Shane looks up. “Dispensation. Why?”
“You want some?”
He tilts his head. “What for?”
“Colonel Lanham had your case reviewed. You can go home for Christmas.”
His mouth falls open.
“The Control won’t mess with your family.” I shift my feet when he continues to stare at me. “It’s not permanent permission yet. You can’t reveal you’re a vampire, not until the agency does deeper background checks on your family.”
“That’s incredible.” He sets aside the guitar and slowly crosses the room to me. “What changed their mind?”
“I begged. Pleaded. Argued. Cajoled.” The lie won’t sit inside me without causing heartburn. I hold up the contract. “I said I’d work for them.”
“What?” He yanks the papers out of my hand. “Ciara, no.”
“It’s just for a year.”
He scans the contract, eyes flashing left and right. “I don’t believe this. How could you sign your life over to those thugs, even for a day?”
“Those thugs just saved my life. With your help, of course.”
“You have no idea what they’ll ask you to do. They have no limits. Everything’s a means to an end.”
“Now you sound like Benjamin.”
“That’s not fair. Hating the Control doesn’t make me a Fortress sympathizer.”
“What’s not fair is expecting me to share your hatred. I’m not exactly a principled person. Maybe the agency is the perfect place for me.”
“No, Ciara.” His voice is soft, and so are his eyes as they look at me like I just died. “You’re not like them.”
“Then you have nothing to worry about.” I touch the front of his shirt. “I won’t let them change who I am. Please have enough faith in me to believe that.”
“I trust you. It’s them I don’t trust.”
“So keep an eye on them and guard my nonexistant virtue.”
“Don’t worry, I will.” He takes my hand. “I can’t believe you did this for me.”
“I love you.” I shrug, still getting used to those words after all these months. “And anyway, it’s not for you. It’s for me. When you’re miserable, I’m miserable. Therefore, you missing Christmas with your family was really bumming me out.” I hope the addition of old slang helps my case. “It’s a completely selfish act.”
He kisses me. “I don’t know how to thank you.”
“You can start by playing that guitar until I finish my paper, even if your fingers fall off.”
Shane caresses my face. “My mom’ll be so thrilled, she’s going to freak.” He kisses me again and heads back to the couch.
The glow of making Shane happy fades quickly as I calculate how many words I have to write and revise—with one hand—in six and a half hours. I’ll be lucky to pass this class.
I tried to get an extension by telling my professor about the “pit bull” attack and subsequent surgery, but he pointed out that in the real business world, we have to meet our obligations, no excuses. I thought that instead of handing in a paper on the effect of identity theft on small business, I’d just give him a list of all the life - and revenue - threatening challenges I’ve overcome in the last six months. The “real business world” has tried to eat me alive, thanks very much, Mr. Ivory Tower.
“I can’t believe I have another two and a half years of this,” I whine to Shane over my seventh cup of coffee. “Is this why you quit college? Life got in the way?”
“Nope.” He adjusts a string, then plucks it with his pick. “Drugs got in the way.”
My fingers freeze above the keyboard. I knew he had a habit when he was alive, but I didn’t know it was the end of his academic pursuit of music theory. I didn’t know it ruined his life. We never talk about the past. Maybe we should start.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him.
“Yeah, well.” He shifts his weight on the couch and plucks the intro to a Steve Earle song. I can’t place the title until he sings the mesmerizing first line, soft and unapologetic. It’s “CCKMP,” which stands for “Cocaine Cannot Kill My Pain,” but, ironically, it’s not a song about cocaine.
The notes create a shroud around him, one I might never penetrate. At the same time, the very acknowledgment of “the only gift the darkness brings” somehow diminishes its power over him.
I try to imagine him in a dark, seedy apartment, jonesing for his next fix, or blissed out with a needle in his arm. That picture in my head hurts a lot, partly because I love him, but also because it stretches my imagination to the breaking point. He’s so full of life now—thanks to the music—that the sad, despair - ridden part of him lurks too deep for me to glimpse.
