Blood Ties (NaNoWriMo 2015)

Twenty-Three

After about three hours and one mini-fashion show later, Ife and I finally settled on a compromise, an A-line navy blue shirt and a cream drape sweater that brought out the warm tones of her complexation.

"Thank you so much Ember! You're a life saver!" Ife gushed as she escorted me back to my room. Her many gold chains around her neck jiggled around as she practically skipped down the hall. I noticed as I'd helped her selected jewelry for the night, that not one piece of it was anything but gold.

"Why is all your jewelry gold?" I asked. "And you are welcome, it does help to have a second opinion."

"It also helps when that second opinion has amazing taste!" Ife squeezed my arm in a tight hug. "And to answer that question, gold is the only precious metal that does not irate our skin. Sliver is actually something you could weaponized against us if you wanted to."

I added that bit to my list of things about vampires. Maybe I could try and get my hands on some silver, keep it on me just in case another unfriendly vampire showed up again. "What does it do to you, if you come in contact with it?"

"Just gives us a terrible rash," Ife admitted and my hopes to find some way to defend against unfriendly vamps vanished. "But if you combined that with brass and sharpen it and boom! You have yourself an very effective stake."

"Brass gives you a rash too?"

"No," Ife said, wrinkling her nose. "That's a drug to us, small doses it just gives a high, too much and we're dead."

"Aren't you already?" I asked.

"Undead," Ife corrected. "The 'un' part makes it different."

I laughed, I was slowly getting used to the vampires cracking jokes about vampires. I opened my door, Ife bouncing up and down on her heels at my side and I prepared to go and collapse on my couch once again and continue going through my collection of movies. However, that plan came to a screeching halt when I saw something draped over my bed.

It was a little black dress, still on the hanger with a note pinned to it. Curious and slightly terrified I grabbed the small bit of paper and read:

Thought this would look nice. Get dressed, I'll pick you up at ten, please wear shoes you can dance in.

-Damon

I looked up at Ife who was now giggly and had a guilty expression on face. I suddenly realized her need of my help getting dressed for Cruor Luna might not have been without ulterior motives. "You knew about this?" I said unable to keep the accusation out of my voice.

"Who do you think told him to go for the little black dress? Every girl needs one! I wasn't sure what colors you liked and neither of us could come up with a solution to find out without bringing unwanted attention." Ife strode across the room and picked up the dress. "Damn, Lockwood has good taste."She frowned half a second later as she held the dress up to me. "Someone at the store had to have helped him, no straight man could've picked something this nice."

Ife smiled widely and I gave her my crazy eyes. "Are you crazy?"

"No, Damon's straight." Ife said as she set the dress down and walked over to my closet. She flung open the doors and went straight for my shoe rack. "And now for shoes, need to be able dance so I think crazy high heels are out, but what would you say if we did a sort of kitten heel? Something to give you some more height but not so much that walking-."

"Ife!" I exclaimed. "I'm not going!"

"Yes you are!" she said cheerfully, holding up a pair of crimson flats. "Yay or nay?"

"Nay! To both!" I said and I waved my arms at Ife in an attempt to shoo her away but she was like an avalanche impossible to stop once started. "I can't go to this! I'm not a vampire!"

"There's no rule that says you have to be," Ife said as she set aside a pair of strappy black heels. "No, these are too high, not to mention black. We need a pop of color!"

"I'm not religious! I don't follow this Zalam, or any other deity for that matter."

"Neither do half the people who show up! They just join in because it's part of our culture!" Ife picked  up another pair of heels, these marginally shorter and a peacock blue. "You'd think though," she said as she set them aside in to what I assumed was the maybe pile. "That they'd all believe in Zalam, I know it might seem superstitious, but they are vampires. If that isn't proof of superstition is less fairytale and more fact I have no idea what is."

I flopped onto my bed, the soft material of Damon's dress rubbing against my face. "I never thought about that."

"No one does," she said. "How do you feel about boots?"

"Ife," I tried again. "I don't think I belong there. I'm human."

"And you were invited," she said. "I promise, you won't notice the company isn't human, you'll be too busy having a good time. Please," she turned to face me, hands clasped together, full lower lip pushed out in a pout. "Just go, I need a wing-woman. That's what they call it these days isn't it?" Ife pushed one of her braids back and forth like a pendulum, the white beads shining. "Sorry, the slang changes about every decade, they get mixed up sometimes."

"That's what we call it now," I assured her. "But..."

Ife furthered her pout, brown eyes going liquid. "Please?"

I was going to regret this. "Alright, you win."

"Yes!" Ife jumped up excitedly. "Now back to shoes! So about the boots?"

"I like the kitten heels," I said not wanting to admit that I did not own boots. I was not a boot type of girl. Flats, heels and Converse yes, boots, no.

Ife smiled happily at me and grabbed them from the little pile. She tossed the rest haphazardly back into my closet and snatched a DVD from the entertainment center. "I haven't seen this either, The Last Airbender, is that a musical as well?"

My worries went to the back of my mind and I grabbed the case from Ife and threw it into the trash. The fury of that terrible adaption from that wonderful show still was just as firey as it had been the day I went to see it in theaters. "No, that is not a musical, it's an adaption based on a TV show and I forbid you to watch it!" I rummaged through the DVDs and discovered they'd been rather unorganized, there was of course plenty of movies and musicals as well as a handful of documentaries I'd already watched. But I'd completely forgotten the idea of TV shows.

After about ten minutes I'd found what I was looking for  (as well as several things I hadn't been, but fully intended to watch later such as  the first two seasons of Grey's Anatomy.) "This," I said waving the case like a carnival gypsy before Ife's wide, confused eyes. "Is the source material for that terrible adaption you just found and, like the film I assume you have never seen it. Don't let the Nickelodeon logo fool you, this is a show for all ages."

Ife sat on the couch, looking interested and I popped the disc into the player. "Get ready to binge-watch," I warned her as the "Water, Earth, Fire Air" opening began. This was going to be fun. The prospect of loosing myself in a show from my childhood and seeing it again with adult eyes was a cheerful idea. It almost made me forget that I was going to attend a party full of vampires in a few hours.

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Okay Damon and Ife are masterminds it's official! Any thoughts on what might happen at the party? I'm interested to hear them so do COMMENT! (Voting is great too!) And tell me, who else watched ALTA growing up? I know I did! Great show-wish they'd do reruns because the new stuff on Nick save TLOK is crap!

Write on! =D