Another swish, and Ned took to the air, a vampire looking for a potential victim. Dad was entertaining the troops, and would soon be on his way. I couldn’t stop shaking, and Vince was pale. I wondered what the next step would be now that we knew these vampires weren’t interested in just getting along.
After a paranoid Saturday, Mom, Dad, and I headed for Wolcroft to attend our final band concert for the year. For the record, both my parents feel it is important they attend my school events. Mom and Dad sit on the sidelines of field hockey games, waving blue Wolcroft pennants. They’ve sat through a lot of bad elementary drama and music pageants. When I was three, I was the lead angel in the Christmas play at church, and I added a few lines about smiting demons I thought were appropriate to the season, which most parents frowned at. Dad laughed and Mom tried not to.
Concert band was one of the things at school I did without Marty, who was tone deaf. Coral was also a bandito. She played that classic vampire instrument, the violin. I didn’t expect to see her at the concert, but she was there, haggard and drained. I thought maybe she’d forgotten to put on her I’m alive look. I regretted the rice. I should have waited until after the concert.
Then again, she really hadn’t cared how much she caused others to mistreat me. She deserved what I’d done to her. So there was no real reason for me to feel sorry for her at all.
The band was twenty girls strong, all the members from sixth, seventh, and eighth grades. We played with as much skill as you would expect. Our concert started with a rousing version of “Oh Susannah.” The audience of parents and grandparents liked it anyway.
I was not a band standout, but I did not embarrass myself either. A few more numbers and we finished the concert, clearing the stage for the main event, the high school band.
I polished my French horn and put it away. As I walked past one of the tiny practice rooms, a hand reached out to touch me. I jumped back. It was Coral.
“No way!” I said. I had no idea what she planned to do.
Coral’s hand fell to her side. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“Sorry?” My voice was too loud. “For mind-controlling the whole school? I’m not sure sorry cuts it.”
“I’m leaving, Abby. I’m not coming back.”
That was fine with me. Probably better for everyone. “Okay.”
“Last week, it wasn’t anything personal.”
How could last week not be personal? “Really?”
“Just stay away from my family, okay?”
Given that William and Larissa had tried to kidnap me, I had no problem with follow through. “Right. Look, I should have listened to you yesterday, about William.”
“Whatever. If my mom asks where I am, tell her I’m still back here.”
Woah. My secret monster hunter sense started tingling. “You’re running away from your head vampire?” I asked.
“What?”
“Vampire hunting 101 says it is unwise for you to run. Not that Larissa Petrova is your real mom. Being dead and all, she can’t have children, right? But why would you run away? That causes you all sorts of troubles. She’s your maker. Can’t she make you do things?”
“That’s none of your business. Just don’t let her know I’m gone. I promise you, if you do this for me, I’ll never bother you or Wolcroft again. You have my word.”
“What’s that worth?”
“Not that you’d know, but a lot.”
I pursed my lips. Darn it. How could I be worried about Coral? Marty was a bad influence. I was getting soft. I mean, first I started to like Ned, and now this? “All right. I’ll do it.”
“Thank you, Abby. I wish—”
I perked up my ears. I hoped this was going to be some movie moment.
“In another time and place, Abigail Rath, we could have been friends. I respect you as a rival, and our swords will
cross again.”
“…that we could have been friends, and you respect me as a rival?”
“Oh no,” said Coral. “Under the right circumstances, I would have cleaned your clock. I wish we’d had a chance to be, you know, just normal together.”
I watched her go. I respected she thought she could clean my clock, but obviously, she was wrong.
I pulled my cell phone out. One more thing to do before I headed for the parents.
“Yeah?”
“Hey Vince. You know it’s me. Can you find Ned?”
“Probably. I’ll call Big Mel’s.”
We had to get Ned a life. Someone his age shouldn’t be working every Friday night. I shook my head to clear it. Wouldn’t do to think of Ned as a normal guy. “Um…send him over to Wolcroft. Special assignment for vampires.”
“Do you want to tell me what’s going on?”
