Odd Stuff

by Nelson, Virginia

  “No way!” I scooped at a crumb of cheesecake on my plate.

  “Seriously. From what I understand, we will be sex fiends by forty. But we aren’t even going to be hot enough to make anyone want to bang us, based on the growth of my ass. It isn’t fair.”

  I eyed her. “Unless we get married.”

  She grinned. “Yup, ‘cause that throws sex right out the window. Then we won’t want it even with the hormones.” We laughed and headed back to the hotel for the spa appointments Mia had called in.

  Getting massaged, we stayed on the topic of sex. Women actually talk a lot about sex, contrary to male popular belief. “Did you know that pig’s orgasms last a half an hour?” I grinned. “Someone posted this thing on social media and—”

  “Was it that one that told you that, and then added that dolphins and humans were the only creatures on this planet that have sex for pleasure?”

  “Yeah.” I nodded. “I thought I forwarded it to you.”

  “Yeah, but pigs don’t have sex for pleasure even though their orgasms last a half an hour…and they say pigs are smart.”

  “Yeah.” I pointed a finger at her. “But what about dogs? I mean, they hump, like, anything. Isn’t that sex for pleasure?”

  “Depends.” Mia waved her hand in the air. “If you are going by the Webster’s definition of sex or the Clinton one.”

  We moved on to pedicures and amber alerts from there. “So, why don’t they plant micro-chip-thingys in kids so that they can’t get lost? Like you just point and click on your laptop, and poof! There is little Johnny.”

  “Paranoid people,” I responded. “I mean, if we can afford to put them in dogs, can it really be that expensive to do?”

  “Wait, back up.” She looked down at her toes and wiggled them.

  “Yeah?”

  “What do paranoid people have to do with planting microchips in our kids so we can find them if they get kidnapped?”

  “Two levels, here. On the first, if we did that, wouldn’t the sickos know we did it and, like, carve them out of the kids?”

  “Blech.” She pulled a dramatic face at me.

  “Okay, now say that we ignore that and plant a microchip in every kid under ten.”

  “Sounds great. You would always know where your kid was and kidnapping would be wiped out of possibility.”

  “But wait…then those kids start turning sixteen, and they are still in there.”

  “Great. No more teenage pregnancy. We bust them when their heart rate rises. Oh, like, we make the chips able to monitor heart rate and temperature. When your kid has a fever you would know. And when your kid was getting nasty in the back of a Chevy, and—”

  “Hang on.” I raised a hand. “Okay, then your kid robs a bank and we can wipe out all crime because we know exactly who was where when stuff went down and—”

  “Sounds great!” Mia grinned.

  “But—”

  “You always have a but,” she muttered.

  “The government then knows everything about everyone. More kids have gotten them…eventually we all have them.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “Big brother would have nothing on that one.”

  She shivered delicately. “Okay, I see your point.”

  “Do you think the government knows about things like vampires, witches, all that?”

  She looked at me. “Makes you wonder…”

  “Wonder what?”

  “Maybe they do. Maybe they help keep all of the other stuff, anything beyond the norm, hidden from the regular people.”

  “Why would they?” I wondered. “I mean, you could tax blood. You could make a per spell tax…you would think there would be a lot of money in making oddities mainstream.”

  “Picture the hysteria. I mean, our country goes buggy over a man marrying a man, what would they do about a man marrying a dog? Like a werewolf? Or a woman marrying a human leech, aka vampire. It would mean mass insanity. People would be loading up with holy water, stakes and silver bullets.”

  “Oh, that is an unpleasant thought.” The woman doing my toes looked at us as if we were completely and utterly insane.

  “Book plot,” I told her. She smiled, relieved to have a logical explanation.

  I looked at Mia with raised brows, and she giggled.

  We headed back upstairs. Feeling pampered and decadent did a lot to our flagging spirits. Curling up with a chick flick, we dozed off together in the monstrous bed. I woke as the sun set to the sound of something moving in the closet. In a moment, the door opened and a ruffled Vance emerged. He took one look at me, hair coiffed, white terry cloth robed and pink toe nailed, and growled. “What?” I looked back at him.

