you’re not qualified for the jobs with pasties, either,” Zeb said, dodging when I reached out to smack him.
After Zeb went home, the remaining sensible-librarian portion of my brain told me to put on some PJs, hide under the covers, and read the Guide for the Newly Undead. But the idea seemed so confining. Surely my night life wasn’t supposed to get more boring after becoming a vampire. I knew I would just sit there twitching, unable to concentrate. I didn’t want to stay home, but I didn’t know where I could go. I wasn’t comfortable going to any of the known vamp clubs and bars in our end of the state. I wouldn’t have been able to make it home by sunrise, anyway. And besides Gabriel and Missy, I didn’t know any vampires. Knowing my luck, I’d offend someone with some archaic undead etiquette issue and end up staked.
So I did what any other rational person does at two A.M. I went to Wal-Mart. If nothing else, I wanted to check out the “special dietary needs” aisle, which translates into vampire products.
There are three things vampires need to know about grocery shopping just after they’re turned. One, the smell of freshly cut meat is far more appealing. Two, the ice cream aisle is not fun anymore. And the cheesy glow of fluorescent lights is even more unbearable with super senses.
Even at this hour, I was nervous to be venturing out into public for the first time as a vampire. Despite living there for most of my life, I’d never felt I was part of the Hollow. I was accepted, but I didn’t belong. I loved the people there, but I knew I wasn’t like them. From high school on, I knew I’d never be happy following in my mama’s footsteps, marrying some nice boy she picked for me, hauling our kids to basketball practice after school and church every Sunday, making Velveeta-based casseroles for pot-luck barbecues with his fishing buddies. I was different. Not better, just different. I read books that didn’t have Danielle Steele’s airbrushed face smiling out from the back cover. I didn’t consider Panda Express to be exotic cuisine. I honestly did not care whether the Half-Moon Howlers made it to the regional championships.
I briefly entertained the idea of moving after college, but it seemed wrong somehow. Every time I looked at jobs in other states, I got this weird feeling in the pit of my stomach, as if the planet were tilting off its axis. So I stayed, because this was my place in the world.
My weird tendencies were lovingly tolerated by kith and kin, who—with the exception of Aunt Jettie—figured I’d eventually “grow out of it.” And when I didn’t, they made a hobby of worrying about me. When would I meet a nice boy and settle down? When would I stop working so much? Why did I seem so uninterested in the things that mattered so much to them? I ended up a permanent fixture on the prayer list of the Half-Moon Hollow Baptist Church, where Mama had simply written “Jane Jameson—Needs guidance.” Every time a member of Mama’s congregation saw me at the library, she pinched my cheeks and told me she was praying for me.
It was a little vexing, certainly annoying, but I knew it came from a loving place. These were people who saw me play a sheep in the Christmas pageant for five years running. They sent me care packages when I was taking college exams. They stood by me and helped me through Aunt Jettie’s funeral. Now, for the first time, I was afraid of seeing my neighbors, my family. It was only a matter of time before they found out about me. I couldn’t survive on sunscreen and my wits, such as they were.
In Half-Moon Hollow, vampires still occasionally died in “accidental” fires or falls on handy wooden objects. That’s why few local vampires had come out of the coffin, so to speak. People stopped talking when the new vampire’s parents walked into the room. Their families were frozen out of their churches, their clubs. Friends stopped calling. And eventually, the vampire either left town or succumbed to injuries sustained during a tragic “drapery malfunction.” But I wasn’t going to leave the Hollow. I didn’t care if Grandma Ruthie got kicked out of her bridge club. I didn’t care if I got funny looks at the grocery store. I wasn’t leaving my home, the only place I knew. I could only hope my friends and neighbors were rational enough not to go the pitchfork-and-torch route. But even if they did, I was pretty sure I could outrun them.
I wandered the food aisles out of habit and got a little depressed at all the foods I couldn’t eat anymore. I had the store to myself, apart from the lethargic stockers replenishing the shelves. They didn’t make eye contact, but I think that was more of an “I’m pissed off at the world because I’m stacking cases of adult diapers at two A.M.” thing than anything to do with me.
