True Blood and SVM belongs to its respective owners. This is my first fanfiction, I'm a very huge fan of the books and show. My writing isn't very good, but I'm hoping you might find some enjoyment and interest in reading more. There will be flashbacks of high school, some teasing and revenge schemes, a nerdy Bill Compton, and more.

Vroom Vroom

My best friend, Pam, rang me up at 8.30 in the morning and forced me into going out dancing and drinking with her later tonight. Little had I known, just what she had in store for me. Least said about it, the better. She approached it in a very cunning method.

"We're going out tonight. You, me."

"Pam, not tonight..." I groaned.

"Oh, come on. Stop being a whining little bitch, and get your glad-rags on. We're going out to party 'till the break of dawn! No exceptions!"

"Pam, I'm too old for this!"

"Nonsense," she hissed out vehemently. "I am two years older than you, you're just a baby." A baby at twenty-five? Ha-ha. "It's not gonna kill you to go out and have fun, every once in a while." There was a weird noise on the other line, a beeping, and then, she let loose a vicious stream of curses."Oh, fuck! Did I mention?" Exasperatedly, I held the phone away from my ear, because I knew what was coming. "You have to put a little more effort in tonight, because I called up the guy's!"

"The guy's?" Oh, God. This definitely wasn't good. "Which guys?"

"Maybe your brother," she admitted ruefully. I moaned. Last thing I wanted was to see my promiscuous brother out on the town. "And then there is Alcide." Her voice dropped, until she was whispering it out so quietly, I had to strain my ears to hear her properly. "And maybe... somebody else."

"Who?" Really, it needn't to have been asked. I already knew.

"I might have called, uh, The Love of Your Life. The One."

"Oh, Pam!" I shouted. "You didn't!"

"Sorry, honey. I did. And when I clarified you were going, let's just say he almost suffered a fatal embolism. You two really need to hook up again! What's it gonna take to make you realize he has wanted you ever since that day in high school when he called you a lesbian?"

I'll surmise it simply: A few months ago, after too many shots, much to my mortification, I got drunk as a skunk, and woke up in a very strange bed next to a snoring stranger. And not just any stranger, but a fellow I used to know back in high school. His name was Eric Northman, and we never got along very well. Saying we never got along very well, was really understatement of the century. We were mortal enemies, and I hated his guts. And... I'm pretty sure, he hated mine. In fact, on a few occasions in high school, I'm pretty sure he was the main culprit responsible of spreading malicious rumours around the entire student body that I was a lesbian, which I'm not, and I had the half-naked pin-up boy posters on my wall back then to prove it.

Ever since that Drunken Mistake, whenever I mysteriously ran into him, he never tired of reminding me that I slept with him and, according to him anyhow, I apparently declared that I had a major thing for him in high school. Which I'm pretty sure is just plain, utter bull-crap to get me riled up.

I knew the main reason Pam was pushing me to go out with her tonight, was because there was the possibility of running into Eric, who she often referred to as 'The One And Only, For Sookie' which was very delusional of her. The fact I had to be inebriated before I could do anything sexual with him, just proves there is nothing between us. Everytime I so much as thought about him, and that cocky expression he often wore whenever he ran into me, I shuddered all the way down to my toes in disgust. I believed all that was a good enough reason as any to avoid the wicked man at all costs.

"Uh, Pam. I'm actually kind of...busy."

"With what? Doing your washing? Watching Buffy re-runs? What?"

"Uh, well..." I panicked wildly, then started thinking about various ways I could make up an excuse not head out with her. What the hell could I say I was doing? My mind was shooting blanks, because she had already named and shamed every other excuse I had used previously in the past two months. "I actually... have some things I need to get done. Very, very important things."

"Like?" She prompted dryly. Goddamn her!

"Umm..." I had clearly hesitated for too long. She laughed loudly on the other line.

"Oh, Sookie. I totally see straight through you! What's the worst that can happen with you running into Eric Northman again?"

