Rose Blossom

chapter 6





"Rose, you're awful quiet, what's wrong?" I heard Julian ask as he sat down next to me on my parents' couch. It was Sunday and it had been two weeks since I had met his family. We had fallen into a pretty good routine where he spent all day Sunday at my house.

"Yeah, Rho what's going on?" Avalon's voice echoed as she sat down next to me. True to my word I was spending time with Avalon and had gotten her to loosen up a bit in the past weeks. Her brown hair was in a pony tail and she was flushed today, as was Julian, both a little warmer than normal. But I had realized that whatever they ate or did not eat was what caused the temperature change in their skin.

I turned to Avalon, she was a curious little thing and my dad adored her. When she was with us and Julian and I wanted alone time, my dad let her go into his study and look at his books. I took a deep breath and smelled the jasmine and copper which floated off of Avalon.

Several days before I had given up figuring out why each member of Julian's family's breath smelled like a flower and a darker sent. Either way their scents calmed me down and let me breathe easier, even in the midst of my worse attacks. Besides my theory of what they were had grown; now all I needed was an opportune time to ask about it.

"Come on love, tell us what's bothering you," Julian pleaded, his hand cupped the side of my face as he pulled me onto his lap, I wasn't a small girl but Julian made me feel like one. I sighed, I didn't want to admit what had me depressed. It was silly really but with the end of October came the holiday I dreaded more than any other, Halloween. I had never been allowed to participate, too much excitement. Parties, trick-or-treating, costume shopping, my mother had never allowed any of it.

And Mel loved Halloween more than anything. She always held a huge costume party that I was never allowed to attend. I said as much to Julian and Avalon. They looked at each other shocked and then Julian just shrugged his shoulders.

"Do your parents not celebrate it either?" Avalon asked.

"Kind of, as you can tell they have the stereotypical jack-o-lanterns and my mother will allow me to be in charge of handing out candy. But anything else is forbidden." I leaned against Julian, turning my face to his chest.

"Well this year that will change," Julian told me. I looked up quickly.

"What?" I asked

"I will convince your parents to let me take you to the party," he said.

"Even if you could the party is a week away. Where are we going to find costumes this late? It's themed, 'famous couples,' " I lamented.

"Oh Rhodanthe! Julian's had your costumes bought for weeks and I've had mine bought too! We love Halloween!" Avalon exclaimed.

I swiveled and looked at Avalon, when I saw the excitement in her eyes I stared back at Julian, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I had no idea you weren't allowed to celebrate Halloween, I just figured you didn't care," Julian said, looking a little unsure.

"Oh Julian, if you can convince my parents to let me go I'll.... I'll do.... I don't know what but something!" I squealed and kissed him. He froze under my lips and then his hands were linked behind my back and we were locked in a deep embrace, I felt like he was devouring me and it was a pleasing sensation.

I heard Avalon cough, "Someone's home."

Julian and I pulled away from each other and sure enough a minute later, though I had heard nothing, the garage door opened.

Julian smiled down at me, "give me 10 minutes and I'll get the okay." He quickly left the room.

The minute he was gone I turned to Avalon; she sat back a little, probably not liking the expression on my face.

"Avalon, may I ask you a hypothetical question?" I had craved this chance to get her alone for days now. The girl retained knowledge and ideas better than a computer.

"Well, I guess, if it is hypothetical then yeah, sure," she shrugged, watching me with careful eyes.

So I launched into my theory, "If you and Julian were....say....vampires, how would you get around the whole sunlight issue?"

I watched the light dawn in Avalon's eyes. She sat up and crossed her arms in front on her chest and thought about it, and finally she answered.

"Well...if such things existed it would be tied into the basic blood diet, I would guess. If, say, a vampire drank only human blood then things like sunlight and holy objects would affect them like in stories of old."

I could feel excitement building inside of me, "well what else besides human blood would a vampire drink?"

"I would assume animal blood," Avalon's eyes glowed a bit and I could tell she was enjoying our game.

"And would drinking animal blood have negative effects?" I was desperately trying not to seem too interested, I didn't want to scare Avalon off, but it was hard, I knew she could hear my heart and its beat was slowly speeding up.

"Well since it would go against the vampire's base nature, in theory, it would weaken some of their powers, but they would be able to withstand sunlight and have no problem with holy objects."

I stood up and began to pace, I could feel her eyes following my every move. "How do you think a mortal would be able to tell if someone was a vampire?"

I heard Avalon take a deep breath, "well, I've heard that vampires who drink mainly animal blood have floral and metallic smelling breath and unless they've fed recently their skin is supposed to be cool to the touch. And their eyes glow when they are in a powerful mood, supposedly."

