On the other hand, a pet human would probably require far too much maintenance. Nosy critters, weren’t they? “No,” she said.
“Okay,” he said. “I am an excellent listener, if you change your mind.”
“You’re just the whole package, aren’t you? Kind to kittens and puppies. Don’t park in the handicap spot. Never leave the toilet seat up. I’ll bet all the girls melt every time you walk by.”
“That’s why I always carry a towel. Clean up the meltwater.”
She laughed out loud and then instantly stopped as she realized she was laughing at a human’s wit. Surely this was a sign of a coming apocalypse. Turning away from him, Pearl looked out the window.
As they drove across town, Pearl watched the sun glint off car windows and houses. It danced over fences and sidewalks. At a traffic light she leaned forward to study the pedestrians. The sunlight reached everywhere all at once. Everything from the shape of their faces to the depth of their shadows looked different.
Pearl fantasized about throwing the curtains open in her Family’s living room and lounging on the couch in the sunlight. . . Of course, if daylight was theirs, it would change more than just house lighting. For one thing, they could hunt in the day. But, to be honest, she also liked the idea of just sitting on a sunlit couch with a magazine.
As the last pedestrian hobbled across the street, Pearl said, “I didn’t realize so many people were up and about this time of day.”
“Not a morning person?” he asked.
“You could say that.”
“I always wake at dawn,” he said. “Doesn’t matter what time I fall into bed. The birds and me, we’re pals. I know, it’s weird.”
“Coffee drinker?”
“Nope.”
“Oh?” She perked up. No coffee in the blood was a plus.
“Mountain Dew, every morning.”
Uh-oh, there went her perfect meal. Also, it explained his puppylike cheer. She wrinkled her nose. “Ever think of switching to apple juice or milk?”
“Didn’t figure you for a health nut,” he said.
“I watch what I eat.” She smiled sweetly at him.
Evan turned into the library parking lot, and Pearl was disappointed to see it swarming with early risers—librarians arriving to work, a father with a set of toddlers, a pair of senior citizens. Oh, well, she didn’t really want secondhand Mountain Dew anyway. She could wait longer for her breakfast, but the day wouldn’t wait. She unclipped her seat belt as Evan parked.
“You sure you’re okay here?” he asked.
He sounded genuinely concerned, and for the barest of seconds, Pearl was flustered. Why on earth should this random boy care? Because he thinks you’re human, she answered herself. “I can take care of myself,” she said as she opened the car door.
“Of course you can,” he said. “That’s why you were walking down the center of the street at dawn in hooker wear.”
Pearl felt her eyes bug. “I am not wearing hooker clothes.” She surveyed herself: black leather corset top, lace skirt, knee-high boots. “It’s Goth.”
“Sure it is.”
“And it’s ironic.”
“The Titanic labeled ‘unsinkable’ is ironic. Your skirt is just short.”
“I happen to know I have nice legs.”
“All the world happens to know you have nice legs.”
Her mouth opened and shut like a fish. She knew there was a reason she avoided talking to humans. She stepped out of the car and slammed the door.
He opened his door and stepped out too. Leaning his arms on the roof of the car, he said, “I stuck my foot in my mouth. I’m sorry. It’s just . . . All I’m trying to say is that you give off a cry-for-help vibe, and I want to help.” Again he radiated sincerity nearly as bright as the sun. She wondered if all humans were this intrusively nice. It was obnoxious.
“So you criticize my clothes. Very helpful.” Pearl glanced down and saw streaks of black reflected in the car window. She saw a hint of a pale face, ghostlike, that drifted over the glass and then vanished. Shaken, she retreated from the car and the impossible reflection. “Thanks for the lift. See you around.” Spinning on her heel, she strode away.
“Hey, will I see you at school?”
“Nope, sorry,” she said. “Homeschooled.”
As she walked up the ramp toward the library, she swayed her hips. Let him watch that. He had zero right to judge her.
