I'm just like you!

Isabel was at the park seated criss-cross apple sauce right on the ground with a slew of machinery items sprinkled all around her and a screwdriver in hand. The Flores household had been intense as of late with Elena’s pregnant hormones raging about, twin babies that will be entering the picture sometime soon, and a shot down engagement proposal… Isa preferred being outside.

And what better way to distract herself from everything than tinkering? 

Wondering where all the machinery items came from? Yes, the toaster. (Poor toasters not one has ever survived the hands of Isabel Flores) 

Elena and her raging hormones were going to kill her, but that’s okay because Isa was making an environmental analyzer. She had other projects she could be working on but working on the same thing for a while left Isa’s brain bored. 

The brunette was in the process of screwing some pieces together for her brand new device when one of those pieces flung itself out and flicked itself away. With a sigh, Isa got up and began looking for said piece and when she saw how futile her searching was appearing, she tapped the first person she spotted in the park.

“Hey, have you seen a toaster piece?”

Vee didn’t let it change who she was, however. She cared about people, even though most were afraid of her. So when a girl she thought she recognized as a graduate from the secondary school her first year in town tapped her on the shoulder, Vee whirled around, a friendly smile on her face. 

“Hmm? Oh! Sure, let me see—um, hmm...” Vee said, narrowing her eyes and looking around. This was one thing that made being a vampire pretty handy. She had great eye sight and could spot things most couldn’t. “Ah! Yes, there it is—under the bench. Looks like you might be missing a few of those tiny screws too. Allow me—” she zipped over to the park bench and collected the pieces, offering them to the young woman. “Here ya go! So—” she eyed the girl’s project curiously. “Whatcha building there?” she grinned. “Pretty sure that’s not a toaster.”

Melody hadn’t worked at Whosits since she had come to town like a little lost duckling looking for a home, but she had gained an appreciation for all the knickknacks and the trinkets. She made it a habit now to stop in on Saturday mornings just to see if there was something she could add to her messy apartment. Well it wasn’t messy at all but if she kept getting little things she imagined it would be.

Giggling to herself as she stumbled upon a new set of little plaques Melody blushed knowing she had accidentally grabbed someone’s attention.

“I think most homes could use this? Or maybe a class or a business office.” Melody laughed again.

On this particular day, Vee had decided to visit some of the shops in town. Whosits had a lot of neat stuff—some things she remembered seeing back before they were antiques. 

She’s just found a lovely vase that she thought would be the perfect complement to her mothers favorite Begonias when she heard a quiet giggle. Glancing over she made eye contact with the girl and smiled, letting out a giggle of her own when she read the plaque. “Oh I agree. I can think of several of my teachers from last year who would have loved to have something like that in their classrooms.”

Merida always gravitated toward people who believed something. It didn’t matter what that something was– it could be dumb as hell, and sometimes it was. One of her best friends at home, Keegan, was obsessed with Dungeons and Dragons. He worked endlessly hard at coming up with campaigns and worldbuilding, but he loved it so much, would passionately defend his own lore, that Merida couldn’t make fun of him for it. 

Dipper was like that about cryptids and demons. He could go on a whole rant about some kind of rumour and Merida would listen, smiling, the whole time. 

And here was a vampire. A real, blood-sucking, undead vampire. One of the most dangerous creatures to the Order, ever– one of the hardest to kill because they could look exactly as Vee looked now– kind and pretty and harmless. 

She talked, and Merida wanted to believe her.

Her training kicked in, knee-jerk. That’s part of its seduction, said that brain.

But she resisted. Underneath her shirt, Merida bit her lip and then her eyes darted to the side. 

And maybe it’s a losing battle, but nothing will ever change if we don’t at least try, you know?

It was exactly how she’d felt, once, about becoming a knight in the Order. A flawed dream she now realized, but at the time, Merida had envisioned herself a pioneer. The first Woman Knight. The first, yes, but not the last. She just had to try.

Merida swallowed. Coughed again, quite against her will (that smell really was awful). But then– “So… ye just want me to sign the thing? I don’t have to er…come into the town or make some grand speech or soemthin’, aye? Cuz no one’s gonna want me to do that, trust me.” 

