Chapter 40 The Do（om） It Yourself Trope
Officially done with everyone, I sent Vlad away with directions to drive Dr. Rosetti home without feeding on her. I offered to pay her for what had essentially turned into another session, but she’d insisted that we call it even. “Just forget I got drunk last night,” she said.
With the chaos over, I poured a glass of B positive and stared out my favorite picture window in the living room.
I brooded broodily while Heaven cleaned up painting supplies.
She’d been painting the walls of all the common spaces black, first upstairs, then downstairs.
She described the color choice as “bold, elegant, timeless.” Maybe, but it was giving black lacquered coffin.
It was also giving vampire and acceptance.
Ironic, I guess, given that I wasn’t willing to accept Vlad’s offer to live like vampires together.
It might be nice, but Vlad was a prince.
If anyone had the power to change the rules, to make life as a vampire less restrictive, it was him.
I wanted to be a Hallmark vampire, not an Anne Rice vampire.
Forget Vlad. Forget Tyrone. Dr. R and Heaven were right. I needed to work on my own issues, whatever that meant. The house wasn’t the only thing that needed to be rewired.
My shirt provoked a thought. “Heaven,” I asked, “what is your most deep-seated fear?” Apparently done with paint cleanup, her arms were now filled with various salts: Morton, Epsom, rock. Why the salt? should have been my question, probably.
She flipped open the metal spout on the box of Morton salt like she was popping her collar and began pouring a trail of salt around the edge of the room. As I watched, she dumped the rest of the box in a mound in front of the door.
“What are you doing?” Everyone was going to track salt through the house.
“Cleaning.”
It looked like the opposite to me. “That was supposed to be for baking.”
She flashed me a look and I held up my hands. I wasn’t going to the mat over cinnamon rolls right now.
“I’m cleaning the negativity out of this place. All that arguing, and I have a bad feeling.”
“What is your fear, though?” I thought I knew the answer.
She stopped trailing salt through the foyer and said, “It was death. After I almost drowned, I—” She picked up a large black tourmaline crystal and sat down on the bottom step of the grand staircase. “You know how some people see a light and their family waiting for them when they die?”
“Yes.”
“I was dead for a minute, no pulse, but I didn’t see anything. No white light and no ancestors.” Heaven was as serious as I’d ever seen her.
“Maybe you forgot?” I suggested. “Or you weren’t dead enough, or your relatives hadn’t gotten the memo yet? We know G-O-D is real. Who else would always be smiting us?”
She laughed softly. “Yeah, but at that moment, I realized there might be nothing for me after this life, and it scared the shit out of me.”
“One of Jeff’s shirts says, ‘it’s not the pace of life that concerns me, but the sudden stop at the end.’ ” Jeff was becoming our resident philosopher, or more aptly, the No Fear company. I’m pretty sure they would be thrilled to sponsor vampires.
“Exactly. I went all in on positive energy to crowd out the darkness.”
I sat beside her on the stairs and gave her a firm side hug. A tear trickled down her cheek and plopped on the black crystal.
“Well, I had meant to soak these in salt water to activate them,” she said sadly. “I was thinking Epsom salt, but this works, I guess.”
“So what are you scared of now?” I asked.
“I guess I’ll think of something new. Maybe spiders.”
I shook my head. “Nah.”
“People?” she said.
That gave me pause. “Vlad’s scared of people. He thinks they’re out to get us.”
“Other vampires?”
“Eh. Same as people. There are good ones and bad ones.”
“Let’s go with nothing. No fear.”
“Do you want one of these T-shirts too?” I asked. “There are a bunch.”
She eyed it skeptically. “Maybe to sleep in, or if my other clothes are dirty.”
I insisted on getting her one.
Half an hour later, I was staring at my phone as I sat next to freshly washed crystals, incense sticks, and Heaven meditating in a circle of candles while holding an egg-shaped rock.
She was playing music that I would describe as sounds of ancient healing, and her face had a look of peaceful determination and gritty contentment, if that was a thing.
Things weren’t perfect, and I didn’t know how to fix my life, but it was nice to see Heaven making peace with vampirehood, and even stretching beyond the fears and limitations that had held her back as a person.
When a car pulled up to the house, I assumed it was Vlad returning from dropping off Dr. R. I steeled myself. There was no way I was going to promise anything to him tonight. He could wait while I mulled things over. There was no deadline on eternity.
When I peeked out the front window, my stomach dropped to the floor. It wasn’t Vlad. The outdoor light shone like a spotlight on a Valentine police cruiser.
