We trekked back to the car. I dropped Mitchell off first and headed home hoping my parents weren’t still up. Walking in the house, I quietly put my keys on the hook and hung my jacket on a chair. I turn around to go upstairs and my mother stood there with her hands on her hips and a stern expression.
“Where have you been?” she demanded.
“I was at Jackie’s. Remember, I told you that before I left,” I replied.
Her tone grew sterner as she said, “That's a blatant lie. Jackie called here looking for you and said she was worried that you left school earlier.”
I huffed and said, “She did that on purpose to get me in trouble. Ugh! I can’t stand her anymore. See mom, she's jealous because she cheated on Mitchell with Will and Mitchell turned to me for friendship and now we're growing close and it's getting to her. So, yes I lied. I was with Mitchell tonight. He needed a friend so we went and had dinner and just talked. I'm sorry I lied to you, it won’t happen again.”
My mom had removed her hands from her hips. “Sweetie, I’m sorry about you and Jackie, I didn’t realize things were so bad between you two. You should've said something. She seemed so worried the day she came by to tell us about…” Her words trailed off.
I waited a minute to see if she would finish and asked, “Tell you about…what?” She waved her hands in dismissal and started to fidget with things around the kitchen. “Mom, what are you talking about!?” I asked again with urgency.
She smiled and walked toward me and put her hand on my shoulder. “Sweetie, I don’t want to bring up bad memories for you. I promised Jackie I would pretend like he never existed in order to protect you.” She brushed my hair out of my face and looked at me with much empathy.
“Mom…are you telling me that Jackie told you to pretend as though…Quinn never existed?” I asked as I put the pieces together in my head.
She nodded, “She was only looking out for you, honey. I couldn’t believe what Qu…well what he did to you. I had such high hopes for that boy. He seemed so sweet, a real gentleman…so I thought.”
I snapped off, without thinking and said, “He is a real gentleman.” I stopped myself from going any further and causing too much confusion for my mother. Stepping back from her I sat down in one of the chairs behind me, “Mom…what did she say he did?”
She looked nervous, like she didn’t want to bring it up, as though I would break. “She said his best friend from back home came to town and that he dumped you for her and broke your heart…is that not true?”
Was Jackie brainwashed or working with Elizabeth to keep Quinn and I apart? None of this made sense to me. I stood up and walked to the window and stared out at the woods. My mom walked up behind me, put her arms around me, and told me she loved me.
Closing my eyes, I told my mom another lie, “Yes, Jackie told the truth, it’s not his fault though,” as tears streaked my face. She patted my hair and said, “Don’t make excuses for him, sweetie. He isn’t worth it, not after what he did to you.”
Betrayed by my best friend, losing the man I love possibly forever, and having to lie to the only family I have…things couldn't get any worse.
When I got to my room, I called Mitchell and filled him in on what I learned; he was almost as shocked as I had been. He has lost so much faith in Jackie already that it was hard to be completely shocked at anything she does anymore. “Mitch…why don’t you come over, my parents are in bed and you can climb the trellis up to my window. Come hang out, neither of us wants to be alone right now.” He was there within a minute, vampire speed is so cool. He tapped on the window, I opened it and let him in.
“Hey there, Fangs, I think maybe I should've called you speedy,” I said as I greeted him with a hug. He smiled letting his fangs come out. “Ooh, scary,” I said as I faked a shiver. He playfully punched my arm and we both laugh quietly.
One of the advantages, of being who we are, is that we both have an increased sense of hearing so that we can still chat, but not wake my parents. Plus, at the moment, my dad was dead to the world with the sleeping pills he took. All the traveling he does has played hell on his sleeping patterns so when he was home now he needed help sleeping. This has been helpful to me because he doesn’t wake up at every little sound anymore.
There had been something on my mind for a while and now seemed as good a time as any to find out the truth. “I’ve been curious, but I didn’t know how to ask Quinn. Will you tell me what happened when he changed you?”
