Author's note: Oh my god guys, I'm so sorry I haven't updated in so damn long!!! But I've been really busy! So I hope you like this chapter! BTW I've edited some stuff in earlier chapters so that things all make sense in the end! Happy Holidays to everyone!!!!!
Several days later, Laurence's mother brought her daughter with her to the grocery store. Laurence didn't especially like going into markets, except for when there were samples for new foods. And also when her mother let her drop candy bags and packaged bake mixes into the cart.
"Do you have the groceries list?"
Laurence held up a small piece of paper. Her mother nodded, and then proceeded to pushing a grocery cart down the aisle.
"Milk?"
Laurence picked up a jug of milk and put it in the cart.
"Eggs?"
Laurence eyed the egg display and carefully brought down two cartons of large eggs, one package of white eggs, and one package of brown eggs.
"What about ham?"
Laurence, rather uneager, strode over to the meat display and picked up a large pack of the savory meat. She was very bored.
"Mom, can't I just wander around and then meet you on the bench outside in about, umm…" she glanced up at the big clock on the grocery store wall, "about 30 minutes?"
Her mother sighed.
"Fine, go ahead; leave your old mother all alone in the store. I don't care." Her mother began to push the cart in the opposite direction, and then Laurence stopped her.
"Wait," she pleaded with her mother, "just five more items, and then can I go look around?"
Laurence's mother stopped to think for awhile, and then nodded.
"All right, fine then. Just don't talk to anybody shady."
"Okay." Laurence had absolutely no problem with that condition; she felt chills go up her spine whenever an older, perverted boy or a man just stood there and stared at her, while she had to pretend not to notice.
In the male product section of the grocery store, Edgar, Allan, and Bo were browsing for men's shaving cream and standard razors. Well, Bo was, he just dragged his two cousins along to the store with him.
"I'm telling you guys," Bo stated, looking at a canister of men's shaving cream, "if we get shaving cream that's just slightly scented, then the ladies will be all over us."
Alan threw a deodorant stick at Bo's head, and it found the target right in the center of Bo's forehead.
"Sure, like that'll ever happen," Alan said blankly as he watched Bo rub his head in pain.
"Owww, why are you guys so mean to me all the time?" he said in a fake-whiney voice, "can't you see that you guys are always hurting my-?"
"Bo, just shut up for once!" Edgar snapped at his perverted cousin.
Bo glared at Edgar.
"You know what?" Bo said, dropping the shaving cream to the floor, "I don't really care about the shaving cream anyways. Who said I needed to shave? Maybe I'd look cool with a goatee, for all you guys care." He straightened himself up.
"What's your point, Bo-Bo?" Edgar snickered.
"If you ever call me Bo-Bo again, I'll yell out something crude beyond belief." Then he leaned and whispered it quickly into Edgar's ear.
Alan just leaned against the wall and watched his brother's face fill with pure horror. Bored, he glanced at the mirrors at the end of the aisle, and in one, he saw the reflection of a dark-haired girl with an older woman he suspected was her mother.
Hmm, that's probably the girl Edgar was talking about, Alan though to himself, fingering the edge of his jacket sleeves; he always wore a jacket when he went into the grocery store because it was always over-air conditioned, but to make sure…
"Hey Ed. Do we have any cereal left at home?"
"Uh… no, I don't think so."
Great coincidence, Alan thought to himself.
"Can you go get some? I think that it's the section just 5 aisles down."
"Get it yourself," Edgar muttered, but then Alan threatened him with what Bo had said he would yell at the top of his lungs in the store. So Edgar leisurely strolled over to the cereal aisle. He turned into the aisle, and he froze.
It was the girl whom he met a couple days ago, when she bought the comic book. While she was browsing the cereal, she was holding herself, trying to stay warm. Obviously her jacket wasn't warm enough to endure the grocery store's glacial climate. She was occasionally rubbing her long, creamy white legs together in order to bring heat back into them.
He quickly realized that there was no way that this was a mere coincidence; Alan must have set this up. He was going to storm back over to the men's section, but then he realized that he would be faced by a whole lot of bull coming from both his cousin and his brother. So he slowly walked along the other side of the aisle, observing the girl intently for any suspicious aspects that might suggest vampirism is present.
Nothing; she was only pale and graceful, but that was the extent of it. He finally found it safe to walk towards her.
"Hey."
She slowly turned around.
"Oh, hi," she said, pushing her long wavy dark hair away from her face, "how are you?"
