Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side (13 page)

"Uh, yeah. Sure."

"To save you time, I will add that we do not sleep in coffins. We do not sleep upside down. We, quite obviously, don't disintegrate in sunlight. How could one live a practical, useful life that way?"

"So far, being a vampire sounds pretty dull if you ask me."

"At the risk of raising a bad subject—and again, my apologies—you didn't seem to think my fangs were dull the other evening. In fact, you reacted quite strongly to their
sharpness."

And to the feel of his hands, his body. . . Don't go there, Jess.
"How
did
you
do that? Did you have, like, a set of plastic teeth in your mouth?"

Lucius shot me an incredulous look. "Plastic teeth? Did they look plastic?"

"No," I admitted. "But dentures look real."

"Dentures." He snorted. "Don't be absurd. Those were— are—my teeth. That is what vampires do. We grow fangs."

"Do it now then." I steered the van onto Route 30, navigating traffic.

"Oh, Jessica ... I don't think that's wise while you're driving on a busy road. You quite panicked the other night."

"You can't do it, can you?" I challenged. "Because it was a stupid trick, and you don't have your props."

"Don't provoke me, Jessica. Not unless you really want me to do as you ask. Because I can, and I will."

"Do it."

"As you wish." Lucius turned toward me, bared his teeth, and I nearly ran off the road. Lucius grabbed the wheel, swerving us back into place.

"Holy shit." He'd done it again. He really had. I slid my gaze over, cautiously. The pointy teeth were gone.
It's a trick. A trick.
I wouldn't fall for it. Teeth were covered with enamel, one of the hardest substances in the body. Enamel couldn't shift or change. It was impossible, at the molecular level.

"You really must get used to that," Lucius chided.

"Do you buy the trick at, like, a magic shop?"

"It's not a
trick.
Please stop using that word." Lucius drummed his fingers on the VW's vinyl passenger seat. I could tell he was getting frustrated again. "Vampiric transformation is a
phenomenon.
If you'd read the book I provided—"

I groaned. "Oh, god, that thing." My unwanted copy of
Growing Up Undead
was
still under my bed. I kept meaning to throw it out but somehow never got around to it. I didn't want to think about why.

"Yes, 'that thing,'" Lucius said. "If you'd read the guide as you should you would know that male vampires gain the ability to grow fangs at puberty. It happens when we're exceedingly angry. Or . . . aroused."

"So you're saying 'fangs' are like an—" I started to say "erection" like I said it every day of my life. But the truth was, I had never said that word out loud, and discovered that I couldn't do it then. But Lucius understood.

"Yes. That. Precisely. Often kind of a tandem effect, if you understand my meaning. But it gets easy to control with practice. And women can grow fangs, too, of course."

"So why can't I do it if I'm supposedly such a big-time vampire?" Sooner or later, I would confound him with logic.

But Lucius shot right back, "Women have to be bitten first,
I
need to bite you. It's a great privilege for a man to be his betrothed's first bite."

"Don't start that betrothal talk again," I said seriously. Spotting the first entrance to the outlet mall, I made a quick turn. "Not even joking. We're done with that."

Lucius tilted his head. "Are we done with it?"

"Yes."

I pulled into a parking spot. "How about mirrors? When you try on clothes, will you be able to see yourself in a mirror?"

Lucius rubbed his temples. "Have you taken basic science at Woodrow Wilson High School? Do you know the principles behind reflectivity?"

"Of course I do. I'm the one who actually believes in science, remember? I was just joking." I yanked the keys out of the ignition. "So let's recap. You can't change into a bat, you don't dissolve in sunlight, and you're visible in mirrors. What
can
vampires do? Why's it so awesome to be one, then?"

"What would be so wonderful about dissolving in sunlight? Or not being able to look in a mirror and judge if you've dressed yourself properly?"

"You know what I mean. You keep saying vampires are so great. I just want to know why."

Lucius's head dropped back against the seat. He stared at the shag carpet on the ceiling of the van as though begging for patience or guidance. "We are only the most powerful race of superhumans. We are physically gifted with grace and strength. We are a people of ritual and tradition. We have heightened mental powers: the ability to communicate without speech when necessary. We rule the dark side of nature. Is that 'awesome' enough for you?"

I grabbed the door latch. "So why drink blood?"

Lucius sighed deeply, opening his own door. "Why is everyone so obsessed with the blood? There's so much more."

I dropped the subject. I'd sort of became distracted, anyhow, now that we were about to go shopping. "So where do you want to go first?"

Lucius came around the front of the van and placed his hands on my shoulders, pointing me toward the Levi's outlet. I here.

Five stores and about five hundred dollars later, Lucius Vladescu looked almost like an American teenager. And, I had to admit, a hot American teenager. He wore a pair of 501s even better than his black pants. And when he put on a loose white untucked oxford shirt—having decided that a T-shirt would be a bit too
Real World/Road Rules Challenge
for Romanian royalty—well, the effect was pretty nice. It didn't seem embarrassing to be with him. Not at all. Mindy would probably pass out, literally, when she saw him.

"So how about getting rid of the velvet coat?" I asked.

"Never," he replied.

So much for not being embarrassing.

We were walking toward the car, juggling all our shopping bags, when Lucius stopped short and grabbed my arm, dropping a bag.

I turned. "What?"

He was looking in the window of a store called Boulevard St. Michel, an upscale boutique with very, very expensive clothes. The kind of clothes that rich women wear to cocktail parties. I'd never been inside. For one thing, my dad didn't believe in dry cleaning, because of the "perc emissions" that messed up the environment. And for another, I couldn't afford one shoe from Boulevard St. Michel, even at outlet prices. Not even after a whole summer slinging burgers at the diner.

"What are you doing?" I followed his gaze.

Lucius kept staring at the window. "That dress—the one with the flowers scattered across the bodice—"

"Did you just say 'bodice'?"

"Yes, and skirt—"

"The dress with the V-neck?"

"Yes. That one. You would look lovely in something like that."

Lucius had officially fallen off his already cracked rocker. Not only did he think he was a vampire, but now he believed I was some sort of thirty-year-old cocktail-party attendee. I laughed out loud. "You really are crazy. That's designed—and priced—for women who do things like go to, I don't know, symphonies or something."

He shot me a look. "What's wrong with the symphony?"

"Nothing. Except that I don't go. I mean, can you see me in that at 4-H? I bet it costs a mint, too."

"Try the dress on."

I pulled back. "No way. I am one hundred percent sure that they don't like teenagers in there."

Lucius scoffed. "They like anyone with enough money."

"Then they won't like me. I don't have enough money even to look."

"I do."

"Lucius . . ." But I'll admit, I was kind of intrigued. It
was
a beautiful dress. I'd never even tried on anything like it. It was so . . . sophisticated. It was the color of fresh cream, with tiny, black, embroidered flowers scattered here and there across the whole thing, not really in any kind of pattern, but that only made it prettier somehow. It reminded me of chaos theory: random but beautiful in its simplicity. The neckline was more daring than anything I'd ever worn. You could see the swell of the mannequin's plastic breasts peeking out above the fabric. The
expensive
fabric. I tugged Lucius's arm. "Come on. Let's go."