“If you all want to die, I can’t save you!” She threw her hands up in the air. “I can’t save anybody!”
A fresh tear slid down her cheek, and I wanted to hug her or comfort her in some way, but I didn’t know how. I was afraid that anything I did would just set her off more.
“We’re really, really sorry,” Milo said.
“I can’t save anybody!” Mae wailed, her voice cracking.
“Mae,” Ezra whispered. She sobbed, doubling over and holding her sides. He wrapped his arms around her and held her up. “Mae, love, it’s all right. ”
“It is not all right!” Mae tried pushing him away, but he held steadfast. “This is not how it’s supposed to be!” She cried harder, her words lost completely in her tears, so she turned and buried her face in his chest.
They stood that way for a minute, and the rest of us stared at them. We weren’t really sure if we should leave or stay there or speak or what, so we just stared.
“I don’t mean to be rude,” I said carefully when Mae seemed more composed. “But, um, what is going on?”
“Mae went to visit her human family,” Ezra explained.
Even though his words were meant to be soothing, I heard the disapproval in them. He didn’t think that Mae should have anything to do with the humans she had left behind when she turned, but she insisted on driving out to check on them, although she never interacted with them.
“Tonight, she found out that her great-granddaughter is terminally ill, and she only has a matter of months to live,” Ezra said, and he held her more tightly. Just hearing him say it aloud devastated her.
Mae had been twenty-eight when she turned, leaving behind a young daughter. Her change hadn’t been entirely by choice, and she had to leave a family that meant everything to her. She had been forced to watch her daughter grow up from a distance, and then her granddaughter, and now her great-grandchildren.
Ezra tolerated her fondness for them because he loved her so much, but he had given her a deadline. They were going to have to move away from them soon, because she couldn’t spend her entire existence watching her future generations getting old and dying.
The hardest part for Mae was that she had had an infant son that died several years before her daughter was born. It almost killed her, and Mae swore that she would never outlive any of her other children. Unfortunately, she had become immortal, so she would have no choice.
But nothing could’ve prepared her for losing her five-year-old great-granddaughter. I doubt she could even wrap her mind around losing her adult daughter, let alone a small child.
I went to her, and she pulled away from Ezra just enough so she could hug me. As much as she loved him, at that moment, she wanted a child, and I had become a surrogate daughter for her. She held onto me so tightly it was painful, but I said nothing.
Eventually, she calmed down and apologized for her behavior. By then, Milo and Bobby had snuck up to their room, much to my annoyance. Ezra stayed by her side, in case she might need him, but Jack had ventured into the backyard with Matilda to give us space.
When Mae could speak clearly, she explained that Daisy, her great-granddaughter, had been looking under the weather the last few months, but it wasn’t until tonight that she was able to overhear them talking and found out exactly what was going on.
Ezra was convinced that rest was the best solution to her current state, and he looked rather drained himself. He helped Mae back down to their room, looking apologetically back at me as he did. He cared about her very much, but he was still upset she had any contact with them. Nothing good came from keeping humans in your life.
I thought of Jane at the club, and Bobby upstairs with my brother, and shook my head. Eventually, everyone would die, except for us, and I could never tell if that was comforting or terrifying.
Jack was outside, wrestling in the fallen leaves and frost with Matilda. The moon was fat, but thin clouds hazed over it. I stepped out the French doors, relishing the chill in the air. Breathing in deeply, I tried to let the freshness from the outdoors cleanse everything else. All of Mae’s tears, and all the horrible images of Jane in the darkened rooms of V.
Jack grinned when he saw me and got up from a pile of leaves he and the dog had been demolishing. Matilda had twigs and leaves imbedded in her fur, and she loped around the lawn carrying a big stick in her mouth. He ran a hand through his hair, freeing a few leaves himself and walked over to me.
“How are you holding up?” he asked.
“Great. ” I was exaggerating, but I did feel a lot better being outside.
“You sure?” He looked at me seriously, and I picked at some of the foliage that clung to his tee shirt. His bare arms were dirty and cold from the ground, but I doubted he noticed.
“Yeah. Mae is the one having the rough night, not me,” I said.
“How is she?” He looked past me at the house, worrying about her.
