“Of course,” Jude said, only a little deadpan.
“But now that you mention it...” The sharp, slightly mischievous ringleader smile crept back onto Jasper’s face, like he was about to welcome a captive audience to the greatest show in the underworld. “His hands were good for lots of things besides migraines. My favorite was—”
“All right,” Jude held up his own hands, but he was far from actually bothered, instead, deeply relieved to find himself back on solid ground. Jude had a very low tolerance for teasing under most circumstances, but when Jasper did it, the world made a little more sense. “I have a pretty good imagination.”
“As if you’d have to imagine!” Jasper actually laughed, and this one sounded much more genuine than his previous sardonic chuckles. “You knew we’d end up together before I did. And you’re blushing. You are!”
“I am not!” Jude protested, even as his hand flew up to his cheek to check. It was warm, which he knew it would be. Jasper had gotten under his skin again, this time without even trying. But the weariness and pain were gone from his face, and it even seemed like his head didn’t hurt quite as badly. An even trade.
“You were right, though, we did belong together. Sometimes you have to take a leap of faith. And adrenaline is an addictive substance.”
“Addictive.” Jude couldn’t help but smile. “Really.”
“The only thing better than jumping out of a helicopter, running into a burning building, or asking someone to marry you is live theatre.” He adjusted his red silk scarf and sequined collar. “Or so I’ve heard.”
They both fell silent, comfortably so. Jude rarely felt the need to fill up quiet rooms with meaningless words, and never with Jasper or Eva. With them, he wouldn’t have cared if it stretched on all day. He knew exactly how rare and wonderful that was, to have two people in his life he could say that about. He’d once had three, but he still counted himself lucky.
“I would have loved to be your best man,” he said at last. It was hard to get the words out, but not because they weren’t true. Quite the opposite. The truer and more important something was, the harder verbalizing it seemed to be. “If things had gone differently. I wish they’d gone differently.”
“Me too,” Jasper answered mildly. His tone was light and noncommittal, revealing nothing. He didn’t have to. It hurt anyway.
“Just the fact that you asked me...” Jude continued, suddenly finding words pale, clumsy things, not at all what he needed to express the never-ending gratitude and deep warmth he carried with him through the bleakest of nights. “Best man. Man, specifically—you don’t know how much that means. I don’t think you can.”
“We had some idea,” Jasper said, an answering fondness in his voice. “But you’re right, some things no one can really understand unless they live it. I’m glad we could give that to you.”
“You were the first I told. Before Eva, even.”
Jasper looked up now, eyes clearing and wide with what looked like slight surprise and deeper emotion. “Even her? I didn’t know that.”
“You were the first to call me by my name.” Jude nodded, swallowing past the thickening feeling in his throat. All this time, and he’d never told Jasper any of this. Maybe he should have, years ago. They both knew firsthand the importance of making sure loved ones knew exactly how important they were, while the chance remained. “You called me a man for the first time in my life.”
“Well,” Jasper said, slowly rising to his feet and replacing his hand on Jude’s arm. This time he didn’t move away. “We always did think you were the best.”
It took Jude a moment to clear his eyes and even longer to speak. “There’s really nothing I can do, is there?”
“Just listening helps.” Jasper’s face was soft under the dark, sharp-lined makeup. “Talking about him helps. I don’t do it enough.” His eyes narrowed again then, tone turning a little bitter. “Or maybe I do it too much, I don’t really know anymore.”
“I don’t know if there is a too much.” Jude tried to maintain the connection they’d enjoyed for these few minutes, a deep understanding that made him like feel part of the world again instead of isolated from it. He knew it was good for Jasper too, but he could feel the distance between them growing, just like Eva last night. There was only so much either of them could handle before the pain got too close, even in memories. “Not when you lose someone like that. I hope you find some peace, Jasper.”
Jasper replaced his hat and shot Jude a smile that came nowhere near reaching his eyes. “After five years, I’m lucky if I can find my way home.”
