Page 20 of Overexposed

Charlie’s mouth puckered. “Maybe… I’d just run away from home. How old was I? Maybe seventeen? Maybe? I could have been fifteen?”

“Shit,” I mumbled.

Charlie looked at me. “You’re not a vampire.” He looked at Auris. “Is he yours? I’m Jonathan’s. He says no one else can touch me, because I’m his.”

The next curse that wanted out of my mouth I swallowed right back down.

“This is Ethan,” Auris said. “He is under my protection, yes. Do you know why Jonathan took you here? You are not from here.”

That puckered mouth again. “He said he likes it better here. He never liked CCTV. He says you can get all the things here and have lots of fun. Oh, he said he had dealings with the fur people in the area.”

“Right,” Auris said. “Who or what are the fur people?”

Charlie tilted his head, left, right, left again. “Don’t you know? I think they are wolves. Or bears? Like were-bears. I’ve never seen them, but there was supposed to be a meeting. We missed that. Jonathan will have to set up a new one, once we get him out of the ossuary. So did you see him in there?”

Auris went quiet, shifted to the side, closer to me. Then he said, “Jonathan is dead, Charlie.”

Charlie’s wide eyes stared at Auris. He stared some more. In the end, all he said was, “Oh.”

“Do you think you can go home now, Charlie?” Auris asked.

Puckered mouth. “I’m not sure. He said to wait. He was very specific. Wait. Come help him. He always said he couldn’t go long without me, because of the hunger, you know. Are you… are you sure? That he’s dead?”

Auris picked up the bag I’d put between my feet, put it next to Charlie on the bed, and undid the hastily made knot.

“Oh,” Charlie said again, sounding not at all like someone confronted with his dead vampire lover. As Auris and I watched, Charlie pulled out the skull, held it up in one hand, and ran a thin index finger along the brow line, down to the cheek. “Oh,” he said again, a tear running down his cheek. He kissed the charred skull with an amount of tenderness that made me feel all kinds of conflicting emotions.

Auris put a hand on my shoulder. “Ethan, I saw a tub in the bathroom. Will you do me a favor and run a bath for Charlie?” I felt him flinch, tighten his grip. “If that is okay. I can do it instead.”

I stood. “No, that’s fine. He’s been entranced? Ever since…”

“I expect so,” Auris said.

I ran the water in the small bathroom like Auris had asked. Pacing while waiting for the tub to fill would have been my preference, but in lieu of that, I walked back the six steps to the bedroom.

Charlie had gone on to examine the rest of the bones while the skull was on the duvet on his right. It was the strangest scene I had ever seen, and I wasn’t sure what to make of this, whether it was grief or whether Charlie was looking for some specific mark on the bones.

“Charlie, come with me,” Auris said after about ten minutes. “Ethan, I don’t know how he’ll react.” I heard the unspoken things there, don’t come in the bathroom, nothing bad will happen, don’t listen to the noises, this is nothing like what happened to you. Auris’s face didn’t betray much, but I knew he didn’t want to trigger me.

“I’m okay, really.” I pulled out my phone. “I’ll just play some Candy Crush.”

Auris nodded, but I could tell he wasn’t happy, going by how tense his shoulders were. He and Charlie went into the bathroom, and Auris closed the flimsy door behind them.

Instead of Candy Crush, I looked up werewolves, then found bear warriors or berserkers, and wondered whether I could handle the knowledge that those too existed in the world along with vampires, magic, and murderous priests. There was splashing from the bathroom. It didn’t really bother me because I knew Auris wouldn’t hurt anyone, not unless they tried to hurt him or me. The whispering and sobbing unsettled me somewhat. It was followed by more splashing. I looked at the skull, nestled on the duvet, and wondered whether I should leave it out or put it back.

It was just a little after eleven when Auris came out of the bathroom, a bedraggled-looking Charlie wrapped in a towel behind him. I decided I didn’t need to have an opinion about the fact Auris had made Charlie take his clothes off, looked at the old plastic bag on the floor that held all Charlie’s possessions as far as I knew, and felt bad about almost being jealous.

Auris’s face was tight, his lips a thin line. I bobbed my head. “We’re taking Charlie with us?”

“At least for tonight,” Auris said.

Charlie walked toward the bed, looked at the bones, and said, almost too quiet for me to hear, “Shit.”

I waved at the duvet. “I wasn’t sure. If I should put them back, I mean.”

“I’ll do that,” Auris said, picked up the plastic bag, and handed it to Charlie. “Get changed. Collect everything you want or need. Do you have your passport?”

Charlie nodded. “The one Jonathan had made for me.”

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