“Coral needs a tail.”
Vince sighed. “Everything’s okay?”
“Oh sure. Just send Ned. And get yourself some holy water.”
“I’ll call you later, make sure everything’s okay.”
“You do that.” I closed my phone and headed back for the auditorium.
After the concert, I stood with Mom and Dad by the punch bowl, getting my recommended daily allowance of parental praise. William bought his mom up to meet us.
I wasn’t the least bit attracted to Austin Von Trapp anymore. A healthy dose of realized mind control followed by a holy water chaser seemed to have done the trick.
Dad was all smiles, and Mom less so. I could see Dad recognizing Larissa, Mom recognizing Dad recognizing Larissa, both of them knowing Larissa had tried to kidnap their daughter.
“Thanks for the good time the other night, Mr. Rath,” said William.
“We missed you at the end,” Dad said, staring into the strawberry depths of his punch cup.
“Yes,” said Larissa. “I took him home. I enjoyed the movie and your presentation.”
“Did you know,” said Dad, “you are the spitting image of one of the starlets from Anvil Studios?”
Larissa shook her head. “You are mistaken. I have never acted.”
“You certainly could have,” Dad said.
Dad was so smooth.
The adults fell into adult chitchat, no doubt really some thinly veiled conversation. I know you’re a vampire. I know you’re both vampire hunters. We can do nothing here, but spar with words and frustration.
“I’m sorry about the other night,” William said.
“You should be,” I said. “What you tried was kidnapping.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“Dude,” I said. “I have only one thing left to say to you.”
“Yes?”
“Your mind control is kaput. I’m not interested. Buzz off.”
Puzzlement shadowed William’s perfect face. I doubted any girl in his experience had ever told him to buzz off before. Always happy to do things first.
Mom and Dad closed down their conversation, and William, crestfallen, was led away by his mom.
“The nerve,” said Mom.
“Steady, Polly,” said Dad.
“Mom, Dad, I need to tell you something.”
“Go get your things, Abby. We need to get home, right away.”
I went to the backroom. No Coral. A scribbled Post-it stuck to my French horn case said, “On it. N.” Ned
had poor penmanship, but he was turning out to be an excellent bodyguard. I thought Coral might need one more than me tonight.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Revenge of the Creatures
After the concert, Mom and Dad thought one of them should follow up with Larissa given the kidnapping attempt. They drew straws, and Mom won. Mr. Christopher was going along, and Dad, aggravated he had not drawn the short straw, was going to stay home with me.
They didn’t know I knew this, but I was listening in instead of sleeping. Hey, I’m not stupid. They are monster hunters. I’ve spent half my childhood listening to them get ready to go off and risk their lives, with very little thought to how them risking their l
ives strings me out. Double standards, again.
“It’s clear,” Mom said, packing her bag of tricks with potions and spell books, “Larissa isn’t a vampire we can negotiate with.” I could see Mom in my head, wearing her black lace blouse, a stylish leather jacket with puffed sleeves, and her split bolero skirt.
“I will give her the option to leave Los Angeles,” said Mr. Christopher. Mr. Christopher never flaunted his flair for the theatrical on a mission. He wore dark slacks and a turtleneck. No capes except for when he was doing the actor thing.
“This is my fault,” said Dad. “I never should have killed her sister.”
“No regrets, Reginald. You saved a life.” Mr. Christopher’s deep voice carried in the night. “However, our actions will always have consequences.”
“Abigail wonders why we don’t want her flinging herself into it.”
“I agree with Abigail, about her training,” said Mr. Christopher. “Her chances of encountering your old enemies have always been high. You have closed your eyes to realistically preparing her for these eventualities.”
Wow. Go, Mr. Christopher. At least he didn’t think I was a nut. He found fault with Mom and Dad instead.
I heard the door slam. Dad paced for a while. I stared at the ceiling until around one a.m., at which point I don’t remember drifting off, but I stopped seeing the clock every fifteen minutes.
