Real Vampires Don't Sparkle (21 page)

“What was the rest of it about?” Matheus asked. “The smiling and the leaning and the whispering in my ear. What was that supposed to do?”

“Oh, that. I wanted her to think we were lovers.”

Matheus stopped, bags hitting the pavement. “What?” he screeched.

Quin turned around, a few steps ahead of Matheus. “It was a useful distraction. It kept her from asking too many inconvenient questions and from pining after you like an abandoned puppy. Like I said, humans are prey, not dating material. Also, it was fun.”

“You sociopathic son of a bitch,” Matheus said. “I’m not fucking gay.”

“I know,” said Quin. “People in Zambia know. The anal-probing aliens that pick up hicks on back roads know. When they buzz by in their invisible spaceships, they go, ‘oh, not Matheus Taylor. We can’t pick up him. He’s not gay.’”

The white-hot flash of anger rushed away as quickly as it had arrived, leaving Matheus feeling sunken and a little silly. He cleared his throat, staring at Quin’s Adam’s apple.

“Invisible spaceships?” he asked.

“If your mission was to explore the rectums of a primitive species, would you want the rest of the universe to know?” asked Quin.

“Ah, no, probably not.” Matheus collected his bags, ignoring Quin as he began walking. Matheus liked to think he had a modern outlook on homosexuality. He’d tried hard to expunge the things his father had taught him, but erasing childhood lessons was like a murder on a TV show. The blood looked cleaned away, but one quick spray of luminol under a black light, and suddenly everything stood out, bright and clear. They walked in silence for a few minutes, passing the coffee shop where Matheus used camp out during finals.

“What does it matter if people think you’re gay?” Quin asked. “If you don’t plan on fucking them, does it make a difference?”

“But I’m not,” said Matheus. He wasn’t; he’d had girlfriends. The last one had been only—Matheus thought for a second—oh, God, three years ago. He raked through his memories. There must have been someone else since then. A healthy adult male did not go three years without sex and
not notice.

“I don’t get upset when people assume I’m straight,” said Quin.

“That’s different.” Matheus gave only half his attention to Quin. The other half examined his sex life from the perspective of an outsider. In truth, he’d never actually been all that interested in sex. The effort and clean up didn’t seem worth it, when he achieved the same result with some Jergens and a box of tissues. But he definitely thought about women when he did it, Matheus told himself. Definitely.

“Why? Because it’s more socially acceptable to be straight? I suppose I should be pleased that I’m not a rainbow flag-waving twink. That I
pass
.”

It dawned on Matheus that Quin spoke louder than usual. He pulled himself away from his own worrying thoughts, and glanced over at Quin. He had a set, bitter twist to his lips and his stride had grown longer, the heel of each foot hitting the sidewalk with a distinct rap.

“That’s not…. I’m not going to argue with you about this,” Matheus said.

“Because you know I’m right,” said Quin.

“I know you’ve got a chip on your shoulder.”

Quin grabbed Matheus’ arm, using it as a fulcrum to swing himself in front of Matheus.

“If you have issues with me being gay, tell me now and I’ll find someone else to look after you while you learn. I’m not ashamed, and I’m not going to pretend to be something I’m not. Not for you. Not for anyone.”

Matheus thought of Quin telling him about the sun, with the strange fullness in the words warping the air around them. All Quin’s insulating layers stripped away to reveal this one sparking wire, exposed and defiant at the same time. Poked the wrong way, it’d produce a nasty shock or short out entirely, and Matheus didn’t know how to avoid either result. He preferred when Quin wore his armor.

“I….” Matheus looked away, unable to meet Quin’s eyes. “No, I don’t have a problem.”

“Matheus,” said Quin. “Be sure.”

“I’m sure.”

“Look at me.”

Goddamn
, Matheus thought as his stare snapped to Quin’s. He blamed the connection, but it went beyond that. Quin knew how to command, and if Matheus’ father had forced one thing into him, it was how to follow.

