Chapter 12
It was on the bus on the way to school that I decided to broach the subject.
There would be a finite amount of time, and then a full day of school after that to keep his thoughts from settling too long. Milo had his textbook open on his lap, doing some last minute cramming for a test he would undoubtedly pass.
Since I was trying to make everything seem perfectly normal, I had in my ear buds and the iPod played the Tears For Fears, but it was quiet enough where I could talk.
“Hey, Milo?” I tried to keep my voice as casual as possible, but I didn’t exactly know how I could keep it light and easy. How exactly did I go about inserting the supernatural into everyday conversation?
“Huh?” Milo grunted, his attention unwavering from the textbook.
“What do you think of… vampires?” I hesitated before the word, as if by saying it aloud to someone other than the family, it would make it real.
Thankfully, he didn’t notice.
“I don’t,” Milo answered flatly. He hadn’t even expressed the vaguest interest in this conversation, but I pressed on anyway. I hated not telling him things, and it was nearly impossible for me to carry around a secret this life changing.
“You don’t think maybe they’re real?” I pulled at the straps of my backpack and bit my lip, waiting for his response.
“No.” He looked at me like I was a total idiot, which is what I had kind of expected. “Do you think werewolves are real?”
“There’s no such thing as werewolves,” I replied promptly.
“Yeah, and there’s no such thing as vampires.” Milo shook his head and went back to studying.
“But you don’t think that, like, there’s even the possibility that they might exist?” I asked hopefully. He lifted his head, looking confused about why I would be talking about utter nonsense.
“Creatures that live on only blood and never age?” He shook his head again. “That’s not even biologically possible. And then they sleep in coffins?
That just seems unnecessary.”
“Well, maybe they don’t sleep in coffins,” I suggested, picking at a chipped piece of nail polish on my finger.
“That doesn’t make it any more plausible.” Then he looked over at me with narrowed eyes. “Okay. What’s this about? Did you stay up late watching The Lost Boys again?”
“No.” I ran a hand nervously through my hair, trying to think of how I could explain this away. “I just had a bad dream last night. That’s all.”
“You know, maybe if you didn’t stay out all hours of the night running around with Jack, you would be able to sleep like a normal person without any ridiculous dreams.” Milo had taken on parental heirs again, and I rolled my eyes when he went back to looking at his book.
“Right.” I decided that maybe hinting would be my best bet. “All hours of the night.”
“Yeah, that’s what I said,” Milo grumbled, sounding irritated.
“Yep. I had vampire dreams cause I was out all night with a really attractive guy!” I was trying emphasize everything so he would get the point, and when he lifted his head again, I thought I’d finally gotten through to him.
“Wait. I thought you said you didn’t think Jack was attractive?” Milo asked curiously, and I sighed.
“Just forget it.” I laid my forehead against the cold glass window. He started to ask me about Mae’s cooking last night, but I just shook my head and turned up my iPod. As it turned out, I didn’t really feel like talking about vampires.
Jane made a point of telling me that I looked like hell and I hadn’t been acting like myself over lunch. She brought up Jack for the first time in days, but I didn’t feel like talking about him, so I said that I wasn’t feeling well and went to the bathroom. When I looked at my reflection in the mirror, it didn’t really seem to look like me. I was tired, pale, and I was losing weight. Since I spent most nights over to Jack’s and they never ate, it never really occurred to me to eat.
Maybe it would if I didn’t spend so much of the time with my stomach twisted in knots.
This was getting to be impossible. I didn’t know how much longer I could go on living this way. My normal human life felt like a total sham, and the vampire parts that had once felt fun and exciting were starting to just be painful. Everyone had been so nice to me and they all claimed that they cared about me, but then why were they hurting me so much? Again, I was reminded of the story of the ugly girl in the beautiful people village. Only this time, I related much more to how dried up and used she must’ve felt by the time they were done loving her.
After school, Milo proceeded to launch into a lecture about how I’m never home anymore and how Mom’s even starting to notice. At least he seemed to have forgotten entirely about the vampire conversation on the bus, which made me feel a little better. I didn’t think that anybody would really care if I told Milo. I just figured that he’d probably have me locked away in a psych ward and I’d never be able to see them again.
But then really, would that be so bad? My heart screamed painfully at the thought, and I realized that it most definitely would. Soon, very soon, this would all get straightened out. I wasn’t sure how exactly, but there were over six hundred years of experience amongst them. They had to be able to come up with something.
Good news. Peter and Ezra are on a business trip. Jack text messaged me, and Milo rolled his eyes.
“You know I really like him, but have you considered what this is doing to your school work?” Milo demanded. He was sitting at the kitchen table, working on some piece of homework, but I laid sprawled out on the couch half- asleep.
My lack of nightly sleep was starting to result in afternoon naps.
“Nope!” I retorted cheerily. Schoolwork didn’t really seem to matter anymore. It was starting to look like I’d probably marry into money, or maybe I’d just die. Either way, education didn’t seem that important.
Why is that good news? I messaged him back. Knowing that I wouldn’t see Peter hurt, but it was also a relief. There were only so many of his rebuffs that I could tolerate.
We can hang out and I can take the Lamborghini. Are you game?
Definitely! I’ll meet you outside! Hurry! I responded and jumped up from the couch.
Milo started in with a lecture about school and sleep, but I didn’t even pretend to listen. After the stress of the past weekend, I could really just go for a night of silly Jack fun. He always knew how to make me feel better.
I burst through the doors of the building just as the red car pulled up in front, and I had never timed it so perfectly before. We seemed to really be in sync, and I tried to ignore the fact that that thrilled me in some strange way.
Throwing open the car door, I leapt inside and smiled broadly at him. Jack laughed at my exuberance, and my heart swelled at the sound of it.
“You’re in a good mood today,” Jack grinned. We didn’t drive right away, and he just sat there for a minute looking at me. “What do you wanna do?”
“I don’t care! Just as long as we get there fast!” I declared, and his eyes glimmered.
“You don’t have to tell me twice.” He threw the car into gear and we sped off so quickly, I was pressed back tightly against the seat. Even though we’d just been in a car wreck, I still felt safe with him. After all, he had saved me from the crash, even if he had also been the cause of it.
“This weekend felt so long,” I muttered drearily.
“Tell me about it.” Jack was just as tired and frustrated as I was, and that was easy to forget. Generally, I considered him to be a culprit in all of this, but he was just as much a pawn as I was. We were trapped in an unyielding battle with biology.
“I just want everything to go back to normal.” I had expected him to agree with me, but he just laughed.
“I’m assuming you mean normal in that you were running around with your new vampire best friend,” he smiled. “Yeah. Cause that’s the baseline for normal.”
