This, Roman thought happily, This is exactly what I've been missing. He had moved on from a little tipsy to properly drunk a while ago. He was leaning against Peter on the couch, his feet propped up on the table next to his, his eyes half-closed. Suddenly, he remembered something that seemed of vital importance to tell Peter.

"You know what's funny?"

Peter turned and looked at him. "Your face?", he dead-panned. They both broke out in giggles.

"Nooo. When I was little I always fantasized about being a werewolf."

"For real?"

"Yup. I saw one of the werewolf movies, can't remember which 'n I thought if I could turn into a wolf 'n run free in the woods, I could like join a pack and nobody would care that my father was dead 'n that my family was weird. I'd be the pack leader, of course. And me and my pack would just run in the forest and eat rabbits and kill deer 'n shit. And I wouldn't be alone ever again."

"Hmm." Peter said thoughtfully.

"So, when you were little, did you already turn? Were you like an adorable tiny wolf cub?" Roman imitated wolf cub cooing noises.

"Naah. That'd be weird. Y'know, when I was little I wanted to be a dragon."

"Hmmm. Why?"

"Y'know 'cause dragons are all wise and shit but when somebody pisses them off, they just go 'Roaaaar' and burn down the fucking village. Nobody messes with dragons. They're respected and king of their territory."

"You mean dragons are for real?"

Peter raised an eyebrow at his friend. "No, dragons are not for real, dumbass."

Roman looked indignant for a moment but then smiled. "Shame."

"Eh, dunno. 'm sure we'd founda way to make one mad at us if they 'xisted. Seems to be our thing."

"True." Roman leaned back on the couch, sighing. "When did it all go to shit?"

"No idea. Probably 's all your fault. 'was just doing fine before I met you." Peter turned around grinning and saw a deeply hurt look in Roman's eyes before the upir hid it behind an all too familiar mask. "Jesus, Roman. 'm joking. I screwed up just as bad as you. Maybe worse, recently."

Roman was still giving him the blank mask. Which was quite an impressive feat, given his state of non-sobriety.

For some reason, Peter suddenly felt that it was of vital importance that he made this abundantly clear to Roman, It felt almost like a premonition.

He looked Roman in the eye and put both of hands on either side of Roman's face for emphasis. It seemed like the most natural thing in the world.

"Listen up, Roman. If it hadn't been for you things would have been much worse, much sooner. You've helped me and defended me every step of the way and I've been a lousy friend. I've abandoned you and just came to you whenever I needed something. I'm sorry. You deserve better." Whoa. Where had all of that come from? Peter dropped his hands and leaned back, surprised at his outburst.

When he looked up again to apologize for the emotional outpour, he saw that Roman was looking at him wide-eyed. Peter closed his mouth again in surprise.

"Peter." Roman seemed to almost choke on the word. "There's something I've been meaning to tell you." He sounded completely sober again. Peter saw that the upir's hand holding the whiskey glass was shaking badly.

Roman took a deep breath. He put the glass down and sat up straight. He put the palms of his hands together in front of his mouth and exhaled slowly, bracing himself. Peter could feel the tension radiating off of him.

They sat like this in silence for a while until it become too much for Peter. Just when he was about to break the silence, Roman started talking slowly. He was pointedly not looking at Peter, staring straight ahead.

"You know how I can influence people sometimes, right? Like, command them to do what I want?" Peter nodded, and then realized that Roman couldn't see it. The upir continued anyway. "My mother used her power on me somehow. She made me do something. Planted the suggestion in my head. You have to believe me that I didn't know what I was doing. I only found out afterwards." Peter's question was almost a whisper "What did you do?"

"You remember how Letha thought Nadia's father was an angel?" Roman's voice had died down to a whisper as well. Peter felt cold ice run down his spine. No.. He wanted to ask Roman to just stop talking but no words came out.

Roman's heart beat was racing and his breath was coming is short gasps. He was sure that he was putting everything on the line. He had a sudden vision of Peter walking out and never coming back. The thought was almost overwhelming. He wasn't sure if he could bear that again. But there was nothing for it. He had to pull through and see what was left of the friendship when he was done.

"It was me." The words were barely a whisper but Peter's acute hearing picked them up anyway. "I'm Nadia's father." With an effort of will, Roman continued talking. "And do you want to know the kicker of this story?" No., Peter thought again. He definitely did not want to hear the kicker of this story. "Turns out, Norman was my father.

He took a deep breath and almost spat out, "Letha was my half-sister."

Finally, he turned to Peter, trying to gauge the other's reaction. "How's that for fucked up, huh?"

Peter raised his hand in a gesture that clearly communicated I can't deal with this right now and jumped up from the couch. He paced back and forth for a couple of seconds, mussing up his hair with his hands without even noticing. Finally, he stopped in front of Roman and raised his hand as if he was about to start speaking, but in the end he couldn't speak. Without a word, he stormed out of the front door.

Peter sat down behind the wheel of his car and took a deep breath. How did he think this would be a good idea? Everything he touched at the moment turned to shit. I'm the motherfucking gypsy Midas, he thought bitterly. All of a sudden, he was angry. He started hitting the steering wheel with ferocity, cursing loudly. Then he jumped out of the car and kicked the side of it for good measure. His anger deflated as suddenly as it had appeared.

Fuck. He tried to think rationally. He knew that Roman had loved Letha and would never have willingly hurt her. He knew that the compulsion to obey an upir using his power was overwhelming. Back then, Roman had the potential, but he was not an upir yet, whereas his mother had already been very powerful. All of these things made sense, yet he couldn't help feeling betrayed.

He was distracted in his thoughts by a loud crash. Weary, Peter slowly made his way back toward the house.

When he stormed out, he had left the door ajar and through the gap he could see the glass table in the living room. It was turned over and in shambles. He saw no sign of Roman.

For the second time that day, he was filled with indecision. Again, his instinct was just to bolt and not look back.

With a heavy sigh, he admitted to himself that acting against his instinct had turned out for the best earlier and opened the door all the way. He spotted Roman in the corner, just as the upir punched the wall with full force. Roman cursed loudly and turned around, shaking his hand. Peter noted that a sizeable chunk of wall had evaporated. Even though he had seen it in action many times, he was still taken by surprise by the upir's strength.

Roman was staring at him dumbly, still shaking his bleeding hand. Peter cleared his throat.

"Um, listen, Roman." Peter tried very hard to find the right words, he did not want to fuck this up as well. "I'm sorry I just ran out. I'm gonna need some time to process … this." He gestured vaguely around. "I know it wasn't your fault. But I … just … okay?" So much for finding the right words.

Roman gave a small nod and Peter returned the gesture. Then he turned around and calmly left the house.