a/n: I didn't proofread this, so apologies for major spelling errors!
Chapter 18
"Eric!" Her voice had become nails on a chalkboard to me. Nothing pleasant ever came along with Pam. At times I wished she was never around because maybe I would still have my human Eric.
"What is she doing here?" I asked Eric, dropping the last dish I was washing. Pam scared the shit out of me.
"I don't know, I will find out now." Eric looked furious and I backed a few steps away from him. "Do not invite her in." He commanded then headed through my living room to the front door.
I had no plans of ever inviting that psycho blonde into my house.
I followed behind Eric slowly and stopped a few feet behind him. If she was his family she wouldn't hurt me right? She would listen to Eric…. Unless this was a part of his master plan to murder me.
No! no! I could trust Eric, I wanted to so badly.
"What are you doing here Pam?" His voice was stern and full of authority as he opened the door.
Pam was there in her designer clothes. Her top was pastel blue and it seemed all too friendly a color for a vampire. The conservative string of pearls around her neck was also too Stepford for my idea of a monster.
"Every night you take off somewhere, you've been acting crazy as fuck, so I wanted to know where." She explained with fury. "Turns out you're visiting this human? What the fuck Eric! You have shit to take care of in Area Five and you're neglecting it for some blood bag?!" Her fangs snapped down and she hissed at me.
Holy. Fucking. Shit.
I looked around for a weapon but there was nothing close enough. My coat closet was a good distance away with my brother's old rifle in it. I would have to turn my back to get it. However while I was thinking this Eric was already reacting.
His fangs came down as well with a definitive click and he snarled at Pam. The growling sound erupting from his chest was down right frightening and sounded feral.
"Pamela this is the last time you will disrespect me. I am your maker, and you have no say over anything I choose to do. If you ever come near Sookie again or threaten her, I will command you out of my area." He growled. Eric was not yelling but the lethal edge to his voice would force anyone to take him seriously. "As your maker I command you to go home, now."
Pam looked a bit dumbfounded and maybe even hurt. She darted off into the night too quickly for me to tell. When Eric shut the door and turned around his fangs were still visible. I had not seen them since the night he left me. Seeing the evidence of what he was made this situation extremely real. I was staring and recalled my Gran saying that behavior was rude. However right now I could not help myself.
Eric walked over and I expected him to hide his fangs again, however the hell he did that. Instead he took my hand in his. The cool feeling of his skin was strange but I didn't feel threatened. I watched as he slowly lifted my hand. When I realized he was bringing my fingers towards his mouth I started to pull back.
"Trust me" He murmured and for some insane reason I did.
Eric brought my fingers right up to his lips until one of my fingertips was touching his fang. He could bite me right now but instead he let my hand drop but didn't completely let it go.
"See, I don't bite… all the time." He smirked and I smiled a little. Eric was pretty good at getting me to smile I'll give him that much. He had always been good at that as a human. "I am sorry about Pam. She's used to me being around all the time and I have certainly changed since I was turned human… she tends to get dramatic. But I would never let her hurt you."
"I know." I said and for the first time I really believed it. Eric had defended me to Pam and he was getting into fights with his own family over me. That had to mean something. I could tell that argument was not staged for my benefit in some master scheme he had to kill me. This was all very real for Eric and now I just had to figure out if this could possibly work.
Did I still have feelings for him? Of course I did but they tended to revolve around the human version of Eric I held close to my heart. I needed to let this Eric into my life and see if I could love him the way I did before. For now I chose to not think about the complications of hiding what he was to my friends and family, or how I could date someone who only came out at night.
"Come out with me, tomorrow night" Eric was still holding my hand and I wondered if my skin felt burning hot to him.
"Where?" I was leery of going outside of my own home with him. This had become a safe zone and I felt comfortable here.
"On a date of course. I will take you to dinner, a movie… whatever you like."
Was he for real? His face was dead serious so I guess he was. "Do vampires even go on dates?"
The way Pam was reacting to all of this made me wonder what Eric was like before a spell turned him human, and drained out all his memories.