"Uh, I'm all right. Just getting some stuff with my brother and my dirty cousin,"
Edgar said, adjusting his jacket a little bit; he could feel a little heat brew up under his shirt.
"I'm here with my mom, so my situation isn't all that different from yours." She picked up a box of Lucky Charms.
"Nothing humorous like a bowl of cereal in the morning," she muttered sarcastically, contemplating the nutrition facts.
"Well, did you know that Lucky Charms are made of real leprechauns?" Edgar joked lightly.
Laurence giggled a little. "Really. I had no idea."
"Yes, the leprechauns are imported directly from Ireland, and then they are sent to the guys at Quaker Oats." Edgar continued. Seeing Laurence giggle even more, he found it safe to go even further, this time employing a high-pitched Irish accent. "The silly little leprechauns have no idea what's coming to 'em, and they're all 'O, what a might-ee loh-va-lee countr-ee is the U-night-ed Staytes ohf Ah-meh-ree-cah!"
Laurence giggled even harder, and nearly fell over, clutching her stomach, shaking with laughter. Just then, a short red-headed kid walked over to them.
"Hey man, that is just not cool," he poked Edgar in the stomach with a rather menacing-looking expression on his face. Edgar just stared down at him, and Laurence stopped laughing. The kid's nametag said Sean.
Sean glared up at Edgar, and then walked away, then looked back over his shoulder, and yelled "AND WE DON'T TALK LIKE THAT, YOU FRICKIN' DIPSHIT!!!"
Edgar looked mighty pissed off. Laurence found the whole situation very funny.
"Never anger the Irish, or the Italians," she strongly suggested.
"Yeah, good call," Edgar said sarcastically, adjusting his red bandana.
There was an awkward silence for a good five minutes, and then Edgar spoke again.
"So you're here with your mom and dad?"
"Nope, just my mom," Laurence replied.
"Your dad's being lazy huh?"
Laurence was silent.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have-"
"It's not that. It's just that…I don't know who my dad is. He left my mom just one, maybe two years after I was born."
"Oh." Edgar was thinking.
"So it's just me, my mom, and my older brother Jason. Go figure."
"Hmm…"
They walked over to the fruit and vegetable display. Edgar mockingly picked some garlic and shook it in front of Laurence's face.
"Garlic anybody?"
Laurence then shook her head. "Please, get it away from me. I'm allergic to garlic!"
Allergic to garlic, eh? I don't think so, Edgar thought to himself suspiciously. If she had an aversion to garlic, then she still might be a vampire. But to get her to eat it…
"Sorry," Edgar said apologetically, putting the garlic back in its proper place on the display rack. He was still thinking of how he could get her to eat garlic.
"It's fine, you didn't know."
"Laurence, it's time to go!" She heard her mom call from the cash register.
Laurence rolled her eyes.
Great, just great, she thought to herself bitterly, I finally get to talk to this guy, and then we have to go home; figures.
"I gotta go. See you around?"
"Yeah, see you."
Laurence gave him a small smile, and then walked over to her mother's shopping cart. As soon as she was all the way over there, Edgar was joined by Alan and Bo.
"So that's vamp girl, huh?" Alan muttered. "No problem, if she is a vampire, she probably wouldn't be that hard to deal with."
"Who cares if she's a vampire? She's got an awesome- Wait, hold a minute, is that her mother with her?"
"Uh, yeah, why?" Edgar had a nasty feeling.
"Dude, her mom's HOT!"
"What?!" Edgar and Alan looked incredulously at their cousin.
This was probably #1 on their list of all the crude and absolutely disgusting things that Bo has ever said. Though looking at Mrs. Farrow, Edgar thought that she couldn't be older than 42, but definitely not young enough to be 35. She had the same thick, dark hair that was present in her daughter, but she was tanned, unlike her daughter, who could have been mistaken for a real-life Snow White. Although there was a slimness in the both of them, there was something about Laurence, which had nothing to do with age, that gave the impression that she was lighter, more graceful, than her mother.
"Hmmm," Alan was thinking to himself.
Bo turned to him.
"What?"
"Never mind, you… you don't listen."
"Since when?"
"Since always."
Edgar sighed; he was due to have to endure another long spat between his brother and his cousin. Not that like it was anything new, but he was trying very hard to focus on something else:
The look in Laurence's eyes when he had held up the garlic in front of her previously laughing face… a look that could have easily been interpreted as fear…
