Beep Beep Beep

Amy clumsily groped around the bedside table, refusing to use her sleepy eyes to find the alarm clock. She took a final swipe, sending the infernal machine flying across the carpet.

Amy had never been a morning person. Alarm clocks were the necessary evil that got her out of bed before midday, but it didn't stop her from abusing the thing every time it made a sound. She rolled over, burying her face in between her pillows. Just ten more minutes.

A rhythmic buzzing came from her left. Ugh. She rolled back over to find her phone skittering closer and closer to the edge of the table. She picked it up before it could move any further- her phone was one noisy thing she absolutely could not do without.

Karma was calling her. At seven thirty in the morning. Crazy morning person. Amy touched the "answer" button.

"Karma?"

"Morning, sleepyhead! Got your bushy tail on yet?"

"Ugh. I can barely form sentences."

"You did remember that you're picking me up today?"

Of course she did. Karma had been reminding Amy every day for a week that her parents were going to be out of town.

"I dunno, Karma… seven-thirty-in-the-morning-Amy's a bit forgetful… you might find yourself walking…"

"Okay, okay, I get it. Go back to sleep, you lazy butt. I keep forgetting how grumpy you are in the mornings."

Amy couldn't help but grin as she hung up. God, that girl drove her crazy. As if it'd ever be any other way. She flopped back down onto the bed, relishing the coziness.

knock knock knock knock knock

Seriously?

Amy groaned as she hauled herself from the mattress and trudged across the room to open the door. As soon as she did, Lauren bustled past her, making a beeline for Amy's bathroom.

"Um, excuse me?"

"I need to borrow your hairdryer. Mine isn't working."

"You could have at least asked…"

"Oh, please, you would have agreed anyway."

Lauren was right. Amy was being made to share everything, since Lauren and Bruce had moved in. Farrah was committed to making them as comfortable as possible, which meant that many of Amy's belongings were no longer solely hers. Luckily, she got to keep her room to herself. For the most part.

"Mornin', sweetheart!"

Farrah peered in through the doorway, her hair already perfectly coiffed, not a single strand out of place. An equally well-groomed Bruce joined Farrah in leaning over the threshold. Amy sighed.

"Is there a party in my room, and why wasn't I invited?" Her tone dripped with weary sarcasm.

Farrah looked to Bruce. "It's just a mornin' thing, she'll perk up by breakfast."

Lauren came out of Amy's bathroom, carrying the hairdryer. Amy weighed up the possibility of ever seeing it again, and came up lacking.

"Could everybody please vacate? I need to change."

Farrah chuckled. "Oops! Sorry. Breakfast is in ten."

They left and the door closed. Amy threw her bed-hair back in frustration.

I really need to invest in a lock.

When Amy pulled up outside Karma's house, Karma was already perched on the edge of the gutter, waiting for her. Karma always looked ridiculously chipper in the mornings. There were never any remnants of sleep left on her face, though Amy honestly didn't know how much of that was due to natural alertness, and how much of it was due to concealer. This morning, though, Karma seemed unusually happy. Her gait more resembled a skip as she strode over to the well-worn chassis of Amy's Jetta.

"It's a beautiful day, isn't it?"

Amy lifted an eyebrow as she pulled at the gearstick. "Who put Adderall in your coffee this morning?"

"What? No one. Just look at the sky. Not a single cloud."

"Karma. We both know you're not excited about the sky."

Karma looked like she was just about to explode. "Liam Booker's transferring into my math class!" She let out a small squeal and balled her hands into excited fists.

Math was the one subject Amy and Karma didn't have together because, unlike Karma, Amy actually payed attention in math.

"I thought he was in the year above us…"

"He is!"

"Then why is he taking a sophomore-level class?"

"I dunno, something about him taking dropping math for a semester to pick up metalwork, or woodwork, something adorable and artsy like that."

This wasn't what Amy had heard. She'd heard Liam had just blown off every math class in his timetable to go kiss girls in the art room. She didn't mention this to Karma.

