Author's Preface
Eventually—when the car approached the town—Michael finally flumped back down into his seat, sniggering breathlessly and feeling truly elated.
“You’re a hazard,” Zariah chided with a laugh, instantly rolling all of the windows back up.
“I’m sorry,” Michael grinned exasperatedly, leaning back against his seat. “I’m just…”
He paused and combed his hairs back more, lowering his hand and sighing.
“I’m just happy,” he realized. “I think this is the first time I’ve ever… not been… worried about something.”
Zariah nodded quietly, reaching the bottom of the hill and stopping at the red light of a small intersection.
“You have a lot of responsibilities,” she guessed, glancing over at him. “Don’t you…?”
Michael continued staring up at the ceiling of the car, his smile waning slightly. He ran several things through his mind; he’d spent a lot of his life keeping Zander out of trouble or trying to prevent him from accidentally hurting himself somehow, and he did the same with Verity, mostly talking her down and comforting her whenever she fought with Zander. He’d also helped William with most of the cooking and cleaning around the house during their awake spells, because there was always too much for one single butler to do, and it wasn’t as if Zander or Verity would ever volunteer to help with the housework. His mother and father spent most of their time in hibernation nowadays—but during the small windows of time when they were awake, Michael had grown well accustomed to making sure they both ate shortly after the long sleep, or else his father would get irritable and his mother would get foggy-minded. The two of them were also getting older, and Michael couldn’t rightfully expect either them to do much housework, especially since they were so often groggy from hibernation. As a result, he always just tried to do as much as he could for them.
“Yeah,” Michael mumbled with a shrug. “I guess I do.”
“Well’p. Then guess what,” Zariah said, turning right and heading into town. “I’ll be your getaway.”
Michael turned and squinted questioningly at her.
“Like… your escape from your responsibilities,” Zariah clarified. “Whenever you need to leave and just have a break… just come to me, and we can hang out.”
Michael’s mouth drifted agape. “Oh. Um…”
He looked down at his lap, fidgeting with the ends of his flowy white sleeves.
Zariah glimpsed between him and the road.
“Unless you… don’t want to,” she added.
“Oh, no, no… it’s not that,” Michael assured. “It’s just, um… I don’t know if I’ll be able to… leave home again after today.”
Zariah shot him an odd look. “How old are you?”
“Um… I’m not sure.”
“You’re not sure …?”
“No… I’m not… uuum…” Michael paused, tapping two fingers to his chin. “I think… thirty-something… I don’t know, I kind of lost track nine or ten years ago…”
“Oh wow… okay…” Zariah uttered. “Well… the point is, you’re an adult, and you can leave home whenever you want. They can’t just lock you up… and you don’t have to just listen to everything they say all the time.”
Michael sighed heavily, staring down at his lap again.
“Hey… how do you think they even met each other and made your whole family?” Zariah added with a laugh. “Because it sure as hell wasn’t by following the rules.”
Michael made a sideways nod in agreement, thinking of what William had told him before he left the manor.
“I know,” he murmured, partly to himself. “I know I can’t be afraid of the outside world anymore… and I want to be out more, I really do… it’s just… it’s not about my parents.”
He bit his lip and frowned.
“It’s about all of them,” Michael resolved. “Zander tends to go too overboard with everything he does… and VV’s all depressed lately… and Mom and Dad aren’t getting any younger… oh my God, and there’s that window in the back hall that still hasn’t been boarded up, even though it shows the moon right beside Will’s office… and that’s a huge risk…”
“Oh,” Zariah exhaled, suddenly understanding. “Okay… I getcha. You just wanna be there for them…”
“Well, they… they need me to be,” Michael told her. “It’s not like I wouldn’t want to come back and hang out with you again… because I definitely would… but I can never… I can never just disappear from home.”
“No… I get it,” Zariah said genuinely. “I feel the same way with my father. Ever since Mom died, I feel like Dad’s just been… consumed in his work… and just… lonely. I feel like I need to be there for him, too.”
The drive fell silent for nearly a full minute.
Zariah stopped at another intersection, a few trees nearby the red light, allowing the earliest autumn leaves to gently flutter down atop the roadside.
“Hey… I definitely didn’t wanna imply that you should disappear from your home,” she said, turning and giving him a serious look. “I’m sorry if it came off that way, I just… I…”
She paused and sighed.