"Some of them do, many of the younger ones want to still feel human. There are even some older vampires who still prefer to live in a more human manner. I can't say I ever had the urge to until now." Eric admitted without shame.
"Have you ever been on a date?" I questioned. My curiosity was insatiable around him.
"Other than the ones I went on with you, no, I had never been on a modern human date before that."
Wow, a thousand years of experiences and not one regular date. I was sure Eric had done something similar to dating in his human life… but it probably was called something different back then. Or maybe he was married? Or had an arranged marriage? Did he have kids? There were still so many questions to ask.
"Okay, lets go somewhere outside of town though. Everyone is pretty much hating you around here right now." I admitted but he probably suspected that. As far as my brother and everyone else knew, Eric just up and left me very abruptly.
"Yes….that is unfortunate. I did like that human man Hoyt. He was simple but never annoying." Eric pondered for a few seconds. "Oh well, I will pick you up tomorrow night at eight. Goodnight Sookie." He kissed my hand and when his cold lips briefly touched my skin I felt a jolt of adrenaline and it wasn't the kind you felt when scared, it was definitely the good kind.
"Night Eric" I smiled and he headed out the door.
The following morning I was at work half asleep when Amelia came bouncing in. I was sitting at the front desk going through spreadsheets that listed out each patient's prescriptions.
I can't wait to tell her! This is going to be so exciting!
Amelia's thoughts were screaming at me as she took a seat next to me.
"Morning Sook!" She beamed and was all too chipper for the early hours of the day. I supposed having a late night visitor all the time didn't help my case.
"Hey Ames, what's got you in such a good mood?" I'd much rather ask than pull it from her thoughts.
"Octavia has officially agreed to start training me as a witch! How cool is that?" She was grinning from ear to ear.
"That's great, but what exactly does it mean?" I had paid more attention whenever Octavia talked about vampires. The witch stuff I tended to not focus on. I had enough to remember about one supernatural race without adding another.
"I'm going to start attending the meetings she holds with her coven. That's the group of witches she works with. Then from there I guess I'll just start learning spells and the rest of the supernatural world. I can't wait!" Amelia squealed and was almost bouncing in her seat. I was glad she was so excited but I also wondered what we were both getting ourselves into.
"Just promise me you won't start hating all vampires like Octavia, okay?" I understood being cautious but if by some miracle things worked with Eric… I didn't want Amelia to hate him.
"Now why would you ask me that?" Her head was buzzing with her many ideas of what I had been up to with Eric. Some of them were far too pornographic for my taste.
"I have a date with Eric tonight." I blurted and looked back to my spreadsheets. I don't know why I felt self conscious about it.
"Really? So you're definitely giving him another chance? What if he bites you? Has he bitten you?" Her words came out in a tumbling rush. I wondered how her mouth kept up with her brain.
"God no! That freaks me out… I don't know how any of this will work out, but yeah, I decided to give him another chance." I was tapping my pen nervously on the desk.
"Damn… I don't know if I'd be able to do that. Good for you though, I do know I've never seen you happier than you when you were with him….well human him." Amelia explained "So if you date him, does he run off and bite other people when he needs a snack? Octavia told me feeding and sex are almost the same thing to vamps. So weird."
I had not even thought of that. Then again I had no idea feeding meant sex might be involved. I felt very naïve in this new, dark world. "I have no idea, I didn't even know that. I guess I have to talk to Eric about it. I can't say I want him biting me at the moment." It was just freaky to think about, especially when a couple weeks ago I thought vampires were not real.
"I don't blame you Sook. That's an awful lot of trust to put in someone. And I'll tell you anything new I learn about vampires, it seems like there is an awful lot of crap to know about them."
"Thanks" I forced a smile and went back to work. Before I was looking forward to my date, now I was dreading it and my nerves were going wild.
Hours later I was staring at myself in the mirror, holding up a curling iron on one side of my head. Was I insane? When I spoke with Amelia at work today I sure felt like I was losing it. I barely knew a thing about vampires or how their lives worked, yet here I was getting ready for a date with one. What if vampires did not have monogamous relationships? What if they didn't even have sex the same way humans did? Could they have children? Could they eat human food or would it poison them? Did they have politics or did they all just run around doing their own thing?
