25Please respect copyright.PENANANndVZZAB4s
I was sitting at the table, nervously fiddling with the napkin. In a moment the door would open, and I would have to look in the face of my biggest fear. For the first time since my escape, I would meet my mom. True, I had talked to her on the phone, but a face-to-face meeting was something altogether different. Now I would see her eyes for the first time. How did I pray that there would be no tears in them – or I would die right on the spot from shame! I had messed up so badly! Mom must have aged ten years because of me! How could I stand to look her in the face?
Inside of me, I felt some kind of emotional heartburn. A caustic mixture of shame and fear began to burn a hole in my digestive tract. I was getting more nervous by the second. Together with crumpling the napkin feverishly I started nervously tapping my feet against the floor and biting my bottom lip. I had never been this worried in my life! What should I tell her? What is she going to ask? What if she starts crying? What if I start crying? What if my fangs show? Millions of “whats” and “what ifs”, and no answers to any of them in sight. I let go of the napkin and started rubbing my forehead as if trying to smooth out thousand-year-old wrinkles.
Despite all uncle Mike’s exhortations, mom wouldn’t wait longer than five days before finally visiting me. So the family reunion was scheduled for Saturday. I was sitting at the table in a cozy little pizza place, old-fashioned, with large, red imitation-leather seats and a glass window along the whole facade. Uncle was sitting next to me, serenely sipping a huge milkshake. The slurping of the thick pink stuff as it went up the straw into Mike’s mouth was soothing me a little.
Our table was directly across from the entrance, so I was intently peering into the sidewalk and road outside the window. And then came the moment of truth. My dad’s car drew up outside the building. The back door opened and Mary hopped out, followed in a few seconds by my mom. She shut the door, took a step forward, but then turned to the car. The front window slid down and for a moment I saw my father. He gave mom a nod in response to something. The glass went back up and the car pulled away from the curb at once.
I was rather surprised that dad hadn’t come out. I thought that maybe he just had to go take care of some business and he would be back soon. The bell hanging over the entrance door interrupted my thoughts. Mom walked in first. She looked down the table rows with her slightly myopic eyes and finally caught sight of me and Uncle. Having belatedly realized that she was already looking at me, I jumped up.
Mom hurried toward me. I went around the table and headed for her. She clasped me in her arms – the embrace was tight, but also tender and very warm. My nerves seemed to be calming down. This was my mom, after all. I suppose any person feels the most protected when their mother hugs them. She gingerly touched my face as if afraid that the slightest touch would scare me away and I would vanish into thin air like a mirage.
She kept standing there and just looking at me, still holding my face in her hands. It was getting a bit awkward. Uncle Mike came to my rescue.
“Hi, Molly! Good to see you! Come on, sit!” he yelled happily and pointed to a free spot next to him.
That didn’t work right away, but in ten seconds or more Mom let go of me and walked to Uncle. I noticed Mary only then. All that time she was standing behind Mom. Sis was giving me her hallmark mocking stare, looking businesslike with her arms akimbo. Something like a staredown happened between us and I must have won because Mary ran into me, hugging me tight at the hips because she couldn’t reach higher. I pressed her head tenderly to my stomach.
“Don’t scare me like this again,” she mumbled, adding “You jerk!” in the end.
I answered with a merry smile. My sister was still the same impudent brat, which meant that everything else that I already considered “my former life” stayed the same too, and the world kept on its usual course and wasn’t tumbling down a precipice. And whatever else might happen in my life, I could handle it.
Mary peeled off me, sat down, and demanded in a bossy voice, “Okay, what’s good here?”
Uncle passed her the menu. I sat down with the others and only then said, “Hello, Mom.”
“Hello, Samantha! How are you? Are you okay? Are you eating well?”
It was as if Mom had just waited for a go-ahead to pounce on me with questions. Mike touched her hand, hinting that she should dial down her energy.
“Everything’s good. I eat regularly and get all the necessary nutrients,” I replied.
“You don’t keep her on fast food, do you?” mom turned to Mike.
“Of course not, Molly, how could I! I cook for her every day!” Uncle gave me a subtle wink.
