Vampire Island

by Adele Griffin

  “Grungy,” he proclaimed with a nod.

  “Thanks.” Lexie was happy with the way her costume had turned out. “Swashbuckley,” she complimented back. Because Pete was dressed in his favorite dueler’s garb—ruffled shirt, long black boots, and the dashing pencil mustache of Zorro. She took the single red rose he offered and tucked it behind her ear. “We sure have ‘Dressed for Effect.’ Come on in a sec while I do my nightly chore.”

  “Uh, okay.” Pete looked uneasy as he shuffled into the Livingstone living room, where Lexie’s parents were rehearsing their new song, “Shiny Cobwebs.” “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Livingstone,” he called.

  “Hello, Peter,” answered Lexie’s father in a strained voice. “Lexington, hurry up! You don’t want to be late!”

  “Yes, go! Go!” agreed her mother.

  As pleasant as her parents were to her other friends and neighbors, Lexie was disappointed that they’d never warmed to poor Pete. No matter how nice he was, Pete genuinely upset them. Now Lexie could hear that her father’s drumbeats were off as her mother plucked worriedly on her bass guitar. Unfortunately, Lexie had a weirdly similar effect on Mr. and Mrs. Stubbe, who were always trying to shoo Lexie from their home, too. Whenever Pete and Lexie discussed it, they concluded that both of their families not-so-secretly longed for their child to hang out with kids who were more normal than Lexie or Pete.

  But Lexie also suspected there might be a bigger reason.

  Lexie swung back to the bathroom and scooped a cup of dried wax worms and mealworms from the Bette’s Pets feed bag stored behind the toilet tank. She cracked open the bathroom window and spread the worms evenly over the windowsill. Even though they no longer communicated with other winged creatures, the Livingstones long ago had made a pact to offer free meals to them, out of respect to the hardship of foraging.

  A pigeon, poised on the outside sill, regarded Lexie in his dime eye. He seemed to want to tell her something. He waddled and twitched in frustration. Her heart tugged. Of the many unexpected sacrifices the Livingstones had made in immigrating to the New World, losing the ability to chat with other animals had pained Lexie most. Only Hudson had retained this gift, and he rarely shared it. He said what went on in the animal kingdom stayed in the animal kingdom.

  “Remember to tip the driver, kids,” said Lexie’s father, swiftly handing over the taxi fare as, over his shoulder, Lexie’s mother snapped a quick picture—a sweet if empty gesture, since of course there was no battery in the Livingstone camera.

  “Have fun, good-bye,” she said with a wave as her father practically pushed Pete out the door.

  Fun! Lexie winced from the word. Ever since the night of her non-professed love, Lexie had been avoiding Dylan like the plague. Specifically, the Bombastus Plague of 1837, when the Livingstones and other hybrids, deadly fearful of accidentally siphoning infected blood, had escaped to the one point of the Channel not teeming with bacteria.

  For his part, Dylan was as easygoing as ever. He’d even texted Lexie a couple of times this week, asking if she’d hurt herself falling into his garbage can. Lexie could not bring herself to answer. She was through with humiliating herself over Dylan. She would admire him from afar, and that was it.

  “No more moping, no more professing, and definitely no more showing off,” she told Pete as the taxi pulled up.

  “Good plan,” he said. “Dylan doesn’t deserve you. Hope there’s a costume contest. I bet I’ll win it. Tonight should be way fun.”

  That word again.

  Inside, the cafeteria had been transformed. Lunch tables had been folded and stacked to give room for a dance floor, and kids bopped to the music and kicked up dozens of pink and silver balloons. Lexie had Mina radared within seconds. Her archrival looked delicately perfect in a lace top and jeans, with a violet ribbon strung through her curls. As soon as their eyes met, Mina pinched Lucy’s arm, and the two of them beelined over.

  “Dyslexie, ew! Why are you wearing those grimy old pajamas?”

  “Oh…because…” Lexie stared around, trying not to let the confusion appear on her face. Everyone looked great. Nobody had chosen to “Dress for Effect.” With the exception of herself and Pete, everyone had Dressed for Style. Compared with Mina, she felt taller and clumsier and more battish than ever.

  “And if it isn’t Pete Stubbe.” Lucy sneered as she eyed Pete’s costume. “What’s your problem? Did you think this was a Halloween party?”