I thought my chats with Eric helped me learn a lot but there was so much more to ask. I debated cancelling but every time I picked up the phone I changed my mind. Eric had given me his cell number so it would be easy to back out….
No, I had trusted him last night and agreed to go out with him. I would give him this chance and see what happened. Eric seemed to be trying his best to still be a part of my life so I owed him that much. I finished getting ready, dabbing on some makeup and putting on a casual summer dress. It was yellow with a white paisley print. I liked it because it reminded me of a warm spring day even though we were in the late heat of summer. Still wondering where Eric would be taking me, I sat down at the kitchen table to cut some coupons while I waited for him. I know, romantic, right?
When there was a knock on the back door I jumped in my chair. I had the door open to try and let some of the cooler night air in, with only the screen door protecting me from the bugs. Outside I could hear the loud chirps of frogs and bugs yet I had not heard a single one of Eric's footfalls. But there he was, in all of his 6'4" glory, wearing jeans and a black button down shirt. As usual his clothing looked like it cost as much as my entire wardrobe.
"Good evening Sookie" He opened the door and walked right in much to my surprise. "You have to rescind my invitation for me to no longer be able to enter your home." He quickly explained.
"Oh" See? So much shit I had no idea about.
"Are you ready to go?" He held his hand out and I stood up to take it.
"Yep" I put my small white purse over my shoulder and headed out the door with Eric. He opened the passenger door of his corvette for me and I awkwardly slid into the bucket seat. I would make a note to never wear a shorter dress in this vehicle.
Eric climbed into the other side with little effort and started the engine. We started heading down my dark driveway towards the road. "So how was your day?"
"To be honest with you, very nerve-wracking" I sighed and looked out the window as he turned onto the road.
"Why is that? Did your brother get his pickup stuck in the mud again?" Eric grinned as he drove. Jason had managed to get his pickup buried in some mud near the pond in his backyard. Eric was the lucky guy who I volunteered to help remove it.
"No, I was just thinking there is so much I don't know about vampires. It's overwhelming." With a human man I might not know his personality or history, but I knew the basics of his existence as a human.
"Sookie you can ask me anything, I will do my best to answer your questions." His eyes were on me as he spoke.
"Eric! Pay attention to the road!" I was not getting into an accident with him.
Eric chuckled and set his eyes on the road again. "My reflexes are fast enough that I never need to stare at the road like a human does when they drive."
"See, yet another thing I don't know…." I muttered.
"Is it not the point of human dating, to get to know the other person?" Eric questioned but with a knowing look because he was not really looking for an answer to that.
"I guess" I leaned back in my seat and tried to think of something interesting to ask him. "Where are we going?"
"You will find out soon enough, I am sure you have a better question than that for me."
"Can vampires have babies?" That one freaked me out, imagining a little vamp toddler running around.
"Not in the way humans can, vampires can only be created by turning a human." Eric explained casually as if it was common knowledge. "I thought you weren't sure if you wanted children?"
"I'm still sticking to that. I was just curious." I did find it amusing that like a human man Eric looked a tad nervous about the idea of talking babies. "What about… you know… do vampires have sex?" I could feel my face turning red, damn you fair skin! "Since you can't have babies and all…"
"Oh we definitely do, that's the one thing that hasn't changed in a thousand years." The way he said it sent shivers down my spine. I could feel his eyes on me.
"What about politics? Do ya'll just run around randomly or is there some kind of structure?" I was quick to change the subject since the temperature in the car seemed to have jumped up eighty degrees.
"Well… I can only discuss that so much. Vampires are very secretive about their existence as well as our hierarchy. I would not want to put you in danger by over sharing." Eric was quiet for a few seconds but then gave me a short explanation. "We do have a political structure. It does not follow your American human politics, but we have leaders in certain regions throughout the world. We also have our own justice system and laws to abide by."
That was actually fascinating. I wanted to know more but I respected Eric's wishes for now on the subject. Maybe in this case he needed a bit more time to trust me in order to share. I wondered if globally there was one leader for all vampires? Did witches have politics too? I would have to ask Amelia…
"Here we are" Eric pulled into the parking lot of a small Italian restaurant in Munroe. I did not realize we had been in the car for so long. When we got out of the car and headed inside it all seemed too normal for a vampire date.