The walk home was short and blissfully silent. Jude barely saw anything, eyes out of focus and feet carrying him back to Sunset Towers—his usual, vampire free route—the way he did most things, by muscle memory. He’d already hit the lights, made it into the kitchen, and opened the fridge when he heard it. A soft noise, half-knocking, half-scratching, like someone fumbling with the doorknob with their hands full.
“Eva?” He called, poking his head back out of the kitchen. His living room was actually feeling warm and almost homey, a far cry from the tense atmosphere from the night before. It was amazing what a good conversation with a trusted friend could do. Even if he was on his own when it came to vampires—which he was done chasing, he reminded himself, so this was quickly becoming a moot point—and even if Jasper was clearly still in a much worse place than he’d like to admit, Jude couldn’t help but feel better about everything. He’d made the right decision, and he wasn’t alone, not really. Maybe this was how healing started.
“Come on in, enjoy some delicious blood sauce,” he laughed a little at himself, hand on the doorknob. “How much of that stuff did you say you had? 99 bottles? Was that a joke, or—”
CRASH.
Shards of glass and wood showered the living room as something exploded through the nearby window. Jude barely caught a glimpse of a shadowy form topped with a flash of pink as he dove behind the couch, heart in his mouth as he tried to gauge the distance between himself and his next course of action.
Back in the kitchen, grab the holy water? Too far, by precious seconds. Bedroom? Required leaving his cover. He couldn’t even see well enough to make a choice that didn’t end in death—whatever it was had knocked over a lamp and shattered the bulb in a shower of sparks, halving the light and casting strange, flickering shadows up across the walls and ceiling.
Every option opened himself to attack from whoever—or whatever—had just slammed into his living room like an asteroid. Paralyzed by indecision and fighting panic, Jude held perfectly still and did nothing at all.
A few seconds went by, silence broken only by his own shallow breathing. Then:
“Ow.”
Jude didn’t recognize the voice. And couldn’t tell from the single word where the intruder was. He waited a little longer, but nothing met his ears but more silence, and the whistling of a cold night wind through his now-broken window. Finally, very slowly, he peered out from behind the couch.
He had one chair that matched the old sofa, and now it was tipped over along with the lamp, lying on its back on the floor. In it, a young man sprawled, upside-down and legs in the air, looking like he’d just stepped out of a punk rock concert, or maybe off the stage. His jeans were torn, his hair was bright pink, and his ears were full of piercings—large, unusually pointed ears. His only concession to the cold outside was a scarf pulled tight around his neck, black, covered in tiny red skulls, and with the tags still hanging from it. New at best, stolen at worst. The whole ensemble would have been at home at some loud, chaotically anarchist gathering Jude would have wanted to leave immediately. But none of that actually added up to intimidation, at least not while he was down on the floor. If this was a burglar, he was about the most ineffective one Jude had ever seen.
And he made no effort to move, folding his hands across his soft, round belly and staring up at the ceiling. Didn’t even seem hurt or distressed, more like he was getting his b
earings and taking a quick break. For the few seconds it took both of them to adjust, he stayed right where he’d landed.
When Jude managed to speak, his own voice was surprisingly calm, considering. “What the fuck?”
The uninvited guest stared up at him, a matching expression of confusion on his upside-down face. “You’re the one who invited me in.”
“I did not,” Jude said automatically.
“Yes you did, I heard you, just now, you said ‘let yourself in.’ So I did.”
“I wasn’t talking to you!”
The pink-haired intruder shrugged, or did the closest movement possible while lying on his back. “Sorry. My bad.”
“Your bad...” Jude repeated, raising his eyebrows in bewilderment, suddenly aware of how absurd all this was. He was arguing with a young punk—exactly the kind of delinquent who made Jude’s reluctant job harder every day, the kind who threw things at Eva, the kind that still hadn’t righted himself or gotten up off the floor. “This is my apartment. And that was my window.”