“I’m sure,” Matheus repeated, exhaling as he realized he hadn’t made of liar of himself. “I don’t want to go to anyone else. Granted, there are lots of reasons why I want to bash your face into a brick wall, but that isn’t one of them. And I don’t want you to send me away.”

“Good.” Quin resumed his walk, although his gait remained stiff.

Matheus waited, keeping silent as the tension ebbed away. The ornate Liberal Arts building of Bayhill University stood in his view, its windows dark, marble steps lit with old-fashioned gaslights retrofitted for fluorescents. Opposite towered the ten-story dormitory, a depressing building of cinderblocks and concrete. A cheery red banner hung over the entrance, doing little to hide the fact that the dorm looked like a relic from a Soviet era re-education camp. Matheus had lived there for two years, and every morning he woke up disappointed a tornado hadn’t destroyed the building while he slept.

“It’s the connection, isn’t it? That claiming thing?” Matheus asked.

“I don’t know,” said Quin. “It’s not very flattering to me, if it is.”

“Oh, dear, have I bruised your ego? Gosh, I can’t imagine why I wouldn’t want to hang around the psychopath who murdered me.”

Quin rolled his eyes. A group of students dressed in club gear milled around the entrance of the dorm. One of the boys attempted to climb a lamppost while his friends shouted out insults. A subgroup of girls stood to one side, pretending unsuccessfully to ignore the boys.

“Get over it,” Quin said.

“Get over it? You fucking killed me!”

The boy fell off the lamppost as the students nearest Quin and Matheus turned to stare at them. Quin smiled and gave them a wave. He moved closer to Matheus, lowering his voice as they passed through the crowd. The shouts and loud jokes rose up around them again.

“Share it with the whole world, why don’t you?” Quin said. “You know, someone killed me too, but I didn’t whinge on about it.”

“Right. I’m sure you gave him a great big hug.”

“No, I killed her. Eventually.”

“So you’re saying I should kill you, too?” Matheus asked.

“Well, I’d rather you didn’t,” said Quin. He stopped at the crosswalk, the only place where a tall, wire fence didn’t separate the two sides of the road.

Between the buildings, Matheus could see the river. A small mall stretched out behind the Bayhill building, with the rowing sheds beyond that. A tarred path ran along the top of the embankment, passing the Edwards Bridge all the way down to the harbor. Bicyclists and runners ruled the path in the daytime, and college students searching for a cheap date took over at dusk.

Quin faced the bit of river for a moment, absently smoothing a hand over his head.

Matheus opened his mouth to ask if Quin was lost when he started across the street. Matheus groaned and followed him. People invented taxis and public transportation and buying things online for a reason: blisters. A small farm of them had sprouted on Matheus’ feet.

Quin cut through the mall to the path along the river, slowing his stride as Matheus started to limp. He spoke as he walked, with the same offhandedness he used to brand all his past.

“Akantha decided to turn me after seeing me fight,” he said. “She wanted a bodyguard. Why she needed one, I don’t know. As an accessory, maybe. One of my perks was that she agreed to share my bed.”

“But you’re—”

“I know. It wasn’t optional.” Quin sighed. “Things were different then. There wasn’t this idea of being gay. I could have handled it. Sex is sex, after all, even if it’s not who I would have preferred. But Akantha liked pain.”

“Oh,” said Matheus, watching the river. The air was damp with the smell of salt and fish. A short distance away, Edwards River fed into the harbor.

“I don’t mean rough sex, with ropes and smacks and biting,” Quin continued, looking at Matheus. “I mean real pain. Knives and broken bones and humans to play with.”

“Oh, God.” That explained a few things about Quin. Especially the insistence that humans were food and nothing else.

“So, I killed her.”

Matheus swallowed hard, trying work some saliva into his mouth. A touch of dizziness blurred his vision. The narrow path meant that he bumped against Quin every few seconds. He wished for a bench or rock to sit down on.

“Is that where you got your scars?” The question slipped out before he thought.

“Some of them.”