I bit my lip as I heard the door from the garage open; we both stilled and watched as my father walked into the room. He smiled at us, shaking his head in laughter," Julian and your mother are still outside," he said then went upstairs.

My eyes darted to the door and then to the clock, I was afraid we wouldn't be able to finish our conversation before Julian got back.

"Okay, let's say a vampire made friends or dated a human, how much danger would the human be in?" I asked.

Avalon froze, and I noticed her eyes had a faint red tint to them; I inched away from her and waited for her response.

Slowly Avalon answered, "The human, no matter how well behaved the vampire, would still be prey. I mean these vampires would be able to smell their blood and hear their heart beat. But I think that even with all these factors the human would be safe enough. Especially if you added in how the vampire felt about them and the vampire's strength of will."

After she finished talking there was silence and the only sound that came was the ticking of the clock, I took a deep breath and into that powerful silence I asked my last question, "how would one become a vampire?"

What I wasn't expecting was Julian's voice to answer from the front entryway, "The human would need to die. The vampire drains the mortal’s blood they are very near death, and then they in turn drink from the vampire and pray it works."

We both turned to stare at Julian as he came further into the room, he looked paler than he had before and a worried crease sat between his eyes.

"Julian I....." Avalon trailed off.

"No Avalon, it's alright," he said, but his eyes never left mine, there was pleading in those blue depths and I realized he was afraid I would leave him if I knew the truth.

But what he didn't know was that I wasn't afraid, maybe a little shocked that vampires actually existed, but not afraid. My heartbeat was a little faster than it should have been, but only from the adrenaline.

"Julian," I said his name quietly and held out my hand to him, "it doesn't matter." The relief on his face was apparent, I glanced at Avalon and she was smiling. Julian practically jumped over the couch; he wrapped his arms around me and kissed my forehead. "Your mother went for a walk," he whispered.

Just as I was opening my mouth to ask about what he'd said there was a loud knock on the front door.

I moved out of Julian's embrace with an apologetic smile and went to the front door. What I didn't expect was to see a truly pissed off Mel on the other side. Her eyes were violently green, which was a sure sign she was mad. I left the door open but took a few steps outside.

"Hey Mel, what's up?"

"You never freaking called me back!" she exclaimed, "You're always too damn busy with your new boyfriend and his weird little sister!"

"I did so call you back, why don't you check your voice mail!" I told her. I frowned, not really understanding why she was so angry, "and don't call Avalon weird, it's not nice. She's really very interesting and you'd see that if you actually talked to her."

"Don't defend her! She's replacing me I can feel it!" Tears filled Mel's eyes, "you NEVER want to hang out with me anymore."

"That's not true Mel, no one could replace you, we've been friends since kindergarten, besides every time I have free time you're with your own boyfriend." At this point I raised my hand to place it over my heart; it skipped a couple of beats as I watched Mel decide what to yell at me about next.

I could feel the color draining from my face, but still I had the gumption to be upset that Mel wasn't noticing because she was too angry.

"Okay, fine, but I'm still worried about you Rho," Mel said, staring at her feet.

"What? Why?" I rolled my eyes.

"I think, well maybe Julian is taking over your life, maybe you should consider dating someone normal, like Athol. I mean shit! He is always bugging me about you during P.E."

At the mention of Athol's name my heart stalled, I hoped Julian had not heard that, I took a deep breath in through my nose and peace began to fill me as Julian's scent enveloped me. My heart started to return to normal. But it was another shock as one more odd quality of Julian's was shoved in my face. Mel couldn't see him but he was standing inches from me, helping me to remain calm.

"I understand you're worried Mel, but there is no need to be. I want to be with Julian, and honestly Athol gives me the creeps. But you know what? Friday evening is free for me, why don't you come over and we'll do a movie night, how's that?"

Mel smiled at my suggestion, her whole demeanor brightening, "That would rock Rho! Okay, well then, I'll see you at school tomorrow." She grinned at me and ran down the sidewalk to her car.

When I turned around I was not surprised to see Julian standing behind me, a predatory gleam in his eyes.

"Athol is asking about you?" he asked a slight growl in his voice.

"I guess," I shrugged, "but who cares? I'm with you and that is not going to change."

Julian just stood there for a minute or so eyes fastened upon me so intently I couldn't help but wonder what he was thinking. So I asked.

"That he's going to continue to cause trouble," was his answer. "What about you, what are you thinking?" he countered. "All I got was a few words."

Hands on my hips I made eye contact, "you masked yourself from her thoughts." It was a statement not a question. Julian blinked and then nodded in agreement.

"Do you ever do that to me?"

"Never." He lifted one hand and placed it upon my cheek.

A little shaky I walked past him to the living room, I sat down next to a very wide eyed Avalon. I steadied myself before inquiring, "How did you become a vampire Avalon?"