Don't apologize, I love the questions. I would say that they've got to be sixteen or seventeenish by now? Its got to be over a year or more since the story began. Doing a birthday is a great idea! Definitely need to do that! I guess you could say that about Liz and Kyle, in a way that day is their re-birthday lol.

That night had been relatively quiet. Matt stayed up all night keeping an eye on the werewolf girl while the rest of us slept. I don't know if she ever fell asleep. When I woke in the morning, Simon was already up and Matt had fallen asleep accidentally. Simon was sitting beside the girl in front of the TV.

"I know you don't want to talk," Simon said. "But could you at least give us your name?"

She kept watching the TV, Simon frowned. Thinking she wasn't going to answer.

"Emma," she whispered.

Simon smiled.

"Thank you Emma."

Simon turned back to the TV too. He didn't want to push her with more questions. I got up and showered, by the time I was out, almost everyone was up. Tori tossed me a granola bar.

"Looks like Matt will be sleeping away the day," she said. "What do we want to do today?"

I shrugged as I ate.

"Why don't we just explore the town until we find something to do?"

It was as good a plan as any. We didn't really know what there was to do around here. Jeremy decided he wanted to stay behind with Emma. He said he didn't want Matt to wake up all alone with her. The rest of us ate, got dressed, and we were off.

Walking around felt nice, none of us really cared about the layer of snow on the ground. We wandered for maybe an hour before coming upon a strip mall. Tori and Liz insisted we went inside.

I'm not a huge shopper so I wandered around with the boys instead. Simon was showing Kyle all the stuff he missed over the years. Xbox and PlayStation and the multitude of games. Kyle was fascinated that people could sit in front of TVs for hours just pushing buttons. It dawned on me, had I ever really asked Kyle how he died or even just what time he was from?

"Hey Kyle," I said. "Can I ask you something personal?"

"Of course," Kyle nodded as he read the backs of DVDs.

"What time are you from?"

Kyle looked up at me.

"I died in 1996," he said.

That was around the time most of us were born…

"We don't have to talk about that if you don't want to," I said.

Kyle smiled, "Its not that big of a deal. It happened so long ago now. To be honest I'm surprised it took this long for someone to ask. Do you want to know how?" Kyle glanced around to make sure humans were out of earshot. "Before that place was a motel, it was an orchard. Beautiful farm. I went with my family one day to pick apples and we found most of the trees picked clean along the bottoms. The apples were out of reach. So I climbed the trees, filled our buckets and passed them down. I'm sure you can figure out what happened next."

"You fell…" Simon said.

Kyle nodded, "Onto a discarded pitchfork."

I gasped. "I'm so sorry."

Kyle shrugged it off, "Its in the past now. I'm alive again."

Derek shook his head bewildered, "I've never seen someone so okay with their death."

"I've never seen someone so ok with speaking their mind," Kyle teased.

Simon and I laughed.

We browsed the DVD section for a bit longer and picked out a handful of cheap movies we wanted Kyle to see. Then met up with Liz and Tori to get food. We decided on splitting a pizza because it was the cheapest option.

It was getting late in the afternoon now so we thought we should head back. It was snowing lightly so we walked fast.

We got back, knocked the snow off our shoes and headed back to the room. Matt was still asleep when we walked in. Jeremy and Emma sat on the floor beside the bed.

"Hey," Jeremy smiled at us.

"Hey," we said back.

I could hear Emma's stomach growling from where I was standing. I came over and knelt in front of her. While everyone else got settled in.

"Do you want to eat?" I asked her.

She had a worried look in her eyes, I took her by the hand.

"Come on, I promise nothing bad will happen."

I helped Emma over to where we had the food and got her a chocolate chip granola bar.

"Here, it's really good."

Emma took it and ate it quickly.

"How old are you Emma?" I asked.

She swallowed and looked at me, "Nineteen."

"Wow," I smiled then added. "Thank you for telling me."

She smiled back at me. I could hear her stomach still growling.

"Do you want another?" I asked.

Her smile disappeared, replaced by a look of fear. She shook her head panicking. Jeremy quickly came over and put his hands on her shoulders.

"Shhh," he said. "Its okay. Calm down you don't want to change."

She drew her good leg to her chest.

Time Skip to later that night

It was dark in the room. The only light came through the window from a streetlight outside. Jeremy and Emma were the only other ones up. I don't think they noticed I was still awake too.

"Emma, why won't you eat? I can hear you're starving. You know we are the good guys. We didn't do anything to the food."

"They did things…"

Emma was talking!

"The vampires? What did they do to your food?"

Emma shook her head, "To me not to food."

Jeremy pushed something away from his has he spoke.

"What happened?" He said. "Ow. Paper cut."

Emma started hyperventilating.

"Its just a paper cut," Jeremy tried to reassure her.

"Go," she backed away from him. "Get away."

I sat up, ready to intervene.

"Emma," Jeremy sighed.

I smelled the drop of blood on his finger and saw the look of panic in her eyes as her stomach growled.

"Jeremy you should go," I quickly got out of the bed.

"Why?"

"Just go," I snapped quietly.

I grabbed Emma's arms and Jeremy quickly went out into the hallway.

Her hyperventilating slowed. She laid her head against my chest.

"Don't let me hurt him," she said.

I let go of her arms and hugged her gently.

"I won't."

She was still shaking.

"How'd you figure it out?" She asked.

"I've seen that look before," I said vaguely. "Is this why you haven't been talking?"

My shirt felt damp as she sniffed. She was crying.

"What would they say if they saw the fangs?"

"That we're different too and we will help you."

One of her hands went to her stomach, "I'm so hungry."

"We'll figure it out," I promised.

Jeremy opened the door slowly.

"Can I come back yet?"

I could feel Emma tense.

"Have you stopped bleeding?" I asked.

Jeremy looked at his finger, "Yes."

"Wash your hands first," I said.

Jeremy washed them then came over.

"What was that about?" He asked.

"Jeremy," I spoke for Emma who was still buried in my shirt. "She's got some vampire in her."

I watched it click into place in Jeremy's head. His jaw dropped.

"You need blood Emma? Why didn't you just say so?"

Jeremy grabbed a small knife from his sock.

"What're you doing?!" I scolded him while trying not to yell too loud.

"She needs blood, she'll get it."

Before I could snatch the knife from Jeremy, the blade cut into his bicep. Blood immediately started flowing down his arm. Emma grabbed me tightly trying to control herself. She shook harder and harder.

"It's okay Emma. You're not hurting me if I'm willing," Jeremy said setting the knife down.

Blood was getting all over Jeremy, Emma couldn't control it anymore and jumped at him. Fangs sinking into the cut.