  “Zorro is a romantic figure, appropriate for any social gathering.” Pete patted his glue-on mustache.

  “Speaking of romantic, you two are perfect for each other.” Mina planted her hands on her hips as she stared from Pete to Lexie and back again. “Sometimes I think you two aren’t even from the same planet as the rest of us. More like…Planet Freak.” She shook back her curls as the others hooted. “Ooh, Dylan’s here. See ya.”

  “I never mean to act freakish,” said Pete as they watched the girls take off. “And we’re dressed just the way we wanted, right?”

  “‘I have never failed to fail,’” answered Lexie in a tone she hoped would have made doomed Kurt Cobain proud. Of course, K.C. had been proud to be a freak.

  Lexie’s eyes followed Mina as she fluttered over to Dylan, who stood with Alex and the rest of their friends in the lunchroom doorway. Kids were grinning and nudging as they noticed Pete’s costume. Lexie wished she could share Pete’s attitude and not mind if kids didn’t totally accept her—except she did mind. I had to give up the language of animals, but I don’t speak the language of my classmates, either. I don’t fit anywhere, thought Lexie.

  As if sensing her misery, Pete squeezed her hand. “Let’s try some of that strawberry fizz punch.”

  Fun was nowhere in sight tonight. Sipping artificial strawberry flavor while Pete practiced his fencing moves, Lexie leaned against the wall. Everyone milled around, having a good time. Here Lexie had waited hundreds of years for her first middle school social, and she had read thousands of musty romantic books and poems, and she had spent millions of moments brooding over adorable Dylan, and not one single thing about love had turned out the way she’d thought.

  Something pricked her eyes. Lexie blinked. She had read about tears, but never in her hybrid life had she managed to conjure one. Until now. What did it mean? Was it a sign that she was becoming less hybrid and more human?

  She caught a teardrop on her finger.

  DJ Jekyll’s voice boomed. “Okay, Cathedral Middle! Right now, we’re inviting everyone to ask your secret crush to one dance. Only your secret crush, though, and one dance only. So get brave, get busy, or get off the dance floor.”

  Pete tapped her shoulder. “If you think he’s worth it, then you better get brave, Lex,” he called over the commotion.

  “No way.” Lexie quickly wiped her tear on her flannel sleeve. “DJ Jekyll is talking about a secret crush. It’s no secret I like Dylan.”

  “It is to me.”

  Lexie froze. Slowly, she inched around to find Dylan standing right behind her.

  “Really?” Lexie was stunned.

  Dylan smiled. “Dance with me?”

  “‘No one worth possessing / Can be quite possessed.’” At Pete’s sudden outburst, Dylan stepped back, palms up.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t realize.” He looked hard at Lexie. “Are you…possessed?”

  “Not at all,” Pete answered for her. “But we came together, and we’ll probably leave together, too. You might say Lex and I belong together.”

  “What are you doing?” Lexie squeaked, pinching Pete’s side just as Lucy reeled up and tapped Dylan on the arm.

  “Wanna dance, crush?” Lucy giggled. “Mina says I need to be your bodyguard against stalkers.” She raised her eyebrows meaningfully at Lexie.

  Dylan gave Lexie one last bewildered look. She gazed back at him. Then, his hand caught in Lucy’s, he stumbled off. Heart pounding, Lexie watched them go before turning on her friend in frustration.

  “Pete,” sh
e said, trying to keep her voice calm. “Was that supposed to be chivalrous? I like Dylan. You totally messed it up.”

  Under the blue party lights, Pete’s yellow eyes seemed to glitter. Lexie wondered why she hadn’t noticed until now that Pete’s recent growth spurt meant he’d caught up to her in height. And was that mustache really glue-on? Because it perfectly matched Pete’s strange silvery hair. “It might not have been the best timing,” Pete admitted as he ladled his fifth cup of punch and downed it in one thirsty sip. “But I was compelled to say it.”

  “You were compelled to drive away my crush?”

  Pete looked dismayed. “When Mina made that remark about us both being from the same planet, something clicked inside me. Like, maybe you and I…we…?” He clasped his head in his large, heavy hands. When had Pete’s hands become so pawlike? “Or maybe I am the one who’s possessed! At nighttime, I can’t think as clear as by day. I’m confused, Lex—but I know that’s no excuse.”

