A/N: Second chapter of Adrian's (love? )story! Enjooooy!

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"Adrian, be reasonable."

"I am not, nor will I ever be."

"Adrian!"

Daniella Ivashkov grew impatient. She wore an elegant black, silk gown and her dark hair was in its usual, classy bun. As stunningly beautiful as most people thought she was, her angered expression at the moment could make anyone reconsider. My mother just continued to stare at me as I carelessly lay in my bed, unconcerned about her naggings.

"Mom, I'm not going to some stupid party. Just forget it."

Her glare could pierce through walls. "And do what instead? Go to another party and get drunk again? Sleep with another one of those… blood whores?" Wow. I doubted my mom had ever used the word 'blood whore' before. I'd never seen her lose it this much. Unfortunately for her, my temper was starting to flare up as well.

With a taunting smile I said "Hey, at least I don't share them with my aunt in law!"
This made her stop. Her eyes widened in despair. "Adrian-"

"But, wait. That's what you did, right, mom? Ambrose, or what's his face. Yeah, you shared him. You slept with a blood whore yourself. "

She started to shake her head. "Adrian, you know it wasn't like tha-"

Again I interrupted her and exclaimed "You cheated on my father!"

My eyes burned as I watched her freeze. I couldn't help shaking, so I just sat there on my bed, not wanting to stand up, in fear that it would reveal my trembling legs.

While turning my eye from my apparently paralyzed mother, I watched the pattern of my pillow case. Though it wasn't exactly the same as hers, it still reminded me of Rose. Her covers had had almost been identical to these. I'd noticed the pattern and colors the night that she and I had…well, not 'made love', but almost. I have slept with a fair amount of women, but that had been the one night that I actually thought we'd made it out of love. But, of course that had only been me. As far as she was concerned, it had probably just been something fun to do while waiting for Dimitri. And when he finally arrived and they could go on their 'trip', well…she probably just couldn't wait to sleep with him. She just couldn't wait to cheat on me. Just like my mom had done to my dad.

A thought formed in my head.
"You're all the same."

My mother snapped out of her trance and looked at me questioningly. "What?"

I brushed the thought away and ignored her. I got up out of bed and headed for the door.

"Adrian! What about the queen's party? You can't-", she started but stopped as soon as she saw what I was doing.

"I am simply holding up the door for you, so you can get out while I get dressed."

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It was the hour of Vampires. The moon was round and full, and shone for us in the dark, summer night. The air musty and hot and every breeze felt like a blessing. Voices carried in the occasional wind and its sources standing inside a magnificent, gothic building, mingling while waiting for the main event of the party.

The party wasn't so much as a party since most of the guests were either old or boring. No, make that old and boring. The only exceptions were Mia Rinaldi, Christian Ozera and Jailbait. Eddie was there as well, but I counted him into the boring category.

The primary reason for my agreeing to go to this ridiculously boring gathering had been to drink all the liquor I could get my hands on, since it obviously was free. But then I found out that my friends would be there (more importantly, that little miss Jailbait, would be there) and I had no intentions of making them be embarrassed of knowing me. That privilege was for my mother alone.

"But why exactly are we throwing this party", asked Mia as she stirred her drink irate. "Lissa was crowned more than two weeks ago and everybody saw her back then. Wouldn't all of this excitement have minimized by now?"

"Lissa is going to college in two weeks", Christian answered with a slightly sad voice. "So, that's why they have this to make sure everybody gets to see her at least once. They start today with the older Moroi and then older Dhampirs and followed by middle-aged Moroi et cetera until you reach the ones who actually might live long enough to have a chance on spotting her more than once."

Mia nodded but seemed to have thought of something to add. "So, how do the foreign Moroi react to being after Dhampirs to see the queen? Aren't they upset?"

Christians smiled proudly. "Yeah, of course. But Lissa is doing a great job convincing them that no matter which race you come from, you still should respect the elderly. She's making the council, if not our whole society, see that race doesn't matter and that…"

The rest of his words became a blur as I walked away from the group, bored, heading towards the garden just outside. Sure, I felt proud over Lissa as well, but seeing Christian's with an air that screamed 'lovey-dovey' and his dopey grin as he talked about his girlfriend, had started to make my stomach upset.

Finding a bench under a tree a bit away from the crowded ballroom, I sat down and drank out of the bottle of wine I'd managed to pick up in the ballroom.

I'd barely taken two sips, before hearing small, careful footsteps that searched for me. I couldn't help but laughing at her lame attempt at discreetly following me. The follower had stopped at my laugh and started to search for its source. The steps faster sped towards me and there she was: in that cute, pink gown, her dark and curly hair swinging round and about, looking at me with those eyes, those jade green eyes. When she saw me laughing and smiling, her face immediately flushed red.

A nervous smile formed on her lips and she looked down at my feet while addressing me. "Umm … I was…well, we were worried about you when you ran off like that." While carefully peeping through her curtain of hair that hung in front of her bent head, Jailbait's eyes caught the bottle I was holding. After giving a small frown, they drew their attention back to me.

"Are you okay?" That made me laugh even harder. How could I possibly be okay? My aunt had been brutally stabbed and murdered, my mother had cheated on my father and as for my ex-girlfriend…well, let's just say there was a reason I called her my 'ex'.

Jailbait had been a bit startled by my increased laughter (which probably made me look crazy), but had regained herself.

As for me: I was afraid I was going mad.

I lit a cigarette and felt her gaze lingering on me and her lovely jade green eyes were probably full of disapproval. 'They are all the same.'
I sighed and let out a small puff of smoke as I did.

"Why are you looking like that at me for? Do want a cigarette too or something, wannabe princess?"

I was surprised at hearing myself speak to her like that and thought about apologizing when she suddenly asked "Do you want me to want one?"

I looked up at her, surprised at the question. "What?" I scoffed. "What kind of question is that?" It had sounded like something a therapist might do, answering a question with a question.

She repeated the question with a grave expression. "Do you want me to want one?"

I felt my face making a puzzled expression.
What did she mean? The answer to that was so obvious. Of course I didn't want her to smoke. "No."

"And why don't you? 'Cause it seems to me like your having a great time smoking," she tilted her head and raised her eyebrows "So why not?"

I frowned at her response. "Well, because me smoking is my business, but you should stay away from it. It's not healthy."

Now it was her time to frown. "So, it's okay for you to hurt yourself, but I can't? That doesn't seem fair to me."

I felt myself gaping and immediately closed my mouth. This must have been the longest conversation we'd ever had. At least one without her usual blushing and stuttering. She was really starting to get on my nerve now, by asking all of these questions with so obvious answers.

"You are so weird, Jailbait. Why the hell would anyone want to hurt themselves?" She smiled at me. And I felt it hit me.

All those times where I'd drink and drink, smoke and smoke, just to make it all go
away. To make all those dark thoughts go away. My spirit powers had been a great reason to be subduing my powers, but they had also been a great excuse for me to consume liquor. Hurting my body and mind, so that I wouldn't feel the much deeper wounds inside myself.

I felt a warm hand holding mine and realized Jailbait had bent down and was sitting on the ground opposite to me. She squeezed my hand gently and I realized I was crying.
She looked up at me and said "I was wondering the same thing." A smile twitched on her sweet lips. "And my name isn't Jailbait, by the way, in case you hadn't noticed. It's Jill."

I dared to meet her eyes and the green held my gaze while my hands traced the lines of her face. "Jill…"

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A/N: Ok, that was the end of ch 2! Hope you enjoyed it and ch 3 will be coming soon!
Please review!