“Good idea.”
We jump up from our seats and rush to the door. We stare at it for a moment, then at each other, both wondering what we would find on the other side. Would he be elegant and poised? Would he try to hypnotize us with mesmerizing eyes? What if he had one of the hounds of hell with him, like the boyfriend in the movie, ready to attack? Or maybe he’d be full-on vamped already, having decided to skip dinner and go right for our necks . . . as dessert.
You never knew with an evil vampire, now did you?
“Okay, let’s do this,” I say. I take a deep breath, then wrap my fingers around the handle and pull it open, revealing the man on the other side of the door.
Sunny looks at the guy, then at me, one eyebrow raised in doubt. I know what she’s thinking. The guy doesn’t exactly look like a creature of the night. Out of his tux, he looks more like . . . well, an accountant. Maybe it was the lighting in the Blood Bar that made him look so commanding. Or the tux. Dressed in a pair of beige slacks and a button-down shirt, I gotta admit, he just doesn’t give off the same ghoulie glow.
Or maybe it’s the pocket protector that’s throwing us off.
He’s also . . . tanned looking. But, of course, that could totally be faked with Jergens. There’s this girl at school, Denise, who always looks like she’s been vacationing in the Bahamas, but it’s totally bogus. The girl has never been south of Jersey.
In short, the guy looks nothing like a blood sucker. But that could be his clever disguise. One thing I’ve learned in the vamp world—no one is as they seem. The former Master of the Blood Coven, Lucifent, looked like the little boy from The Sixth Sense. The former slayer, Bertha, resembled a hippo more than Sarah Michelle Gellar. And, of course, Jareth, who is uber-hot and channeling Jude Law, is in actuality the most annoying, uptight, jerky vampire in the known universe.
Not that I’ve been thinking of Jareth. In fact, I’d nearly forgotten he even exists up until this moment. I’m not even disappointed that he had a council meeting tonight and couldn’t meet me at the Blood Bar. In fact, I’m relieved. Very relieved not to have to see him again. . . .
Sorry, tangent. Back to what happened.
“Hi. I’m David,” Mr. Accountant Nerd says, incidentally (or not so incidentally) giving the same name as Kiefer’s character in The Lost Boys. He’s carrying a bouquet of dark red roses. The color of blood, I might add. “You must be Sunshine and Rayne?”
Hm. He knows our names. Very interesting. Then again, I guess Mom could have told him. . . .
“I’m Sunny. She’s Rayne,” Sunny says, helpfully. I wonder for a moment whether she’s been hypnotized to do his bidding and tell him all, then I decide it’s just typical Sunny, being overly friendly.
David looks from me to Sunny and back again. “Um, would you like to invite me in?” he asks, looking a little doubtful.
Ah-ha! I shoot Sunny a triumphant glance. He used the exact words! He asked to be invited in! I knew it! I knew he was a vampire.
“It’s pretty wet out here,” David adds.
Whoops. I’d been so wrapped up in what he looked like I hadn’t even noticed the torrential downpour the guy is standing in. Guess at least we could rule out him being a witch. He so would have melted by now.
Still, that doesn’t mean the plan has changed any.
“Actually, no. We can’t invite you in,” I say, trying to sound as apologetic, but firm as possible. “We are not inviting you in.”
“Right,” Sunny adds. “In fact, we personally, Rayne and I, are denying you entrance to our house. If someone else wants to let you in—like Mom or something—well, we can’t stop her. But that doesn’t mean we’re inviting you in. It’s her decision. Which is separate from ours.”
“Right. What she said,” I agree. “We cannot invite you in to our house. Nothing personal. We just . . . won’t. Can’t.”
“What’s going on out here?” Mom comes up from behind us. She surveys the scene. Us blocking the door like two identical sentries. David standing outside in the rain with his wilted roses. “Girls? Why are you standing in front of the door?”
Caught. We jump aside, both with matching guilty expressions.
“The girls were just saying that it was up to the lady of the house to invite me in,” says Mr. Smooth, tossing us a little wink.
Mom looks over at us, her eyes narrowed. She’s wondering what we’re up to, I’m sure, and doesn’t look the least bit amused.
“O-kay,” she says at last. “Well, please come in, David. Before you get soaked to the bone.”
Bingo. She says the magic words and the vampire steps over the threshold and into our house.
Ugh—hang on. Getting IM’ed. I’ll write more in a few. . . .
POSTED BY RAYNE McDONALD @ 10 P.M.
ONE COMMENT:
ThisVampsGotBack says . . .
You know, you can be very discriminatory when it comes to your narrow definition of an appropriate-looking vampire. First poor Francis, who has a little extra muscle, and now this David guy, who because he wears glasses is all of a sudden Clark Kent. Vampires are not all Goths. They come in every shape and size and race. I’d appreciate a little more tact when you describe our kind from now on.
15
TUESDAY, JUNE 5, 10:30 P.M.
Dinner with Dracula
Okay, sorry, I’m back. Ready to recap dinner with Dracula. So we all go into the dining room, which for a moment I don’t even recognize. We’re not all that formal in the McDonald house, you see, and we usually sit at the kitchen table. The dining room is reserved for big projects like 1,000-piece puzzles or papier-mâché recreations of Custer’s Last Stand or whatever school project we’re currently working on. It’s usually messy and informal and covered in books and jackets and other bric-a-brac.