  And Pete looked so genuinely embarrassed that Lexie had to forgive him, with a quick touch of her fingers to his cheek. On contact, the tips of her fingers, as well as her ears and her nose, inexplicably tingled. Was it Pete’s skin, or hers, that was too hot?

  “Let me make it up to you,” Pete pleaded. “Time for Plan B.”

  “What’s Plan B?”

  “First, we dance. Then, leave it to me.”

  Lexie nodded. Together, she and Pete swung onto the dance floor. Immediately, Mina joined them, whirling into the group with Alex on her arm. Soon there was no room to move. Everybody had paired up with someone to protect somebody else’s crush, Lexie realized. Human behavior was so peculiar.

  The music changed, signaling the end of the crush-dance, and Pete bumped deliberately against Lexie so that she jostled Dylan’s elbow. His eyes quizzed her.

  “Hey, Dylan. Sorry about earlier,” Lexie stammered as Pete walked away. “Pete gets protective.”

  “Sure.” Dylan shrugged. “But Pete’s not the only problem. You’re hard to understand yourself. And you’re the first girl I ever met who could spy from a fourth-floor window.”

  “I wasn’t spying, really,” said Lexie. “I was planning to profess…something.”

  “Know what I think?” Dylan leaned close toward her ear. “I think you prefer hanging out with freaky Pete Stubbe. I think you like standing on the sidelines with him better than getting to know a normal guy in a normal way.”

  Lexie was speechless. Was Dylan right? Was freaky Pete doomed to be her destiny? How tragic! Yet Dylan was so boyish, so innocent, so human. Maybe she didn’t know how to relate to him in a normal way. Maybe she simply wasn’t normal enough.

  By now, her crush had turned back to his friends. “Watch me,” he commanded, and everyone looked over just in time to see Dylan execute one of the world’s worst side thrust karate kicks, accompanied by a whoop as he went crashing to the floor.

  “Oooof!” Dylan’s hands clasped his knee as he rocked back and forth.

  “Dancer down!”

  “Bring a heating pad!”

  “Call an ambulance!”

  “Find an ice pack!”

  Teachers flew over. Even without her cowbell, Mrs. MacCaw took control. “The hospital is only a few blocks. We need a big, strong young man for you to lean on…” Her eyes searched for candidates.

  “Me.” Lexie stepped forward. Another bat stunt, but necessary. After all, she was the strongest person here. She bent down and swept Dylan into her arms.

  “Okay, that does it.” Mina raised her voice. “Is everyone watching this? Can we all just please admit that this is too weird? That a regular girl does not have the muscle to carry a full-sized guy?”

  “But…Lexie wins the Presidential Fitness Competition every year,” said Alex.

  “Yeah, and Mina’s always talking against Lex,” added Pete in a strong, deep voice. “Remember that time when she said Lex picked her nose with her tongue?”

  Everyone nodded. Yes, they remembered. Mina glared at Pete. And now Mrs. MacCaw was leading Dylan and Lexie out of the gym.

  “Do you care that I can carry you?” Lexie whispered to Dylan.

  “Just don’t drop me.” Dylan hooked his arms tighter around her neck. Ooh, and he smelled so nice, thought Lexie. Like new sneakers and spearmint gum.

  She carried Dylan the whole seven blocks down Lexington Avenue, all the way through the doors of the hospital emergency room. Dylan mustered a smile as Lexie settled him into a wheelchair. “I hope I did break my leg. Then I’ll get a cast and everyone can sign it.” So cute—even in his pain, Dylan was thinking about his buddies. Lexie gave Dylan a double thumbs-up as he was wheeled off for X rays.

  “Goodness, Lexington Livingstone, I’d like to see an X ray of your bones,” joked Mrs. MacCaw as they settled in the waiting area. “Strong girl. You must drink plenty of milk.”

  “Mmph.” Lexie tried not to gag at the disgusting mental picture of herself drinking milk, which she had not tasted in multiple hundreds of years—except that one time, right after the malted milk shake had been invented.

  Her gaze wandered over to a tall, skinny couple standing at the front desk. They looked sick. Not just any kind of sick. Their lips were liverish, their skin lima bean green, their eyes bugged out and glassed over. Lexie was pretty sure she’d seen that illness before. In fact, she was almost certain she’d once had it herself.

  “I’m very sorry,” the receptionist was telling the sickly couple, “but without your Social Security numbers, you won’t be permitted to see a doctor.”

