Still Sucks to Be Me: More All-True Confessions of Mina Hamilton, Teen Vampire

by Kimberly Pauley

  For YOU

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  About the Author

  Copyright

  1

  I, Mina Hamilton, am officially dead. Officially, officially. You name it, I’ve got it: death certificate (which I’m not allowed to keep in a scrapbook, per the Vampire Relocation Agency rules), obituary in the paper (depressingly short, if I do say so myself, and ditto on the scrapbooking), and a funeral. A funeral which, incidentally, my family’s personal VRA goon, Josh, would not let me attend.

  What’s the point of having a funeral if you can’t go and see who cared enough to show up? I had an excellent disguise picked out and everything, but the Josh-erator put me under total house arrest.

  Or should I say total hotel arrest. It’s not like I—or for that matter, anyone in my family—can be seen in our house since we’re all, you know, supposed to be dead.

  But maybe I should back up for a minute here. In case you haven’t been following my every move (and why would you be?), at the end of my junior year in high school, my parents dropped the v-bomb on me. Sure, I knew they were vampires (I mean, duh, I’ve lived with them my whole life) but the stupid Northwest Regional Vampire Council was making me choose if I wanted to be one too. That meant:

  a) I had to attend vampire information sessions (aka pro-vampire propaganda classes) taught by this crazy vampire lady named Ms. Riley (aka Grandma Wolfington) so I could make an informed decision on my bloodsucking future,

  b) which would have completely sucked except that I met George, my boyfriend and (who knows?) possible love of my undead life there, and

  c) ultimately decided that, yeah, I’d rather be a vampire and stick with my family than get my brain washed and lose them forever. (Though I’d be lying if I said I were giving up my best friend Serena, because I’m not. She knows it all and I don’t care what The Council says … okay, I do care, but I’m not telling them.)

  So that brings me up to this week. One minute Mom’s telling me it’s time for us to die (and I’m like, “Huh? How much more undead can we get?”) and the next, there’s the Josh-erator at our front door saying The Council has decided that we can’t live here anymore. But when you’re a vampire, you can’t just call up U-Haul and schedule a moving day like normal people. No, you get assigned a Vampire Relocation Agent who comes and hacks your whole life apart. He changed our last name, made up fake lives for us (Dad and Mom are supposed to be my brother and sister-in-law? Embarrassing!), and worst of all, he’s shipping us off later tonight to some undisclosed location. And here I was hoping The Council and the VRA would be off our backs since we were all legal now and I was a bona fide, registered vampire.

  I managed to get exactly one text out to Serena before the Josherator confiscated my cell phone:

  Send text to (SERENA)

  Me (3:44 pm): dnt frk out no matter wht nt dead del ths msg!! more l8r dnt txt bk!

  Which was a good thing, since she’d have completely killed me if she found out I wasn’t actually dead (like dead-dead, not just undead) after the funeral.

  Not only did I miss my funeral, I also missed my own death. “Your presence is not necessary,” was how the Josh-erator put it. Huh. That totally doesn’t seem right to me, but the VRA and The Council certainly know how to suck the fun right out of everything.

  Josh did at least get me a copy of the article they ran in the newspaper about our so-called demise (after warning me at least five times that I’d have to destroy it after I read it). It was pretty nice, you know, as far as those things go:

  Local Family Dies in Tragic Car Accident

  Four people were killed in a road accident in San Mateo County early last evening. According to eyewitness reports, a large dog or other mammal darted in front of their car, causing the driver to veer sharply off the road and into the guardrail. The car, a silver-colored minivan, then reportedly continued over the guardrail to fall into the Pacific Ocean. The area, known as the Devil’s Slide, has claimed many lives over the years.

  Detective Lee of the San Mateo County Police Department commented, “This is one of the worst accidents I’ve seen in some time, and I’ve seen my share of tragedies. There’s no way any of the family could have survived a fall of that height.” The deceased include Bob and Marianne Hamilton and their seventeen-year-old daughter, Mina, as well as Mortimer Hamilton, the father’s uncle …

  It went on for a while about things like keeping your dog in check and the problem with the guardrails along the highway, and the controversy over whether or not the road should be rebuilt entirely, etc. etc. And there was a picture of the tail end of our minivan sticking up (barely) out of the ocean. I can’t say I’ll miss the thing; it was pretty much on its last legs anyway. Or last wheels. Whatever.

  Those eyewitness accounts? All VRA plants. As well as the deputy they got the quote from and for all I know, the guy who wrote the newspaper article. If there’s one thing you can say about the VRA, they’re very thorough. And very, very present. As in around ALL the freakin’ time. Maybe they do that on purpose so you don’t have a chance to back out of the relocation or so you don’t mess things up by popping up somewhere noticeable when you’re supposed to be dead. Or maybe they just like to be annoying.