She didn’t slow as she strode through the library doors, breezing past the librarians at the front desk and past the set of toddlers clustered around their daddy by the return bin. Her indignation lengthened her strides. Snacks didn’t have the right to criticize her. He was so far beneath her. In fact, he was so below her on the food chain (literally) that she wasn’t going to waste a second more of daylight in thinking about him or his ill-conceived and ill-considered and just all-around ill opinions.
In the reading room, she halted in the center of the carpet. Colored sunlight streamed through the stained glass. Slices of ruby and emerald split the room and overlapped on the wood bookshelves. All of her irritation drained out of her. She turned slowly in a circle, drinking in the blues and reds and purples. Colored light tinted her pale skin, and Pearl raised her arm and turned it over to watch the stained-glass light dance over her blue veins and bring hints of color into the whiteness, as if her skin were Formica.
Well, look at that, she thought. I’m a sparkly vampire.
But it was only a trick of the light through the glass. Entering the reading room, a girl with strawberry-blonde hair also glistened as if sparkles were imbedded in her skin. For the first time, Pearl looked at a human as if she were a work of art rather than a meal.
The girl never looked at Pearl, never knew how lucky she was to be here safe in the sun, rather than meeting Pearl in the shadows. Oblivious, the girl curled up in a sunlit chair with a book. Pearl resumed studying the light.
Slowly, the sunlight drifted from window to window, tossing colors and lighting up different panes of glass. She tracked it around the room like a cat after a mouse. She ignored the looks of the humans, and she dismissed the several librarians who asked if she needed help—what was it with these humans and their offers to help? She resolved to find a different wardrobe for her next foray into day. Maybe she could ask Antoinette. Assuming, of course, there was a next foray into day. . .
This could be a one-day miracle. If so, she’d better drink down every second.
Abruptly, she strode out of the reading room. The girl with the strawberry-blonde hair put down her book as Pearl passed by.
Pearl’s heels clicked on the library lobby’s parquet floor. She shouldered past an elderly couple. She smelled their blood, pressing against their thin skin, but she didn’t even slow. The sliding doors opened before her and she walked out into the light. Across from the library was a school yard. She crossed the parking lot and squeezed through a break in a chain-link fence.
A field stretched before her. She began to run. Feeling the wind in her face, she ran faster and faster. Her legs blurred as she raced, sun on her shoulders, across the field.
In the center of the field, she flopped down on the grass. She lay on her back and looked up at the blue sky. Around her, all traces of darkness had disappeared. The overhead sun had rid the world of shadows. Yet here she was, a child of shadows.
Soaking in the sun, she lost track of time.
After a while, in the distance, she heard laughter and lifted her head above the grass to see real, live human children pouring out of one of the school buildings. They swarmed like gnats over the playground. They swung themselves up onto the jungle gym. Screeching, they flew on the swings. In pairs and solo, they zipped down the slides.
Pearl had never seen so many children at once. Sometimes she’d see them in the evenings, especially in summer, but never en masse. She felt pressure against her gums as her fangs began to poke into her mouth. Drooling at the children, she sat up. Even across the fiel
d, she saw their plump faces, flushed pink as their sweet blood rushed through them.
She also saw, across the field, a blue Honda Civic.
Rising to her feet, Pearl shielded her eyes from the sun. The sun on the windshield obscured her view of the inside, but she was certain that it was Evan’s car, even though he’d dropped her off ages ago in a different parking spot. The guy really did have some serious Good Samaritan issues. If he wanted that badly to help her, he could oblige her by donating a pint. She crossed the field toward the car.
Before Pearl reached the parking lot, the strawberry-blonde girl from the reading room climbed into the Honda Civic. Pearl watched the car sparkle and flash in the light as it zipped backward and peeled away.
Chapter
FIVE
On the roof of her house, Pearl drank in the sunset. She watched the light paint the sky colors she’d never known existed. As the sun dipped lower, it darkened to a burnt orange, and the clouds around it were streaked with rose and purple. Above her a few stars poked through as if someone had pricked the blue with a needle and caused it to bleed light.
She’d spent the day outside. She’d lain on park benches, wandered into stores that were closed at night, and watched the humans scurry about like (tasty) squirrels. In the backyard of a random house, she had kicked off her boots and walked through the empty flower beds. The sun had warmed the dirt in a way that the moon never did, and she could feel the tips of bulbs, waiting to burst out of the earth, as full of promise as a freshly risen vampire. It had been a marvelous day.