“I’m sorry if this sounds… mean, or patronizing, or anything… but… you kinda seem like you… need a friend,” Zariah attempted to explain. “Y’know?”
Michael glimpsed at her and nodded. “Yeah. I understand… and you’re… you’re not wrong. I’m not gonna lie… I’ve been… really happy since I met you. I really needed to make a friend out here, because I have no idea what I’m doing… and I definitely need help. It’s been really nice today… just… having someone help me so much for once, instead of it being the other way around. I mean, it’s not like I mind doing so much for my family, but… it’s just nice to have that… returned to me. You know what I mean?”
“Oh yeah… definitely,” Zariah said, nodding and thinking of her ex, feeling her stomach churn a bit. “You can only do so much for people without getting anything back…”
“I do, though… I do wanna stay friends with you,” Michael said, giving her a serious sort of look. “And… come over, and hang out, and… do whatever friends do, I guess…”
The light turned green, and Zariah returned his profound stare for a moment before facing forward and driving on.
Michael glimpsed between her and his lap, feeling a touch of nervousness inside.
“Is that a weird thing to say?” he asked impulsively. “I’m sorry, I’ve never done this before…”
“Well… honestly,” Zariah said, choking out a laugh. “If anyone else said something like that after knowing me for like… what… an hour or two? Yeah… that would be a little bit weird. But… with you… not so much.”
Michael gave her another long stare, this time a confused one.
Zariah glanced at the befuddled expression on his face, then elaborated further.
“Okay, it’s like this…” she started, gesturing while she drove. “If a girl meets a strange new guy, and the guy starts talking about coming over to her house and hanging out with her within the first hour of knowing her… then… that could easily creep the girl out. But when you do it… it’s not creepy or weird at all. It’s just kind of… innocent… and honest.”
Michael made a slow, strange nod, his brow hardening, staring down at the floorboard and still feeling a little lost.
“You don’t have any creeper vibes… you’re just kind of… you, just you, right on your sleeve,” Zariah explained. “And besides… your whole situation is unique, too, and that’s definitely part of it. I know that’s part of why you wanna be my friend… because you kind of need a tour guide out here.”
“No,” Michael blurted.
Zariah blinked, glimpsing over at him again and giving him an odd look.
“No…?” she muttered.
“No, that’s not… that’s not why,” Michael said honestly. “I mean, I really appreciate it… and I definitely need it… but that’s not why I wanna be your friend.”
Zariah made another turn, cruising down a small road with a shopping center to the left and a few small buildings to the right, giving him a peculiar glance again.
“Then why…?” she uttered.
“Because… you… want to help,” Michael told her sincerely. “I don’t wanna use you for all your help, I just… I just think you’re a really good person… because you just wanted to help me out for no real reason. Sometimes, it seems like I’m the only person who cares enough to be like that. It’d be nice to finally be around someone else who does.”
Zariah made a thoughtful nod as she drove, falling silent and pondering on this for a moment.
“Okay,” she sighed. “If that’s the case, then… I think… you and I definitely have that in common.”
Michael flashed a smirk at her. “Then we’re a good match.”
“Yeah,” Zariah agreed.
There was another pause.
“But… you do realize that I’m like… personally invested in the supernatural, right?” Zariah inquired. “I am really into that stuff… and it hasn’t even crossed your mind that I might only helping you so I can pry more into your family.”
“No… hasn’t crossed my mind at all,” Michael shrugged.
Zariah shot him a strange look. “Yeah, but why not?”
“Because you helped me before you even knew who I was ,” Michael laughed. “I was just some random guy passed out on a bridge. You didn’t know I was a Voltaire.”
Zariah looked forward once more, mulling over this and nodding in agreement.
“Oh yeah… you’re right,” she determined. “I gave it away that I’m a bleeding heart right out the gate. Dammit…”
Michael chuckled, smiling contently and gazing out the passenger window again. He quite liked Zariah, and he loved all he’d seen of her so far. He truly did hope the two of them would remain friends after today was over.
Zariah finally reached her destination, pulling the car into a smack parking lot to the right, one just outside of a quaint red restaurant called Phillies. There were only a few other cars in the parking lot, the old maroon rooftop inhabited by a couple of wayward seagulls, and she turned the car off and stepped out, Michael doing the same.