Karma's crush on Liam Booker had been a conversation topic between her and Amy for well over a year. While Amy could acknowledge that he was definitely good-looking, she didn't really know what else Karma saw in him.

Karma didn't shut up about Liam for the entire five-minute drive. Amy pulled into the parking lot at school, still nodding and smiling at whatever the hell Karma was saying.

As they got out of the car, Liam's biodiesel screeched into the park beside them. Karma let out a blissful sigh; Amy rolled her eyes and focused on shutting her own outdated vehicle's door. Karma turned to Amy.

"I'm gonna go talk to him. Who knows, maybe he needs a math tutor."

Amy attempted to remain unresponsive to the irony of the statement, but her eyebrows betrayed. Karma giggled.

"See you in history? Third period?" She said, swinging her woven shoulder bag over her head.

"We won't be able to goof off this time- that assignment's due tomorrow."

"And I only have an outline. Why'd you remind me?" Karma whined.

"Because you'd fail if I didn't. Now go bother Liam." Amy replied. Amy thought she'd be used to this by now. Many mornings, Karma would skip off in the direction of a minority group, hoping to find an in with them, only to return to Amy's side by the time the bell went for first period. Still, there was something in Amy that dimmed every time Karma walked away from her. Like a light went off, and it was that little bit harder to see.

That morning, Karma didn't seek Amy out at their spot in the shade of the Arts building. Amy sat and studied alone, hoping, for a reason she didn't quite understand, that Karma and Liam weren't making out in a broom closet. The whole situation gave Amy pause. She and Karma were each other's constants- they shared everything, and had done so since they were in kiddie overalls. Naturally, crushes were a hot topic between them. It seemed that, every week, Karma's eye would have a different apple, but Amy never really noticed anyone else, nor was she interested. Relationships seemed too complicated, on top of school and keeping up with her Netflix queue. She was comfortable- the only people she really needed were her mother and Karma. Karma obviously didn't hold with that. She'd been on the lookout for a boyfriend since serious relationships became a thing. Her affection for Liam had lasted the longest. This bothered Amy- not that it was really any of her concern. But she knew Karma deserved better, and feared seeing her hurt.

A chorus of shouts snapped Amy out of her contemplation. A group of students bustled past her, yelling incoherently at each other, with a conviction that seemed almost offensive to the high school environment. A light blue leaflet floated out of their wake. Amy picked it up.

Bring the creatures of darkness into the light! Vampire segregation NOW!

Not the vampire thing again. It had been public knowledge going on a year now, but Amy was still convinced the whole vampire virus was an enormous hoax. It seemed like the stuff disaster films were made of- a bizarre experiment gone wrong, allegedly millions infected… the amount of pamphlets she had seen floating around detailing vampire repellents and emergency infection hotlines, with absurd titles like, Are YOU living with a bloodsucker?

Still, the very thought of it gave her chills. Bloodsucking people who preyed on other humans, because of a virus? Outbreak was one of the few movies she couldn't bear to watch all the way through. The common cold was enough to reduce her to a shivering mess. A vampire disease still seemed 99% implausible, but that niggling 1% turned her stomach.

Amy crumpled the blue leaflet into a ball, tossing it in the trash on her way to class. Hysteria-inciting propaganda like that deserved nothing better than the garbage, anyway.

History was practically a study hall. Their officious substitute demanded silence, though it wasn't as if the buzzing in the absence of sound was any less distracting than Karma's mile-a-minute speech. Amy was meticulously rounding out her essay, while Karma furiously flicked between textbooks, Internet sources and her paper. Amy ripped a sheet from her notebook and scribbled a note in barely intelligible handwriting.

How's the assignment going?

Awfully. I'm still writing Putin when I mean to say Stalin.

Amy grinned. Ah, Russia. Land of strange vowels and odd names.

How are you going with yours? Karma's loopy cursive scrawled in an arc over the page.

