************************************
A steady knocking on the door awoke him from his brief slumber. He sat up, looked around and checked to see if the money was still there. When he saw it, he knew that he hadn’t dreamed the ordeal and that it was indeed real.
He exhaled, then got up and went to open the front door.
“Hi Marvin.”
Marvin was speechless. Standing on his porch was the most beautiful girl at Cedar Hill High school. She had on a pair of basketball shorts and an old Allen Iverson jersey from when he played for the Philadelphia 76ers.
He immediately started laughing. It wasn’t that he thought something was funny, he just thought that she was absolutely adorable.
“Why don’t you quit laughing and go put your basketball shoes on,” Bristol said with a straight face. She stood there with her hands on her hips until Marvin finally got the message. When Marvin went into the backyard, he glanced over and saw the blue Hummer parked on the side of the house with the keys in the ignition.
Tomorrow is my turn to drive it! He thought happily as he grinned at the huge vehicle. He knew that he was about to be the most popular guy in school now that he had access to money and an expensive vehicle. No one was going to take him for a joke anymore.
He felt like he was on top of the world as he walked to the basketball court. When he arrived, Bristol was dribbling the ball, but studying Marvin simultaneously.
“Why are you looking at me like that Bristol?”
Bristol shook her head and shot the basketball. She knew that something was wrong when she saw the expensive vehicle being dropped off by Marvin’s friend. She could smell the contaminated blood of the people that took Marvin’s friend back home. She had read their thoughts and saw some things that she wished she wouldn’t have. One of Patrick’s friends was named Tony, and his intentions were to let Patrick and Marvin take a chance on going to prison for 15 years by persuading them to make cocaine and methamphetamine deliveries.
This troubled Bristol greatly.
“So, what’s the deal with the truck?!” Bristol asked him, trying to spark the conversation.
“The truck? Oh… yea, we’re going on a date in the truck tomorrow.”
Bristol could sense that the vehicle made him proud. Made his self-esteem stronger and his ego bigger. But she also sensed danger ahead.
“Well, I think it’s ugly Marvin. I’m not riding inside of a vehicle that soldiers in Iraq ride in!”
Marvin started laughing. “No this isn’t the same thing. Their vehicles are called Hum-Vees I think. This is a Hummer.”
“I don’t care, I don’t like it Marvin. Let’s just walk to the Baskin Robbins tomorrow and have a simple date. We can get some ice cream and just get to know each other a little better.”
“Walk? Why would I subject myself to such a thing when I can drive now? Let’s just drop it. You want to play some one on one?”
Bristol was frustrated because she could sense that Marvin was already skeptical of the situation with him, Patrick, and Tony; but was choosing to ignore his skepticism in order to impress people that didn’t even matter. She noticed that there was still an available avenue for her to try, and she jumped right on it.
“How about this… If I beat you in basketball and don’t let you score a point, then you walk to Baskin Robbins with me instead of driving.”
Marvin laughed heartily. “How about this… I’ll just walk with you to Baskin Robbins anyway, but after we get home, I’m jumping in that Hummer and rolling out!”
Bristol was getting exhausted because of how difficult Marvin was being.
“What about school Marvin? Are you not taking the limo in the morning?”
“Why would we take the limo when we have the Hummer?”
“We? No! I’m not riding in that thing! I already told you that.”
Marvin was getting frustrated. “Why won’t you ride in it Bristol?”
She shook her head. “First tell me where you got it from.”
“A friend of mine…”
“That’s not good enough Marv. I suggest you call that friend and tell him to come get his vehicle. That truck looks like it’s going to get you in a world of trouble.”
Marvin was irate. “You don’t even know me like that! You’ve only known me for two days, so why are you all up in my face?! Huh? You don’t know nothing about me Bristol! Nothing!”
Bristol backed up a little bit because her natural survival instincts came out whenever someone screamed or raised their voice at her. She didn’t want to hurt Marvin, so she diverted her attention to a random object other than him.
She grabbed the basketball, ran to the basket and did a layup. In order to clear her mind, she focused on the temperature and admired the beautiful glow of the full moon.
Marvin stood there feeling bad for his outburst towards his new neighbor. He could tell that his words had hurt her feelings and he wanted to do something to correct it.
“Bristol… I’m sorry. Will you accept my apology?”
Bristol didn’t say anything, she just continued to drain her jump shots. She was shooting with one of the purest strokes he had ever seen a female possess. She grabbed the basketball and walked up to him.
“The only way I will accept your apology is if you accept my challenge. If I beat you in basketball and don’t let you score a point, then you leave that vehicle here and tell your friend to come get it.”
Marvin looked at her with a smirk on his face. It humored him that she thought that she was really good enough to not let him score one basket. He didn’t want to take advantage of her, but maybe it was time for her to learn a lesson about the game of basketball.
“O.K. you said one point? That’s simple. I accept. What are we going to? The first person to 12?”
“First person to 12 is fine Marvin.”
Marvin burst out laughing as he bent down to tie his shoelaces.
