Bring On the Night

by Jeri Smith-Ready

  I took two steps toward the door before my knees folded. A pair of strong arms caught me. I gaped at the carpet, which was two inches from having my nose embedded in it.

  “Easy there.” Bearing most of my weight, Shane helped me shuffle to the closest armchair.

  Behind me, Jim snickered. “Not ready for prime time.”

  The door to the hallway opened. I craned my neck as I sat, my mouth watering at the thought of Jeremy.

  Regina stood there, hands pressed to her cheeks. “You did it. You’re alive.” She rushed over to take me in her arms, pressing my face to her sharp collarbone. “I’m so much happier than I thought I’d be.”

  “Thanks. I think.”

  She let go of me and sniffed my mouth. “You guys haven’t fed her yet? What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  After a short, oddly uncomfortable pause, Spencer said, “I was just about to do that.”

  Regina peered at my face. “How do you feel?”

  “Everyone keeps asking me that. I’m fine.”

  “You’re not fine.” She touched my arm, with more gentleness than I thought she possessed. “You died and came back to life.”

  “And what was the alternative? Dying and not coming back to life. So all things considered, I feel pretty damn lucky.”

  I rolled my shoulders, then stretched my arms above my head. My muscles sang. The shift of fabric against my skin was almost painful, and I had a mad desire to tear off my clothes. I resisted.

  I looked around the apartment for the first time. The brown-and-oatmeal-striped sofa bed sat in the center of the common area, flanked by matching comfy chairs and a set of teak end tables with black-tipped legs. Every horizontal surface contained at least one smoked-glass ashtray.

  Were it not for the bloody sheets, it could have been any 1970s basement family room. (Not that I had direct experience, but I’ve seen That ’70s Show.) The only thing that didn’t fit was a long chain of dark blue beads on the table beside the sofa bed.

  The kitchen area looked comparatively modern, which made sense, since the apartment itself was built in the mid-nineties. A pale yellow counter stretched along the wall behind me, ending at a cream-colored refrigerator. A microwave was built into the cabinets over the gleaming white stove.

  Surrounding the common area were six closed doors—leading to the DJs’ bedrooms, I assumed. A dim corridor led off from the kitchen. I wondered what mysteries hid there.

  Spencer came out of the kitchen area with a shiny green insulated coffee mug. “Drink.”

  I opened the little hatch on top and crinkled my nose at the stale scent, then took the bendy straw Spencer offered me. “You don’t all have to stare.”

  “At least one of us does, to make sure you drink it.” Shane gave me a crooked smile. “Probably more than one, considering your sleight-of-hand abilities.”

  I put the straw in my mouth and sipped a few drops. Then I swallowed quickly, banishing the warm, salty metallic substance from my tongue. This is all I’ll ever eat again. My stomach sank with this piece of reality.

  They stood surrounding me, their eyes on mine, waiting for my verdict. I felt like a judge on Iron Chef, but I didn’t bother saying so, since they wouldn’t get the reference.

  My stomach dropped further. In five or ten years, I might not understand pop culture references either. In twenty-five years, I might still be making Iron Chef jokes. This was it, this was as far as I’d evolve without serious professional help.

  But I couldn’t show my doubts now, not after what they’d done for me. I lifted my cup. “Nummy.”

  Shane’s head took on a skeptical tilt. “No, it’s not. Bank blood is like hospital food. It doesn’t do much except fill you up and keep you alive.”

  I sipped again, relieved my underwhelmedness didn’t mean there was something wrong with me. The tang that had pierced the back of my throat since Jeremy’s escape faded with each sip.

  “After you finish,” Shane said, “we’ll get you cleaned up.”

  I touched my neck and grimaced at the drying-paint stickiness. The wound made me think of Monroe, and I turned to thank him for saving my life.

  He was gone.

  I looked at the floor near the sofa bed, where I’d heard Shane drop the guitar. The instrument was missing, too.

  “Monroe’s run out for a bit,” Spencer said.

  “Run out for what?” Maybe he was getting me a present. Maybe a glad-you’re-not-dead flower bouquet or a tasty young man with a shy smile and thin skin.

