2
Lathan
By the time Monday rolls around, Lathan is still feeling so refreshed from what happened at the party with the werewolf that he doesn’t need his first blood packet of the week. Normally he digests blood faster than most other vampires he knows, leaving him mildly uncomfortable until the next offering—twice a week, the cafeteria caters to their needs. It’s a system that works for the majority, and keeps demand lower. But today his eyes are still bright, and he doesn’t even flinch as the other vampires at his table drink their fill. Instead, he picks at the premade sandwich in front of him, plucking out the cucumbers and nibbling on them separately. Vampires still need to eat normally, they just also have a need for blood. He wonders if the stoner wolf knows that, or if he thought he was actually starving.
The vampires at the table…he wouldn’t call them friends. Acquaintances, classmates, at best. Lathan doesn’t exactly have close friends, but he also doesn’t have enemies. Other than his growing animosity for his parents.
“Not enough booze,” one of the women says as he tunes back into the lunch conversation. “And it doesn’t take much when you barely have blood in your body!”
“Yeah, but the DJ was great. Some girl from economics. I think.”
Lathan taps a half-eaten cucumber against his lips. “There was weed, though,” he says. “If you asked the right person.”
The girl with spiked hair gawks at him; he doesn’t remember her name. “You got weed ?”
He shakes his head. “There was this weird wolf smoking on the deck.”
The group smiles, chuckles.
“That’s Kylo,” the guy beside him says, chewing on the spout of his blood bag. “He’s always got some. He’s pretty chill.”
“Yeah, Kylo’s super sweet. I’m surprised he didn’t offer you any. He usually does,” the girl laughs.
He remembers the boy tugging at his shirt collar, offering his flesh despite them not knowing each other. The taste of his canine blood, and how he’s still full off of it. The sound of the dog panting as he feasted on his neck.
Lathan shifts. “He did,” he says, and pushes the rest of the cucumber between his teeth, his eyes down.
◆◆◆
Kylo. The name stays with him, and he can’t stop thinking about that damn wolf. He’s been living year-round on campus for four years, and never once came across the guy everyone apparently knows. Not until that party. Which means the likelihood of coming across him again is low. Almost nonexistent.
Lathan doesn’t know how he feels about that now—it’s best if they never see each other again after their encounter, but something about Kylo intrigues him. Pulls his thoughts. He tries to ignore it, chalking it up to the intimacy that comes with a vampire feeding—something he’s never done before with someone not a vampire. There’s blood play between vampires, since it’s rather known their feeding is a pleasurable experience, and vampires do have blood, just not a lot of it. But it’s different between mutuals because they can’t use their fangs, which means they don’t experience the same drug-like effects of the venom. But he could with the wolf. And not having to be as careful with him was exhilarating.
Which is why he can never do it again.
The exam period officially ends—the weekend party a pre-celebration—and Lathan watches the masses pack up and move back home for the summer months. The academic year is over, but Lathan’s life doesn’t change. He doesn’t see his parents, and as an only child, he doesn’t have anyone else to go home to. Since enrollment, he’s lived fully on campus, even over the summers. He isn’t the only student who does so, but the population dwindles pathetically during the break—though, he doesn’t entirely mind. The quiet is a bit eerie, since Obscura is one of the largest student bodies in North America, but it’s nice.
He asked once if his parents would visit him during the summer, since they don’t come down during visitation days either term, thinking maybe a smaller crowd would be more comfortable. But they didn’t. And they won’t. He hardly even speaks with them. His mother never answers when he calls, and his father is dismissive of their distance. He’s used to it, but at the same time he can’t fully acclimate to the absence. So he takes a condensed class or two in the summer to keep himself busy and distract from the emptiness of the school, and the growing emptiness he feels inside. From the rejection of his parents, his only family, who want nothing to do with him until he’s graduated and certified to join them in the human Society.
Luckily, due to his more-than-full-time status, Lathan’s had the same room the last two years. He has an agreement with student services, and pays extra for the isolated, single suite to avoid a roommate—and having to move his stuff unnecessarily year-to-year.
Hunched over his desk, Lathan’s organizing his new textbooks and supplies for the fall semester that’s just days away, when a knock at his door beckons his attention. In the hall is a representative from residence services, and when she smiles at him big and bright he knows something is wrong.
“Hi, Lathan. I’m just stopping by because we’ve had some issues accommodating everyone for this academic year. With a huge influx of new students, we don’t have enough rooms to offer single suites right now.” She waves her hands nervously, as though to add to her point. “I have all the paperwork and notices being sent to everyone’s student emails. So sorry for this inconvenience.”
He blinks at her, his eyebrows knitting. “What does that mean? I’ve always had a single room. And I’ve been in this room for two years. Doesn’t that count for something?”