“Yeah…” Now he slowly sat up, brushing small bits of glass off his shoulders and back. He seemed only slightly sore rather than actually hurt by his sudden and exciting entrance. He’d come through in a lot better shape than Jude’s window, at least. “Sorry about that. Windows just kind of sneak up, you know?”
“No,” Jude shook his head, actually impressed at exactly how calm he was staying. “I don’t. I don’t know anything. Like what you’re doing here… Pixie.”
“Hey, you remember!” Jude’s upstairs neighbor had always been distinctive. The bright hair and shiny piercings, his small, chubby build made of soft curves and few sharp angles. The way his nose wrinkled up a little when he smiled (infuriatingly, that was the exact look he’d had right before Jude had told him to turn his music down, the exact one). The big, pointed ears with their rows of studs and hoops, which gave a little twitch, as if he knew Jude was looking at them specifically.
“You’re kind of hard to forget. I thought you were missing,” Jude said, relieved despite his frustration and everything else about this moment. This was unmistakably Pixie, from the pink hair to the unlikely name. Still, something he couldn’t quite place was bothering him. Besides his window, lamp, and glass-covered floor.
“How can I be missing if I’m right here?” Pixie seemed to find the idea amusing. Jude didn’t, eyes narrowing as he peered closer, trying to get a better look in the too-low light.
“Something’s different about you.” Jude was sure of that, but still couldn’t say why. It wasn’t his hair, although that had changed since Jude had seen him. Last time they’d clashed it had been an electric blue, appropriately sticking straight up as if he’d stuck his toe in a wall socket. It wasn’t even the scarf or the T-shirt Jude had never seen before, ripped in a way that might have been intentional, reading ‘Chaos Chainsaw.’ Was that a band? A singer? A too-strong drink? So much baffled him tonight.
“Well, you look the same as ever,” Pixie said, still sounding upbeat and eager to make a good first impression. He could start by repairing the window. “Jude, right?”
“That’s right,” he said, still studying his impromptu nighttime visitor and resisting the urge to show him out the way he'd come in.
“Hey, Ju—uh,” Pixie stopped as Jude’s face hardened into an immediate glare. He’d put up with a lot tonight and that would have just been the last straw. If even Eva and Jasper weren’t allowed to tease him like that—not that they would on purpose, they knew how he felt about it—this guy absolutely wasn’t. A sheepish grin spread across Pixie’s face, and he pointed up with two black-nailed fingers. “Dude. Hey, dude, how’s it going?”
“It’s quieter. Haven’t had to make a noise complaint in the past month.”
“You never did appreciate my music,” the younger man said primly, getting up off the floor. He talked as if he had some kind of high ground despite being surrounded by broken glass. Which he’d shattered.
“No, I don’t. And I asked you very politely—”
“Pff, banging on your ceiling is polite? You almost punched a hole in my floor!”
“I had to get your attention somehow, since apparently asking five or six times wasn’t good enough!”
“Everybody’s a music critic!”
“That was not music.” Jude folded his arms while Pixie clapped a hand to his chest and gasped as if mortally offended. “I don’t know what that was, but it wasn’t music, it wasn’t anything I’ve ever—”
“Excuse me!” Pixie’s large ears twitched again as he took a step closer, looking up at a sharp angle at the taller Jude, who stared unflinchingly right back down. “I don’t criticize your taste in whatever it is you like!”
“No, you just burst into my apartment at night, almost give me a heart attack, and shatter my window! You still haven’t told me what you want.”
“Want?” Pixie let out a giggle that sounded distinctly nervous. “Can’t a guy just, uh, wanna come see a fr—not a friend, just another guy, a familiar—”
“Familiar is right,” Jude squinted again, leaning down closer. Pixie held very still, not even blinking, as if he were even holding his breath. “But there’s still something different about you. I just can’t put my finger on it.”
“Uh, I don’t know what you mean.” Pixie started to bounce quickly on the balls of his feet, as if holding still for just those few seconds had taken all the self-control he had. “Oh—it’s probably the hair. Or the earrings! I got a few new studs.”
