stop selling your ass. Face it, that’s what you’ve been doing for a year now.” There goes my short-lived attempt not to judge. “Hasn’t it occurred to you that if you want to be taken seriously by Salvador and the rest of the seethe, you have to prove your worth beyond that of donating blood?”
“Like how?”
Oh. My. God. I think she’s serious.
“Get a job or work within the seethe to better it and protect it. Make a difference to them and stand out. If you don’t, you’ll be forever looked at as food and not worthy of any other title in their eyes. They’ve been keeping you like a pampered pet for a year and you let them.”
“I… I hadn’t… ” She hangs her head and fingers the pretty beads on her silk sarong. “You’re right. It was too easy to take and not really pay attention. I feel like a fool.”
“No offense, honey, but you’ve been playing the fool. These are not some characters from a movie and this life isn’t glamorous. Vampires try to blend in like regular people with jobs living night to night and fighting to not misstep and be uncovered for what they really are. They form the family to protect each other and to care for the ones they love, but companions like you come and go. Have you talked to anyone who’s left the seethe?”
That question gives her pause. It never fails to amaze me how many young people get roped into this lifestyle thinking about the books they’ve read or the movies they watch. There are no Goth mansions on the outskirts of the big cities. No bodies drained of blood scattered across New Orleans. There are no cults having massive blood and sex orgies in small towns in the Midwest. Wouldn’t people notice that sort of thing? I’d think it would make the evening news somewhere.
Sheba collects her thoughts then raises her head to answer my previous question. “Yes, I have seen some of the others who left. I know they are safe.”
“I never doubted they were safe. Most would have a family or friends who would call the cops if they disappeared, unless the master prefers runaways and street people. But more important, did they remember you?”
I can see she’s slowly figuring out where I’m going with this. She pulls some strength from inside, straightening her back before responding.
“Yes, they did.” Her face scrunches up in an effort to recall the details. “But they weren’t the same. They didn’t remember much about the house or our lives there. I thought they were pretending or maybe embarrassed by some of the things we had done together with Sal and Theresa.”
Good, that tells me Sal does not do a complete mind-wipe. He does the barest he has to do, and I respect him for that. It’s the same thing I do here with the employees when they leave.
“No, Sheba, Sal clouded their memories to protect the seethe. Similar to the compulsion he has placed on you not to reveal what you know when you visit your family and friends from before you met him. His only other choice would be to kill them. Salvador isn’t a stupid man and unexplained deaths are noticed.”
“So you’re telling me when I do leave, I’ll be okay but won’t remember anything?”
“You’ll remember some, but not enough to know there are vampires in the world or that you donated blood to them. It will not change the core of who you are.”
She looks like she can’t decide if she’s relieved by this news or put off. And of course, I don’t have to wait long for her to reveal why. Her beauty and grace are refreshing, but her self-centeredness and base laziness prove tiresome.
“I have a journal,” she says with a triumphant lilt to her tone. “I write down everything I do in the seethe, or should I say whom?” She finishes with a big grin.
Ah, I was right. She’s hoping to write a book or sell her story when she leaves.
“You mean to tell me after all we’ve discussed, you honestly think Sal doesn’t know about it already? Or that you’d be allowed to take it with you?”
A movement in the kitchen brings my head around. Rafe walks out wearing only a pair of black, skin-tight boxer briefs. I’m not thrilled he’s wearing them in front of this lazy fangbanger, but at least he didn’t come out naked.
He starts to busy himself with making coffee and