Oh, boy. Did she honestly need to ask? "Hmm, I don't know, Pam," I murmured, heavy on the sarcasm. "So many painful things. I've learned from experience- and trust me on this- that Eric Northman revels in making me feel like worthless gum stuck on his shoes- even after all this time! Last week, I happened to run into him while doing my grocery shopping and, you know what he did?"

Luckily for me, Pamela was all ears. She was a great friend, in that respect. She was a wonderful listener."What'd he do? Call you a lesbian again?"

I grimaced. "Close, but not close enough. He cornered me in the, uh... frozen food aisle."

"Ooh. Sounds kinky."

"Well, it wasn't," I told her briskly. "It was... freezing. And he wouldn't get out of my way. He mentioned all this nonsense about going out to dinner, and... maybe a few things about that terrible night shared between us, and the ever awkward morning-after conversation that just keeps on replaying in my head like a sickening video-tape."

"Like I said, what's the worst that can happen? You're coming with me tonight, because that's what friends do!" And, at that, she hung up brutally. I was left with the troubling conclusion that if I backed out tonight, it would potentially slaughter our friendship. Pam was murderous in cutting a person down to size like that.

It was a horror of an afternoon with figuring out what to wear.

After artful consideration, I donned a tight white, frilly shirt and cut-off denim shorts, with the most comfortable high heels I could find. I got to the nightclub a little late, because the nausea I felt made its savage reappearance, when, first motorbike I saw parked by the side of the road when I pulled in, belonged to none other than A-Hole Eric Northman himself.

You could totally tell he was fastidious about the state of his Harley-Davidson; Some men were obviously anal like that, about their cars, bikes, whatever.

They treated their machines as though they were their most prized and precious possessions. In all the other times I had seen his bike out and about, it always appeared so immaculate and meticulously shined. It took what little restraint and self-control I had from ramming my truck into the back of it wickedly to knock it over, when I pulled in and found a parking space. When I slid out of the car and applied my lipstick, I had another bitter idea of running the sharpest edge of my set of keys into the glossy black paint. I found I could be an utter vindictive bitch whenever it came to Eric Northman. Never had I ever felt that way before, towards anyone... except for Eric Northman. I guess that alone attested to how much I despised the man, and how much he managed to succeed in getting underneath my skin where it hit hurtful the most, when being in his disagreeable company.

As I went inside, I sought out and watched Pam while she stood at the bar resignedly. Clearly, she had already begun partying without me, and she was halfway through downing what looked like an extremely lethal tequila shot.

"Sookie, you bitch!" She literally growled like a saucy cat in greeting, once she noticed my late arrival. "You're late, so I had to start without you! Don't worry though, I got a few shots in on your behalf!"

She came staggering over towards me in a very worrying way in her high heels, and flung her arms around me in a tight grip. She managed to burp, kiss me sloppily on the cheek, and get grimy lipstick over my cheek, all at the same time. She had also been effective in making me feel guilty over my tardiness.

"God, I'm sorry I'm late!" I managed to return the hug awkwardly. "I had some... things to do. I might have also... got lost. I couldn't, uh, remember how to get here, actually." My excuses were coming up pitiful tonight.

"Lost? Bullshit!" She cackled into my shoulder, drunkenly loud. "Anyway. The boy's are here. Let's go!"

She grabbed me by the hand and, obediently, I allowed her to drag me along to a side-table.

"She got lost!" she announced to my cad of a brother, Jason, who murmured disinterestedly. He was staring at something - or someone across the room dopily- and when I followed the line of his gaze, I ought to have already known just what had his interest for the night. My brother was about as slutty as a man could get, and he had his eyes planted predatory on some skinny, tanned number for the evening.

I rolled my eyes, and laughed, when Alcide rose to his feet clumsily, managing to knock a few bottles over the table in his wake, at the sight of me.

"Sookie! Long time, no see! Get your fine ass over here and say hello!"

"Oof," I whimpered, when he threw his arms around me and engulfed me into a super tight and enthusiastic hug. His big hands also roamed downwards, until he groped my butt cheekily.

