Bag of Blood - Vampire Mystery Romance (8 page)

Robert hustled Lena into his truck, speeding out of the restaurant's parking lot on the way to the hospital. She sat in the front seat, wringing her hands in her lap.

"You sure this is ok, Robert?" Lena bit her lip. "I already ordered, so my food'll be on the bill." She rifled through her wallet, pulling out a few bills and tucking them into her friend's shirt pocket. "Have them box it up; save it for me and bring it to me on Monday, ok?"

Robert nodded. "Fine, whatever. Did Vanessa say what was up with your dad?"

"No," Lena replied, gnawing on what remained of her thumbnail. "Just said 'something was wrong' and the ambulance came to the house to take him to the hospital. She got a call from work and is leaving as soon as possible; we'll probably beat her there."

Robert grunted, eyes on the road as they always were. He was, after all, a very careful driver.

"Robert…" Lena began, not sure how to start what she wanted to say. He stiffened, already guessing what was on her mind. "Yesterday, with your mother…"

He opened his mouth to protest, but Lena cut him off. "I promise; I won't tell anybody! I just wanted to talk it over with
you
." This seemed to shut him up, so Lena continued.

"How long has this been going on?" she asked. "I mean," she struggled to keep her tone gentle, not wanting to give the impression of being mocking or unsympathetic. "We know she's been drinking… a lot… for a while now. But when did it get so out of hand?"

Robert sighed, running a hand down his face. "Isn't it obvious?" he laughed bitterly. "Since dad died."

"Oh." Robert's father had died six years ago. "That long?"

"Well, it started out as barely noticeable. But by the time she met Ray, it was already noticeable. It actually got worse after she married him; no matter how much she said she 'adored' him, he still wasn't dad. Maybe she thought that if she drank more, she'd become dad ." Lena gazed at her friend, her eyes large and sad behind her glasses.

"Don't look at me like that!" he boomed, and then caught himself. "Sorry, Lena. I'm used to it, really. Must seem pretty stupid, huh;
Oh, I'm gonna marry a guy I don't really like to fill the void, and then to forget that he isn't the man I love, I'm going to destroy my liver."

Lena shook her head. "Your mother must have loved your father very much." Her memories of Robert's father were foggy, at best; a giant ox of a man with a crooked smile and a loud laugh. She remembered, as a child of about eight years old, falling asleep on Robert's sofa watching cartoons, only to be shaken awake by his dinner plate sized hand.

"
Come on, hun
," he had whispered. "
Are you staying for dinner, or do you need me to give you a ride home
?"

Of course she had chosen to stay, the offer of sizzling stakes on the outdoors grill being too tempting to resist.

"
Stick with Robert, willya
?" he asked, winking, as he prodded the large hunks of steak with a long-handled fork. "
He needs a friend like you
." Being eight, she had merely nodded, not fully understanding.

"So, was last night the first time she's gone wandering?" Lena asked, gripping the seat as Robert made a sharp left turn.

"No." He grunted, glancing at Lena's stomach. "How are you, by the way? You hit the dashboard pretty hard; I heard a crunch." Lena shrugged, not wanting to mention the large purple bruises.

"You're changing the subject," she accused. "Please tell me; I love you."

He stared at her when she said this. "What?"

"I said I love you!" Lena insisted. "You've been my closest friend since I was a little kid. My oldest friend. I just want you to be happy."

"But Megan—" Robert began, confused.

"Go out with Megan, date her, kiss her, whatever! There are different kinds of love, you know. I don't love you like that. But make her cry and I may have to kill you; she's my friend too, you know." Lena grinned; Robert did not.

"Fine. Love you, too, Lena." he grunted. "Alright; I'll tell you. No, she's gotten out of the house completely hammered a few times before, but I've always been there to drag her in before Ray or Claire notice."

"What if you don't notice, Robert?" Lena countered. "What if you're not there? What if it's someone else's car on the street, and if he or she
doesn't
hit the breaks in time? Do you want to lose your mother as well as your father?"

Robert whirled on Lena. "Shut up!" he spat. "What the hell do you know about it?"