  Mia stirred next to me.

  “I had to spend the day sleeping in a hotel closet and you girls had a spa day?”

  “And we had cheesecake. And we used your credit card. But I feel less beat up and Janie feels less weird, right Janie?”

  “Yup,” I concurred.

  “I am thrilled for you both. I need a shower.”

  “Out of towels. You’ll have to call up for some.” Mia stretched.

  “Freaking spa day,” he grumbled and left the room.

  Mia and I laughed. Sometimes it’s good to be a girl. When he returned from his shower, Mia had gone to get some food, and I felt it was time to face the music, so to speak.

  “Vance, I’m leaving.” There, that wasn’t so hard.

  “Yeah, we should hit the road. You need to be home to get Vickie tomorrow.”

  “Yes, that, too. But I’ve decided I’m not staying in Ashtabula. I’m moving in with my cousin in Colorado.” I said it simply and without inflection.

  “What made you decide that?” He had gone still and his expression was unreadable. I mean, the guy is a vampire. When he stills his face, there really isn’t a lot going on. I mean, he is technically a dead guy.

  “I can’t stay around you and Mia and hope to stay normal. I have known you, what, since Tuesday night? And here it is Saturday, and I have met vampires and magicians, and a score of other weird stuff. I have found out I’m an aura junkie, and broken my own vow not to sing. Twice. Now, if I sing again, I’m trapped in a life that I don’t want. I can’t risk it. How long until the next big bad thing and a choice between singing or losing one of you? I need to remove my daughter and me from this world before we’re trapped in it.” I looked into his eyes, hoping he’d understand. “I can’t be this. A part of me wants to, but I can’t. I have worked so hard my entire life not to be this thing…this monster. I can’t be it now.”

  “What if you have no choice? What if five minutes after you leave town, you sing? Then what?”

  I looked at him. “I would come back. If I had no choice but to join the monsters, I wouldn’t leave you. I’ve known you less than a week, and yet I care about you, but I am not going to sing. So, what ifs don’t really matter.”

  “But it’s not me?” He was still very still and expressionless.

  “No. Why would it be you?” Baffled, I turned wide eyes on him.

  “You aren’t running because you are afraid of me?”

  I blinked at him, trying to decide if he was serious or not. “No. Why would I be afraid of you?”

  “Because I am a monster.”

  Oh, well, yeah, he is. He didn’t act much like a monster, other than the thing with blood drinking. It was like a mosquito. You know they drink blood, but you aren’t really bothered by the drinking itself, you’re more bothered by the itchy bump they leave behind. And they aren’t scary. I mean, they are just mosquitoes.

  Vance was a vampire and, yeah, I never saw him during the day. Yeah, he sucked a little blood, but other than that and the steak breath, he was just a regular guy. Super attractive, and nicer than any guys I knew, but just a guy who happened to hang out at night and didn’t eat much…

  I had forgotten to be terrified of the blood drinking monster and even slept with it.

  A lot.

 
; I processed all of this and tried to work up a little terror, just to see if I could. But really, if you knew you had the power to swat the mosquito, would you be afraid of it?

  Nope. I shook my head at him. “I kind of forgot how to be afraid of you at some point.”

  He let down whatever walls he’d erected, and his face broke into a smile. “My ego can take a lot, but scaring you off…all the way to Colorado, was kind of knocking it down a peg. I care about you, and I don’t want to lose you. But I don’t think you will be able to resist the pull of your abilities. I guess if I am not the problem, I can wait you out.”

  “I am not coming back. Seriously, I am not going to sing.”

  He nodded. “And I was going to walk into the sun on my first morning as a vampire. Survival instincts are stronger than you think.”

  “I won’t have to use survival instincts if I am away from all of this.”

  “Okay, how about this? I give you ten years. If you haven’t sung by then, I will chase you down.” He stalked toward me, demonstrating how he could chase me down.

