Author's Note: Sorry about the delay – I know I promised to get this to you on Tuesday. It turns out, I'm not infallible. Grrr…
Chapter Six:
Santa Monica, California, 1949
It was a nice evening, for winter. I'd found that Californian winter was nothing like winter further north. To start with, there was no snow, which meant that my clothes didn't get too dirty. Of course, the woman who'd rented me my room had looked at me strangely, with my pale skin. I told her I was a traveler from Canada, and she never questioned it.
I walked through the small town now, unnoticed in the winter dark. It was suppertime, and in this neighborhood the dining rooms all faced out onto the street. I passed many families sitting around the table, eating, talking. I wasn't paying attention to them, wasn't searching for anything to eat. I just needed to move, to clear my head.
Something had changed in me, and I couldn't figure it out. There was certainly no conscious decision, no major change in attitude. It had been nagging at me since I'd watched the little boy doting on the pretty little girl – a girl I couldn't, after all, bring myself to kill.
Why couldn't I kill her? I knew what she would grow up to become. I had power, and the responsibility to use it. I knew what would happen as the little boy grew up, too. If not her, it would be someone else. Always someone laughing, always someone mean; it was the way the world worked. I felt pathetic, useless; I couldn't save anyone.
It kept going through my head, a thought I couldn't shove away. The little girl could change. The little boy could become thin and handsome. I wasn't God; I didn't have that kind of power.
And then I snorted; when was the last time I had thought about God? Who was he to me anymore? I would live forever; I didn't need him or his broken promises anymore. When had I worried about stepping on his toes?
Still. I turned to the humans around me for proof. They were unworthy to live, by anyone's standards, weren't they?
It was then I discovered something disturbing. I crouched under the front window of the first house I came to, listening to the dinner conversations. Maybe this father was a lawyer who'd swindled from a bankrupt family. Maybe this mother gossiped about the poor single mother living across town. Maybe this daughter slept with her boyfriend, even though she didn't love him. Maybe this son cheated on his homework.
Instead, this father talked about his job as a firefighter – about the baby he'd saved from a burning building, and how grateful its parents had been. Instead, this mother talked about organizing a welcome party for Nancy next door, who was new to the neighborhood. Instead, this daughter talked about a new dress she wanted to buy; shallow, but innocent. Instead, this son spoke of his high hopes for next weeks' basketball game.
I moved away from the house, disappointed. The family was a sweet picture; laughing, smiling, listening eagerly as stories passed around the table. Maybe I would paint it someday, but right now I had to find proof that I was right. This had to be an anomaly. Families couldn't be happy. People couldn't be innocent.
Two houses down, a mother fussed over her crying baby. She told her husband he spent too much time worrying about the stock market instead of helping her. He told her he had to worry about money now, because of the baby. She asked if he didn't want the baby. He told her that he loved the baby, was glad to spend extra time saving up for its college education. He told her he loved her. She kissed him.
It was too sweet. Every house I turned to, no matter how many problems they had or mistakes they made, these families were happy. They had no malicious intent. No evil tendencies. I didn't want to be wrong – couldn't be wrong! I based my entire lifestyle on these assumptions. On my own experience! How could I be wrong?
But – I couldn't let this happen to me. I had to think it through. Had to remember my years at the orphanage, remember my rage. I returned to my rented room and sat on the bed, head in my hands.
Once it occurred to me, it was impossible to ignore. Had I brought this upon myself? I couldn't control the stock market crash, or my parents' subsequent downfall, but there was plenty else I could control. Maybe if I had made friends, instead of closing in upon myself. If I had listened in class – no matter how odious – I wouldn't be called "stupid." And there would be no one to call me Stupid Curly, because I would have friends, and they would know that I was Mildred. If I had chosen to talk to Sister Mary, instead of just silently soaking up her stories, she might have felt loved, might not have starved herself. I could be thankful for the years I had with Molly, like a little sister to me, instead of angry.
I couldn't change that all now, however. I was still here, still stuck, a vampire. I was no longer angry at the humans, but at myself. What was I to do?
I pulled out my sketch pad, and began my drawing of a family around a dinner table. Margaret Rose; I couldn't remember her, so I drew her as I imagined her, serving up a roast. My father, with a smile and a carving knife, telling me a story. Myself, a sixteen year old girl with plain brown eyes, not a monster, but a happy teenager in a pretty pink dress, laughing at something my father had said.
It would never be, but it was a pretty picture all the same. This one, I wouldn't sell.
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