“With you, those two are the same thing.”
He laughed then, at himself I think. “I
tolerate
it because I came here to support you—”
“Hmpf! Why?” I scoffed at the ceiling, and when nothing but an empty feeling replied, I looked back at David. His cold eyes locked to mine.
“Enjoy your time with him while you can, Ara-Rose,” he said, the menace in his tone making it seem like he moved forward a step. “Because once we get home, my tolerance to this fraternisation with that traitorous cretin is an entirely different matter.”
I flinched, shutting my eyes tight as the bathroom door slammed behind him. But, all in all, I was kind of glad to see that version of him again. Nasty David had done a one-eighty since my dad died, and it was unsettling. I felt like he was a time bomb just waiting to go off—blast us all with a compounded version of the evil David he’d suppressed for the sake of appearances. But it was still there
—all that hatred, and I still knew where I stood with him. He was just very good at playing the role of the caring husband when the need called for it.
***
Vicki went home to take a nap, and Mike and I headed to the local mall to get something suitable to wear to a funeral. Shopping was the last thing I felt like doing, but I hadn’t packed anything black, since I hadn’t planned for my trip to New England to see my dad becoming my last chance to say goodbye.
“I was pretty nasty to him,” I said after Mike changed the subject suddenly and asked how things had gone with David last night.
He scooped my hand up in his, but it wasn’t enough for him. He dropped it and put his arm around me, and we strolled past the same shop window I’d seen our reflection in the day we got engaged: the image of us was exactly the same, aside from what we wore, but the relationship had changed so much that we looked almost like strangers.
“He’ll understand, Ar. Besides, didn’t you say it was before breakfast?”
I nodded.
“See?” He laughed. “We’re used to the ogre. Don’t think too much about it.”
“He was just trying to help, though. And I threw it back in his face.” I stopped then, seeing David up ahead. He had a suit bag over his arm, a few other bags in his hands, and that vacant, almost injured mask still on his face.
“You could always apologise,” Mike suggested, jerking his head to the vampire down the street.
I considered it for a second. “Yeah, but I still think he should've checked before he put this ring back on me.”
Mike nodded. “Yes, he should have. Even
I’d
be pissed about that, Ara. But if you feel bad for the way you reacted, you can always just apologise for
that
.”
“You’re right.” I nodded and took a step in David’s direction. “Even if it’s just to ease the tension. We played it cool at the funeral home this morning with Vicki, but she’s noticed things aren’t right.”
“Well—” He stopped me and took my shopping bags from my hands. “Let me take these home for you. You can ride back with David.”
“No, I—” I started, but the damn vampire was gone. “Argh!”
“Everything okay?” David asked, stepping up out of nowhere.
“No.” My fists balled up and I almost stomped my foot out of frustration. “Mike just left me here!”
“Why’d he do that?” he asked, laughing a little as he searched Mike’s escape route.
“I’m not sure what his motive was,” I said, then looked at David’s bags. “Did you get what you needed?”
He nodded, eyeing the garments and shoes sadly. “I … they asked what the occasion was.”
I placed my hand on his upper arm. “They did the same thing to me.”
“I’ve said it before, you know,” he mumbled, and then went quiet.
“Said what?”
“The word.” When he realised that I still wasn't following, his eyes changed and he looked at me, for once like we were both on the same planet. “I’ve bought black garments before—told people I was going to a funeral, but…”
“But this one hurt a little more?”
He nodded, his eyes returning to that glazed thoughtfulness. “I guess I’ve never really lost someone since…”
“Since?”
“Since my human compassion set in.”
That simple little fact compressed my heart and squeezed all the blood out of it. For David, this would be almost like dealing with grief for the first time. He always said vampire emotions were more profound and felt more intensely than a human’s, and I could see that so clearly in his eyes now.
“Here,” I said, forcing him to surrender a few bags. “I’ll help you carry these and, in exchange, you can take me home.”
“Do I have to?”
“No.”
He offered a gentle smile and we both turned and headed to the parking lot.
***
We laid in the shadows at the centre of the school’s football field, hidden by the hour of the night. No one, not human or vampire, would’ve noticed us here. Even I could hardly see my own hands. The moon had disappeared completely since I last looked at the sky a few days ago, taking any light with it.
“New moon,” Jase said.
“Huh?”
“It’s a new moon.” He nodded at the sky. “That’s why you haven’t seen it for a few days.”
“Oh. I didn’t even realise I was thinking about it.”
“You were and, somewhere under that, you were wondering why everything that brings light into your life eventually disappears.” He held me a bit tighter, and I rolled onto my side, moving my head from the crook of his arm to rest my cheek on his chest. “Your dad isn’t gone, sweet girl. He passed away but, when you’ve lived for a few centuries, you see that death, new moons, they don’t represent endings, but new beginnings.”
“How can death be a new beginning? And don’t rattle off some crap about life in Heaven, Jase, or I’ll—”
He laughed. “No. Because, if you live long enough, you always see them again—as something new.”
“What, like reincarnation?”
“Yeah.” He angled his head awkwardly to kiss my hair. “One day you’ll meet someone and they will remind you so much of your dad that you’ll wonder if it’s actually him—come back as your own little girl or a neighbour—someone that’s in your life somehow.”
“That’s a nice thought.”
His head moved in an absent nod, his ribs lifting my cheek as he drew a breath and let it out. “We never truly lose those we love, Ara. We just miss them for a while.”
A huge gulp of air hiccuped in my chest, but the tears in my eyes had been overused
—dried up completely, so the need to cry just sat there inside me, hurting everything. “Do you know what I hate most about losing someone?”