“What about homework? Can you manage it? We can hire you any tutors you need!” Mom sounded very anxious.
“It’s fine, Mom. I’ve already finished the homework from the school time I missed.”
“Yes, yes, I took it to the school yesterday myself,” Uncle touched Mom’s hand again in an effort to pacify her.
“That’s good, very good! You are a senior, you can’t fall behind!”
“Don’t worry, Molly, it’s going to be okay. I got her new assignments, she will do them in a week, I’ll get more. If something doesn’t work out, I can find her a good tutor myself.”
Now Mike already had Mom’s hand in his right hand and started caressing it with his left. She seemed to start calming down.
“Where’s dad? He’s coming, right?”
“Dad couldn’t join us. He had some urgent business to take care of. Something broke at work, and no one can fix it without him. Well, you know how it is. Your dad is the smartest guy in that place.”
Mom looked away saying this, and I thought she wasn’t being quite frank with me. She seemed to notice the doubt on my face, and there was an awkward pause between us.
“Las Vegas!” Mary’s voice rang out. “I want the Las Vegas pizza. Special sauce, mozzarella, ham, bacon, tomatoes, pickles, and greens.”
No surprise, Mary had always preferred pizza with a lot of toppings. Uncle Mike hastened to finish off the silence that was stabbed in the side with Mary’s child voice and shouted, “Waiter! We are ready to order!”
In just ten minutes we were brought family-sized pizza and a glass of Coke for each. The Las Vegas turned out to be delicious. The food gave a spur to the conversation, mostly thanks to the wise guidance of uncle Mike, who was craftily keeping us all away from dangerous subjects and adroitly getting the talk back on the peaceful path in those rare moments when it was running off the rails, threatening to turn into a disaster with a pile of dead bodies.
The pizza was finished in about half an hour, and the moment Mary swallowed the last slice Mom’s phone rang in her purse.
“Hello,” she said. “Already? But it’s been less than an hour. Okay, okay, whatever you say… Don’t start now! All right, we are coming.”
Mom sounded disappointed and even a little angry. She put the phone back in her purse and tried to erase indignation from her face.
“Honey, I’m sorry but we have to go. Dad’s having some more problems, and he can only pick us up now,” And then she added quietly somewhere aside, “Next time we’ll take the bus.”
Everyone rose. Mom reached for her wallet, but Mike stopped her with a gesture and nonchalantly threw a few twenty-dollar bills on the table. Mom took Mary by the hand, which annoyed my sister to death, and headed for the exit. I followed, with Mike bringing up the rear. We came outside and less than a minute later dad’s car drew up next to us. Mom pecked me on the cheek and gave me another tender hug, Mary just waved, and they got in.
I took a deep breath, expecting a rather difficult encounter with my dad. But no – the car raced off and vanished around the corner a moment later. My brows went up in surprise. Unlike with Mom, I hadn’t talked with Dad even on the phone those last few days, but I thought he had been mad at me because of my running away. But that was already too much! He could at least have stepped out of the car. It would have been okay even to scold me, but to just drive away, without even taking a look at his favorite daughter – that has gone too far! How long could he hold a grudge? He was the only one of them who knew the truth, he could have shown some understanding!
Uncle clapped me on the back and nodded to the parking lot where we had left the SUV. I gathered the courage to talk only after the pizza place had fallen behind by a dozen miles.
“Didn’t you think it’s strange that Dad didn’t even get out of the car?”
“Phew,” uncle exhaled tensely. “I did, of course. But that’s probably my fault.”
“Your fault? What do you mean?”
“I think it’s time to tell you another family secret. I am not your father’s younger brother, Sammy, I am his twin.”
“What do you mean, twin? You are seven years younger! And you don’t look like him at all.”
“We are fraternal twins. Only identical twins look the same.”
“It’s not your looks that I’m confused about so much. You are a lot younger!”
“Don’t forget, Sammy, I’m a vampire, and your father is an ordinary human. So, I age much slower. The difference in appearance between us started getting more and more obvious since we turned sixteen or so, and later the official version was made up that George was the elder one. But we were born only a few minutes apart, slept in the same cradle, went to the same kindergarten and later the same class in school.”
