to partake every day, the way that your body seems to require.”
“ Paris?” Vlad shook his head once again. Clearly, his uncle had lost his mind. “I can’t move to Paris, Otis.”
“It would be different if you were a monthly feeder, Vladimir. But as your appetite seems more demanding, we have to make adjustments. I have good friends there who will care for you, watch out for you.”
Vlad picked up his backpack, which was heavy with school supplies, and swung it over his shoulder. “What about Nelly? She won’t be safe without me here.”
Otis swallowed hard. When he spoke, it came out in hesitant, worried gasps. “ Vladimir… with your growing hunger and your refusal to drink from unwilling humans… soon she may not be safe
Vlad furrowed his brow. He’d never hurt Nelly, no matter how hungry he got. Otis should know better. He headed for the front door. “I’m not going.”
Otis followed him all the way to the porch, his voice pleading. “Then let me teach you how to hunt. Just in case.”
“No.” Vlad moved down the steps and out the gate, leaving Otis and his bizarre ideas behind.
Henry was waiting for him across the street. “Dude, where’s your girlfriend?”
Vlad tried to hide his smile at the mention of Meredith-
“On account of what, exactly?”
“On account of I’m dating his daughter, I think.”
Henry nodded toward Otis, who was still standing on the porch, watching them as they finally disappeared between houses. “What was that all about anyway?”
“Nothing.” Vlad’s grip on his backpack tightened as he relived the conversation. He still couldn’t believe Otis had suggested that he might someday be a threat to Nelly. And he was leaving tonight! Talk about picking a crappy time to get someone mad at you. And as if that weren’t bad enough, bringing it up on his first day of school was exactly what Vlad didn’t need.
“Oh man, I forgot to tell you.” They stepped out from between the houses and rounded the corner to face the front steps of Bathory High. “Snelgrove got a new job.”
“Oh yeah? As what? I’d kill to see the middle school principal shoveling dog turds for a living.” Vlad chuckled, but his amusement wasn’t long-lived. Standing on the top step was a familiar face, twitching his little mouse nose distrustfully and watching passing students like he was some kind of prison warden.
“Actually…” Henry winced. “He took over being principal of the high school.”
Vlad sighed, defeated. First Otis’s lecture, now Snelgrove. The only thing that remained was for Eddie Poe to tell everyone he was a monster, and Bill and Tom to shove him into a locker, and his day would be complete. “Great. Today officially sucks.”
Henry pulled him by his sleeve and whispered with a chuckle, “Dude, you’re a vampire. Every day sucks for you.”
“Vlad!” Across the sidewalk stood a pretty girl with chocolate brown hair and a penchant for wearing pink. Vlad grinned. Meredith.
She crossed the street and kind of skipped over to him, smiling, her pink backpack bouncing against her back. “I was hoping I’d see you before class.”
“Ditto.” Vlad’s heart thumped solidly against his chest, nice and strong. A few popular kids walked by, wrinkling their noses at him, but nothing they could do would bring his mood back down. He had a girlfriend. A real live actual girlfriend. And nothing could take that away. Not Snelgrove, not Eddie, and not even a million snotty looks from the popular kids.
And there had been a million snotty looks from the popular kids. They’d started during last year’s Freedom Fest, when Vlad had hung out with Meredith all night. And with each look, Vlad’s stomach had shrunk a little in fear. It seemed everyone but Meredith knew he didn’t belong at her side. Even Vlad knew it. Meredith deserved better.
Meredith smiled at Henry, then crooked her pointer finger, gesturing for Vlad to come closer. When he did, she whispered in his ear, her breath all warm and sugary-sweet. It sent chills up his spine. “I missed you. Maybe we could get together after school, just the two of us?”
He reached up, brushing her soft hair from her ear, and whispered, “Can’t tonight. My uncle is leaving and I need to see him off. But let me ditch Henry after school tomorrow and we can meet up at Eat around three-thirty, okay?”
She turned her head, lightly brushing her lips against his cheek in response.
Vlad’s heart nearly exploded from joy overload.
The food at Eat, the town’s diner, wasn’t exactly fantastic, but it was a place where they could be alone, without fear of Henry feeling left out or of Meredith’s father swooping down and stealing her away from the clutches of a homicidal maniac-i.e., her boyfriend. Suddenly, Eat seemed like paradise. And while it wasn’t technically called Eat, that’s what its single neon sign screamed into the streets. More of a command than a sign, really.
Meredith joined Melissa Hart at the bottom of the steps, and they walked up them with a bouncy gate. Vlad gazed after Meredith, still feeling floaty on the inside. Henry cleared his throat, his mood suddenly sullen. “We’d better find our lockers. Bell rings in five minutes.”
He led the way and Vlad followed, struggling to keep his happiness undercover. He knew it bothered Henry that he was seeing Meredith and that Henry wasn’t seeing Melissa, but it wasn’t like Vlad had planned it that way, or that he was going to spend much time feeling guilty over it. For once, Henry was struggling with girl issues, and Vlad wasn’t.
Truth be told, it was kind of nice.
“Don’t think I’m not watching you, Mr. Tod,” Principal Snelgrove snarled as Vlad walked by. Vlad waited until the coast was clear before rolling his eyes.
But just inside the doors stood someone whom Vlad was worried about, someone who’d also been watching him, and strapped to his neck was a brand-spanking-new digital SLR camera.
Eddie Poe.
The boy who’d seen Vlad’s eyes flash that weird iridescent purple last year, the boy who’d photographed him floating up to the belfry. The bane of Vlad’s existence had just upgraded his equipment. And he was watching Vlad closely, as if waiting for him to latch onto the nearest cheerleader’s neck right here in the middle of school.
As if Vlad would bite a cheerleader. The thought left a bad taste in his mouth.
Vlad nodded curtly to Eddie, who did the same, gesturing to his new camera. Then Vlad pursed his lips and headed to locker number 313.
Ever since Eddie had seen Vlad’s eyes flash purple, he’d been following Vlad around, snapping pictures, staring. Your basic stalkeresque activities. But Vlad could handle that. What really made him crazy was the sudden surge of hungry confidence that Eddie’s budding obsession had brought on. At every turn, Eddie seemed to delight in taunting Vlad, as if waiting for the day he would snap and reveal his darkest secrets. It was as if Eddie had found a way out of his pit of nobody-ness, and Vlad was the one holding the ladder.
Vlad pulled his padlock from his backpack and slipped it into the hole in the locker’s door, then stuffed his notebooks, pens, and other school supplies inside. His locker already looked messy. Vlad closed the door.
Eddie was waiting for him. And he wasn’t smiling.
Neither was Vlad. “What do you want, Eddie?”
“Just to show you my new camera. You like it? I saved up all summer for it. Must have mowed every lawn in Bathory to afford this baby.” He patted the camera gently, his eyes never leaving Vlad’s.
Vlad shrugged. “It’s nice, I guess. I don’t know much about cameras.”
“I do. I know about lots of things.” Eddie’s normally quivering jaw set, a determined look in