  “We need help,” wheezed the man. “We even quarantined ourselves. We could have pneumonia, or a stomach virus, or yellow fever, or typhus, or dropsy.”

  “Or worse,” coughed the woman. “Much, much worse.” Her fingers twisted the black enameled beads of her necklace. Watching, Lexie felt momentarily hypnotized by the necklace’s sparkle and glow.

  “Even if any of those extremely awful things are true…” The receptionist upturned her hands. “You’re not in the computer file. And if you’re not on our records, then you don’t exist.”

  “We do exist. We’re standing right here.”

  “I need more proof,” said the receptionist. “That’s how paperwork works. Our on-call doctor will be out in a few minutes, if you’d like to speak to her.”

  The couple shuffled off to wait in plastic chairs.

  Lexie knew what had to be done. The Argos would want her to risk it. According to the terms of the New World truce, Old Worlders were encouraged to assist fellow Old Worlders. Even if this couple wasn’t fruit hybrids, they were definitely newly arrived Old Worlders who had very likely gotten food poisoning off a New World delicacy. Lexie remembered a few years ago becoming quite ill from jelly beans which, as it turned out, were neither made of jelly nor bean, and contained no healthy, natural fruit preserve whatsoever.

  Leaving Mrs. MacCaw, Lexie hurried over. “Excuse me. I’ve seen your symptoms before,” she said. “You two have been poisoned. If this hospital can’t help you, I can concoct my mother’s ancient remedy. Just tell me where you live.” Then Lexie uttered some words of the Old World to show that she was a friend.

  The couple’s expressions changed. Their clammy fingers squeezed Lexie’s wrists as they whispered their address in Old World language.

  “That’s easy,” Lexie answered. “You’re right in my neighborhood. I’ll prepare it tonight, and by tomorrow morning it will be on your doorstep.”

  “Thank you,” croaked the woman.

  “Don’t thank her yet,” gasped the man. “We’re still sick.”

  And then they were gone.

  Hudson

  9

  AN OLD HOUND KNOWS THESE THINGS

  Out of the corner of his eye, Hudson watched his sister tornado over. One minute she was plunked down at the sixth grade’s lunch table. Next second, she stood at the head of his.

  O Glory Be! O Joyful Tidings! Up until the moment Maddy rapped on the table
for attention, Hudson had been worried she’d ditch her end of the bargain.

  Kids fidgeted before she’d said a word. Like all the other grades, Mr. Apple’s fourth was pretty much incredibly terrified of Maddy.

  “Hand over your lunches, brown-baggers,” Maddy ordered. “Chop-chop.”

  One by one, children surrendered their lunches. Only the spitballing lunkhead kid feebly protested. “Why should I?”

  “Because,” answered Maddy, “you don’t want to make me mad, do you?” Her nostrils flared. In the bright lunchroom light, all color drained from her brown eyes, turning them pale as cream, then white, then crystal clear, and then brown again. So quick and so chilling that nobody could say for sure what had just happened. Yet it was enough to send a tingle down every spine, including Hudson’s.

  Ever since Maddy had confessed that she needed to fulfill her nonvegan destiny, Hudson had noticed his sister embracing her killer instinct. She sucked down the scant winter supply of blood-filled mosquitoes and ticks whenever she could, and as a result her tongue and gums were a deeper, more violent shade of red. Also, Maddy now could move in small tornado bursts, faster than a human eye could follow. These days, she was so speedy that she no longer bothered taking the bus to P.S. 42—but was always there before it pulled up.

  Now this trick. Clear eyes. Exclusive to purebloods.

  Whenever Hudson thought he should mention Maddy’s metamorphosis to their parents, something stopped him. His instinct told him that he and Maddy were in this together. If he was meant to be a Protector, then he needed his sister’s Predator help.

  The lunk added his lunch to the stack in front of Maddy, who worked so rapidly that Mrs. Westenra, the fifth-grade teacher and today’s lunchroom monitor, was not disturbed in her chat with head chef Mr. Lin about his knockout chili-lime salsa. Within minutes, Maddy had unclung every sandwich, sorting food from its wrapping into two sticky piles in front of her. “You see this plastic?” she asked. “Every day I watch you kids carelessly toss it into the regular garbage. I am fed up. Where does it belong?”