He was hesitant, “Well, I wasn’t expecting that. I don’t know, Park. I'm not sure that's something you want to hear right now…or ever really. Besides, I'm not sure Quinn wants me to tell you, maybe he should be the one to do it.”
That seemed a bit ominous, but I pressed on, “Well he isn’t here and I may never see him again…” my voice cracked. He started to put his hand on mine, I jerked back and straightened myself. “Please, I can take it. It’s not like it'll change how I feel about him.”
He tried to blow it off with a simple explanation, “I was walking home when something attacked me. He fed me his blood and took me in, simple as that.”
Exasperated, I said, “Seriously, I can handle the truth, Jack.”
He snickered, “You have such a way with movie trivia.” His chest rose as he went through the motions of taking a deep breath, even though vampires don’t need to breathe. He began the story.
“I was walking home from Jackie’s and I saw a flash of movement to my left. Something practically flew out of the woods and hit me, knocking me to the ground. There was a sharp stab at my neck and I started to scream out. A hand went over my mouth to block any sound. I tried to struggle, but he was so strong that I could barely move at all under his weight. I could feel the blood leaving my body, could feel my pulse slowing. The hunger engulfed him; it was like a person who hadn’t eaten in weeks suddenly presented with a buffet. When I struggled, he held me down and bit harder.”
He stopped, “Are you alright? You're pale as a ghost.”
Nodding my head, I struggled to say, “Yes, please continue, I’m good.”
“Yeah, you look like you're really enthralled with this story. Look, you get my point, it wasn’t the real Quinn, so you shouldn’t...”
I cut in, before he could finish. “Mitchell…please, I want to hear the rest.”
He continued, “OK, well, just when I thought I was dead, he jerked away from me. I watched as he bit his wrist and let the blood drip into my mouth. He held his wrist against my lips and I started to fight drinking it, but the taste was…"
He glanced at me for a moment with a look of shame. "Well, needless to say, I drank. I pulled his wrist harder against my mouth taking as much in as I could. He had to knock me out to get me to stop drinking.”
I gulped, this was more visual than I really needed.
“So, once I came to, he had me tied to the bed at his cabin. I was ravenous and he had to calm me so that he could explain what I was and how to control it.”
He paused for a moment looked me over to see how I was handling it, which I guess he thought was okay so he continued, “My parents were leaving town that night so Jackie thought I was out of town on summer vacation with them, thanks to the text Quinn sent. But I spent a couple of weeks with Quinn to make sure I could control my hunger. He wouldn’t let me leave until he tested me a couple of times.”
I gasped, “He tested you? By using real people as bait?”
He was startled when I gasped, but seemed a bit relieved at the reason for it. “No, no, of course not. He had human blood that he stole from the hospital and he tempted me with it. When he placed it under my nose and I didn't flinch, he knew I was ready. He was great, Parker. I know when he attacked me it was like he was a monster…but it isn’t who he is…”
He gave me a once over again to see how I was going to take all this news in. I wasn’t even sure how to h
andle it. It was weird to hear a firsthand perspective from someone who saw the monster hidden inside of Quinn. I knew that isn’t who he is, just like a wolf isn’t who I am. The only problem is that neither of us can run from the monster inside.
He put his hand on my shoulder. “You know that was a momentary lapse of control, that he isn’t that thing…right? If you're scared of him, you may as well be scared of me. He's truly like a brother to me now. I trust him with my life.”
Eventually, I found my voice, “Yes of course, it’s just a side of him I'm unfamiliar with. He has told me about feeding on humans before, but it was brief and it's different hearing it from the perspective of the…victim, for lack of a better word.” The last thing I wanted to do was think about things I couldn’t control right now, and I felt we could both use a distraction.
My DVD collection was pretty extensive; I’ve always been a girl that enjoyed buying movies instead of clothes. My closet is filled with shelves of movies and seasons of television shows and I keep my clothes in a dresser. Mitchell asked where I was going when I stood up abruptly. I raised one finger to him, to signify to give me a minute, stepped in my closet and grabbed a comedy.