  “And then I will say, how is Vickie?” He pinned me to the bed. “And if you say, ‘Why Vance, she is fantastic. She is out on her own, and I am just so bored and lonely. Will you run off with me and we can be monsters and have a hell of a time?’ I will say to you, ‘why yes. That sounds fantastic. Come with me and I will warm your nights and you will spend your days wishing I was there’.”

  “Yeah, because that sounds just like me.” I laughed.

  “It will. Because you can’t resist me.”

  “Ten years, huh? What makes you think you’ll still be interested in an almost fifty year old?”

  “Because no one else does it on a skylight.” He nuzzled my neck.

  “Oh, yeah. There is that. So, you’ll wait for me because I’m good in bed?”

  “Yeah. Oh, did I forget to mention…” He wagged his eyebrows. He tried a bad impersonation and said, “I von to suck your blood.”

  Laughing he rolled me over to sit on him, and Mia reentered the room. “God, can you keep your paws off each other for two minutes?” She balanced a tray of food.

  “We are going to shoot for ten years.” I grinned at her.

  “Yeah, so we need to start missing each other now. Why don’t you be a good witch and go ride a broom or something for a couple of hours?” asked Vance.

  “Hang on let me find a broom.” Her tone was dry. “I know just where I’m going to shove it.”

  CHAPTER Fifteen

  All of Vickie’s stuff was stowed with mine in the trunk of my beat up Focus. The plan was to stop back at Odd Stuff and say goodbye to everyone and head out in the morning. I walked through the mall at three thirty, which was a half an hour early, but I was missing Vickie so much that I hadn’t been able to wait. I sucked another sip out of my cherry slushie and looked at the backs of paperback books in front of the bookstore. It was funny. I had come here to come home. To be safe. To have time to relax and heal.

  Instead, I had been too busy to notice that I had any wounds that needed tending. I had been certain that I would never be involved with a man again, and had gotten wrapped up in a whirlwind romance with a vampire. I had broken my vow not to use my abilities, but found that I was never quite complete without them.

  I had come here, sure I knew what I needed, found nothing I had come for, and ended up finding everything I was sure I didn’t want.

  But a part of me felt more alive than I had ever felt before.

  Another part ached. I tried to ignore that part. It was the part that was weird. It wanted me to finish it. It wanted me to be what I was born to be. It was the Niagara Falls part that wanted to turn the water on full blast, erosion or not.

  And lemme tell you, I would be lying if I said it wasn’t tempting. I mean, think about it…I could be the stuff of dreams. If you could wake up tomorrow with all the powers that the superheroes had, be that darn cool, wouldn’t a part of you want it? Come on, you know you would. Everyone wants to be more than mundane. To have that little extra something. And to know that your life really made a difference. But if you were given that choice, and knew you had a kid to raise…you would have to give it all up. You can’t be a homeroom mother by day and be a kick ass siren bitch by night. Leather and packing lunches did not mesh. Going to parent-teacher conferences by day, going after bad guys at night…illogical. And I was a mom. I had to be logical. I had to make the right choice, the safe choice.

  And dating a vampire was not a safe choice for a single mom. It was probably, like, rule number one in the good mommy handbook. Dating the undead is a surefire way to get the Bad Mommy Award.

  So, that part ached, but it couldn’t matter.

  I stuffed all of that deep, and chose to look at the part that was happy. I was happy. It was weird, maybe weirder than vampires and sirens and witchcraft. I’d been so sure I would never love again, and here I was…falling in love with a dead old man.

  I looked at my reflection, tossed back by the glass front of a store. I didn’t look any different. I felt different though. I felt alive. Maybe I hadn’t felt that way for a long time and just had not noticed.

  My green T-shirt had a picture of Yoda on it. Under him were the words, Judge me by my size, will you? I also wore a pair of jeans and a winter jacket. My hair, yanked back in mommy casual, showed no signs of floating. My pale face looked mundane, like all the other faces passing me. Good, because that is the look from here on out. No more pearly skin and floaty hair. No more predatory face. No more weird shit for me at all.

