Author's note:
Sorry for the long delay. My muse happens to be a fickle bitch, with very short attention span. But I guess at least the chapter's rather long this time, in exchange. Enjoy!

– CHAPTER TWO –
Photographs

It has been over a week since what Benny dubbed "the Rory incident", and apart from the small detail of Ethan having avoided punishment upon his return home, he really did not get any more information about the night, even though he was promised. Eventually, he had to file it away as a strictly no-pun-intended spell of spontaneity, and if it had not been for the free pizza, he would not have given it any more thought. That, however, was a rather big deal in his humble opinion, so much so that he should have taken offense… but upon taking really everything they have been through into consideration, he decided to just shrug it off, just this once. "After all, not much has changed, right?" He has been watching them both closely, well, as close as he could without being too obvious. Rory was not seen moping about since then, and he was sleeping over at Ethan's again.
Except for the part about sleeping.
Having tried to keep his eyes shut, as well as fixing them on a certain point on the ceiling, he first settled on attempting to hypnotise the alarm clock on the bedside table. This resulted in two revelations: one, his magic powers were absolutely inadequate to influence time just yet; two, time felt going much slower if he kept watching the minutes tick by. So, he got up and walked to the window, staring out, as if really believing for one moment that there could be anything interesting to watch there.
'I don't care…'
'Ethan?' He turned around as he heard his friend mumble.
'Please… Rory…' The brunette went on, clearly not awake.
His voice was not laced with panic, his movements did not seem like a violent struggle to get free – Benny figured he was not having a nightmare. "Wake him up, he'll be cranky all morning," he pondered. "But if I am wrong…"
'Please!'
'Ethan, wake up!' He tried, leaning close and gently shaking the other's shoulder.
Which, in hindsight, was a mistake, for the touch had an instant effect on Ethan, waking him up.
'WHAT?' He cried out, sitting bolt upright, head-butting Benny in the process, the impact knocking him over.
'OW, dude!...' the taller teen groaned as he picked himself up off the floor, rubbing his forehead.
'Benny? What… what are you doing up? … And why does my head hurt?' Ethan asked, apparently oblivious to what just happened.
'Um… you looked like you were having a not-so-pleasant dream, I woke you up, our heads met…' Benny supplied.
'Oh… Sorry I woke you up… are you okay?'
'Yeah, don't worry. And, I was up anyway.'
'I told ya not to eat all the sweets. You'll be a zombie tomorrow.'
'Uh, thanks, brainiac, but no, thank you. Been there once, it wasn't that good,' Benny fired back. 'Anyway, care to fill me in on your dream instead? Something about not caring about something…?' He asked, carefully, not wanting to mention the name.
'Huh. I-I …would, if I remembered any of it…' Ethan replied, looking confused.
He could not even recall dreaming, much less what about. Benny stared at him for a while, but then dropped the subject, not wanting to pursue it in the middle of the night with both of them needing sleep. But, he made a mental note to tackle Sarah with the issue.

