Page 19 of You’re So Vein

8Augustin

Hannah: I promise I won’t go outside or answer the door to anyone. I’m staying right here watching Shop Makeover and making more scarves. Tell everyone at the council meeting they’re now two for twenty pounds.

BANG BANG BANG. I LOVE the harsh sound of my gavel slamming down on the desk, closing the council meeting. Komal glares at me from across the table.

I may have banged the meeting closed over her proposal for a festival to uncurse November, but it’s only because we have to vacate the community hall in fifteen minutes for the Naughty Knitting Club, and I need to get Komal alone.

(If I’m being honest, I eighty-five per cent need to talk to Komal, and the rest is that I don’t want yet another absurd festival for Hannah to get excited about that she can’t attend. November is peaceful when it’s cursed.)

The councillors and committee representatives rise and descend upon the Jammie Dodgers and stale cheese scones brought in by Councillor Mowbray. Komal promised that if she’s elected mayor, she’ll have council meetings catered by her friend Celeste at Glazed and Confused, which is a cheap way of bribing the councillors for their vote. Judging by the number of raspberry jam stained hands, her plan will succeed.

Perhaps next week I’ll come in with a full suckling pig, and that will win them back to my side.

Note to self: Ask Reginald for a recipe for suckling pig.

People break into small groups, spraying scone crumbs on each other as they chit-chat about the television shows they’re watching. This is my least favourite part of council meetings. I’m good with a prepared speech in front of a crowd, but I never know what to say when people ask me about my family or what I’m up to on the weekend. I usually escape home to Hannah as soon as the meeting is done.

That’s all I want to do now, especially since I’ve been feeling so strange, all rattly and nauseous, like a poltergeist has taken up residence in my chest. Perhaps it has something to do with a foul odour that surrounds Komal tonight – something sharp and Italian that disguises her usually pleasant scent.

Tonight, I must push through this malaise, for I have a singular focus – convincing Komal to work with me.

“Ms Ahuja, may we talk?”

Komal rolls her eyes and excuses herself from Councillor Maxwell. I try not to stare as she wipes scone crumbs off her white Helitours t-shirt. I fail. “What do you want, Durant?”

I beckon her to follow me. She makes a huffing noise, and my chest poltergeist tightens its grip, but then she stomps after me through the small kitchen into the old mayor’s office. It’s not much – a room with stained carpet and an antique desk and a wall covered in black-and-white photographs and paintings of the village at different periods in history. I can’t wait until it’s my office.

I open the stationery cupboard and gesture inside.

“You want me to get into the stationery cupboard with a vampire?” Her eyes narrow.

“If you wouldn’t mind.”

“Why?”

“Because no one else on the council knows what I am, and I have something important to discuss with you that I don’t want anyone to overhear. I placed a charm on the cupboard that means anything said inside can’t be heard out here.”

As I speak, one of my vines curls out from the cuff of my shirt and wraps around the door handle. Komal doesn’t notice.

“It’s so annoying that vampires are pretty and have magical powers.” Komal rolls her eyes, but she steps inside. “You coming, Durant? Or is your brilliant plan to win the mayoral race to lock me in here and tell everyone I went on vacation?”

I realise my mouth has been frozen open after her vampires are pretty comment and promptly snap it shut.

She wasn’t talking about you.

The poltergeist disagrees.

Komal fumbles in her pocket. Ah, so that’s what that foul smell is – one of Isis Meriwether’s anti-vampire charms.

Despite the overpowering garlic reek emanating from the hex bag, when I step in beside Komal, I catch a whiff of her distinct perfume – fragrant cedar, rich dark plum, and something uniquely her.

The sharp, iron sparkle of her blood.

I hesitate, my fingers gripping the door handle as the vine shifts beneath.

I’m locking myself in a tight space with a human who smells this delicious? I haven’t been to that feeding club, and I’ve been feeling so strange lately.

My tongue presses against the roof of my mouth.