“I really don’t know,” I admitted. “Ezra took her back to their room to get some rest, but…” I trailed off and shrugged. It was hard to say how she would hold up.
“I’m sorry we couldn’t help Jane more. ” He returned his concern to me.
“Me too, but you’re right. She has to want to help herself, and she’ll probably never want to,” I sighed and rubbed at my arms, even though they weren’t really cold.
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“You’ve had a really long night. You should probably get some rest, too. ”
“That is true. ” It was early for me to go to bed, but I hadn’t felt completely rested since before I went to Finland. I yawned and thought longingly about curling up in bed.
“Do you want any company?” Jack asked, wagging his eyebrows.
“You know I do,” I chewed my lip. I always wanted Jack in bed with me, especially after we had started earlier, but my heart wasn’t really in it just then. “But we probably shouldn’t. I’m probably not in control enough to handle what you would do to me. ”
“That is true,” he smiled a little sadly. “You go in and go ahead to bed. I might come up in a bit to grab some clothes, but I gotta get the dog cleaned up before I can take a shower and crash on the couch. ”
“I feel so bad about kicking you out of your own bed,” I said for the millionth time since I had moved into his room.
“Hey, I’m nothing if not a gentlemen, and I couldn’t sleep knowing you weren’t absolutely comfortable. ” He leaned down and kissed me. His lips were cool from the night, but the kiss was brief, stopping too soon. Still, my skin felt warm and flushed when he straightened up. “Go on and get to bed. I’ll see you later. ”
Reluctantly, I turned to walk back into the house. Matilda chased after me, planning to sneak into the house, but Jack stopped her. Her big white paws were covered in cold mud from running around by the lake, and her fur was full of debris from rolling around. I don’t know what his plan was for getting her clean before they went into the house, but I left him to it.
I watched them for a minute before heading up to his room. Matilda leapt happily over piles of leaves, and Jack charged after her, laughing and egging her on. He was dirty and his clothes were getting ruined, but he didn’t notice at all because he was having too much fun with his dog.
It was weird how things like that could make me love him so much. My heart swelled at the sight of him, and I turned to go upstairs before I changed my mind about inviting him to go with me.
In the middle of a horrible dream about crocodiles chasing kittens, Jack came in and gave me a kiss. I stirred a little in bed and invited him to join me, but he declined for reasons that remain a mystery. I’m sure he told me, but as soon as the words were out of his mouth, I was asleep again, but thankfully, I managed to save all the kittens from the crocodiles.
When I did wake up for good, I realized that one of the things that Jack had said to me had been goodbye. Not “good night,” not “see you in the morning,” but “goodb
ye,” which had way too much finality in it for my taste.
I raced downstairs to find the den, a. k. a. Jack’s current sleeping quarters, deserted, with all his blankets folded up neatly, and he never folded up blankets or made his bed. I thought about checking in with Mae, but I didn’t want to disturb her.
That left me hurrying back upstairs to check with Peter on the off-chance he knew something, and Matilda trailed after me, another sure sign that Jack was gone. Peter was gone, too, but I wasn’t even sure if he’d come home yesterday.
In truth, I’d known Jack was gone the second I opened my eyes. I could always feel when he wasn’t around me, like the thread between us got pulled painfully thin. I couldn’t tell exactly where he was at or anything; I just knew that it wasn’t close by.
Before knocking on my brother’s bedroom door, I listened carefully. After hearing what he’d been up to yesterday, I didn’t want to walk in on them in the middle of something. From the sound of it, Milo was still asleep. It wasn’t even six at night, and in vampire time, that’s pretty damn early. Usually, I’m not up before eight pm.
“Milo?” I knocked cautiously but didn’t dare open the door. This was weird considering Milo and I usually just burst into each other rooms. We had never any reason for propriety before this Bobby character had come into our lives.
I was about to knock again when Bobby opened the door. He wore pajama bottoms and nothing else, revealing his heavily tattooed torso. Something in Latin was scrawled across his chest, and ivy wound about just above his pubic area, not to mention about a million others that I didn’t have a chance to study. He hadn’t flat ironed his dark hair, so it stood up in a crazy mess, but he looked to have been awake for awhile.