– Meanwhile… –

He knew his closet was a mess, but he would not have thought it was this bad. Half an hour of searching and he has only gotten as far as having two piles: one on his bed, labelled "stuff"; and another – much bigger one – on the ground, in front of his bed, labelled "trash". He would have sworn that most of the "trash" had been thrown away ages ago: clothes that have been too small for him for far too long – "Won't really be having that problem anymore, I guess", he thought bitterly. Old textbooks and old, ripped schoolbags that have been of no use for years. Shoes and caps he could not imagine himself wearing ever, and yet, they did look old and worn. And finally, there at the very back on the top shelf: a shoebox. He blew on it and sneezed from the dust flying in the air promptly after, but took it to his desk anyway.
As he opened it and examined the contents, the memories flooded him, memories of people and places and events from his past. The summer vacation in London, when his parents still had time for him, unlike now when they are at work basically around the clock. The one Christmas that brought all his family together: his father's and mother's parents as well as his mother's brother with his wife and son. Celebrations and performances in kindergarten and elementary school that he always hated because they were awkward and embarrassing – yet, he held on to the memories because they were of him and his friends, together. That one time when they went on a fishing trip and he fell into the lake fully clothed, with his backpack still on his shoulder too: he laughed it away after he surfaced, together with Ethan and Benny. The visit to a circus and the glitter dust that was dropping out of his hair even two days later, thanks to the supposed-to-be-funny clown. The Halloween when they went trick-or-treating and Benny dressed up as a mummy and tripped over his wrappings and fell over just as a young couple opened the door for them. The day Ethan won his debating trophy: he was really proud of his friend, he squeezed the air out of his lungs – the only one with just the two of them.
All the tickets, tokens and most importantly: photographs.
Everything felt so long ago: Benny not towering over them like now, Ethan with short hair, his own glasses… He found one picture of themselves, the three amigos, sometime during the summer before their freshman year. Before everything changed…
'Rory, honey, lights off and go to sleep, it's far too late for you to be still up!' He heard his mother knocking on his door.
'Yeah, Mom, okay…' he sighed.
He placed the photo on top of the stack of schoolbooks, the rest of the items back in the shoebox which he shoved under his bed, then switched the lamp off.
He would have that photo framed.
Of course, he had no intention of sleeping, he could not have slept, anyway. He climbed out the window and floated up to the roof: stargazing always seemed to manage to take his mind off things he did not want to think about. Because, behind his totally nonchalant and carefree attitude to his new life – his undeath, as he preferred to call it –, he really did not fancy being a vampire all that much. Sure, the extra perks were nice, initially. But the magic has all but worn off; and finding blood to drink has always been a nuisance. Hunting for squirrels in the parks and forests or for rats around dumpsters in dark alleys – not exactly his definition of having fun. And obviously, even if there had been one human stupid enough to regularly feed him, he would not have accepted it. Sleeplessness also was a drag: he had used to be a notorious sleeper; not to mention having to forfeit sunny beaches, the best place to check out so much flesh of all the hot babes, well, that was just preposterous. But the most painful part was the memories.
All the tickets, tokens and most importantly: photographs. And all that they represented.
Fun times, together with people he loved and cared for, people who mattered. People, some of whom already passed away; the rest, he knew, would disappear just the same, while he would not even age. It was not all that difficult to see the real nature, the curse of vampirism. Not only were photos out of the question for evermore, but his friends would grow up – without him, even if spent his every waking moment with them. Which he really did have in abundance.
'Nothing could ever eclipse those days…' he whispered into the night as he stared at the heavens, remembering.
Solitude seemed a petrifying prospect to him. True, he had Sarah and Erica in the same predicament, but he doubted they would hang with him. Not for long, anyway.

