Author: Molly Harper

I consoled myself with the fact that the nasal backwoods twang that fell from those bee-stung lips strangled dead any sort of Tomb Raider fantasies Zeb might harbor. The twang was the second thing I noticed, after the weird body odor. It wasn’t an unpleasant smell, just an organic punch to the system, like fresh-cut grass and apple skins. Maybe beautiful people smelled different from most?

“It’s so nice to meet you!” she squealed. She swiped at my shirt, which was now covered in crumbs from the bran muffin she’d been eating. “Zeb’s told me all about you! We’re so glad you could join us.”

“Well, Zeb said the group has been really helpful, and everyone seems so nice,” I said. “He said you’ve been coming here for a while?”

She shrugged those smooth, tanned shoulders. “Well, my best friend since high school was turned a few years back. It took her a year to come out to me. I felt like an idiot for not seeing the signs. It was hard. My family…well, they just don’t trust vampires. Never have. And it took me a while to adjust to her being undead. I’m havin’ to overcome a lot of built-in prejudice.”

“Good for you, though, for trying,” I said. “So, do you and your friend still hang out?”

Jolene’s lip trembled. Her eyes flashed, an electric glow under the green. I looked around to see if anyone else had noticed, but they were too involved in their kale rolls. “No. Tessie—that was her name, Tessie—um, she got dusted about six months ago. Her family said it was an accident. But she was always so careful. She wouldn’t have gone out so early, with the sun still up. I miss her.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, squeezing her arm.

She tilted her head and smiled. “Well, the group’s been really sweet with me. I’m sort of dealin’ with a whole ’nother round of grief. My family doesn’t really understand what I’m going through.”

“I’m glad,” I said, meaning it. I hated to think of how Zeb would feel if I’d died and he had no one to turn to for support.

“Good!” She nuzzled and kissed my cheek and bounded away to snatch some of Daisy’s pita crisps. Seriously, the woman never stopped eating. She’d gone through an entire one-pound bag of peanut butter M&M’s during the meeting and was now trying to sweet-talk a kale roll out of George. The burly trucker was happy to hand over the high-fiber treat.

Zeb wrapped an arm around me. “What do you think?”

“She’s gorgeous,” I assured him. “Charming. Very affectionate. But, um, did she just quit smoking or something?”

“No, why?” he asked.

“Well, she hasn’t stopped eating the whole time we’ve been here. And she’s not exactly a stocky gal.”

“OK, you have to promise that you’re not going to freak out,” Zeb said, pulling me away from the rest of the group.

“You’ve pretty much guaranteed that I’m going to now, but go ahead.”

“The thing is that…well, Jolene’s a werewolf,” Zeb said, his voice lowered.

“Oh, ha ha, Zeb. Halloween’s not for a few more weeks.” I laughed, mugging spookily. “Ooh, Jolene’s a werewolf. You brought me to a vampire-support-group meeting to introduce me to a werewolf. I guess that explains the long teeth and the flashing green eyes and the nuzzling…Oh, crap, you’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Yep.” Zeb nodded. “Her whole family is made up of hereditary werewolves. It’s not a curse or anything. She was born like this. I was sort of surprised you didn’t guess, to be honest. I thought you creatures of the night could sense each other or something.”

“How would I possibly guess werewolf? Swimsuit model, maybe. But it makes sense. If vampires are real, then I guess werewolves, the Mummy, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, and the rest of the Universal horror-movie standards must be real, too. Wait, does that mean she already knows I’m a vampire?” I whispered.

Jolene came up behind me, tapping my back and making me jump. “Zeb told me on our first date.”

It took me a few seconds to register the different emotions I was experiencing: hurt, a little betrayal, the sting of being excluded. I finally landed on the ability to produce sarcasm, which was far more useful.

“Well, thanks for telling me,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I’ve faked eating hummus all night for nothing!”

Jolene squeezed my shoulder. Ouch. She had some very strong hands. “I wasn’t lying when I said my family is antivampire. But it’s because they’re werewolves, not rednecks. Actually, they’re a little bit of both.

“I came to the FFOTU meetings to try to get a better grip on how to deal with Tessie’s being a vampire. I wanted to stay friends with her, and I knew my family, my clan, wouldn’t be happy about it. And after she died, the group members were the only people I knew who were nice about it, who could understand why I was so upset. So I kept comin’ because I wanted to help other people who were going through the same thing.”

“And then I met Zeb, and—I’m in love with your friend,” Jolene blurted out. “I know y’all have been close forever, and I want us to get along. I really do.”

“OK,” I said, at a loss to drum up any other response.

“You’re not upset?” Zeb asked, sounding suspicious.

“Why would I be upset?” I asked. “I mean, I haven’t had much time to process the information, but it’s not as if Jolene can help being what she is, any more than I can help being a vampire. In fact, you were born this way, right? You had even less of a choice than I did. It would be hypocritical of me to go all crazy just because my friend is dating a—”

“Werewolf,” Jolene said for me.

“Right.” Of course, that probably wouldn’t keep me from going all crazy later, but I had to give myself some credit for being able to string that many words together through the shock.

“I’m so glad you feel that way!” Jolene squealed, throwing her arms around me. “We’re going to be really good friends, I can just tell.”

