But it seemed to do the trick for the moment. Gan was mesmerized by Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon, thus allowing Ed and myself to retreat to our respective home offices to get some work done. Sadly, programming deadlines wait for neither man nor immortal beasts of the night.
Unfortunately, I didn't spend any real time as a teenager babysitting; otherwise, I would know that the Golden Rule of doing so is not to let the kids out of your sight. About two hours passed before I heard some loud yelling, in Chinese presumably, coming from the living room, followed by an equally loud crash. Ed and I raced out to find Gan standing there, or more specifically, Gan standing there with her fist through the screen of our TV.
Ed pretty much summed it up for both of us by yelling, “What the fuck!?”
“This box was insolent,” Gan said in a pouty tone.
“What the hell does that even mean!?” again yelled Ed.
I stepped forward to intervene. I may have explained that Ed was my friend, but I had little doubt he'd meet with the same fate as the TV if she deemed him too insolent as well. “Gan, why did you kill the nice TV?” I asked in a patient voice.
“I demanded that it bring back the yellow one. It refused, so I punished it accordingly.”
“The yellow one?” I asked.
“Yes,” she replied. “The one who lives in the fruit and makes these things called patties.”
“Let me get this straight,” said Ed, an edge to his voice. “You smashed our TV because SpongeBob ended?”
I shrugged and gave him a sheepish smile. “Guess I should have showed her how to use On-Demand.”
Satan’s Shopping Mall
That was pretty much the straw that broke Ed's back. Attacking him and treating him like dirt was OK. Breaking the TV, not so much. He left in a huff with heavy hints that Gan should be gone by the time he got back. I really couldn't disagree with him. When I was recruited into this whole vampire thing, I accepted that I would probably face horrors beyond my imagining and endure an eternity of dealing with the darker forces of the universe. At no point did I ever think that babysitting would be included in that package; otherwise, I might have just let them stake me on that first night like they had wanted to.
Around mid-afternoon, I gave Sally a call. She would be awake by then, no doubt looking forward to another night of filling the coven's larders with the city's suicidally depressed. Well, she was going to have to change her plans. No way was I letting her or the others out of helping me with Gan tonight. I was the coven leader, and if I ordered the rest of them to make with the Romper Room, then by God, I was going to get me some Romper Room!
“Let me guess, not a social call?” asked her voice as soon as she answered.
“Not even remotely. Starlight back yet?”
“She should be back here by sundown. I sent a car up for her.”
“Good,” I replied. “Assign someone else to help her.” I lowered my voice so Gan wouldn't overhear. “She's gonna need it.”
“None of the others are going to be happy with that.”
“Ask me if I give a shit about what makes the others happy. Last I checked, none of them seemed overly concerned with my state of mental well-being.”
“OK, calm down. I'll ask around.”
“Better yet, put Dusk Reaper on it. He gives you any lip, tell him he and I will be having a long sit-down to discuss.”
There was a pause. I couldn't see her, but I knew Sally well enough to know she was probably smirking. “Can do,” she replied.
“Good. I'll bring Gan over as soon as the sun goes down.” I glanced over at her and noticed she was still sitting around in my T-shirt. “Oh crap.” I had forgotten all about getting Gan some new clothes to wear.
“What's wrong?” Sally asked over the phone.
“Grab your pocketbook. Once I get there, you and I are going shopping.”
* * *
Sundown came, and I got Gan dressed as best as I could, considering my apartment's complete lack of little girl clothes. Once done, I grabbed my wallet and told her we were heading out.
“Where are we going?” she asked. “If tonight is to be our wedding, I shall require more suitable attire.”
“Uh, yeah. Sorry, the hall was all booked up for tonight,” I lied. “We'll try again another day.”
“Then where do you take me?”
“I'm going to leave you with my coven. I...didn't like the way the human talked to you. My vampires will be more respectful.” (maybe)
“Yes. That would be good. But what of you, my love? (argh, don't call me that!) Will you stay there with me?”
“Not tonight.”
“Then where shall you be?”
“Out,” I said, opening the door and leading us into the hall.
“Ah, I see!”
“You do?”
“Yes. You wish a night out to...how do they say...sow your oats.”
What the!? Oh, whatever. As long as it got her out of my hair. “Yeah, OK. That works,” I muttered. We started to descend the stairs. All I knew was that I couldn't get to Manhattan fast enough.
As we were coming down, we ran into Tom going the opposite way.
“Hey, Bill!”
“Hey. Can't really talk, got things to do,” I said, dragging Gan downstairs with me before she decided to see if I had rethought my policy on sampling my roommates.
“I need to tell you something,” he called down to me.
“It'll have to wait,” I yelled back, as I went through the front door.
“Dude!” his voice followed me out the door. “My girlfriend...I think she's a...”
