Things I Don't Own: Southern Vampire Series and its characters no matter how many attempts I've made to just borrow a certain blonde Viking.

Things I Do Own: A cat that my family claims I love more than any human, a set of CH books from Target, and a craving for a glass of good wine that I need to take care of.

Song That Inspired this Chapter: Little Conversations by Concrete Blonde (obviously) and Strange Attraction by The Cure

A/N: Thanks brought to Southernlady2323 by our favorite blonde Viking on a silver platter. I appreciate her acceptance to be my Beta and she and I are going to rock this Southern style!

Chapter 1

SPOV

Excerpt, Dead And Gone, by Charlaine Harris, Book 9, page 3 (hardback)

I switched off the television and tied my other shoe, shaking my head at American's new addiction to vampire "reality" shows. I got my red coat out of the closet. The sight of it reminded me that I myself had some absolutely real problems with a vampire; in the two and a half months since the takeover of the Louisiana vampire kingdom by the vampires of Nevada, Eric Northman had been fully occupied with consolidating his position within the new regime and evaluating what was left of the old.

We were way overdue for a chitchat about Eric's newly recovered memories of our strange and intense time together when he'd temporarily misplaced his memory due to a spell.

I just didn't have time to worry about that right now. I gathered my things, locked the door, and jumped in my car hoping I wouldn't be late. Lord knows Arlene is late often enough for all of us. As I started my car, I leaned over, pulled the portable CD player out from under the passenger seat, and inserted the cassette adapter in to my radio. I don't know how people live without music. I grabbed the CD that Pam had given me one night at Fangtasia that was filled with music she was trying to get me to enjoy because she said the whiny stuff we called Country music in the South was ear splitting.

As much as I hated to admit it, I liked a lot of the music she'd put on the CD, especially a band called Concrete Blonde. I began to sing along to one of their songs I especially liked called "Joey." I suspected Pam was not as hard as that thick layer of veneer she put off for every one. I started to feel like I was shaking the negative thoughts in my head and prepared myself to smile and serve food and drinks at work tonight; heck maybe I'll even talk myself into enjoying it.

I had to hand it to Eric's child, she was sure full of surprises, and I suspected she was. The quiet chords of the ballad "Little Conversations" begin to play and Johnette Napolitano's smoky voice filled my car.

The Little Conversation is over very soon,
and I watch in admiration from my corner of the room.
They shine on you with starry eyes
They rain a friendly storm like kids around a Christmas tree
and then you smile all nice and warm.

This song reminded me of an impending conversation with a certain blonde hunky vamp. I couldn't stop thinking of Mr. Brooding Fang in Shreveport, and this simultaneously stirred so many feelings deep inside me that I wasn't sure if things would turn out how I hoped. I didn't even hope for the things that I had been dreaming of when it came to Eric.

The Little Conversations if I tried my very best
You know I never could say anything in twenty words or less
Somewhere, sometime, down the line someday
I may confess, and tell you all, that's all.

At some point, I realized things would finally calm down at Fangtasia and I would find a way to have a real conversation with Eric about what happened between us, so I could put this all behind me. I knew Eric, and I was confident that he could never, in his normal mind, have any true feelings for me.

Even though there was a brief period where he felt safe with me, and he was truly the perfect man that loved me. I knew that person wasn't the real Eric. Although he looked like Eric and sounded like Eric—the sheriff of Area 5—he was under the effect of a powerful witch's spell. Now that I'd saved him and we'd all survived the Witch War, the spell was removed. He was back to the Eric that looked at me as some thing that he could use to benefit him.

I knew the Eric that was quiet and often cryptic. He sometimes left me reeling because I felt that I had missed something really important in his words. Now that all had been said and done, that only reason he kept in contact with me because…well because Sam and I had saved his ass and somehow managed to save the new King of Louisiana in the employee parking lot of Merlotte's.

The King had granted me formal protection and of course, this was Eric's problem since he was the Sheriff of Area 5. This edict didn't seem to not bother Eric because first of all, he liked to use me to get info out of humans and second, he had always been a little intrigued by my telepathy and the way I wove in and out of the Supernatural world with ease. I don't think it helped my situation that he wanted to do things to me that were probably illegal when he was human and then some.

The Little Conversations on me are very rough.
They leave me all in pieces you know there's never time enough
Like a book with missing pages like a story incomplete
Like a painting left unfinished it feels like not enough to eat.
Starvin'

I hated to admit even to myself, that I really didn't care to be involved with humans. The peace I felt when I was with a vampire was almost a religious experience in itself. The quiet in my mind when I was with Bill was one of the things that made me fall so hard for him. Now that I've had time to recover from knowing the truth about Bill meeting me, I felt a little better thinking that a large part of my attraction to him was, quiet literally, the peace of mind I had being around him.

Unfortunately for him, shortly after meeting him, I met other vampires, and learned it wasn't Bill whose mind was quiet to my telepathic ability, it was all vampires.

These little conversations well for me they'll never do
now what am I supposed to do with broken sentences of you?
I'll stay in my corner `cause that's all that I can do and let the others speak for me.

I pulled in to the parking lot and thought about my very limited experience in love and how my relationships were pretty much all with vampires. The peace I felt around their minds was central to how I began to develop feelings about them, but I had no understanding of why Bill ever wanted me. I felt like I was more of an employee to Eric (except for those few days while I was hiding him) and it really bothered me that I couldn't seem to get more than a little conversation out of Eric or Bill for that matter, as neither wanted to have a heart-to-heart with the little human.

I found myself feeling a little sorry for Bill, as he was sincere in his attempts to return to my good graces. Although I could appreciate the sentiment, I just couldn't seem to feel the way I had once felt about him. Although he didn't see it this way, he never even attempted to be honest with me about things that may have been hard for me to accept or have scared the pants right off of me.

Eric was painfully honest with me whenever I asked him something and it was as if he didn't have any humanity left in him at all. That was what terrified me the most about him, and even though I felt this way, I couldn't help it when my heart sped up at just the thought of him.

I stepped out of my car and began walking to the employee entrance of Merlotte's and knew I had to pack up all these thoughts and put them in my "To Be Continued" folder in my mind. No answers to any of these questions would come to me while I was doing my job this evening, so all of this needed to be pushed off until I could sit and think. All of this needed to be pushed off until I could find a soft, cool place to think.

A/N: Ok, that's done. This is the first chapter of my first FanFic ever and it felt a little like giving birth ya'll! But you know what they say about child birth, you forget the pain, right? As a mother I think that is so false but maybe I'll go with it this time.

Next chapter: Pam and Bill will meet so Pam can give Bill a reality check and of course she's running around following her Master's orders. Will it be the Pam we are used to or will the elusive vampires surprise us?

Please review and give me your thoughts! I will try to answer all questions and know that this story is centrally about Eric and Sookie but as I write it, there will be some curve balls I throw your way. I promise zesty lemons in future chapters!