I couldn’t say anything until Sam gave me a little tug.
"Bye," I said, and Sam and I started to move away, but I whispered "Thank you" again. He simply gave me a smile. No flash of gold attempted to trap me this time as Sam led me away.
The next day, Sam woke me up early and forced me to the mall. She knew I wasn’t a morning person and this felt like retribution for making her leave Masteria so soon. We spent the first hour in and out of stores bikini shopping for our trip to Hawaii. Despite my protest that I was hungry and needed to eat, she merely said, “with no food in you, you will fit into the bikini better.” But that was when her stomach made a low rumble and she finally gave in and we had lunch in the food court.
"You know, I’ve been wondering: what was Joe, no... John doing to you yesterday?" I finally asked, biting into my pizza. After not having breakfast, it tasted like absolutely the best thing I’d eaten in a long time, the hunger took over and I couldn’t even be annoyed at her when she tried to wiggle out of the question.
"You mean Jordan?" she asked hesitantly.
"Yeah, was he just a bad kisser or what?"
"What do you mean?" She didn’t look at me when she said this.
"Come on Sam, he nearly ate your head; he had so much lip on your neck. Also, the way he talked sounded strange."
"Oh, you noticed that, too." She averted my gaze.
"Sam..."
"Well, it’s this new thing that’s been popular lately. He had caps over his teeth to make him look vampiric..." Her last words trailed off, I was sure something she thought I’d disapprove of was coming.
"So he was wearing fangs?"
"Sort of, and he was going to bite me... a... little..." was said in an even softer voice.
"You’re funny," I laughed harshly.
"Seriously, it’s really fun and feels great. They call them Nightcaps," she said, louder, glad I didn’t tell her she’s stupid. At times, she associated my reactions to what she would expect from her mother. I don’t know why she did this, I wouldn’t intervene unless there was an imminent threat, yet I couldn’t help myself from reaching over and sweeping her hair back to check her neck for marks; there were none. Sam was a big girl and could for the most part take care of herself.
"Looking for fang marks?"
"Kind of."
"There are other places where blood flows freely, Nessa," she hinted, with a wink and a smirk.
"So let me get this straight, you’ve let some guy bite you and drink your blood?"
"Well, it’s not really drinking, more like tasting, but you know Steve from our old fifth period Chemistry?"
"I thought you didn’t like any of the boys at school."
"Well, I decided to try a simple, and well...”
I gave her a look and she smirked. "Oh, it’s not like we had sex or anything, just a little licking and blood. I always thought girls who said guys were 'yummy' were sluts, but I guess they meant it," she said airily.
"You know, that’s a little sick right, not to mention unsanitary," I said in a conversational way, even when I had a few more choice words I’d like to call that act.
"We were just playing," she explained, more relaxed after knowing for sure I wasn’t going