Three
Maron
I’m proud of my perfect penmanship. Every letter perfect; every grammar mark exactly where it should be. It was one thing I could control about my life and control it, I did. But today was of the utmost importance. Today I was writing a letter to Portia, the owner of the Deadication Dating Agency. She was also the owner of the town, but today I was addressing her as the woman who had the potential to find me a suitable match - one who wouldn’t care that I ate salad instead of red blood cells. I thought maybe a match for me was pretty far off, especially within the vamp world. I was a pariah… at least with the few people who did know about it. They loved me, I knew, but they definitely didn’t understand me. Sometimes I didn’t even understand myself, but what I did know was that I was not responsible for what happened to me. Or, according to my parents, whatdidn’thappen to me.
My friend and our conversation had wormed its way into my head. My clock was ticking. Albeit slowly because I was immortal, but still a tick here and there. Now that it was in my brain, I couldn’t get it out. So, I told Portia everything. Pouring my heart out on the page, I lamented the fact that I had never dated and certainly had never loved anyone. When I’d come close, his parents found out my little secret and put the kibosh on any warm and fuzzies we had for each other. The next time I saw him, he pretended like he’d never even met me. We moved soon afterward. I’d taken the remnants of my broken heart, put them quietly into a metaphorical box, and never spoke of it again. Until today. Poor Portia.
The letter went on and on and on until even I was tired of talking about myself. But I really wanted her to understand. No. Ineededher to understand. I included a picture I’d printed out of myself, drinking a green smoothie and waving at the camera. Nary a blood spot to be found.
I also explained the kind of man I wanted to settle down with, even though I figured I didn’t have a lot of room to be choosy. I wanted him to be blond with light brown eyes. I specifically chose the words “the color of burnt brandy” just so she would understand the kind of brown I wanted. I wanted him to be sensitive, and I also thought he should enjoy long walks in well lit forestry. I enjoyed nature, but I also enjoyed not getting mugged and not stepping on potential squishy things. I wanted him to have no aversion to cooking, but I would also prefer he knew how to cook. I wanted someone unafraid of cleaning up a mess and who liked to read Jane Eyre. I would also prefer someone who wrote poetry, but that wasn’t a dealbreaker.
After reading over my letter and ensuring I was satisfied with both my clarity and the contents of it, I signedMaron Archerwith a little flourish on the last R in my name, folded it carefully, and sealed it inside a heavy parchment envelope. I addressed it to the dating agency with Portia’s name at the top, but I planned to hand deliver it to her box just to make sure the postal service didn’t lose it. This could potentially be one of the most important letters I’d ever written. If I was lucky, Portia would read it and get right to work on my dream man.
I snorted at my positivity. With the way my life was going, the first option was like a unicorn showing up on my doorstep ready to whisk me to Narnia.
If I was unlucky, Portia, or her assistant, (because I highly doubted she read her own letters), would chuck it in the trash and I’d be back to square one. Grabbing my keys and purse, I whisked myself out the door, only stopping to glance up at the sky. I frowned at the dark grey of it. A storm had been swirling over the top of us for close to two months now. The weatherman said it was nothing to worry about, but something in my gut told me it definitely was. No storm hung around for that long or kept the same, strange swirling pattern.
I’d heard the rumors, same as everyone else here. The first night of the storm, all kinds of strange beasties had fallen out of the sky. Where they had gone was anyone’s guess. As people were wont to do, as soon as there was no real evidence of the weirdness, they went right back to their lives and pretended like nothing was happening. I’d kind of done the same thing, but I couldn’t push it quite to the back of my mind yet. Something was up with this storm and from the way it looked, it couldn’t be anything good.
I clicked the unlock button to my old beat-up Ford Ranger. I called her Elvira because she had a wicked sense of humor and liked to break down in the rain. Granted, we didn’t get much rain around here, but Elvira could always sense it coming. Plus she was black as the night sky and had odd blood red leather seats. It was the perfect truck for a vampire, so I felt a little sorry that Elvira had gotten stuck with me, the least vampiric of all the vampires.
I patted her on the hood as I got closer, opened the door, and slid in.
My parents were appalled when I rolled up with this thing after I’d argued with them for weeks about the appropriate car for an Archer. That was me, an Archer, but one who didn’t quite fit in with the Archer family. We were of an old, mysterious, vampire bloodline and, if we knew what was good for us, we usually drove either a silver Mercedes or a sleek black Beemer. Not a Ford Ranger better suited for Halloween than real life.