But it’s there and always will be. As bits of truth color in the tapestry of his past, it’s harder for me to fill in the empty spaces with the things I want to believe.
When he finishes the song, I close my laptop lid. “Can I ask you a personal question?”
He sends me a crooked smile. “You’re my girlfriend. You can ask me anything.”
“So.” I fidget with the frayed edge of my sling. “How many female vampires have you slept with? Besides Regina.”
His left eyebrow quirks, but otherwise he takes it in stride. “A couple. Maybe several.”
“Are they better?”
“Better than what?”
“Me.”
“No one’s better than you,” he says without smiling.
“Are they better than humans? In general.”
“No.” He breaks my gaze and glances at the wall over Elizabeth’s stereo. “Just different.”
“Different how?” My heartbeat quickens as I think of what David told me, about why human men can’t risk sex with a female vampire.
“Colder.” Shane taps his fingers against the wood of the guitar. “Stronger. Rougher. There’s usually biting.”
I wipe my forehead. The honesty is making me sweat. “Do you miss it?”
He turns back to me. “You know what I miss?”
My throat has frozen shut, so I just shake my head.
“Sometimes in the middle of the night,” he says, “when I’m in the studio, a song will remind me of you. One line of lyrics, or even just a riff that travels up my spine the way your fingers do. And suddenly I’ll miss the way your skin smells in all the hidden places. I’ll miss the way you sigh when I slide inside you, and the way your eyelashes flutter. Or I’ll just miss the way you laugh at one of my stupid jokes. And sometimes this happens in the middle of the day when I’m at the station, and I know you’re upstairs in the office, and I could walk up and see you in less than a minute.”
I somehow find my voice. “Why don’t you?”
His gaze meets mine, stealing what’s left of my breath. “Because I want you to miss me, too.”
The look on his face makes me forget about my paper, about pretty much the rest of the world. I cross the room to sit beside him.
Shane sets the guitar on the floor and takes me in his arms. I kiss him with the bottomless need of the almost nearly dead. He pulls away a few inches to look at me.
“Shane, I—”
“Shh.” He leans in and whispers against my ear with a soft breath. “Don’t say anything. Don’t do anything.”
Shane undresses me carefully, brushing his lips and fingertips over every inch of my skin, reclaiming the body we almost lost.
Then he makes love to me slowly and gently, just the way I need it. I feel no twinge of pain, in my arm or anywhere else, and in his eyes I see no regrets, no disappointment with my fragile human form.
That’s when I realize the truth doesn’t always have to hurt.
27
Heart Full of Soul
Just after twilight on the night before Christmas Eve—what my mom used to call Christmas Eve Eve—Shane and I begin our drive to Youngstown. I’m relieved he doesn’t want to listen to seasonal music, instead flipping the satellite radio among eight or nine rock stations.
H
alfway to Pittsburgh, we hear the first haunting piano notes of Evanescence’s “Bring Me to Life.”
“Oh! I love this song.” I turn up the volume. “I know, what vampire - lovin’ female doesn’t? Forgive the cliché.” Not that he’ll even recognize the tune.
“Is that . . . ?” Shane focuses on the radio display before turning his eyes back toward the road. His grip on the steering wheel tightens, and his brow crinkles as if every neuron is sparking.
I keep quiet, hoping his memory will stretch forward to 2003, when the song was released. But maybe it’s like wishing a dinosaur would remember when humans started walking the earth.
He suddenly switches the station to the blues channel. I frown at his temporal hiccup, then make a mental note to download the Evanescence track next time I’m online.
Ten, maybe twenty seconds pass, then Shane’s shoulders ease their tension a bit. “That was Sara’s favorite song. Regina let her play that CD all day in our apartment, I guess because it’s sort of Goth. Then one night it accidentally got ‘lost’ under the wheel of Jim’s car.”
“Do you really think Regina’s a murderer for making Sara a vampire?”
“It’s not Regina’s soul I worry about. Sara’s the one who asked to die.” He chews his lip for several seconds. “I know you think I’m an idiot for believing in souls and sin.”
