Chapter Text
Baz
Most sons look up to their fathers. I sure do look up to mine. He’s strong, resilient, and is always there for me. I even love him in times that I don’t. Like right now.
I sigh, trying not to hear the groans coming from the human that Lamb has taken a bite from. The sun is merciless as it beats down on the strip, begging for the attention it doesn’t deserve. I’m bored and dreadfully hot; my shirt is sticking to my armpits like I rubbed gorilla glue all over myself. I should be used to the summers in Las Vegas, but I make a point to not go outside when it is hellish. If I want a drink, I have someone bring it to me. But of course, Lamb was desperate for a hunt, and he forced me (used his compulsion and everything) to get me to come out with him.
He whined dramatically, “I only get two more months with you before you leave me. I’m not ready for an empty nest.” I couldn’t tell if he was actually upset that I was leaving for college or if it was all a ruse. He can’t be that upset; I’m going to Harvard. Sure, it’s far away but there are plenty of magical creatures in glamor that go there. I’m sure I’ll be able to find another vampire.
I bring my right thumb up to my mouth and bite at the skin around the nail, watching calculatingly at my father’s mouth on the woman’s neck. It’s effortlessly clean, no blood running down her neck unlike in the movies. Lamb was absolutely appalled when I showed him Twilight. After he’s had his fill, he kisses her cheek softly and turns towards me, grinning with stained teeth.
I long for the crisp feeling of air conditioning and the shower’s ice-cold water on my skin; how nice will that feel on a day like today. Maybe I’ll even dress up to go to the ballroom and have a nice dance with one of the younger vampires. Lamb loves when I come down so he can show me off and prove to whatever “old friends” are there that yes he is capable of love and yes he has raised me. He’s raised a good boy with manners and smarts and athleticism. Nosferatu, he loves that I’m athletic.
Lamb’s lukewarm hand finds my shoulder squeezing it tightly. Somehow the tightness is still comforting. “Want an ice cream?”
“I’m not five. I don’t—”
And then he gives me that look; his eyes go all sad and an obnoxious pout finds his lips. The one that screams, ‘please don’t remind me that you aren’t a little kid anymore.’ He has hated every birthday of mine that I forced him to celebrate. His hand squeezes my shoulder again, harder than before.
“You are the one that wants ice cream,” I conclude causing Lamb to sputter annoyingly, “and you’re trying to pawn it off on me. You’ve just had dinner and now you want dessert. Don’t pretend I don’t know your games.”
Lamb rolls his eyes, shoving me with enough force for me to wobble. He starts walking down the strip towards the hotel. I take the hairband from around my wrist and pull my shoulder length hair into a ponytail. Lamb walks a good fifty steps from me before turning around to see I haven’t moved an inch. His whole body moves in an exasperated sigh as if I don’t realize the hellish heat tucking us into a bed of dryness. He’s the one that dragged me out here, now it’s my turn to be petty.
“Basil whether you want ice cream or not, I want it and it’s fucking hot so come on or face the consequences.”
“I knew it was all a plot,” I say, walking slowly to him. The bitten woman is starting to awake from her trance, her hand flying up to her neck as if she can’t believe it happened. She’ll never know if it did; Lamb always cleans up.
His shoulders slump and his jaw sets. All semblance of a happy go lucky father has drained into a less than pleased attitude. I raise my chin and grin, knowing I succeeded in making him wish he never raised me.
“Stop being cheeky, Baz. It doesn’t suit yah,” Lamb says, looking behind him to glare at me before looking ahead.
I walk quickly to catch up to him. “The boys at the club like that I’m cheeky.”
Lamb raises an eyebrow. I hear him pretend to gag. He’s always been supportive of me but hates that I hook up with bleeders as if he doesn’t do it himself. Hypocrite.
I follow Lamb into his favorite ice cream shop. It’s touristy, filled to the brim in cliche décor that any Instagram influencer would wait in line to take a mediocre smartphone picture with. The cold air collides with my skin making me feel grosser somehow, like I finally realize just how sweaty I am. I shouldn’t’ve worn this button down. I should’ve dressed in a tank top and shorts like everyone else around here, but I’ve never been one to fit in.
The man at the register is incredibly attractive. He has an auburn fringe that tickles his eyelids. His long fingers wrap around the ice cream cone that he hands to Lamb, and he grins wide at me and asks, “What can I get for you?”
My mouth goes dry (it might have already been dry. I’m terrible at staying hydrated). I don’t know how many seconds pass before Lamb chuckles out my order, ruffling my hair. The server must be a vampire because there’s no way in hell Lamb would say this otherwise, “My son here gets enamored around pretty men. He’s single, by the way.”
And I want to die. Fully die. Curl up into a hole and drop something on me to put me out of my misery. He deserves to shrivel up in the sun like a raisin and—
The beautiful green-eyed man laughs throwing his head back slightly, that lopsided grin not leaving his face as he scoops two perfect globes of mint chocolate chip ice cream into a cup, slathering it with whipped cream.
