A/N: So, I was cooking supper and writing Night Shift chapter 8 last night, as one does, and I was hit in the face with a very demanding and insistent plot bunny. Fucker just wouldn't leave me alone. I started out writing notes for later, which turned into just plain old writing. So, I stayed up until four in the morning and wrote the goddamn thing. So, please. Have a 5000 word binge-written one-shot. A rarity for me, I must say.
By the way, I finished the Night Shift chapter this morning, too. 😬😀
One Last Kiss Goodbye
Pam sat on the sofa in her office, amused. One of Sookie's granddaughters was visiting and she was poring through the photos on Pam's computer, asking a million questions and making several very funny comments about places Pam had visited and vampires she'd known over the years. Pam had finally separated out the ones she thought the girl could handle. Nothing over a PG-13, she was quite sure. Sookie's granddaughter had been begging her to do it for years. She had always been a curious child, although Sookie was more apt to just call her nosy.
It was Adele's youngest, and Pam's favourite, which wasn't a secret to anyone. Pam had been spoiling her rotten right from the beginning. She and Adele had had a bit of a thing once upon a time, which had been casually revisited many more times over the years, but Adele's daughter reminded Pam so much of Sookie back in the day that she couldn't resist. Both Sookie and Adele had warned her away from the girl, but she was completely uninterested in her on a sexual level. That wasn't what this was about. She'd loved her ever since she was born, for goodness sakes. Besides, the girl was stick-straight, just like her grandmother.
For Pam's part, she had done the same with Eric, and threatened him with bodily harm if he touched any of them, and this girl in particular. She really tried not to mention any of the Merlotte clan to him but sometimes it was inevitable. And, if he ever saw a picture of this human girl, he might get some ideas.
Sookie's granddaughter had always thrown herself into whatever her current passion happened to be. When she was five, it had been fairy tales, and Pam had regaled her with stories of every princess she'd ever met. Only the parts mostly fit for a five year old's ears, at least. And she'd been delighted to buy every frilly and flouncy and twirly princess dress she could find, until the girl's mother had complained about running out of room in her closet. Adele looked very much like her namesake, Sookie's grandmother, but she often gave Pam exactly the same you've-got-to-be-kidding-me look her mother did. It had been one of the things that had made her Pam's second favourite breather.
Now, at sixteen, her daughter, Maxine, had bumped Adele into third place. She was dressed all in black with a spiked wristband and lace choker and torn tights under her short knit dress and Doc Martens. Goth or not, she was sweetness and sunshine, just like her grandmother, without the lovely scent she still carried.
Max's current obsession was all things supernatural and her thick eyeliner and black hair with purple streaks — that Sookie had paid for when Adele hadn't approved — made Pam almost feel nostalgic. She wondered if she still had one of those old gauzy black nightmares she used to wear at Fangtasia set aside somewhere. She thought Max would get a kick out of it. And she knew Sookie would.
"Hey, Pam? Who's this with Grammy?"
She turned the laptop so Pam could see. Pam smiled.
"That is my maker, Eric."
"Wow…"
She was silent for a few moments but she didn't scroll further.
"He's so gorgeous. You and him?"
She waggled her eyebrows a couple of times, wanting to know if they'd had sex.
Pam tried to hide a smile.
"A very very long time ago. Decades before your Grammy was born. I prefer women, you know."
"Oh, I know. You and Mom…"
She waggled her eyebrows again and Pam snorted.
"You aren't supposed to know about that."
Max grinned. "You would be surprised how many things I know that I'm not supposed to know about."
"Somehow, I'm not surprised at all."
Max looked at the picture again for a while before her eyes flew open.
"Him and Grammy?"
Pam laughed. "I can neither confirm nor deny. Well, maybe I can. I was very bad to include the picture, but I couldn't help myself. Your grandmother doesn't like to talk about him. He doesn't like to talk about her, either. I try to keep my mouth shut." She shrugged. "But I guess I wanted you to know. Before…"
Before Sookie died. Which would be soon. Far too soon. Max nodded and swallowed around a lump in her throat and looked at the picture some more.
