Michael Griffo - Unwelcome

Involuntarily, he felt his fangs descend and his eyes narrow. He watched his fingers elongate and the space in between them turn into webbing; he felt the leather of his sneakers stretch and he knew the same change was happening to his feet. The beating of his heart quickened as his body prepared for battle even while his mind prayed a fight would never come. He hated feeling this way, apprehensive, no, that wasn’t being completely honest, he was afraid. Still afraid like the boy he used to be. What’s the use of being immortal if I’m afraid to defend myself? If I’m afraid of being defeated? If I’m just the way I always was?

His fear was short-lived, however, and replaced by the will to survive when he was struck from behind.

Breathing deeply, David recognized the scent, it was one of his own. Pungent and thick, it quashed the more appealing aroma of the snow-filled air and, for a moment, David was greatly annoyed. He hated wanton intrusion. But one of his children was restless or possibly in trouble and like every good father, he had a duty to come to the aid of his child, to offer comfort and, of course, punishment if that was deemed necessary.

When he got to a clearing and saw what was happening, saw that Michael was being attacked from behind, he knew there would be no need for punishment or reward, but merely intervention.

Michael felt his fangs cut into his lower lip as his face crashed into the snow, small droplets of red tarnishing the otherwise white landscape. What was happening? Who was on top of him? Of course, it had to be Nakano! He knew that he wasn’t going to allow Michael to get away with embarrassing him in front of his classmates, forcing him to quit the swim team. He wanted revenge, and Michael stupidly gave him the perfect opportunity by wandering outside alone.

He felt Nakano’s hand grab the back of his head and he knew that if he didn’t escape, if he didn’t get out of this position, his head was going to be bashed into the ground until his skull shattered. The anger he felt breathing down his neck was that potent. Michael had no choice, so he allowed his instinct to take over. Instead of fighting against the fear, he let it fill him, he let it consume his mind and his heart so he could take action. Reaching back, his hand over his head, he grabbed ahold of Nakano and pulled at his hair until he heard him cry out in pain. Michael pulled with all his strength and he could feel the strands of hair stretch, forcing with it Nakano’s scalp. He had to keep pulling until Nakano couldn’t take the pain any longer and fell off of him so he could be free. But wait, no, something wasn’t right. Nakano’s head was practically shaved; he didn’t have hair long enough to pull.

Someone else was on top of Michael, someone else who just wouldn’t give up. Until that someone was ordered to.

David admired loyalty, but this action was premature, he did not want death to mar his homecoming. And it was not well planned. Death, like life, should have purpose. Just as David gave the command to release Michael, he heard the roar. He had to admit that it was a touching sight, Ronan coming to the aid of his young companion, but he felt a greater sense of relief watching his devoted subject scamper away, on all fours close to the ground, like a wild animal. “Good, you were unseen, which means you cannot be prevented from trying again,” David said. “When, of course, the time becomes right.”

“Did you see who it was?” Michael asked, his breathing beginning to return to normal.

Ronan shook his head. “What are you doing out here?”

What was he doing outside? He tried to remember, but he felt as if he was in a trance. “Music.” Yes, that was it. “I heard music and I thought it was . . . so I came out here to find out . . . I . . . I couldn’t find you. . . . Where were you?”

Ronan felt the tears sting his eyes. If I’d returned just a few seconds later, you might not be alive; if I hadn’t gone out at all, you would never have been in danger. “I wasn’t where I was supposed to be,” Ronan cried.

David turned away, not interested in watching the two boys embrace, one comforting the other, and started to walk back to his office when something else just as irritating caught his eye. “Those damned roses,” he hissed. “Will they never die?”

Along the outside of St. Joshua’s Library, as always, was a row of white roses in full bloom, their petals soft and shimmering despite being sprinkled with snowdrops. David yanked one out of the hardened ground, its roots dangling between his fingers, and slowly crushed it in his hand, smiling cruelly like an angry child clutching a fly in its tiny fist.

Michael looked into Ronan’s eyes and knew that he should be angry with him for leaving him alone, but he couldn’t. He saw in his expression such tenderness, such gratefulness that Michael was safe and unharmed, that all he could feel was the love that had been in his heart from the moment he laid eyes on Ronan. Kissing his boyfriend under the moonlight, the snow tumbling around them, Michael felt like both a man and a child, aware of the passion burning inside of him and relieved to be held by someone stronger, someone he could always trust.

Opening his fist, David stared in disbelief as he watched the crumbled rose spring back to life, reclaiming its robust form. Some things just cannot be trusted to stay dead! It was then that he felt her presence. Startled, he looked around and, for the first time in decades, no, more like centuries, his confidence waned. He couldn’t see her, but that didn’t matter, he knew she was there.

He wasn’t the only one who had returned home.

Phaedra stared at Michael. Michael stared at his food. Neither of them spoke a word.

It just won’t work, Michael silently complained. He was attempting yet again to make his shepherd’s pie disappear from his plate, master a vampire trick that would fool others into thinking he was eating when all he was doing was making his food evaporate by using his preternatural vision as a sort of laser beam. It was a handy trick that Ronan had been trying to teach him, that Ronan could execute with the skill of a bored magician, but Michael just couldn’t do it. He knew it was a necessary alternative for times like now, when he was sitting at a crowded cafeteria table in St. Martha’s and it wasn’t possible to use his incredible speed to toss his food to the side, but no matter how hard he tried, his uneaten meal remained on his plate for all to see. Aggravated, he glanced at Phaedra sitting across from him and thought he should ask her for help. She was, after all, the expert at transforming solid matter into thin air, but then he realized she was the real problem. How could he focus on dematerializing his lunch when all he could think of was how much he wanted to confront her?

“Why didn’t you answer me last night?” Michael blurted.

Phaedra didn’t understand the question. Maybe she didn’t hear him properly; the lunch room noise was quite loud. “What?”

“I called for you. I really needed your protection, Phaedra, but you never showed up,” Michael explained. He then pushed his plate aside, abandoning all pretense of trying to make it look as if he were eating and leaned in closer to his friend to whisper, “This is the second time you abandoned me.”

Looking into Michael’s eyes, Phaedra could tell he wasn’t being dramatic or exaggerating. Looking into her heart, she knew he was telling the truth. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, something was happening to her, something unforeseen, and it was preventing her from helping him. “What do you mean, the second time?”

Michael recounted his fight with Nakano in the swimming pool the first day of the winter semester and then last night’s encounter. He emphasized that both times Ronan came to his rescue so there was no real harm done, but he couldn’t stop himself from reminding her of what she told him. “You said you were still here for me.”