He passes it to me with a wink. I can hear Lamb laugh at me when I startle, probably hearing how fast my heartbeat is. I don’t know why it’s beating so much; I haven’t had my blood for the day, and I haven’t drunk human blood in almost a month.
“That’ll be ten dollars,” the man says, ringing us up at the counter. He must be from the East Coast, maybe Pennsylvania or Maryland, because his accent doesn’t sound particularly offensive. It’s the most plain of the plain.
Lamb hands him a ten and we walk to the very back corner. The shop is loud with the whirring air conditioner and pop music so sweet it’ll break your tooth. A little girl is running around, her face covered in pink ice cream, screaming as loud as she can as another little girl chases her. I force myself to look away.
I used to beg Lamb for a brother or sister when I was too young to understand that he was merely my guardian. Back then, I couldn’t discern what my life was pre and post bite. I was too young to tell that the tall man I once feared wasn’t Lamb, but my actual father. Lamb would laugh, a delicate tremble, “You like my attention too much to have a sibling.”
I always wondered if Lamb had children before me; there’s so much I don’t know about him. Hundreds upon hundreds of years on this Earth and I only know these past few decades. Sometimes it’s hard to believe he’s so old. He’s licking his ice cream cone as if he was a little kid. His kind eyes are trained on me; I wonder if he’s picked up on the worry in my brow and the anxious thoughts that I wish would slip from my mind like ice cream down my throat.
“Eat up before it melts,” he says as I go for another spoonful. “This ain’t like you. That cup should be gone by now. Feeling bad for being snotty to your old man?”
I know better than to voice my worry in public. Lamb’s always been cautious when talking about anything having to do with my presence here. It was the type of conversation that was held in private, behind closed doors where no one could hear him even mention the word Speaker or the name Natasha Pitch.
I drag my eyes away from him to glance at the attendant. He’s smiling obnoxiously to the current customer as he hands her some type of milkshake. She walks off and I see him lean against the back counter to take a breath. He’s built well, his uniform shirt clings to big arms; he looks cuddly somehow.
I mm, pretending to agree with his bullshit reason into which I haven’t inhaled my ice cream, putting my gaze back on him. Just to show him that I’m okay, I start to pick the speed of my eating up to normal. A smile overcomes his face, the same one I saw earlier today when he remembered I was off to college soon. He’s going to be sad when I leave. He has said that repeatedly, I tell myself. He’s shucking thousands of dollars so I can go to my top university and get the best education, he’s bought me ice cream, and even with the knowledge that I want to age, he doesn’t get angry at me.
“If I had the choice, I would be twenty forever,” Lamb said to me once when I was ten. That was the year I started getting blood cravings and it was also the year I decided that I didn’t want to be immortal. “But alas, I didn’t get turned till thirty.”
“You should feel sorry,” Lamb pesters. “It’s not nice.”
I roll my eyes. His cone is almost gone now, and I wonder how long I was staring into space.
“I feel terribly,” I mumble flatly with the last bite of ice cream in my mouth. I savor each crunch of chocolate inside the silky cream.
Lamb gets up and I watch him as he takes our trash to the can. Then he gestures for me to get up and I follow him away from the cotton candy smelling store into the dry Las Vegas summer. We walk down the strip to the hotel, both of us saying pleasantries to the staff and guests that we know. Lamb grabs my bicep and squeezes before he walks away from me.
The elevator is dreadfully slow; it climbs like molasses dripping slowly out of its bottle up to the penthouse. I make a beeline to my room, desperate to get my clingy clothes off my body and hop into a long, cold shower. I undress, reveling in the cold air hitting my body, and sit on my bed, attending to my phone that I left here.
[1 text from ANSWER ME, FUCKER]
[1 text from Love <3]
I smirk, opening the text from Love first.
(19:30): U up?
(20:20): Yes.
(20:21): I miss you.
(20:22): Come back to Vegas.
(20:23): your dad would kill me.
(20:24): So…
(20:25): stick with your kind, baz.
(20:27): I’m off to college soon. It’s not going to matter whether I’m hooking up with bleeders, speakers, or…
(20:29): me?
(20:31): Yeah.
Just thinking about hooking up with Love makes me start to get hard. I would love nothing more than to lie down and slowly drink warm blood as I imagine his hands on me with his voice bringing me off. I snap myself out of my trance when I hear another ping from my phone.
[1 text from ANSWER ME, FUCKER]
I sigh opening up that conversation.
(18:33): I’m in town tonight.
(20:35): I’ll be at your place around… 10?
(20:37): Niall, this isn’t a good night.
(20:38): Have a date or something?
(20:39): Is it with your hand and your dick?
(20:40): Wouldn’t you rather hang with you best friend who has been away for three dreadful months?
(20:41): Not really… I’m pretty horny.
(20:43): I’m coming over. Take a shower, drink some blood, and calm the fuck down.
I can’t help but grumble as I put my phone down and head to the bathroom. I check myself out in the mirror, grimacing at how pale I look, not like I’m not used to it, but it seems like other vampires always make the pale skin look better. I turn on the shower, putting it onto scolding hot. The pellets of water race down my body and it feels orgasmic as I wash myself.
