“Are you going to apply to MCAD?” I asked. Minneapolis College of Art and Design would be a perfect fit for a college for Bea. They even taught courses on graphic novels and animation.
She shook her head lightly, not breaking the deep concentration she always entered when drawing. “My dad won’t pay for it. He thinks art is a fine hobby, but I should get a real education to support my ‘dabbling.’”
“Your dad’s an asshole,” I noted, leaning over her shoulder to watch as she transformed the blank section of the notepaper into a work of art. “You’d be wasted as a computer programmer.”
That was what Bea’s dad was, and, consequently, he thought all this artsy-fartsy stuff such as theater and drawing were trivial distractions from the real world. Bea’s mom was a little more supportive, but she was in the same camp when it came down to the importance of a decent job and financial security.
Heck, neither of Bea’s parents had much respect for my mom’s work. I’d heard them at parties tell her half jokingly, half seriously that it was time for her to grow up and move out of the dorm. It was true that my mom worked long hours, but that was because she wasn’t tenured. To make up for that, she taught as an adjunct professor at several different colleges and universities in the area.
At least I knew my mom wouldn’t turn up her nose if I applied to a theater program somewhere. She figured all college degrees were valuable, even the most liberal of the liberal arts. But I would have a fight if I decided not to go to college, or, Goddess forbid, a technical or community college. In fact, I’d better pick a school with a good reputation or I’d never hear the end of it. She would probably rather die than tell her colleagues her daughter was off at some kind of party school, like the University of Florida–Gainesville.
“You’re missing driver’s ed,” Bea noted when she looked up long enough to stretch her neck. Pointing to the candy red analog alarm clock, complete with big brass bells, she said, “It’s after ten.”
“I know,” I said. Speaking of things Mom would be mad about, I’d begged and begged her to get me into a driver’s education program that wouldn’t interfere too much with my summer plans or my vampire princess duties. To spite me, I swear, she got me into a class that started at eight in the morning. This would be the third class I’d missed. I’d slept through the other two. “I’m never going to get my license.”
“You don’t need to drive. You could get an Igor as a chauffeur,” Bea pointed out.
I made a face. “Only if he’s not one of the smelly ones.” A lot of the Igors I’d met had a dubious sense of hygiene. They hung out in too many caves, I guessed.
My cell beeped. I checked the text. It was Thompson, wanting to know if I was up for meeting him for lunch before tryouts for the Renaissance Festival. Sounded like a date to me, so I turned to Bea. “Want to go to lunch with me and Thompson?”
“I don’t want to be a third wheel,” she teased.
“Gah! We are not dating!” I said, though I was beginning to wonder if I had missed that particular memo. Anyway, I was already telling him that he could pick us up at Bea’s house because she was coming along. Having done this with theater people before, I added, “We should decide now where we want to go. I hate all that ‘I dunno, where do you want to go’ stuff.”
“Jimmy John’s,” Bea suggested.
I had enough money for that, so I texted Thompson. Then I sent another one telling him to bring his truck because I needed to throw my bike in the back.
He replied, “Bike? Bet u look like W. Witch.”
Bea, who read it over my shoulder, chuckled. “He thinks you’re cute.”
“How do you get that? The Wicked Witch was green.”
“You know that’s not how he meant it,” Bea said, her grin widening. “I don’t know why you’re so resistant. He’s cute and sweet on you, and now he’s a theater guy. That’s all win, girl.”
“If you ignore our terrifying history.” I grimaced. When Bea had the audacity to look confused, I explained. “He used to bully us, Bea. All the time. Don’t you remember putting a spell on him when it looked like he was going to punch us? The rude words on my locker? The licking incident? Hello, that was only last year.”
Bea frowned briefly and then dismissed all that with a little shrug. “We were in a show together. That forgives everything.”
I wasn’t sure I agreed. Sure, doing the updated version of My Fair Lady opposite Thompson was pretty amazing. He seemed like a completely different person during the run of the show. Maybe that was part of it. I just didn’t trust the change to last.