But I liked the old beat up truck and she sometimes liked me. I adjusted my seating position and turned the vehicle on. She rumbled to life like a contented cat. I smiled. Today was going to be a good day.
The Deadication Dating Agencywas a stark reminder of who owned this town and who pulled the strings in people’s daily lives. I, for one, got kind of aggravated that someone had that much power over things, but I was willing to squash it down for the sake of true love. It was the one thing that really bothered me since we moved here. This place wasn’t the most democratic I’d ever seen. There were no elections and I’d never been involved in any of the decision making process for the town because I, nor anyone else here, had ever been invited to participate. It wasn’t that I thought Portia was doing anything shady, it’s just I didn’t believe one single person should have all that power.
I pulled into the parking lot, turned off Elvira, and grabbed the envelope sitting on the seat beside me. Taking a deep breath, I got out and headed over to the large box marked “Community Correspondence”. I wasn’t sure how many people used this thing, but the size of the box was large enough to give me pause. It looked like one of those post office drop off boxes you rolled through while driving your car. Were there that many lonely people in this town?
For the hundredth time since my conversation with Cassidy, I grumbled something unfavorable under my breath. I was fine until she’d put a lot of pressure on me to find someone.
I wanted to, but I was also worried about the future. And I was also certainly worried about how someone was going to view me when they realized I was not a typical vampire.
I forced myself to relax the thunderous frown forming on my brow. Opening the handle, I tossed the letter in and tried to peer inside to see where it landed. It wasn’t full enough for me to see any of the other correspondence, so all I got was an eyeful of nothing.
The handle slammed shut as soon as I let go of it, and I was left standing there with an empty feeling. This was quite anticlimactic.
Turning, I happened to glance up only to see a shadowy figure in one of the windows of the agency staring right at me. The light hit the person in an odd way, allowing me to only see a shadow and no discernible features, but from the shape of the person and the length of the hair, I suspected it might have been a short woman.
The curtain fell away abruptly at my perusal.
I squared my shoulders and headed back to my vehicle. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen or how soon it would happen, but I needed to keep living my life the best way I knew how to. And that was basically doing the same thing I’d always been doing and waiting for something amazing to happen.
I gripped Elvira’s steering wheel and headed out of the parking lot. All I could do was wait and see what the future brought.
When I pulledinto the driveway of my small little house, I made a mental note to do something about the way the outside looked. The Archer’s were also appalled when I refused to stay in the family mansion. I would rather open a vein than listen to my mother harp on about my eating habits. As soon as I was able to dip into my inheritance, I’d scoured the realty websites until I found this little gem. It was 800 square feet of mine.
The floors were heated and hardwood, so I never had to worry about cold feet, unless I forgot to turn it on. With how cold my blood ran, that was almost never. There was a small kitchen with plenty of cabinet space and a double oven because I liked to bake bread. A lot. My bedroom was tucked off to the side, away from the sight of people entering the small home. There was a master bath on the other side, butmasterwas a grandiose word to describe the small space. Though I did make sure there was enough room for a claw foot tub because those were life.
I slid off my shoes as soon as I entered the house, tossed my keys and purse on the side table, and made my way over to the fridge to rummage through for lunch. I liked to claim I was vegan and while that was true most of the time, sometimes I slid into vegetarian territory, especially when baked goods were involved. After all, there would be no creme brulee if it wasn’t for dairy, and few cakes tasted good without eggs.
Cake was also life.
But these were rare indulgences indeed and only when something waved itself in front of my face that proved irresistible. For now, I popped the top off of leftover beans and rice, scooped some into a bowl, and microwaved it until it was piping hot. Careful to handle the bowl by the bottom curve where the heat couldn’t reach me, I took it over to the couch, plopped down, and flipped on the television.
Five minutes into a game show where people got slime dumped onto them, I realized something important. Something I’d never thought of because my parents never would have allowed it. I sat up straighter. Wouldn’t they have some docs around here that helped paranormals when they needed it? I know most of us went our entire lives without medical care, but there were some instances where itwasnecessary. Maybe they could help.
I sat my spoon back in my bowl.
Yes. This was a good idea. I’d just have to be discreet. I didn’t want my parents to know.
Smiling to myself, I cranked the volume up on the television and drifted off to sleep watching people get covered in green goo.
