The Single Undead Moms(34)

I was so glad that Danny was inside, because the string of curse words that came streaming out of my mouth would surely be repeated at school, resulting in my son progressing beyond behavior level four to at least a seven.


When I called Jane in a panic, she assured me that the notice was a good thing, that it was less likely to end in a courtroom or in bloodshed if they were willing to mediate. Of course, I was the first custody case she’d ever handled, so I wasn’t really sure on what she was basing this comparison. But it made me a feel a little better.

I was a bit disappointed in the plain gray conference room of the Council offices. I expected something a bit more American Horror Story meets Mad Men, particularly after Jane described the insane number of Hello Kitty office accessories she’d had to toss out of her predecessor’s office. But maybe the vampire officials were trying to put visiting humans at ease by lulling them into a boredom coma. Nondescript gray carpet, gray laminate table, gray chairs, but no windows. The rest of the Council complex was decorated in a similar fashion. I wondered if the lack of windows and other indicators of time of day were as much an effort to trick employees into higher productivity as to avoid unpleasant sunlight exposure. Like Vegas, with duller furnishings.

The main advantage of the setting was Les and Marge’s abject discomfort. Marge clutched her purse in her lap as if some vampire had been waiting for centuries to snag her Vera Bradley bag and its bottomless supply of coupons. Les just sat across the table, arms crisscrossed over his chest, glaring at me. Because I’d become a vampire specifically to annoy him.

I’d dressed carefully in my most respectable “mom clothes,” or what had passed for my respectable mom clothes before I was sick. My teal sweater set and khakis were baggy from the weight I’d lost, but they were pressed, clean, and appropriate.

I hoped that this meeting would end more amicably than current attitudes around the table would indicate. I didn’t want to deny my in-laws visitation or access to Danny, but I refused to let them take over parenting him. He was my son. But for now, I was wary about weekend visits or even ice-cream trips. On some level, I just didn’t trust them to bring him back to me.

“Our mediator, Miss Dwyer, will be here shortly,” Jane’s very human receptionist, Margaret, assured us. Margaret was a graying, humorless woman with all the personality of dishwater, but she was kind and almost deferential to me, offering a variety of soothing herbal blood blends while we waited.

“If she’s not here in ten minutes, we’re out of here.” Les grunted. “We don’t spend time in buildings run by vampires after dark.”

“We’ll try to get you home as soon as possible,” I told him.

“Oh, because you’re running the meeting, are you?” Les said, his mouth twisting into a sour line.

I sighed. “I didn’t say that, Les, really. I’m just trying to—”

“Oh, we know what you’re ‘just trying’ to do,” Les interjected. “We know all about how you’re ruining our grandson. Weird hours at home, no proper meals, outbursts at school.”

I lifted a brow. How did my father-in-law know about my outburst in the custodian’s closet?

Wait, no, he probably meant Danny and Mrs. McGee. Mr. Walsh and I had a phone conference about the Applesauce Incident and agreed that while Danny’s reaction had been inappropriate, Mrs. McGee would not be allowed to continue to volunteer at the school if she couldn’t keep her opinions about vampires to herself. Mr. Walsh was willing to let her go over the incident—in his opinion, this was no different from a volunteer spouting slurs about other ethnic or religious groups. But honestly, Mrs. McGee was an institution at that school. Politically, I didn’t think I could afford to be the parent who insisted on her removal. So she had one more chance. After that, Mr. Walsh could toss her out on her ancient butt.

“That was one incident of misbehavior at school, not even worth a visit to the principal’s office. And Danny is supervised in the afternoons by a Council-approved, CPR-certified child-care provider who prepares healthy, balanced meals,” I told them.

At the mention of this, Marge sort of quavered, as if the idea of someone else cooking for her grandson was somehow the cruelest cut of all. I added, “You should know that if you’re going to call my parenting into question, you’re going to have to find something a little more serious than a classroom tantrum.”

Les sneered. “And you should know that we’re not screwing around with visitation. We don’t want a judge to think we’re happy with that. Our lawyer told us to hold out. It’s going to make it easier for us to go for full custody of Danny. Our boy deserves to be raised in a normal, human home with normal, human parents.”