I had to admit it was nice to be worrying about boys instead of vampires for the moment. I wondered, however, if Bea intentionally distracted me. She’d dropped a pretty big bomb at the breakfast table—that the Elders were seriously considering letting everyone in the kingdom die from neglect, as it were. I wasn’t even sure that would work. I got the impression from Elias that they would become nosferatu before that. Mom had found that out last night too. Hadn’t she brought that up to the Elders at their secret meeting?
I wanted to ask Bea but was afraid that if she didn’t know, she’d tell. I didn’t want the Elders to have any more of a head start than they already had.
Knees bent up and ankles crossed, she lay on her bed, putting the finishing touches on her drawing. The grimoire sat open beside her. She looked so comfortable with the book that I got the feeling she’d done this many times before. She claimed she couldn’t read the writing, but I’d have bet it wouldn’t take her artist’s eye long to parse out the letters if she put any effort into it at all. She’d known it was in Old English.
Bea was craftier than I gave her credit for.
Putting her pencil down, she noticed me staring at her and smiled broadly. “Hey, what do you think I should wear to tryouts?”
And she hopped up to drag me into the furious business of fashion decisions. I didn’t surface until we heard the beep of Thompson pulling up to the house.
Matt Thompson arrived in the kind of truck you’d expect to have a gun rack in the back and, in the proper season, a dead deer in the bed. He was a hockey player and had the kind of dark curly hair that made cheerleaders swoon. His jeans were dusty and grass-stained, and he had a body that looked as if he actually used it for something.
I dare say I noticed that body thanks to a nicely fitting T-shirt that clung in all the right places.
We stood on the stoop as he walked up the sidewalk. Bea leaned into me and quietly said, “Yum.”
“You should date him,” I told her, even though I couldn’t have agreed more about his appeal.
“He’s not even looking at me, girlfriend.”
It was true. Bea could have been invisible for all that he seemed to notice her. And I’d helped her pick out her cutest outfit too. She wore a sparkly belly-shirt that showed off a tiny bit of skin and low-slung, curve-hugging jeans. We’d learned from experience that it helped to show off your, uh, assets when auditioning. It usually worked even with gay-guy directors. But Thompson was apparently immune.
“Hey,” he said to me, stopping just short of the steps. Standing as I was at the top, we were almost eye to eye. For the first time, I noticed that Thompson’s eyes were blue—a soft, sort of denim color. Like the jeans he wore, they seemed faded but lived-in.
Bea broke the spell by clucking her tongue disapprovingly. “You look as if you’ve been rolling in the grass,” Bea said, pointing to the flecks of clippings that clung to his cuffs. “Where’ve you been?”
“Work,” Thompson said, his gaze finally leaving me for a brief glance in her direction. “I didn’t have time to change.”
Thompson worked for his dad’s landscaping company during the summer. I hadn’t told him, but I’d actually seen him earlier in the week. His crew woke me up at nine o’clock when their gigantic mowing machines trimmed the neighbor’s lawn. Surreptitiously through the lace curtains, I’d watched Thompson clip the hedges that I’d crashed into las
t year when I attempted a vampire-ninja jump off my carriage house roof. I probably should have gone out to say hello, but, honestly, I was kind of worried I might embarrass him.
“You look fine,” I said quickly.
But Bea already started in, saying, “You can’t wear that to an audition. They’re not doing Oklahoma!”
“You really think it matters?” Thompson looked down at the dusty T-shirt that fit him oh so well and frowned.
“No,” I said honestly. It was a classic double standard, but the truth was that usually shows were so hurting for male bodies that directors would take any boy, even if he came dressed in a gunny sack. I wouldn’t have thought a few grass stains would matter.
Bea shot me a look. “Of course it does. There are going to be a ton of other guys there. This is Festival, not some high school play. We should skip lunch and get you some better duds. Do you live close?”
He looked around at the large perfect houses in Bea’s neighborhood and shook his head as if she must be kidding. “I live in Phalen.”
