So I won’t become a vampire.I held her gaze.
“I think not.”
The skin on the back of my neck prickled.But you’re not sure.
She took me by the shoulders and stared into my eyes. I felt like she could see my secrets. “You will not. That is all. You did not invite him in. You have new blood. It must protect you.”
Why is not inviting him in so important?The transfusion made sense because replacement blood, but it seemed weird that vampires would require hospitality before they could attack someone.
“I do not know.” She shrugged. “I was a child when I learned these things. No one explained the why—perhaps they did not know themselves.”
What if I do become a vampire, though? An infection might survive a transfusion.
She shook her head. “You will not.” Her voice was kind, but it was still a command. Then, so softly I wasn’t sure I’d heard right, she murmured, “I cannot kill another one.”
After she left, I stared at nothing for a long time, worrying. What if I was a vampire, though? I tried to reassure myself. She thought the transfusion had scoured out any possible vampire infection. I’d also seen my reflection in the mirror. Everyone knew vampires didn’t have reflections. So I must be fine, I reasoned. And I didn’t feel different. Inconvenient questions kept popping into my head. Why would a transfusion get rid of the infection? They didn’t pump out all my blood and replace it; they just topped me off, like a gas tank on empty. The infection could still be there. Would it be diluted? Would I then be only sort of a vampire—and what did sort of a vampire look like? Were some people more resistant to the infection? Questions sleeted through my mind faster than I could process them. I found a notebook and scribbled keywords until my brain calmed down enough to group them into categories. Then I looked at the categories and tried to figure out the main question of each one.I narrowed my list to my three most important questions: How long does it take after a bite for the infection to become noticeable, what are the symptoms of vampire disease, and is there a cure? Then I dived into Google. No matter how I fine-tuned the search parameters, though, the majority of hits were for fanfic, RPGs and cosplay, and video games. The few medical references I found basically said to see a therapist if you thought you were a vampire, because your brain was broken. So the internet, at least, didn’t believe vampires existed.
“Good morning.” Dad came into my room and sat down on my bed. “How are you feeling?” I scooted over to make room, sliding my vampire research notebook under my pillows.Sore, I wrote.
He nodded. “You really gave us a scare.”
I’m sorry.
He sighed. “You’ve always been a responsible kid, and so maybe I was too lax with you. I let things go because I trusted you to use good judgment. I can understand in a strange country, in a new culture, how it could affect your thinking—how you could trust the wrong people and end up putting yourself in danger.”
I started to write that I hadn’t put myself in danger, that my friends were good people—that I wasn’t to blame for the fact that I’d been attacked, but he took my whiteboard out of my hands. “Listen to me. This isn’t Portland. It’s a big city with a predator on the loose. You can’t just assume that everyone you meet is going to be your friend.”
I just stared at him. Dad had met Nick and his parents,and he’d never said, “That boy is dangerous, Tosh. Stay away from him.” A couple of weeks ago, he’d told Nick he trusted him to keep me safe. Madame Dupuy had talked to Nick’s mom and interrogated Nick. She hadn’t thought he was dangerous or untrustworthy. And it wasn’t like bad things didn’t happen in Portland. Or on school-sponsored debate trips. I reached for my whiteboard to protest, but Dad set it onto the floor.
“I’m absolutely serious about you staying away from Nick and his friends. And for the foreseeable future, you don’t go anywhere without either me or Madame Dupuy. And don’t give me that look. I’m doing this because I love you.” He pulled me into a hug that sent spikes of pain shooting through my bruised and scraped body.
I pushed away, mouthing, “It hurts.” He apologized, kissed me gently on the forehead, and left. I retrieved my whiteboard from the floor and lay back on my pillows. It hurt that Dad had literally silenced me. It more than hurt. It felt like him saying my voice didn’t matter.
A few minutes later, Madame Dupuy came in with a steaming mug of throat infusion. She held it out to me. It tasted like hot nothing, but its warmth did sooth my throat a little. “How do you feel?” she asked. I held my hand out flat and rocked it down. Alone is how I felt. Broken is how I felt. She took my hand and squeezed it gently. “You will heal,” she assured me. “It will take time, but you will heal.”
After she left, I turned my phone on. Lily and Mina had sent a video of themselves visiting some of our favorite Portland places with the sublimely cheesy Eiffel Tower souvenir stuffies Nick and I had picked out for them.
Nick had lit up like—well, like the Eiffel Tower—when I’d self-consciously asked him if he knew any good places to buy souvenirs for my friends. “Bien sûr, mademoiselle. I know the best shops in the city.”
