Almost Midnight (2 page)

She stopped listening and tried to make sense of the crap that had just happened. She remembered seeing the gang fight, then she fell, and then she'd been surrounded, and … “Oh damn, am I dead?”

“No. But you're going to think you're dying in just a bit. You touched me with an open wound. Your virus is turning live now. That's why you're feeling like you do.” He stopped talking and put his nose in the air. “Damn, the hounds are looking for us. I've got to get you out of here.” He reached for her and she jumped back.

“Stay away. You've got puke all over you.”

“It's your puke.”

“I don't care. I don't want it on me. I think—” Whatever she thought went out the mental window. Once again, the wind whipped her hair around her shoulders. The long strands flipped around so hard, it stung when they slapped against her face.

*   *   *

Della's head hurt something fierce. Was this her official first hangover? How many beers had she had; only one, right? She never drank more than … She opened her eyes, and found herself staring at her bedroom ceiling. She knew it was her bedroom, because she could smell the vanilla-scented candles and the Lemon Pledge she faithfully polished her furniture with every Friday. And her pillow still smelled like Lee, from when he'd dropped her off at home from school on Monday and no one was home. She loved how he smelled.

But how had she gotten home from the …

Fragments of memories started forming—Chan, the gang fight, flying.

Flying?

She jackknifed up. Her head nearly exploded. “Crap,” she muttered and told herself it had been a dream.

“Hey, cuz.”

His voice came at the same time the nausea did. She turned and for the second time puked all over her dead cousin.

“Ahh, gross,” Chan said, but then he snickered. “I guess I deserve this. Not that I meant for this to happen. I really didn't.” But then he laughed again.

Della wasn't laughing. “What's happening?” Tears, partly from the frustration, partly from the pain, filled Della's sinuses. She forced them away. She wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her shirt and saw her leather jacket tossed over the foot of her bed.

Chan put a hand on her shoulder and gave her a nudge. “Lie back down and I'll explain.”

“There was a gang war,” she muttered, trying to remember.

“Yeah, vampires and werewolves. I went to watch. It's cool to watch us take out a few dogs.”

Her phone, sitting on her nightstand, beeped with an incoming text. She tried to reach for it, but moving hurt. Another surge of tears filled her throat.

“It's your lover boy,” Chan said. “This is like the tenth text he's sent. I think you missed your hookup date.” Chan shook his head. “So my little cousin is getting it on with a guy, huh? I feel like I should go beat him up or something.”

She dropped back on the bed.

“Do you want me to text him and tell him you're okay?”

“I'm not okay!” Talking made her head pound worse. Realizing she was talking to a ghost make it pound twice as hard. Pain shot in the back of her eyes and she closed them, wishing for relief.

“What's wrong with me?” she muttered to herself and not to Chan, because logic told her that Chan wasn't really there. Someone must have put something in her drink at that party. Yeah. That had to be it.

She heard a chair being pulled up beside her bed. “You're not going to believe this, and that's to be expected. It will take a while to soak in. You see … I'm not dead. I … well, our family carries this virus. It's dormant and you can go your entire life and not even know it, but if and when we come in close contact with a live carrier, especially when there's blood involved, the virus can turn active.”

“I got a virus?” She swallowed another bout of nausea.

“Yup.”

“Bird flu?” she asked.

“Not quite.”

“West Nile?”

“No. Vampirism.”

She opened one eye—that's all she could do—and peered at him. She would have laughed if she didn't feel as if she were dying. “I'm a vampire?”

“Not yet, it takes four days. And it's not going to be easy. But I'll help you through it.”

“I don't need your help.” She was her father's daughter, always figuring out how to help herself. Della closed her one eye. Another pain shot through the back of her head, and she realized the way she had to help herself right now was to get help. But not from a ghost. Using every bit of energy she had, she got to her feet. The world started spinning.

“Where are you going?” Chan caught her right before she fell on her face.