"You're looking great," he said, very appreciatively, in his gruff, deep voice. I beamed up at him, feeling loads better. I was definitely under dressed, by Pam's standards. She was wearing a slinky, strapless red shimmering dress that hugged her body and showed off all her womanly goods.

"Thank you," I whispered, touched. "You're looking pretty good yourself." And he certainly was; He was wearing a plaid red lumberjacks shirt, tucked into tight faded denim jeans. He could have done well with a shave, though; When he kissed me on the cheek chastely, his beard scratched me painfully. "Jesus, Alcide! It wouldn't hurt you to shave every once in a while!"

"I know, I know," he mumbled, embarrassed. He lifted a hand to run his fingers over his beard ruefully. "But Debbie likes me this way. Who am I to go against anything that makes my girl happy?"

Debbie and Alcide had been dating for over four months now, and I had only met her once. She seemed very quiet and reserved, very sweet, the time I had met her. But whenever they were going through some silly lover's tiff, he would tell me all the things she had said to him, and, I learned, she had the mouth of a sailor on her.

"How's life been treating you lately? You been good?" At that, whether he realized he was doing it or not, his hands reached down and squeezed my ass again.

"Alcide, hands off," I scolded playfully. "What would Debbie think of all this?"

He went red underneath his unshaven face, and lifted his hands in the air. "You're absolutely right. Sorry, darling." He looked behind my shoulder, and his embarrassment increased. "Oh, shit! Seemed you warned me just at the right time, too! You know what'll happen if you hadn't!"

"Debbie's here?" I asked hopefully. I had truly wanted to meet her again, and get to know her. I whirled around excitedly.

Instead, what I got, was a flicker of the utter humiliation I always felt whenever I was peering into the devilish eyes of none other than appalling Eric Northman himself.

The evil man, the devil's reincarnation in human form himself- was standing tall over us- scrunitizing me in my clothes. No doubt he had witnessed Alcide's less than friendly ass-groping of me, if he had in fact been standing around us after all that time.

"Northman," Alcide greeted, with a manly inclination of his head. The Devil dragged his eyes to Alcide, and returned it wordlessly. "Say, you... uh, you know Sookie, right? Jason's little beauty of a sister?"

"As a matter of fact, I do," he said, turning to me, attempting what seemed a stiff, scheming smile. The Devil was all for nefarious games and cruel ploys. "And well. No doubt, better than you ever will." He laughed, in quite a cruel and secretive way. Then, he went on more seriously, in that deep and throaty voice of his, like he truly cared to know, "How are you, Sookie?"

"Humph," I grunted rudely, deciding it best not to give him any fuel to add to the fire.

Eric was one of those blonde-haired, blue-eyed creeps, and he was frighteningly tall- at around over six-feet in height. He was wearing an offensively tight V-neck shirt in a military green shade that seemed to cling to every inch of him, and an unbuttoned, long black overcoat that slung loosely off his shoulders. He was also wearing tight and holey dark denim jeans and biker boots. Not that I really noticed, nor cared what he was wearing, of course. Gross sexy. That was Eric Northman; Advocate for the gross sexy look.

"Uhm. Cool."

I was aware of Alcide becoming intimidated by Eric's presence; Eric often did that to a man. Both sexes, really. Myself included. He slid back into his seat like a desperate man, eager to get away, leaving me standing there aimlessly, on edge and nervous around Eric Northman. I watched sourly as he threw himself into humoured conversation with Pam, who was fluttery and flushed pink from however many drinks of alcohol she had consumed before I had arrived.

I was vaguely aware out of the corner of my eye that Eric had shifted closer to my side; his hands shoved deeply into the pockets of his coat. "Hey, Sookie." I squared my shoulders and pursed my lips; braced and ready for the instance some snide comment flew out from his mouth. But surprisingly, it never came. "Did you come here in your car?"

"Indeed, I did," I replied shortly, keeping my eyes on Pam, who was gesticulating wildly with her hands to Alcide.

"Pity. Because, I, ah..." Oh, here it comes. "...I could have driven you home later on my bike. You might have even enjoyed that."