Eric's hand wrapped around mine as we made our way to the hostess, who proceeded to eye my date like a piece of meat. When her eyes landed on me I could see the jealousy in them.
He's fucking gorgeous. Like a male model. What the hell is he doing with her? He could definitely do better. In fact he could do me, right now.
I frowned and looked at the floor while we waited for her to gather our menus and lead us to our seat. Eric noticed but I just shook my head so he wouldn't ask any questions right now. We were lead to a nice secluded booth in the corner of the restaurant. The setup here was fairly private so most people could not see anything but the tops of our heads at our table. Once we were seated in the horseshoe shaped booth Eric sat right next to me instead of across from me.
"What's wrong?" I didn't really feel like talking about how hot some girl thought he was.
"Just overheard some not so great thoughts, happens all the time." I shrugged and opened up my menu.
Eric frowned but the let the subject be. He knew from when he lived with me how sometimes my telepathy could be a real pain. I learned to live with it and even use it for my job, but it still sucked to heard some of the nasty thoughts people had. The gross sex fantasies were bad, but even worse were the absolutely mean and spiteful things people thought for no reason at all.
"Won't it seem weird that you're not eating?" I was starving but I knew Eric would eat nothing off this menu.
"I will order wine and an appetizer. No one will bother questioning it." He lifted his arm so it was resting on the back of the booth behind me. He wasn't touching me but he was definitely closer. Instead of feeling scared I just felt the normal butterflies of a regular date in my stomach.
We ordered drinks and the food all at once since I easily picked out what I wanted, stuffed tortellini. Our drinks arrived shortly after and Eric pulled the wine glass closer to his side of the table. I wondered if he would actually drink it.
"Is it normal for you to be out with someone like me?" I wanted to ask if vampires ever dated humans, but I kept it vague since we were in public.
Eric paused and for the first time all night he looked a little unsure. "Not really…not like this at least. Some of us keep pets around but they are not treated as equals and are mostly there for food and sex. Once the vampire is done with them they are glamoured to forget everything."
His voice was so low I could barely hear him myself. The answer was not pretty but I wanted the truth. I had suspected this was not regular behavior with the way Octavia was acting and even Pam.
"Oh…" I took a sip of the martini I had ordered.
"Things might change with that someday, there's talk of human blood being synthesized and that could change everything for us." Eric quickly stopped speaking when the waitress came over to drop off my food. I wondered how big the changes would be… would they all stop feeding on humans?
"So has Octavia shared many horror stories with you?" Eric smirked as he changed the subject.
"She definitely doesn't like you but no, nothing specific about you." She complained about vampires in general but she had yet to come up with an actual bad story about Eric.
"Good, I don't need her making me look worse than I already do."
"You look fine, trust me, more than fine." I stabbed one of my tortellini and rolled my eyes at the stupid grin on his face. Apparently a simple compliment was enough to boost his ego after all this time.
"I must admit I was worried you would be repulsed by me now." Eric still had one hand on his wine glass and was tracing the rim with his fingertip.
"Me too, you're different, but not in a bad way I suppose." His cold skin did not make me want to push him away, nor did his fangs.
The rest of the meal was pleasant and once again I discovered myself becoming more relaxed in Eric's presence. I did want to ask more about synthesized blood when we were alone. That subject was as interesting to me as their political system. For the most part Eric was very open with me and I appreciated that.
I found out he was married as a human but it was not for love. His father was the chief of their people and once he passed Eric became their leader and his marriage for the most part was arranged. It was strange to think about having my husband selected for me… but Eric said he did grow to care for and love Aude, his human wife. They learned to respect each other and he described her as a great mother to their three surviving children. It was sad to hear they had five children total but two did not make it through a particularly tough winter.
Eric was very calm as he spoke about all of this. I supposed since it was so long ago he had a lot of time to come to terms with it.
"Did you ever see them after you were turned?" I asked on the drive back to my house.