She started to ignore Chan, because he wasn't real, but what the hell. “Gotta get Mom.” Whatever someone put in her drink was pretty powerful stuff because she was sitting here talking to a ghost about vampires.

“I can't let you do that.” Chan pushed her back on the bed—not that it took much effort. She had about as much energy as a snail on Xanax, skinny-dipping in a cup of chamomile tea.

“Mom?” Della screamed.

*   *   *

Della wasn't sure if she'd been in the hospital three hours or ten. She wasn't feeling any better, but at least she'd stopped hallucinating. Chan had disappeared. He hadn't appeared since her mom found her in the fetal position, throwing up again.

The nurses came in and out of her room, trying to force her to drink something. She didn't want to drink anything.

“What the hell did she take?” Della heard her father mutter.

“We don't know she took anything,” her mom answered.

“Why would she do this to us? Doesn't she know how this will look?” her dad asked.

Della considered trying to tell them one more time that the only thing she'd done was drink one beer. Earlier she'd almost confessed her theory that someone might have put something in her drink, but stopped when she realized that would've gotten Lisa in trouble. Best to keep her mouth shut, and take whatever punishment came.

“I don't give a damn how it looks! I just want her to be okay,” her mom said.

It was the same argument, different version. Mom hated Dad's pride. Della didn't like it either, but she understood it. She hated making mistakes, too. And on top of that, she'd seen the one-room apartment over a Chinese restaurant that her dad and his sister had been raised in. Her father and his family deserved to be proud of what they'd accomplished. And it hadn't happened by making mistakes.

Della heard the hospital door open again. “Why don't you take a coffee break, I'm going to be here for a while,” a female voice said. Della thought she'd heard the voice earlier. Probably a nurse.

The sound of her parents leaving filled the room. Della felt an overwhelming gratefulness toward the nurse for sparing her from having to listen to the argument, but she didn't have what it took to express it.

“You're welcome,” the nurse said, almost as if she'd read Della's mind.

Della opened her eyes. The nurse stood over her.

Blinking, Della tried to focus, but then something weird happened. She could see … something on the woman's forehead. Weird crap. Like lines and stuff, like some kind of computer-jumbled pattern. She blinked hard and slowly opened her eyes again. It helped. The odd stuff was gone.

Della went to push up and realized something else that was gone. The cut on her hand. How had it healed so fast?

The nurse smiled. “Has anyone talked to you yet?”

Della forced herself to reach for the large cup on the hospital table. “About drinking my water. Yeah.”

“No, about what's happening to you.” The nurse took the cup from Della's hand. “Don't drink anything. It'll make you sicker.”

“Sicker? Have they figured out what's wrong?”

The door swished open and a doctor walked in. He moved to the side of her bed and stared down at her. “Does she know?” he asked the nurse.

“Know what?” Della blurted out.

“I don't think so.” The nurse ignored Della's question.

“Know what?” she asked again.

“Her parents aren't live carriers?” the doctor asked.

“No,” the nurse answered.

“Would you stop talking about me like I'm not here?”

The doctor met her gaze. “Sorry. I know this is hard.” The intensity of his stare disturbed her. For some reason, everything about him disturbed her. Which was odd. She didn't normally instantly dislike people. It generally took at least fifteen minutes and a good reason.

She started to close her eyes, and bam, the weird crap appeared on the doc's forehead.

The doctor growled, a real growl. Della recalled the gang members doing—

“Someone knows.” The doctor nodded back to the door.

The hospital door swung open so hard, it slammed against the wall and sounded as if it took a chunk out of the plastered wall. Della glanced up, but the doctor blocked her view.

“What the hell are you doing to her?” Chan stopped on the other side of the bed.

“Shit,” Della said. “It's happening again.” And when she glanced at the nurse that crazy thing was on her forehead again. It was as if Della could see inside the nurse's head, like in some cheesy B-rated movie. She could see the front of her … brain. Yup, it looked like a brain, only it wasn't just wrinkled. It had strange-looking zigzaggy lines, a cross between bad modern art and ancient hieroglyphics.

