Page 21 of Thirsty
Lorenzo turned his head slowly to glare at her. Rachel stood up, shut off the TV, and stormed away to her room in a huff.
After her door slammed, Charlie asked Maggie, “What was that about his driver’s license?”
“The DMV’s only open during daylight hours,” Maggie explained. “Which I personally think is discriminatory against vampires and other nocturnal-only creatures, but—tell that to Congress.”
“And you need a license?” Charlie asked Lorenzo.
“Ihavea driver’s license,” he said.
“Yeah, but he hasn’t gotten it renewed since like the 1970s,” Maggie said. To Charlie, she added, “His picture is amazing.”
“I’ll help you renew your license!” Charlie said eagerly.
“You can’t,” Lorenzo snapped. “They have rules. You cannot apply for another person, I must go myself. In person. And I cannot.”
“I’ll find a way,” Charlie said.
“No, you won’t.”
Charlie took a step toward him and tossed his chin back. “If I do—if I can figure out how to get you a new driver’s license somehow—then you answerallof my questions,” he said. “No limits, no weaseling out.”
“Weaseling?” Lorenzo demanded, his tone making clear what he thought of Charlie’s twenty-first century vocabulary.
“You have to be my full guide to the supernatural,” Charlie pressed. “Get me everything I need. For my thesis.”
Lorenzo narrowed his eyes at him. He’d needed a stalling tactic, and this would work nicely. Arranging a plumber was one thing, but circumventing byzantine government regulations would take Charlie weeks, if he could manage it at all. “You will never succeed,” he said.
“Do we have a deal?” Charlie asked, holding a hand out. “I want yourword.”
His neck wasn’t the only place that Lorenzo could see Charlie’s pulse; it beat in his wrist too, the skin there so thin and delicate that his veins seemed to be blooming outward, ripe and ready. He stared at Charlie’s palm, caught between too many competing desires.
“How about this,” he said, when Lorenzo continued to simply stare at him. “If I fail, I’ll leave you alone forever.”
“Deal,” Lorenzo said.
He shook Charlie’s hand briefly. Humans’ skin always felt searing hot to him, their blood roaring so swiftly just beneath. Lorenzo reminded himself of this when the phantom warmth of Charlie’s palm lingered on his fingertips even after he’d turned his back.
Chapter 5
The bartender hadn’t said a word to Charlie since he’d sat down. He was drumming his fingers on the wood, and when the bartender glared at him, he realized that his knee was bouncing so hard it was making the whole bar top rattle. He forced himself to stop and smiled apologetically. The bartender was already doing something else.
He hadn’t been this nervous since he’d published his very first column. He’d come back from the werewolf prom almost in a trance and filled page after page, staying up until the literal dawn. Writing hadn’t felt that good in years—it felteasy, as he reflected on everything he’d learned, everything he’d seen and felt, and everything he’d talked about with Lorenzo.
And after that one perfect evening, he’d started to worry that it had all beentooeasy. It was some kind of trick; maybe he hadn’t really ever recovered from the writing slump he’d been in, and he just couldn’t see that the new stuff was as dull as the old. But when he sent Ava his first full column, she seemed to like it, and then—it actually did decent numbers. It wasn’tbreaking the internet or anything, but the click gods seemed happy. He had to use the word “engagement” unironically now.
So naturally, he was vibrating out of his skin. First the writing was painless, and now the column was doing well? Something had to be lurking around the corner. It couldn’t just be this easy.
No, he was choosing to assess the situation with cold hard dread, and that was why he had to keep going—keep learning more about the supernatural, keep writing more columns leaning into the Crone persona, and get his career up off the mat. He needed this to work so he could get out of Brookville and back to his real life.
He clicked his nails against the soft wood of the bar. He’d lived in this town most of his life, but he’d never been to this particular bar. It was nice inside, dark and cozy, but the exterior was one of those squat, windowless buildings that’d always given him the creeps. He never would’ve checked this place out if Maggie hadn’t texted him the address.
He felt off-kilter living back here in Brookville. He hadn’t visited at all since he’d moved to New York, and now that he was back, he’d mostly kept to the same places he knew from college; those were decent memories, at least. Going to the DMV today had been weird. He’d been there just once before, as a teenager, to get his own license—waiting for hours and filling out paperwork just to show his dad that he could do something on his own.
His father had always been vaguely unimpressed by Charlie. That hadn’t really mattered much while his mom was still around. Dad may have hovered above the two of them as if having a family were a little beneath him; but Mom was funny and warm and wonderful, and she softened his dad just enough to keep the whole family together.
And then when she was gone, there wasn’t anything left between Charlie and his dad to even rebuild. Professor Wever still had his scholarship and the respect of his peers, and Charlie did get out of Brookville, eventually.
For a while.