I forced myself to walk away from the food when I found myself tearing up over a box of Moon Pies. Fixating on delicious regional snack cakes that you can’t digest anymore cannot be good for one’s mental health.
The “special dietary needs” aisle was hidden in the back, between the health and beauty aids and the gardening section. I turned the corner of the feminine-products aisle, thankful that was something I’d never have to deal with again, and found a teeming hive of vampire activity.
“So, here’s where all the customers are,” I murmured, watching as a vampire lady compared the labels of Fang-Brite Fluoride Wash versus Strong Bite Enamel Strengthener. Farther down the aisle, a vampire couple argued over whether they’d had Basic Red Synthetic Plasma for dinner too many times in the last few months. An older vampire gentleman invested in some lubricating ointment I didn’t want to think about until I was several centuries older.
I’d never ventured down this aisle before, because, frankly, it just had never occurred to me. As a human, my shopping trips usually focused on getting in and out of the store as quickly as possible before Fitz destroyed the house in search of Milk-Bones. Plus, the stigma attached to those who were seen shopping in the vamp aisle made it about as desirable as openly perusing hemorrhoid medications on a busy Saturday afternoon. But no one even took notice of me here. Much like humans, the vampire shoppers seemed to be “in the zone,” zeroed in on what they needed so they could get out and get back to their lairs.
The range of choices was overwhelming. Fake blood, protein additives, vitamin solutions, iron supplements. The companies couldn’t seem to figure out what sort of packaging would attract undead attention. Skinny Victorian glass bottles with filigreed labels. Round, vaguely Japanese pop-art jars in candy colors. Opaque plastic coffins with cartoon Bela Lugosi faces etched into the front. The combination was jarring and left me a little disoriented.
A vampire female who was turned in her late twenties passed by on my left. She seemed to be moving in slow motion, her long blue-black hair swishing behind her in a shining curtain. She made capri pants and Crocs, a combination which I think should be outlawed in the state of Kentucky, look good. She was so…put together. She seemed comfortable as a vampire. Carefree, like someone you’d see in a nonthreatening shampoo commercial.
I found myself following her, tossing one of everything that she chose into my cart. Fang-Brite Fluoride Wash, Undying Health Vitamin Solution, Basic Red, Razor Wire Floss. I followed her all the way down the aisle until she reached the mega-dose SPF 500 sunscreen. I waited in agony for her to decide between Face Paste and Solar Shield (“Tested on astronauts, to be used in emergency daylight situations” versus “Guaranteed protection against reasonable sun exposure for up to thirty minutes”) and finally realized I was behaving in a rather creepy manner.
I backed away, narrowly avoiding bumping into the ointment guy. But I did grab some of that sunscreen, because you never know.
As I headed toward the checkout, I was struck by a gnawing anxiety. The cashier was going to see my purchases and know that I was a vampire. It felt like the first (and last) time I bought my own condoms at the drugstore near my dorm. No matter how much other random stuff I threw into the cart to distract her, that cashier knew exactly what I (and the colorful assortment of latex I was purchasing) would be up to later. What if the Wal-Mart cashier knew my mama or recognized me from the library? Any anonymity I had would be shot as soon as the cashier woke up from her postmidnight-shift stupor and started making phone calls to the kitchen-and-beauty-parlor gossip circuit.
Aw, hell. I had to do it sometime. Besides, I was going to get pretty hungry without faux blood at home, and that could put me in a precarious moral position with my whole “no forcible feeding” stance.
Fortunately, I underestimated the apathy of employees forced to work the midnight shift. The cashier didn’t bother looking up at me, much less pay any attention to what she was halfheartedly dragging across the scanner. The closest thing to communication I got was when she grunted and pointed to the total on her register screen.
Grocery shopping at two-thirty A.M. is the only way to go.
I lugged my lone bag of groceries up the front steps, only to find a slender redhead in a black sundress sitting on my front porch swing. I stopped in my tracks. I stared at her. She stared back. I tried to cast out my senses to pick up any evil tendencies.
Nothing.
She rose on her mile-long legs and spoke in a voice utterly without accent. “Hello, I’m Andrea.”