Sookie's children knew of Eric as Pam's maker but Sam had been a jealous man and Sookie had been very hurt after the mess with Freyda and had shut down any talk of him until Pam had stopped even bothering to try. As far as she knew, none of Sookie's kids knew about her history with Eric or how involved Sookie had been in vampire affairs a few decades before. They knew Pam and Bill, of course, and even knew their mother and Bill had dated for a few months before she and their father got together, but that was the extent of it. She didn't know why she was sharing all of this information with Max all of a sudden. She had planned to after Sookie was gone, just to get it off her chest, but when she'd seen that picture, she hadn't even hesitated to scan it and put it with the others.
"He sure is hot."
"Oh, no. Don't you get any ideas. Your grandmother would skin me alive. Your mother, too. And I would skin him alive if he got anywhere near you."
Max raised an eyebrow. "I dunno, Pam. Doesn't seem to me that either one of you are alive."
She was having a hard time keeping a straight face. So was Pam.
"Oh, ha ha."
Max burst into laughter. After she finally calmed down, she went back to studying the picture.
"I can't believe the way they're looking at each other…"
Pam smiled. "Your grandfather was not your grandmother's one true love from your fairy tales. I know she loved him very much but I think you are smart enough to have figured out that she didn't love him quite as much as he loved her."
Max shrugged and then nodded. She had noticed, and Grammy was the most loving person she knew.
"Well, for her, that was Eric. I'm sure it was. And, even though he is more than a thousand years old, I think she was his."
"What happened?"
Pam sighed wistfully, thinking back to that time more than fifty years before, a couple of years after her existence had been changed when a mouthy human had marched into Fangtasia with Bill Compton and drmanded to know if they had seen two dead girls from Bon Temps.
"Sometimes, despite everyone's best intentions, everything just goes to shit. At a thousand years old he was sold by his maker to the Queen of Oklahoma, shortly before his maker was ended. He had to marry her and stay on as King Consort for one hundred years. Your Grammy didn't think that was acceptable, especially since he insisted he had to because of his honour. Nevermind that they were married at the time, and that was a load of bullshit."
"They were married?!"
"Well, it was a vampire marriage, but yes. He sort of… tricked her into it. Of course, he tricked her into a divorce, too, so his other marriage would be legal. Strangely enough, Sookie had a big problem with both."
Pam winked at her. Sookie hadn't changed much over the years and the whole family knew how little she liked having decisions made on her behalf. It was why she still lived alone.
"They were bonded, too. Also not by your grandmother's choice. Eric's either, but he would have done it sooner or later, I'm sure. But then she blindsided him by breaking the bond with magic, thanks to your aunt Amelia. He thought Sookie was dead for a minute or so. I've never seen him so distraught."
"Holy shit."
Pam sighed. "Oh, there were all kinds of complications. Your grandmother was framed for murder and arrested, he was drugged with fairy blood and she found him in bed with another woman, and then my maker promised Oklahoma another hundred years to keep Sookie safe from her and the King of Louisiana. Of course, this was after he offered to take Sookie to Oklahoma as his mistress behind Freyda's back. Too many things had already happened over just a couple of years or so and they usually involved your grandmother getting gravely injured or nearly killed. It was just too much for her. She wanted a nice quiet life and a family, not more violence and pain. And she had wanted Eric to fight for her."
"Grammy got nearly killed? And arrested? How?"
Pam laughed. "Your Grammy got into more messes than a dozen other humans could, put together. She was a magnet for trouble. She was a real badass, though. She saved my existence more than once. My maker's, too. Bill's. Your grandfather's, even."
Pam leaned forward.
"She's even finally killed a few vampires."
"Grammy?"