“Since you’re a girl, you can have the ball first.”
Bristol had to be careful in that situation because she didn’t want to overplay her hand. With her supernatural strength and powers, she could easily jump clear over Marvin and dunk the basketball, but that would expose her as other than human.
She had to appear human, because there was no telling what would happen if he found out that she was a vampire. She accepted the ball first even though she really wanted to tell him to take it.
As soon as Marvin walked up to her to play defense, she pulled up for a long jump shot from almost 30 feet away.
Swish.
It went straight through the basket, without even so much as grazing the rim. Marvin retrieved the ball and passed it back to her. She caught it and passed it back to him.
“It’s your turn Marvin…”
“No, we’re playing make it, take it!” He bellowed. “If you make it, you take it! Understand?”
Marvin was playing relaxed defense against her, and appeared to have a confident demeanor. Despite that, she had read his thoughts and noticed that he was beginning to become worried that she would actually score 12 points before he got a chance to get the basketball.
She saw that he was thinking man, I should have taken the ball when she said it was my turn. I could have been gotten this game over with.
Bristol dribbled the ball with her left hand and knew in advance that Marvin was about to reach out for the steal. When he reached his hand out, she made a spin move to the opposite direction and pulled up for another jumper. Swish!
When Bristol had scored 11 points, Marvin started playing airtight defense and trying not to allow her to dribble or shoot. When he pressed against her, she realized how much she enjoyed the closeness of his masculine body. She enjoyed the sweet smell of his flesh and the flattery of his thoughts equally. She could tell that even though he was frustrated, he still thought that she was drop de
ad gorgeous.
She could also tell that she turned him on physically, yet mentally she was being a complete nuisance to him. She turned and faced him while holding the basketball away from him.
Then, Marvin lunged for the ball out of anger and determination, and accidentally bumped his shoulder into Bristol’s mouth, causing them both to fall on the ground. There was blood on Bristol’s lip, but the blood wasn’t hers…
She looked at Marvin and saw that he was holding his shoulder in pain. She was nervous now because if her parents were awake, they would smell his human blood and think that it was meal time.
“Marvin, let me help you…”
Despite her reluctance, she picked Marvin up, but acted as if she were struggling to do it. She started walking to the house with him in her arms when he shrieked out.
“Put me down! I can walk!!”
Embarrassed, Bristol put him down and walked with him into the house.
“Where are you going Bristol? I don’t need any help; you won the game fair and square. I won’t drive it. I’ll tell Pat to come get the damn truck! There… are you happy now?
She saw that he was telling the truth, but also that he was bitter about losing and not being able to score at least one point against a female. She accessed him and quickly realized that there was nothing she could do to soothe his anger.
“Marvin, let me patch up your shoulder. Do you have a first-aid kit in here?”
“Yea, I’ll go get it, it’s in the bathroom-”
“No, you lay down on the sofa, I’ll get it. Let me do it Marvin.”
“Wait, I thought I saw your lip bleeding when we were outside; but now I don’t see anything there at all. Did you wipe it off? Are you o.k. Bristol?”
“I’m fine. What you saw was your blood on my lip I guess… I wasn’t bleeding. I’m fine.”
The truth was that Bristol’s lip had been cracked open, but her body had the ability to repair itself of any open wounds as long as the wounding object wasn’t fire. Her lip had cleared up immediately.
She went into the bathroom and found the first aid kit with no problem. While she was in there, she took a small bowl that they were using to store soap in, and washed it out. She grabbed the iodine bottle and created a mixture to use to clean Marvin’s flesh.
She was about to walk out of the bathroom when another idea hit her. If she added a little of her own blood to the mixture… but she quickly nixed this idea and went out to clean Marvin’s wound.
“Ouch…”
“Relax Marvin… how about you just lay back in my lap and let me work on your shoulder.”
Marvin sighed and laid his upper body across Bristol’s thighs. He closed his eyes while she worked on him. He could feel the warm wash cloth gently rubbing across his skin and then the pressure of the bandage being pressed across his cut.
“I cut my shoulder on your teeth. That kind of sounds like you bit me. Are you a vampire or something?” Marvin asked jokingly.
Bristol tensed up, and didn’t say a word. She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath simultaneously. When she opened her eyes, she saw Marvin sitting there staring at her with a big smile on his face. She relaxed.
For her, that comment had hit much too close to home. It alarmed her temporarily; but she was glad that he was only joking.
“Where did you become so skilled?” Marvin asked as he closed his eyes and relaxed.
“Skilled in what?”
“Skilled in everything, Bristol… Your jump shots are amazing. And if my mind isn’t playing tricks on me; I do believe that you could possibly be stronger than me, yet you look so delicate. Look at your skillset… You even cleaned up my shoulder like a professional nurse… And on top of all that, you are beautiful.”
He opened his eyes and stared into hers. It caught Bristol off guard and she didn’t know what to say in response. She knew that she and Marvin had a lot of things in common; the biggest similarity being that neither of them had ever been in love before. They were both only kids with lots of love to give and no one to give it to.