Watching the werewolf girl, Vee was hopeful. She could sense the wheels spinning inside the young woman’s mind and while she had no illusions of them being best friends or anything of the sort, she hoped they could at least agree to be on the same side against the injustice to both of their kinds. 

She smiled at the cough. Poor girl, she felt for her. At least Vee could simply stop smelling things since she didn’t breathe. But the girl was trying inspire of her built in instincts that naturally tried to set them against each other as enemies.

Vee was thankful they both had brains and were both willing to use them.

“No speeches will be necessary,” she said with a chuckle. “Just sign here,” she held out the petition and pen, staying as far back as she could so as not to startle the girl. “And—I’ve sensed that you’re sort of the alpha around here? If so, maybe you could encourage your fellow wolves to consider signing the petition too?” 

Vee shoved him and Robbie wanted to laugh. Of course she shoved him. Of course she wanted to fight with him now after all the fight had left him as his laptop shattered into pieces. Fuck her. It was selfish and stupid of him, but he didn’t want to fight her now because that was giving her what she wanted and he really just didn’t have the energy anymore. 

“I’m not going to hit you,” he said, his voice low, almost uninterested. “I love you, Vee.” The words came out of him and he meant them. He knew he did. He loved her. She was his family and he would always love her. “I love you but I’m really just…not in the mood. I know you’re sorry and I know there were things happening that I know nothing about and all of that is fine, but I was happy. I was really happy for the first time in a very long time. Do you know what that’s like?” 

Robbie looked up at her and shook his head. “I’m sure you do. You can usually find something to be happy about. I can’t. Everything drags on. Life keeps going and I’m pulled along with it but I’m not living. I just exist. I was living, Vee. And I know that sounds stupid and foolish because he’s just a guy, but he was so good. He made me like myself. I liked who I was with him and now that he’s gone I’m having all these thoughts and the darkness is circling back on me and I hate it.” 

Burning emotion began to slowly seep back into his veins, sluggish and painful. “I hate myself,” Robbie said, clenching his fists. “And right now I feel like I hate you too. I hate it all and I’m sorry if you want me to try to hurt you so you can feel better about what you did, but I won’t. I’ll stand by you, but you’re going to have to give me some time for the rest.” 

For the record, Vee did not want Robbie to hit her so she could feel better about herself. She wanted him to swing at her so she could fight him for being such a jerk. She was mad! Yes, she knew she had screwed up and felt awful for what she’d done to their family. But it was an accident. And he didn’t seem to understand. Only that she’d apparently ruined his existence, and he wanted to blame her for it all.

“You were living? So what are you saying? After everything we’ve been through together, the only person in the entire world who has ever made you feel “alive” and “good” is this boy? I—ok.” she blinked, this crushing realization hitting her like a hammer as she backed away from him.

She had to go. She was going to cry again and this time she didn’t want her brother to see. A gaping chasm had opened in her chest and she felt like she was bleeding out, never had she felt so useless and alone.

That wasn’t fair. 

Robbie knew Vee loved him. He loved her too. They were family and family was the most important thing in the whole world. But Robbie was mad and it wasn’t fair of her to cry. It wasn’t fair of her not to fucking fight with him. He wanted to fight. He wanted to scream and yell and throw things until they’d trashed the entire room because that’s how angry he was at the whole world. 

It wasn’t even just about Vee. It was about Marlin too. It was about the fact that he never had a choice about becoming a vampire and people still held it against him anyway when he was trying so hard to be good. So yeah, none of that other stuff was Vee’s fault, but he wanted to scream at her. 

“Then why didn’t you?” Robbie spat. He was going to hate himself later, but what was new? “You know this could destroy everything, right? Not just my life. Your own too. Everything is so fucked up now!” 

Robbie wanted to hurt someone. His eyes flashed as he glared at Vee and before he could do anything he’d really regret he turned and grabbed his laptop and threw it at the wall behind Vee. It shattered into pieces and Robbie did too. “It’s all so fucked up,” he said, his voice smaller as his chest deflated. 

