Silence of a Love Bat

“Cause seeing clear would be a bad idea/Now catch me up on getting out of here” – Panic! at the Disco, New Perspective

“Go out…like go out, as in outside?” I asked, smiling.

“Yeah,” Pete smiled. “All five of us.”

I glanced over at Patrick, who looked uneasy. “That’s probably not the best idea…what if something happens? It’s not logical.”

“Patrick,” Pete chimed. “We’ll all be there!”

Patrick stood up abruptly. He grabbed his water bottle from the workbench, and headed up the basement stairs. Pete shot up too, and reached his hand out for mine. I grabbed it, squeezing his fingers. The grin he gave me in return was priceless; toothy and happy.

“Patrick!” I called out, dragging the word as we bounded up the stairs.

Pete whined, “Trick!”

We walked out into the kitchen, where Patrick was making coffee. He sent us a glare over his shoulder. “No.”

“Please?” I pleaded.

He turned around quickly. “Did you forget what happened last time?”

“Last time?” Pete quirked his eyebrow.

“Yeah, last time. You ended up at fucking William’s,” Patrick pointed his finger at Pete, then me, with red cheeks. “And you were a mess.”

Okay, he had a point.

Pete rolled his eyes. “Like I said, all five of us will be there.”

“Yeah, Trick. I’m a vampire now. I can take care of myself,” I added.

“No, it’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard,” Patrick stated. He pulled the brim of his hat down over his eyes, and then turned back to the coffee. Joe and Andy sauntered in. Andy was whistling, while Joe slouched down on a barstool.

“That’s a pizza you owe me, Troh,” Andy grinned.

Joe stuck out his tongue. “Fucking Xbox.”

Pete’s eyes lit up, and he dragged out another, “Patrick.”

Patrick froze, and turned to us. “You two are freaking killing me! You know that right?”

* * *

I’ll admit I was nervous. I mean for God’s sake we were going out, and I probably wasn’t ready. Pete swore he wouldn’t let anything happen. He swore on his life, which neither Patrick nor I thought was funny, but the others got a kick out of it.

We were only going for pizza, which couldn’t be that bad. But our luck wasn’t always that good, so I had a bad feeling about this. Though I did want to – I really did want to get out of the house – I felt queasy when we were walking the streets. We kept inside alleyways, or short cuts as Pete called them, so I didn’t have to run into anyone unless necessary.

“February twenty seventh, Emily embarks on her first journey to the outside world as a vampire,” Joe said in a narrator type voice. “She makes a face as her best friend in the whole world makes fun of her. Her jaw sets, and her eyes go small. She looks truly evil.”

“Knock it off,” I said, smacking him upside the head.

“Hey, hey, hey!” he laughed. “That hurt.”

“Good,” I smiled.
We walked in silence the rest of the way. When we got to the main part of town, Pete stepped closer to me, grabbing my hand more possessively than protectively. All of the guys took a step closer, so I was in this awkward circle. From behind me Joe leaned over and pulled the hood of my sweatshirt up.

“You good?” Andy asked, his hand reaching out to my shoulder.

I really wasn’t. I really, really wasn’t. “Yeah.”

The air smelled sweet with skin, sweat, perfume and blood. Everything looked clear, but in a fog. The people around us were clear, bright, shinning and gleaming. The fog surrounded them, a hazy, blurry mist that kept bringing my focus back to the people. It was like an illusion. The longer you looked at the fog, the more everything else looked better, the more you wanted to take a step closer to the brightness and get away from the shadows.

“Pete,” I whispered, when we stopped outside of the shop.

He looked at me, worry etched in his eyes, but he didn’t make a move to help. He was making me talk, making me tell him. The one time I needed him to jump to conclusions, he wasn’t. “Yeah?”

“Does it always look like this?”