Nick hit the brakes so abruptly that LaCroix was nearly pitched into the front seat. As it was, he materialized there a moment later.
"Really, Nicholas... driving like a bumpkin already? And your best beloved, falling down among the local drunkards. And I had such high hopes for your little experiment in country living."
Nick cut off the engine and turned in his seat to glare at his unwelcome companion. He had thought, he had hoped, LaCroix might leave him and Maura in peace at least for a little while. Especially Maura. Tormenting her had always been one of LaCroix's pet pastimes.
"This isn't an 'experiment' LaCroix," he growled, "You know every reason why we left. I thought maybe you'd find some other amusement than to make things harder for her, especially now."
The older vampire shook his head. "Always expecting the worst of me, isn't that just like an ungrateful son. The truth, dear Nicholas, is that the Community is, to use a worn cliché, 'gone to hell'. Time marches on... our former companions have all departed, leaving nothing but undisciplined fledglings, their equally undisciplined masters, and a growing flock of carouches to litter the streets."
He spoke with affected weariness, but Nick wasn't impressed. Why should he be? In eight hundred and ten years, he'd heard it all before.
"I'm still waiting to hear why you've come. Who's running Raven while you go slumming among the 'bumpkins' and 'local drunkards'?"
"Oh, that." LaCroix rolled his eyes, dropping the persona that he could see was making no impression on Nick. "I sold it to some mortal, I believe he's turned it into a predictably déclassé 'family' eatery." The shudder that followed was absolutely genuine.
Even Nick was put off by the idea. Raven had been the place at the center of the Community, the center of their existence, where it was safe to be themselves, and to enjoy for some brief hours who they really were. It was where he had found respite and refuge with Janette, long before the refuge and life he'd found with Maura. So much of his existence would not be as it was now if not for Raven.
Forcing the image of hanging plants and plastic tabletops from his mind Nick asked, "What about CERK, the Night Crawler? I can't believe you'd leave your willing audience of mortals hanging on your every philosophical soliloquy." He didn't try to conceal the sarcasm, which LaCroix (of course) pretended to ignore.
"Even worshipful silence can become a bore," LaCroix confessed, and his expression curdled with disgust as he added, "and the CERK programmers were pushing an in-studio interview segment. Can you imagine? It's one thing to address the phoned-in 'issues' of the great intellectually unwashed ... but quite another to be forced to converse with them in person."
Nick was almost - though not quite - moved to sympathy. If there was a version of lowest level of hell for LaCroix, his description of the downfall of his former empire of superiority had just captured it perfectly. Nothing tortured him more than to be forced to endure the mediocrity of modern mortals.
He started the Caddy again but didn't put it in gear. "Look, I'd love to sit here listening to you describe your latest existential disappointments, but I have somewhere go go. And no, you are not coming along."
"Ah yes, you're seeking employment as a common laborer. Don't worry, the job is yours."
"If you've gotten involved in this somehow..." Nick glowered, but LaCroix laughed at his growing anger.
"Do calm yourself, I did nothing of the sort. I have simply been conducting some... reconnaissance, and overheard some locals discussing you and your blushing bride. It seems you've made quite a favorable impression, with only a bit of the usual mystery. In fact I salute your success in fitting in so quickly... even if I wonder how long it will last."
"Enough, LaCroix. You won't find this place to your liking, there are too few people to cover the customary disappearances that happen when you arrive in a new town. And much too little cynicism for your taste. Go find a nice, big, shiny anonymous city to lose yourself in. I guarantee you'll be back to your version of 'normal' in no time at all." When the other vampire failed to leave, he added pointedly, "That was not a suggestion."
LaCroix gestured in exasperation. "Oh, very well. You obviously will have no interest at all in what I have planned for my new incarnation." Then he brightened... always a bad sign. "I'll discuss it with your Maura, she of the logical mind." He looked Nick over, taking in his new denim working-class persona. "In some respects."
"I wouldn't advise that, LaCroix. Of everything she left behind, you were the one thing she was glad to be losing. She's already getting a lot stronger than she used to be, in spite of everything that's happened."
"Nonsense," dismissed the other. "You may find her formidable, but you have always been a slave to sentiment. Her wrath will be an amusing diversion."
And with that, he was gone. Nick very briefly considered returning home, and quickly decided against it. He really had noticed Maura beginning to revive into her old self and perhaps something more. Her honest revelations last night were a sign of something new that was happening in her as well, more than just recovering the confidence and sense of herself that had been so beaten down by recent (and not so recent) events. It occurred to him that LaCroix would likely find her a bit more formidable than "amusing". He laughed to himself as he gunned the engine, speeding up so he'd get to Ernie's before closing time. In a strange way LaCroix's appearance gave him new determination to make the most of this new life and this new place, in spite of the eternal doubts of the vampire who had created him.
"Poor LaCroix, I think you're about to be disappointed again."