  So here I am, stuck in a fleabag motel on the outskirts of my hometown. Mom and Dad are out conferring with the Josh-erator in some “undisclosed location” (i.e., probably some pancake house or something like that), which means I’m finally alone for the first time since this whole fiasco started. Uncle Mortie was supposed to stay and babysit me, but he disappeared right after the Josh-erator, muttering something about having to “take care of a few things” (which probably means there’s either a blonde or a hamburger in his future, or both if he’s lucky). The Josh-erator may not trust me, but at least Uncle Mortie does.

  Not that he should. Trust me, that is. Because the first order of business for the brand new Mina? One last big hurrah with my best friends. There’s no way I’m leaving town without a party. And it’s about time George found out that Serena knows about the whole vampire thing anyway. I hate keeping secrets from my boyfriend.

  Since we’re going to go out tonight, I need to figure out what to wear so no one will recognize me. But there’s no way I can piece together a decent disguise with the stuff at this dump. I’ve only got my one VRA-allowed tiny little overnight bag of stuff with me that holds

  a) my notebook from my vamp
ire lessons, since I hopefully (but probably doubtfully) took notes on at least some of the stuff the Josh-erator keeps mentioning (and besides, it’s not the kind of thing you want to leave behind for people to discover); and

  b) my fav picture of me and Serena, and a prom picture with me and George and Nathan and Serena, all looking really happy (VRA contraband, but I hid them in my notebook); and

  c) a couple of my favorite outfits (my Ella Moss dress, a pair of jeans, my fav shirt and a T-shirt I snitched from George that still smells like him); and

  d) Mr. Lumps. Because there’s no way I’m leaving my teddy bear behind. I don’t care what the VRA says about it.

  My only possible disguise option is to put on the shower cap that looks like it’s been here since the nineties. Somehow I think that’d make me more noticeable than I am normally. I’d hope, anyway.

  Time for plan B. I call Serena from the front desk of the hotel after I give the guy some story about how our room phone isn’t working, just in case the VRA’s checking up on our phone calls (I wouldn’t put it past them). I tell her to bring some disguise-ready stuff and meet me at this cute little tea café place I saw around the corner from the hotel. It’s not like anyone who knows me will be hanging out at some teahouse halfway across town eating crumpets or curds and whey or whatever it is you have with tea. We can get in disguise there. Or I can, at least. Serena doesn’t really need one. Her normal look is a pretty good disguise.

  2

  I’m not, as a general rule, a very teary person. Okay, so I do cry at chick flicks and my dad has totally banned the Lifetime channel from our house, but it’s not like I cry over cheesy commercials or anything like that. Yet I totally break down as soon as Serena pulls up in the Death Beetle in front of the tea place. This of course makes her turn on the sprinklers too.

  I climb into the car and we cry on each other’s shoulders for about five minutes until our backs are about to break from the awkward pose. Volkswagen Beetles, especially the old-school ones, are definitely not made for physical contact. Which, come to think of it, might be why Serena’s dad gave her the car in the first place.

  We finally get ourselves together and go into the café, which is when I notice Serena looks pale as anything and is wearing a black dress and some heavy (the part that’s not totally tear-streaked) eyeliner. Oh no, I am not letting that slide!

  “You’re not going Goth on me again, are you?” I yell loud enough for two little old ladies next to us to look up in disgust.

  “D’oh!” she says. “I’m in mourning. Haven’t you heard? My best friend died in a tragic car accident!” Which causes us both to break into a fit of insane giggles and the two old ladies to get up and move to another table.

  I guess I can’t blame them, but I’m not about to explain what’s really going on. Let ’em just think we’re a couple of juvenile delinquents. That’s what it always seems like the little old ladies think anyway.

  “So what’s your excuse for not calling me sooner? Besides going off a cliff.”

  “Hey, you’re lucky I got that text out to you at all. This is literally the first time I’ve been alone since this whole thing started. I got no warning from Mom and Dad at all.” Yeah. Ask me if I’m happy about that. I’ll give you two guesses and one of them doesn’t count.

  “Where are they sending you?”

  “All I know is that it’s south of here.” That’s all I’ve been able to gather, even with my superhearing. What the heck good are übervampire powers if nobody says anything important remotely near you? Nada. That’s what.

  “Your mom and dad don’t know either?”

  “I guess not. They haven’t said.” They haven’t said much, period. Which I am beyond over. But I don’t want to get into that right now.

  “So you think maybe LA? That’s south.”

  “Maybe.” Los Angeles seems like it would be the obvious choice. Big, lots of people, easy to disappear. I bet a ton of vampires live there. And I had glimpsed the initials LA on a piece of paper before the Josh-erator had whisked it out of sight.

  “It’s a drive, but it’s doable. I could come see you on weekends once things get settled! I’ve got an aunt who lives there, so I’ve got a good excuse to go down. She’s always asking if I can come and help watch her kids. She’s got twins and my uncle travels a lot. Definitely before school starts I could get down there at least once. I could really use some time away from the family anyway.”