I didn't quite catch that last part as the front door had slammed shut, but to my vampire hearing, it had sounded vaguely like bitch. That figured. Welcome to the club, buddy, I thought as Gan and I headed out towards the city.
* * *
Have I ever mentioned that there is something about being in a shopping mall that fills me with a near uncontrollable rage? No? Well, it does. Living or dead, I have always hated mall trips. I find the typical mall dwellers to be their own fetid little subspecies of humanity, maybe the result of some deranged genetic experiment to fuse man and cockroach gone awry. Vampires may be bloodthirsty monsters and zombies are disgusting walking corpses, but mall denizens...well, let's just say I'd sooner hang with the zombies. I don't know if I believe in Hell, but if it exists, it probably very closely resembles the Manhattan Mall.
Sally, on the other hand, looked like she was having a grand time. I don't think I'd seen her smile as much in total during the past several months as she was doing now, dragging me from store to store. I know it's cliché to talk about women and shopping, but she was doing her damndest to live up to the stereotype.
I thus found myself standing in some smarmy little boutique up on the third floor, holding Sally's iced latte for her as she spritzed herself from yet another bottle of perfume that probably cost more than the down payment for a car.
“How's this one smell?” she asked, thrusting her arm into my face.
“Skanky,” I replied morosely.
“You have no taste,” she said with a feigned sulk.
“I also have no sense of smell. I think it burned out two stores back.”
“Don't be a complainer,” she said, handing the bottle back to the equally smarmy sales girl who was helping her out. “You're the one who wanted to go shopping.”
“For clothes for Gan,” I reminded her for the fortieth time.
“Relax. You can't just dive into these things. We have to work our way there.”
“If you say so,” I replied in a dead tone. God, this was taking forever. I glanced out the door, and then my eyes fell on the Victoria’s Secret a few shops down. Well, that at least had potential. If Sally decided she needed to try on some lingerie, there was at least some entertainment to be had in that.
Alas, it was not to be. As we walked towards it, she saw my longing gaze wandering in its direction. “Down, boy!” was the on
ly thing she said as she strode past.
“Can't even throw me a bone?”
“I'm not touching anything that contains references to you and bones in the same sentence,” she said, dragging me into a shop called American Girl. Considering that's exactly what I wanted Gan to fit in as, the name of the shop definitely seemed hopeful. At long last, my ordeal seemed to be nearing an end.
“Any chance we can bag the hotline and maybe just send the coven here to clean out this place?” I gestured to the mall as a whole. “Should be enough to keep them in blood for a while,” I quipped while she searched through the outfits on display.
She stopped what she was doing and gave me an eye-roll. “Gutting this place would just be...wrong. Even I have my moral limits,” she replied. I was contemplating which of the fifty or so possible answers rolling around in my head would be the best when she finally held up a little dress. “Now, this is adorable. I think we have our first winner.”
I took a look. OK, whatever; I guess it was cute. Then I happened to notice the price tag. “Holy shit! I just wanted to get her some clothes, not finance her college education.”
“Don't be so stingy with your bride to be,” she teased. Bitch!
“Seriously, whatever happened to jeans and a couple of tees?”
“Gan doesn't strike me as the tom-boy type. Nor does she strike me as the Sears clearance rack type.”
“I noticed. Speaking of her highness, I hope she isn't giving Starlight too much trouble.”
“I'm sure they'll be fine...ooh, here's another cute one!”
* * *
After about another twenty minutes, during which I seriously contemplated a mall-based murder spree, we finally made it to the counter with a small bundle of outfits for Gan. The cute counter girl sized us both up as we approached. She gave Sally the smallest of sneers, but then reversed her expression when she turned to look at me. I actually got a nice, friendly smile. Come to think of it, I had noticed more than a few glances in my direction during the mall trip but had been too irritated to put two and two together. Now it was finally clicking.
In the past, I had noticed that whenever I went anywhere with Sally, I would get stares of envy from other guys. It was obvious why. Sally was gorgeous, and they were all wondering what I had that they didn't (fangs and an aversion to sunlight). I knew because I had done it myself on more than one occasion. It's especially true if the guy in question with the hot babe on his arm isn't all that much to look at himself. Dudes like me just want to walk up and ask them for their secrets.
The thing is, while we guys are envious of our fellow brothers’ prowess in hooking some of the hotter fish in the sea, there's usually no hatred going on there. It’s more of a ‘good for you, man! Hope to be there myself one day’ kind of vibe. However, judging from the looks I had been seeing, it's different for women. Let’s face facts: no guy is going to be jealous of another guy who happens to be dating what appears to be a shaved ape. Women, on the other hand, seem to have this hatred for each other, no matter what they have by their side. Sally was a looker, and the other women hated her for it; however, Sally also had me walking by her side, which only seemed to increase this scorn. No matter what I looked like, they appeared to be flirting with me for no other reason than to try to take me away from her. Damn, that's cold.