“He’s still asleep,” Bobby whispered and crept out of the room, closing the door quietly behind him so we wouldn’t disturb Milo. “Is there something I can help you with?”
“Uh, maybe, I guess,” I said. He crossed his arms over his chest, trying to protect his bare skin from the chill of the house, and I wondered why he hadn’t just put on a shirt. “Do you know where Jack is?”
“Kinda, actually,” Bobby nodded, looking pleased to be able to help. “They had some emergency business thing. I didn’t understand exactly, but the stocks were going crazy and they had to go fix it. Ezra and Jack left a few hours ago, and I think Peter was already on his way there. They should only be there for a day or two. ”
“How do you know all this stuff?”
“Oh, cause I have insomnia,” Bobby smiled a little. “It kinda works out having a vampire for a boyfriend, but he still sleeps, and I don’t. ” He shrugged at the humor in it, but I wasn’t sure if I found anything about him fun or charming.
“I see. ”
Matilda finally decided neither of us were Jack nor were we suitable replacements, so she wandered down the hall. I watched her walk away, then went back to staring awkwardly at Milo’s half-naked boyfriend.
He smelled delicious, but I didn’t really want to eat him. I counted that as a good sign, but I didn’t like him. Still, I didn’t really want to go back to my room just yet.
“So, are you up for the day?” Bobby asked.
“Yeah, I think so. ”
“Cool. Let me just get a shirt,” he said, as if I had invited him to do something. I nodded and waited for him, like I thought I had invited him too.
Bobby disappeared briefly into the room before coming out with a slim-fitting zippered hoodie hanging open. I tried to peer around him to see what Milo’s bedroom looked like now that he was sharing it with someone else, but Bobby barely opened the door. I’m not sure if he was trying to hide something, or if he was just trying to respect Milo’s sleep. Either way, I decided that I didn’t trust him.
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“I was gonna get something to eat,” Bobby said, zipping up his hoodie. He didn’t do it all the way to the top, but from what I could tell about his penchant for low V-neck shirts, he was a big fan of showing off his chest tattoos.
Not that I blamed him really. Bobby was actually very attractive. If I was still human and didn’t have Jack and didn’t know that he was shagging my brother, I’d probably think he was hot.
“I wasn’t, but that’s probably better for you. ” I was kind of joking, but I was also trying to sound kinda threatening. Just as a reminder that if he hurt my brother, I could totally kill him.
“Right. ” He gave a small laugh and went downstairs. I went with him, because really, I had nothing better to do. “So… do you ever miss food?”
“Not really,” I shrugged, following him into the kitchen. “It’s hard to explain. I remember the way food tasted, and I kinda crave it. But when I think about eating it, I feel nauseous. Besides that, blood tastes a million times better than any food ever could. ”
“I’ll take your word for it. ” Bobby crinkled his nose at the thought of drinking blood, which I found distasteful. I knew he let Milo drink his blood, and he enjoyed it. It seemed kind of hypocritical.
“Whatever. ” I pulled a stool up to the kitchen island and sat down while he rummaged around in the fridge.
“I’ve always been partial to a bagel with cream cheese. ” He got said foods out of the fridge and popped the bagel in a toaster. “I don’t think I could ever give it up, so I guess being a vampire is out for me. ”
He was trying to make a joke, I’m sure, but it sounded like a stupid thing to be a deal breaker for immortality, especially considering that eternity would be with Milo.
Bobby leaned against the counter, waiting for the bagel to pop up, and an uncomfortable silence settled over us. I was thinking my day would be much better spent watching the newest season of Dexter on DVD in Jack’s room. I had been slowly working my way through the whole series since Jack constantly raved about it.
“So… you don’t really like me,” Bobby said after his bagel popped up. He spread cream cheese thick all over it and didn’t look at me. “I don’t blame you. ”
“Why? Low self-esteem?” I said flippantly.
“Kinda, but that’s not what I meant. ” He took a big bite of his bagel and turned to face me. He swallowed it before continuing. “I get it. Milo is your little brother, and he’s pretty young and inexperienced. And I’m older, and I do kinda have that bad boy vibe, even though I am clearly not a bad boy. ”
With the tattoos and dark features, Bobby did have a rebel without a cause thing going on, but after the way I had seen him cowering around Milo in the club last night, I could say with complete certainty that Bobby was not a bad boy in any real sense of the word.
