“Jack, you know how much I love you. ”
I reached out for him, and he pulled away. He exhaled shakily, so I reached out for his hand again, and this time he let me take it. He wouldn’t look at me, so I moved so I was standing in front of him.
“I really do love you, and this is the right choice. And we didn’t do anything wrong, not really. I mean… I don’t know. What else were we supposed to do?”
“I don’t know,” Jack admitted quietly. He was still looking down so his eyes wouldn’t meet mine, and I touched his cheek.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you like this. I just…” I trailed off. He felt so sad and guilty. I hated to see him this way. “I just wanted you to go easier on Peter. You two should be able to get along. ”
“No, you’re right. ” He forced a smile at me, but it barely counted as one, so he let it go. “I will try. ”
“Why don’t you come inside with me?” I asked. I wanted to stay with him all day, but the sun was really starting to get to me. It was this heavy sort of weakness that just barreled down on me like a wet blanket.
“No, I wanna stay out here just a little bit longer. Matilda’s still having fun,” Jack said. Matilda had actually sprawled out on the patio, basking in the sun for warmth, but I didn’t argue with him.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked and wished he would just look at me.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” he nodded, but he was lying.
“I love you,” I whispered, hoping that would help somehow.
“I know, and I love you, too. ” Without looking at me, he gave me a quick kiss on the forehead, and stepped away from me. He had never kissed me so brusquely before. “Mattie, come on! Where’s your ball?” Matilda jumped up to start searching for it, and Jack went to help her.
I glared up at the sun before going back in the house. If it wasn’t for the stupid light, I would’ve stayed out there with him. But the bright noon sun was too draining, so I walked back into the house. The dark sanctuary of the kitchen brought relief, and I sighed. I had no idea if I had done the right thing, but anything that made Jack that upset was probably bad.
I spent more of the afternoon pretending to sleep than actually sleeping. To fill the time, I texted Jane and tossed and turned a lot. I listened for Jack to come in the house, but he never did. Bobby got up to eat, but everyone else was sound asleep. Except for Jack, who was gone.
Finally, I gave up on getting anymore rest and got out of bed. I texted him to ask where he was, but he didn’t answer. I was starting to think I was a pariah the way nobody answered my calls or texts.
When Bobby walked by on his way to his room, he smelled overly delicious. My bedroom door was shut, and the scent of his hot blood wafted in. It had been a few days since I ate, and vampires could go much longer than that. I had to get my hunger in control if I ever planned on being with Jack.
So as hungry as Bobby made me, I swallowed it back and decided to clear my head with a nice long shower. I had just started gathering my clothes when I felt the warmth in my chest, meaning Jack was nearby, and a moment later I heard him bounding up the stairs.
“Hey. ” Jack poked his head in, still hanging onto the bedroom door. “Are you up?”
“Yeah, I was just about to take a shower,” I held up my clothes for him to see. “Unless you wanted something?”
“No, go ahead and shower. But do you wanna watch a movie after?”
“Yeah, sure,” I shrugged. “Have you slept yet?” It was after six, and as far as I knew, he hadn’t gotten any sleep since he got back.
“Nah, I’m okay,” he shook his head. “I’ll talk to you after your shower then. ”
“Uh, yeah, okay?”
With that, he left, shutting the bedroom door behind him. I stood there, holding my clothes in my arms, trying to figure out what was going on. I heard him knocking on the door across the hall. He got more nervous, which made me nervous, so I decided to wait to see how this turned out before I got in the shower.
“Yeah?” Peter opened his bedroom door sounding crabby, but that was Peter.
“I went to the video store and I, uh, rented Brideshead Revisited. I know you really like it, and I thought you might want to watch it with us. Me and Alice, I mean,” Jack said.
“Um… sure. ” Peter sounded taken back, and so was I.
“Alice’s taking a shower, so it’ll be a little bit,” Jack said.
“Okay. ”
“Okay. ” There was kind of an awkward silence. Jack must’ve finally excused himself because Peter shut his door, and I heard Jack running back down the stairs.