"I know
I
might be losing my father right now!" she retorted, not backing down out of his face. "And if
I
could do
anything
to stop it, I would! So stop being selfish and
save your mother!
" she hadn't realized that she was screaming until she stopped speaking; the silence echoed loudly in the truck.

"What am I supposed to do, Lena?" Robert's voice was hoarse, desperate, when he finally spoke. "Have her locked up in some
home
? Turn my own mother in?"

"It's your decision to make, Robert," Lena said quietly, noticing how Robert's forehead was wrinkling, his eyes more damp than usual. After what felt like an achingly long moment of silence, they finally pulled up to the hospital.

"Do you want me to come in with you?" Robert asked softly as she slid out of the truck.

"No," Lena replied, trying for a smile. "Go! Rescue your lady love from the horrors of being stranded at a nice restaurant."

He waved as he pulled from the parking lot. "Text me once you know stuff," he told her before heading back to where he came from.

The loud pattering of heels approached Lena as she pushed open the glassy hospital doors, glancing around for an elevator. She knew who it was long before a body slammed into hers from behind as her sister tried—and failed—to skid to a stop on the slippery linoleum.

"Lena!" Vanessa panted. "Come on; he's on the fourth floor."

Vanessa, following texted instructions from their mother, led the two of them to an upstairs lobby where their mother paced nervously.

"Girls," she breathed, hurrying to hug her daughters. Lena breathed in the familiar scent of her mother; clean soap with a tinge of bleach. Her mother rocked them side to side for a moment.

"So, what happened?" Vanessa finally managed to ask.

"He was walking out of the bathroom when he collapsed," their mother explained. "Said he could barely move; it was like fire shooting all over his body. Luckily he had his phone in his pocket and called the police before passing out; he didn't even say anything to the operator, he was already out. The ambulance brought him straight here."

Lena was chilled to the core by this news. She squeezed her sister's hand tightly. "What was it?" she asked, suddenly feeling a lot younger than her sixteen years.

"A heart attack. Of course." Their mother began walking, beckoning for her daughters to follow. "Of course," she muttered again to herself. Lena hastened to keep stride with her.

"What's going to happen, mom?" she asked, trying to keep the rising panic from her voice.

"They're going to perform the surgery earlier. It's riskier, now, but it's even riskier not to."

"Risky
how
?" Lena was unable to help the rising in her pitch, causing her voice to squeak.

"Lena, shh!" Vanessa chided, wearing a
don't upset mom more
, look on her face, but Lena was powerless to stop herself from demanding an answer.

"
Risky how?"

"His heart is already damaged from the attack!" her mother explained, upset. "You don't think surgery won't screw him up more?"

Without waiting for an answer, she held a door open for the girls, and without looking around, Lena hastened inside. There, behind a curtain, resting in a comfortable-looking chair beside a bed, sat her father. His eyes were closed, a tube leading from a needle in his arm to an IV drip filled with clear liquid.

Lena approached him softly. "Daddy…?"

Vanessa pulled her back. "Don't touch him until
after
the hand sanitizer," she insisted bossily, grabbing the room's supply of it and pumping a generous amount onto her hands. Numbly, Lena rubbed her hands and arms with the stuff, liberally coating them before once again hurrying to her dad's side. He opened his eyes.

"Hey, baby," he turned up the right side of his mouth in a sloppy grin. "How’s my girl?"

Lena couldn't even open her mouth, fearing that all that would emerge would be a sob. Instead, she took his hands in hers. He looked around slowly.

"Oh, it's
all
my girls," he acknowledged his family. "That's good, real good. I love my girls."

Vanessa sat on the edge of the hospital bed. "When is his surgery scheduled?" she asked their mother.

"Tomorrow," their mother replied. For the first time, Lena noticed the bags that ringed her mother's hazel eyes, the pallor of her skin. "He'll be in the hospital for at least two weeks afterwards, probably three."

"He'll miss Thanksgiving," Lena commented, her voice having lost all inflection, reverting back into herself like a turtle into its shell. "He loves Thanksgiving." Their father seemed too far gone on pain medications to do anything but smile benignly at his family.