Vee groaned in frustration. It was like he wasn’t even listening to her. She wanted to hit something. But she didn’t because she knew violence wasn’t the answer, but she sure was tempted! And for a split second, she thought he wanted to hit her too. 

And then his laptop flow past her head and she gasped, eyes widening as she whirled to follow its progress. It smashed against the wall, shattering into plastic and metal splinters. 

Now she was really mad. She whirled back and returned his glare, not even caring in the moment that his voice went all small and deflated. She marched over to him and stood toe to toe, glaring up into his face, somehow managing to make her entire 5′1″ more intimidating than it should have been. Pressing her hands against his chest, she gave him a shove. 

See, Merida didn’t believe the girl. 

She was still trying to change that. In her heart, she knew that what Vee said was true. Not all werewolves were dangerous magicks– even if Merida herself was one. She might not trust herself, but she also knew that she didn’t want to hurt people. She struggled every day. She cried, still, sometimes in frustration, sometimes simply in loneliness. This was the same for most magicks. Perhaps magic was not as evil as Merida first thought, but she was not sure it was a gift either…and for magicks like herself and for this vampire, their powers were a curse. 

She doubted any vampire, especially a nice vampire (the idea was still absurd, but, aye, sure), would choose a life where they had to hurt others to survive. 

But she’d grown up being taught much differently. And the fact still stood that a vampire was perhaps one of the most deadly magicks of all because they could not live without the blood of another. The only thing worse might be demons themselves, who took over a person’s whole body, whole soul.

Merida swallowed, grimacing still because of the smell. 

“Don’t ye think this is a losing battle?” Merida said after two long seconds of struggling against her upbringing. Instead of saying any of that, she’d say this. Her eyebrows twitched. “Is a petition really going to change anything? The human world isn’t ours anymore. Yours and mine, I mean. They’re going t’fear ye no matter what you do. It’s who we are, now.” 

Vee had always been an idealist. She believed that she could be friends with anyone and that all magicks and mundus had the potential to live at peace with one another. In the past, it had been naïveté on her part to just assume that because she had made a friend it meant that they would be accepting of what she was. She’d grown a lot since that first betrayal centuries ago, but she had never wavered  in her beliefs. 

Stubbornness was a rather vampire kind of trait, after all. Part of their unchanging nature, she supposed.

Vee smiled kindly at the young woman’s question. This was an argument she’d heard too many times before. From her own family, from other “dangerous” magicks—the modern world belonged to the mundus and there was nothing they could do about it. 

Vee refused to believe that. 

“Just one petition? Probably not,” Vee said with a shrug. “But this one petition could be the start of something bigger. It will get people talking and thinking about what is really important. Maybe we can’t change the whole world—but I think we can make a difference in our little corner of it. And maybe if the mundus and “safe magicks”—” she scoffed at her own words, rolling her eyes. Because in her opinion there was no such thing as a safe magick. Or a safe mundus, for that matter. There were extremely dangerous individuals in every species, magical or non. 

“If they can just see that many of us want nothing more than to go about our lives and live in peace with our neighbors, then Swynlake would be a much more better place for it. And maybe it’s a losing battle, but nothing will ever change if we don’t at least try, you know?” 

Robbie’s conscience twinged just a little as Vee spoke her mind. Of course he didn’t hate her. She was his sister–his family–and he could never hate her. He could be mad at her though, and right now he was furious. 

Vee stood just over his shoulder and he thought of what it must’ve looked like in Rome–her just standing there while Ashley A called her out–Vee not saying a goddamn word against it. His fingers curled into his nails were all but digging into his palms. Because of that stupid school trip, Nemo could no longer talk to him. 

It wasn’t all Vee’s fault. A lot of it was Bae Mu-yeol’s fault. That bastard didn’t even want to try to give Robbie the time of day and Robbie hated him for it. He hated him for being unreasonable and bigoted. He also hated him because he kind of understood, at least a little, why he wouldn’t want Nemo dating a vampire. It was exactly as Robbie had told Nemo from the beginning: he was dangerous. 