She smelled human, normal. In fact, she smelled great. Earthy and fresh, like something just baked. She had a face made for another century, for high-waisted lace gowns and hairstyles involving ringlets. Yet, here she was, standing on my porch like a nocturnal Mary Kay lady.
It seemed to be my turn to talk. “Can I help you?”
“Gabriel sent me.”
“For…?” If Gabriel sent someone to give me an after-undeath Goth makeover, I was going to be seriously pissed. Andrea stood and unknotted the silk scarf at her throat. Even in the dark, I could make out the healing bite marks, the purpling bruises.
“Wait, are you a pet?”
More important, was she Gabriel’s pet?
She laughed, a soft, silky whisper that made me feel frizzled and oafish. “I’m a freelance blood surrogate. I have friends in the vampire community. Friends who enjoy my company and my discretion.”
I remained silent. How exactly was that different?
“I’m AB negative, so I’m a popular selection,” she added.
“That’s a rare blood type. Only one percent of the population has it,” I blurted. “Bet you’re popular down at the Red Cross.”
“Yes, I’m sort of a delicacy,” she said, smiling. “How did you know that?”
“The brain may die, but my compulsion for useless trivia lives on,” I said, ignoring the frown that marred her alabaster brow.
Andrea was clearly unaccustomed to not being jumped the second a vampire spied her snowy swanlike neck. “Gabriel said you were nervous about feeding from a human. So he sent me over to help you through it. I think he’s worried about you, to be honest. It’s kind of sweet.”
I rattled my keys not so subtly and motioned toward my front door. “I’d really rather not.”
Andrea was even less accustomed to being turned down flat. Suddenly awkward, she strode toward me, her gait unsteady. “It’s OK, I want you to. I enjoy it.”
I heaved my groceries onto the hall table and closed the door. Even without my ghost aunt lurking about, I didn’t want this conversation happening anywhere near my home. It was just unseemly. If I could have found a polite way to heave this woman off my porch, I would have. Damn Mama and her hereditary devotion to hospitality. “Look, Andrea, I haven’t completely decided where I stand on the feeding-on-humans issue. What’s the vampire equivalent of a vegan?”
“There isn’t one,” she insisted. “What can I do to make this more comfortable for you?”
“Get a tourniquet and a glass, and take your neck out of the equation?”
She laughed and led me to the porch swing, where I sat as she tipped her head back. I opened my mouth, extended my fangs, and leaned toward her. I saw her pulse beating beneath her skin, her living, human skin. Every nerve ending was an opportunity for me to cause her pain. She took a steadying breath when she felt my nose awkwardly brush her ear. It reminded me of how I used to exhale sharply when I was stuck at the annual library blood drive.
“I can’t,” I said, giving her a helpless, apologetic look. “I’m sorry, I’m just afraid I’m going to hurt you.”
“Don’t worry about being nervous. A lot of vampires have trouble with this from time to time. It happens to everyone.”
“If I was a forty-year-old man suffering from erectile dysfunction, that would be a great comfort to me, thanks,” I said, even as the thirst sent my stomach rumbling.
“Think of me as a free-range animal,” she offered.
“That’s…a brilliant idea,” I started, until I pictured her being led into a slaughterhouse by vampires wearing black cowboy hats and Dracula capes. “But not helping.”
Seeing a chink in my argument, Andrea smiled and crooked her head back, offering her delicately veined throat. “Don’t think of me as male or female. Or even human. Think of me as a cheeseburger on legs. That seems to help the newbies with pacifist tendencies.”
I waited for icky visuals involving an undead Ronald McDonald, but none came. “Oddly enough, I think that might work.”
I leaned toward Andrea, who happily settled into her “feeding position,” head tilted back, arms relaxed. She moaned as my lips skimmed her throat.
“Um, if I’m going to do this, you can’t do that,” I told her. “Vampires do not suddenly become sexually ambiguous the moment they’re turned…unless, you’re Angelina Jolie, and then we can talk.”
Andrea silently leaned back and offered her jugular. I found a place on her skin that hadn’t been marked and sank in my teeth. Her blood was warm, alive, and electric, flowing freely into me and flooding my senses. True to her word, Andrea was delicious, with a delicate, floral flavor under the hemoglobin. Absently, I wondered if blood types were like wines. Maybe type O negative was full-bodied with undertones of oak. Or if you want something light with hints of tropical fruit, type B positive.
