“What do you mean?”
She’s turned away again, looking at my bookshelf. My eyes gravitate toward the gold-flecked frame of the picture of us that I’ve turned sideways and tucked away between the books. I wonder if she sees it.
“I kind of looked in your diary and read about the party. I kind of told him.” Lisa looks at me, her chin quivering. “But when he realized who he was talking to, and that you weren’t home, he went crazy He said he was going to come in. He said he’d hurt me.”
“He can’t come in unless you invite him! Didn’t you read that in my journal?”
“I wasn’t exactly thinking clearly! I… I just wanted him to go. I didn’t think he’d find you. I wasn’t even sure if you were really at the party; you wrote that you weren’t going, and that entry was from a couple of days ago.”
I shake my head. “You read my journal and you sent him after me.”
“I’m sorry!”
“We’re not fourth grade best-friends-forever who swap diaries anymore!”
“I just…”
“What — invaded my privacy, almost got me killed?”
Lisa squeezes her eyes shut and rocks back and forth. “I’m sorry.”
“Look, I’m sorry, too. I was pretty messed up the first time Michael showed up, and I won’t be getting any awards for good judgment, either. Forget the stupid diary, what’re you doing here? How did you even get in? How did you get my cell number?”
Lisa wipes her nose against her sleeve and takes a shaky breath. It’s surreal to see her barely holding herself together.
“The number is on your bulletin board.” She points at the board and I shake my head. I can never remember my own number, so I put it up where I’d have to see it a lot.
“And I still have your key from when I used to feed Nutty if you were away or in case of an emergency.”
I’m not sure sneaking into my house and reading my diary qualifies as an emergency but her eyes are wide and hopeful, like I should be totally stoked about this trip down memory lane. I’m guessing now is not the best time to tell her I tossed out her key a few years ago.
“And I wanted to see how you were.”
“Well, now you know. Total head case being stalked by a vampire — classic teen angst. How have the last few years been for you?”
Lisa manages the tiniest of smiles. “Pretty sucky, actually.”
“Come on… tennis all-star, in-crowd, great hair — high school dreams come true.”
“I know you know about me being away.”
I shrug. “Rehab is very Hollywood right now. All the A-listers are doing it.”
Lisa sighs and pushes herself up slowly. She walks over to my bed and sits up by my pillow, drawing her knees to her chest. She leans back against the headboard and closes her eyes. “I wasn’t in rehab…. I was at the Twin Oaks Psychiatric Hospital.”
“What? But everyone said…”
Lisa opens her eyes and rests her chin on her knees. “You can thank Marnie for the rehab rumor. Apparently, she saw OxyContin in my purse one day and assumed I’d scored it on the street instead of picking it up at Walgreens. After I left for the hospital, she took it upon herself to turn one bottle of pills into a full-blown drug habit — the rest is history.”
“But how did you end up at the hospital? And what the hell were you doing with OxyContin?”
“After I took a few too many of said pills, my doctor thought I needed a little more supervision — end of story. And right now I’d kind of like to figure out how we’re going to deal with Michael instead of discussing my accidental overdose.”
I shake my head. “Whoa, wait a minute. You can’t drop a bomb like that and expect me to forget about it.”
Lisa gets up and walks to my mirror. “I shouldn’t have told you. Besides, it was nothing — it was an accident.”
“An overdose isn’t nothing — accidental or not. And you still haven’t told me what you were doing with OxyContin in the first place? That’s, like, heavy-duty stuff.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does! Lisa, what’s going on?”
She looks at me and bites her lower lip.
“You can tell me.”
“Fine! I have lupus. And before you ask, it’s a chronic inflammatory disease — complete with chronic pain, arthritis, headaches, heart and lung problems, and hair loss. Fun, huh?” Lisa runs her fingers through her curls and comes away with a handful of hair. “Oh, and exposure to sunlight brings on this lovely rash. Not real conducive for being out on the courts or attracting guys — not that I have any energy for that.”