“I’m okay with souls.”
He gives me a rueful glance. “What if I told you I thought those signs the Fortress painted were right? About me, at least.”
“That you’re going to hell?” I decide now is not the time to discuss the nonexistence of said realm. “Because you’re a vampire?”
“No. Not all vampires are damned. Just the few who get turned on purpose.”
“But Regina made you against your will.”
“No, I’m not being clear. It’s not about vampires. It’s about suicide. That’s what I wanted from Regina—death. Just because she gave me something more doesn’t mean I didn’t try to die.”
“But you’d tried to kill yourself before. Were you damned after those attempts?”
“As long as I was alive, there was the chance for salvation and redemption through repentance. Once I died, that chance was gone forever.”
I speak carefully. “Shane, I respect the fact that you believe that, but isn’t it possible you could be—”
“Wrong? Yeah, except for one thing.” Shane’s pale skin shines blue and haunted in the glow of the radio display. “Most vampires say that when they were turned, when they died, they saw a bright light waiting for them.” The shadows shift on his face. “All I saw was darkness.”
A cold sensation sweeps over me, lodging in my throat.
“I’m dead, Ciara. You won’t admit it, because it means things for us that we never talk about. But I don’t age. I don’t change.”
I argue, to keep from crying. “Your heart beats. Your blood flows.” I count off on my fingers. “You blink. You breathe. Sometimes when we have really wild sex, you even sweat.”
“It’s not life. It’s reanimation.” He puts his hand on mine. “Feel how cold I am. The warmest my body ever gets is ninety-seven degrees, right after I drink, and even then it’s another human’s warmth flowing through me. It’s not real.”
“You’re not dead. You’re just alive in a different way than I am.” When he starts to protest, I smack him in the shoulder. “I am not a necrophiliac—”
“Technically you are.”
“—and you’re not a suicide. Don’t you see? You’ve been pissed all these years at Regina for turning you against your will. But she saved your soul. You can kick the despair that made you want to kill yourself. The rest of your existence— which’ll be a really long time if I have anything to do with it—you can have hope. You can even have faith.”
“Faith in what?”
“Anything. Faith in yourself, or in the future, or”—I point at the radio—”good old - fashioned Tennessee blues. Just never hole up in fear like Gideon. If hell exists, he’s in it.”
“Great. I put him there.”
“He would have killed you. He would have killed me, and David. Gideon’s despair wasn’t your problem.” I take his hand again. “Only yours is.”
We’re silent for several minutes, during which I turn up the volume.
Finally he says, “How do I confess to a priest that I killed myself?”
“Fudge the facts. Say you tried, but someone saved you, and that you’re sorry and you’ll never do it again.” Wincing, I rest my right elbow on the window frame. “That’s true, right? Promise me? Never again?”
He appears to think about it for several long moments, then brings my hand to his lips. “Never again.”
The moment we step out of the car, Shane’s mom smothers him with a hug. It lasts approximately a year, while I pretend to do something abstract with my keys.
I wave at the trio of people on the porch. Only one of them, the tall teenage boy on the lowest step, returns my gesture. He looks back at Eileen, who stands with one hand on his shoulder and the other on the shoulder of the younger boy, a blond kid who’s chewing his thumb.
“Come on, Mom,” the older one says. She lets go of him and he bounds down the walkway. “Uncle Shane!”
Shane releases his mother and turns to him. “Is that Jesse?”
Eileen’s sharp voice cuts the cold night air. “He’s gotten big in the last twelve years, huh?”
Jesse gives Shane a quick, hearty hug. “I downloaded your podcasts? They were so awesome, I listened to them, like thirty million times. I told all my friends I knew you, and they wouldn’t believe me. So I bought a WVMP T - shirt. Can you autograph it and say ‘To Jesse, my favorite nephew’?”
“You gotta earn it.” Shane ruffles the boy’s shaggy brown curls, then looks at the porch. “You must be Ryan.”
The blond boy, who’s maybe ten or eleven, takes a half step backward and casts a nervous glance up at his mom.
