“I know, and I love you, too.” Without looking at me, he gave me a quick kiss on the forehead, and stepped away from me. He had never kissed me so brusquely before. “Mattie, come on! Where’s your ball?” Matilda jumped up to start searching for it, and Jack went to help her.
I glared up at the sun before going back in the house. If it wasn’t for the stupid light, I would’ve stayed out there with him. But the bright noon sun was too draining, so I walked back into the house. The dark sanctuary of the kitchen brought relief, and I sighed. I had no idea if I had done the right thing, but anything that made Jack that upset was probably bad.
I spent more of the afternoon pretending to sleep than actually sleeping. To fill the time, I texted Jane and tossed and turned a lot. I listened for Jack to come in the house, but he never did. Bobby got up to eat, but everyone else was sound asleep. Except for Jack, who was gone.
Finally, I gave up on getting anymore rest and got out of bed. I texted him to ask where he was, but he didn’t answer. I was starting to think I was a pariah the way nobody answered my calls or texts.
When Bobby walked by on his way to his room, he smelled overly delicious. My bedroom door was shut, and the scent of his hot blood wafted in. It had been a few days since I ate, and vampires could go much longer than that. I had to get my hunger in control if I ever planned on being with Jack.
So as hungry as Bobby made me, I swallowed it back and decided to clear my head with a nice long shower. I had just started gathering my clothes when I felt the warmth in my chest, meaning Jack was nearby, and a moment later I heard him bounding up the stairs.
“Hey.” Jack poked his head in, still hanging onto the bedroom door. “Are you up?”
“Yeah, I was just about to take a shower,” I held up my clothes for him to see. “Unless you wanted something?”
“No, go ahead and shower. But do you wanna watch a movie after?”
“Yeah, sure,” I shrugged. “Have you slept yet?” It was after six, and as far as I knew, he hadn’t gotten any sleep since he got back.
“Nah, I’m okay,” he shook his head. “I’ll talk to you after your shower then.”
“Uh, yeah, okay?”
With that, he left, shutting the bedroom door behind him. I stood there, holding my clothes in my arms, trying to figure out what was going on. I heard him knocking on the door across the hall. He got more nervous, which made me nervous, so I decided to wait to see how this turned out before I got in the shower.
“Yeah?” Peter opened his bedroom door sounding crabby, but that was Peter.
“I went to the video store and I, uh, rented Brideshead Revisited. I know you really like it, and I thought you might want to watch it with us. Me and Alice, I mean,” Jack said.
“Um… sure.” Peter sounded taken back, and so was I.
“Alice’s taking a shower, so it’ll be a little bit,” Jack said.
“Okay.”
“Okay.” There was kind of an awkward silence. Jack must’ve finally excused himself because Peter shut his door, and I heard Jack running back down the stairs.
In the shower, I sing very loudly (today it was the theme to Golden Girls), but even over the sound of my voice and the water running, I could still hear Mae screaming. This would later prove to be a godsend, when Peter explained to me that Brideshead Revisited is an eleven-hour long period piece that originally aired on the BBC in the 1980’s.
At the time, however, Mae’s desperate pleas were enough to scare the hell out of me.
- 18 –
Once I got out of the shower, I could hear well enough to ascertain that Mae wasn’t in immediate danger, and Ezra was trying to calm her. But something was the matter and I didn’t like it. I threw on a pair of my sweats and one of Jack’s oversized tee shirts, and hurried out the door.
“I wouldn’t go down there if I were you.” That was Bobby’s word of advice. He stood just outside of Milo’s door with a hoodie wrapped tightly around him. “It doesn’t sound pretty.”
“You aren’t bloody listening to me, Ezra! You never listen to me!” Mae shouted from downstairs.
“What’s going on?” I asked Bobby, hoping to gain some insight on the situation before diving into it.
“I don’t really know. Milo and Jack left on a blood run about fifteen minutes ago, and Mae and Ezra started fighting a few minutes after that,” Bobby shrugged.
A blood run meant that we were getting low on bag blood at the house, and they had gone to get some from a blood bank. My stomach grumbled at just the thought of blood, but Mae was yelling so much, I ignored it.
“Don’t tell me to calm down! I am not going to calm down!” Mae continued after Ezra mistakenly suggested she relax a bit. “This isn’t something that we should be reasonable about! This is life and death, Ezra!”
“I know that, Mae! That’s exactly why we need to think about this!” Ezra raised his voice, but there was nothing angry about it. He was just trying to be heard over her. “But everyone else in the house doesn’t need to hear us yelling.”