  I made it to the food court and sat down near the arcade. Vickie would want to get in a game or two before we left, so I might as well find some quarters now. I began rummaging in my purse. That was when I noticed the silver cord.

  A strand of silvery light ran from the middle of my chest toward the arcade. As looked at it, it thrummed slightly.

  Okay, what new weirdness is this?

  I stood and the silver cord moved with me. I sat back down and tried to see where it went, but saw nothing other than a vague into the arcade. I couldn’t see past some of the taller games to see exactly where in the arcade. I tried, anyway, shifting back and forth. Nothing.

  I took another chug of my slushie for strength while I thought.

  I didn’t want to be part of anymore weird stuff and my internal weird radar screamed—definitely weird. Nobody else in the food court had glowing lights coming out of their chests, just me. Ain’t I the luckiest girl in the world?

  I knew I should just keep sipping my slushie and hope the freaky light went away. Yet I felt compelled to follow that cord of light and see where it went.

  And that, I thought, was the kind of dumbass idea that made this week as bizarre as it had been.

  I put a hand up and it went through the cord as if it wasn’t there. No one else was looking at me, so I guessed that no one else could see the big white beacon. Well, that is handy.

  It pulsed slightly, kind of like a heartbeat would look if you could see one. Maybe it is just my heartbeat?

  Yeah, my heartbeat was suddenly a white pulsing light that shone from my chest. That makes perfect sense, I berated myself.

  Music thrummed out from the arcade. The lyrics pounded into my brain as I stood. I was going to do the stupidest thing I possibly could…again.

  I was going to follow the cord and see where it went. I couldn’t take the curiosity. I had to figure it out. Why would a weird light come out of my chest and go to an arcade? Was it a sign from the universe that I should go play Tekken? Or was it something weirder? Something I was going to regret finding out?

  I leaned toward dumb idea and something I didn’t want to know, but I was going in, who was I kidding? As I got closer, the song grew louder, and I could identify the lyrics.

  It seems that what is left of my human side is slowly changing in me…

  Apt lyrics. What was left of my human side had been singed by this whole week. I made it to the doorway of
the arcade, and still I could see nothing out of the ordinary—games, squealing kids, low lights—no sign yet as to where the light was leading me. The music vibrated the room, and the lyrics continued to beat down on me.

  Looking at my own reflection and suddenly it changes, violently it changes...you’ve woken up the demon in me. My reflection had changed…outside the Galley after I drained all those people. Again when Chance had given me power. Had they woken up the demon? Was there no going back to normal now?

  And I saw where the light cord ended. A man stood, still and waiting. He wore a long black trench coat and a fedora. He looked down, face invisible to me. I knew who it was, though, and I froze in place. The light ended in the middle of his chest. It ran from my solar plexus to his, brighter now that I was closer, a silver cord, tying me to him.

  He looked up slowly and glass green eyes laughed at me.

  I stared at him, a low trembling beginning in my stomach. He had woken up the demon in me, and his eyes screamed at me, daring me to deny it. He had vomited light and power into me, burning off bits and letting bits grow, and suddenly I wondered if I had ever had a chance at normal after that. I wondered if he could see some weird alien sickness growing in me…festering. Eating at the normal human life I had chosen and leaving me nothing but this. Whatever the hell this was.

  Chance smiled slightly, but made no move.

  I wanted to do the girl thing and run away screaming, waving my arms. It seemed a weak thing to do—never working out for girls in horror flicks anyway, since they invariably tripped and the monsters caught up—but I found I couldn’t make myself do it. The cold part of me, the part I hadn’t even known I had until this week, wouldn’t let me be weak.

  I steeled my will and raised my jaw. So be it. Bring it on and all that. I’m not afraid of no stinking monsters.

  I let the cold voice, the one he’d freed with his happy lightning bolt of power, take the reins in my head, and I stalked over to him. Just then, I noticed he was one tall guy. I met the green eyes and golden retriever face I’d mistaken for a jolly master magician on our first meeting. Pretending to ignore the silver cord, and favoring him with a glare, I said haughtily, “You wanted something, I assume.”