"Grammy. I'm telling you, kid, your grandmother is very special. She had two vampires fall madly in love with her back then. And I'm pretty sure they both still do. Vampires don't just go around pledging their love to humans. I couldn't really even imagine it. Then again, she's been my best friend for a very long time, and I love her, too, so I guess I'm one to talk."
Max couldn't pull her eyes away from the computer screen.
"It's all just so… exciting. And romantic. Is he still married?"
Pam snorted. She had not been a fan of the Queen.
"No. Oklahoma pissed off a bunch of humans and got herself killed a few months ago. The FOTS bombed her palace when Eric was away with his new child. He declined the offer of the kingdom and moved to California, a free man."
"I remember hearing about that."
Eventually, Max moved past that picture and looked at the others, but she was distracted. She didn't ask Pam any questions about the other vampires. When she made it through all of the photos, she found the picture again and looked at it some more.
Pam finally dragged her away from the computer, but Max was much quieter than usual for the rest of the night. Before she left late that evening, she disappeared for several minutes. Pam found her back in the office, looking at the picture again. She noticed there was a pen moved from the mug filled with writing implements to the desk. The cup was truly hideous and said Best Friend on the side. Sookie had bought it for her years ago. Ironically, Pam was sure.
Max wasn't very good at putting things away and Pam picked up the pen and put it back. She stroked Max's hair back from her face. She wanted a better look. It was so much like the one Max was looking at on the display.
A few weeks later, Sookie was sitting on the porch swing at the old farmhouse, enjoying the beautiful evening. It was warm but the humidity had broken and there was a nice breeze that cooled her off and kept the mosquitos at bay. She had just made the trip to visit Sam. It was getting harder and harder to walk to the cemetery and back. She wouldn't be able to do it much longer. It wore her out. But then, she supposed, she would be joining him soon and then she wouldn't have to worry about it.
All her life, she had rarely gotten sick. Just like her Aunt Linda and her brother, Jason. And, just like them, she was going to die of cancer. Soon. She was afraid. She hated the idea of losing her family. Of missing things. Sam had already missed out on so much and he had been a few years older than she was now when he died. She looked forward to seeing him and Gran and Jason and Linda and her parents again, along with a few others she hoped would be there, but she would have preferred to wait a while longer. Her grandchildren still had so many milestones to reach. She hadn't had any great-grandchildren yet and there were two on the way.
She felt a void coming across the graveyard and winced. She hated the way Bill looked at her now, with his pity and mopey eyes and a fair bit of well-disguised disgust. He was still in love with her, which had caused some sort of cognitive dissonance that ran him afoul most of the time. It hurt. She was glad he'd stopped dropping by so often. It had been weeks, though, and she supposed it was time. She didn't have much of it left and she was sure he would at least want to see her once more. To say goodbye. She sighed and stood up and got ready to invite him in. She was already starting to get chilled and he often overstayed his welcome.
She had to grab the porch railing. God, she was weak, and the pain was bad tonight. You'd think she'd be used to it by now. She needed to sit down. He hadn't made it around the corner of the house yet, so she just called out.
"Come on in. I'll be waiting in the living room."
She went inside and slowly walked over to the couch and sat down. She felt him outside but he didn't come in right away. She was a little surprised but she thought maybe he was dreading it, too. She took a pain pill with the glass of water on the table beside her and closed her eyes and waited.
She heard the door open and someone approaching. There was something wrong. The footsteps didn't sound like Bill's. Pam's, either. There was nothing wrong with her ears. She opened her eyes and braced herself for trouble, even though her days of staking vampires were long since over.
When he turned the corner and her blue eyes met his, she thought she was going to stop breathing even sooner than expected.
"Jesus Christ, Shepherd of Judea."