All of these emotions stirred inside of him and Robbie turned to look at Vee. “I’m mad,” he said, nearly crushing the arm of his chair in his grasp. “I’m mad because Finn told me you didn’t even try to defend yourself, Vee. Why didn’t you try? Why didn’t you fucking lie to her?” 

Ah yes. Speaking of lying and the Ashleys. “I dated that monster Ashleigh Q. for months to protect our family and our secret!” His voice was steadily growing in volume, but he couldn’t stop. The pain of losing Nemo throbbed in his head like the ghost of a pulse. “A teenage girl calls you out one time and you just accept it?” 

Robbie wasn’t going to cry. He couldn’t let himself. If he started crying, he’d never stop. He’d cry until he withered up into nothing. “I was so happy that week,” he said, his voice calmer now. “And then everything just fell apart. I don’t hate you, but I’m mad, Vee. And I’m so fucking sad.” 

The effect was instantaneous. Vee drew back as if she’d been burned, gasping as the tears that had lined her eyes with silver began trickling down her cheeks. She understood that Robbie was angry. He had every right to be angry, but knowing that he was hurting more than she’d realized was like a stab to her heart. She felt helpless, desperately wishing she could go back and—what? She didn’t know how she could have changed anything.

And then she was angry. He’d been brooding and silent all of these weeks because he listened to what a bunch of teenagers had to say and never once bothered to ask her side of the story. She’d kept her distance because she was ashamed. She knew she’d screwed up and she knew he was hurting and thought he deserved space to grieve without her being a nuisance, but dammit! It hurt to know that he’d been so furious over a second hand story when she’d been there the whole time.

“Oh Finn told you everything did he?” she hissed through the tears. “He told you how it was me and him and that brat in a room packed with fifty of our classmates, teachers and parents all staring at us as I tried to stop Ashley from bullying him?” She started pacing as she continued, “And did he tell you how I begged and bartered and pleaded with her to try and keep her from telling? Did he tell you how horrifying it was to be taken by surprise and put on the spot with so many people watching? And did he happen to mention the near crippling fear that the Italian polizia could possibly burst through the hotel door any second to try and exterminate me like some filthy rodent when I had done nothing to hurt anyone? Sure! I’m sure he told you all of that—” she whirled around and poked him in the chest with a forefinger, “because you sure as hell haven’t asked me about any of that, Ryeo Hwan.”

Just as quickly as it came, the fight left her and her shoulders drooped as she stepped back and crossed her arms, hugging herself. The tears falling in earnest now. 

Mei preened at the compliment to her dancing/gymnast abilities, as she always did when she received a compliment, twirling the end of her ponytail a bit. Until she realized what Vee was doing and dropped her eyes down to watch her friend’s feet. She listened quietly and intently to what Vee was saying: position feet, stay loose, don’t fall down. 

Seemed easy enough.

She was eager to try it out herself, as it did look fun. Mei had watched Lock and Vee whip around the warehouse or the park after school a few times and always thought it looked a bit thrilling. And Mei was always a fan of a thrill. 

And she was also glad that they could do this and not talk about stressful shit like petitions or vampirism or Mei’s newly single status. That’s why she’d pestered Vee for this in the first place, missing her friend but not wanting to get into all that…political stuff.

(Her mom would be so ashamed, but she was mad at her mom, so good. Maybe she should be ashamed. If Mei hadn’t been shipped off to this stupid town in the first place, maybe she’d still be political.) (She ignored the burn in her gut at the thought of her mom’s shame.) 

She was distracted the next moment anyway. Her eyes rolled and she made a face at Vee. “I don’t care if I impress Lock or not,” she protested, but her cheeks warmed slightly, her heart fluttering in her chest at the thought. “I’ve wanted to learn how to do this forever.” Which was true. Long before she got all stupidly fluttery-hearted thinking about stupid Lock, with his stupid girlfriend.

Shaking her head, she took a breath, stepping onto the board. It rolled a little beneath her feet, making her immediately feel unstable and she tensed up, flailing a hand out to grab Vee’s shoulder with a little yelp.