“Those things are true,” I said carefully.
“And I am human, which is dangerous in a way for vampires,” Bobby said. “I mean, he’s stronger and more powerful than I am, but I complicate things for him in a lot of different ways, and I know that. ”
“If you know that then why are you with him?” I asked, not unkindly.
“That’s a good question. ” It was such a good question that he had to finish the entire bagel so he could think it over. Finally, he swallowed the last bite and leaned back against the kitchen counter. “I don’t want to tell you. ”
“I don’t like the sound of that,” I warned him icily.
“No, it’s not…” He shook his head. “You’ll think I’m just under the spell, that one that vampires put humans under, and it’s not that. ” He paused a second. “It sounds cheesy and like an easy excuse and everything… but we’re in love. ”
“He’s sixteen! What does he know about love?” I don’t know why that was my go-to argument, and it was Bobby’s turn to think that I was hypocrite. “Okay, yeah, I get that I’m not much older than Milo, but…”
“You understand where we’re coming from,” Bobby said with a wry smile, and I shook my head, unwilling to admit defeat. “The situation is difficult, but the heart wants what it wants. ”
&nbs
p; “What a stupid thing to say,” I scoffed. “My stomach wants what it wants, too, but you don’t see me ripping out your throat to get it, Bobby. ” He shrugged, unfazed by my veiled threat, and I wasn’t sure if it made me hate Bobby more or less. “What is that about?”
“What?”
“You’re like twenty-one, and people call you Bobby. Isn’t that a little boy name?” I wrinkled my nose, and he laughed.
“People called Robert Kennedy ‘Bobby’ his entire life. ”
“And look at how well that turned out for him,” I countered, referring to his untimely assassination.
“Maybe. But my name actually is ‘Bobby,’ not ‘Robert’ or ‘Bob’ or anything,” he shrugged. “So it’s just what I go by, since it is legally my name. ”
“Was your mother like a hippie or something?” I asked.
“Something like that. ”
“Okay, so fine, you and my brother are crazy in love,” I said, and it left a bitter taste in my mouth just playing devil’s advocate. “Let’s say that I buy that. How did you two meet? And how did you come to know our particular lifestyle?”
Lifestyle wasn’t exactly the right word, because it implied that there was a choice in this. I had chosen to become a vampire, but I could never choose not to be one, not unless I died. Even then, I’d just be a dead vampire.
“Um… well…” Bobby fidgeted with the zipper on his hoodie. “I used to frequent the gay clubs, especially right after I turned 18. I wasn’t a slut, exactly, but I wasn’t… not a slut, either.
“One of the gentlemen pursuing me turned out to be a vampire. We ‘dated’ for awhile, but I’m using the term loosely. We’d just fool around, and he’d bite me. But it took some time before I figured out what was going on. I mean, even after I realized that he was physically biting me, it was still a hard concept to buy that he was a vampire. ”
“Yeah, I know what you mean,” I said. The supernatural could be a very hard pill to swallow. Sometimes, I still found it hard to believe in vampires, and I was one.
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“I was never a bloodwhore,” Bobby said quickly. “I did like the way it felt, being bitten. ” He looked at me. “You’ve been bitten, right?”
“Only twice. ”
“It’s pretty wonderful,” he smiled. “But it’s even better when you’re in love. All their feelings rush over you, and if the guy biting you is a douche bag, it can feel pretty dirty and terrible, even when it feels so good. ”
That was exactly why Ezra had been in such horrible shape in Finland, but I wasn’t eager to think of that, so I nodded for Bobby to continue.
“Anyway, I started hanging out around V, looking for vampires, and then I met Milo. ” Bobby looked at the ground. “It was like love at first sight. That sounds like a line, but it’s true. ”
“So you just saw him, and that was it?” I asked.
“Pretty much. He just walked over to me and we started dancing, and kissing, and talking, and we’ve been together ever since. ” Bobby smiled wider. “Milo’s a pretty great guy. ”