After I get dressed, I glance at my phone seeing more notifications from Love.
[4 texts from Love <3]
(21:01): I wish I could hold you in my arms right now.
(21:02): I would kiss up and down the back of your neck.
(21:03): while you drink your evening blood.
(21:04): You would pretend I wasn’t kissing you, but I would be affecting you.
(21:06): I can’t do this tonight.
(21:08): Oh?
(21:10): Niall’s coming in like twenty minutes.
(21:11): [gif of Karen Smith from Mean Girls saying “Boo you whore”]
(21:12): jk jk. You know I don’t care.
(21:13): Can you send me a pic?
(21:14): Of what?
(21:15): you preferably.
(21:17): [picture of Baz posing in front of a full-length mirror. His hair is meticulously blow dried and styled in a half up, half down man bun. His white cotton tee hangs loosely around his torso but is tight to his biceps. His black jeans are incredibly tight and he’s has a pair of mismatched Vegas tourist socks that Lamb bought for him as a joke. There is a smirk on his face, one eyebrow raised high above the other.]
(21:20): fuck me.
(21:22): you are such an ass.
(21:24): why do other bleeders get you but I have to sit in fucking London with my dick in my hand?
(21:25): This would all be solved if you came here.
(21:26): your father would kill me. stake me with a fucking wooden thing.
(21:28): I love you but I don’t want to mess with the Vampire King
(21:29): he’s harmless.
(21:30): he threatened to get me cursed. I’m already cursed. I don’t need another!
(21:39): He wouldn’t do that. He knows that I love you.
(21:40): ur delusional baz
(21:42): Go be with your very pretty girlfriend.
(21:43): my very pretty girlfriend is out with her best friend.
(21:44): Penelope wanted me to have fun with you tonight
I put my phone down, finding myself more tired and sad than I felt previously. I make my way to the kitchen. I search for my favorite mug, black with a red spill coming from the rim down to the bottom. I open the fridge and find a pint of pig’s blood and carefully pour it into the mug before putting it in the microwave for a minute.
The minute feels endless. I’m in the deepest misery when the door opens, and the scent of Niall’s rosy blood fills the air.
“Yo,” I greet in an unamused manner, not even glancing at my friend. I grab my mug from the microwave and enjoy the warm feeling of it in my hands.
I feel his large hand clap my shoulder blade, before he wraps me in a hug from my backside. “Did you miss me?” he screams in my ear.
I roll my eyes although he can’t see it and nudge him off me with my elbow. He doesn’t look any different. Most people when they have money travel to exotic places, but Niall’s family decided that England, a place without air conditioning, would be the perfect place to go. He’s not sunburnt nor is he wearing any obnoxious touristy clothes. His face is still ruddy in a way that makes him seem incredibly boyish even though he’s veering on nineteen and English fashion has not changed his tank top lifestyle.
“Incredibly,” I say, causing Niall to give me a wide grin. His perfect white teeth shining as if he just got them cleaned. “How was jolly ole England?”
“My family sucks. All my little cousins talk about is the boarding school they go to. And then, we kept having to go to these stuffy parties because apparently the Kelly’s are part of high society and—” Niall cuts himself off, probably because I’ve started to move to the living room. I lounge on the plush sofa, delicately sipping my drink. He takes off his shoes and curls up in Lamb’s leather chair.
When I have nothing else to do (or I’m extremely depressed), I think about what my life would’ve been like in England. I vaguely remember a big house with a small family and if I shouted, the echo would go on for ages. Just me, my mom, my father, and my aunt. I don’t think my aunt had someone. I wonder if she does now.
“—and I had the best croissant of my life there. Merlin…”
“Merlin?” I ponder, the ending of the word going up in a mocking tone.
“Ah, sorry. My cousins say that. They are obsessed with magic,” Niall shifts awkwardly in the chair.
“Niall, does your family have magic? Like capital m, Magic?”
His ears turn red. The wide grin that always seems glued to his face falters. I feel bile roll up into my throat and I can’t help but feel disgusted. He’s a Speaker. I can’t believe it. All this time he knew I was a vampire and failed to tell me. Thirteen years of my life flash before my eyes in a whirlwind.
“My parents left the World of Mages right before I was born. My father thought something bad was going to happen. And it did. That’s why we went to England. My parents haven’t seen their family in forever, but there’s a war going on, I think. I was grouped in with the kiddos so I’m not sure, but from the bits and pieces, it’s not safe there. They’re rich so I’m sure they’ll be fine, but, uh…” Niall shrugs, his eyes turning downcast from staring at me. “The kids might not be able to go back to school come fall. They don’t know that… Can’t imagine.”
His deep brown eyes meet mine and he watches me as I drink my blood. I grow fuller with each sip, although it’s not from the blood being particularly tasty. It’s silent for a long time. I distantly hear Niall’s fingers tapping against his right thigh.