He stood up and glanced in the closet. “Wow, I knew you were a movie buff, but damn girl, you're a freaking video store. Is there a movie you don’t own?”
Being silly, I said, “A few.”
To take our mind off things, we popped the movie in and chilled for a while. I ran downstairs as quietly as I could and got us some drinks and a bag of popcorn. Mitchell reached for the popcorn and I yanked it away from him teasingly. He smirked and then gave me a pouty face.
With baby talk, I said, “Aww look at the cute little Mishy pout.”
As soon as I said the nickname he snapped, “Don’t ever call me that.” My whole body jumped at the anger in his voice. He stood up and walked to the window looking outside.
“I’m sorry, that was stupid of me, I don’t even know why I said that.” I walked over to him and put my hand on his shoulder, he turned around. “I shouldn’t have snapped, Parker. I’m the one that should apologize. It’s just…well that name is what Jackie has called me for what seems like forever now.” He looked so sad, I felt like such a jerk.
“Jackie was really sick one time, she was on pain pills and all loopy. I was taking care of her because, well, we had just started dating and I wanted to be a gentleman and protector.”
I smiled, that sounded just like him…and Quinn too. He continued. “She was saying crazy things and couldn’t say my name and it kept coming out as Mishy. We laughed about it later and it just sort of stuck.”
His fists clenched and he butted it against his head, “Damn, Parker, what happened to her? I can’t deal with this anymore, not knowing why she turned on us. It’s killing me. It’s like something evil took over her. She never even used to lie; she used to be horrible at it, now she's a freaking pro. And it’s even possible she's working with Elizabeth, or Lizzy, in order to destroy all of us. I don’t understand.”
His face was scrunched up in pain and grief. I wrapped my arms around his neck and he leaned his head against mine. “I wish I had the answers Mitchell, I really do. I don’t get any of it myself. I thought I knew Jackie better than anyone. I could read her like a book, but now,” my words trailed off and I changed the subject. “No, we're not going to do this right now…Let’s sit down and watch some more of the movie and just enjoy each other’s company tonight.”
We lay back down on the bed and started the movie up again. I woke up as the credits rolled and looked over at Mitchell, who had fallen asleep too. He opened his eyes and we looked at each other for a moment. He reached over and gently moved a hair behind my ear. Then, to my surprise, he leaned forward and kissed me.
When our lips met, it was soft and gentle, at first, and then it turned a bit more passionate. My arms wrapped around his neck and his went around my waist, pulling me taut against him. My fingers grabbed at his hair, pulling his face closer, deepening the kiss between us. We came to our senses at the same time and pulled apart abruptly. We both covered our mouths in shock and exclaimed at the same time, “I’m sorry!”
We sat up at the same time on opposite sides of the bed and did our best to not make eye contact. Neither of us spoke for what seemed like an eternity. In my heart, I knew what happened was wrong, but my body wasn't thinking that right now.
“I’m sorry, Parker. I shouldn’t have done that, Quinn is my best friend. I just miss Jackie so much…but that doesn’t excuse it,” he rambled on. Turning around, I put my hand over his mouth to stop him. “It’s okay, Mitchell, I didn’t exactly resist. It’s natural, we both miss the people we love and so much has been bad lately we needed to feel something good…Wait, I didn’t mean it like that…Anyway, it didn’t mean anything, it was just two friends comforting each other, and that is it,” I finished.
“You know, I've really come to care about you these last few months, Park. Before, you were just 'Jackie’s friend' and we barely spoke to each other. But since Quinn came along, you've become one of my best friends and I really need that friendship. I don’t want to mess it up,” he said as he looked down at the ground sadly.
“Don’t worry about it, nothing is going to change between us,” I assured him. But I wasn’t so sure that was true. That kiss felt incredible and I felt like a jerk for thinking that when the man I love is in danger. I cleared the thought from my head and decided it was time for Mitchell to go home.
Chapter Eighteen