  Spencer gave the others a look that verged on warning. “Best leave him alone, honey.”

  The back of my neck chilled. “Leave him alone for tonight? For tonight, right? Not… forever?”

  Spencer turned away to fold up the futon. “Noah, don’t forget to wash this mattress pad.”

  I sat frozen, clutching my first meal. Monroe had walked out on me. What about our blood bond?

  “Why did he leave?” I looked at Shane and Regina, kneeling on either side of my chair. “Was it something I did?”

  “Don’t think that.” Shane rubbed my back. “You haven’t done anything.”

  “We’ll take care of you,” Regina said. “And we’ll also hunt down that callous prick Monroe and bring him back.”

  “Tomorrow night,” Spencer added. “Give the man some time.”

  I turned to face him. “If you had made me, would you have run out? Would you need time?”

  “I’m not Monroe.” He leaned over my shoulder and pulled the cup toward my mouth. “Drink up now, so we can stop frettin’.”

  I took another sip, swallowing past the lump in my throat. The rest of them, even the schizoid Jim, made me feel safe and cared for, like an orphan puppy brought in from a snowstorm.

  But it wasn’t enough. I needed my maker. What if he never came back, or came back but acted as if nothing had changed? My heart twisted at the thought.

  The sensation distracted me. I put a hand to my chest to feel the organ beating beneath my skin. I was alive, reanimated. Moreover, my body still reacted to unpleasant emotional states such as total fucking abandonment.

  Wondering what else my body did, I ran my thumb along my teeth. “Did I fang out when I tried to pounce on Jeremy?”

  “I saw no fangs.” Noah carried the armful of bloody linens into the mysterious dark corridor off the kitchen. Oh. It was the laundry room. So much for mystique.

  “Believe me, you’ll feel it when it happens.” Jim lit a cigarette and took a pensive puff. “But like I said, everyone’s different. Your fangs’ll pop soon. Probably next time you see a human.”

  “How long before I can control it? In time for Lori’s wedding?” I imagined writing to the etiquette column of Bride magazine: Are saber teeth an acceptable maid of honor accessory? Or should I stick with a string of Swarovski pearls?

  “They’ve postponed the wedding,” Shane said. “Guests had started canceling because of the plague.”

  I felt a sudden, stabbing sadness for the chicken pox victims who didn’t have vampires to deliver them from the clutches of an untimely death. Chastened, I finished my first blood mug without further self-pity. I vowed to remind myself that no matter what happened, there was no such thing as a fate worse than death.

  Our shower together was nothing like the last one. Shane washed the blood from my hair and neck and chest, as tenderly as a mother cleansing an infant. My skin felt extrasensitive, as if it had been stretched and reshaped.

  I examined my arm, beaded with water drops. “What’s happening to me?”

  “You’re growing extra nerve endings.” He turned off the water and picked up a WVMP Lifeblood of Rock ’n’ Roll beach towel. “Actually, you have the same number of nerves, but the ones that feel pain are changing to feel other things, like hot or cold or touch. Your whole body will feel like a cat’s whiskers until you get used to it. Some vampires notice the sensitive eyes or ears or nose first. I guess for you it’s touch.” He held out the towel for me to step
into. “Like it was for me.”

  “So that’s why you’re ticklish.” The terry cloth scraped like sandpaper, and I swallowed a hiss of not quite pain.

  I stepped toward the foggy mirror. Using a dry washrag, Shane wiped a large circle in the condensation so I could see.

  I was still Ciara. Same blue eyes, prominent nose, and dark blond hair. I trailed my fingers over my neck. The gash in my throat—the one that had robbed and restored my life—had disappeared.

  “What do you think?” he said.

  “I thought I’d look different.”

  “You will soon. Even better than before, if that’s possible.”

  “No more zits?”

  “You never had zits.”

  “I had a huge one last October.” I pointed to the edge of my jaw. “Right here.”

  “Oh yeah, that was hideous. I almost moved out.”

  I smacked him in the chest in my usual playful manner. This time he staggered back and held up his hands.

  “Watch the hitting, until you learn your strength.”