I watched Bea struggle not to make some kind of derogatory comment or look down her nose. “Oh. Well then, we’d better hurry.”
If Thompson noticed, he didn’t say anything. He just went over to where I’d tossed my bike on the ground, and picked it up. We trailed behind. I scrunched my face at Bea. She lifted her shoulders and opened her palms, as if to ask what I was so cranky about. Bea could be so insensitive. Ever since we were in My Fair Lady together, I knew how much Thompson struggled to feel a part of our theater clique. He might not be my boyfriend, but I didn’t like to see him hurt.
I hurried to stand beside him as he lowered the tailgate. “You know, if this is awkward, I honestly don’t think it’s absolutely necessary. Like I told you before, I heard the audition is all improv. I don’t think they’re really going to care if we’re dressed up. I mean, I’m going in this.”
After moving aside a toolbox and a case of Diet Pepsi, he carefully set my bike down. He wiped his hands on his jeans and straightened up. He looked me over. “Yeah, but you look good in anything,” he said with a smile. Then he looked down at his broad, manly chest, clearly seeing something I didn’t, because he looked disappointed. “Bea’s right. I should probably clean up a little. If I’m going to be a knight in shining armor, I probably shouldn’t be sweaty.”
Actually, standing as close as we were, I wanted to tell him that the scent of freshly cut grass and musk smelled damn good on him. But Bea pulled at the car handle impatiently. “Are we going or what?”
A brief flash of irritation flickered across Thompson’s face. “Yeah, let’s go.”
I should date him, I thought. He and my best friend already hate each other.
The drive to Thompson’s house continued the awkward mood.
Bea insisted I sit in the middle. The cab wasn’t really meant for three. My thighs pressed against Bea on one side and Thompson on the other. Every time he used the stick shift, Thompson’s arm grazed my breast. Worse, I was kind of tippy because my butt straddled a raised section of the slippery upholstery. Each corner we took brought me much closer to either of them than I would have liked.
Actually, I think Thompson and I would have been fine. Each time gravity threw me at him, we shared a secret, amused smile.
Bea, however, was complainy and seemed determined to start a fight. “You don’t have an MP3 player?” she asked, though the answer was pretty clear, especially given that she was pointing at the simple dashboard radio.
“You can listen to music if you want to,” Thompson said, reaching past me to flick the knob. Heavy metal blasted from the speakers.
Even though Thompson clearly knew the song as he bobbed his head along with the rhythm, Bea knocked into me as she grabbed for the tuner. I scrunched up against Thompson’s shoulder as she spun the dial. She settled on an alt-rock station … which just happened to be playing Ingress, my ex-boyfriend’s band.
Bea gave a squeal of delight. “Hey, Ana! It’s Nik!”
Did she really think any of us in the truck needed the identification, or the reminder that I used to be romantically attached to a rock star?
Beside me, I felt Thompson’s body stiffen. To his credit, he tried to act mildly interested. “I heard they’ve got some kind of record deal.”
I’d heard that too, but even so, something weird twinged in my chest. Jealousy?
“Columbia,” Bea agreed. “The big league.”
The twinge suddenly felt more like a punch in the gut. She knew details? Was Nik still talking to Bea? She once wanted to date him, but she was with Malcolm now, wasn’t she? I opened my mouth to ask her when she last talked to Nik, but she shushed me to sing along.
To a song, I wanted to point out, that he wrote for me.
Chapter Seven
I had a hard time concentrating on anything else for the rest of the trip. Memories and emotions roiled around in my head to the point that I didn’t even notice when we’d turned up Johnson and sped past the lake Thompson’s neighborhood was named after.
Apparently sharing gossip about Ingress constituted some kind of truce between Bea and Thompson, because they chatted amiably about the upcoming audition. I didn’t really pay the conversation any mind until Thompson’s admission: “My dad thinks I’m at a job fair.”
“You lied?” Bea was horrified, although she herself rarely told her folks anything; I couldn’t even remember the last time she had.