The two of them left the car and walked toward the glass double-doors, Zariah striding inside and Michael quietly following behind her, his hands pocketed and his eyes shifting around with curiosity. The inside of the restaurant was decorated in old farmland portraits, a pitchfork, a mounted deer’s head, and several paintings of cows, a long line of red leather boots in the front, mostly empty.
Zariah eyed the booths by the windows, then looked to the ones across from them, the ones that didn’t have the sunlight of the windows beating down on them. She chose the left side, sitting in a corner booth with Michael across from her. A brunet waitress arrived and handed them menus, and Zariah flipped through hers, Michael slowly opening his and giving it a questionable little squint.
“Huh. I don’t know…” Michael mumbled slowly, his eyes narrowing harder at the menu. “What… any of this is…”
Zariah laughed and placed her menu down. “I can just order for you. I already know what I want.”
“That works for me…”
Michael set his menu down too. Moments later, the brunet returned and brought them their drinks—an iced water and a sweet tea—and Zariah ordered each of them a t-bone steak, one rare and one medium-rare.
Once the brunet walked off again, they were quiet for a second, gazing across the table at one another.
“I think we just missed the lunch crowd,” Zariah remarked, scanning over the surprisingly empty restaurant. “We must’ve got here like right after everybody on lunch break had to run off back to work. Lucky us.”
Michael nodded silently.
Zariah then intertwined her fingers, placing her chin atop her hands and giving him a curious look.
“So. Four o’clock is right around the corner,” she said. “What all do I need to know to help you look for your brother?”
Michael met her eyes, sparing a moment of thought.
“Well, he… looks kind of like me, just… with short hair, and darker outfits, usually,” he explained. “And… he’s like… wilder, I guess. Oh, and I heard… when I came into town this morning, some guy told me he was investigating some criminals that my brother’s apparently been dealing with, and he warned me to get him out of whatever situation he’s in before he ends up in trouble, too… so… that’s not good…”
Zariah nodded thoughtfully, glancing down for a second.
“If he’s hanging around at Rock Rollers… you think he’s involved with the malus dealers over there?” she wondered.
Michael’s mouth opened, slowly shrugging and shaking his head. “I have no idea what that means…”
“Oh, right, sorry… um… malus is a new drug that’s kinda taken over in this area,” Zariah informed. “It’s the new fentanyl, supposedly… only it’s even worse. The people who sell that shit tend to hang around at Rock Rollers and the neighborhood around it. If anybody’s being investigated over there, then… it’s probably the malus dealers.”
“Oh God…” Michael sighed and pressed his fingers into his temples. “He’s being Scarface…”
Zariah shot him an odd look. “Wha?”
“He… my brother… he always… okay, for context, we all grew up on a lot of movies,” Michael told her. “Movies were our only real window into the outside world… and he always liked the ones that were crazy. He acted like the people in those movies. He talked with a Godawful Italian accent for like a month after we all watched Scarface for the first time.”
Zariah gaped at him. “You think he… he wants to be Scarface? He’s seen the ending , right?”
“Yeah,” Michael sighed exasperatedly. “He just likes the idea of being a big shot in the criminal underworld. I mean, we were kids, but still. I didn’t think he’d ever try to go be like that for real , but… I don’t even know how long he’s been out here, doing God knows what. Ugh…”
Zariah frowned apprehensively at him. “He’s not into Tarantino movies, is he?”
Michael choked out a laugh. “Oh man… I hadn’t thought of that. That’s a scary thought…”
Zariah’s eyes narrowed, cracking a smirk. “He’s a From Dusk ‘Till Dawn fan, isn’t he?”
“Oh my God… you’ve no idea,” Michael snickered. “I still say to this day that showing him the Tarantino movies was the biggest parenting mistake my father ever made. My dad likes those movies too. That was something they bonded over. VV doesn’t like them, though. She hates them.”
Zariah giggled, taking a sip of her tea.
“So… if none of you ever left the house, then… who got movies for you?” she wondered. “I’m guessing you don’t have like… streaming services, or internet, or whatever.”
“Oh… um… Will did,” Michael answered. “He stocked up on entertainment for us when we were all little.”
Zariah squinted at him. “How long ago was that?”
“I… don’t know,” Michael mumbled. “We’ve had the same library of movies for a couple decades now.”
