The Single Undead Moms(6)

Not to mention, I could move all of my own furniture one-handed now.

Once my in-laws found out not only that they were not going to get custody of their grandson after I died but that I was a vampire, I doubted very much that they would continue to let me live in their house rent-free. It was time for me to move on anyway. Maybe I should have moved to an apartment after Rob died, but Danny had just lost his father. I didn’t want to traumatize him with even more changes. Plus, my in-laws kept saying what a comfort it was to have Danny so close, which tugged at my guilt strings. And then I was diagnosed, and I wasn’t capable of moving a laundry basket, much less a household.

I had so much to do before Danny got home, a whole checklist of chores I’d worked up before going “underground.” Not to mention, it was two A.M., and I felt like it was the middle of the afternoon. I could probably burn through the whole list tonight: finish packing, find a new apartment, file for my undead identification card online, do this week’s payroll for my clients, and conquer my bloodthirst. OK, it was a little ambitious, but really, that’s how much energy I had running through my undead nerve endings.

Jane walked casually up the steps behind me, as if she wasn’t watching my every movement. It seemed that my supervision was going to begin immediately and run round-the-clock. I supposed I deserved that. The drive from the park had served as some sort of reboot on my brain, and I had come to understand exactly how badly this situation could have turned out if my local Council officials weren’t reasonably compassionate people.

The vampires’ governing body, known for its tendency to solve problems in a swift, ruthless, and untraceable fashion, could have decided that I’d gone too far in my sire-for-hire quest for immortality, no matter how noble my reasons. They could have decided to stake me the minute I rose, toss my ashes back into my little grave, and claim no knowledge of my ever having been turned. They could have locked me up in any one of the rumored underground facilities where “problematic” vampires were incarcerated. Or, worse, they could have made me move to Arkansas.

I’d taken a huge risk becoming a vampire in this way, but I couldn’t keep relying on reckless optimism and the kindness of bureaucrats. Now that my initial desperation had passed, I would not waste my immortality on rash decisions and my own (clearly flawed) judgment. I promised myself that I would be a model undead citizen, more considerate, more patient, more rational.

And that lasted all of five minutes before I walked past the long, narrow mirror that hung over the foyer table and caught sight of a beautiful willowy blonde. I stopped in my tracks, realizing that I was, in fact, looking at my own reflection. I promptly burst into tears, the big honking sobs you only saw on the Oprah network.

I hadn’t looked this pretty in years.

My skin, dry and sallow just a few days before, had taken on the pearlescent perfection of a fairy-tale princess’s. My eyelashes were thicker and darker, fringing my blue-green eyes and giving them a wider, wicked appearance, like I knew a secret and was going to use it to my advantage. The hair I’d lost during treatments was now full, thick, and lustrous, glimmering golden even in the harsh fluorescent lights. Over the last few months, it had become so brittle I’d been almost pathologically afraid of touching it. But now I could run my fingers through it like I was the star of my own personal shampoo commercial.

When I’d gotten sick, I’d told myself it was stupid to fuss about my appearance when I had so much more important stuff to worry about. But it had been a blow to know I was losing my looks on top of everything else. I’d never thought much about being pretty B.C. (before cancer). I wasn’t going to play modest. I’d always known I had a certain backwoods-girl-gone-good appeal. But now? I was the very best imagined version of myself, the girl who mentally dated Tom Hiddleston and accepted an imaginary Oscar.

“It’s a bit of a shock, huh?” Jane asked. I gingerly touched my fingers to my cheek, as if I was worried that touching my own face would somehow ruin an illusion. Her smile was wry, almost fond, as she placed a hand on my shoulder. “The first time I saw myself in the mirror, I thought of it as the bookworm’s jackpot, all of those little problems the women’s magazines promise to solve for us fixed in one big swoop.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Dick snorted as he hauled an enormous Coleman cooler through my foyer. “I was a prime specimen of manhood even before I was turned. Nothing about me changed, not one bit.”

“Except his modesty,” Jane told me, her tone dry as sand. She pulled my hair back from my face and into a sort of half-updo. “I know the extreme makeover takes a bit of getting used to, but when you think about it, it makes sense. Predators have to attract prey to survive. And how could we could draw in a . . . well, I don’t like to use the word ‘victim.’ Let’s say ‘blood source’—with bacne and a unibrow?”