“I had to,” Thompson said, turning down a narrow street lined with brick apartments. Kids playing kick ball in the street moved out of the truck’s way. “My dad would never give me time off to go to an audition.”
Remembering that his dad never came to see him star in the show, I gave his leg a sympathetic squeeze. He tried to smile at my gesture, but his expression looked sadder than anything else.
“What are you going to tell him if you get in?” Bea wanted to know.
“It’s on the weekends. It won’t interfere with work,” he said with a defiant lift of his shoulder. “Besides, there’s a paycheck. It’s like a second job. He has to respect that.”
He seemed to be trying to convince himself. But it was true that the Renaissance Festival paid. It wasn’t much; in fact, the amount was laughable for first-year rookies, which we would be, but it was money.
“Your dad sounds like mine,” Bea said.
Thompson grunted. I wasn’t sure if it was in disbelief or sympathy. Directing his question to me, he asked, “What about your dad, Ana? What does he think of your theater stuff?”
“My dad?” I remembered the crazy haze that clouded his eyes before he suggested that his hungry subjects devour me, and I shivered. “I don’t know, and I don’t care. We don’t really talk.”
Bea was gesturing over my head when I looked up, and I thought I saw her mouth “separated,” which I guessed was technically true.
“It’s cool,” Thompson said. “My parents are divorced too. My mom moved back to Ohio, and we lost touch. I heard she might finally be in rehab, though.” He trailed off then, as if he suddenly realized he’d said just a bit too much. His announcement, “Here we are,” spared us the opportunity to completely mess up a thoughtful response. He pulled the truck up to a curb. There were no sidewalks in this part of town, and the houses were one-story squares in various states of repair. The one I guessed to be Thompson’s had the nicest, greenest lawn, and the framing around the front door had recently been replaced, as the wood was bare and unpainted.
Bea started to open the door, but Thompson reached across me to put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m just going to be a minute. Why don’t you girls wait here?”
“Aw, come on.” Bea pouted. “I totally want to see your house.”
“There it is, four two one,” he said, gesturing toward the house. His face was closed, and I could tell he would resist any argument. “Just wait here.”
I gave Bea the don’t-push-it glare, and, for once, she listened to me. “Fine, but I
’ll expect a full tour sometime!” she called after him as he dashed up the asphalt drive.
“Yeah, maybe next Garden Stroll,” he shouted back, referencing the fancy tea and garden charity event in my neighborhood. I blushed.
“Check out this place,” Bea said gleefully, once Thompson had slipped inside. “Oh my God.”
I couldn’t see what her problem was. Okay, so these weren’t hundred-year-old mansions with sprawling, palatial lots, but they seemed homey and mostly well cared for. There was that one house in the middle of the block that had a dirt-packed yard full of filthy children’s toys and other detritus, but Thompson couldn’t control who his neighbors were any more than I could.
I was just about to tell her to be nicer when I noticed a woman coming out of Thompson’s house. Thin to the point of being scrawny, she wore a bikini that left little to the imagination. She tottered toward us in high-heeled sandals. She waved at us. I returned her greeting halfheartedly and gave Bea a questioning look. Bea’s eyes nearly bulged out of her head.
The woman leaned into the open window on the driver’s side. She had bleach blond hair and smoked a cigarette. She blew the blue smoke off to the side and then smiled at us. I couldn’t determine her age. If Thompson hadn’t said his mother was in Ohio, I might have assumed this was his mom.
“Hi, girls,” she said. Her skin was tanned, but it had that sort of leathery look of someone who’s spent too much time exposed to the elements. “Which one of you lucky ladies is dating Matt?”
I couldn’t find words for a reply, so, of course, Bea chimed in. “Ana,” she said with a helpful point at me.
“I’m not dating Thompson,” I said for the fifteenth time that day, but my voice was very small.
She didn’t hear, anyway, because she talked right over me, “Oh, Ana! I’ve heard so much about you. Matthew says you’re so smart, and some kind of actress?”
“I guess,” I admitted, since the last part seemed to be a question of some sort.
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