Fine. It's just… really, really extensive. This is what happens when they don't give us a word limit. I can't fit it into a folder, so I'm going to have to get it bound. I'll go to the library during lunch.

Uhm… I was hoping you could help me with my drama essay then. You know how bad I am at getting words in the right order.

Amy shot Karma an icy look from across the table. Karma responded with a sheepish half-grin. Amy knew that grin, and she knew resistance to it was futile- at least for her.

Okay, fine. I'll just go after school.

You're the best, Amy.

Don't you dare forget it.

Karma and Amy entered the library after school, making a beeline for the binding machine. Both of them were keen to get home: Karma to finish her assignment, Amy to have some time to wind down. Thursdays exhausted her; why Wednesday was not a mid-week rest day would forever remain a mystery to her.

As they rounded a bookshelf, Amy pulled out the plastic sleeves containing every last page of her assignment. She got ready to line them up in the binding machine, only to find somebody had gotten there first.

Lauren was standing there, shuffling papers in and out of the machine, her perfectly manicured nails clicking against the metal. The stack of pages she was pulling from piled to a foot high on the table beside her.

"What are you doing?" Amy asked, injecting as much accusation into the question as she could.

"Binding church directories. I've got about a hundred to do, so it's going to take me at least two hours." The twinge of victorious snark in Lauren's tone didn't escape Amy's notice.

Amy didn't bother arguing with her. She turned around and stormed back out of the building, with Karma following close behind.

"I swear," Amy said through clenched teeth, "If she doesn't stop with the snooty, I'm going to shove my hairdryer up her a-"

"Amy!" Karma jumped in front of her, stopping her tracks. "Look, I think you're overreacting. It's just a binder, right?"

Amy rocked back onto her heels and sighed. "It's not just that. She's been sucking up to my Mom, and Mom's been sucking right back. Not even my bathroom is sacred. Not to mention that I'll have to go the print shop tonight-"

"I'll come with you!" Karma offered. "Come on. You have to drive me home anyway."

"Mom needs me home by four. I don't have time to go bind my assignment and drop you home."

Karma quirked an eyebrow. "What's your mother doing that means you can't have a Thursday afternoon to yourself?"

Amy shifted her backpack over her shoulder and continued walking to her car. "Wedding planning. I'm meant to be making "save the dates" with her tonight. Bruce is nice and all, but…"

"Lauren. I get it." Karma nodded. When Amy shook her head, it surprised her.

"Not just Lauren. It's been just my mom and I for, like, five years. It's already weird enough sharing a house, and it's only gonna get weirder when they're married."

They got to the car, and Amy opened the door for Karma, as she did every day. Karma flashed back her trademark grin.

"Hey, if things get too rough, you can always come stay with me." Karma gently shoved Amy's shoulder as they walked. "And you know how my parents are, they'd be thrilled. They might even give you one of their hippy nicknames, like Destiny, or Chakra, or-"

"Karma…"

"What?"

"I'm not planning on moving out any time soon. Plus, I'm not sure I could deal with vegan bacon that often."

"What do you think of the whole vampire thing?"

The words were out of Amy's mouth before she realized she wanted to talk about it.

"I dunno. I think it's sad, that there's no cure…. But it's also kind of hot."

"Really, Karma?"

"What? Don't tell me you wouldn't date a vampire guy."

"No, I wouldn't," Amy said as she turned the corner into Karma's street.

"Are you racist against vampires?" Karma prodded with mock disapproval.

"Racism doesn't come into it. I wouldn't want to date someone who could kill me with their teeth. Besides, I think the entire thing's bullshit, anyway."

Karma unbuckled her seatbelt as the car slowed to a crawl. "Well, you don't have to worry about me dating Liam. He's most definitely human." She declared, slamming the car door with a flick of her wrist.

Amy drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as she backed out of driveway. I won't have to worry about her dating Liam anyway, Liam can't be something that doesn't exi-

Wait, DATING?