I racked my brains frantically for any smart comeback I could use. All I could manage was: "Yeah, right. In your dreams. I'd rather die, than get on the back of that death machine with you."

Much to my dismay, it had the opposite effect I was hoping for. Instead of deflating his mood in some way, rather instead, he chuckled gently. I shuddered involuntary at the sound. "Death machine?" He sounded astounded. "Sure, I do like to ride her hard and fast, but you'd be safe with me. I wouldn't ever dream of going over the limit with you."

I expressed a derisive laugh of my own over that. "It's a bit too late for that, Eric. I think you already crossed that limit over... oh, say... that dreadful morning I woke up in your bed and your arms were wrapped around me."

"Ah. Well, for the record, you were begging me to take you home to my house for the night. It wasn't my idea. Not that I had my objections, of course."

Oh, for God's sake.

"Well, just so you know, it's never, ever gonna happen again. I was drunk and, obviously, I lacked good judgement and clear reasoning. That was the only reason why I did... what I did that night."

Completely out of the blue, I felt his hand close over my elbow, and he ran his thumbnail down my forearm. I shivered. I felt him lean in until his mouth was so close to my ear, I could feel his ragged and warm breaths. "I won't be waiting long, Sookie." A mischievous laugh bubbled up inside the back of his throat. "After all, there is always the next time you wind up drunk. Which, no doubt, will be fairly shortly."

I resolved then, that for the rest of my life, I would stick to non-alcoholic beverages in the future if that truly were the case, as he was saying.

"Never," I repeated firmly, through gritted teeth. "I'd rather die."

His hand never loosened from my arm. I felt his mouth close over my earlobe as he bent down behind me; his lips tickling, his unshaven chin scratching, as he spoke in a hushed murmur, "Aren't we a bit old for all of this high school animosity? Whatever I did to you back then, that caused you to feel the need to treat me this way... is history now."

"To you, perhaps. I will never forgive you for what you did in spreading all those rumours 'round the school about my sexuality! It is downright unforgivable!"

"Oh, yes. I remember that now." Eric's voice was sardonic, and I could tell that, inwardly, he was laughing over that hurtful incident all over again. It might have been a joke to him, but it stung me, at the time. I was far from a lesbian, and I just couldn't understand how somebody could be so cruel as to spread such a lie. "The infamous Sookie Stackhouse Is A Raging, Full-Blown Lesbian rumour, where everybody believed it so easily."

I could feel my face turning bright red in all the anger I was trying so hard to suppress. My hands balled into fists painfully, my nails digging into my palm. I wanted to slap him so hard. I never got the chance to do that in high school... but I still had the chance right now. He wouldn't have even known what hit him.

"Tell me, Sookie. How many chances of finding a decent date did that compromise?" He was breathing down my neck. "If I rightly remember, you had half the lesbian girls at school lining up eagerly for a chance. No boys, after that. They were all frightened away."

He was so close, all I had to do was take a forceful swing. Responsibly, I turned vocal instead. "Why did you do that, Eric?" I was almost shouting uncontrollably. "Just to show how much of a piece-of-shit asshole you truly are?" Sure, that was a bit harsh. I knew it myself.

I jerked my arm away and shoved my face into his, trying to appear as intimidating as possible.

All he did, was blink down at me impassively.

"You know why I did it."

"No." I shook my head violently. "I don't know why you did it, at all. Did I really..." I ground my teeth together, feeling my anger building with such sheer ferocity it was frightening. "Did I truly seem like a lesbian to you?"

He ran a hand through his slicked back hair, then palmed his forehead, exasperated. "You know why I did it. Hasn't anyone ever fucking told you about, you know..." His jaw clenched, and suddenly that anger was directed right back at me. Our faces were so close together, our noses almost touching. We were having a serious head-butting session here. "When you're a kid and you... Like boy's teasing girls... because they..." He paused and couldn't seem to say it. And then, he blurted it out, with a hard glare, "... are attracted to them?"

"What?"

