Eternal: More Love Stories With Bite (11 page)

"What did you do to Chelsea?" It took all the air I had to get the sentence out.

"I tried her out. But I
don't like blondes." A small laugh into my hair. His breath was warm. "They
told
me
I'd
get lonely after a while. They said to be careful. You're perfect."

Nobody had ever said anything remotely like that to me before. My heart was pounding. The waves of hot and cold intensified, each one shaking me a little. I made some sort of tiny sound.

"You, I can change." His lips brushed mine. His breath smelled like peppermints and smoky desire. He rested his forehead
against mine,
like he could read my
mind
by pressing
our skulls
together. "But
you
have to do something, sweetheart."

"What?" I
was drowning.

"You have to say yes." He leaned against me, his arms over my shoulders, our foreheads touching, and everything else was so
far
away. Our bodies fit together. The only other real
person in
a cardboard
world,
and
he
was standing
right
in front of me.

Had
he
held Chelsea this way? Did he
do
it before he . . .

My brain stopped working.
His
head dipped. He kissed my cheek. Nuzzled at my jaw. "Say yes," he whispered. "Say
it."

What else did I
have to say? There was nothing
I
could do.
I
was still following Chelsea.

It was too late to back out now.

"Yes,"
I
whispered, and the teeth, long
and
sharp, drove into my throat.
I
jerked,
my body finally
realizing
that I was driving
it
right
off the
edge
of
the cliff, but
his
arms were like steel bands and
he still
smelled of peppermint and sweetness.
I
understood why she'd gone with him.

Anyone would.

* * * *

Sunlight. Hurt. Stinging my eyes.
I
blinked.
My
alarm clock was making
a
horrible noise and
my
throat
hurt.
I managed to
hit
the snooze button and
lay
there, stunned.

What the hell?

I blinked again. The ceiling blurred. My cell phone rang again, vibrating on my nightstand.
I
fumbled for it.

It was Jenny. She didn't waste any time. "Jesus! Where the
hell
did you go last night? We freaked the
fuck
out! What
happened?"

Oh, shit. I wasn't dead. My head hurt like a steel spike was driving right through it.
I
fumbled around some more until I came up with sunglasses and slid them on. "My dad called." The lie came out hoarse and natural. "He was insane.
I
had to ditch and go home."

"And you couldn't call? Or, like, walk five steps to tell us?" She was really worked up.

"Jesus, Jen, you know my dad." She didn't, but it was a good line. "He said to come home right-fucking-now. I jumped in a cab. My phone was dying anyway. What's your damage?"

It was the wrong thing to say. But Christ
I
was tired of putting up with the shit. And didn't she have any fucking clue that last night. . .

Jack.

My brain froze up briefly. I smelled peppermints, copper, hot desire, and felt his arms around me again. A bolt of heat went through me. Consuela was stirring downstairs. I smelled the bacon before it hit the pan and began to sizzle. I heard her humming to herself.

"Well, excuse the fuck out of me." But Jen sounded oddly unrighteous. Kind of deflated. "Are you coming to school today? Did you just wake up?"

"Just." I checked the time. My throat hurt like hell. I sounded like
I
had a cold. "I'll be there. See you in class." And then I hung up and tossed the phone back on the night- stand, flung my arm over my eyes.

Oh Jesus. I wasn't dead.

What was going to happen now?

* * * *

When you've got a big heaping helping of who-gives-a-fuck, school loses a lot of its importance. And worrying about your friends tossing you off the top of the food chain loses a lot of its snap, too.

But a funny thing happens when you don't care anymore. Suddenly they can't get enough of you.

Was this how Chelsea always felt? Take it or leave it, who the hell cares, fuck off? JoJo and Bebe both fell over themselves trying to make me talk. They gossiped and Jenny fell back into watching. It was exhausting to be the one they were trying to impress. JoJo in particular would
not shut
up,
and during class time the teachers were talking on and on about shit that didn't matter. None of it mattered.

Because he'd bitten me. The two scab-marks on my throat, small rough spots under my fingertips when I realized I was touching them, felt hot. Infected.

And I wasn't dead. I wasn't in a ditch with my legs spread and my throat cut.

Trig class gave me some time to think. I doodled aimlessly on my paper, sometimes glancing up at the crucifix over the door as Sister Lucia droned on about the wonders of mathematics. I took notes, too, whenever I could focus enough to hear what she was saying.

I wasn't dead. My throat hurt, a dry sandy pain.

It was near the end of trig when the idea took shape, slowly, under the surface of utter panic. I guess from the outside I looked calm, but everything was whirling inside me. Like the winds, whistling sharply around the corners of the building. The low moan ran under my thoughts, scattering them like the dust particles that had spun through the circles of lamplight last night.

But the thought wouldn't go away, and it finally shouted itself loud enough to be heard over the wind, just as Sister Lucia said my name.

"Are you ill?" Her eyebrows were up, her wrinkled mouth set in a thin line.

"I don't feel good," I croaked. Convincingly, even.

She wrote me out a pass to go visit the nurse. "Lucky," JoJo said softly as I picked up my bag and scooped my book and notepaper together.

I almost replied
Bite me,
but the words died in my burning throat.

I didn't visit the nurse, either. I got off school grounds the way Chel and I always had when we skipped, flagged down a cab on Charter Street, and went home. Consuela was out shopping, so nobody saw me when I drank two bottles of Evian and went out to the gardening shed. The water sloshed uneasily in my protesting stomach.

I
found what I was looking for, and stood staring at it for a long time before getting down to work. I almost ripped one of my fingernails off and a splinter the size of Texas rammed into the meat of my left hand. When I pulled it out, a trickle
of
blood followed, and I
clamped
my
mouth over it before I could
think
twice.

I
came back to myself
on
my knees, sucking at my hand, my hips tilting back
and
forth as I rocked
and
moaned a little. The metallic tang of blood slid across the dry sand filling my throat, sharpening the thirst. And I surprised myself by bursting into tears. I sniveled until the snot ran down my face while
I
finished working, then I got back in the house
and
cleaned up before Consuela got home. I
scrubbed at my hands for
a
long time, the lather building up, and
the
bubbles went down the drain with a wet chuckling sound.

* * * **

"You look sick,
mija."
Consuela put her wrist against my forehead. "You go to bed early,
ay?"
She set the plate down in front of me, and the sight of food made me feel like horking like that bulimic bitch JoJo.

Dad stuck a forkful of steak in his mouth, chewed. His eyes were on me. When he finally swallowed, he set his fork down and took a sip of wine. "You do look pale. Maybe you should go to bed early instead of running around with your friends."

I hung my head and tried to look repentant. "Yeah, I think so. My stomach's messed up."

He stared at me like
he
knew what I was up to. Consuela shuffled out
of
the dining room.

The sun
was going down. I tried
not to
stare at the window.