In the shower, I sing very loudly (today it was the theme to Golden Girls), but even over the sound of my voice and the water running, I could still hear Mae screaming. This would later prove to be a godsend, when Peter explained to me that Brideshead Revisited is an eleven-hour long period piece that originally aired on the BBC in the 1980’s.
At the time, however, Mae’s desperate pleas were enough to scare the hell out of me.
- 18 -
Once I got out of the shower, I could hear well enough to ascertain that Mae wasn’t in immediate danger, and Ezra was trying to calm her. But something was the matter and I didn’t like it. I threw on a pair of my sweats and one of Jack’s oversized tee shirts, and hurried out the door.
“I wouldn’t go down there if I were you. ” That was Bobby’s word of advice. He stood just outside of Milo’s door with a hoodie wrapped tightly around him. “It doesn’t sound pretty. ”
“You aren’t bloody listening to me, Ezra! You never listen to me!” Mae shouted from downstairs.
“What’s going on?” I asked Bobby, hoping to gain some insight on the situation before diving into it.
“I don’t really know. Milo and Jack left on a blood run about fifteen minutes ago, and Mae and Ezra started fighting a few minutes after that,” Bobby shrugged.
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A blood run meant that we were getting low on bag blood at the house, and they had gone to get some from a blood bank. My stomach grumbled at just the thought of blood, but Mae was yelling so much, I ignored it.
“Don’t tell me to calm down! I am not going to calm down!” Mae continued after Ezra mistakenly suggested she relax a bit. “This isn’t something that we should be reasonable about! This is life and death, Ezra!”
“I know that, Mae! That’s exactly why we need to think about this!” Ezra raised his voice, but there was nothing angry about it. He was just trying to be heard over her. “But everyone else in the house doesn’t need to hear us yelling. ”
“I don’t care who hears anything!” Mae yelled, followed quickly by the sound of something glass smashing, like a vase. Matilda barked in response, and Mae snapped at her to shut up.
“See?” Bobby whispered, but the things that made him cower were exactly the reasons I felt like I had to intervene. Peter was still in his room, trying to sleep from the slow sound of his heart beat, so that left me as the only one to help out.
I went downstairs and found Matilda looking as worried as a dog can look. Mae stood to one side of the living room, and she was even worse than yesterday. Her hair was a frizzy mess, and her skin was blotchy from yelling and crying so much. She hadn’t changed her pajamas in days.
Glass was shattered all over floor in front of her. A heavy glass statue of a swan had sat on the mantle, and she would’ve had to have thrown it very hard to make it shatter like that.
“You’ve woken Alice,” Ezra told Mae, almost tiredly. He stood on the far side of the room across from her, wearing silk pajama pants and a tee shirt. Apparently, they had started fighting immediately after waking up.
“No, I was awake. I just got of the shower. ” I tugged at my hair to demonstrate. It dripped wet down my back since I hadn’t had a chance to dry it.
“I don’t care if I wake her! I don’t care if I wake anybody!” Mae raised her head
to the ceiling as if to wake anybody else that might be sleeping.
“Will you knock it off? This isn’t about them. This isn’t their fault,” Ezra said.
“How is it not about them?” She pointed at me, but she refused to look at me. “This is completely about them! They’re why you won’t do this!”
“No, that’s not true. They have no bearing on this,” he shook his head.
“Bloody hell they don’t! They have everything to do with it! You wouldn’t even turn Alice because her brother had just turned, and I know you wanted her to turn!” Mae gave him a knowing look that I didn’t understand, and he shook his head. “Don’t be so damn condescending, Ezra! I know you turned her brother for her! So why won’t you do this for me?”
“This is an entirely different situation, and I won’t do this. Absolutely not. ” He was quiet, but his voice was so firm and finite.
“Dammit, Ezra!” Mae wailed, tears streaming down her cheeks. “You can’t deny me this! You have no right! No right!”
“I cannot allow this, Mae, and I am sorry. ” He pursed his lips tightly but didn’t budge.
She looked ready to collapse, but he made no move towards her. I wanted to help, but I was afraid of how she might react to me. If Ezra wasn’t going to tend to her, then I didn’t think that I should either.