Andrea let loose a comfortable yawn and companionably wrapped her arms around my waist as I swallowed mouthfuls of her blood. It was surprising how quickly my thirst was slaked. Then again, there wasn’t much in the way of excitement to stretch the procedure out. It was cordial, efficient—like an ATM transaction.
I pulled back, watching a drop of scarlet run from tiny twin punctures I’d left on her throat. Andrea whimpered and collapsed back on the swing, rolling around like a puppy in high grass.
I lay back, too unsteady to stand. The comfy emotional distance I was enjoying evaporated as Andrea writhed and wriggled. Obviously, she had enjoyed the experience far more than I had. I felt dirty, like some married father of five walking away from an encounter at the Lucky Clover Motel. But at least I knew I hadn’t hurt her. At this point, I just hoped I hadn’t cultivated myself a dandy new stalker.
Andrea’s wounds began to close but didn’t heal completely. Just after the Great Coming Out, I’d read something about the proteins in vampire saliva speeding up the healing process in humans. It seemed only right that we helped them heal after drinking from them.
Andrea’s breathing had returned to normal. She sat up, stretching in a long, lean line. She pulled a prepacked alcohol wipe out of her purse and wiped at what looked like the mother of all hickeys. She tied the scarf in a jaunty knot at her throat and smiled. She looked like a woman who’d just spent an afternoon with a masseuse or possibly on a masseuse.
“Why would you do this?” I asked, wiping at my mouth.
“It’s nice to be needed.” She rose on wobbly legs. “And if you understood what it feels like to be on the giving end, you wouldn’t ask.”
She stood and fished a card out of her purse.
“I’m going to leave my number,” she offered, smiling. “If you’d like to see me again, just give me a call.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “I mean, you seem nice, but I don’t know if you’re…”
“Someone you would spend time with in real life?”
Open fanged mouth, insert foot. “No, I didn’t mean…This is so strange. I’m sorry.”
She smiled, her lips thin. “It’s going to be a little strange for a while. I’ll leave it here for you.”
She laid the card on the porch railing and walked away without as much as a look back. Humiliated, I flipped Andrea’s card between my fingers. She seemed so nice. And I hurt her feelings. I made her feel cheap. This was the sort of thing that was going to keep me cringing for days and then strike me at odd intervals over the next year.
Yep, I’m that kind of social neurotic.
If Gabriel would just leave me alone instead of treating me like some undead child, I could find my footing. I would stop making these weird vampire social gaffes. Who asked him to send take-out on legs to my house? Why couldn’t he just let me take care of myself? Smothering, overinvolved, toxically incapable of butting out. He was like Mama with fangs.
Please, Lord, let that be the only time I compare Gabriel to my mother.
I was running before the idea of confronting Gabriel was even fully formed. Still enjoying my newfound inner track star, I sprinted over to Silver Ridge Road at full speed. It was so much better with shoes. I passed a couple of cars, but if they noticed a woman running at sixty-five miles per hour in the dark, they didn’t make a fuss.
I reached Gabriel’s driveway just as I was hitting my stride. Even in my foul temper, I could appreciate the sight of Gabriel’s house. It was about as stately as houses get in the Hollow. Immaculately whitewashed clapboard, big wraparound porch complete with Corinthian columns, and a front door that covered more square feet than my first apartment. It still amazed me that Gabriel had been able to direct public attention away from this place. My mother and her historical society cronies would probably sacrifice their firstborn just to snoop through the root cellar.
And yes, I do realize that would be me. (Jenny had produced grandchildren, after all.)
I slapped the hood of my old station wagon in a sort of greeting, wondering idly if Big Bertha had behaved herself for Gabriel. It didn’t really prick my conscience either way.
Lifting the brass knocker, I was struck by a horrible thought. What if Gabriel wasn’t home? Or worse, what if he was home and had someone with him? Some vampire groupie/snack or another vampire? What if he was feeding? Ick. Or having weird vampire sex? Ickier.
I had turned on my heel and started to run back to my house when I heard Gabriel ask, “Where are you going?”