As much as I hated to suspect a new friend, it was Andrea who suggested going to the Cellar in the first place. Did I really keep track of how much she drank that night?
Was the snuggly-drunk routine an act? Gabriel said vampires kept pets. Could Andrea be an operative planted by a vampire to torment me? If I could control my stupid mindreading powers, I would know.
The question was what vampire would want to torment me.
Fact: Gabriel could have turned me just so he could play creepy James Spader mind-games with me.
I chose not to explore that last one.
Mama was master of the “psychological reset.” It went something like this: We’d have an argument. I’d hurt her feelings (or I’d disobey a direct order, pretty much the same thing).
She’d sulk for a while and refuse to speak to me until I apologized. Eventually, she’d realize that I was not going to apologize. Then she’d just breeze back into my life as if the disagreement never happened. And we’d be right back where we started.
It was infuriating. It was toxic. It was evil. But damned if it wasn’t extremely effective. How do you continue an argument with someone who claims to have no memory of the argument ever happening? That was why I could not comfortably watch Gaslight.
So, I wasn’t exactly surprised the next Monday night when Mama breezed into my kitchen just before dusk, all smiles and sweetness. She didn’t bother to knock, but why would she? It was only my house. She and Grandma Ruthie had this whole thing about the “doors of River Oaks never being closed to an Early.”
I had to get some thicker doors.
Fortunately, I had woken up insanely early when Fitz howled at the approach of some Jehovah’s Witnesses. That avoided the “Why are you sleeping through the afternoon?” questions. In the unfortunate column, I was experimenting with a syntheticblood breakfast smoothie. I had a combination of Faux Type O, protein powder, Undying Health vitamin solution, iron supplements, a frozen pink-lemonade mixer, and orange juice in my blender. I was putting the blood back into the fridge when she walked in. I snapped the door shut and dropped a dish towel over my copy of the Guide for the Newly Undead.
“Hi, Mama. What—what are you doing here?”
“Do I need a reason to drop by?” Mama asked, peering into the blender. “What are you making?”
“It’s a health shake,” I said, hitting the frappe button before she noticed the streaks of red. The resulting mixture was a garish vermillion that practically screamed, “There’s fake blood in here!”
Mama pinched my cheek as the blender whirred. “Honey, you might want to think about a new shade of makeup. This one makes you look awfully pale. You know, your cousin Junie just started doing Mary Kay. She could come over and show you how to make yourself up properly. She’s been looking for someone to practice her at-home demonstrations on.”
“I don’t think I want makeup tips from a day-shift dancer at the Booby Hatch.” I shook my head as I let the blender grind to halt. “But thanks.”
Mama ignored me in her special way as I poured some smoothie into a glass.
“Your daddy mentioned you turned down pizza the other night. You’re not going on some weird vegetarian diet, are you? I don’t want you going anemic on me. It would explain why you’re so pasty.”
I laughed. “No, I’m definitely not a vegetarian. This is very good for me. Lots of vitamins, minerals, see?” I took a big sip. “Mmmm.”
Mama arched a brow and took the glass and sniffed.
“Mama, I wouldn’t—” Before I could stop her, she’d brought the glass to her lips and taken a sip. All right, I probably could have stopped her with my lightning-fast reflexes. But I kind of wanted to see if she would actually do it. There was nothing in there that could hurt her.
Fine, fine, I let my mother drink fake blood. I was going to hell.
“Oh, my, that’s awful!” she said, gagging as she swallowed.
“There’s a lot of iron in it,” I said, taking the glass back and draining its contents.
“It takes a while to get used to it.”
“Well, I’ll just dump it out while you’re getting dressed,” she said, pouring the contents of the blender into the sink.
“What would I get dressed for?”
“I thought we could all go out for a nice dinner,” she said brightly, pushing me toward the den.
“We all?” I arched an eyebrow at her.
Mama marched me into the den, where my older sister and Grandma Ruthie where checking over the contents of my china cabinet.
“Oh, boy.” I sighed, prompting Grandma to bobble the little china cow she was holding. Jenny’s lip curled instinctively at the sight of me and my sloppy PJs. She was wearing pressed white linen slacks and a peach scoop-neck sweater paired with Grandma’s heirloom pearls. Pearls that had been Aunt Jettie’s until I foolishly left Grandma unsupervised during Jettie’s funeral luncheon at River Oaks.
I declined to sit across from them as they made themselves comfortable on my couch. Frankly, it was a better defensive position to have them looking up at me.
“Jane.” Grandma Ruthie sniffed, toying with her purse strap. “I haven’t seen you in so long I hardly recognize you. Have you put on a few pounds?”
Was that two or three insults in one shot? Sometimes I lost track. I offered a thinlipped smile but said nothing. I think we can all agree this was the wisest course of action.
“Now, Mama,” my own mother warned in a tone that would ultimately do nothing to stop Grandma Ruthie.
Mama had her moments, but she was a rank amateur in terms of good oldfashioned offspring manipulation compared with my Grandma Ruthie. Guilt and passiveaggression were Grandma Ruthie’s weapons of choice, all wrapped up in pastel dress suits and a cloud of White Shoulders. Miss a Sunday dinner at her house, she developed a debilitating migraine. Go to the movies with a boy she didn’t approve of, and she ended up in the hospital with chest pains. Announce you were planning to study library science instead of elementary education, as she had planned for you, she checked herself in for exploratory surgery. All the while, she moaned from underneath her soothing gel eye mask that she “doesn’t want to be a burden” with all of her demands, but “who knows how long I have left?”
Jettie appeared near the window, surveying the little tableau we presented and grinning from ear to ear. “And it’s not even my birthday.”
Aunt Jettie danced over to the china cabinet a few feet behind Jenny and Grandma and began levitating various bric-a-brac over their heads. Fortunately, Mama was rearranging the photos on my mantel to keep hers at the forefront, so she didn’t notice. I clenched my jaw and shook my head at my ghostly great-aunt, who was making spooky
“Ooooooo” noises that nobody else could hear.
Jenny, who had obviously been waiting patiently for this opportunity, was unaware of the candlestick floating over her head. She quirked her carefully painted lips (which matched her twin set) and said, “So, Mama says you haven’t gotten another job yet.”
If I corrected her and said anything about my new job, it would only prolong their visit, so I shrugged it off. “Daddy says you repainted your kitchen.”
“How are you going to pay the bills? You know, the taxes on River Oaks are coming up soon,” she said, trying her hardest to be nonchalant. “If you can’t pay them, you can always come to Kent and me for a loan.”
I narrowed my eyes at my sister. Same old Jenny. The same Jenny who refused to let me touch her pep-squad pom-poms because I’d “mess them up.” The same Jenny who picked our second cousin to be a bridesmaid over me because everyone else in her wedding party was thin and blond, and she didn’t want me to “stick out.” Well, screw the same old Jenny.
“I’d rather roll naked over broken glass and dive into a pool full of lemon juice, but thanks,” I said, smiling back. “Besides, Junie said there are some shifts opening up at the Booby Hatch. I thought I’d give that a try.”
Mama gasped and turned, prompting Jettie to drop the candlestick behind the couch with a thud.
No one noticed, because Grandma Ruthie loudly demanded, “You know what your problem is, Jane?”
“No, but if I had a couple of hours, I’m sure you’d tell me.”
“You’re too full of yourself.” She sniffed. “Always have been. I’ve never understood what you thought was so special about you—”
“Why don’t you just go get dressed, honey, and we’ll wait down here?” Mama asked, her voice desperately cheerful.