“Okay, now I get it. So what is it you did to your not-elder brother?”
“Our father, your grandfather, started telling us about vampires when we were very young. We knew from the age of seven or so that at fifteen or sixteen we would start transforming into vampires. We both couldn’t wait for it to happen because Dad had told us in vivid detail how strong, brave and just all-around wonderful these creatures that we would become were. Your grandfather was a real fan of our kind. It was because of his love for his race that he restored the Order of the Night Guardians. We also knew that the vampire gene could skip a generation and appear only in our kids. But we tried not to think about that. How could we? We were sure, it definitely wouldn’t happen to us! We grew up as ordinary brothers, arguing, fighting, breaking each other’s toys sometimes, but we got along all right on the whole. The vampire gene is basically dormant until puberty, but I guess some of it seeps into the blood a little. Your father and I, like all brothers, constantly competed in everything, and I was always better just a little bit. I could spit an inch farther, do one more chin-up, hold my breath a second longer. Your father envied me, but only a little, as a brother reasonably might. But then we turned sixteen. I grew fangs, George didn’t. He was feeling his jaw five times a day, hoping his teeth would catch up and grow… But that never happened. This was a real tragedy for your father. He became secretive, distanced himself from me, and his envy turned into hate. I think you’ve noticed how often George and I have been meeting and how “friendly” those meetings were.”
I rubbed my chin thoughtfully, as Uncle often did.
“But that’s not your fault. You didn’t choose your genes, you didn’t steal my father’s superpowers. He is just an envious jackass,” I said indignantly.
Uncle’s story made me very mad at my dad. So that was it? He hated me now, too, because I had become a vampire and he had not? Envying his brother in the childhood might have been okay, but now! He was all grown up, and I was his goddamn daughter!
“Don’t rush to conclusions, Sammy. I’ve told you the world isn’t black and white. It’s not your dad’s fault either. Your grandfather is more to blame.”
I looked at Uncle in surprise again.
“Our father was a remarkable human being… or rather a vampiric being. In the Order, we all call ourselves humans in everyday life, but it was very important for your grandfather to underscore his separateness from humans. His “patriotism” toward his species was a little unhealthy. Our father wasn’t a complete unhinged vampire-racist, but for him we were much better than people. And not only when it came to strength, speed and intelligence. No, for him vampires were better in absolutely everything, even morally. So, when our father realized that one of his boys was a little physically inferior, he began to treat him differently. Just a little. As I had been better than George by a tiny inch or a second before, so now your grandfather was better with me a bit. I was getting a sweeter, riper apple, my bike was the same model as George’s but with chromium rims. Small stuff, of course, but your father always noticed. And every time it made him think a bit worse of vampires.”
“Why didn’t you convert him? He would have been a vampire then!”
“Our father was categorically against it. He said conversion was too dangerous and could cause irreversible damage to the mind of a still weak teen. That was the official version. Now I think that he might have worried not only about George’s health but about the purity of vampire blood as well. He thought converted vampires were some kind of bastards of our kind.”
“So grandfather didn’t want his own son to be a mudblood…” I observed thoughtfully.
Uncle scratched the back of his head and continued, “But I’m still guilty toward George too. I never talked to Dad about preferential treatment over George, though I noticed it too. It would be nice to think I was just young and stupid then, but I’m afraid that’s not true. I never talked about it with my father not because I didn’t know how much it hurt my brother but because it suited me. It was me who was getting everything a bit better.”
Uncle turned his head to me. “That’s life for you, Sammy. Sometimes we feel like blaming another, but often we ourselves are responsible for the treatment we get.”
Mike’s story had me lost in thought. First Jack, my best friend, turned out to be a murderer. Then Rettle, who had seemed like a homicidal maniac, was revealed as a victim. And now my dad and his reluctance to see his own daughter. Who was he? An asshole who had abandoned his child at the most difficult moment? Or was there still a little boy, always considered a second-rate creature by his own father, living inside the adult man?
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