“What’s that?”
“The never-agains.”
“The what?” he asked with a little chuckle.
“The never-agains. There’s things my dad will miss now, you know? Like seeing my baby when she’s born and watching her grow up. But it’s the things he’ll never do again that hurt me the most.” My lip quivered just thinking about it. “He’ll never come home again. I’ll never see his smile again, never hear his voice. He’ll never use that stupid coffee mug again, and the salt shaker, Jase—” My voice quivered. “Vicki will never have to take it from him again. And that’s worse—
so
much worse than anything he might miss in my future.”
He rolled me into him a little more, firmly pressing one hand into my hip and bunching my fingertips against his chest with the other. “I won’t let it hurt for long, Ara
—the missing him. I won’t let it hurt you for long.”
“And what can you do to stop it?”
“I know grief,” he said softly. “I know that you need to acknowledge it, not fight it. That hole in your gut, that tightening in your chest, you need to just feel it—every time it hurts, you just need to acknowledge its presence and let yourself be in pain, because hurting right now is normal. Trying to fight that hurt—trying not to cry—that’s not normal, and that will make the pain last so much longer.”
“So, accepting the pain will make my head and my heart stop missing him?”
“No. You will never stop missing him. Ever. But one day, in a little while, it just won’t hurt the way it does right now. And I—” he kissed my head, “—will
always
be ready to comfort you through those moments of pain, Ara, so you don’t have to cry alone.”
I wrapped my arm over his ribs and twirled my fingertips through the grass under him. “Guilt makes it hurt more.”
“Yes. But, even if you’d said goodbye, Ara—even if you’d held his hand as he died, there would still be guilt. It’s a side-effect of grief, and all you can do is tell yourself, every time that guilt surfaces, that you’re not to blame. That you weren't meant to be here when he passed, and that some things in life are just not in your control. But that doesn't make it your fault. And your dad wouldn’t blame you. You know that.”
I did know that. But having Jason point it out helped—made me feel kind of silly for even feeling guilty in the first place. “He never even knew I was having a baby.”
“But I bet he knows now.” He smiled suddenly up at the clouds, gesturing for me to look too.
I followed his gaze and, there, shining through among them, was one tiny silver star, its sharp glowing points reaching out to several corners of the universe.
“He taught you to believe in wishes, right?”
I nodded.
“Then believe
that
—” He nodded to the star again. “Believe he’s watching over you, Ara—that he knows
everything
now.”
I sat up and hugged my knee, keeping my eyes on the star until the clouds moved in again, blackening it into the sky.
“Makes you feel a little less alone, doesn’t it?” he asked lightly, reaching up to rub my back.
“To think he knows we’re vampires?” I asked, not really waiting for a reply. “Yeah. It would've been nice to see his face when I told him, though.”
Jase laughed. “Yeah, even
I’d
have paid to see that.”
***
The front door closed with a bit of a creak that echoed through the late night’s stillness. I waited until I heard Jase’s car start up and drive down the street before I moved, even though I knew no one would link the sound of a car to my late arrival home and assume I’d been out with a boy. And a horrible empty feeling flooded me after that thought, making me miss everything I took for granted about my childhood—about overprotective parents and that ultimate sense accompanying the annoyance that I was truly loved. Truly cared about. It would have mattered to my dad to know I was a vampire now—that I was safe from the mortality other humans faced. In fact, I wished now more than ever that I’d told him I was married to a vampire, too. And a greater part of me wished David and I had continued that conversation about turning my dad. If I’d just received that letter in time, maybe we could’ve made it here—turned him before it was too late…
Guilt.
I let out a long breath and reminded myself, “It was not your fault, Ara-Rose,” feeling the pain eat me up for a few seconds before the agony actually passed and I could breathe again, left only with the mental anguish, which, as Jason said, didn’t cause any pain at all. They were just thoughts: things without any real power over me. I could switch focus—think about something else, if I really wanted to.
Taking each step forward on my toes, remembering the quiet spots in the floorboards at the last second, I made it back up to the spare room without being seen or heard. Even David was asleep when I opened the door. I half expected him to have waited up
—maybe lecture me or argue with me about spending time with his brother. But it was so quiet and so peaceful in the house that I let out a cool breath of relief and snuck over to the bed to grab my pillow.
Outside, that singular star was shining down again. I slipped out of my jeans and set my bed up on the floor under the window, closing it first so I wouldn’t catch a chill, then laid down to fall asleep in the light of that shining ball of gas. I knew it wasn’t a sign from my dad, but it was a nice thought. And as I laid thinking about stars, my mind quietly wondered why the window was even open when I came in. I closed it before I left and I was sure David hadn’t gotten hot and opened it, looking for a cool breeze.
“What are you doing, Ara?” David said out of the blue.
“Going to sleep.”
“Don’t sleep down there.” He sat up a bit, the sheet slipping down to reveal his bare chest and arms. “Come up here.”
“Uh—” I looked at the bed, then at the tiny space we’d have between us. “No, thanks.”
“Ara, I mean it.” He patted the bed. “I’m not having a pregnant woman sleep on the floor.”
“Why? It’s not like you
condone
my pregnancy,” I said spitefully.
“Ara,” he groaned my name out. “Look, I didn’t mean that, okay? I—”
“Well, you said it.”
“I know. I said a lot of things I didn’t mean. But
…” He lowered his head with a short little jolt. “That’s on me, okay. Don’t punish yourself for that.”