"There won't be any more Thanksgivings, not for us, if you want your father to live!" Mrs. Thresh shot back angrily. "You want to give him another heart attack? Stuff him full of carbs until his heart gives up?"

Lena shook her head miserably. "No," she whispered. Her father touched her face.

"Don't be so sad, baby," he murmured. "I love you, and I love 'Ness, and I love your mom. And you love me, right? So what else matters?" the doped-out slur of his voice was almost too much to bear.

"I do love you," Lena whispered. "I love you so much."

School seemed to go by at an slow agonizing pace with the constant worry of her father on her mind. Trying to keep her promise to Vanessa in mind to do better, she diligently wrote down most of what her teachers said in various notebooks. Still, looking back at her words, she shook her head. Most of it didn't make a lick of sense in hindsight.

"Me
gan
," she groaned during her lunch period, feeling too grumpy to eat. "Will you help me do my essay for Psychology?" She flopped her face down on the picnic table in a dramatic display of moodiness. Gripping her by the hair on the back of her head, Megan pulled Lena's head back up.

"Stop that. You'll probably get E Coli from the table or something," her friend teased. "If that's possible, you'll find a way to do it. And yes, I'll help you if you give me one of your mini-chimichangas."

Gratefully, Lena pushed her plate towards her friend. "Have all three of them!" she made sure to snatch the brownie from the edge of the plate up before Megan had a chance to grab it; no matter how frustrated she felt, there wouldn't be a chance she'd miss a brownie. Megan made a face, but cheerfully dunked the fried treat into the small cup of salsa and bit off the end of it.

"Mmm. Unhealthy goodness," she grinned.

"What's this about E Coli?" Elliot asked, tentatively seating himself at the table as if not entirely certain he would be welcome.

"Oh," Megan smiled at him, not dimpling nearly as much as she did for Robert, but the dimple was prevalent nonetheless. "Lena is being filled with dark and dramatic angst today." Her teasing rubbed Lena the wrong way, and she puffed out her cheeks in what was probably a very childish pout.

"I'm just too dumb to do my homework, is all," she groused, not really wanting to go into her dad-issues with Elliot listening.

"Can I see it?" Elliot held a hand out over his overflowing plate of lasagna. Lena reluctantly handed over what was supposed to be her Physics notebook, and he flipped to today's notes, helpfully categorized by the dates they were written. He poured over her neat handwriting with his brows slowly growing more and more furrowed.

"You seem to be mixing your Physics notes with your Geometry notes," he commented, his voice remaining polite though sounding a bit incredulous.

"What?" snatching the book from him, she poured over her own words.
Son of a…
"You're right," she finally commented. "I guess that explains why the homework was so confusing." Pulling her assignment from her bag, she poured over it with the new information in mind.
Hmm… it does make more sense this way,
she realized, her cheeks heating with embarrassment over her own carelessness.

"If you're having homework troubles," Elliot began carefully, trying to look nonchalant by carving his lasagna into tidy little piles, but his tone revealing how he was dancing over eggshells. "I can help you. I'm good at math and science."

Megan ducked her head and took a huge bite of Lena's lunch to hide her glowing smirk.

"We can stay at the school library; they don't close until about an hour after school ends. Or… we could go to my house? I have a little sister, but she's pretty good about staying quiet during homework time if I promise to play with her later. Or if you wanted to go to your house?"

Lena stared at him for a long moment, her eyes wide. Slowly, as if registering his words, her cheeks went from pale pink to a scorching red. Megan couldn't conceal her snort of laughter but tried to pass it off as a choking cough. Tears streamed from her brown eyes as she tried to cover her obviously intense amusement at the situation.

Misinterpreting Lena's silence, Franz quickly busied himself with his lasagna. "Yeah, it was a dumb idea. Sorry."

Megan shoved her elbow painfully in Lena's ribs, unknowingly hitting directly on the bruise she had caught from Robert's hasty car-breaking. "
Ow!"
she hissed sharply through her teeth. The pain cleared her mind, and she made a decision.

