Around

by Glenn Rolfe

  “Hey,” Julie said, killing the engine and getting out of the car. “Who’s this?”

  Rocky wiped the bangs from his eyes and said, “This is November. November, this is my sister, Julie.”

  “Hey,” November said.

  “Hey,” Julie said, smirking up a storm.

  Please don’t embarrass me. Rocky tried with all his might to telepathically send the message to Julie’s mind.

  “Where are you two off to?”

  “Not sure, just gonna go riding, I guess,” he said.

  “Well, Mom and Dad are going out for dinner tonight. If you want to practice parallel parking, tonight sometime before it gets dark would probably be best.”

  He definitely needed to practice parallel parking; it was the one thing he really hadn’t done yet.

  “Yeah, we should do that.” He checked his watch.

  “Listen,” Julie said. “Go out for a while. Be back around six and we’ll just go downtown for a bit.” She lifted her chin toward November. “If she wants to come or hang out after at the house, that’s fine with me.”

  Rocky turned and found November grinning.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “You mean I’d get to see you drive?”

  “I’m not promising that it’ll be fun.”

  “No, this I’ve got to see.”

  “So, be back here by five thirty or six,” Julie said.

  “Okay,” he said.

  “See you guys later.”

  Julie disappeared inside.

  “So,” November said, pulling up beside him. “Lead the way.”

  Before shoving off, he noticed her looking around, almost like she was searching for someone.

  “Everything all right?” he asked.

  “Huh? Yeah, no, let’s go.”

  Chapter Eight

  Rocky saw Julie sitting in her car in the driveway. He could hear her singing along with ‘Papa Don’t Preach’ as he and November rolled into the yard. She glanced at him then looked at her watch. “Jesus, Rocky. It’s nearly six thirty, come on,” she said. “Mom and Dad left like an hour ago.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “We lost track of time.”

  She got out of the car, went to the passenger side and got in.

  Rocky held the driver’s-side door open and pulled the lever to lean the seat forward so November could climb in the back.

  She ducked and sat back.

  Rocky put the seat in its upright position and got behind the wheel.

  He reached over and turned the radio down.

  “Okay,” Julie said. “You’ve done this bit plenty. Just take us to the avenue nice and slow.”

  He pulled the lever behind the steering wheel, putting the car in gear, and pulled out of the driveway.

  “Wow,” November chimed in from the back seat. “You really are a good driver.”

  “Ah, thanks,” he said.

  Julie turned back. “So, November. Are you new in town or are you here with the summer people?”

  “I’m here with the summer people.”

  Rocky gripped the wheel, his palms suddenly sweaty.

  “You here with your parents?” Julie asked.

  “My mom and my brother.”

  “Oh, brother? Older or younger?”

  “Older.”

  “Is he cute?”

  “Hey,” Rocky chimed in. “I thought you were going out with Brick?”

  “His name is Derek,” she said. “And we’re not exclusive.”

  “My brother’s in his twenties. He’s not that nice.”

  “Ooh, so he’s a bad boy?”

  “Ah…well,” November said.

  “I thought you had to be a preacher’s daughter to be attracted to bad boys?” he said.

  “This isn’t Footloose, Rocky,” Julie said. “All kinds of girls like bad boys.”

  “Yeah, well, Brick seems like a dude destined for jail. You should be all set.”

  “Hey, don’t be a jerk. I’m taking you out when Mom and Dad would kill me. This is risky business.”

  “All right, I’ll shut up,” he said.

  “I do like Derek. I was just making conversation. Turn here.”

  Rocky made the turn onto Plane Street. He glanced at November in the rearview mirror. She was once again scanning the sidewalks.

  “Okay,” Julie said. “Pull up alongside that green Dodge.”

  She talked him through the steps. He managed to get a good angle, but cut his wheel too late; his back tyre hit the curb.

  “It’s okay,” Julie said. “Just pull back up beside it and try again. You can do this.”

  She really had an amazing ability to calm him down. Going out with Mom or Dad was like riding with someone holding a ruler, ready to snap it across your wrist at the slightest wrong move. Julie managed to keep cool no matter the situation. It was something he’d picked up on when he was pretty little. It was almost like her superpower.

  He pulled out, lined up with the green Dodge and tried again. This time he nailed it.

  “Whoa, bro, that was smooth. I told you you could do it.” She punched his shoulder.

  November leaned over the seat and kissed his cheek.

  “Good job,” she said.

  “Okay,” Julie said. “Now, let’s try it again.”

  He managed to do it flawlessly four more times, only having to try again once.

  When they pulled onto their street, Derek and his on-road/off-road dirt bike sat waiting in the driveway.

  “Oh, look,” he said. “It’s Brick.”

  Julie nudged him again.

  “Be nice,” November said from the backseat.

  Julie smiled. “I like her.”

  They pulled in beside Derek and his bike and got out.

  “If you two want to hang out and watch a movie, you probably have time,” Julie said. “Dad left fifteen bucks so we could order pizza.”