As the sun melted behind the hills and trees, Pearl felt a lump in her throat like a clot of cotton. Her eyes itched. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, and she noticed a streak of blood decorated her skin. She stared at her blood tear for a moment, the tear of a vampire.
“Seriously?” she said out loud. She was all choked up over the sunset? She was a vampire, a nightwalker. She shouldn’t mourn the end of day. It had been nice. It had been fun. It had been kind of pretty. But her kind ruled the night.
Right now, though, she didn’t feel like ruling anything. She felt exhausted down to the marrow of her bones. As the last drop of sun disappeared, she slipped down the roof tiles, hopped off the porch roof, and let herself inside.
The house was silent.
Slipping into the hall closet, she unlocked the seven locks on the hidden door. She tiptoed down the stairs into the catacombs beneath. In the underground chambers, she heard the Family stirring as they woke for the night—a door squeaked, voices murmured, Cousin Jeremiah crooned in half Latin and half gibberish. Pearl let herself into her bedroom and collapsed on her bed. She’d rest a little, she told herself, and then she would tell everyone about her discovery.
She was asleep in an instant.
She snapped awake when her door clicked open. Lit by the hall light, Cousin Antoinette drifted into Pearl’s bedroom and peered down at Pearl. Antoinette had styled her hair like Cyndi Lauper, circa 1984, and she wore neon-red lipstick and yellow eye shadow.
“Congratulations,” Pearl told her. “You have now instilled in me a fear of being woken by a deranged clown.”
“You skipped lessons,” Antoinette said. “It’s nearly dawn. You are so dead, pun totally intended. Your mother wants you upstairs.”
Pearl shot up to sitting. She tossed off the sheets and was out the door before Antoinette could issue any comments on Pearl’s rumpled clothes or the fact that she’d slept in her boots. As she mounted the stairs toward the main house, she dragged her fingers through her hair until she’d smoothed it straight.
Catching up behind her, Antoinette chattered cheerfully about the plans for the Fealty Ceremony. Daddy had lined up a source for night-blooming flowers. Aunt Rose intended to embroider every tablecloth with gold thread. No one had a lead yet on a feast for the king and his guards, which was a worry.
Reaching the upstairs living room, Pearl halted in the doorway.
Ever the master of the obvious, Antoinette proclaimed, “Found her!”
Mother rose from her chair. “Go to bed, Antoinette. It is nearly dawn.”
Antoinette fled back downstairs.
For a moment, caught in Mother’s gaze, Pearl was frozen. Her voice locked in her throat, and her muscles tightened into knots of rope that wouldn’t unwind.
“Jadrien informs me that you missed your training with him tonight,” Mother said. Her voice was soft and even. There was no hint of anger or judgment, but still Pearl jerked backward as if she’d been hit. “You also missed lessons with Aunt Lianne and Aunt Fiona. Fiona in particular was most upset.”
Pearl clasped her hands behind her back and schooled her expression to one of bland interest. She didn’t know if it was Family legend or truth, but Aunt Fiona was reputedly descended from banshees. When she was upset, her screech could shake the plaster off the walls.
“Uncle Felix informs me that this is normal teenage rebellion,” Mother continued. “Is it, Pearl? Do you feel an unusual surge in hormones that is unbalancing your common sense?”
Pearl wondered if that was rhetorical or if Mother wanted an answer. As she waited for Mother to speak again, she felt a familiar itch across her skin: morning was coming. Outside, she heard the chittering of birds on the bushes by the windows. She looked at the thick curtains drawn across the living room window. “Mother, would you please wait by the bookcases?” She pointed to a corner of the room and then crossed to the window.
Pearl opened the shades. It was predawn. The sky was a dirty blue, speckled with a few stubborn stars. Dim early light lengthened the room’s shadows.
“Pearl.” Mother’s voice was sharp. “If you plan to immolate yourself, you should know that it is an exceedingly painful way to die.”