On the other hand, there is the simple math of it all. Me plus Sally equals me looking more desirable. Note to self: hang out with Sally a lot more.
Anyway, the flirty (towards me anyway) counter girl rang up our order and then announced the bill. “Wow,” was all I could say for a moment. “Are you sure we can't check out that clearance rack at Sears?”
Sally turned to me and gave a super slow eye-roll. Then she pulled her wallet from her purse. “Do they pay you in peanuts at that job of yours? No, don't answer that. I suppose, since I had a hand in this, I can help you out this one time.” She pulled a card out of her wallet and handed it to the girl. Wait...was that...? The girl swiped it and handed it back. Yes it is! Holy shit, I've never seen one of those. I grabbed Sally's hand before she could put it away again and held it up before me.
“You have a black Amex!?”
“You might want to say it a bit louder. I'm sure there are one or two people on this floor who haven't heard you,” she snapped back.
“I didn't even know those were real.”
“They are, just not for people like you.” She put it away and started to take the bags off the counter.
“Where did you get it from?”
“American Express, obviously,” she quipped, starting to walk from the store.
“No shit! I meant...like...how?”
She stopped and turned towards me. “It's not exactly rocket science. I manage all of the coven's finances. It has its perks.”
“Wait a second. That's a coven black Amex?” I asked, an idea forming in my head.
“Fitting color for creatures of the night, if you think about it.”
“No, I mean that's attached to coven funds, right?”
“I suppose so,” she replied
“And I'm coven leader, aren't I?”
She suddenly narrowed her eyes at me. “What are you getting at?”
“My turn,” I said, grabbing her by the hand and leading her back into the bowels of the mall.
“Where are we going?”
“Shopping,” I answered. “Dr. Death needs himself a few new toys.”
* * *
OK, so the mall was a horrific experience overall; however, I had a brand new Playstation and a whole bunch of new games to go with it. That should go a long way towards soothing any hurt feelings amongst my roomies regarding Gan (and the broken TV). It's about time I got something out of this whole vampire thing. Sure, it might be hard to play with the TV currently being busted, but I figured baby steps and all. I can’t be expected to figure everything out, now can I?
Anyway, Sally and I were on our way back to the loft. “Care to stop for a coffee?” I asked while we walked through SoHo, bags full of clothes and games at our sides.
“Make it an Irish coffee, and you're on. Shopping always works up a thirst,” she answered.
There was a nice little outdoor bistro that was on our way. They made some pretty decent drinks. Sure, I absolutely hated SoHo and nearly everything and everyone in it, but just this once I could make an exception and maybe pretend I was somewhere else. Having just experienced an early Christmas had put me in a surprisingly chipper mood.
Thus I should have expected something to happen to spoil it. I just never expected her to be the one to do it.
As we approached the cafe, Sally started talking about something else. I think it may have actually been important. I vaguely heard the words Gan and assassins mentioned, but the rest was completely burned out of my memory.
Sally took a step or two before realizing I had stopped. She turned and noticed the gaping mouthed look I was giving. I’m sure she said something or made some gesture in return, but she might as well have been invisible at that moment.
Seated at one of the bistro's tables was Sheila, AKA she who I could neither get out of my thoughts nor speak to about them, no matter how hard I tried. She was dressed in conservative business attire, but lets face facts: to me, she looked like she had just stepped out of a dream (and not one of my nasty dreams either). However, that wasn't what had stopped me dead in my tracks. It was who she was sitting with. She was sharing a drink - and a laugh, too, by the looks of it - with Harry Decker, the fucking VP of marketing from my company. Goddamn it! Goddamn it all to hell!!
Of all the women in my workplace, how dare that smug asshole put the moves on mine? I saw red, literally. The rage I felt at the mall was nothing compared to what I suddenly felt bubbling up inside of me. It must have been radiating off me in waves because Sally took a step towards me with actual concern in her eyes. I have never before felt such immediate anger well up inside of me. Within the space of a moment, it had consumed my be
ing. I could feel my fangs and my claws (finally got them to work!) extend. My eyes went black, and then it went beyond even that. I could feel myself...not even sure how to describe it. I suddenly didn’t feel like me anymore. I didn't know what was happening, but Sally's eyes suddenly widened in surprise. Her concern was no matter, though. The beast that was inside of me, the one that I had been able to control for so long, was finally tearing free of its tethers.
And then Sheila looked in my general direction.
Oh shit! I panicked and did the only thing I could think of...adopt a tried a true movie cliché. I grabbed Sally, spun her around so that my back was to the cafe, and planted a big kiss on her lips.
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