How many people had Vlad told our secrets to? Should I get ready to be run out of town with torches and pitchforks?
As I watched, Wayne Jarvis stepped out of the passenger side door in a cheap suit and a winter jacket that he probably bought at Costco. He was straight out of the movie Fargo.
I would’ve preferred torches.
A uniformed cop stepped out of the driver’s side door. I pressed my back to the window and tried to compose myself. “Heaven,” I said. “Wayne’s here. With a cop.”
Her eyes went wide. “Why?”
“I’m sure it’ll be fine.” I tried to stay calm for her, but it was definitely not fine.
Heaven blinked herself out of her meditative state and grabbed a spray bottle. She hit the switch on her Himalayan salt lamp and spritzed it with some sort of lavender mist.
“I’m keeping the demons out.”
“Let’s activate these too.” I took the bottle and spritzed my fangs. “Ugh—that’s disgusting. It doesn’t taste how it smells at all.”
Horror movie style, I heard their boots crunching the snow, then walking up the stairs, and finally echoing in the hollow space under the porch where they stopped just on the other side of the front door.
Get ahold of yourself, Tiffenie.
The doorbell rang, a new one that played a gong sound through speakers Heaven had installed throughout the house. Thank you, GoFundMe.
“Hello, Mr. Jarvis,” I said as I opened the door, my voice an eerie overlay to the fading sounds of ancient healing.
“Hello, Ms. Blair. I’m sorry to intrude in the middle of the night, but it’s urgent.” He said my name with no warmth, last name only, as if it would be easier to take me down if he kept it impersonal. As he stepped over the threshold, he left a booted footprint in the salt Heaven had just spread.
“Do you like the new deck?” I asked. “No more holes, huh?”
He gave a perfunctory nod. A look passed between Heaven and me. Something wasn’t right.
“What can I help you with?” I asked, wondering if showing a little fang would help or hurt in this situation.
“The illegal canid inspection.” He gestured to the police officer, who I now noticed had one of those metal poles with a loop on the end, the kind that dog-nappers use in cartoons—and in real life, apparently.
“As you can imagine, people hide their pit bulls and what have you if they know we’re coming. ”
Heaven spread the salt around with her foot, as if that would make the men go away.
“I emailed you,” I said. “Tyrone killed the coyote. I wasn’t sure what to do with it, but I have it here.”
“How can I be sure it’s the coyote that bit me?”
“Test it for rabies. I don’t know.” Frustrated, I said, “But either way, I’ve done all I can.”
“I have concerns beyond the coyote…Ms. Blair, can I see your ID?”
Every cell in my body froze. “Why?”
“Just a formality.”
“You didn’t ask for it last time.” He hadn’t. He’d chatted cheerfully about rotted wood without ever mentioning an ID.
“My fault,” Mr. Jarvis said, staring hard at my face. “It’s standard practice.”
Heaven practically growled. I put a restraining hand on her shoulder. “I’ve got it,” I said. “No big deal.”
“No one in town has seen you for a very long time. You have no family left here,” Wayne said calmly.
“That seems more like my problem than yours.”
“But you can see how that also presents a difficulty for me. How do I know you are who you say you are?” He flashed all of his teeth in the world’s fakest smile.
Smiling to show all of my teeth, I handed him my driver’s license. “See.”
He frowned at the plastic card, turned it over, and ran his hands along the edges like he believed it was a fake.
Heaven and I exchanged a look.
No Fear.
The cop inspected my driver’s license as well. “Where have you been for the last decade?” he asked.
My chest tightened. Vlad had been right all along. They were going to run us out of town. He had tried it my way and it was a failure.
“I don’t think I have to answer that. Isn’t your domain building code compliance?” I said, turning to Wayne. I bared my lavender-activated fangs.
Wayne laughed uncomfortably. “It is indeed. And from what I can see, I don’t think you’re going to pass that inspection.”
Nope. I was not going to take this one lying down.
A man in a cheap suit with no charisma was telling me, a three-hundred-year-old vampire, what to do.
Threatening to destroy my house, run me out of my own life.
Sure, I could drain him, but that was a short-term solution.
I decided to play nice. “I believe everyone in town knows that I lost my Jeff. The last few years haven’t been great. ”
He nodded with his arms crossed over his chest like he knew there was more to the story.
“And then you moved to LA?” the cop asked.
“I always wanted to be an actress.” I looked away from the officer to Wayne. “Would you like to do your inspection now? Get it over with?”