“Oh… so they’re all older movies,” Zariah understood. “Okay, lemme see if I can guess any of your favorites. You… strike me as a Goonies fan.”
Michael’s eyes lit up, and he grinned at her. “Oh, I love The Goonies. Do you know how bad I wanted to go out and find pirate treasure when I was seven?”
“Dude, are you kidding? I still do,” Zariah laughed. “I freaking love that movie. They don’t make movies like that anymore. Those kinds of movies have heart in them. Hey, can you guess what movie I’m referencing just from a quote?”
“I don’t know… try it.”
“Okay. Um…” Zariah cleared her throat. “Great Scott!”
“Back to the Future,” Michael guessed instantly.
“You have no power over me,” Zariah said.
“Labyrinth,” Michael responded.
“Use the force,” Zariah said in a lower voice.
“Star Wars,” Michael knew.
“Kevin!” Zariah practically yelled.
“Home Alone,” Michael replied swiftly.
Zariah leaned back in her booth bench, folding her arms and raising her eyebrows at him, looking impressed.
“Wow,” she smirked. “You are damn good. You know what I wanna do? I want us to have a movie night and just binge on old movies… and I could show you some newer ones too, if you want. We could get pizza, and junk food, and rum… and just be lazy all night long.”
“That sounds nice,” Michael smiled.
“Are you free tonight?” Zariah asked.
“Oh. Um… I’m not… really sure yet,” Michael muttered, scraping his thumbnail against the fabric of his sleeve. “I don’t know how everything is gonna go after I take Zander home… and I don’t know if my family will need me to do anything for them tonight or not… or when I’m even gonna get back…”
Zariah nodded. “Tomorrow maybe?”
“Maybe, yeah,” Michael said. “I really would like that.”
“Me too. Well, you can just text me when…” Zariah stopped for a second and eyed him. “No… wait… no you can’t. You don’t have a phone, do you?”
“Ah… you mean like a phone phone?” Michael asked her, raising his hand and miming the motion of using a smartphone. “Or one of those futuristic cellphones?”
Zariah fell silent, revealing a slow, amused smile.
“You know what?” she said, placing both hands to the table. “I have enough money right now to just get you a phone. It’s probably gonna take a while for you to get used to using a smartphone, but you’re kinda gonna need one if you’re gonna have any kind of life out in the normal world.”
Just when Michael opened his mouth to protest—the brunet waitress returned with two plates, a hot fresh steak on each one. She placed them down in front of both of them before refilling their drinks and walking away.
Michael stared down at his freshly-grilled t-bone, thick and juicy with a stark red color in the center, crimson juices pooled underneath the large cut of meat, a hard, dull aching appearing in the pit of his stomach out of nowhere, feeling as if he hadn’t eaten in decades all the sudden.
Zariah began cutting her own steak, glancing at him and snickering. “You look like someone who just found a cold water in a hot desert.”
Michael’s mouth eased open, his eyes flickering up to her, then back down to the steak, his stomach making a low, strange rumble. His tongue gently licked the tip of his canine, and he took a deep breath, his mouth practically watering.
“I’ve never seen a steak like this before,” he breathed.
“Well… then you’ve never seen a steak before,” Zariah quipped in response. “You’ve probably only ever had like salisbury steaks or chicken-fried steaks or something. Sounds like Will was kinda cheaping out on you a little bit.”
Michael felt his heart pound as he stared intensely down at his steak. He’d never been enraptured by any foods before; his brother and sister were both more into favorite snacks and meals than he ever was. He was never a big eater himself—but now, he felt as if he wanted to buy and stash as many of these bloody steaks as he could ever possibly get, and he hadn’t even taken a bite yet. Just the look of it—the scent of it—it simply entranced him, delectable and practically hypnotic.
He pulled up his right sleeve, grabbed the entire steak, and took a huge bite out of it—ripping a hunk of meat and gristle off the t-bone and chewing on it fervently.
Zariah stopped, gazing across the table at him and scoffing out a surprised little laugh.
“H’oh m’God,” Michael mumbled between chews, his cheeks full and his eyes drifting shut as he savored the glorious taste.
He then took another bite—sinking his teeth into it and tearing a chunk off almost savagely.
Zariah merely stared, her eyes narrowing slightly.
“You don’t wanna…?” she uttered, briefly raising her fork and knife upright.
Michael glimpsed down at her silverware and shook his head, swallowing and taking another giant bite.