“Okay, this is definitely harder than I thought. How do you make it look so easy?”

Vee smirked but didn’t say anything. She knew Mei had a thing for their bad boy friend, and suspected he just might have a thing for Mei in return. Vee could smell the tension on them whenever they were together, it was so strong. Heck, she could scent the tension on Mei right then. But whatevs. That was 100% Mei’s business, though it didn’t stop Vee from poking every one in awhile. 

What kind of best friend would she be if she didn’t?

Vee watched with a practiced eye as Mei carefully stepped onto the board. She could already see Mei was too tense, but there wasn’t much to do about that. The second Mei was on the board, it wobbled and Vee lunged forward to catch her before Mei could tumble to the ground.

“Years of practice.” Vee grinned. “But don’t worry,” she reassured her friend. “You’ll get the hang of it. It’s just a different kind of balance, you know? Like—you have to learn to keep your head separate from your hips and your hips separate from your feet. Kind of like in dancing. You gotta be fluid, yeah?”

She steadied Mei on the board, stepping back and holding out her hands. “Here take my hands and just focus on feeling the board beneath you. Try to work on shifting your center of balance from holding on with your hands to holding on with your feet.”

It had been a long day of work, but Tiana was actually looking forward to going to the costume crew work session that evening. Tiana had to admit that her mother had been right– Tiana did miss hanging out with people she didn’t work with, and while the crew meeting had been full of all kinds of personalities, the costume crew seemed full of friendly and helpful people. And there was something relaxing about sewing and crafting.

Tiana only knew the basics of sewing, but she was determined to make herself useful, so she took on the task of tracing, cutting, and pinning the patterns for some of the ensemble members’ costumes so that the more experienced members of the crew could sew them together. “I hope I’m doing this right. There’s a bit of a learning curve going on here,” Tiana chuckled, glancing again at the measurements in front of her. She turned to the person next to her. “Is it your first time with costumes too?”

Which is what brought Vee to the costume crew work meeting. Her mother had asked her to help cut patterns and help out the volunteers who may be doing this for the first time. Vee worked quietly for a few moments, focusing on cutting a perfect curve on the skirt piece she was working on when the girl beside her spoke. Looking up, Vee smiled warmly. “Nah, my mom and I helped out with the Les Miserables costumes last year. But it was a ton of fun, you’re going to love it!” She peered over at the cut pieces laying on the table in front of the girl and grinned. “And if this really is your first time cutting patterns, you’re doing an amazing job so far.”

Again– wut the fookin hell–? 

Merida kept the door only partially open, not that it stopped the reek. Her nose scrunched behind her shirt and her eyes were sharp as arrows as she stared the vampire down. Was she really here…canvassing? Was that what the vampire was here? Merida wanted to laugh, but laughing would involve taking in several deep breaths in rapid succession, and Merida thought she might gag and vomit if she did that. 

No wonder vampires and werewolves hated each other. In fact, there was a theory– well, more like a story– that lycanthropy had been a curse created by a sorcerer in order to kill vampires. Merida didn’t know how much she believed that, since that damn Twilight series had used such a story in its own lore, but it would explain the visceral, gut-wrenching reaction to the creature’s smell. 

If Merida held her breath though, she knew that the girl would just seem like a girl, though. Her wolf would be blind and Merida could see her through her own eyes.

If only her own eyes weren’t watering right now. 

“Yer here about some stupid petition?” Merida said from behind her shirt, figuring that was the case, then, if she was here for all magicks. “Yer came all the way out here to talk me ear off about town politics?” 

It sounded so trivial and silly when she put it like that. Like Vee had nothing better to do than annoy people about petty political stances. This wasn’t politics though, not really. This was an issue of inherent rights.

“No! It’s not politics! I mean, yeah, technically it’s a petition, but this is so much more important than putting some silly stop sign up on main street.” She paused, crossing her arms. “I don’t know about you, but I came to Swynlake because it was supposed to be a safe haven for all magicks. But in the year since I moved here I’ve watched the town make some very definite changes to become quite the opposite.”