  “Sorry.” I pulled the towel tight around me, up to my chin, wondering why he hadn’t kissed me yet. Maybe he was hurt and angry about my betrayal, despite what he’d said in front of the others.

  Might as well get this out of the way, naked or not. “Do you think I’m going to hell?”

  He put his arms into his shirt and didn’t answer until he’d fastened two buttons. “I guess that’s up to God.”

  “But what do you think? In your best theological opinion.”

  “Unlike me, you saw the white light.” His voice was taut, as if he strained to keep it steady. “You saw heaven.”

  “If that’s what it was.”

  “Did it feel like it?”

  “It felt… blah. But good blah, like vanilla ice cream, or a rice cake.”

  He stared at me, mid-button. “The afterlife felt like a rice cake?”

  “Not the plain ones that taste like cardboard. More like the cheddar-cheese or barbecue-flavored ones.” In an effort to fit into my maid of honor dress, I’d become a connoisseur of low-calorie treats. “It felt comforting. But not something I’d want to make a habit of. So thanks for calling me back.” When he kept staring at me, I added, “With my song.”

  His eyes widened. “You heard that? While you were dead?”

  “I felt it.”

  “I pulled you back to life?”

  “No. I had to make the effort. But the song showed me the way back to this world.” I summoned all my courage and took a step forward. “Back to you.”

  Shane raised his trembling hands like he wanted to seize me. But instead he rested them gently, one on each of my cheeks.

  “Ciara.” He bent low and brushed my lips with nothing but his breath. “I’d have kicked God’s own ass to get you back with me.”

  In my shock, I released the towel. The air met my naked, cooling skin, tightening it into a thousand goose bumps.

  Before I could marvel at the fact that I could still get goose bumps, Shane kissed me, and the thousand turned into a million.

  19

  Jesus Don’t Want Me for a Sunbeam

  Inside Shane’s old room, a faint cream-colored lampshade spread soft illumination over the blue walls, which were mostly covered in posters of rock icons.

  “I know—it looks like a 1994 dorm room,” he said, “but I never thought I’d be bringing a girl here.”

  Wrapped in the towel, I sat on his twin bed while he turned on the clock radio on the nightstand. Just like at home, it was tuned to the D.C. classical music station, which helped him sleep during the day.

  I watched him open a drawer in a beat-up wooden dresser. “Now what?”

  “Sleep.” He handed me a plain white T-shirt and a pair of gray running shorts with a small Pittsburgh Steelers logo.

  I glanced at the pillow, and had to admit it looked as tempting as chocolate mousse. Regret stabbed me as I realized that from now on, chocolate mousse would taste like styling mousse.

  I put on Shane’s clothes, sighing at the feel of the soft cotton after the towel’s scrubby terry cloth. Then I crawled under the covers, which smelled faintly of Shane. It had been half a week since he had last spent the day here, but my nose picked up his scent.

  He slipped the chain of blue beads out of his pocket and hung it on the doorknob of his closet, where it rattled against the wooden surface. I noticed that beads at certain intervals had pieces of tape on them.

  “What’s with the Mardi Gras swag?” I asked him.

  “I use it as a rosary.” He stripped off his shirt and tossed it into a hamper in the corner. “Obviously I can’t use real ones, since they have crucifixes.”

  “I thought sacred items only hurt vampires when wielded by a believer.” Holy water, on the other hand, was intrinsically sacred and could burn vampires no matter who splashed it.

  He spread his arms as if to gesture to himself.

  “I know you believe,” I said, “but you wouldn’t use it against yourself. There has to be intent.”

  “Best to play it safe. Like humans not leaving a loaded gun in the house.” He peeled off his jeans and sat on the edge of the bed to remove them, looking as weary as I felt.

  I shifted next to the wall to give him room. Over the head of the bed hung the classic poster of Kurt Cobain, with him staring straight into the camera, unsmiling. The photo was in black and white, but my imagination filled in the sharp blue of the dead man’s eyes. They held a haunted quality that Shane’s gaze often approached, but with a harder, desperate edge I’d never seen in my lover.

  Shane slipped under the covers beside me. As his arm wrapped around my waist, I laced my fingers with his, absorbing his strength. I wondered how he could have willingly given up this world.

