“Well, I suppose that’s good for maintaining my privacy,” he mused dryly.
Siobhan stuck her tongue out at him. “All part of some plot of yours,” she accused. “I knew it.”
*
Siobhan’s phone was ringing. She was aware of it. She could hear it. But she was trying to nap. She had the bed all to herself, aside from Barton taking over the foot of it, and she could spread out as much as she wanted, and no one was interrupting her. At least, no one had been interrupting her until her phone had begun to ring.
She was actually sort of offended at the cell phone’s audacity. Honestly, who did it think it was? What gave it the right to interrupt her nap? She was a good person, and she didn’t deserve such disrespect.
With the utmost reluctance, she rolled over and grabbed her phone from where it sat on the bedside table, glaring at it distastefully. Her glare fell away, though, once she saw the name on the caller ID, replaced instead with quiet surprise.
Her brother hadn’t called her in years. Oh, sure, they spoke, but Siobhan usually initiated things. But after the last time she’d called him, setting her affairs in order in case the showdown with the seraphim resulted in her turning into a greasy smear on Belleview’s pavement (not the case, thankfully), she supposed she shouldn’t be surprised that he was trying to get in touch.
She answered the call and brought the phone to her ear with a mumbled, “H’lo.”
“…Did I wake you up?”
“Yes, and you’re an asshole for it,” Siobhan informed him plainly.
“It’s the middle of the afternoon?”
“Naps are a thing, Sean,” she explained patiently, muffling a yawn behind her hand. “What’s up?”
He cleared his throat. “I was talking to Sinead, and we decided the three of us should get together sometime. Soon, preferably. Before you make any other ‘bad omen’ phone calls and scare us half to death again.”
Siobhan supposed she could’ve just said ‘no, I’m busy.’ But she did miss her brother and sister. And she had meant it when she called and said she wished they got to see each other more often.
“No Mom and no Dad?” she asked, just to be sure.
Sean snorted, though it sounded more like a burst of static over the phone. “Duh, of course not.”
“Can I bring my boyfriend?” she asked, right on the tail of his words. “Or is this a ‘family only’ thing?”
“Well, if you don’t bring him, I don’t think we’re ever going to meet him,” Sean reasoned dryly, “so go ahead.”
“Do you have a girlfriend?” Siobhan wheedled, finally sitting up properly, internally admitting that her nap had been well and truly interrupted.
“All your questions can be answered in person,” he replied, trying and failing to sound mystical and mysterious. She took that as a no.
Siobhan scoffed. “Yeah, alright,” she sighed. “Two days from now, there’s a great little diner. We’ll meet at eight at night. I’ll text you the address.”
“Bit late for dinner, don’t you think?” he asked, though he didn’t sound like he was complaining.
“It’ll make sense once we’re there,” she assured him, though, truth be told, she hadn’t actually decided if she was going to explain anything to them or not.
She supposed it would depend on how well dinner went.
“Yeah, alright. I’ll let Sinead know.” He paused for a moment, as if he was going to say something else, but all he offered was, “See you in a couple days.”
“See you soon.” Siobhan hung up.
She dropped her phone back down onto the side table, flopped onto her back, and kicked her feet petulantly for a moment. Everything was getting so damn complicated again.
*
Two days passed in a flash. It seemed like Siobhan had hardly finished telling Jack, “You’re meeting my siblings,” before they were in his truck and driving to the diner. They made sure they were well fed before they left, and made doubly sure for Barton.
It was in a small town not too far from the manor, and it was cute. The diner looked as if it had been ripped right out of the 50’s and dropped on the side of the road in the 21st century. The floor tiles were a little beat-up, but it was clean, and Siobhan was reasonably sure the food was supposed to be good. Also, the owner liked dogs, which meant he was willing to let Barton trot into the building on Siobhan’s heels.
They sat in silence at first until Siobhan asked, as casually as she could, “Do you think Regina would completely hate me if I told my siblings about being a vampire?”
Jack looked up at her sharply, looking, for a moment, as if someone had slapped him with a halibut when he’d least expected it. To his credit, he regained his bearings quickly and shook his head. “Not completely,” he answered carefully, and he shrugged one shoulder. “And, I mean… if you think they aren’t going to go blabbing it to everyone they know, then you could just… tell them, and not tell Regina you did so.”
Siobhan blinked at him slowly, tipping her head to one side.
“She’s not actually psychic,” Jack pointed out plainly. “Good intuition, sure, but she’s not psychic. If you never mention it to her, I doubt she’s going to figure it out.”
“But—”
“Keep in mind, you’re already uncomfortable around all of them,” he reminded her wryly. “If you’re slightly more uncomfortable than usual until lying by omission stops bothering you, none of them are going to notice.”
Siobhan scowled at him, though it more resembled a pout. Even so, she couldn’t actually argue with that point, and she sighed out a slow breath. “Right. Well. I guess that’s decided, then.”