I look at the red blotches I’d noticed a few days ago splashed across her cheeks. “But isn’t there medicine you can take?”
“Yeah, it’s just the medicine isn’t working that well, but my doctor thinks I’m making great strides managing the pain. Only thing left to do is figure out how to live a completely different life from the one I’d imagined. Once I nail that down, I’m hoping to get off the antidepressants.”
“Why didn’t you tell anyone? What about Alicia? She could’ve shut Marnie up.”
“Alicia? We’re real close when I’m playing well, but let’s just say most of my friendships revolve around being good at sports. And you know as well as I that if I told everyone I have lupus, there’d be a big pity party with tons of sympathy, and then everyone would slowly back away, leaving me with nothing but my rash.”
“No!”
“Yes.”
“I don’t believe that, but I’m here for you, and you’ve got your parents. Do they even know where you are?”
Lisa sighs. “No. I snuck out after bed check. I couldn’t sleep and I needed to clear my head. I wasn’t planning to stay out all night, but then Michael showed up.”
“Well, when your parents wake up and find you missing, they’re gonna freak.”
Lisa nods. “I know. I’ll call them soon.” She stretches her arms over her head as she walks over to my desk chair. “The important thing right now is: What are we going to do about Michael?”
Lisa’s hand flutters to her cheek and she traces the rash with her fingers so exactly I imagine she’s spent a lot of time looking in the mirror. “Is he still Michael? I mean, is he still the way he was before?”
“I think so. He sounds the same. He doesn’t have a soul, but he still…” I pause because I was about to say he still loves me, but now I’m wondering if that’s possible. Can you love someone if you don’t have a soul?
Lisa is staring at me intently, waiting for me to finish.
“But, well, you wouldn’t know it,” I say finally. “He can still be kind of a jerk, but that’s nothing new. And he still has feelings,” I add, thinking maybe you can still feel love without a soul.
“Is that why you haven’t done anything about him?”
“Yeah, and…”I want to tell Lisa the truth, but I can’t. “I suppose I was hoping one of these nights he’d just stop showing up.” I push my lips into a smile and keep my focus on Lisa’s eyes. I resist the urge to look away and brush my bangs aside — which, according to Rachael, is a body language red alert for lying.
Lisa shakes her head, “You know, Jordan, you haven’t changed. You always expect your little problems to go away by themselves. Well, believe me, you’ve got to deal with things head on.”
“Little problems?” I ask, wondering how Lisa thinks my problem with Michael is so trivial. “Are we talking about the same thing? Michael may still be Michael, but I’ve been trapped in my house for the last four months by this ‘little problem’ capable of draining all the blood from my body!”
“I didn’t mean it like that, it’s just…” Lisa slumps in the chair. “Okay, bottom line is he has to go, right? He went after you last night, and now I know about him — things have changed.”
I let out a big sigh. “It’s not that simple. I’ve read a lot about vampires, and getting rid of them isn’t easy. And…” Here’s my chance to tell her that
Michael is in love with me, and that until very recently, I thought I might still love him, too.
I flop back onto my bed and close my eyes. “I just don’t think it’s doable.”
I hear Lisa get up and walk over to my bookcase. She starts drumming her fingers across the spines of the books. I open my eyes just in time to see her pull our picture out from in between the books, and then quickly slide it back. “Everything is doable, and if at first you don’t succeed, you find another way.”
“Yeah, except in this case, not succeeding gets you killed — or worse!”
“Not if we’re prepared. I mean, really, how would you do it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, let’s make a list. We’ll write down all our options, and decide on the best course of action.”
Okay, I know Lisa has always been a total list maniac, but doesn’t she realize that no matter how much we prepare, chances are still pretty darn good we’d be dead meat by morning? And doesn’t she remember how many times she failed to change the world — or me — with her lists? I want to tell her to stop. I want to tell her I won’t be slipping back into my old role as her unwavering follower.
