Why We Don't Hug

"You don't call, you don't text…"

"Klaus!"

"The one and only."

"You say that, but –"

"But our favourite invincible, invulnerable vampire has been playing mind games, I know." He peels himself off the wall behind me like gum of the sole of a shoe – like bespoke, exotic spice-scented gum off the sole of an Italian leather shoe, possibly handmade. "So he's been you, and now he's been me. He really seems to know how to push our buttons."

"Your buttons."

"Has it occurred to you that we've technically been in the same body? That makes twice now, counting the time when I was Tyler. Imagine what could've been if you'd given me just a little more –"

"Stop!" My hands fly up of their own accord, warding him off. I am dramatic, but he makes me flamboyant. I am irritable, but he makes me pissed. "This is not something to joke about."

"No," he agrees. Something about his voice has changed, and his eyes are a shade darker than they were before. "I object to having my image used to hurt you and your family. Moreover, I object to your having been frightened." There is the smell of spice as he comes closer, but it's from his clothes or his cologne, not from imaginary gum. The intensity of his gaze makes me feel naked.

I wore layers today, so that's a lot of intense.

"There doesn't appear to be any permanent damage."

"I'm a vampire, remember?"

"But your shoulders aren't hunched. You're not tucking your chin into your chest to protect your neck. Humans – although we aren't humans – are like animals, really. The true test of trust is if they bare their throat and have faith in the fact that no one will rip it out."

"And you won't?"

"And I won't."

I have been through too much today. He was Silas and asked me to go to New Orleans with him. Silas was my mother. Silas killed my mother. My mother has no idea that she didn't just visit the other side, she nearly relocated there permanently. She was about to be handed a piña colada by the Grim Reaper when that syringe went into her heart.

"Last time I needed comfort, you were a dick about it."

"And I'm trying to make amends for it by not being a dick now."

"So I see."

"Do you..."

"Just this once."

It's more than a little awkward to assume the position, to make like we do this all the time and there's nothing strange about it. But up close, with his arms around me? He feels alive. Alive and normal, even. He feels like any other guy would. There's no Original or hybrid or wants-to-make-my-best-friend-human-again-to-use-he r-as-a-blood-dispenser drama.

"The next person who lays a finger on you," he promises. "Will find out what their own liver tastes like."

I think he thinks I don't feel his hand on my hair, he's touching it so softly.

"And that," I say into his shoulder. "Is why we don't hug."

Fin.