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“Geez, just things.” Lorraine shook her head. “And I thought you were supposed to be the articulate one.” But the sarcasm in her voice didn’t match the way she behaved—unsure if she should take her things up, asking to use the bathroom—almost like she’d never spent the night before.
I never thought of her as insecure, Zoë thought, but I snap at her, and she acts like I might dump her for good.
Zoë found herself trying to reassure Lorraine in small ways, dumb ways, really, like chuckling if she said something even slightly funny, or letting her decide what they should make for dinner, and soon Lorraine got her sea legs again. She happily bullied Zoë into helping her concoct a huge pot of spaghetti and made her eat a large helping of it, all the while complaining of how fat she was getting.
“Bull,” Zoë said. “You’ve got a great figure, not like me.
Lorraine sniffed. “You might be skinny, but your bra’s bigger
than mine. You better eat more, otherwise every time you get up, you’ll fall over from the weight of your tits.”
They screamed with laughter at this image until they had to wipe tears from their eyes.
They were getting ready to clear the dishes away when Harry Sutcliff came home. Lorraine flirted with him outrageously, as usual, and cajoled him into eating too. Zoë felt warmed by the way he actually smiled a little, and tucked in with more appetite than she had seen in him for a while. It’s Lorraine, she thought. There’s so much life in her, it’s catching. Zoë didn’t feel as worried as she might have when he excused himself quietly and disappeared to his bedroom with a briefcase of work to catch up on, but he never came out to ask them to quiet down as he might have once. Zoë didn’t know whether to be relieved or irritated. She kept on half expecting to hear his voice.
They had stayed awake long past the time when things made sense, as if fighting off the inevitable by making the night last forever. They pigged out on chips and dip, listened to records, and giggled at stupid jokes as if they were at a fifth-grade slumber party all over again.
Yet there were awkward silences sometimes, when they strayed too close to dangerous ground.
Finally, Lorraine tried to talk about her mother. She stumbled over her words. “It’s not fair. I was just getting used to having to go somewhere else to visit her, and now I’ll hardly ever be able to do that even.” She cut herself short and messed around with a pile of albums as if looking for something.
Zoë knew it was the specter of her own mother’s death between them, stopping Lorraine from venting all her fears, and she sighed. I sometimes think she’s selfish, but she’s not, not really, Zoë realized. It is unfair for her. She deserves to feel bad. She’s losing her mother too. The last took Zoë by surprise. She’d been so wrapped up in herself that she’d never thought about it that way.
“Lorraine,” she said softly, in one of the silences when she could bear it no longer, “I’m sorry I’m such a jerk.”
Lorraine threw a bottle top at her. “You said that last night.” But she looked warily at Zoë, sensing more to come.
“But I’m still a jerk if you can’t talk to me. I’m not going to shatter and break if you talk about your mother. I’m sorry if I’ve been a self-centered pig, and made you feel that way.” She felt her face glowing with embarrassment.
Lorraine turned away.
God, I’ve pissed her off, Zoë thought, confused. Lorraine’s shoulder’s were shaking. No, worse. She’d made her cry. Zoë slid from her bed and crawled across to her friend, unsure of what to do next. I have to be tactful, she thought, just as her hand came down firmly in the bacon-and-chive dip.
“Ugh!”
Lorraine looked around, tears in her eyes, saw Zoë’s hand, and howled—with glee. It was impossible not to join in.
“You’ll either have to wash it or lick it,” Lorraine gasped between giggles. “Here, have some chips.”
“Shut up, you’ll choke.”
Gales of laughter again.
On her way to the bathroom Zoë said, “I guess we can talk now, huh?”
Lorraine took a deep breath. “I guess.”
But there was one thing Zoë couldn’t talk about.
What could I say? she thought at one point. There’s this cute boy, and he likes to drink blood? She’ll think I’ve gone round the bend.
Often her fingers strayed to her neck and stroked the fading marks. It had been three nights; the wounds had healed fast. They were just pale yellow bruises now. She’d said she’d help him, but how could she do that? What had possessed her to say it? It was his kisses. What if it were all a mistake? What if someone innocent got dreadfully hurt?
She tossed and turned, unable to sleep even after Lorraine had been snoring for what seemed like hours.
But now it was morning, and the first shaft of sunlight lit Lorraine’s hair, bringing out hidden gold in the rioting tendrils. It could have been Lorraine down that alley, if Simon was right. Wasn’t that reason enough to help him? She tried to hold on to the moment and push that thought aside. It will always be like this, Zoë thought, hard as a wish. It will never change. This is every morning Lorraine has lain asleep on my floor, and I’ll be within those mornings, never ceasing, from now on. There is no sad vampire boy, with sharp kisses, waiting out there in the cold somewhere.
Then Lorraine uncurled, and her eyelids fluttered. She stretched to grasp the day, and time moved on.