Eric smiled that half smile and her heart did the same pitter pat it always did. She blushed, embarrassed to look like this when he still looked like that. Guilty he still made her feel this way, fifty-odd years later, knowing how much it would have hurt Sam. Her eyes welled up and she looked away. She didn't want to see that same disgust on his face she always saw on Bill's. She was eighty-two years old and dying. She had a fuzz of white hair that had just started to grow back after she'd stopped treatment a few months back when it wasn't doing anything but making her sicker. She was skin and bones, and the skin was crepe-paper thin and loose and lined with wrinkles. Both breasts had been lopped off the year before. But this was more important than her vanity. She'd had no idea how much she'd wanted to see him one last time before she died, until right that moment.
"I'd offer you a TrueBlood but I don't even think they make it any longer."
"They don't."
She took a deep breath and blew it out and looked at him again. She resisted the urge to apologize about her appearance.
"It's been a long time."
He shrugged. "I suppose. By your standards, at least."
She laughed a little. It was very weak and hurt her.
"I never ever thought I'd say this, but it's good to see you, Eric."
He smiled and she was surprised how genuine it looked. How honest he sounded.
"It is good to see you as well."
He looked at each of the pictures, one by one, on the walls and mantle and table and the top of the piano. She hadn't had a piano before. The house looked nearly the same, although the furniture and wallpaper were all new. Well, new to him. Everything looked as dated now as it had the last time he'd been there.
"You have four children?"
She nodded. "And thirteen grandchildren, if you can believe that."
There were dozens of photographs, spanning decades. He remembered a handful of them from before. He smiled at one of Pam holding a small blonde child who looked very much like the pictures of Sookie around the same age. He looked at it for a long time, and then at a picture of Sookie and Sam on their fiftieth wedding anniversary two years before. He knew Sam had died just a few weeks later.
"I was sorry to hear about Sam."
"Were you?"
After a short pause, he turned to look at her and laughed. "Ok. Maybe not. But I was sorry for your pain."
She smiled. "Thank you. It's been a tough couple of years."
He studied a picture of her taken the night King Russell of Mississippi had married King Bart of Indiana in Rhodes. The night they were bonded. He wondered if that was why she had it displayed. He hoped so.
"You had a happy life."
She nodded. "I have a beautiful family. I'm very lucky."
She teared up again and cursed herself as an old fool. She hadn't cried in years. Not since the birth of her youngest grandchild. She hadn't even cried after Sam had died. And here she was turning into Poor Pitiful Pearl as soon as her dead ex boyfriend walked back into her life half a century later.
"I… felt the same about Freyda after the bombing. I'm sorry for your loss. I know you saved her and the kingdom a couple of years ago. You were happy there?"
He raised an eyebrow at her.
"You follow vampire affairs so closely?"
She shrugged and smiled at him.
"I guess I do when it comes to certain vampires."
They smiled at each other for a moment and then he answered.
"Yes. Yes, I settled in eventually. Grew to enjoy it, even. I respected her very much. It's been a big change. We've been staying in California."
"We?"
"Yes. I have a new child. A man. His name is Sam, strangely enough."
"Oh."
There was a long pause. She took a shaky breath.
"Why are you here, Eric?"
"I wanted to see you again."
"Why now?"
He laughed but there wasn't any real humour in it this time.
"Sam is dead. Freyda is dead. The only one standing in my way was you. And I understand you will be dead soon as well. I didn't want to miss my chance."
She laughed, too.
"Well, why should I be the odd man out? Everyone else is. Did Pam tell you about the cancer?"
He shook his head. "Did she tell you about my time in Oklahoma?"
"No. I kind of found out on the down low. How did you hear about me?"
Eric pulled a piece of paper out of the inside pocket of his leather jacket. He unfolded it and handed it to her and sat down beside her on the couch. She read it quickly and rolled her eyes.
"Maxine. Oh, this has Pam's name written all over it. Believe me. As far as Pam is concerned, the sun rises and sets on Max, and the feeling is mutual. I know very well she's going to turn that girl one of these days and I am going to make it my personal mission to haunt her for the rest of her nights if she does. A pull, my ass. You know, it's bad enough she slept with my daughter for years. Maybe she still is, for all I know. Adele is still a beautiful woman, even if she is nearly fifty. Of course, she's also been married for almost twenty-five years, but that is none of my business."