She looked at the girl who was staring back at her with watering eyes and her nose covered. Vee actually felt bad for her. Since Vee didn’t have to breathe, she could block out the smell and ignore the wet dog scent. This girl didn’t have that luxury seeing as she required breath in her lungs to survive.

But there were more important things to worry about in the moment. Vee knew she had to focus and hope the girl would be reasoned with.

“Its just—there’s been a movement to make a bunch of unfair laws singling out so-called ‘dangerous magicks’ and I think that’s really crappy, if I’m being honest. A werewolf, vampire or any other magick that has made the choice to obey the laws of the land and live in peace with their neighbors should not be discriminated against just because of gross assumptions made about them.”

Robbie definitely wasn’t doing okay, no matter what he said to Nemo. None of what he said was a lie, exactly, but he was picking and choosing bits of his day when he’d felt the least downtrodden and holding those up in his mind as bright beacons of truth when the reality was much dimmer. He was in pain. Everything hurt and he was sad all the time. 

It wasn’t fair. 

If Robbie were going to be completely honest with himself, he would admit he didn’t think he and Nemo were going to last forever. He knew that one day Nemo would realize he was destined for much more than a brooding, dramatic vampire, and he would leave. He would fly off and find his happiness. But that day wasn’t supposed to be so soon. Robbie had been counting on at least being able to take Nemo to his prom. He’d wanted to dress up for Nemo. He’d wanted to get him flowers and make him feel like the most beautiful person in the whole school. Robbie wanted to give Nemo memories that would stick around his whole life. Robbie wanted Nemo to think of him when he was older and he looked back on his life and some of the important moments. 

He didn’t need to stay in Nemo’s life forever, but he wanted to stay in his heart. 

That wasn’t possible anymore. It wasn’t possible because Vee hadn’t even tried to outsmart a fucking teenager and he really needed to calm down because he was getting angry again. 

Thinking of the scared and disgusted faces he saw in the halls at school every day didn’t help either. It wasn’t just Nemo. It was everyone.

“I’m not,” he finally said, staring at his desk. “I’m definitely not doing okay. How are you doing?” 

Vee cringed into the door. She knew he wasn’t doing ok. Of course he wasn’t. And it didn’t look like this was going to be a painless conversation either. She started to brace herself for whatever was to come. 

“I—” she started, her voice soft. “No. I’m not okay either.” She looked away,  worrying her lip between her teeth and wanting to avoid the rage smoldering in his gaze. 

She needed to just rip off the bandaid and unleash the simmering anger lurking just below the surface. She wasn’t sure she really wanted to know what he was thinking—it was sure to hurt—but she was certain that whatever it was needed to be said if they were ever going to move on.

Swallowing hard, she straightened, steeling herself and looking him in the eye with as much confidence calm as she could muster, though she wrung her hands before her. “Ok, Robbie. Just say it, ok? I know you well enough to know that you are mad at me, and I don’t blame you one bit. But, please— Just tell me whatever it is you’re thinking so we can talk about it so we can start to move on.” 

Lock laughed as she swatted at him, batting her hands away as he continued to chuckle. Was he wrong? In the age sense, he was right at least. And it was funny to see her get all huffy about it.

The tone quickly shifted though when she told him her history. Which was -  a lot. It was hard to believe that had happened to her. All that time ago too. And her whole family…

The idea of choosing that life though was…not terrible, he supposed. He’d seen her. She was fast. Strong. More powerful than most other creatures on this earth. Practically unkillable. He wondered…

“You’re a weird chick, Vee,” He laughed again, reaching over and ruffling her hair. “Just promise you won’t eat me and I won’t give you any garlic bread anytime soon, how about that?”

“You have no idea just how weird,” she agreed easily, laughing along with him. It was true, she was weird. Compared to both humans and vampires. 

“And don’t worry, you can keep your garlic. I haven’t bitten a human in almost two hundred years. We pay for our food and its all 100% donated to banks by people who are fully informed about where their blood is going. It’s like fair trade food for vampires,” she laughed at her dumb joke.