  November was scanning the houses around them.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “No, I’d love to, really, but I’ve been gone all day. I really should get home.”

  His heart dipped.

  She took his hand. “Tomorrow?”

  “For sure,” he said.

  “Do you need a lift home?” Julie said.

  November gave his hand a squeeze, before letting go and starting for the sidewalk. “No, I like the walk,” she said. “But thank you. And, Heatstroke, I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

  “Cool,” he said.

  He watched her walk down the road.

  “Heatstroke?” Julie asked.

  “She calls me that sometimes.” He kept the story to himself.

  “Hmm, well,” Julie said. “Whatever. She’s cool, Rocky. And she really digs you.”

  “Hey,” Derek said, “maybe you’ll even get laid.”

  Julie elbowed him. “Jesus, Derek. Shut up.”

  “Sorry, babe.”

  “The money for the pizza is on the kitchen counter. Order whatever you want, okay?”

  “What are you guys doing?” Rocky asked.

  “We’re gonna go hang out in my room for a bit, then maybe we’ll come watch something with you.”

  He knew full well what went on in her bedroom; he’d heard them doing it the other afternoon before Dad got home.

  “Yeah, all right. I have to bring Axel’s bike back first.”

  “Okay, but right back here after, okay?” she said.

  He nodded.

  Julie and Brick walked into the house, Brick’s hand on his sister’s ass.

  Rocky shoved his hands in his pockets and kicked rocks down the driveway.

  He wished November would have stayed and hung out awhile longer. S
he’d seemed pretty skittish for the last couple hours. He hoped she didn’t get in trouble for being out all day with him. It would suck if he didn’t get to see her tomorrow.

  He also wished there had been a goodbye kiss. Not that he had tried.

  He walked his bike to the porch and then got on Axel’s and coasted down the lawn and onto the sidewalk.

  It only took a couple minutes to get to Axel’s. He locked the bike up and started his walk home. He paused as a man sweating through his collared shirt stapled a poster to one of the telephone poles ahead. The guy pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead before continuing down the road.

  Rocky walked over to the pole and checked out the white piece of paper and saw the picture of a cute blonde who looked about his age. Beneath the black and white portrait, read:

  Missing

  Vanessa Winslow.

  Sixteen. Blond hair, she’s 5’2, 112 lbs.

  Last seen wearing khaki shorts and a bikini top.

  If you’ve seen her please contact her parents, William or Mary Winslow

  at the Atlantic Ocean Suites.

  207-678-0909

  Rocky couldn’t recall the last time he’d seen a missing persons poster outside of TV. He and his mom used to stay up watching 20/20. They had all kinds of kidnapping stories. They used to give him the creeps and make him paranoid when he was younger. As he looked at the poster, that childish fear crept over him.

  He thought of how nervous November had seemed tonight. She was so cool and composed the other night on the beach. The man making his way down the sidewalk stopped to hang another poster. Rocky wondered if that was Vanessa’s father, William. He wondered if the girl would turn up. He didn’t know her, but he hoped so.

  He gave the poster another look before starting toward home, a little more urgency in his step than normal. The sun would be setting soon. He didn’t feel like being out when it finally did.

  Chapter Nine

  November made it home just as the sun fell behind the trees. Gabriel was still in his room; she could feel him. She breathed a bit easier knowing that he’d been asleep this whole time, rather than out in the daylight watching after her. Good. Maybe he was learning to trust her a bit.

  The small television was on in the living room. Her mother lay on the sofa, curled up in a brown blanket despite the heat and humidity.

  “Evening, Mother,” November said.

  “Evening, love,” she said.

  She’d been ill for the better part of the year. That winter she’d had trouble breathing for nearly two months. Despite all Gabriel’s demands for her to drink human blood to help give her the strength to get well, she refused. Instead she made November fetch her small animals from the forest, and eventually worked herself out of it, mostly. She never fully shook whatever was afflicting her, but her breathing had improved. Now she just seemed fatigued all the time. She was pale, of course, but that came with the territory. November was worried. She wished they could take her to the hospital and make sure it wasn’t anything serious. Unfortunately, their kind could not go to the doctors’ without it leading to more questions and inevitably, more trouble. They’d never been discovered, not that November had ever heard of, but Father had told them of a cousin named Jeffrey who had sought treatment for a wound and when the doctors got a look at his blood, they demanded he come back for more tests. When their cousin went back to the hospital, he saw men in black suits waiting for him. They stood talking with his doctor. Cousin Jeffrey turned around and left. Terrified that these men in black suits would come looking for him, suspicious that they knew what he was, he ended up packing up his belongings and moving south.

  November never met the man but knew they could never risk hospitals.

  She took a seat next to her mother on the sofa, leaning down and kissing her forehead.

  “Should I go get you something to eat?”

  “No, dear, you don’t have to do that. If I get hungry, I can look for myself.”

  This was what she said every time.