He was trying to hold back a smile. No matter how much different she looked, no matter how long it had been, she was still Sookie. He could almost see the fiery young woman she'd been, just under the surface. She shook the paper at him.
"I didn't even know she knew about you. Pam doesn't say much of anything about you when I'm around and I thought we had an understanding about not saying too much around the kids. And too much isn't a whole lot more than nothing. But somehow, Max not only knows who you are, but that we have some history and how to contact you? That we were…"
She stopped. He finished her thought.
"That we were in love?"
She looked away and blinked back the tears that threatened to come again. She shrugged. Eventually, she looked at him again.
"Yeah. That we were in love."
She took another shaky breath and blew it out.
"I've been happy. So have you. We have our own families now. Maybe we should just be happy for each other for having had a happy fifty years."
"Maybe so…"
He was looking at one of the photographs on the wall across the room. One of Sookie on her wedding day, but not the one that Pam had sent to him. He'd burned that one a long time ago. But he could still see it as clearly as he ever had.
"I've missed you."
She was surprised he'd said it. She thought he was, too. She swallowed but didn't answer. She couldn't. She had no idea what to say.
He gestured at the pictures. "I won't ask if you regret what happened between us. I can see that you do not."
She laughed again and this time, it sounded bitter.
"No. No, Eric, it was what had to happen. It was for the best. I can't look at my babies and grandbabies and have any regrets. But a part of me always wondered, of course. And sometimes, I did miss you, terribly, and wished like hell things had been different. Walking the floor with a colicky baby all night long. Every time I heard Sam think about something that pissed me off or hurt my feelings or even that turned my stomach. Not his fault. We all think things we shouldn't."
She looked up at him. "Sometimes, just because I was lonely for you..."
She smirked and touched his knee.
"And sometimes, I really missed having sex with you. When I let myself remember. Nobody could ever top you there."
He laughed. "You either."
"Bullshit."
He shrugged. "Believe it or not. It is true. Remember, I told you once I would always tell you the truth."
She narrowed her eyes at him and he shrugged again. He looked sincere. She shook her head.
"I always thought you were full of it when you told me that I was the best you'd ever had. The first few times, I was the only one you could remember, so I get that. But after…? A thousand years is a hell of a long time. And I don't even want to guess how many women…"
"I could likely figure it out, given a couple of minutes. Close, anyway. Maybe within a dozen or two. There was a lot of sex and drink in my human life — it was our way — and some of those memories aren't quite so clear."
She laughed a little and then coughed for a good while longer. She was exhausted and it hurt so much but she wasn't quite ready for him to leave just yet.
"No. Even after all these years, I'd rather not think about you with anyone else."
He smiled and shook his head.
"The thought that you belonged to the shifter instead of me for all that time… It was good I stayed away."
They didn't speak for a minute or two. She swallowed.
"I'm scared to die. I'm angry, even though I'm old and have lived a good long life. Way longer than I should have, considering how many times I came close to being killed or dying. And yet… I still feel like I have so much living left to do. "
"I could turn you."
She looked at him and laughed.
"Don't you dare. Everyone would mistake me for the Ancient Pythoness."
He laughed, too.
"Don't be ridiculous. You are still beautiful."
She rolled her eyes.
"Cut the shit, Eric. You're still beautiful. Every bit as gorgeous as you ever were. I'm an ugly old woman. A crone."
He touched her face.
"Yes, you are old. You have lived a long life — for a human, at least — but that changes little. You could never be ugly to me, Sookie."
He wiped a tear from her cheek with his thumb. He was heartbroken and relieved to know for sure that he still loved her. The heartbreak was winning.
"I must go. Thank you for seeing me."
"Thank you for coming. I guess you kind of fulfilled a dying wish I didn't know I had."
