Except of course, if he was a vampire and he’s putting the whammy on me. Dad had raised the possibility of Coral, and the logical place to go with my observations was vampire siblings.
Maybe I could be interested in a vampire like that.
Who was I kidding?
William smiled at me. I checked him out for fangs. No fangs. “Hey. Willie.”
He frowned a bit at that. “I prefer to go by William.”
“I’d guessed.”
“Sorry I didn’t get to Kaplan Kone. Coral says she met your dad. I am so jealous.”
“Yeah,” I said. “My dad is pretty cool.”
“Gonna win limbo tonight?”
Crush! Kill! Destroy! “I’ll give it my best shot.”
“I want you to win.”
I snickered. “You have no family loyalty,”
“Coral wins at too much already. Can I buy you a Coke?”
I shrugged. “Sure.” Another illicit Coke. What my mother didn’t know…
We skated over to the bar, and I settled into a plastic bubble chair. Vince rolled by, glaring at me.
At the beverage counter, Ned was glowering.
William came over with the drinks. The bubbles of the Coke tickled the back of my throat. I chewed on the straw and smiled at William. “Liking the new school?”
“It’s okay,” said William. “The soccer’s nice. Do you play soccer?”
“Nope. I’m on the field hockey team. Coral too, I hear. I haven’t seen her play yet.”
“Yeah. I hear you got into trouble.”
“What can I say? I’m a bad girl.”
William laughed. “Are you coming to Coral’s party?”
“If my parents let me.” Not a whole lot was more normal than a slumber party.
“If you come, and all that makeover stuff bores you, we can watch movies. I just got a disk of Subterranean.”
Mole people on television in the sixties. “Very tempting.”
Vince and Coral skated over. “Abby,” Vince scowled. “Is this guy bothering you?”
“Wow. That was...predictable,” I said.
William veiled his eyes. “Hey Vince.”
“Do you want to skate?” Vince asked me.
Coral placed a hand on his arm. “Maybe we can get a drink,” she said.
Vince and Coral moved to the snack bar.
“He really does not like you,” I said to William.
“Of course not. But I’m winning.”
“You guys are having a little contest?”
“You haven’t noticed?”
I sighed. “You know, Vince is my oldest friend. I value that. A lot.”
William nodded, leaning forward. His voice softened. “Of course I do. That’s why I’m being polite.”
That seemed reasonable. William wasn’t the guy with the jealous chip on his shoulder. “Look,” I said. “I’m gonna get a candy bar.”
“Let me.”
“No,” I said. “I want to say hi to Ned. I’ll be back.”
The cash register behind the counter rang as Ned stowed some bills. “Two Snickers, please.”
“Is that guy bothering you?” Ned asked.
“Did you and Vince plan that?”
“What?”
“Nothing. We’re just talking.” I slid two crisp bills onto the bumpy counter. “I wanted to ask you a question. You know, Vince?”
I saw a little flash of canine in Ned’s smile. “Why yes, Abby, I do know Vince.”
“Dad says he has a case of vampiric mind control.” I leaned on the counter to look at the skaters. The effect of all the turning and weaving made them look like a school of fish. Coral and Vince were in there somewhere. “I say no.”
“I say that you’re not as good at this as you think you are.”
“Thanks, Ned. I’ll have you know I am awesome at detecting vampires. But you know, vampires aren’t out during the day. They have fangs. They don’t drink Coke.”
“Because the sugar will rot out the fangs?”
“Ha, ha. However, Coral and William are ruled out by very alive-like behavior.”
“They’re vampires, Abby.”
“I don’t think they can be, Ned. They would be subject to the same limitations as, I don’t know, yourself.” Smart aleck.
Ned exchanged my money for the candy bars. “Okay, what do you think is wrong with Vince?”
“He’s jealous, because I’m his best friend and William likes me?”
“Actually, that’s probably right. I’m surprised you caught on to that.”
“Why?”
“You’re like me, Abby. You are a geek.”
“Ned, I’m a nerd. I’m too smart and my hygiene is too good to be a geek.”
“Why does Reginald Rath”—here Ned sniffed—”think that Vince is mind-controlled?”
“His interest in Coral is over the top.”
Ned paused, weighing this. “I wouldn’t be too certain that’s vampirism.”
“Yup,” I said. I had to face up to the fact that Vince was going to turn into a jerk for a while without any help from the supernatural.
“You know, Abby, Coral cheats at limbo, because she’s a vampire.”
“Yeah. Right.”
William joined me at the counter. Ned snubbed him. Suddenly, shiny bags of potato chips were under siege from Ned’s organizing blitz. William ignored Ned. I unpeeled a Snickers and bit into chocolaty caramel gooey-ness.
“Do you want to skate?” said William.
“In a second.”
William fidgeted, rattling the wrapper of his candy bar.
“Would you go see a movie with me?”
Now William had my attention. That was a date question. “What movie?” I licked the chocolate off my fingers.
“The new Geist film.”
Geist was a lame series of films about a pimply high school girl who had died due to a series of bizarre events her classmates were barely responsible for. She blamed them anyway, and the whole series of films was about how she was working her way through first the murder of her classmates, and then ultimately the murder of pretty much everyone else in the school. They were up to Geist number thirteen. I figured that the school would be empty soon,