“Yes!” she squeaks. “Of course it does. You aren’t required to move. You keep your room…but maintenance will be bringing a second bed and desk here today to prepare for your incoming roommate.” She peeks over his broad shoulder. “You will have to make some space.”
“But this is a single room,” Lathan argues. “It isn’t the same size as doubles.”
“Yes, that’s correct. And I’m sorry again about that inconvenience. But we really don’t have the proper space this year, and so all of our single suites have to be converted.”
She bows and says her farewells with another apology, and Lathan shuts the door hard and groans. Then he snags his laptop to check his email, and, sure enough, there’s a campus-wide notice about the room shortage. One specific line stands out to him in the paragraphs of text: ‘ While the Academy prioritizes same-species residence accommodations to limit conflict and ensure comfortability, please be aware this is not guaranteed this academic year due to the room shortage.’
He scoffs. “Are you fucking kidding? They’re gonna have a lawsuit on their hands.”
After only a few hours, two men are at his door with boxes and a mattress. He watches miserably from his bed, headphones in to deter them from speaking to him, as they assemble another single bed frame, place its mattress, and then build a second small desk for the opposing corner. The room is beyond cramped with two beds, two desks, and the single wardrobe—which he doesn’t plan on sharing. His roomie can suck it up and live out of his bags for the year.
Lathan doesn’t have a lot of things aside from his clothes, his books, and a couple personal items like his phone, headphones, and laptop. But even still, the room is squished, and he places his pillow over his head when the maintenance crew leaves to complain into the foam.
The day’s sun is warm, the linger of California summer promising to be around for a while yet. It blankets the dark wood floor as it pours through the window, winking whenever a cloud passes by its circumference. Outside, new and current students alike crowd the front of the massive school with pillows and suitcases. Classes begin after the weekend, and today is the first day rooms are available for students’ return.
Lathan hates this day. He hates seeing all the parents, the siblings, the aunts, uncles, grandparents, and friends see the students off. Hates the laughter and the tears and the loud, excited footsteps parading through the halls with family in toe. When he first arrived, he was alone.
For the third time today, there’s a knock at his door that has Lathan throwing himself off his bed and marching to, he assumes, the rep returning to check that the new furniture arrived—and that he cooperated and let the crew set everything up.
“Look, it doesn’t fit”—he swings the door open—“in this tiny damn room. It’s meant to be a single—”
His annoyed words slice off as he’s met with the cute wolf from months ago. Kylo, he recalls, as if he hasn’t thought of him often throughout the summer.
Kylo’s eyes raise from his paper—Lathan remembers when he must have looked the same scouring for his room with a room number and campus map in his hand. He lowers his directions as his ears perk up.
“Hi!” A toothy smile spreads across his face, exposing canines in his jaw that aren’t retractable like Lathan’s. His beam is so wide that if he had a tail, too, it would be wagging. “Uh”—Kylo looks at his paper, the tips of his ears turning down despite his cheeky smile not wanting to leave—“this is room three-oh-seven, right?”
Their history, though short-lived, flashes through Lathan’s mind again. More vivid than during these months since. Because now the werewolf’s in front of him, and he hears his voice again, that smile, those expressive ears… the taste of him, the sounds of his pleasure…
Lathan swallows dryly, his expression flat. “It says so on the door, doesn’t it?”
“Oh. Uh.” Kylo looks at the numbers on the door once more, though Lathan assumes he probably read them over and over again before knocking in the first place. “Yeah, I guess it does. Just wanted to make sure,” he says with a laugh, scratching the back of his head sheepishly. “Then it looks like I’m your new roomie.”
Lathan blinks down at him, as though suddenly much taller than the wolf, though they’re only a few inches apart in reality. He takes a deep breath, not hiding his frustration with its emphasis.
“Of course you are,” he mumbles, and walks back into the room. He climbs onto his bed, crossing one black-denim leg over the other, and pulls his laptop onto his thighs to begin a lengthy email to accommodations about this bullshit. Not him. Anyone but him.
He begins typing, in the most professional, but dire manner he can articulate, to request a reconsideration of his rooming situation. He tries to emphasize the importance of at least rooming with another vampire, trying to make it seem that he’s empathetic and thinking of his werewolf roommate in this matter. He sends the message to a twenty-four-hour live chat service Obscura has recently implemented. After a few minutes he receives a mostly scripted answer, until the end, which asks a simple, but daunting question that would have consequences should he answer wrong.
Are you concerned you are not able to live cordially and safely with another species?
Lathan frowns and answers, ‘No,’ because if he says yes , they’ll start a case for him and he could be removed from the school entirely. The point of this lengthy education is to prepare him to be around non-Ethers, around humans, and if he can’t handle even a werewolf—one of the most predictable beings on the planet—there’s no hope for him in Society.
The response he gets after is a simple apology for the inconvenience, but that no special requests can be made.