“No, I’m used to all of those...” Jude waved vaguely at the alternative accessories, and didn’t stop studying Pixie’s face. Maybe it was just the low light (the broken one Jude would make him pay for later along with the window), but the young man’s skin looked almost ashen grey.
“Um, so, what’d I miss while I was gone?” Pixie asked brightly, clearly trying to change the subject. “Anything exciting happen around here?”
“No,” Jude answered after a moment’s hesitation. He was unwilling to let his vague but undeniable suspicion go, but something Pixie said had only deepened it. “Wait. ‘While you were gone?’ Where have you been?”
“Uh, around,” Pixie deflected and looked away, back out the window, and now Jude could swear his ears drooped just a little. He reached up to nervously adjust his scarf. “Um, did anyone ask about me? Come looking?”
“Some police came by,” Jude spoke slowly, watching for any telling reaction. He had the definite impression Pixie was making just as concerted an effort to control himself, and Jude caught the widening of his eyes and the small catch of his breath. “My friend Eva said you’d gone missing. They must have been here to check it out. Have you been back to your apartment at all?”
“Uh, yeah, sure.” Pixie swallowed, eyes flicking again to the broken window. Jude knew that look well. Pixie was doing what he’d done just a moment ago. Gauging distance, time, ease of making a fast escape. “Hey, you don’t happen to remember what these cops look like, do you?”
“What are you asking me?” Jude gave him a hard look, less annoyed and more suspicious with every passing moment. “Pixie, are you in some kind of trouble?”
“Ha, no!” He laughed just a little too loudly. Jude had seen his share of terrible liars (and been one) long enough to recognize when someone was floundering. “What? No, come on, what would I even—no!”
“Listen,” Jude dropped his voice, then his folded arms. “I work mall security, but that’s not why I’m asking. I’m not with the police and I don’t talk to them either.”
“Really?” Pixie asked, voice rising in pitch as he took a step away from Jude and toward the window. “‘Cause it’s kinda hard to tell the difference from where I’m standing.”
“You came to me for a reason, didn’t you? I can’t help you if you don’t—”
“I said no!” Pixie took another step back. As he did, his eyes flared, blue-green and chillingly familiar, iridescent like a cat’s. His mouth, s
till open from his sharp cry, revealed sharp-pointed canines. Even as his pulse pounded loudly in his ears, Jude’s blood ran cold.
He’d been right. There was something different about Pixie.
“Shit.”
They leaped away from one another. Jude flew toward his kitchen at last while Pixie stumbled backwards. Jude threw the emergency drawer open and, in a moment, the holy water was in his hand. He acted on instinct, unscrewing the spray top and simply hurling the liquid toward the dark shape huddled in the corner and its still-glowing eyes.
A high-pitched, inhuman yowl split the silence. Jude scrambled backward, not looking to see the result, but feeling grimly satisfied as he shielded his head with his arms. But, although the vampire’s bloodcurdling screeching continued, no talons raked down his back, no teeth sank into his skin. He wasn’t being ripped to shreds. Something was wrong. Slowly, he lowered his hands and opened his eyes, turning around to face his opponent.
Pixie was right back where he’d started. On the floor. But he’d curled up in a ball, rolling around and covering his own head to escape imaginary blows. Instead of what Jude had thought was a bloodcurdling predatory shriek, he let out terrified squeals. Jude watched for a few seconds, dumbfounded, but nothing else happened. No lethal attacks, no mortal terror. Just increasing levels of secondhand embarrassment.
“Does it really hurt?” he asked, letting the hand holding the holy water drop and hang loose. Pixie didn’t reply, not seeming to hear. The small... vampire, if the fangs and eyes were to be believed, continued to squirm in a tight, scared ball, yowls dissolving into sad whimpering noises. Jude pinched the bridge of his nose, a gesture that reminded him of Eva whenever she was particularly exasperated with him. One for which he now had a newfound empathy and respect. “Please stop.”
The Secret Ingredient Is Love. No, Really Page 5