Dad shook me awake. “No, Dad,” I said. “It’s Sunday.”
“Get up, Abby.”
Dad darted out of my room. His body language let me know there was no time for dawdling. My room was dim. I couldn’t see the edge of the sun peeking around the drapes. A glance at my alarm told me it was three. I slipped into sweats, ran my fingers through my hair, and rushed into the hall, grabbing my backpack parked by the door. If there were vampires on the warpath, we’d need everything I had in my backpack.
“Dad?”
“Your mother is in the hospital. Let’s go.”
We went through the kitchen door into the garage. Dad punched the button and the garage door lifted with a mechanical hum. “After you went to bed, Mom went out with Mr. Christopher to find William and Coral. She found the vampire lair.” He backed out. Shadows of trees projected onto the wall in front of us, headlight beams flashing off shelves of tools. “I stayed home with you.”
He didn’t know that I knew all that. My chest tried to squeeze my heart out. Was Mom okay?
We backed out of the driveway. Dad’s square suitcase of vampire death was occupying one of the back seats.
“Lee took her to the hospital,” Dad continued. “You’ll be staying with the Coopers for a while. I’ll arrange for Fenster to take a couple of days off school to bodyguard.”
Fenster was a graduate student, one of Mom and Dad’s associates, who could operate during the day, which
Mr. Christopher and Ned both could not do. I worried as Dad attempted warp drive to get to the hospital. How badly was Mom hurt? What had happened? My heart pounded like a timpani.
Dad was all business, taking curves like a NASCAR driver, driving around other cars like a stuntman. We pulled into the hospital parking lot near the emergency room, and Dad raced off before he shut down the car and grabbed his case. I turned off the lights and pocketed the keys. Mr. Christopher intercepted him at the emergency room door. Dad, absent-minded, slung the strap of his box over his shoulder, and after some directions, raced down the bright, empty hall.
Mr. Christopher found me an empty chair. His dark eyes appraised me, probably assessing my state of shock.
“Tell me all about it,” I said. I could count on Mr. Christopher to treat me like an adult.
“Abigail, your mother has been, well, she’s lost a lot of blood.”
Nerves kicked my stomach. “Did they bite her?”
“No. If that had happened, I wouldn’t have brought her here. No. She fell from a great height. There are some broken bones and some lacerations. Possibly some cerebral damage. She is in intensive care.”
I swallowed. “Where were you?”
“Regrettably, I was elsewhere. By the time I extricated myself, the deed had been done. Getting your mother to the hospital was more important than catching the vampires who did it.”
My chest tightened. “Mom and Dad, they don’t want me hunting monsters. Well, I don’t want them doing it either.”
“Do you want to see your mother?” His jaw set and his mouth was a thin line. He held my hand with his icy one.
Mom’s accident was scarier than anything in one of Dad’s movies, and I didn’t want to see her like Mr. Christopher had described her, but I had to. Abigail Rath wasn’t a coward. I was my mother’s daughter.
Mr. Christopher and I rode an elevator to a room behind a sealed door. A nurse’s station sat in in the middle of a ring of fishbowl rooms, the entire area draped in a gauzy gray light. I could hear choking, clicking breaths as machines breathed for people who couldn’t. The nurse let me go to Mom. Mr. Christopher waited outside because Mom could only have two visitors at a time and Dad was already there.
For a moment cinema and reality blurred. Dad, eyes watering, stood by the side of Mom’s bed, his hand over hers as best he could. Plastic tubes went into her body like vines crevicing into bricks. Mom’s head was bandaged with one eye covered. I clutched the doorway to steady myself and blinked away tears. I forced myself through the barrier of fear to stand by Dad.
Dad circled his arm around my shoulders and together we cried for a good long time. After that, the doctor came in and gave us the report. While Mom had a serious concussion, the biggest problem was Mom’s ribs had broken, and one of them had punctured a lung. That meant one of her lungs had collapsed, and she had to have the help of a respirator. The doctors were worried that she would lose her left eye.
