Fat Vampire: A Never Coming of Age Story

'It was funny,' Jay mumbled. 'He wasn’t being mean.'

'I really wasn’t,' said Adam. 'I’m just, like, Jay’s too cool for his clothes now. That’s all.'

Doug gave a princely nod. Everyone seemed to avoid his gaze. Everyone except Abby.

'Jay and I are going to start a band,' Cat said. 'Me on bass, him on theremin and MIDI. We’re inventing a new genre — early goth plus nerdcore. We’re gonna call it nerdcave.'

'What’s a theremin?' asked Sophie. 'What’s a middy?'

And so they talked about electronic music, and they talked about nerdcave, and they talked about Cat and Jay’s theoretical band (which was now called Primordial Soup for the Teenage Soul) until Victor approached.

Even Sejal knew his name. He had been impossible to miss on campus. And though Cat had once referred to him as a 'meathead asswipe,' even she stared now with unabashed longing.

'Hey, Victor,' said Adam.

'Can I talk to you a minute, Doug?' said Victor. 'I have a homework question. About the chiroptera family.'

Doug made a face. Then he got up, and the two boys walked away. The drama group watched them depart in silence.

'I never noticed before,' Cat said finally, 'but…don’t those two look kind of alike? In a really weird way?'

Sophie nodded. For a few moments the rest didn’t nod or say anything, but even their lack of reaction to such a patently absurd claim was in itself a kind of endorsement.

'It’s like they’re a ‘before’ and ‘after’ picture,' Adam said. But nobody laughed.

'You look better,' said Victor as they walked around to the far side of the gym. 'Not as douchey. You get some neck?'

'Maybe,' said Doug. Get some neck?

'Maybe?'

'All right, no. But I did try some deer. It’s better than cow.'

'Huh,' said Victor while scratching his cheek. A cheek that had a blue grit of stubble, Doug noted — unlike his own face, which had never produced more than a thin cotton-candy fuzz on the sides of his jaw. And never would, he supposed. 'You hunted a deer?' Victor continued. 'Well, that’s…it’s not actually cool, but it’s closer to cool than before. Like, now maybe you can at least see ‘cool’ if you stand on something.'

'Thank you. Your brotherly encouragement is the fucking wind beneath my wings.'

Victor laughed. 'Not a bad crowd,' he said, pointing his chin in the direction of the drama kids. 'A couple of those girls are definitely fuckable.'

Doug looked lazily over his shoulder as if the thought hadn’t occurred to him. 'That was real subtle —‘chiroptera family’? Are you trying to give us away?'

'Relax. Nobody knows that ‘chiroptera’ means bat.'

'I knew. Jay might know.'

Victor looked back at the tree. 'You think he could figure out what I meant?'

'No,' said Doug, too quickly. He pretended to consider the possibility for a moment, and shook his head. 'No. No way. Jay’s really rational. Like, scientific. I happen to know for a fact that he doesn’t believe in us.'

'Seriously? I know you two have been best friends since preschool or whatever. You used to talk about him all the time at the cabins in the summer. Made him sound a lot cooler than he actually is, too, but…admit it — you’ve told him, right?'

'I have not told him. Seriously. You think I want to get him killed?'

'Good,' said Victor, '’cause the other vamps really have their panties in a twist lately. Where were you guys yesterday?'

Doug frowned. He didn’t know what Victor was talking about, and he was conditioned to be distrustful of situations where he didn’t know what some taller and more popular boy was talking about. They always reeked of a setup. At worst they were a kind of entrapment. At best they were like a friendly hand to be yanked away at the most humiliating moment. But these sorts of stunts required an audience, and the boys were alone.

'Me and Jay?' Doug asked.

'You and Stephin David,' Victor explained. 'We were all supposed to meet and talk about this Vampire Hunters thing, didn’t he tell you? Everyone’s freaked. The signora sent Asa. Borisov sent me. But you and David weren’t at his house at five-thirty.'

That’s true, thought Doug. We were walking around the park.

'Stephin didn’t say anything to me about it. I mean, he mentioned there was concern about the TV show, but he didn’t say anything about any meeting. Maybe he forgot.'

'Well, he owes me,' said Victor. 'I want the half hour back that I spent alone with that ghoul Asa. That guy’s depressing as boiled steak. And now Borisov’s got me watching that lame show for homework so I can report back to him.'

'I missed it,' Doug admitted, 'but they still think I live in San Diego, right?'

'Right. Those fucktards couldn’t find a vampire in a phone booth.'

Doug nodded. Then he said, 'You use a lot of colorful expressions.'

'Well, you know…we’re from Tennessee.'

Look at the two of us, thought Doug. Talking like we’re old friends. He sort of wished more people could look at the two of them, but on this side of the gym they were visible only to the crows and a band teacher in a golf cart.

'So what do you and David talk about?' asked Victor.

Last night we talked about whether I should kill you.

'Nothing much. He rambles. Tells me about the Civil War. I’m thinking of asking the signora if I can meet with someone else.'

'You should definitely go see her. She’ll want to talk to you about the show. She’ll want to talk to you about that other little stunt of yours last night.'

Doug started. Victor grinned his corn-fed grin.

'I knew it was you! Superhero powers, white cape and hood? Okay, that’s officially cool. You stopped an armed robbery! Up here, Batman!'

Victor held up his hand, and Doug slapped it awkwardly. It was a bit of a miss — too much fingers, not enough palm.

'Lost all your clothes, didn’t you? I figured that was why you didn’t have your poncho today.'

'Well,' Doug said, and he gave a glance back at what would plainly have been the drama tree had there not been a gym in the way. 'I don’t think I’m going to be needing it anymore.'

Then Jay emerged from that same direction and approached them — stiffly and with that ridiculous new hairstyle and a look both of apprehension and concentration on his face. Like he was walking toward a bomb while trying to remember a telephone number.

Before Doug’s cat had died the previous winter, he’d become all too familiar with a particular smell, a kind of tangy feline musk she’d produced at the vet’s, during car rides, or whenever you tried to give her her ear medicine. A fear smell. He was getting a whiff of something like this now. And no wonder, he supposed — Jay looked terrified. Then Victor cleared his throat, and Doug turned his head.

It was altogether possible that Victor was making the smell. Doug inhaled deeply, tried to narrow in on it, but now it was gone. Gone, or else his nose, like a gracious host, was already pretending it hadn’t happened at all.

'Sorry to — Are you guys still talking?' Jay asked. 'I need to talk to Doug, alone.'

Victor glanced from Jay to Doug. His face was inscrutable.

'We’re done,' he said, and walked off toward the parking lot.

Jay watched him go.

'You haven’t told me everything about Victor Bradley,' Jay said after a moment. 'Have you?'

'There’s nothing to tell. What’s this about?'

'What’s this about? What was last night about? What’s everything about?'

Doug rolled his eyes. 'I’m not really in the mood to discuss the meaning of life right now. I could probably