  The air changed, the dust molecules shifting, dispersing, as they sensed his presence seconds before she did.

  Gabriel.

  He stood with his hands on the back of the sofa.

  “Mother, sister,” he said.

  “My dear Gabriel,” Mother said. “Come to me, my son.”

  As he came around, November stood and went to the kitchen. She wasn’t hungry, not for any of its few contents, but she wanted to give her brother space.

  She watched Gabriel take up her spot sitting with mother.

  “You must let me do for you what I can, Mother,” he said, placing a hand to her forehead.

  “When was the last time you fed?” Mother said, more than a hint of harshness in her tone.

  She smelled it upon him. November knew her brother’s thirst for human blood was great, but she was unsure how often he indulged. A single kill could fulfil a vampire for many weeks, months even. He had held the scent since their arrival two weeks ago.

  She found herself eager for his reply.

  “Now, Mother, you needn’t worry about me. It is I who is looking out for us.”

  “I can see it in your eyes,” Mother said. “Your scent is ripe with it. Oh, what would your father say?”

  Gabriel’s features tightened. He gripped Mother’s arm. The ill woman gasped.

  “Father is dead.”

  The words filled the room, hanging in the air with menace.

  November came out of the kitchen.

  Gabriel released Mother and stood, staring at November.

  “See to it she feeds tonight.”

  And with that, he was at the door and gone into the night.

  November hurried to her mother.

  “Are you all right?”

  There was something she’d never seen in her mother’s gaze before. It dressed her face like a shadow in the dark – fear.

  Mother placed a hand on hers, which November knew was meant to reassure her but did nothing of the sort. Her hand trembled, slightly, but the tremor was there.

  “He’s a good boy. Your brother is…he’s his own man. He will find his way. He will take care of us.”

  “But the way he just grabbed you—”

  “I’m fine, my love. Besides, he’s right, I should feed. An old woman can give in to stubbornness. Will you be my sweet, and bring me something?”

  “Yes, Mother.”

  “And maybe when you come back, we can discuss this boy you’re seeing.”

  November had been staring at her own hands against her mother’s. At this, she met the woman’s gaze.

  “There’s nothing you two can hide from me. I may be old, but a vampire’s senses are the last to go.”

  “Would you stop this talk of being old? You act like you’re a hundred and riding with the reaper.”

  A small grin creased her mother’s face. “Not yet, I suppose. But there will come a day. And when it does come, you must learn to trust Gabriel, yes?”

  She truly wanted to believe in him. She did, but she just didn’t have her mother’s faith. Perhaps she was judging him too harshly lately.

  “Yes, Mother,” she finally said.

  After a few minutes of sitting with the woman, watching some prime-time soap opera, she got up and went outside.

  She could see the graveyard just through the trees. The way the streaks of moonlight shined across the graves. It was a dark beauty that she adored. She’d walked among the headstones when they first arrived. As with every graveyard she visited, ever since she was a little girl, she wondered if any of their kind might be buried within.

  They were good at keeping secrets, maybe not from one another, but from others. You learn to be great at something when your livelihood depends upon it.

  She paused at t
he steps, wondering if Gabriel was near, or if he was hunting again.

  She decided she didn’t want to know, either way.

  * * *

  Rocky unfastened the straps on his back brace. His body beneath the pads and harder contours exhaled in response. The air felt cool hitting the sweaty, white tank top he wore under the contraption. He tossed the brace to the end of his bed, pulled the soaked shirt off, and tossed it to the hamper across the room. Summer was wonderful for a bevy of reasons, but it was hell on his particular predicament. The heat made him sweat like crazy, irritating his skin beneath the brace. And while everyone else in town was roaming the beach and the square shirtless, soaking in the sun, he had the tank top, the brace, and a t-shirt to boot.

  He was only supposed to be out of the brace for an hour. He needed to take a shower and he was supposed to do some exercises to strengthen his core, but right now, he didn’t want to do either. He grabbed his Walkman and put on his headphones. He opened his little brown suitcase of cassettes and found the newest one. Julie had given the few extra bucks he’d needed to get The Final Countdown by Europe. It had a bunch of great songs on it, the title track had made him and everyone else have to have it, but he was a sucker for a good love song. Call him a hopeless romantic. His favourite track from the tape was called ‘Carrie’. Their singer, Joey Tempest, was great, and the guitar player, man, the solo in this song sang almost just as good. Rocky lay back, kicked his brace from the bed and cranked the song up.

  He rewound and listened to it twice before his door opened.

  “Hey sweetie,” his mother said. His father appeared beside her.

  He took the headphones off.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “Did you do your exercises?” she asked.

  “Not yet.”

  “Make sure you do, buddy,” his dad added. “Did you get pizza?”

  “Yeah. How was your date?”

  “Well, it started out great, then your mother made me watch some chick flick.”

  “Dale,” she said, slapping his arm. “You liked it. I heard you laugh.”

  “Hey, I’ve been playing this game long enough. I know what I gotta do if I want to get lucky.”