“Go on.” She lets go of him. “Say hello.”
Shane greets him halfway up the walk, where they solemnly shake hands. “Glad to meet you.” Ryan just nods in reply.
“You weren’t even born when he left,” Eileen tells her son. She looks at me. “Boys, this is Ciara.”
“Hey,” they say in unison, Jesse just as shyly as Ryan.
“Let’s get inside,” Mrs. McAllister says. “It’s freezing.” She pats Jesse’s faded black My Chemical Romance “DEAD!” T -shirt. “How can you be in short sleeves?”
Shane taps my elbow. “I need to get stuff.”
I open the trunk, and Shane pulls out a bag of gift - wrapped boxes. As I close the lid, he gives me an odd look.
“Don’t you need to get something?”
I look at his bag, and my eyes widen. “Were we exchanging gifts this year?”
His lower lip goes out in the world’s briefest pout. “Uh, I guess not. I mean, I got you something. Several somethings.”
“Sorry.” I squeeze his arm. “I guess I could hit the mall tomorrow, if it’s that important to you.”
His gaze falls to the driveway. “Whatever.”
We go into his mom’s tiny house, into the front room, where snacks and cocoa are waiting for us next to a sparkling tree. It’s like a TV special: A Very Normal Christmas.
We set about opening gifts. Shane gives me a box set of CDs with every 5:54 a.m. song he’s ever played for me. Each disc has a cover with original artwork and a list of songs. The last disc is all him, playing acoustic. In a separate package is the best gift of all: a mix tape of music I’ve never heard, entitled “Not Fade Away”.
I lean over to kiss him thanks. “It must have taken forever to put all this together.”
“Lotta time to kill while you were imprisoned,” he murmurs low enough for only me to hear.
Mrs. McAllister hands him a present and pats his cheek. “I can’t get over how young you look.”
He shrugs. “Must be all those blood transfusi
ons.”
We gape at him. I’d kick his shin if I could reach.
Shane pops up his eyebrows. “You know, from Dick Clark.”
Even Eileen laughs a little. Then Ryan says quietly, “I don’t get it.”
Jesse punches his arm. “Then why’d you laugh, loser?”
“You didn’t get it either.”
“I know who Dick Clark is.” He looks at Shane. “Did Mom tell you I play guitar? Last year Dad took me to see Eric Clapton.”
Eileen frowns and shifts in her seat at the mention of their father. I guess they’re divorced.
“So what bands do you like?” Shane asks Jesse.
“I like a lot of old stuff, but I also like, um”—he counts off on his fingers—”let’s see, My Chemical Romance, AFI, Fall Out Boy, Good Charlotte, Jimmy Eat World, Chevelle, the Killers, Dropkick Murphys—”
I glance at Shane, whose brows pinch tighter as his nephew rattles off bands he’s never heard of. I bet he feels every one of his thirty - nine and three - quarters years.
“—and Green Day, I really like Green Day.”
Shane’s posture relaxes. “Green Day, yeah, they’re awesome.” He turns to Ryan. “What about you?”
Jesse rolls his eyes. “Don’t even ask. Ryan likes country.”
“Country’s cool, too,” Shane says. “It all comes from the same place. It’s just a different way of expressing it.”
“Yeah, a hella lame way.” Jesse pounds his fist on his knee and gives me a pointed look. “Can we do it now?”
“Jesse!” Mrs. McAllister glares at him.
Shane glances between us. “Do what?”
I reach into my pocket and pull out a slim package, wrapped in metallic red paper. “I just realized I tucked this into my purse.”
He takes it from me with a smile of relief and rips off the paper. “Oh. A new pick.” He turns it over. “It’s really nice.”
His mom lets out a giggle. Jesse bounces on the sofa cushion, more like a toddler than a teenager.
“What’s so funny?” Shane asks us.
“There’s another part to the gift.” I give his mom a hopeful glance. “Right?”
She jumps up from the sofa. “I thought you’d never get to it. Shane, it’s in the den.”
Bad to the Bone Page 29