Zariah watched him devour the rare bloody meat, smirking the entire time and thinking that this moment would be a golden one to share with all of her followers online—but she didn’t reach for her phone, and she didn’t intend to actually record or post anything he that was doing.
It was incredible that she’d actually met Villy V’s son—and that the rock star actually did turn out to be a vampire, who had half-vampire children—and she felt genuinely privileged to have met Michael and to have learned the honest truth of his family. It was just the type of thing she lived to learn about, and it was precisely the kind of thing that her entire online community was built around.
But—this wasn’t content for the Zella PI community.
This was simply real life, and her spending time with her new friend, observing him with a delightfully entertained smile as he feverishly inhaled a fresh t-bone.
Once most of the meat was gone from his steak, Michael held up the bare bone and began picking it clean like it was corn on the cob. Zariah giggled again, swiping her hairs aside and grinning at him with delight.
“You’re so cute,” she murmured under her breath.
Michael blinked, lowering the bone and meeting her eyes.
“Hmm…?” he mumbled.
“Nothing,” Zariah replied, still smiling.
Michael stopped his chewing, pausing and staring down at the naked bone in his hands. He was still for a few seconds, seeming to be deep in thought now.
“Wow, I don’t… know where that came from,” he muttered. “I’ve never felt that hungry before…”
Zariah intertwined her fingers, resting her chin atop her knuckles and eyeing him coyly.
Michael continued staring downward, his brow hardening, and his expression slowly darkening into a more troubled one.
“Kinda scary,” he said faintly.
Zariah continued staring, though her smile faded.
“Really?” she asked. “You’re part vampire, and you’ve never felt that way before…?”
Michael glanced up at her, sighing heavily. “No… I haven’t. I never ate anything with… blood in it. I always kind of avoided that. I just never liked the thought of…”
He trailed off, looking away and huffing out another breath.
“I don’t know,” Michael murmured gravely. “I always swore I’d never… do that… if I ever left home.”
Zariah surveyed him quizzically. “Do what?”
Michael faced her again with a serious stare.
“I always swore I’d never actually drink blood from a human being if I ever left home,” he told her straightly. “It just feels really wrong to do.”
He turned away again, and there was a moment of silence.
Zariah glimpsed down, her visage now stony, a sense of guilt arising inside her, suddenly feeling as if she never should have brought him here and teased him with a steak cooked rare.
“Hey… hey, I’m sorry,” she said, reaching across the table and gently patting him on the arm. “I didn’t think it was gonna bother you to eat this…”
Michael turned back to her and gave her an odd look. “What? Oh, no, no… this didn’t bother me at all .”
He laughed and picked up the t-bone, nibbling on it again before raising it and grinning at her.
“No… this was fantastic ,” Michael beamed. “I want more of this. Where do you get this from?”
Zariah let out a laugh. “Ah… well… the store. Or restaurants. Or cows. They’re kinda expensive, though.”
“Oh. Well… then Dad’s gonna have to dip into his monthly record label payments soon, because we need this in our house,” Michael stated, shaking the bone once before placing it back down. “Heck, I think it could solve a lot of problems. Mom always gets weird and disoriented when she wakes up from the sleeps, and Dad kinda does the same thing, only with extra grumpiness. I think… if they both ate this right when they woke up… then they’d be perfectly fine.”
“I’ll take you to my guy, then,” Zariah decided. “There’s a butcher I go to who has the best cuts in town.”
“Awesome,” Michael said happily.
Soon after, the two of them began discussing movies again while Zariah ate her own steak. Eventually, she resolved that she couldn’t eat the whole entire thing, so Michael gladly finished it off for her.
By the time Zariah paid the bill, and they both left the restaurant—they’d just finished a very lengthy discussion about spending their downtime either exploring the beach or isolating themselves for a movie night, and they spoke about discovering all the best parts of town that Michael hadn’t yet seen. Zariah seemed to be looking forward to showing it all to him—and they talked about these things for so long, neither of them even noticed when the four o’clock hour came to be.
Zariah didn’t realize what time it was until they were seating themselves back in the car, glancing at her phone and seeing that it was nearly five. She laughed, gave Michael a glimpse, and stuffed her phone away, then started the car and drove out of the parking lot of Phillies—and the two of them at last headed off to the Rock Rollers nightclub.