Lisa flips over a piece of paper on my desk and picks up a pen. I wish Rachael were here. I have a feeling she wouldn’t approach this problem like we were making campaign slogans for a student council election. Of course, Rachael would probably get hung up trying to analyze Michael’s motivations, but right now that sounds a hundred times better than one of Lisa’s lists.
“Okay,” she says. “I know there’s a stake through the heart, crosses, and garlic. That’s three. Oh, and sunlight, right? What else?”
“You’d need a shitload of garlic to do any damage, but vampires can’t swim, so you could drown them, and there’s always my personal favorite: decapitation,” I say, hoping she’ll see the futility in all this. “But I really don’t—”
Lisa looks at me, her eyes wide. “Could you really do that? Could you really cut someone’s head off?”
“Not someone’s, Michael’s. But, no! I’m not saying I could or I would. Don’t you see how ridiculous this is?”
“So, you’re just going to let him hang out here every night?”
“I don’t want to, but I’m not sure what else I can do.”
“Does he always come at the same time?”
“No, but after I went out last night I have a feeling he’ll be here early tonight to talk.”
“Do you know where he sleeps?”
“No, we kind of don’t talk a lot about him being dead, but what difference does it make? I mean, you can’t seriously think going after him is a good idea?”
“I was, you know, just thinking maybe we could do something during the day. That’s all I meant.”
“Look, I’ll talk to him and see if we can work out some sort of deal, because I don’t think driving a stake through Michael’s heart will be anything like driving a tennis ball down the court. This is Michael Green we’re talking about — Michael Green with supernatural strength to go with his superego.”
Lisa stares down at the list on the desk. “What if it was me? Could you kill me?”
“No! God, what are you talking about?”
“We can’t hide from him forever, Jordan. And if we go after him, he might make one of us a vampire, right?” She’s running her fingers over her rash again. “If somehow he made me into a vampire,” she says, speaking very slowly, “would you go after me? Could you kill me?”
I stare at her in horror. “Lisa, I’m not going to talk about this. Just let me deal with Michael. Let me see what he says.”
“But what if he…”
The phone rings. “I’ll get it,” I say, glad to stop this discussion for a few minutes. I look at the number on the screen. “It’s your house!”
Lisa takes a deep breath and hugs her arms around her chest. “You answer it.”
“Hello?”
“Jordan? This is Mrs. Dolan, I’m so sorry to be calling at this hour, but I’ve called everyone else, and… well, you haven’t by any chance heard from Lisa, have you?”
Her mom’s voice sounds so brittle, like she’s going to break into pieces from worry.
“She’s here — she’s okay.”
Mrs. Dolan lets out a choked sob, and I walk over to Lisa and hand her the phone.
“Yes, Mother? I spent the night. I just needed to get out. I can walk home. We’re kind of busy right now. I’m fine; we’re just working on a school project. Yes, at seven o’clock in the morning! It’s just around the corner — I can walk. Whatever!”
Lisa clicks the phone off and puts it back in the cradle. “She’s coming to get me.” She heads back to my desk and picks up a pen. “How else could you do it?”
“Look, we’ve got plenty of time to deal with Michael. Just stay inside after sunset until we can get together again to figure something out.”
“I can’t wait,” she says flatly. She throws the pen down on the desk. “But I guess I don’t have a choice because my fucking mother’s coming to pick me up because she can’t leave me out of her sight for five seconds!”
My eyes widen. I don’t think I’ve ever heard Lisa swear. Gabby does it all the time and I don’t think twice about it, but hearing Lisa do it is awful. My stomach turns, and I don’t know why, but I’m embarrassed for her. “She’s just worried. I mean, she didn’t know where you were.”
Lisa glares at me, and I feel like I’m walking past the upper-crust tables in the cafeteria. I thought if Lisa and I ever reconnected, she’d be the same; everything would be the same. But I did a pretty bang-up job imagining this wonderful relationship with Michael, so what do I know?