"I saw my oldest son once, by accident. I was traveling along the coast and I could see him coming in on a boat. It was dark but our vision is near perfect at night so I watched him from the forest. It looked like he had taken up some type of leadership with our people and that made me proud." Eric was staring at the road but there was a hint of a smile on his lips. "After that I never saw any of them but it was for the best. They would have feared me and thought I was a demon of some kind."
It broke my heart that he had to let go of his family like that. He never saw his children grow up and he did not get to see what they did with their lives. It was all very depressing and I promised myself I would try hard to never fear Eric again. He might not let it show, but I knew his own son fearing him had to kill him inside. I did not want to be the person making him feel that way now.
"How old were you when you became a vampire?" Eric did not look old but I could also tell he was well past his teen years.
"I was around thirty I believe, but we did not keep time as accurately back then. I was born in the winter but I do not know what month." So he did not even know his own birthday, how strange.
The rest of the drive home was fairly quiet. The only move Eric made was to reach across the console to hold my hand. I didn't retreat and intertwined my fingers with his.
When we got back to my secluded farmhouse on Hummingbird road I invited Eric inside. It was not late and I wanted more time with him. I felt like I was learning a lot tonight and I had endless questions. Eric followed me inside and we settled down on the couch after I got myself a glass of iced tea. It was strange to not offer him a beverage.
I turned on the television just for the sake of background noise. Eric automatically picked up the remote and put it on the History channel.
"I never knew about this channel until I lived with you. I actually enjoy it." He placed the remote back down on the coffee table.
"You didn't watch TV before?"
"I watched the news but never saw a need for all of the fictional shows, and I never bothered exploring my cable channels." He shrugged and leaned back into the couch. His arm was over the back of the sofa and one of his feet was propped up on the edge of my coffee table. It was identical to how he used to sit when he came home from the road crew and collapsed with a beer.
"So that synthetic blood you were talking about…what does that mean for vampires?" I really wanted the answer to that.
"It's all still in the works, we don't even know if it will be successful… but it could mean vampires not relying on humans as a food source anymore. It could even mean vampires admitting their existence to the world… but again, none of this is set in stone yet. The formula for the synthetic blood has not even been finalized." He explained and I was in shock once again.
"So everyone would know about you guys? Aren't you worried people will try to kill you?" The last thing I wanted was for Eric to get hunted down like a dog.
"That is a risk but with the proper PR things could go somewhat smoothly. Vampires have already been planning the best ways to reveal our existence and how to reduce the risk of humans going on another Salem witch hunt." He rolled his eyes, probably because he was in Salem when that shit happened.
"Wow… my brain will need some time to process all of that. It's learning way too much these days." I sighed and put down my iced tea.
"Are you sure you're okay? I feel really bad eating around you and having iced tea." How was he not starving at this point?
"I am fine Sookie. I promise, I don't have to eat everyday like you do." Eric smiled and I felt his fingers playing with the ends of my blonde hair that fell around my shoulder.
"What if I'm offering?" I asked before my nerves could stop me. I was curious and I trusted Eric to not kill me. He had barely touched me all night and he certainly had plenty of chances to attack me and drain me dry.
Eric dropped his hand and sat up some, his face serious but I could see a hint of excitement in his eyes. "Are you sure about this?"
"I guess so? I mean… will it hurt?" My damn face was turning red again.
"I can make sure you barely feel a thing." He said quietly.
"Okay, then I'm sure." My voice was a little shaky but I was definitely sure. My curiosity really was going to get me killed someday, but most likely not tonight.
Eric leaned forward and instead of his fangs snapping down he brushed his lips over mine. My eyes were still open but I shut them when his cool lips pressed against mine again. My hand moved up to his shoulder while we kissed and forgot about him biting me. His arm slid around my waist and pulled me closer as I felt his tongue glide between my lips. I had definitely forgotten all about feeding him as he mouth moved down to my neck and his tongue swirled over my skin.
God damn, the man could definitely kiss!
"Are you ready?" His voice was husky and low.
I was jolted back to the fact that I agreed to let him bite me. I nodded and then I heard Eric's fangs snap into place.