Nightmare (The Noctalis Chronicles 2)

The neon sign over the diner throws orange light onto the hood of the car and onto our skin. She tenses up.

“What if I want them?” Her voice is quiet.

“I will hold your hand. You can fight it.”

“How?” I consider before answering.

“Accept that you want it and move on. The only way to get past it to go through it.”

“I guess that makes sense.” I bring her hand to my lips.

“If you decide that you need to get out, tell me and we will leave.”

“We need a safe word,” she says, tapping her chin with one finger. “How about wings? No, that's dumb. Um, unicorn? No...” she thinks some more.

“Adore,” I say. She turns to me, smiling slowly.

“Perfect. So if I say that, it means I need to get out and you can go all Spiderman and rescue me.” I still have not seen this Spiderman she talks about, but I nod anyway.

Clicking off the radio she says, “you're really going to have pie with me?” I wish I could tell her yes.

“I will sit with you. I will order coffee so I do not look out of place.” I won't drink it, but perhaps I can give it to Ava.

She has to let go of my hand to get out of the car, but she takes it back as we walk into the diner.

“You're awesome.” Her head burrows against my shoulder and her scent invades me.

“Thank you.” I am not going to debate the status of my awesomeness with her tonight. Tonight we are going to be human. As human as I can get. I want this night for her.

“If we're going to be human, you should open the door for me.” My hand was already going for the handle. I open it an usher her in.

“Thanks.” She tenses as she takes a breath of the diner. I wait for her to say the word, or for something in our connection. She exhales.

“I'm fine,” she says. And she is. A little tense, but I know she can handle it. She breathes again, smiling in delight. My Ava-Claire. My strong one.

The diner reeks of fried food and coffee and humans.

“Two?” The hostess at the counter asks us, holding up two fingers.

“Yes,” I say. She writes something down and hands us a number written on a wooden disk. There are several other people waiting for tables, most of them elderly couples, but there are a few families with children. Ava smiles at a little girl who hides her face in her mother's leg, but peeks back at Ava, who blows up her cheeks. The little girl giggles and hides her face again. I have never seen Ava with children.

The family's number is called, and Ava waves to the little girl who skips off to their table.

“She is so cute.” A little twinge of longing permeates her voice. So small she is not aware of it. But I hear it.

“You would make a good mother.” She stares at me. I know that look. I have said something she did not expect. This happens less often to me, but it does every now and then.

Her cheeks bloom with red. “I'm a little young to be thinking about that anyway.” She pulls a thread off my shirt and won't look any higher than my chest.

Not too young to think about throwing away her mortality.

A few minutes later the waitress calls our number. We're seated in the last booth at the end of the diner. It's coated in a thin glaze of grease from hundreds of french fries. Ava slides in one side and I go on the other. The menus wait for us, and I feel as if I should pick mine up, to keep up appearances.

Ava laughs as I pretend to study the menu. “Don't bother, I've got the whole thing memorized.”

“But this is a human date. We should act like we haven't been here.” There are a lot of things on this menu I had never eaten when I was human. What are sweet potato fries?

“Oh, right.” She picks up her menu and pretends to peruse it. I want to reach for her hands. Our waitress comes over moments later. She's about seventeen, Ava's age, with dyed red hair and a jewel in her nose.

“How are you doing tonight?” She leans on one hip and tosses her head.

“Good,” Ava says.

“Can I start you off with some drinks?” I feel her gaze on me, but it skitters away just as fast. Her heart rate increases, and she starts to let off a scent I've smelled millions of times. Fear.

“Water,” I say.

“I'll have a Sprite.”

“Do you need some more time with the menu, or are you ready to order?”

“I'll have a piece of the lemon meringue pie.” The waitress writes it down, leaning as far away from me as possible.

“And for you?” She turns to me, her pen poised. She can sense my otherness, and can't meet my eyes, keeping her gaze firmly on the yellow notepad.

“I am fine, thank you.” She nods and scurries away, glad to be away from my presence.

“You could have ordered something,” Ava says, stacking the menus the waitress forgot on the end of the table. “That would have been the human thing to do.”

“I did not want to waste anything.”

“I guess not. You look kind of overdressed for this place.” Her eyes linger on my chest. They have been doing that a lot since I bought the new clothes.

“I dressed for you, not the location.”

“Also my dad,” she points out. An elderly couple walks by us, taking the booth behind us. He has bad lungs. She has a healing bone in her hip. Still, they wear smiles on their faces. I can almost smell the love of nearly fifty years they've shared together. I tune out their conversation and focus on Ava.

“Also for him.” I wish I could have washed the clothes before I wore them. They still linger with the scent of the thrift store and their last owner. Ava does not seem to notice or care.

“You look good,” she says, putting her hands on the table.

“How are you?”

“I'm good. It's okay. I thought it was going to be really bad, but there's so much else. It's like there is so much of it that I can't focus on one, so it just doesn't bother me. Does that make sense?” It did. I had been through it millions of times before. More than I could ever count or remember. That was the biggest challenge being a noctalis. Resisting the urge for blood and finding something to fill your eternity.

“Yes.” I touch her knee under the table. “What other human things should we do?” I ask. She will have to take the lead for tonight.

“Well, we should gaze into each other's eyes and argue about how awesome the other one is.”

“Do you want to do that?” It doesn't sound like something Ava would participate in.

She smiles. “The gazing maybe. But I don't like to do that in public. It's too intimate. Also, it looks weird when two people are staring at each other. By the way, you should probably blink every now and then. And try to, you know, breathe. Or look like it. I'm used to you being so still, but the waitress is already freaked out by you. No offense.”