“At least she cares,” I add.
Lisa smiles. It’s not her old I’m-on-top-of-the-world smile, but it isn’t a condescending one, either.
“I’m sorry. I’m mad at my mom, not you. But I am worried about you. I don’t think you should go after him alone.”
“For the hundredth time I never said I was going after Michael tonight! I never said I was going after him at all.”
The corners of Lisa’s mouth curl up. “So you’ll wait until we can handle this together?”
“Yes!”
A horn beeps out front. “That’s got to be your mom.”
Lisa looks me in the eye. “Don’t do anything stupid. Stay put tonight!”
“I will.”
Lisa narrows her eyes, and nods her head approvingly. “Good.”
The horn blares again.
Lisa looks in the mirror and runs her fingers through her curls. I watch as dozens of strands of hair float down to my rug. “I’ll call you — unless my mom takes away my phone.”
She walks down the hall, and I hear her feet shuffling down the steps. She used to fly down my stairs — skipping every other step and then jumping past the last three, landing with a thud. But not today. Probably not ever again. I wonder what it feels like to have your body turn on you?
The door slams and I drop down on my bed. I’m glad I’m alone. I need to figure out what I’m going to do — without help from Lisa. I thought it’d be great having someone else help me with Michael, but this doesn’t feel right. And with everything Lisa’s going through, I don’t think she’s in the right place to help me with this.
I get up and walk over to my desk and pick up the list she started. I resist the urge to cross out “steak” and replace it with “stake.”
Could I really do any of this? I may very well have to. Lisa’s right about the situation changing. After last night, it’s clear Michael’s done waiting patiently at my window for an invitation, and if I have any hope of getting my life together, I need to take Lisa’s advice and deal with him once and for all. My best hope is he’ll listen to reason.
Michael, I’ve been thinking about our relationship, and what with you being undead, and me not being into all that — well, I have to be honest and let you know this inviting-you-in thing is never going
to happen. I know, it seems like I’ve been leading you on all these months, and I kind of have been, but I’ve realized that the reason I broke up with you before is because we have nothing in common, and you being a vampire has only widened the gap. But just because you’re not technically breathing doesn’t mean you can’t make something of yourself. I’ll bet there are plenty of opportunities for the undead in the fast-food industry! Wendy’s is always looking for help with the drive-thru window late at night.
Of course, dead or alive, Michael was never the kind of guy to take no for an answer, and maybe “breaking up” with him and pissing him off would be the stupidest plan ever. It’d probably be easier to get close to him if he thinks I’m still all hot and bothered to let him in my window. Get close to him and do what? is the question. Stake him? How do you stake someone who says they love you — even if they are already technically dead?
I think about all the times Michael’s lost his temper in the last few months — those moments when he said or did something and fear took over my body; how he threatened Lisa. Despite what I said, he’s really not the same old Michael and I need to concentrate on that.
I shake my head and look out my window at the tree. I follow the branches with my eyes, then focus on the worn bark where he usually sits. At the very least I should be prepared, and what would be more appropriate than a stake made from the damn tree?
I unlatch the window, then push up the pane and screen. I reach out and pull a branch, bending it back and forth until the wood starts to split. Sweat breaks out on my forehead as I yank and twist the branch around, finally pulling it off the tree. I shut the window and wonder how hard it’ll be to whittle the tip into a point. Too bad they didn’t cover stakes in eighth-grade woodworking class. I look down at my chest. How far do you have to push a stake in before it pierces someone’s heart?
So what now? Sharpen the stake in case things get ugly with Michael — the pointier the better? Plan a speech that leaves his ego intact in the hopes of avoiding using said stake?
I go over to my desk and root around in my junk drawer for the pocketknife I got during my one year in Girl Scouts. I spot the large cross my mom bought during her brief church-going binge after the divorce. It’s bigger than I remembered, at least thee inches long. I close it in my palm and try to feel its antivamp energy.