Just a Bite

by Charlie Tran

  We both got into my truck as rain started to pour. I rolled up the windows after starting up the engine and headed back towards my home.

  "You know, maybe this is a good thing..." I tried to comfort him further. Oliver laughed half-heartedly as he stared out of the window, watching the dark neighborhood speed past us.

  "I don't see how it could be."

  "You said he's been stealing from you. You should have been the one to dump him first."

  I heard the ting of the glass window as he hit his forehead against it. His reflection looked absolutely miserable.

  "I was trying so hard to keep us together. To keep everything copacetic."

  "But why put up with that shit? If he wasn't my brother I would have socked him in the face for how he acts when he drinks."

  With a sigh, Oliver turned around to face me instead of the window. I could feel his chilly hand touch mine as it rested on the stick shift.

  "Because I wanted us to be a happy family."

  "I mean, it's not like you guys were married, or even engaged."

  Oliver took a deep breath, giving my hand a tight squeeze. After a long moment, he pulled away, hunching over in his seat pitifully.

  "I'm pregnant."

  It suddenly felt hard to maintain control of the car. I swerved slightly, thankful that no one else was on the road.

  "You're what?!" I shouted in surprise. I stared at him in between glancing at the road, but he only hugged himself tightly. Was that why he'd been wearing such giant sweaters? Why would he be trying to hide it from me? Or from anyone?

  "I shouldn't have said anything, huh?"

  "No! No, it's not that. I'm just shocked. Why is he acting so crazy with a child on the way?"

  Oliver clicked his tongue, "That's exactly why he's been acting off the wall. Ever since we found out, he's been drinking even more. I feel like he doesn't want to keep it..."

  I didn't know what to say. Was I gonna lie to him? It was clear as day, with the way James acted, that he didn't want the baby. That's obviously why he'd been such a drunk lately. Even with both of their jobs, it'd be expensive to take care of a newborn. Maybe it was too much pressure for him.

  "Well, you're more than welcome to stay with me for as long as you need. I'll help you out with everything, okay?" As I said so, we pulled into my driveway, the rain still coming down as heavy as ever.

  "Okay." He smiled at me, grabbing the bag of his things and getting out of the truck. I hopped out with him, walking a bit faster so that I could make it to the door and hold it open for him.

  As he passed me by, I took a good look at his neck.

  No mate mark.

  So James got him pregnant without even marking him. They'd been together for a while. James clearly didn't see a future with him. He didn't deserve Oliver at all.

  "Get comfortable. You can have my bed, and I'll stay on the couch."

  "You don't have to do that," Oliver assured me as he sat on the floor next to the coffee table, beginning to sort through his bag and separate his small amount of belongings.

  "I'm serious. Take care of yourself and just relax. There’re towels in the bathroom cupboards. Here, I'll draw you a hot bath. Can't let you catch a cold, you know?" I smiled, not waiting for him to protest further. Oliver was far too nice to allow anyone to care for him, but he needed it. Not only because of how I felt for him, but because he did have a child inside of his belly. He'd need to take care of his health especially well.

  He followed me inside the restroom with a change of clothes, sitting on the closed toilet seat and watching as I tested the temperature of the water with my hands as it slowly filled up the tub.

  "I'm sorry about all of this," he started to apologize out of nowhere, but I brushed it off.

  "Have you been to a doctor yet? Like, a pregnancy doctor?"

  "No..."

  "I'll take you. A new clinic just opened up here a few months ago. We'll make an appointment."

  "Isn't it for vampires only?" He seemed worried as he began to fiddle his thumbs together, his brows furrowing as he stared at his hands.

  "It's for anyone. I think the doctor there has a mate who's human. So it'll be alright, I promise. I'll go in with you too."

  "I don't know why James couldn't be more like you. You've been so nice to me."

  "You deserve it. Fuck James." I laughed as I stood up from my kneeling position by the tub, grabbing a soft linen towel and placing it onto the sink before moving towards the door to give him some privacy.

