Эллен Шрайбер - Vampireville

"So how do you like being a vampire?"

I dropped the nail polish and quickly turned around.

Jagger, wearing a white "Bite Me, I'm Transylvanian" T-shirt and black army fatigues, was standing before me.

“What are you doing here?" I questioned.

"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" he asked. His white hair hung in his face.

"I was just leaving—" "I thought you'd be happy to see me. After all, haven't you been spending the last few days searching for me?"

I stepped back and looked away from his blue and green hypnotic eyes. I didn't want to return to Dullsville's cemetery with him again.

"Luna claimed she saw you reflected in the Fun House's Hall of Mirrors," he said, walking closer.

I paused. I could barely breathe. I looked at the white-curtained window, planning to make my escape.

"But I knew better," he continued. "You might fool her with those circus mirrors, but not me. I saw Alexander bite you and transform you right in front of my eyes. I regretted the day I didn't get to you first."

I breathed again. But only for a moment as he inched toward me.

"Isn't Sterling fulfilling your darkest needs?" he whispered. "I thought you got what you wanted."

"I did."

"Then you wouldn't be here, now would you? Sterling's not cut out for what you really desire, is he? That's why you are trying to find me."

I paused. I stepped past him, but he grabbed my hand.

He lifted it. "You have very long love veins," he said, running his finger along a skinny horizontal blue vein, his black painted fingernail in sharp contrast to my pasty skin. "See here, how it splinters off? As if you were pursuing a path with one love, but then you chose another."

"I used to be crazy about Marilyn Manson. Now I love Alexander," I said sharply.

He held my hand tighter. "We are the same now, you and I."

"We never were, nor will we ever be, the same," I argued.

Jagger didn't seem convinced.

"How about we share a drink together?" he asked, lifting my wrist to his mouth.

"Then we will be closer than ever."

I quickly jerked my arm away. "Alexander quenches any thirst I have."

"Is it everything you thought it would be? Being a princess of the night?"

"Why don't you ask Luna."

Then it hit me: If Jagger was here, where was his twin sister?

I raced past him, out to the deck of the treehouse, and looked out to the yard.

Alexander was searching the poolside grounds.

A few yards from the treehouse, I thought I saw some long white hair poking out from behind one of the trees.

I turned around, expecting to find Jagger mischievously grinning. But he was no longer standing behind me.

Instead I saw Jagger and Luna darting from underneath the treehouse, through the backyard, toward my unsuspecting boyfriend.

"Alexander!" I called.

I was too far away to reach Alexander before they did. And what could I do against two real vampires, anyway? How could a mortal goth stop them?

Then I remembered. "Alexander—cover yourself! With a towel! Now!" I shouted.

He looked confused but snatched a folded beach towel from a lounge chair, crouched down, and enveloped himself with it.

I pulled my hoodie over my head and drew the strings tightly shut.

I grabbed the garage door opener from my pocket and pointed it at Henry's house.

I took a deep breath and pressed my finger on the silver button as hard as I could.

The lights burst on, illuminating the entire backyard, including Jagger and Luna.

The two vampires stopped dead in their tracks. The sudden burst of bright light was like kryptonite. They shielded their pale faces with their skinny bleach white arms.

They each hissed and fled into the darkness.

I flew down the ladder and raced to the pool deck. Breathless, I finally reached Alexander, still covered, on a lounge chair.

I aimed the garage door opener at the house again, pressed the silver button, and the once-illuminated backyard turned black.

It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. I could see Alexander, his hair tousled, a towel by his side.

"Quick thinking," he complimented, and gave me a long kiss.

"We better get out of here—," I said.

"Jagger will be more determined than ever to get Trevor now that he knows we've found his hideout. They won't wait much longer."

8 Gossip and Garlic

If there ever was a morning I didn't want to get out of bed, this was it. After pressing the snooze bar repeatedly, I unplugged my Nightmare Before Christmas alarm clock and stashed it under my bed.

What I couldn't unplug was my mother's voice.

"Raven!" she called for the millionth time from downstairs. "You've overslept.

Again."

After a quick shower, I threw on a black-on-black ensemble. I dragged myself into the kitchen to gulp down some of the leftover morning sludge that Dad called "coffee."

I found Billy Boy already commandeering the chair by the TV with our new house guest, Henry. The nerd-mates were glued to the screen, watching historic footage of battleships blasting their cannons and devouring Pop-Tarts and Crunch Berries.

With every crunch of the captain and boom of a cannon, I felt like my head was behind enemy lines.

"Turn that off!" I whined, and switched the channel to the Home Shopping Network.

A petite blond with a perfect french manicure was modeling bedazzling silver bracelets.

"Hurry, there's only fifty seconds left!" I warned Billy Boy. "You could own one in just five easy payments. The blue topaz matches your eyes."

Billy Boy raced to the TV and wrangled the control out of my hand. "Get off!" he said, switching it back to the History Channel. "If you'd watch, maybe you'd learn something. Then your report card could be framed in Dad's office, instead of ending up in his paper shredder."

I stirred cream and a pound of sugar into a java-filled Dullsville Country Club mug and poured myself a small bowl of Count Chocula. The gun battle and excessive crunching continued. I could barely open my charcoal eyelids wide enough to see the chocolate vampires floating in the milk among the marshmallow ghosts and bats.

My mom burst into the kitchen in her Corporate Cathy gear—a crisp gray DKNY pantsuit and Kate Spade mules—and opened the fridge door. "Morning," she said gleefully. "I thought you'd never get up."

"I didn't either," I grumbled.

"I saw Mrs. Mitchell at the pharmacy last night buying Trevor some cough syrup," she said, placing her Tupperware bowl filled with low-fat, low-taste premade salad in her Bloomingdale's tote bag. "Trevor must have the same cold you had."

"Yeah, he's been out of school. It's been the first time I only detested school instead of hating it."

"Well, I think he's on the mend. His mother told me a girl has been bringing him protein shakes and he's feeling better."

"You mean one of the cheerleaders, right?" I queried.

"No. Mrs. Mitchell made it very clear this girl is new to town and dresses—well, not very conservatively," my mom said, grabbing a bottled water and closing the fridge door.

"You mean, like me?"

My mother paused.

It was Luna.

"Is it the white-haired girl Trevor was with at the Spring Carnival?" Billy Boy asked.

"It may be," my mom answered. "I didn't see them together."

"I just saw her from a distance," my brother said. "But a kid at Math Club swears she has a twin. They were spotted coming out of the cemetery. Her brother was dressed like he just stepped off a pirate ship.

"Kids are saying they sleep in sewers," Billy Boy continued.

"It's not nice to gossip," my mother warned.

"I heard they're ghosts. One dude claims you can see right through them," Henry said.

"And talk about tattoos and piercing," Billy Boy added, "I heard he has more holes in his head than you," Billy Boy said to me.