I turn to V, who’s been wearing a stern grimace for the last half hour of the car ride. “I am going to miss you.”
“Yeah, I know,” she says in her usual curt way. She pulls me into a tight hug. “And you deserve to be happy, even if it’s not with us.”
She squeezes me tight, then pulls away, grabbing Gabby’s hand. “Come on, Gabs, we've got a flight to catch.”
I linger there, V’s words echoing in my head, trying to make sense of them. She’s always had her own way of showing she cares, but that was the most direct, selflessthing I think I heard from her all weekend, to the point I’m not even sure I heard it at all. Still, the moment they are out of eyeshot, reality sets in. I’m still alone, going back to an empty apartment, aimless. Somehow, even getting a cat seems too cruel, for the cat at least.
But it was my choice to leave Manny. This was what I decided, this is what I deserve.
Chapter twelve
Endings
There’s something so surreal about being a Victorian-era monster and having to deal with the mundanity of rental agreements. As I stare down at the paper, wondering if I should mark that I’m moving out or want a twelve-month extension, the only thing I want to do is throw the kitchen sink out the sliding glass door in a stereotypical act from a monster flick. The only thing stopping me is that I doubt this landlord would make a good reference when I move.
My phone buzzes again, the third time today. To my continued surprise, it’s V.
“Alright, what’s the big idea? Don’t you know I’m busy?”
“No, you’re not,” V hisses in a snide tone, and suddenly I’m looking out the sliding glass window for signs of a bat spying on me. “And no, I don’t have to spy on you to know that.”
“Then why all the calls? You barely even text in our group chat.”
“Because you’re mopey.”
“I’m not mopey.” I look at the scattered books around my apartment, all romance novels, most half-unfinished, my heart just not in the act anymore. “I’m not mopey.”
“You’re still thinking about him, aren’t you. Admit it!”
“No, I don’t think about him.” I dream about him, fantasize. Manny fills the empty spaces in my mind when it wanders, but I’m not telling V that.
“Just admit you miss him!”
“Is that Franky?” I hear Gabby’s voice over the phone.
“Hi Gabby, tell your girlfriend to leave me alone,” I yell into the mic.
“Hi Franky!” Gabby’s voice still sounds so bubbly, even muffled through a phone speaker from halfway across a room.
“Well, did you at least think about moving back?” V asks, less as a sincere question and more as a bored platitude.
I look at the paperwork, and suddenly the extension seems so much more enticing. “I’m still figuring it out.”
“But you’re still in your apartment, right?”
“Yeah,” I huff.
“No, I mean like, right now?”
I look for that bat again. “Yeah? Whydo you ask?”
Suddenly, there’s a knock at my door, and it all makes sense. This was some ploy to ambush me again. I huff a monstrous snarl into the receiver. “If you two came down here for another surprise visit, I swear to God!”
I throw open the door, and there’s no bubbly ghoul or vampire with an attitude. Instead, I think I’ve finally had a stroke. Yep, my revived brain has finally had it, and my fantasies are bleeding into reality as I stare up at the image of Manny, looking just as good as he did on top of me in my dreams last night.
“H-Hi.” That's all I can manage in the confusion.
“It’s about time he got there,” V snickers through the phone before the line goes dead, leaving me alone, in the threshold of my apartment, with a figment of my understimulated imagination.