– x –

The cafeteria was, to put it simply, crowded. It was the period of the day that most students had off so that they could have lunch without the need to hurry. Too bad that no one really seemed to care that this way, it was not really as time-efficient as it was supposed to be. Benny scanned the place a bit longer than usual to find Sarah. When he spotted her, he quickly walked over to take the only empty seat.
'Hey, Sarah,' he greeted the girl as he dropped his tray on the table and sat down next to her.
'Hello, Benny, what's up?' She smiled at him politely, then, noticing the boy was alone, she added jokingly: 'Left your better half?'
'Got something to discuss with the teacher, I believe,' the boy answered with a fake grin on his face. "It's actually lucky though, I mean… can I ask you something?'
Sarah looked at him questioningly: she could not imagine wanting to talk to her – alone. Or, just wanting to be alone at all, even if the sudden thought of Ethan and Benny going together even to the bathroom made her shudder with the general wrongness.
'Sure, fire away. Something's wrong?'
'No, nothing's wrong,' the lanky teen answered. Then he frowned. 'At least, I hope nothing's wrong…'
'Ooookay, you're being hard to read and frankly that's just scary. So, out with it.'
'Well… how do I say this…' he pondered, scratching his head. He looked around and leant closer to Sarah, so that they would not be overheard. His voice decreased to a barely audible whisper. 'Do you think… do you think E might … like … guys?'
Sarah's eyes shot wide open in shock: she really had no idea what to make of such a question. She went for playing safe.
'Benny, if this is supposed to be a prank, it didn't work,' she said, though she did not believe her friends would try pulling something like that. 'And if it's still about that night-…'
'No, no, no… It's not a prank, I swear. And it's not about that night either, more like… about last night,' Benny explained, gesturing frantically with his hands. Sarah eyed him curiously. 'Really, it's just… I couldn't sleep last night and heard him mumbling Rory's name… Think he was dreaming…'
There was a number of reasons why Ethan would call out Rory's name that Sarah could think of – some of them she would have preferred keeping out of her mind.
'What sort of dream do you think it was?'
'Well, it didn't seem like a nightmare to me… AND! Certainly nothing… er, indecent, either. I mean, not like I knew…'
Benny was definitely sweating now and blushing profusely. He usually acted like a big player, but that's all it was: an act. He really was not all that comfortable discussing such topics with others, except maybe for Ethan.
'Riiight. Benny, I don't think you should be jumping to conclusions. And in any case, it's not like you had a problem, even if he did, right?'
"No, of course not," he thought. Ethan was his best friend. But he has been watching them both and was not blind. He noticed their wider, more frequent smiles. The secret glances they cast at each other when they thought the other was not looking…
'Yeah. I mean, no, of course not,' he blurted out, just as Ethan appeared and took seat on Sarah's other side that freed up in the meantime.
'Whew! And here we always think queues only form in front of the ladies' room! I mean, hi, Sarah!' He explained what he thought was a long absence, only greeting the girl as an afterthought. Then, when he sensed the awkward silence that set in with his arrival, he had to ask: 'Um … did I … interrupt something?'
'I think someone's looking for you, Ethan,' Sarah said as she nodded towards the cafeteria exit, avoiding the answer but throwing a significant look towards Benny. 'Excuse me, guys, I better find Erica before she decides she wants an… unhealthy dessert.'
She left the table with the two boys staring after her, bewildered.
'Whoa, what happened here? You tried hitting on her again while I was away?' Ethan teased his friend.
'What? No, I didn't!' Benny replied indignantly. 'I… I don't know, it beats me, dude…'
'Yo, guys! I couldn't find you in here! Lucky Sarah passed by me on her way out…' Rory chatted as he took the girl's seat.
'Huh. What happened to your super senses, Prince of Darkness?' Benny asked, snapped by to reality by the chirpy blonde, with a grin on his face.
'Well, I can't very well start sniffing around for E-… for your blood, dude, now, can I? I mean, not in here, especially when it's so packed with people…'
"There it is again!" Benny noted, mentally. Sometimes he was too observant for his own good. "Bugger me with a pitchfork if he didn't mean to say Ethan's blood!"
Rory, however, found himself in a tight spot for an entirely different reason. "Shoot! Ethan's blood? What the heck? I mean, I know it's special…but why on earth would I want to single him out?"
Independently though, but they both concluded it was fortunate that Ethan was so oblivious. It would have been awkward…
'So, anyways,' Rory spoke, 'I wanted to ask if I could come over after school, E? I mean, ya know, those poems are the death of me…'
Ethan and Benny gave him an odd, mischievous look, never missingan opportunity to tease him about his state. Given the long years of friendship they shared, words were not always a necessity
'Yeah, yeah, it's so funny you might as well just knock it off already,' he replied dismissively. 'Answer, E?'
'Would you stay home if I said no?' Ethan asked back, smiling. 'What's with asking, anyway? You never ask, you just show up, and was it ever a problem?'
'Erm, yeah… remember, when your parents-…'
'GAH, okay, okay, we don't need the details!' Ethan all but jumped from his seat.
'In any case, dude, I'm sure Ethan won't mind,' Benny piped in. 'His place's like a come-and-go motel already, anyway.'
'…which is exactly why I'm gonna start charging if you go on like that!' Ethan snapped, gently punching his friend in the shoulder. 'And Ror, you can come whenever you want. Just… you know, use the front door, okay? I'm seriously out of fibs to tell Mom when she asks how you got here when you just… fly in.'

