Heather Brewer - Tenth Grade Bleeds

Vlad’s stomach rumbled angrily. He’d been so anxious to get to the cafeteria that he’d forgotten to stop by his locker and grab his sack lunch. But at the moment, he didn’t care. All he could think about was finding Henry and righting whatever was wrong between them.

Winter break had given him plenty of time to consider why Henry might feel suddenly put off by his drudge status. And while Vlad had only recounted a handful of instances where he’d ordered Henry to grab him a Pepsi, and maybe two where he’d told his best friend to back off and let him win a video game, clearly those moments had meant a lot more to Henry than he’d realized. And though he hadn’t at the time, recalling each of those things now filled Vlad with a burdening guilt. Maybe Henry was right-maybe Vlad had been acting more like a vampire overlord than a best friend. Whatever it was, he had to make things right, and hope that Henry would abandon the insane notion of leaving his position as Vlad’s drudge.

As he approached his usual table, he smiled at Meredith before scanning the room for any sign of his best friend. Just as he was about to count Henry as absent, he spied him seated at the “popular table,” a table that made the tiny hairs on the back of Vlad’s neck stand on end. Vlad’s shoulders slumped in confusion as he made his way across the cafeteria toward him. The air grew thicker with every step he took. Vlad was most definitely uninvited here.

Chelsea Whitaker was the first to detect the intruder. She flipped her hair and wrinkled her nose, as if Vlad didn’t smell very good. And though she was looking right at Vlad, she spoke to Henry, who was sitting to her right. “It looks like we have company.”

Vlad’s jaw tightened. He managed to squeak out, “Henry?”

But Henry wouldn’t look at him. He just slumped down in his seat and said, “I’m sitting with Chelsea today, Vlad.”

Vlad spoke through clenched teeth. He didn’t like standing this close to the popular table any more than Chelsea liked him doing it. “We need to talk about something. It’s important.”

Henry picked a French fry off his lunch tray and swirled it around in a pile of ketchup. “I haven’t changed my mind, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“Can I please talk with you?” Vlad moved his eyes briefly to Chelsea and raised his voice slightly for emphasis. “Alone?”

After a moment, Henry nodded and left the table with him, directing him to a quiet spot near the Pepsi machine. “Look, Vlad…”

“No, you look!” Vlad paused and got a firm grip on whatever part of him was still in panic mode. This wasn’t going to be easy, but it would be a lot harder if Vlad approached with the wrong attitude. “I mean, Henry… I’m sorry, okay? I was thinking about what you said, and if I have been treating you more like a slave than a friend lately, I’m really sorry.”

Henry looked as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. But he didn’t speak.

Vlad did. “So do you accept my apology?”

“Of course.”

A rush of relief filled Vlad-a rush that was cut short by Henry turning back toward the popular table. “Wait. Where are you going?”

Henry shrugged, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “I told you. I’m sitting with Chelsea today.”

A thousand words ran up Vlad’s throat, but only a few managed to escape. “Chelsea Whitaker is quite possibly the most obnoxious person on the planet. Why would you want to hang out with her?”

Henry paused. A good long pause too. At least he had to take a second to think about it. “We have stuff in common.”

“Like what, other than the fact that you’re both human? And I’m still not all that sure about Chelsea.” Vlad snorted at his wit, but when he looked in Henry’s eyes, all the humor drained out of his body. That was it. Exactly it. Chelsea was human. Henry was human. And Vlad… Vlad was not.

His mouth went dry from the sudden onset of shock and anger. “You know, you’re a real piece of work, McMillan. I guess you’re more like your cousin Joss than I realized.”

Henry scowled with contempt. “Are you done? Or are you planning on ordering me to sit, stay, and roll over for your amusement, master ? ”

Vlad stepped closer and jabbed his finger into Henry’s chest. “I’ll give you an order. You do whatever you want to do. But you’d better choose right now-either me or Chelsea.”

“Fine.”

To Vlad’s horror, Henry turned and rejoined the popular crowd.

Vlad turned in a huff and left the lunchroom. He slammed the school doors behind him, and was halfway across town before he realized where he was going.

His old house looked exactly as it had the last time he’d visited-cold, dark, empty, haunted. Not haunted by ghosts, but with thousands of happy moments and memories, all spoiled by the horrific reality of his parents’ passing.

He moved around to the back door, knowing it would still be unlocked, and opened the screen. Before he went inside, he took a deep breath-both for bravery and to bring with him a little piece of the outside world, the world where he was slowly getting past the pain of their demise, the world where he was beginning to feel safe once again.

The floorboards creaked slightly as he made his way inside, and that familiar acrid stench of smoke invaded his nostrils. He wasn’t exactly sure why he’d come here, only that he needed to be somewhere alone, somewhere that reminded him of who he was. He climbed the stairs and walked into his father’s office. Papers still littered the floor from when he and Henry had searched the office two years before. A fine layer of dust now covered them. Vlad sneezed, and the sound of it echoed through the house.

He ran a hand over the surface of his father’s desk, then whispered angry words that only his father could answer. “Who am I, Dad? What am I? Am I a vampire? A human? Both?”

He hesitated a moment, choking back horrified tears, then added, “Neither?”

His concern, the same concern that haunted his dreams, was that he would never really fit in anywhere. And he couldn’t help but wonder if Henry’s recent detachment was just another reminder that he wasn’t one hundred percent anything, only two halves… incomplete.

Sometimes he wondered if he would ever be whole.

Disgusted at the mess he and his potentially-former best friend had made, he knelt on the floor, plucked several papers from the floorboards, and stacked them neatly in an empty file box. The least he could do was put everything back in order. Besides, he was technically skipping school, so he needed something to do while he was hiding out until the last bell rang. With any luck, the school wouldn’t call Nelly. After his recent detention, he was pretty sure she’d come down hard on him for walking out in the middle of the day. Normally Vlad would have stuck it out, but today’s events called for truancy. After all, it wasn’t as if it would have done him any good to sit through physical science with Chelsea after Henry had chosen her over him.

Most of the papers Vlad had gathered up were boring-old tax returns, receipts for furniture, photocopies of various things that Vlad didn’t recognize. But then he came upon something he very much did recognize-his father’s handwriting. All it was was a simple list of things to buy, but what made the corners of Vlad’s mouth lift in a small smile was the note at the bottom: Buy roses for M, bring chocolate for V. Whenever his dad had to go into Stokerton to make purchases that weren’t available in Bathory, he’d always bring Vlad’s mom a dozen of the sweetest blood-red roses he could find, and he’d bring Vlad a small gold box of delicious milk chocolates. It was just one of those things, one of those tender things that had made Tomas such a loving and attentive husband and father.