  "I mean it. I promise I won't be in your hair, and I'll leave as soon as I can save up enough money. I'll help with bills and everything too," Oliver rambled on.

  "I'm serious, don't worry about anything. All I need you to do is take a break, and not stress out. And you're welcome to stay as long as you want."

  I shut the bathroom door behind me as I left, the sight of his grateful smile warming my damned soul. I wasn't going to do anything to make him uncomfortable, or push him into anything. But I couldn't help but feel damn good that he was here. Staying with me.

  I'd take care of him. I wouldn’t fail him like James had. And no matter what, I wasn't going to give him back.

  Chapter 3

  Oliver

  "Should this go here?" I asked Liam as I stood on top of the couch. I was struggling to hang up the small streamers he had brought home from work that night. The tack between my lips rolled back and forth as I focused on trying to get just the right angle to pin the orange crepe paper near the wall and the ceiling.

  "You're such a perfectionist, just hang it up anywhere." Liam laughed at my predicament, and probably at how serious I was when it came to decorating for the season. I loved every holiday, and it was a time to get together with loved ones. Even so, it was probably ridiculous from his perspective. James always mocked my enthusiasm. But Halloween was my favorite!

  "This still doesn't look good," I slumped my shoulders, defeated at trying to find just the right spot while also fighting to keep the tack held together by my lips from falling onto the ground. I wouldn't want to step on that accidentally!

  "Here, this would be good." I felt the couch sink in from Liam's weight as he joined me. He was relatively close to my body as his arms reached out to mine that were still holding the paper up. Slowly he guided my hands to the right direction, just a bit farther to the left than I'd been holding it before, and an inch lower.

  My lips puckered, pressing the tack forward as he grabbed it from my mouth and stuck it into the spot he had chosen, quickly hopping back down to the floor to take a look at the placement. I joined him, being careful not to slip and fall.

  At his side, hands on my hips, I narrowed my eyes and focused on the length of the streamer, where it was hanging and how it looked in combination to the small black spider shaped ornaments that I had hung around the ceiling.

  "Not bad," I told him, nodding once satisfied with how it looked.

  "Thank you, thank you," Liam said with a grand flourish of a bow. I rolled my eyes, giving him a shove.

  "Whatever," I teased, carefully stepping over the mess of Halloween decorations I had made and carefully placed the remaining streamers and decor into the plastic bag they came in. I wouldn't want to rip them, should I decide to hang up more.

  "You know, I've never had my home look so festive before." I heard Liam say as he took a seat next to me, assisting me in the cleanup duties.

  "But you like it, don't you?"

  "Of course! And thanks to me for having such an eye for placement too, right? I never knew I was such an expert at interior decorating."

  "Whatever!" I said again, playfully nudging him with my elbow in his ribs. He pretended to wince in agony, dropping the streamers in his hands to hold his rib cage, leaning over to the side in mock pain. "Ouch! You're so strong."

  "I can't with you."

  It wasn't long until the cleaning was done. And even in the quiet as we finished, I couldn't help but feel a sense of calm. It wasn't an
awkward silence that I often felt when I would do anything with James, but a welcoming one. I hadn't felt uncomfortable in the least, even with the lack of conversation.

  "I just thought of something." Liam pulled his phone out of his back pocket, quick to check the time before leaping to his feet and extending a hand out to help me up as well. "We've got an hour before the pumpkin patch closes. You still wanna go?"

  "Is an hour enough time to get there and find something nice?" I made sure to wipe off the orange and black confetti I knew was stuck to my butt.

  "It's just a pumpkin, it won't be that big of an issue. Go get a sweater and some pants, I'll go warm the truck up." He seemed so excited to be getting out of the house again. Liam's enthusiasm was rubbing off on me. As soon as he grabbed his car keys and began to head out the door into the night, I ran off to his room where I'd been sleeping. I still felt bad for basically taking it over while he slept out on the couch, but he wouldn't hear any of my complaints. It was refreshing.