“Okay, but I need super-touristy-awful. I promised Mina and Lily that I’d send them the lowest-brow souvenir I could find in the Land of Culture.”
He’d grinned at me. “Awful souvenirs are one of the overlooked joys of life.”
I’d grinned back. “Take me to the joy.” And he had. To a place jammed with Eiffel Tower golf tees, drones, and cake molds; baguette corkscrews; andMona Lisaneckties. “I’m in love,” I told him, grabbing Eiffel Tower toothbrushes and baguette pens for both of them. Then I saw the Eiffel Tower stuffies in joyfully garish colors, including a blue-white-red French flag version, and my mouth fell open in awe.
Nick followed my gaze. “Mademoiselle, your souvenir-picking skills are unparalleled. These things”—he held one of the plush Eiffel Towers up—“plumb the very depths of cheesy. Your friends will be horrified and delighted, as I am.” Then he kissed me, soft and sweet.
“We miss you, Tosh,” Lily’s and Mina’s stuffies trilled from Mystic Coffee, our favorite hangout. Pierre, Mina’s stuffie—now sporting a Sharpied Monsieur Poirot mustache—did bisous with our favorite barista. Then he accompanied Mina, Lily, and Lily’s stuffie, Madeline, to Lily’s job at the animal shelter. Madeline lost her tiny beret and suffered a split seam and stuffing loss when an adorable German shepherd puppy bounced up and grabbed her. “Banjo—no!” Lily cried.
I missed them so much. Why was I even here when I could be back home, safe, with my friends?
They waved their stuffies and yelled, “Merci buttercups for Pierre and Madeline,” over the yapping of the disappointed puppy. Lily looked down at Banjo, then back at the camera. “Tosh, I loooooovve Madeline, thank you, she’s adorable. But Banjo is so sad. He needs her more than I do.” If I could have talked, I would have already been telling her to give the toy to the puppy—I’d send her another one. As soon as I felt better, I’d go buy one. Which she’d probably also give to Banjo. She melted for puppy eyes. I’d show Nick the video, and he could go with me to get a replacement for Madeline. Except I couldn’t show it to him. Or buy souvenirs with him. Mina and Lily grinned at me from my phone. They’d been my friends since middle school, and now they were eight time zones away.
“I miss you two so much,” I texted, my tears blurring the words. Because eight time zones. I told them about my attack, about how I couldn’t talk. I told them about Dad forbidding me to hang out with my Paris friends and about how he took my whiteboard out of my hands and literally silenced me. “I feel like I’m disappearing,” I wrote.
I felt weak, too. The doctor had said that because of the transfusion, it might take months before I was back to full strength. I wondered if I’d be able to go back to class. I looked at the schoolbooks sitting on my desk. At least I could get a jump on my homework. It wasn’t like I had anything else going on. I picked upHunchbackrather than my grammar workbook, though. I felt that recovering from a vampireattack had earned me a little reprieve from the subjunctive in all its tenses. Although Hugo’s book was just as arduous in its own way. I mean, I get that he was a nineteenth-century guy, so the misogyny, racism, and ableism that hung like a fog over the story would just have seemed like character development to his readers. But they must have wondered, after the third or fourth 180-degree plot twist, if Hugo was going to keep the twists coming until all his characters died of plot whiplash. I did love his descriptions of the Notre-Dame cathedral, though. I wondered if it had kept that sense of mystery, awe, and sanctuary after its recent restoration. The Nick Wallace Tour Company would know. I put the book onto my nightstand. Nick had opened the city to me.Including Le Bec, Dad’s voice said in my head.Oh, shut up, I thought. Nick hadn’t known Le Bec was the one doing the attacks. Nobody had. He’d made Noor and Martine nervous, though, so why had they still hung out with him? I shifted uncomfortably, remembering how I’d gutted out the year on debate team. Why had I stayed partners with Cole? Why hadn’t I asked to change? Because I didn’t want to make things weird. Because I didn’t want to seem weak. Because I wanted to win State. Because I wasn’t sure if Mr. Donnelly would believeme.
I listened to the sounds of the city and thought about my friends. Madame Dupuy brought me another beautiful smoothie—mango this time—that I couldn’t taste. I drank it all, though. I wondered what Nick was doing. The sunlight on my walls faded to shadow. Madame Dupuy brought me more throat tea. It tasted bitter this time. Why could I tastebitter, but nothing else? The shadows faded to darkness. Dad came in and wished me good night, and I made a production out of writingGood nighton my whiteboard to show him I still had a voice. I wondered if Noor felt as broken as I did. The daytime roar of Paris diminished to a rumble. Our apartment took on a sleeping silence. I picked up my phone.