“You are not sorry! You are cold and you are cruel, and I cannot spend my life with you!” She was sobbing so hard she had to grip onto the back of the chair to keep from falling over. “I will not let you make this decision for me! You can’t!”
“You’re right. I cannot make this choice for you, but I will not tolerate it, either. You can do whatever you like, but you will not be allowed in my house with that abomination,” Ezra said coolly.
“Abomination?” Her voice cracked. “We are the abomination! She is merely a child, and I want to save her!”
“You cannot save her, Mae! You can only turn her into a monster!”
“Like we’re monsters?” Mae brushed a strand of her hair from her eyes and looked down at the floor. “Maybe we are, and maybe she would be too, but she would have a life. And it wouldn’t be a bad life. She could have everything that we have to offer. ”
“We have nothing to offer her,” he said.
“How can you say that?” Mae gaped at him, then she looked at me with hate for the first time, and I flinched. “Is it because of her? Because of Alice? She gets everything you have to offer? You let Jack turn her and gave him no repercussions, even though you had just turned her brother. For her.
“She is not the only thing in this life that needs you, Ezra! In fact, I don’t think she even needs you! You aren’t that indispensable to her!” Her lips quivered, and she glared at him. “You aren’t that indispensable to me either!”
“If I’m some kind of burden, I can leave. I don’t want to cause any problems between you two,” I said quietly. I hadn’t completely figured out what their fight was about yet, but I certainly didn’t want to be the source of it.
“You’re not a burden,” Ezra said, looking apologetically at me. “Don’t worry yourself with this. You can go up to your room. ”
“What if she moves out?” Mae latched onto an idea, and her entire demeanor changed. She took a few quick steps closer to Ezra, deftly missing all of the broken glass on the floor. “She and Jack could move out. He can take care of her, and Milo is already self-sufficient. Peter is gone most of the time anyway. We have the room, and we have the time. ”
“Alice and Milo are not ready to be on their own like that,” Ezra said. “And it isn’t about them! You keep trying to solve something that isn’t the problem. Even if everyone moved out, and it was just the two of us, I would still say no. This cannot be done, Mae, no matter what anybody else does or doesn’t do. ”
“There has to be something!” She knelt on the ground at his feet. She was literally begging him, and when she took his hand, he didn’t pull away, but he wouldn’t look directly at her. “Ezra! Please! I have never asked you for anything like this before!”
“You’ve asked me for plenty like this before, and I have indulged you too much,” he sighed. “But I cannot do this. I won’t. ”
Mae let go of his hand and sat back on her heels. Closing her eyes, she rubbed at her forehead, and I knew she was trying to think of something.
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“What if she wanted it?” Mae looked up at him, but she was talking about me. I was getting increasingly uncomfortable with the way she talked about me like I wasn’t standing right here.
“I don’t know why you have this idea that I have some special relationship with Alice. ” He sounded tired by the idea, but he wouldn’t look at me.
“Because you turned her brother for her! I know you were against adding more vampires, but you did that for her anyway!”
“Yes, and I did the same with Jack, for you. ” Ezra looked severely at Mae. Her face darkened with shame, and she looked down at the floor.
I had no idea what Ezra was talking about. From what I knew, Peter had turned Jack in order to save his life. The story that I heard from everyone never made any mention of Mae or Ezra at all. It had been an act of compassion, and for some reason, that made Mae squirm.
“That was different,” Mae said quietly.
“Yes, it was. Because Alice actually cared for her brother. He wasn’t just some random kid. ” Ezra looked off at the wall behind her. “And Milo’s young, but he is not a child. ”
“She is innocent! She deserves a life!” Mae twisted a tissue in her hands and turned to look at me, pleading with me. “Alice, tell him! I don’t care what he says! He’ll listen to you! If you tell him that he needs to do this, he will!”
“I-I don’t really know what you’re talking about. ” I turned to Ezra for help, but he just looked grimly at me. “I can’t tell him anything if I don’t know what you’re asking. ”
“My great-granddaughter Daisy,” Mae said, silent tears sliding down her face. “She is only five years old, and she’s going to die. She hasn’t had a chance to live her life yet. But if we turn her, she can live forever. She can do anything!”