  I pulled on another pair of sweatpants over the ones I was already wearing and pulled on an over-sized Halloween-themed Christmas-style sweater to hide my ever growing stomach. I paused, staring at myself in the mirror in the corner of the room as I did, mid-dressing.

  Huge. Absolutely, positively huge. And I was just going to keep getting bigger. The appointment Liam had scheduled for me wasn't for another week. But at that point, how much longer would I have until the baby came? As I stared at my stomach, everything James had said before began to run through my mind. 'You're so huge it's disgusting.' 'Who else is going to want a whale like you?'

  Thinking of such things made me check my phone too. James hadn't called. No emails or text messages. Nothing.

  At first, I thought he was just going through one of his drunken, angry phases and would call me once he sobered up. But after several days, it seemed like he actually meant it when he said he never wanted to see my face again.

  Not that I minded spending so much time with Liam. Even if it was shitty for me to admit such a thing, he always was the better sibling of the brothers. Nicer, kinder, but he didn't have that Alpha personality that attracted me to James in the first place.

  Maybe that was a mistake of mine. Choosing with my second head, instead of the main one.

  Oh, but Liam was waiting for me still! I hurried and finished changing, kicked on my shoes at the front door and jogged up to the passenger side of his old beat up truck.

  It was sufficiently warm, so warm in fact I felt like I might have over dressed for the heat, but it still felt good compared to the falling temperatures outside.

  "Ready?" Liam winked at me as he pulled out of the driveway. I blushed, nodding at him before turning to stare out of the window and watch the neighborhood begin to pass by.

  "I'm so excited!" I exclaimed, clutching my hands together in front of my chest as I looked around the pumpkin patch, Liam at my side. There were actually many people still out here finding their perfect pumpkin for the season. The town of Worj had plenty of farmers, but not much land was actually dedicated to pumpkins specifically so the options of where to get one was few and far between.

  Thankfully there were still some left.

  A small blockade of hay was the wall that separated the parking lot - which was more like a dirt lot off the road of the farm house - to show where people were allowed to pick from.

  There were different shades and variations of pumpkins to pick from, short and squat, tall and lanky like a typical squash, white and orange.

  "I think your head's going to pop, Oliver. You're like a kid in a candy store," Liam said, but I shrugged his teasing off and ran out into a small plot of the land where there wasn't quite as many people yet.

  "What do you think?" I asked Liam once he joined me. We both had to be careful not to trip on the vines across the ground, but this seemed like a good little portion for us to find some hidden gems.

  "I think they all look the same," he replied with a laugh, stumbling across a root before balancing himself again. "I meant to do that."

  "Sure you did." I rolled my eyes as I pushed some of the foliage back to see if there were any diamonds in the rough. "This one is cute."

  This gourd was small and adorable, surrounded by other tiny pumpkins. Orange with a few splatters of yellow across its lumpy surface. "Or this one. Or this one."

  "Is it that serious?" Liam asked as he followed, scattering more of the foliage away from the pumpkins as he picked one of the gourds I pointed out off the vine.

  "I just enjoy the holiday. Don't you, as a... you know?"

  "That's a stereotype. Are you stereotyping me right now?" Liam made a face at me as he continued along to pick more pumpkins that I pointed out in the patch.

  "I'm just joking, honest." I told him, "Get that one!"

  "I think this is enough." Liam groaned, and I turned to see him struggling with the mountain of smaller pumpkins hugged into his arms.

  "Sorry. I can't decide which one I want..." Even when I tried to help him by relieving some of our haul from his arms, he refused. While I was pregnant, that didn't mean I was totally helpless. But I enjoyed the display of chivalry for once.

  "Come on, let's go back to the farmer."

  "I still can't decide though." I steepled my forefingers together, eyeing each of the pumpkins meticulously, but he turned around and was already heading back to the farmhouse.

  "We're getting them all, if you like them all."

  "Really? I-I can buy them, though. Let me go grab my wallet from the truck."