"That would be fine," she told Elliot. "If you really want to help me, I would appreciate it a lot. When would be a good time for you?"

Elliot's startlingly green gaze shot back to Lena's face, his features lighting up like the fourth of July. "Really? Um, anytime…" he paused to think. "Today would be alright, but my mom has school and needs me to babysit my sister. You would have to come to my house, but if you don't want to, that's ok! Maybe you'd like the library better after all…"

Trying to be bold and quell the fingers of nervousness from crushing her resolve entirely, Lena managed to squeak out "No, today at your house is alright with me, if it's alright with you." She winced, well aware of how high-pitched and unnatural her voice sounded.

"Great!" Listening, Lena noticed a certain odd quality to his voice as well. Was he as nervous as she was? "I'll pick you up, then… You may want to text Robert and tell him not to drive you home. He usually does, right? I'll wait for you outside of your Sign Language class at seventh period."

Lena blinked, taken aback. "How do you know what my schedule is?"

Apparently vampires could blush as well, a bit of a dull, grayish flush. "I just… do. So it's a plan?"

"Guess so." Desperate to stop Megan from her unbearable laughing fit (she was hunched in on herself, shoulders shaking as if she were having some kind of fit), Lena changed the subject.

"Where
is
Robert, anyway?" she asked, remembering how he had picked her up for school like normal that morning.

"He went home sick; had a headache," Megan replied. "I'm getting a ride with Mable," she continued, listing off the name of one of their sewing-class acquaintance. "I'll still help you out with your Psychology essay," she said apologetically, now feeling a tad guilty for her extreme laughing barrage. "This weekend, alright?"

Lena's phone vibrated in her pocket, and she grabbed it, peaking at the screen. She didn't usually leave her phone on at school, but after what had happened to her father on Sunday, his surgery that she wasn't allowed to be there for and the fact that she’d been home alone the entire night before, she felt safer having it on. And sure enough…

Dr. says he's pulling through.

Lena put a hand to her mouth, breathing sharply. Those five words took more weight off her shoulders then she even knew she was carrying.

A gentle hand stroked her hair.

"Hey, hun," Megan said softly, "How come there are tears in your eyes?"

Lena had to be selective with her words, making sure her voice wouldn't waver. "It's suddenly a much better day than I thought," she smiled.

…

Elliot held the door to his nondescript car open for Lena in the student parking lot, once again waiting until she put her seatbelt on before settling himself into the driver's seat.
I should have been wearing my seatbelt when Robert was driving me home from Megan's house,
she mused darkly for herself.
Then I wouldn't have pain every time somebody tries to hug me.
She made a mental note to wear her seatbelt every time from now on, knowing she would probably forget it soon enough.

Elliot seemed unsure what to say, and for a long moment the two drove in awkward silence.

"I need to pick my sister up from school," he finally said, desperate for something to say. "She goes to all-day kindergarten; it ends about half an hour before our school does, but her teacher is a family friend and doesn't mind waiting with her for me."

Lena picked up on the attempt at conversation. "So, your sister is…" she counted in her head. "Five years old?"

"Six, actually. I know it's a big age difference, but my mom didn't want to have a kid right after me." His laugh was an attempt at lighthearted, but Lena detected levels of insecurity underneath it. "She was terrified the vampdrug was still in her blood and any kid she had would be a vampire."

"Oh," Lena responded, not sure how to respond without sounding insensitive or like she was trying to pry.

"She's not, if you were wondering," Franz told her. "Just a normal, healthy kid." He seemed startled at the bitterness in his own tone. "Sorry. Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

Lena nodded. "Vanessa; she's twenty-three. She's seven years older than me, but she lives with us. We're…" she was going to say how they didn't have much of a relationship, but recalled Vanessa's reaching out to her as of late. "We're working things out together."

Elliot seemed genuinely curious when he asked, "Does she work at the Stop 'n Shop? I've seen a worker there and every time I see her I'm reminded of you." He thought for a moment. "I think I noticed that her last name was Thresh."