As Jolene gave me a neck-cracking hug, I narrowed my eyes at Zeb, who smiled and shrugged. Great. My best friend was dating a werewolf, who also happened to be a hugger.

13

Vampirism can lead to a wealth of new and exciting career opportunities, including overnight-delivery driver, stunt person, and custom perfume blender.

—From The Guide for the Newly Undead

I may be the only person in history to have a telemarketing career lasting a total of three hours. Apparently, vampire powers do not translate to phone sales.

I’d reviewed the promotional material on Greenfield Studios. Despite its claims that the company brought quality family photography to the people without the high overhead or “high-pressure sales tactics” of in-store studios, I was just as uncomfortable with the prospect of shilling for them. But I’d filled out an application and given my word. And if my Anglo-Saxon Protestant heritage had blessed me with anything, it was a profound guilt-based work ethic.

Since I wasn’t going to be seen by the public, I abstained from my gal Friday look and wore jeans and my lucky blue sweater. (“Lucky” in that it was my one sweater that had never been stained.) Now sporting a lemon-yellow track suit, Sandy met me at the front entrance and led me through the lobby to a shiny pine door. It was a lot like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, only instead of a magical room where everything is made of chocolate, I got a backroom filled with headset-wearing chain-smokers. The clamor of desperately pleasant conversation was deafening. The room was as dingy and chaotic as the lobby had been spotless. Green contest entry slips exploded out from in-boxes in each cubicle. Poster-size performance charts were layered on top of each other on the wall, listing who’d made sales that night and who hadn’t. The stained floor was littered with old entry slips, crumbs, and cigarette butts. And casting an evil eye over it all was a banner that read in huge red letters, “If you don’t sell, you go home.”

Inspiring.

“Greenfield Studios is a national operation with call centers across the country,” Sandy chirped. “Half-Moon Hollow is our latest branch to open. Our field representatives pass out these entry slips at community events, school fairs, fundraisers. And if people are interested, they fill out their personal information. The slip clearly states that even if they don’t win the cruise, we reserve the right to contact them for future promotions.” Sandy handed me a neon green slip that screamed, “Win a cruise for two to the Bahamas from Greenfield Studios!” where some poor sap named Aaron Miller had traded his phone number and an evening’s worth of peace for a shot at a vacation.

“Each shift, you receive seventy five slips. You call the numbers, remind the customers that they willingly gave us their entry information, and let them know that our traveling studio is coming to their hometown.”

“Traveling studio?” I said, my heart sinking just a degree further.

“Yes, our photographers travel to mid-price hotels, where they set up a portrait studio in a conference room or suite and take family pictures by appointment. Your job is to arrange the appointments and persuade the customer to preorder one of these.” Sandy rifled through a pile of papers on a nearby desk and found what looked like a normal wall clock until she turned it so that I saw the face. Some poor family with stiff, uncomfortable smiles was frozen in time there, forever pinned beneath a minute hand that seemed to be sprouting from the mother’s chest like a grotesquely ornate spear.

“Wow.” At least I knew what the exciting new product was: the scariest freaking clock I had ever seen.

“It’s a beauty, isn’t it?” Sandy sighed. “Every year, the company comes up with a new promotional item. Last year, it was throw pillows with the family photo silk-screened on. This year, it’s kitchen clocks.

“You’re paid minimum wage plus a two-dollar commission per appointment booked. You book an average of three appointments in an hour, or you will be sent home. If less than fifty percent of your bookings follow through with their appointments, your commission will be reduced. You pay for use of your headset, phone line, and office supplies.”

My head spun as I realized the level of sleaziness I’d let myself slip to. Eyes closed, I said, “Let me get this straight. My job is to call these people at home, remind them of a contest entry they made months before, not to inform them that they’ve won but that I’m now using that information to try to talk them into bringing their family to a motel room to have their picture taken by a total stranger? In a temporary studio that will disappear in a few days?”

“And push the clocks,” Sandy reminded me. “We like to call them a ‘memory that will last through time.’”

“Is there an actual cruise?” I asked, holding up a contest entry slip.

“Yes, the CEO takes one every year,” Sandy said with a conspiratorial wink.

I looked around the room at the sadly desperate women, shuffling through their entry slips, joylessly logging their bookings on the progress charts. Each had a pleasant, cheerful voice and a face that looked like ten miles of bad road. And they all seemed to be wearing track suits in varying stages of shabbiness. Any time between calls was spent bent over their cubicles in a racking cough. Their endless streams of smoke had already stained the walls a lovely shade of nicotine gray. And if I wasn’t mistaken, one of them appeared to be taking a sponge bath in the ladies’ room with the door open.

What had I gotten myself into? In terms of looking back at how your life went horribly awry, it was possible that accepting this job was worse than stumbling into vampirism.

Waving at the tendrils of smoke curling around my head, I cast a sidelong glance at the little plaque on the wall that declared the office a “smoke-free workplace.” Sandy laughed and threaded an arm companionably through mine. “I know, it’s not really all that legal to let them smoke inside like this, but they just couldn’t work without a smoke every once in a while. And the breaks would kill our productivity. So, we just let them enjoy a nice cigarette while they work. It saves so much time, and everybody’s happy.”