Page 41 of The Vanishing
“Didn’t you verbally rescind his invitation into our home?” Asao asks. “He can’t come inside anymore. You don’t need to do this.”
“It’s not enough!” Haruka pauses from the outburst, taking a breath. “He can still use his power to vanish us, even if he is not inside the house. As long as he knows we are here, we are vulnerable and I cannot… I can’t sleep knowing this. I will not.”
“So, why not let Cellina and Giovanni stay to help?” Junichi asks.
“Because they have already done more than enough for us. I refuse to burden them any more than I already have. I can handle this.”
Silence falls over the warm space of the kitchen. Haruka rubs his eyes. The inflammation there is growing unbearable.
“How long will this go on?” Junichi asks. “This practice of living in fear and paranoia?”
“I don’t know,” Haruka says, his throat tightening from the anxiety and cutting off his breathing. Everything—the stress, shock and uncertainty of the past month—it all crashes down on his psyche. “I have lost much in my life, Junichi. I lost my parents very young, and I lost my first mate and a child. I almost lost Nino and it scares me to death. If I lose him… I’m finished. There’s nothing else for me in this life.”
Haruka clenches his eyes shut, the fear deep within him rising to the surface and spilling over. His eyes water and he wipes the tears away with his fingertips. “I was too complacent, too relaxed. I… I will do whatever it takes to protect the vampire I love and our home. If this means becoming nocturnal, then so be it. But I do not wish for your lives to be uprooted by my actions. I do not want to make things difficult for my community. I am sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry,” Junichi says. “But I don’t like that all of our lives are being shifted because of this vile vampire. You’re giving him a lot of power, Haruka.”
“I don’t know what else to do.”
Asao exhales a groan and runs his palms against his face. “Going to the bank and grocery shopping are going to be a real bitch.”
Junichi laughs. “You crabby old man—that’s all you’re worried about right now?”
“No more high school baseball games, or afternoon karuta matches at the local rec center. And think about vamps whose businesses thrive in the daytime hours, or how the trains stop running at two in the morning—travel and accessibility are going to be shit. Night buses for everyone!”
“Mm.” Junichi shakes his head. “Fuck the night bus, I’m not doing that.”
Asao laughs. “Vampires on the Night Bussounds like some cheap horror film—”
The doorbell rings and Asao stands to leave. When he’s gone, Haruka squints at the suave peanut-brown vampire beside him. “Did Asao tell you to come back home to talk to me?”
“Asao is not the boss of me. I make my own decisions.”
“He’s your elder.”
“Doesn’t matter. After my father died, I stopped listening to my elders. Evil bastard ruined it for all of ’em.”
Haruka scoffs, unconvinced. Junichi will be one hundred and thirty this fall. Haruka outranks him, but the dynamic of their relationship is comfortable—not rigid in their culture’s traditional, hierarchical manner. It’s nice.
“Thank you, Jun. For listening, and for keeping my circumstance secret… for as long as possible, anyway.”
“You’re welcome.” Junichi smiles, watching Haruka from the corner of his eyes. “That’s what friends are for. Should I start making you new clothes since you’re rail thin now? My dark, ethereal muse is becoming skeletal, so I need to adjust my aesthetic?”
“Ethereal?” Haruka turns his nose up, but then looks down at his baggy sweater, his loose pants with his belt augmented by a self-made hole to draw it in tighter. “Is it so bad?”
“It’s notgood.Why aren’t you eating?”
“Solidarity. But I eat sometimes… I am busy.”
“Doesn’t Nino get a feeding tube for nutritionanda blood IV? Plus, your mate is a little more toned than you, Haruka. He can handle the weight loss better. You, on the other hand,need to eat more than ‘sometimes,’ my dear friend.”
Haruka shrugs. “We have always been taught that as purebreds, we do not need to consume food to survive.”
“Right. You can walk around looking like Nosferatu in a wig if you want to, but you’d be better off with some meat on your bones.”
Asao reappears in the doorway and Haruka is surprised when a casually dressed Doctor Davies is standing beside him. He bows at the waist as he holds the handles of a large bag within his fists. Haruka turns to Junichi, the moment shocking him. He whispers, “There is a human in my house.”
“Who is this?” Junichi sits forward, whispering back with his black eyes wide. “He’s exquisite…”