Lena laughed. "That's her! She works there in the mornings a few times a week, and goes to night school the rest of the time."

Elliot smiled. "I knew it! She's pretty, like you." He seemed to realize his mistake a second after he said it. "I'm sorry, Lena… I know you don't want…" he stumbled for words, obviously worried Lena would grow uncomfortable from any flirting. She lowered her face, allowing her bangs to cover her eyes.

"It's ok," she spoke quietly.
Hands on her chest, squeezing when she was barely old enough to understand. Crying out in pain and getting only laughs in response.
She shoved the memory aside.
This is Elliot; he's not like them.
"That's nice of you to say."

Mercifully, Elliot made a right turn and pulled into the parking lot of a nearby elementary school. It was a pleasant looking building, with bright paints on the walls and a small playground where a few older kids romped. A small child sat on the bench next to a Korean-American woman with a pretty face and a bright smile.

"Hello, Elliot!" the woman waved. "Belinda was starting to miss her big brother."

Elliot slipped from the car, walking towards his sister, who leaned into a one-armed hug her teacher locked her into before slipping off the bench, a small yellow backpack over her narrow shoulder. Lena watched as Elliot took her bag from her, holding it by the top handle in his hand and bending to lift the child into his arms. She allowed him to, wrapping her arms around his neck as he slung her legs tucked over his arm, but Lena noticed right away the very un-childish expression on her face. Short blonde curls (lighter than Elliot's dark golden hair) framed her round face and her eyes were such a strange blue they could have been silver, glowed from underneath her dark eyelashes. She was lovely, but barely looked like a child at all.

Carrying her back to the car, he slid her into the back and buckled her in.
So
that's
where he gets it,
Lena smiled to herself.
He's been trained to make sure
she's
buckled.

"Belinda, this is Lena," Elliot introduced the two. "Lena is my friend from school. She's coming over to our house to do homework with me." Belinda stared for a moment at Lena's face with her oddly glowing eyes. It felt oddly like a test to Lena, like the child was quizzing her for whatever she could see in her face. She tried hard to continue looking back with a pleasant expression on her face.

"Hello," the younger Franz child finally sighed out. Lena noticed that, unlike her brother, the child had no German accent, possibly because she had been born and raised in the U.S.

"Hi!" Lena smiled. Elliot slid back into his driver's seat and headed towards where Lena assumed his house was. She was surprised to notice that it was pretty close to her own home; in easy walking distance, anyway.

He pulled in front of a fairly small but still nice-enough looking house. Actually,
nice enough
wasn't enough to describe it. It was pristine, like the cover of a homemaker's magazine, not a blade of grass out of place, not a single toy or bicycle by the door to even suggest a child and a teenager resided there. The paint was so perfect it almost seemed fake. Suddenly Elliot's bland car made sense; it fit the image perfectly. Lena felt a little tentative stepping onto the driveway, as if her scruffy shoes would somehow send it all crumbling down.

Turning, Lena gave a little jump; she hadn't realized Belinda was standing behind her, close enough to be pressing her nose into Lena's lower back. The child blinked up at her and then reached a tiny hand out, pressing it into Lena's ribcage.

"You hurt here," she said quietly. "And in your head. Your head and your heart have a lot of sad in them." The way she said it, so emotionlessly and yet so confidently, it sent Lena reeling backwards.

"W-what?" Lena asked, confused. Elliot, who was unlocking the front door, groaned.

"Belinda, we've talked about this. People don't like to be told things like that about themselves. It's something you need to keep to yourself."

Lena turned to hustle to Elliot's size. "What does she mean?" she asked, trying to sound causal though still feeling a tad creeped out. He sighed, holding the door open for her. The front entrance of the house was even more immaculate than the outside, if possible; every appliance was set exactly half an inch apart from the preceding one; the carpet was so white it glowed.

"Belinda… knows things," Elliot explained awkwardly. He reached down to run his fingers through his sister's corn-silk hair. "We don't really know
how
she knows them. But when she meets a person, looks at their face, things just enter their minds."