“Except grow up,” Ezra reminded her. “She can never fall in love or get married. She’ll never be able to live on her own or drive a car or even go to a bar. She’ll depend on you for everything, forever, and that may delight you, but she’ll hate you for cursing her to this life.
“Other vampires will never accept her, or you, for it,” he went on. “They’ll try to kill her because she’s an abomination against everything we are. And that says nothing to our more perverse underbelly, who thrive on making childlike vampires to live as their slaves or to trade with human pedophiles in exchange for blood. Is that really the kind of life you want for her? Do you think that’s what her hopes and dreams amount to?”
“It won’t be like that,” Mae insisted. “We will protect her and love her, and she’ll have everything a child could ever want. ”
“But she won’t really be a child forever! She’ll be a woman trapped in a child’s body with a child’s temperament for all of eternity. That is a horrible thing to do to someone you claim to love so much,” he said.
“You don’t understand!” Mae looked desperately at him, and he met her eyes. “I cannot let this happen! I swore I would never watch another one of my children die!” He exhaled deeply and matched her intense expression with a calm one of his own.
“Then don’t watch,” Ezra said.
“Ezra!” I shouted, unable to believe that he would say something that cold to Mae.
“I know she is hurting, but I can’t do this!” His collected façade evaporated for a moment, and he was merely exasperated and worried. Mae had gone back to looking at the floor and crying, and for a brief second, he looked completely lost. “There is nothing I can do to rectify this situation. ”
“So then comfort her! Don’t yell at her!” I told him,
still in shock over how icy he had been to her.
“No, it’s alright, Alice,” Mae said wearily and shook her head. “I knew what I was going to get from him. Ezra is many things, but he is predictable above all else. ” Sighing, she got to her feet. She wiped the tears from her face and tried to smooth out her hair. When she had composed herself a bit, she turned to look at him. “I will do what I have to do. ”
“I understand that, but you will not do it in my house,” he said.
“I know. ” She nodded once, and then turned and walked back to her room.
For a moment after she left, I stood and tried to catch my breath. I had never seen the two of them fight about anything before, let alone something as intense as this.
I knew that Ezra was right, that turning a child into a vampire was an impossible idea, but I knew how desperate Mae was to do anything to protect her family.
Finally, Ezra started to move, picking up the pieces of broken glass of the floor, and I went over to join him.
“You were too cold with her,” I said, picking up a large chunk of glass.
My hair was still dripping cold water down my back, and I tucked it behind my ears. Part of me felt nervous at the thought of contradicting Ezra about something like this, but he had no reason to be that cruel.
“She wouldn’t have listened to anything else. She’s been pleading me with since she found out about the child being ill, and I decided that being forthright was the best avenue to take. ” Ezra was incredibly tired, and I wasn’t sure if he was over what the lycan had done to him yet.
“Why is she pleading with you?” I asked. “I mean, if this is what she wants, then why doesn’t she just do it herself? Why does she need your permission?”
“She’s never turned anyone before, and she’s afraid to, especially with a child so young. She thinks she’ll do it wrong somehow, even though there is no real wrong way. ”
He picked up most of the large pieces of glass, everything that we could get without a broom, so he stood up and tossed the broken bits into the fireplace. Since he had done it, I followed suit and threw what I had picked up into the fireplace.
“So is she going to do it if you don’t?” I asked.
“I honestly don’t know. ” His normal booming voice sounded defeated. “She wasn’t really asking my permission, either. She knows my stand on it. If she turns the child, I will not be with her. I won’t go through that heartache. Neither of them would survive it, not for long. Child vampires never do. ”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
The youngest vampire I had met had been Violet, and she was fourteen. I couldn’t imagine what one would be like younger than that. Would they look older too, the way that Milo and Violet both looked about nineteen?
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“They go insane, or they’re killed,” Ezra said simply. “They learn but can’t mature. They get old but can’t grow. They get impulses they can’t control. They’re volatile and strong and never really understand the consequences of their actions. Other vampires don’t like having them around, and they don’t like being alive.