– x –

The shop was empty, but that did not exactly come as a surprise. With better and better camera phones spreading like wildfires, photography, in the classic sense, narrowed down to professionals. And enthusiastic amateurs, who thought they were professionals if they bought a real expensive camera. But Rory did not care about that, actually, he was only there for a photo frame.
'Hello, can I help you?' A young girl emerged from somewhere, when he's already spent about fifteen minutes just browsing what was on display. She was short, maybe in her twenties, hair in a small bun, wearing spectacles. The boy started rummaging through his bag, looking for his literature textbook he knew held the special photo within.
'Oh, hi… I… um… I'd like… I'd like a frame for this…' he finally said when he found it.
'I see… that's a bit unusual size, did you have anything in mind? Plastic, wood, metal? Ornate or something simple?'
'Er… I don't know, really…' he wondered, frowning. 'There's so many here… Say… Plastic's good, I guess… No, wait, make it wood.'
He was almost stuttering, but he really did not think it through, and the wide selection did confuse him too, a bit.
'Mm-hm, I think we have these in the right size,' the girl answered, gesturing towards the right half of the top shelf.
'You're not guiding me to your most expensive ones, right?' Rory joked, with a smile on his face, although, he was, in fact, rather short on money. The girls seemed to get it, because she smiled back.
'Believe me, I'm not getting a cut of whatever gets sold, so no, I've no motivation to, don't worry.'
'Cool. Um… say, that one there, second from the right,' he said, pointing towards the frame in question.
'Sure thing, I'll be back in a bit,' she nodded and left to the storage room in the back.
Rory was left alone in the store with his photo. And his thoughts. As big a geek as he was, photography was the one area that just was not his thing, so nothing really caught his attention. His mind wandered as he was staring at the picture, and he realised how smoothly he switched between his silly, flirty, easy-going self that everyone knew and the deep, melancholic, now rather empty one that was crushed by the consciousness of being alone. The way he slipped into the cheery, "normal" role just now, with this store clerk: so simple and effortless, it basically scared him. Not because it happened here, with this particular person – but because it happened each and every time when he was in school, when he was with his friends. Those friends that looked back at him from the image. Those friends that smiled back at him from the image. He still had them now, but who knows for how long still?...
'Want me to put it in for you?' The girl's voice suddenly penetrated his mind again, yanking him out of his musings.
'Uh, um… well, yeah, please, if it's no trouble…'
He handed the photo over and she placed it on the desk while she freed the frame from the packaging, but Rory could tell she was examining it the whole time.
'Nice shot. Nice memories attached too, I assume?'
'Oh, yes, I mean… no special occasion, this one, really, just… being together. Cleaning the attic at Ethan's, digging for stuff for a garage sale last summer, and we came across this old camera still utilising film… and Ethan's mother took a photo of us. That's the shorter one there, Ethan…'
'That sounds great. Good friends, huh?'
'Best friends,' the vampire corrected, 'forever.'
It was not really his intention to chat like that, to reveal bits of his past to this stranger, but she asked and the memory flooded him, and once again it was way too easy to put on the nice mask. Still, adding the last word did sting though, but it left his mouth sooner than he could have thought about it. He wanted it to be there, simply because it is expected to be there, but he felt the implausibility of it. Normally, "forever", in such a context, referred to something like "until the end of my life", but whatever happens to that when there is no end to one's life? When one's life already ended, when that someone is already dead?
On another note, he also knew perfectly well that although he did consider the two of them his best friends, he was more like a third wheel in their relationship, because they were each other's best friends. "Figures", he thought, "they better comply with the forever-rule."
'That'll be eight-fifty, if you don't need anything else…?'
He handed the bills over and took the plastic bag with his treasure in it, thanked and said goodbye way too fast, only to be out of the store as soon as possible. He did not like the thoughts that invaded his mind in there.