There wasn’t much else for us to do but worry. Dad settled in. I stayed until Mr. Christopher thought it was prudent to take me to the Coopers, and I found myself in the Cooper’s generic guest room, a penitent Mrs. Cooper doing everything she could to make me feel welcome. Exhaustion took me about eight a.m., and I slept until two.
Dad called Ms. Cheever to let her know I wasn’t coming to school, and I stayed out of school all week. I called Marty, because I knew between Coral and me both disappearing, she would be beside herself. She said she would come to be with me at the hospital after school. I had a hard time telling her not to come because my voice was so thick. I didn’t need Marty seeing any of this. Dad lived at the hospital, and I orbited the hospital, with anxious breaks at the Coopers.
Mom’s condition danced on a very serious edge. Dad was despondent. He ignored eating, shaving, and, well pretty much anything. Mr. Christopher came over to the hospital to make sure he ate. I told him to put a whammy on Dad if it were necessary.
Of course, I wasn’t in good shape myself. When Vince got home from school on Friday, he decided that taking me to his church might help. I didn’t really feel like it, but he was insistent. My family is Protestant, and my parents are not emphatic about church attendance. Vince’s family is Catholic, and I’m surprised Vince isn’t in his own version of private school. However, Mr. and Mrs. Cooper are adamant about the public school thing in the same way Mom is adamant about Wolcroft.
Prayer couldn’t hurt at this stage of things.
The Catholic priesthood tends to draw men interested in monster hunting. That’s because demons seem to be drawn to priests, so I understand turn about is fair play. Besides, I’ve never seen an exorcism film with a Protestant minister starring in it, unless the Protestant minister is a scary zealot. Maybe demons are attracted to Catholicism because they have cooler buildings and neater outfits. Since Catholic priests fight demons, they know a lot of tricks, and they have a lot of useful equipment in the fight against evil. Vince, however, was thinking that I might be interested in the more traditional aspects of a priest’s job, namely getting comfort.
Like so many Catholic churches, this one made an attempt to stretch
up to God. We went before the five-thirty service, and we were alone in the church, except for a janitor who was vacuuming up and down the aisles.
“Do you want to talk to Father Victor?” Vince’s voice was gentle, like he didn’t want to talk too loud or I would break.
Which I did. I sobbed. I sank down into one of the pews and cried like I wouldn’t let myself cry in front of my father and Vince held me for I don’t know how long. My throat grew raw and my nose ran. Vince gave me a Kleenex from the box the janitor bought. When I was done, exhausted, I noticed the janitor was dusting the front pews.
I appreciated Vince not telling me everything was going to be all right, because I didn’t think it was going to be all right. It was pretty awful. I pulled myself together as much as I could, and I walked up to the janitor.
“Thank you,” I said, giving him the box of Kleenex back.
The janitor nodded.
“Chuck,” said Vince, “is Father Victor here?”
“Vince,” I said. “I don’t need to talk to anyone.”
“No,” said the janitor. “Father Stewart is here.”
“We’ll see him,” said Vince.
I didn’t have the strength to chew Vince out. An older priest came out of the back, balding on top, but with white hair which came to points on the sides of his head. He had gold wire-rimmed glasses.
“How are you, Father?” Vince asked.
“Vincente. What can I do for you?” said Father Stewart.
“My friend Abby, her mom’s in the hospital. I wondered if you might talk to her.”
I really didn’t want to do this. I noted Vince had a word with the janitor, and the two of them disappeared into the back behind the altar. Father Stewart sat down on the pew at the front of the church. I sank onto the cushion by him.
“I am sorry about your mother,” said Father Stewart. “Do you want to talk about what happened? Would you like to say a prayer for her?”
So we did, and I felt better. Maybe saying the words and asking for help, that was important. Maybe I should go back to the hospital and hold Dad’s hands and say things like Father Stewart was saying to me. There wasn’t anything that I could do to change what had happened. What could I do to make Dad feel supported as his world fell apart?
Abigail Rath Versus Bloodsucking Fiends Page 14