Jack arched one eyebrow and wondered with long-suffering amusement, “Do I actually get a say in this? I mean, I’m right here with you, so presumably, if you spill the beans, you’ll also be spilling the beans about me.”
Siobhan leaned her elbows on the table and cupped her chin in her hands, making her eyes large and round and innocent as she pointed out, “Presumably, if you really objected, you would have done so just now.” Her eyebrows rose slightly. “Since that’s not the case, I’m going to assume you don’t actually object,” she reasoned pleasantly. “Speak now or forever hold your peace, then.”
Jack held his hands up in surrender. “No, no, I’m good,” he assured her. “Go ahead and tell them.”
Siobhan nodded once in agreement and leaned back in her seat again.
Granted, that still meant she had to decide which details were relevant and which ones she should really probably keep away from her siblings. She had a feeling they wouldn’t react well to the notion of ‘an angel tried to drop me to my death and the only reason I didn’t actually die was because Jack tripped over me like a speed bump.’ When she thought about it like that, it just seemed like there were some details that they didn’t really need to know.
She occupied herself with pondering what to actually tell them, other than just ‘by the way, I’m a vampire now.’ She did, after all, want to explain things in such a way that they might actually believe her. She supposed her idea to confess everything was actually slightly more complicated than just spitting the words out, but she figured she had to do it regardless.
At least it gave her something to occupy her thoughts while they waited.
Siobhan and Jack waved the waitress off no less than four times before, at last, the diner’s door opened once again and Sean strolled in with Sinead trotting in his wake.
Sean was a tall young man, only a few years older than Siobhan. He looked a bit stretched out, as if he had fallen into a taffy puller at some point in the past and gotten stuck for a few moments before scrambling out. He was all long limbs, with hardly any meat on him at all. His hair was a shock of wild curls cropped close to his head, and his eyes were pale green. He had a bit of a tan and he was liberally speckled with freckles. Facially, he was narrow and pointy with a nose that looked a bit too thin for the rest of his face, as if it might try to pok
e someone’s eye out if only they got close enough.
Sinead was a waifish slip of a young woman, with skin so pale and perfect it could only have been achieved with complete avoidance of the sun. She had soft, round features and bright green eyes that threatened to take over her face. She was petite—thin and delicate—and she seemed to be the perfect height for Sean to use her head as an elbow rest. Her hair was black, short, and slicked back against her head. On the whole, she resembled some sort of fey creature that might dissolve into mist and vanish with a strong breeze.
While Sean remained fairly blasé, Sinead seemed to spring to life as soon as she spotted Siobhan, pausing mid-step while straightening up to her full (still rather diminutive) height and clutching her hands together in front of herself. She jerked back into motion, loping across the diner to the booth and throwing herself down on the bench Siobhan was sitting on. She looped her arms around Siobhan’s neck and reeled her into a hug that may very well have strangled her had she been a regular human.
Jack suddenly felt like chopped liver, as Sean slid onto the seat beside him with no fanfare whatsoever. It was quite an impressive contrast.
With Sinead still wrapped around her neck, Siobhan stated, “Jack, meet Sinead and Sean. Sinead and Sean, meet my boyfriend, Jack. And Barton.”
Sinead squealed in surprise as Barton sat up, shoving his head onto the bench from where he was sitting beneath the table. At last, she relinquished her hold on Siobhan as Barton nudged his head into her lap, so she could instead scratch his ears with both hands. “Oh, who’s a pretty boy?” she cooed, and Barton’s tail thumped noisily against one of the table legs.
Siobhan recoiled slightly as Sinead abruptly leaned right into her face, peering at her curiously. “I could’ve sworn your eyes used to be brighter,” she mused thoughtfully, slowly leaning back again. “I guess it really has been a while.”
Siobhan forced a smile and shrugged. “Weird how time can fly sometimes.”
Cautiously, the waitress approached again and visibly sighed in relief when, at last, they actually ordered. There was coffee all around and a great deal of breakfast food, despite the late hour.
Their conversation meandered from topic to topic as they caught up with what had been going on in their lives. Sinead was working as a courtroom stenographer, since it was a job that could be done even with fairly delicate health. Siobhan wasn’t sure why she had half-expected Sinead’s lacking immune system to have improved since they last saw each other, but she didn’t put much thought into the denied expectation. And she made blankets and winter accessories occasionally. She wrote down the name of her online shop on a napkin.
Sean worked no less than three part-time jobs, determined to keep himself as busy as he could to burn off the never-ending supply of energy that always buzzed beneath his skin. Some days, he was a valet. Some days, he was a waiter. Some days, he was a bouncer at a club, which seemed more than slightly strange, considering he was built like a cornstalk, but he had always been a bit like a mongoose, so Siobhan supposed she wouldn’t question it too much.