  "No, it's my pleasure. It's not like we're buying armfuls of gold."

  "Thank you! Thank you a million times!" I jumped happily, running to walk at his side.

  "It's fine, just promise not to set the house on fire if you put candles inside a jack-o-lantern."

  "I promise!"

  I don't know what came over me. They really were just some pumpkins, but I felt overwhelmingly joyful about the whole situation. Picking them out, decorating the house, things that I never did with James before. Maybe my hormones were just going crazy about it, or maybe it was something else entirely, but I stood up on my tip toes in the middle of the sea of gourds and people to place a kiss onto Liam's cheek, carefully wrapping my arm around his shoulders without disturbing the pumpkins.

  It was pointless, though, because as soon as my lips hit the flesh of his icy cheek, they all went spilling from his hands and out onto the ground.

  "Sorry," I apologized quickly as he stared at me, assisting him with gathering as many pumpkins as I could as he squat next to me to gather some as well. I dared to take a look out of the corner of my eye, noticing him staring at me.

  "Liam?" I asked shyly. Even in the cold weather I could feel my cheeks begin to flush and heat up in embarrassment.

  The gourds in his hands fell back to the ground as his chilly fingers took up my face. He moved in just as suddenly to the close the distance between our faces. For a moment - just a split second - I fathomed the idea of staying still and letting him kiss me. But I couldn't do that. It was too soon.

  And he was my ex's brother!

  I pulled away, dodging his kiss to receive one on my cheek instead.

  "Liam? What are you doing?" He released my face. There was some second hand embarrassment on my part as I watched him glance off to the side shyly.

  "I... I just thought... I was just trying to kiss your cheek like you did."

  Yeah. That's why he was going straight for my lips.

  "L-let's just go pay for these," he said suddenly, taking the pumpkins from my arms and grabbing the remainder in the dirt quicker than I would have been able to. I stood, following him to the farmer that sat outside of his barn in a rocking chair. They began to talk about payment for so many pumpkins, but I couldn't focus on the conversation.

  Did he really like me like that? Was he just being nice to get me to like him?

  What if he only wanted me around because he thought I'd fuck him?

&
nbsp; I could feel all the insecurities slowly start to crush me, more than the weight of the small mountain of pumpkins we were purchasing. I could hear James again.

  'You're so huge it's disgusting.' 'Who else is going to want a whale like you?'

  I was pregnant, he wouldn't want me anyway. Who would want me after that? He's just being nice. He didn't mean it. Liam was just caught up in the moment.

  "Oliver!" Liam's voice pulled me out of my spiraling thoughts.

  "Huh?"

  "Let's go, I can't carry these forever you know." He laughed, but I knew there was resentment there.

  Chapter 4

  Oliver

  I fiddled my thumbs as I stared around the mostly empty lobby. There were only a few people here, including the man working behind the desk. I was pleased to see that he was human, because nobody else was. Liam sat next to me, leaning back in his seat with his arms folded across his chest, almost defensively. I wondered if he still felt some kind of way about the night at the pumpkin patch?

  It was troubling that I couldn't stop thinking about it, either. I don't know why I continued to feel guilty about what happened, but I did.

  My attention was drawn to a small girl running around the lobby, laughing at the top of her lungs as she waddled over towards the other man, a vampire who had been sitting across from us with a diaper bag placed in the seat next to him.

  "Claire, stop bothering people," he scolded as the girl changed directions and headed straight towards me. She caught herself on my legs before falling once she became off balanced, staring up at me with a wide, nearly toothless smile.

  "No, it's all right." I told him, gently taking the little girl's hands and standing her up again. She started to wriggle around happily, like some sort of dance as I stood with her. Claire's hands grabbed onto mine tightly as I felt Liam's eyes focus in on me. Slowly I led the girl back to her tired looking father, until she squealed at the funny faces the man was making.

  She let go of my hand and took cute little steps closer to him, and giggled even louder when he picked her up under the arms and lifted her high into the air as made airplane noises.