Midweek, Tyrone offered Heaven and me a sleigh ride and I came clean with him. “Your horses are scared shitless of me.” A couple of days later, I saw him and Jessica flying through the snow, the horses happy not to be dragging two vampires behind them.
Vlad and I kept a respectful distance from each other as we (I) thought through what we (I) wanted.
Not only was I falling in love with myself (what a relief), but I had close to ten friends now.
It was almost like when Buffy got an award at prom. (Dang, that promepisode really had an impact on me.)
Cat interrupted myBuffymarathon with a loud meow and Heaven walked into the room. She looked at the screen, and in a dramatic voice said, “Into every generation, a slayer is born.”
“Fun fact,” I said. “You know the best wood for stakes?” Buffy glossed over the science of stakes. Mister Pointy looked like something Kendra had purchased from the Halloween store. Real stakes were fire-hardened and with a handle that made them look like a cross. “The best ones are made of Chrithmas tree wood.” I cackled madly at the thought. What had I been thinking?
Heaven ignored me and continued. “The slayer will get her lazy ass off the couch and make things with me.” Looking deep into my soul, she asked, “What are you going to make, Tiffenie?”
“Heaven, you know I can’t with the crafts. It doesn’t go with my fangs.”
“Everything goes with fangs.”
“You’re wrong. I saw them on a what-not-to-wear list for 2025. Jojo Siwa had them on, I think.”
Heaven groaned. “Fine, you and Buffy have fun.”
“We always do!” I called after her.
It was ten minutes till the new year and I was all alone, ready to watch the ball drop over Times Square. The camera panned over the crowd—mostly tourists wearing 2025 glasses made of plastic and glitter and festooned in beaded necklaces that would be recycled for Mardi Gras in a few months. They were all mugging for the camera while Alanis Morrisette sang “You Oughta Know,” which had apparently been out for thirty years. But, really, such a beautiful ode to jealous rage was timeless. Ryan Seacrest and a woman from a morning show I’d never seen were seated on a platform in the middle of Times Square. He looked like he was dressed for a dog-sledding adventure through Alaska. The morning show woman was dressed in a skimpy dress and a fur shrug that barely covered her tits. It made me cold to look at her, and I didn’t even get cold.
Back when I was a child, men would dress in bearskins and dance through town to ward off evil spirits. Answering the door to fierce bear dancing—now that had been a tradition. Ryan’s parka paled in comparison.
“It’s only a few minutes to the new year,” Ryan commented.
The woman smiled through the pain, clearly shivering. She was a half-naked middle-aged woman acting excited about a teen pop star and using words likesusandrizz,trying to be forever young and on display in below-freezing temperatures, which was worse than being a vampire,if you ask me.
At 11:53 p.m., Vlad walked through the door. “Where’s Heaven?” he asked.
“She’s on her first date with Dr. R.” I was already planning their wedding, so hopefully they were having a good night.
The Times Square ball slowly lowered down the pole, indicating the beginning of a new year and the end of the old. If an entire crowd of people hadn’t been screaming, it would be hard to know it was exciting.
“Remember that year we went to Times Square?” I said, smiling at the recollection. We had kissed to welcome in 1910. A good year. Vlad had tried to share a virgin with me and I’d refused. It had been harder to find bagged blood in those days.
The camera scanned the crowd. “Where do all those people go to the bathroom?” I asked.
“They just have to hold it,” Vlad said.
On TV the mortals were singing “Auld Lang Syne.”
Vlad sat down at the piano we’d rolled into the room during Heaven’s panic reno and ran his fingers across the keys. With a cringe he said, “This needs a tuning.”
It would be destroyed with the house in a couple of days. Not much sense worrying if it was a little sharp.
He began to sing “Auld Lang Syne” in a melancholy voice along with the TV. How many times had I heard this song? Every new year since Robert Burns had written it. I remember when it was new. Even then, I hadn’t liked it. Better not to reflect upon the passage of time or old friends. Better not to listen to the song.
I muted the TV. What did any of this matter compared to eternity?
Vlad played the piano well and the sound filled the room and reverberated inside my soul in a way only music can, strumming the chords of feelings I didn’t want to acknowledge and definitely didn’t want to feel.
“Should old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind?” Vlad crooned.
Tears pricked my eyes at the sentiment. My whole life was about saying goodbye to acquaintances or being alone and having no one to say goodbye to. Every goodbye emptied me a little more until there was nothing left at all. Vampires are lonely creatures by nature, but Dr. Rosetti was right—I could do better. The world didn’t have to whir past me.