She thought Marvin was impressively handsome. In fact, she thought he was perhaps the most handsome man that she had ever seen in her 200+ years.
“I… uhm… I’ll see you tomorrow morning Marvin.”
She lifted Marvin off of her thigh and abruptly got up and started walking towards the door. The temperature was cool in Marvin’s house, but it felt like it was 200 degrees to Bristol. And that wasn’t a healthy feeling for an Aslaric Vampire.
“Where are you going Bristol?”
She stopped in her tracks, her entire body turning into a bundle of nerves and a mass of silly putty.
“I have to get home; do you see how late it is?”
She glanced at the clock at the same time as Marvin, hoping that it was indeed late. As a vampire, she had no sense of time when the sun went down. The night always seemed like one hour to her.
“Oh, it is pretty late Bristol… you’re absolutely correct… I didn’t realize that it was 2 hours after midnight. Are your parents going to be mad at you? Do they know where you are?”
Bristol stood there speechless, thinking about his question. The truth was that her parents were going to be pissed. They would be able to smell his flesh on her body, and they probably wouldn’t be able to determine if it was innocent contact or sex. They were going to be raging mad and may even make her pack her bags and move to another country.
“Bristol… Did you hear me?”
“What?”
“I said, I’m about to call your parents and let them know that you were over here playing basketball with me; and that we lost track of time. I’ll apologize for the both of us. Is that-”
“Noo! I mean… they’re asleep, so we don’t want to wake them up with this. Especially not at this time of night. I’m just going to go in, take a shower and get some sleep. I’ll see you in the morning at the bus stop Marvin.”
“The limo stop.”
She smiled. “Right… the limo stop.”
************************************
When Bristol went to her house, everyone was gone. Probably feeding, she thought to herself as she went to take a shower to clean Marvin’s scent off of her. She enjoyed the way that he smelled, but she knew that if her father caught a whiff of that, there was no telling what he would do to Marvin.
She didn’t have a need to feed that night because she had drank a pint of Jessica’s blood earlier that day during their fight at school. She didn’t mean to get that carried away in front of a group of students, but once she bit into her neck, was too late to turn back.
When all of the students had rushed out, she bit her wrist, took two drops of her own Aslaric blood and held it to Jessica’s wound while whispering in her ear.
“You will forget that this ever happened to you. In a few seconds, you will be my friend. You will forget our differences and you will love me. This will last for about four minutes, and then you will return to the normal Jessica. Aslar.”
This was a prayer for forgetfulness passed down to her from Lord Aslar centuries ago. It had come in handy many times, but she couldn’t use it often, because there was a chance that it may not work. Sometimes it wouldn’t work because their psyche couldn’t comprehend her accent; or sometimes it wouldn’t work because she had done it too many times in one week. Each time she did it in a week, its impact grew progressively weaker. Luckily, it worked that day on Jessica.
After getting out of the shower, she dried off and went to sit in the darkness of their living room in her pajamas. She could see in the darkness just as good as she could see in the daylight; and she used this as her time to reflect and relax.
After living for so many years, her relaxation had become necessary for her to remain sane. She thought about the meeting that she’d had with Todd and the game of basketball that she’d had with Marvin. S
he thought about the other students of Cedar Hill High and wondered if she would ever be able to be friends with them.
It really didn’t matter to her though, because the only person she was interested in being friends with was Marvin. He was an exceptional being, someone she knew would make a great vampire. One of the strong few who could probably rule the entire kingdom of vampires with his charm and fantastic aura.
She had taken a nap earlier after school, so she had enough energy to last her for at least 24 hours straight. She sat there staring into darkness; in a trance.
When her parents came home, they ignored her because they were used to her ritual. Instead, they retired to their room, their breath smelling of fresh blood and their clothes smelling of human hair.
Bristol started to ask them if they had killed anyone, but thought better of it. Her parents hated when she questioned them. She stared into nothingness and thought pleasant thoughts. Thoughts that were pleasant to her instead of thoughts that were pleasant for Lord Aslar. She knew that she was playing a dangerous game, but she had never felt this good in her entire life.
************************************
Marvin lay in his bed for hours unable to sleep after Bristol came and destroyed him on the basketball court. He had dreams of going to the NBA, but how could those plans come to fruition if he was letting a girl win without him even scoring one single point?
He was hurt, and it felt like everything that he once believed in was a myth. Getting his mother into a better house; putting her in a situation where she could just live and enjoy life without having to struggle all seemed like they would never come to pass. He looked at the stack of money that his friend had given him and shook his head.
If he wasn’t going to be able to make money playing basketball, and if he wasn’t going to be able to get money by rolling with Patrick, then just how did Bristol expect him to make money?
And if she didn’t want to ride in the Hummer with him, then why in the world was she riding around with people like Todd Winters? It was either she wanted her man to have a car or she didn’t.
Otherwise, there was no reason for her to be betraying him, regardless of how long they had been together. He made a mental note to bring this up to her when he saw her again.