"For fucksake, Sookie!" He closed his eyes, and his jaw was twitching crazily. A vein was pulsing in his forehead. "I... was attracted to you. Boys teasing girls because they liked them. I... I am in love with you, Sookie." Clearly, he hadn't meant to let slip that much information, because he covered a hand over his mouth, and his eyes flitted open and widened in sheer terror. "Ever since freshman year. It was idiotic what I did, yes. But it worked. No boys approached you, I had you all to myself. It was the... only way to get you alone."

I gasped, as the full weight of his words finally sunk in. It was worse than I could have imagined. I wouldn't have minded so much, if he had only simply done it to be a mean asshole. But... because he was attracted to me? Because he- he was in love with me?

"The fuck!" I squealed, in disgust.

And then, before I could get firm hold of myself, I was slapping him on the cheek. I could tell it was a pretty decent hit, because my palm stung afterwards, and his cheek reddened from the contact.

It was like the world screeched and halted at that moment in time. All I saw, was something wet gathering around his eyes, and then a chair was being knocked over and, next thing we all knew, with a loud 'umph', Pam was falling headfirst at my feet.

"Oh, my God!" I whispered shakily, over both the shock at Pam's descent, and at hitting Evil Eric. It was hardly satisfying in the slightest. "I am so sorry, I cannot believe I just did that!" I cried at him apologetically, half crouching over Pam to help her to her feet, and half twisting my face around to declare it straight into his face. "Pam?" She was lying motionless, and her body felt limp and heavy, when I wrenched her up by the forearms. Her head dipped into her chest, and her mouth was hanging wide open, her eyes tightly closed. "Pam?" I shook her gently, then next thing I knew, there was Alcide lying her out on the ground and Jason scrambling from his seat to get a cold cloth. "Alcide, is she breathing?"

He touched her neck, checking for a pulse. Then, with relief, I saw his face collapse into itself in gratitude. "She is. I think maybe she just had a bit too much to drink, Sookie."

"Well, no shit," I huffed out, breathlessly. Jason returned and applied the cloth gently over her forehead, and she stirred. I felt all the fear instantly leave my body, when she stirred sleepily and mumbled a few curse words.

I peered up at Eric, only to be met with a stranger's face I did not recognize. I examined the room, only he was nowhere to be seen; My stomach sank. I really wanted to apologize over my cruel and violent behaviour, only I couldn't even do that, because he was gone.

"Sookie." Alcide's urgent voice broke me out of my stressing. "I think she better stay with you for the night. Think you better head on home. She fainted, obviously."

"Of course." I tried to push aside the sadness I felt, and guilt, and instead, worked into attempting to move Pam out of the club and into my car. It was difficult, and Alcide had to help me, by nursing most of her weight. Her hand was clammy when I grabbed onto it, and she kept mumbling underneath her breath.

Outside into the parking lot, it was then I saw him again.

He was sitting perched on the leather seat of his motorbike. He was watching us, and he seemed relieved himself, when he took in that Pam was going to be just fine. He didn't look at me, at first; Perhaps he was too angry, and really, I couldn't exactly blame him. Alcide helped me heave Pam into the seat of my car, and I turned to hug him goodbye tightly. Unfortunately for me, I caught Eric watching on this time. His motorbike roared to life thunderously, but I could tell, judging by his expression alone, that he wasn't as mad as I had first thought. His eyes softened, and his expression warmed, when he held my gaze above Alcide's shoulder intently. He gave me a sly little wink, before his expression straightened grimly. It was like with his look and that little wink alone, he was reassuring me that my slap was forgiven. I managed a weak smile, and then he nodded briskly, looked away, and then he was out of the parking lot; speeding away with the sound of the loud motorbike's engine humming away in my ears.

All in all, I learned some very insightful things tonight; One, that I was capable of being violent and hurtful to another person, if my irritated heart was in it. Two; That Pam should avoid alcohol more at all costs, and that she'd be having a hang-over from hell come morning. And thirdly; One that made my skin feel hot and a warm flush spring all over, that Eric Northman maybe didn't despise me as much as I assumed he had, in high school. No, he- what was his words?

He was in love with me. All along.