“What's happening?” the nurse asked.

“I'm … seeing ghosts.” Della had to force herself to stop staring at the woman's brain. She looked at Chan and now he had something on his forehead, too. Only his brain looked different.

“We're trying to help her,” the doctor answered Chan.

Della's breath caught. “Can you see him, too?”

Chan snarled at the doctor, exposing his teeth, and she recalled the insane talk about vampires earlier. “She doesn't need your kind of help, werewolf!”

“Did you do this to her?” the doctor asked. “Are you the one who infected her?”

“Yes,” Chan seethed. “But I didn't know she was bleeding, and if you must know, I didn't have a choice. It was snatch her up and get her out of the alley or let you dogs kill her!”

The doctor frowned. “Have you at least explained it to her?”

“I tried,” Chan said. “She's not buying it.”

“Buying what?” Della asked, blinking furiously, trying to get the crap off everyone's forehead. “He's dead,” she snapped.

“We have to get her out of the hospital before Phase Two hits,” the nurse said.

Phase what?
Nothing was making sense now.

The doctor looked at Della. “Look, your cousin isn't dead. He's … a vampire and thanks to his carelessness, like it or not, you're about to become one, too.”

Della's head started to pound again.

“I have to go,” Chan said. “Her parents are coming up in the elevator.”

“Wait,” the doctor said to Chan, “If I get her released, will you see her through this?”

“I don't need anyone's help!” Della insisted.

“Of course I will,” Chan said. “She's my cousin.”

The nurse looked back at Della. “When the turn is complete, I want you to call this woman.” She handed Della a card. When Della didn't take it, the nurse placed it in her hand.

“Call who?” Chan asked as he backed toward the door.

“Holiday Brandon. She's the director of the Shadow Falls Camp. She can help.”

“Oh, hell no! Della's not going to that stupid camp to get brainwashed by the government.”

The nurse's shoulders tightened. “They don't brainwash anyone. They'll help her decide what's best for her.”

“I know what's best for her. She's going to come live with me.”

Live with Chan?
Della struggled to keep up with the crazy conversation. Then she heard the elevator bell ding as if it were right outside her door.

“And fake her death, like you did? That's why she thinks you're a ghost, right?” The nurse shook her head. “Is that really what you want for her? To have to walk away from her entire life, her family?”

Chan didn't answer. Della only saw a blur appear where he'd stood. The door swung back open and caused another chunk of plaster to rain down on the floor. The doctor and nurse looked back at Della with pity, sympathy. Della scowled at them.

“The nurse's right,” the doctor said. “Call Shadow Falls. Trust your cousin to help get you through the next few days, but after that, don't believe everything he tells you. You look like a smart girl. Make up your own mind. With proper planning, we can live normal lives.”

“We?” Della asked.

“Supernaturals,” he said and pointed to his chest. “Werewolf.” He motioned to the nurse. “Fae. And you're vampire. There are others, but you'll learn about them in time.”

Della slumped back onto the pillow. “So it's official?” she muttered.

“What's official?” the nurse asked.

“I've lost my mind.”

*   *   *

“You need to eat and drink something,” Della's mother said and handed her a cup with steam billowing above the rim.

Della had been out of the hospital for a day. Her head pounded like a mofo, her body hurt like the worse case of flu she'd ever had. And mentally she was slipping. Her assessment no longer hinged on the fact that she saw Chan. It hinged on the fact that she was this close to believing him. She was turning into a vampire. And, according to Chan, the first two days were a stroll down Easy Street in flip-flops compared to what the next two would be.

She pulled the cup of hot tea to her lips, pretended to drink, hoping to appease her mom. The nurse, and then Chan, had told her that eating or drinking anything would make things worse. Oh, Della hadn't taken them at their word. Nope. She had to go prove it.