Matheus nodded, realized after thirty seconds he was still nodding, and forced himself to stop. He had no idea what to say.
Boy, that sucks
just didn’t seem good enough. He had discarded a half-dozen ideas when Quin tapped his fingers on Matheus’ forearm.

“It was a long time ago,” Quin said. “Don’t worry about it. I don’t.”

They started over the bridge, a remnant from the time of the city’s founding. Hand-carved grey stones fitted together without mortar, decorated with a pair of stern-looking angels on either side. Occasionally, people brought up replacing it with a modern bridge, but those plans never reached the development stage.

“It’s horrible,” said Matheus as they reached the apex of the bridge.

“Yes,” said Quin. “That’s the shoe store up there.”

The lights were still on in the small shop, much to Matheus’ annoyance. Any decent cobblers should be in bed, letting the elves get on with their work. Unless, Matheus thought with some alarm, elves were who Quin brought him to see. Being a walking corpse had completely screwed with Matheus’ sense of reality. If he existed, who was to say that elves didn’t? Hell, maybe Saint Nicholas really did live at the North Pole.

“I don’t need shoes,” Matheus said.

“You can’t wear sneakers all the time. Besides, yours are disgusting.”

“They’re fine. They don’t have holes in them.”

“If that’s your criterion for footwear, you need help,” said Quin. He wrinkled his nose as he looked down at Matheus’ sneakers.

Matheus felt a sense of déjà vu expanding in his mind. The clothes, the shoes; next, Quin was going to tell him to cut his hair, stop failing math and learn some responsibility. Not very different from most teenagers’ experiences, but his father went to special lengths, enough to make Matheus break out in hives at the thought of being called into his father’s study. Matheus thought of being sixteen and scolded like a dog that peed on the carpet.

“I don’t need you to buy me stuff,” he said, the muscles in his jaw tight.

“There’s nothing wrong with having nice things.”

Matheus thought about every time his father smoothed over a conviction or paid off his teachers to give him a passing grade. Even as a child, Matheus knew his father acted not out of love or affection, but self-interest. There was an image to maintain, and his father planned to keep it intact whether Matheus cooperated or not. Every expensive gift tied another rope around Matheus’ neck. Matheus took years and a lot of pain to work that out.

“There is when you don’t earn them yourself,” he said. “It’s your money. If you want to get thousand-dollar suits and shoes handmade by artisans in Florence for yourself, that’s fine. But just handing someone everything they want isn’t kindness. It’s a slow rot.” He plucked at the suede jacket he wore. “I didn’t buy this. I didn’t work for it. Why should I value it? So what if it gets ruined? What have I lost? You’ll just buy another one, right? Being spoiled makes people lazy and stupid and selfish.”

He glared at Quin, daring him to argue.

Quin shrugged. “So pay me back,” he said.

“What?”

“Get a job and pay me back. It might take a while, but that’s not a problem, is it? I’ll even charge you interest, if you like.”

“Where the hell am I supposed to get a job?” Matheus demanded. “The all-night diner on Reed Street?”

Quin made a slashing motion with his hand.

“There’s plenty you can do. Work from home. Start an online business. Take up pickpocketing. It isn’t the seventeenth century anymore. People can work all hours.”

“So, you think I should get a job to pay for the stuff you forced me to get? How is that fair?” Matheus thought about chucking the clothes straight into the river, but he was afraid of what Quin might do. Probably throw Matheus in after them. Although, he knew Matheus could swim, so he might break his arms and legs first, then throw him into the river. Matheus would float out to sea and be eaten by a shark.

“No, what I think you should do is pull the tree branch out of your ass and let me buy you the damn clothes. You’re the one fixated on
earning
them.”

A shark would have been more comforting company, Matheus thought. Quin had entered the door-crashing-down, screwdriver-throwing kind of mood. And now Matheus gave him a poke.

“I’m not getting shoes,” he said.

“You’re getting shoes,” said Quin.

“I’m not.”

“Sunshine, stop arguing. You’ll get the shoes and you’ll wear them.”

“Will not.”

“Will.”