“Just . . . wait for a few minutes,” Pearl said. “You have to see to understand.” She positioned herself directly in front of the window and looked out at the east.
Behind her, Mother was silent.
A few moments later Pearl heard Daddy speak. “Kitten, why don’t you step away from the window.” She felt his hand on her shoulder. “You don’t need to do this. A few skipped lessons . . . Your punishment will not be so harsh as this.” He stroked her hair lightly as if she were a child. “You have a long and glorious existence ahead of you, my dear.”
“I know,” Pearl said. “Please, just . . . step back with Mother.” She turned to point and saw that all of the Family stood there. They clustered together in the far corner of the living room: Cousin Antoinette, Cousin Jocelyn, Uncle Pascha, Uncle Felix, Cousin Jeremiah, Uncle Stefan, Aunt Rose, Aunt Fiona, Cousin Shirley. . . Each of them watched her silently. A few, like Aunt Lianne, had their hands pressed across their hearts.
Cousin Jeremiah began to croon softly in a minor key.
Cousin Antoinette smacked him on the shoulder.
He quieted.
“Can I have her room if she dies?” Cousin Charlaine asked.
“Pearl, be sensible,” Jadrien said—they’d invited him, too, even though he wasn’t Family. Perhaps they thought he’d have influence over her. “If you won’t think of yourself, then think of me. I can’t have a fried girlfriend.”
Uncle Pascha intoned, “‘All our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!’”
Daddy cupped his hand under Pearl’s chin and lifted her face to look at him. “Think of all the glorious times that await you. You are only sixteen years into an existence that could stretch for centuries. You have not even tasted the blood of our king!”
“I don’t want to die, Daddy,” Pearl said. “You’ll see in a minute. The sun won’t hurt me. Yesterday I spent the day in the light. Our vulnerability to sun is a myth!”
The Family murmured.
“Daddy, step back, please,” she said. “It’s possible this was a one-day miracle.”
He shook his head. “You are my legacy. Your fate and mine—”
Sharply, Mother said, “Step back. Now.
”
He obeyed.
Outside, the sun poked a drop of brilliant golden orange above the hills. Pearl watched it as it lifted higher into the air, and the light spilled across the town, the trees, the yard, the shrubs, and through the window in the living room. It poured over her skin, and she stretched her arms toward it.
Again, she didn’t burn.
“Oh, my, wow!” Cousin Charlaine said. “We can face the sun!” She strode forward into the beam of light that fell across the living room. In a millisecond, her skin smoked and flame burst onto her face and arms. She screamed.
The Family stood motionless in the shadows.
Smoke billowed into the room, and the Family and Jadrien watched as Charlaine’s hair was wreathed in flame. Pearl took two long steps across the living room and shoved Charlaine out of the sunlight. She fell backward over Uncle Felix’s couch into the shadows.
“My couch!” cried Uncle Felix.
Aunt Rose tossed her embroidered quilt on top of Charlaine. Cousins, aunts, and uncles piled pillows on top of the quilt, smothering the flame beneath. All of them kept their distance—vampires are as flammable as gasoline-drenched kindling. Mother fetched a fire extinguisher, and the room was suddenly full of white foam that sprayed through the air, lingering in the smoke.
Pearl shut the shades over the window.
“Take her downstairs,” Mother ordered. “All of you, downstairs, now. Speak of this to no one. Understood? Consider yourselves sworn to secrecy. Pearl, stay.”
All the aunts, uncles, and cousins filed downstairs. Only Mother, Daddy, and Pearl remained. Mother frowned at the char marks on the couch. She tossed Aunt Rose’s quilt on the floor and stamped on it, extinguishing the remaining embers. Pearl waited without breathing, watching her.
Finally, Mother looked at Pearl.
“Well,” Mother said. “Isn’t this interesting?” Her inflection told Pearl nothing. She remembered once Cousin Jocelyn had dipped Jeremiah’s hand in holy water out of curiosity. Holy-water scars never faded. Mother’s retaliation had involved tattoos of matching scars on Jocelyn’s palms and knuckles. She wondered if Mother would recognize that this was different.
Drink, Slay, Love Page 5