– x –

'So, this one goes there… and then it goes… that…waaaaay…?'
Ethan groaned as he saw Benny's hand doing just about everything wrong in his notebook. He has already shown him how to solve this particular type of problem three times, but he did not seem to get it.
'No, Benny, that was the exact opposite of what you should have done! Pay attention already!'
'Pfft, bollocks. Come on, E, it's not like I'll ever need any of this crap in my life, and you know that too!'
That was absolutely typical of Benny: he always complained about how useless about ninety per cent of their curriculum was. The worst in it all was the fact that most of the time Ethan had to agree with him.
'Yeah. But you don't want to get an F on it either. Unless,' he added when he noticed Benny's mouth was about to open, 'you get off on your grandmother making your life hell.'
'…DUDE! THAT IS SICK!' Benny cried out, half disgusted, half offended, frowning. 'Really. Sometimes I'm worried for you, man.'
Just then, the doorbell rang, making them both look up.
'That's Rory,' Benny stated the obvious.
'Right,' Ethan nodded, grinning silly. 'Let's take a break, okay? Or, you can go over it again, it certainly won't do any harm.'
'Ugh, no thanks, I'm totally dehydrated. I'll grab a drink.'
By the time they descended the stairs, Jane already let the blonde vampire in.
'Yo, guys! I'm here,' Rory announced with his trademark wide smile.
'Yeah, we kinda see that…'
'Hey, Ethan, can I use your bathroom? Think I had way too much soda.'
'Um, sure. You know the way,' Ethan replied, nodding towards the direction of their bathroom.
Rory put his backpack and the bag on the kitchen counter and disappeared, while Benny stepped to the fridge to find himself the box of orange juice he knew was in there. He took one swig when he noticed the white plastic bag and pointed at it.
'What d'you reckon he's carrying around in that? His dinner?'
'I've no idea, but I told you to use a damn glass! You know how Mom always freaks out about anyone drinking straight from the box,' Ethan ranted, taking the tainted object from Benny's hand.
'Alright, alright, geez… sorry. Anyhow, let's see…' the taller teen said, reaching for the bag and removing its content and holding it up so his friend could see it as well. 'Hey! Check this out!'
'…I should say something about how you're not supposed to just go through people's belongings,' Ethan sighed, 'but what with your drinking habits, I doubt it'd have any effect.'
'It's not random, E, it's Rory's!'
'Okay, you're missing the point, but Rory not being random… that's a first,' the brunette concluded as his friend gave him the photo. 'Hey, that's us!'
'Yep, and freshly framed too, from the looks of it.'
'So, can we head… upstairs..?' Rory asked, appearing behind them, but was stopped in his words when he noticed his friends looking at their picture.
'You're not out to trap our souls with that, dude, right?' Benny joked.
'It's just a… memory, Benny, that's all', he answered, blushing slightly, snatching it from Ethan's hand. He was not sure whether he should be miffed at the invasion of his privacy, but he figured, who else would be entitled to it if not the two people he called his best friends?
'Hey, it's cool, y'know,' Ethan chirped in, patting his shoulder reassuringly. 'I've one in my room too.'
Benny and Rory turned to him and spoke at once, one excited, one just frowning again.
'You do?'
'No, you do not!'
It turned out that Ethan was not lying: there indeed was a framed photo of the three of them on one of his many shelves. Slightly obstructed by a few of his action figures, true, but it was there. It made Benny slightly uncomfortable: was he really that inconsiderate? Shallow? Because, apparently, he was the only one of them without any hard proof of their friendship in his room. It confused him. He was upset over the mere suspicion that Ethan and Rory might subconsciously have a thing for each other, but now it seemed he was a horrible human being for not displaying the affection that surely was there. After all, he did like both of them, even if the blonde often annoyed him. The whole thing was further amplified as he watched them giggle.
'Benny doesn't seem to be here,' his brain started to pick up Rory's words.
'Yeah, he likes to zone out on things he doesn't understand,' Ethan explained, pointing towards the taller teen's math notebook, hastily thrown on the bed.
'Oh? What problem?'
Rory grabbed the notebook and quickly skimmed through what was supposed to be Benny's homework. He could not help snapping his fingers when realisation hit him.
'Whoa, hey!' He shook Benny's shoulder to get his attention.
'Huuuh, what? Hey, that's my-…'
'Yeah, yeah, listen here, genius,' the vampire cut in, grabbing a pen from Ethan's desk. He circled a certain part in the problem. 'You just pick this here li'l dude up… and move it over… there. Now, go solve it!'
A few minutes later, during which Ethan started to unwrap the mysteries of Shakespeare's sonnets to Rory, Benny was staring at his notebook incredulously: he solved the problem and it seemed good too. He glanced up and spoke in a somewhat scared voice.
'E, we have a problem.'
'Yeah?'
'Yeah. Never thought I'd say this, but… Rory's a freakin' genius.'
'What? You got it right? Let me see…'
A quick look was enough for Ethan to see that the solution was indeed correct.
'Well, better late than never, I guess.'
'Yeah, you spent an hour explaining, and Rory got me through it all in a minute. How's that?'
'Hey, no need to thank,' Rory shrugged humbly, even though Benny did not actually thank it yet. 'I do have too much free time since… since I don't sleep, y'know. Figured that trick out after I spent hours struggling with it myself. And the best thing is, it's totally fool proof. It doesn't alter the data, just modifies how you tackle it, so you don't end up going the wrong way…'
Benny had to admit he really needed to get a picture of them framed: their friends always came through for him, no matter if he continuously ended up doing stupid things or was just plain hopeless at something. It was the least they deserved…