  “Did you know, deep down, that Regina wouldn’t kill you like you asked her to? That she’d make you a vampire instead?”

  His breath stilled. “I don’t think anyone knows what they know deep down.”

  “If she’d been good for you, the way you are for me, then you would’ve wanted to stick around and get more of her. Alive or undead.”

  “It’s not that simple.” He sighed. “You can’t understand. You were blessed with good brain chemistry, not to mention a personality that finds a way around every problem, rather than wallowing in it.”

  “Hey, being shallow is hard work.”

  “You’re not shallow,” he said. “You’re strong.”

  “Not compared to you. Which is why I can’t imagine you wanting to end it all.”

  “First of all, it’s not a matter of strength. And second, I’ve changed since I was alive.” His arms tensed, and I wondered if we shared the same thought.

  “Will I change?”

  “Yes. The question is how.”

  I had no illusions about the quality of my character. I’d spent years as a professional con artist—a different kind of predator. My new vampire vibe would give me even more power to manipulate people’s desires and actions.

  I could be dangerous—and worse, unlovable.

  “For now, just sleep.” Shane took his hand out of mine and reached for the bedside lamp.

  “Leave it on. Please?”

  “Okay,” he said without hesitating, as if it were perfectly normal for a vampire to be afraid of the dark. He shifted close to me again, his body stretched against mine.

  I turned my head to see his eyes open, staring at the wall on the other side of me. “Aren’t you going to sleep, too?”

  “I need to watch over you. Feed you. Keep you warm.”

  “Is there something I should—”

  “Sleep.” He threaded his fingers through my hair, over and over, like he used to do when I had insomnia before a big exam.

  I drifted off, too exhausted to indulge my fears. I slept without dreams, but when I woke again, it was like swimming up through cold quicksand.

  Shane was shaking my shoulder. “You need to drink.”


  “No. Sleep.” I put my arm over my eyes to blot out the light. “More blankets.”

  “Blood, not blankets.”

  “Monroe come back yet?”

  “Not yet. Here, drink.” A warm, smooth surface rested against the back of my hand. I latched onto the travel mug with nearly numb fingers.

  Shane tilted up my head so I could sip. Cold burned in my core like a fire fueled by ice cubes. My neck was so stiff, it felt like it would snap.

  But by the time my straw gurgled at the bottom of the mug, warmth flowed through every cell. My mind cleared, enough to wish with all my heart that my maker was the one feeding me. The stab of pain made me long for the cold numbness again.

  Maybe if I pretended nothing was wrong, nothing would be wrong. “Thank you,” I murmured to Shane. “Check, please.”

  I lay down again, weighed by fatigue and a new, crushing dread: I was now an addict. Blood wasn’t like air or water or the endlessly interchangeable food I once ate. It had a very specific source, one that now had complete power over me.

  Before drifting off, I swept my tongue across my teeth, in a fruitless search for fangs.

  The next time I woke, I heard Shane’s voice, but from a few feet away rather than the pillow beside my head. He spoke in an urgent, breathy whisper. No one answered.

  “… grant to the souls of thy servants and handmaidens departed, the remission of all their sins…”

  I parted my eyelids to see him kneeling on the floor next to his dresser. His eyes were squeezed shut. The Mardi Gras rosary beads lay in a pile on the thin carpet beside him.

  Finally he said, “Amen,” then tilted his chin up to gaze at the ceiling with more agony than I’d ever seen in his eyes.

  “What was that?” I whispered.

  He started. “Did I wake you?”

  “It sounded like you were reciting, not making it up.”

  Shane collected the rosary from the floor. “It’s a novena for the souls of the departed.”

  “Departed? Are you praying for me or for the ones who died for good?”

  “All of you,” he said without looking at me.

  My heart wanted to rip in half. “So you are worried about my soul.”

  He folded the rosary into his palm, where the beads spilled like water over the edges. “I’m worried about your soul, for giving up when there was a tiny chance you could survive. I’m worried about Jeremy’s soul and the souls of the other DJs, for conspiring to end your life.” He lowered his gaze to the floor in front of him. “And I’m worried about my own soul, for being glad they did.”