He leaned forward and closed his eyes and gave her one last kiss goodbye. She was hesitant but she closed her eyes and kissed him back. Somehow, one or the other deepened it and he was kissing her the way he had all those years ago. And it felt just the same.
They both opened their eyes at the same time. Eric's were wide and almost panicked. Sookie almost didn't notice. She couldn't remember the last time she felt as good as she did right then. Nothing hurt. Not one bit. She smiled at him for a fraction of a second before it fell away.
"What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
He stood up and took her hands and helped her to her feet.
"Eric? What's going on?"
He didn't answer He walked her carefully to the bedroom. Of course, he knew the way very well. The vanity was gone, but there was a large chest of drawers with a mirror on top. He stood her in front of him so she could see. Their eyes met in their reflection. She looked almost just like she had the first time he'd seen her in the white sundress with the red flowers at Fangtasia. She looked twenty-five again.
She reached up and touched her face. Her hair, which was now a blonde fuzz almost exactly the same colour as his. She held her breasts in her hands. Squeezed them. They were big and perky and pretty damn spectacular, just like they used to be. She'd certainly never gotten any complaints. She turned back around and looked up at him.
"I have no idea whether or not this is a dream. Just in case it is, hurry up and kiss me and then take my clothes off before I wake up. I sure as hell don't want to waste this opportunity."
He smiled a huge smile and then laughed.
"And what if it is real?"
She shrugged.
"Then I'll get to do it tomorrow night, too. The cubby is still in the other room, although I think the twins might have kept a possum in there for a while. I can't guarantee it will smell very good."
He laughed again. She was smiling so wide her cheeks hurt. She had no idea what kind of miracle had taken place or if she was dead and heaven was just being next-door to a kid again and having lots of danger-and-intrigue-free sex with her vampire. And, if so, score.
He pulled off her shirt and leaned down and kissed her again. She hadn't been wearing a bra, of course — she hadn't even had breasts when she'd gotten dressed that morning — so there was nothing in the way when he kissed down her neck to her chest and took the most beautiful breasts he'd ever seen into his hand and his mouth for the first time in more than fifty years. It was almost like going home. Part of him wondered if he were dreaming, too, even though it wasn't even possible. It seemed more likely than the reality, if that's what this was.
He took off his jacket and threw it over the back of the chair in the corner before he finished undressing. He didn't notice the fine powder that sprinkled out of the inside pocket.
…
Maxine Merlotte-Fortenberry rode her bike as fast as she could until she made it home. Her mom and dad were gone to Grandpa Hoyt's place for the evening and her older brothers were both away at college. She was relieved she was alone and she did a little dance in the middle of the kitchen. She had watched Grammy and Pam's maker through the window and he had actually kissed her! Just like she'd hoped! And they were obviously still in love. At least she assumed so based on what had happened next. Just the part where her grandmother had turned young again. She sure as hell hadn't followed them into Grammy's bedroom.
She called another one of her grandmother's very best friends — one who also had a very special place in her heart for Adele's daughter, Max. There was no answer, so she left a message.
"Hey, Aunt Amelia! I just wanted to say thanks again for the book you got me for Christmas. I used it for the first time three weeks or so ago and I am really happy with the results! I'm sure I'll talk to you about it in a day or two. I think Grammy might call you with some good news soon, too. Love you. Bye!"
She thought about calling Pam, too, but she decided to let it be a surprise. She opened up her book and turned it to the spot marked with a dog-eared page, titled True Love's Kiss. Just like from one of her old fairy tales. Her changes were marked in pencil. The spell in the book was a little different from what she'd needed, but it had been no big deal to change it up a little bit to get the desired effect. And now they would have their happily ever after.
Her best friend was Wiccan and Max had started visiting her coven with her a year or so before. Since then, she had really gotten interested in witchcraft. She'd picked Aunt Amelia's brain for hours and had checked out every book she could find at the Bon Temps library. She had discovered she had a real talent for that sort of thing. It was almost like she was a little bit magical herself. Just like her Grammy.