  “Maybe I could even meet you halfway or something, if I can talk my parents into a car.” They totally owe me one for all this relocation nonsense. “I’m sure the VRA would kill me if I came all the way back here. I’m not even supposed to be out at all.” I leave out the part where the Josh-erator was threatening me with “dire things” if I left the hotel room. No need to make her worry, and what the VRA doesn’t know won’t hurt them.

  “So what have you been doing since you ‘died’?”

  “Ha!” I say. Shoot, I could spend an entire half hour on the packing trauma alone, but I do my best to condense things down to the main points:

  a) The Council sucks and is all up in our business (as per usual); and

  b) The VRA is a bunch of nosy busybodies who have confiscated everything I own, including all communication devices (so I won’t be tempted to make contact with anyone who isn’t supposed to know anything) and all memorabilia (like yearbooks and photos, since they’d be identifying factors or some such nonsense); and

  c) If I hear the Josh-erator go, “Okay, pop quiz!” one more time, I may whittle a stake out of my toothbrush and do him in myself; and

  d) I am so ticked that the VRA didn’t let me attend my own funeral. How wrong is that?

  “It was nice,” Serena says. “For a funeral, anyway.”

  “Did a lot of people come?” I hope so. It would kinda suck if no one cared enough to show up. Not that I had a lot of friends other than Serena. But still. I mean, I did die an untimely death at a young age. Isn’t that supposed to count for something?

  “Yeah, pretty much the whole school showed. Even Bethany was there. And Ms. Reed and Ms. Tweeter were totally bawling their eyes out the whole time! I’m kind of ticked, actually. I squeezed an onion to get some juice just in case I couldn’t work up enough tears, but with all the waterworks they had going, nobody noticed me one way or another.”

  “Wow.” Geez, I hope Ms. Reed didn’t still think I was pregnant because I checked out that teen pregnancy book by accident. I probably gave the poor woman nightmares. Talk about a dedicated librarian.

  “By the way, what was up with your weirdo vampire friend?” asks Serena. Off the top of my head, I’m not even sure which vampire friend she must mean. Maybe Linda? I haven’t seen her since she turned, so maybe the former poster girl for the Chess Club went all crazy ninja or something. Or maybe Lorelai wore her cheerleading outfit. I wouldn’t put it past her.

  “Who? What happened? Somebody scare the locals?”

  “Some freaky Goth chick with a serious attitude problem. She was all skulking around. Now tell me the truth: I didn’t look that stupid when I was Goth, did I? Please tell me I didn’t. I had style, right?”

  “A Goth chick?” Whoa. I’ve never hung out with any Goth chicks other than Serena. That could only have been Raven, crazy vampire wannabe from my vampire training classes who had it in for me over some stupid guy. Maybe Grandma Wolfington let Raven turn after all even though they kicked her out of class? Otherwise, she should have no idea who I am anymore, since they should have done the whole brain-wiping thing on her. Either way, I can’t imagine why she would have shown up at my funeral, unless she actually thought I’d died for real somehow and wanted to gloat. “Did she say anything to you?”

  “Yeah. It was kind of weird. She asked me if I was a friend of yours—actually, she said ‘the deceased’—and I said you were my best friend, but she should’ve been able to tell without asking. I had some great fake tears going. You should have seen me. I swear I should
be an actress.”

  “That was it?”

  “No, that’s when it got bizarro. She got right in my face and said, ‘Wouldn’t want to be you.’ I thought maybe she meant, you know, about you being dead and everything, but it was really strange how she said it. Then she poked her finger at me and said that she was my worst nightmare. She was like stupid creepy, if you know what I mean.”

  That definitely had to be Raven. She was always poking her finger at me too. What did she mean by all that? Is she trying to get back at me through Serena or something? It’s not like it’s my fault she got kicked out of class. Not exactly. Mostly.

  “Are you sure she was a vampire? She say anything else?”

  “I dunno. How can you tell? She just looked like she wanted to bite me or something. But she didn’t say anything else. Some girl in a cheerleading outfit came over and the Goth chick disappeared, like, poof! I forget what the cheerleader’s name was, but she seemed pretty nice. For a cheerleader. I can’t believe she wore her little cheer suit to your funeral though.”

  “That’s just because you don’t know Lorelai. She was in my intro class too. Good people. I heard she got accepted to some pre-college cheerleading camp thing. Besides, she knows I’m not really dead.” Dead-dead anyway. I’m just, you know, undead. I doubt if she even owns anything black. Wait, I take that back. I bet she’s got at least one perfect little black dress in her closet somewhere. Or a bunch of them in multiple hem lengths so she’ll be prepared for any situation.

  Which reminds me. Clothes. I point at the overstuffed purple backpack she brought in with her. “So, what did you bring for disguises? Tell me it’s not Goth stuff.”

  Serena plops the bag on the table and nearly knocks a flowery little china teacup filled with sugar cubes off the table. She starts pulling out a bunch of hats and sunglasses. “No Goth. I just mostly brought stuff for your head since I figured that’s what you’d need to hide the most.”