When they prodded at Jack, he settled on saying he was a personal assistant for a very wealthy woman. He tolerated it with good-natured exasperation when they ribbed him about being a fancy gofer. In a sense, they weren’t wrong, even if lately his job consisted of ‘go for this angel, go for that angel.’ Ah, the strange places life occasionally took them…
Of course, the conversation turned to Siobhan and her life eventually. She admitted readily to just living in the house of Jack’s employer and laying around looking pretty, but it was Sean who said, “I thought you were a bartender. What happened with that?”
Siobhan rubbed the back of her head and cleared her throat. “Well…”
“Uh oh,” Sinead sighed. “What happened?”
“I’m not actually human anymore,” Siobhan stated, throwing it out there because she knew it was the most likely thing to stun them into silence and let her simply keep talking.
As they gaped at her, she plowed onwards. “There was an accident at the cabin a couple months back, and I would’ve died. But Jack was in the area and found me because Barton was barking. Jack’s a vampire, and to save my life, he turned me. Since then, I’ve been busy helping with casual emergencies around the manor. As far as the owner of the bar is concerned, I got very sick and had to quit for my own health.”
She fell silent after that, folding her arms and leaning back at an angle against the wall, so she could watch both of her siblings expectantly.
It was Sean who burst out laughing, slumping down on the table as if he had begun to melt. As he howled with hilarity, he managed to get out in between peals of laughter, “Yeah—yeah, I can buy the whole ‘very sick’ part. Siobhan, what the fuck?” He folded his arms on the table and let his head fall down onto them as he laughed.
Sinead reached over to Siobhan and pressed a hand to her forehead. “You don’t feel like you’ve got a fever,” she mused, “but you’re definitely delusional.” Her brow furrowed in concern before she swung her attention to Jack, and concern turned into anger. She pointed an accusing finger at him.
“And you!” she snapped, and Jack recoiled slightly at the sharpness of her tone. “You’ve just been, what, encouraging this? What was it actually? She hit her head, you took her to the ER, and you decided you liked being her knight with shining fangs too much to get her actual help after that?”
“Hold on a second—”
Sinead didn’t give him a chance to protest, her words steamrolling right over the top of his. “That’s gross, and you should be ashamed of yourself!”
“Sinead—” Sean tried, only to nearly leap out of his seat when the accusing finger was instead leveled at him.
“He’s being a creepy, enabling bastard!” she argued sharply. “Am I supposed to be polite about that?”
With a slow sigh, Siobhan dragged her hand down her face. She had expected them to think she was joking. She had prepared for that outcome. She hadn’t expected this response, and she flashed Jack a tiny, apologetic smile as Sinead continued to glare furiously at him, as if she could melt a hole through his face with the power of her gaze alone. Jack looked less than impressed by Siobhan’s apology.
Siobhan straightened up, waving her hands to catch Sinead’s attention. “Slow your roll,” she huffed, slamming one hand down on the table. “No need to go attacking people.”
“But—”
“How about I show you where I’m living?” Siobhan interjected sharply, pasting a smile onto her face. “It’ll be fun! It’s huge.”
“Siobhan,” Sinead tried to reason, only to fall silent as Siobhan pressed two fingers to her lips.
“Shhhhh,” Siobhan cooed gently. “Just come see that place. You’ll feel better about all of this afterwards. Alright?”
Sinead’s eyes narrowed slowly, and then she huffed and folded her arms, her eyes dropping to the table. “Fine,” she relented. “This house had better be fucking spectacular, Siobhan, I swear to god,” she groused, just so she could have the last word.
Siobhan relaxed slightly. True, the manor was spectacular. Her siblings wouldn’t be able to deny that. But even more importantly, she knew of someone living there who would be undeniable proof that non-humans existed. Two someones, actually. They would probably make Siobhan’s story look a lot more convincing.
They left soon after. Everything had become a bit too awkward to carry on a proper conversation anymore.
*
Periodically, Siobhan peered in the rearview mirror to make sure that Sean’s car was still following them.
“I don’t think they’re going to suddenly take the next exit,” Jack assured her wryly after the sixth time she checked the mirror. “Especially with how dead set Sinead is on making sure you’re safe.” Siobhan stuck her tongue out at him and sat back in her seat.
When they were nearly to the manor, she began prodding at the mental bond with Gabriel, just to let him know that she
was very expectant. She felt a flare of something like muted curiosity, which turned to confusion as she just carried on being expectant at him. And she kept right on doing that, even once the truck was parked and Sean’s car was pulling to a halt, and all of them were spilling out onto the driveway. She kept right on being expectant at him until Sean and Sinead were beginning to get confused.
She held a finger up, both to silence any questions they might have asked and to silently say ‘hold on.’
There was one more pointed jab of expectancy, and then she heard feathers in the air, and Gabriel landed gently in front of her, his arms folded and his expression exasperated as he asked sharply, “What?”
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