A Break from the Blood (A Pink Rhinestone Tiara Christmas Story)

Chapter 1 of my contribution Between the Snowflakes

"A Break from the Blood"

by

DJ Shaw

Chapter 1

Catriogwyn Stacey watched as Demetrio Pirozzi hung up the Christmas lights along the eaves of the house she had inherited from her Great-Great-Niece Prudence, which had just recently been renovated. It was the first Christmas in two hundred fourteen years where she had refused to work. She had chosen to spend it with someone other than co-workers, and the criminals she chased, and she was actually trying to celebrate. Of course she was only doing all of this for her Genie.

Being a Vampire/Succubus Hybrid had its perks such as being immortal; at least she thought she was immortal. All the research she had done on her species said that there weren't many Hybrids to experiment on. According to that research Succubi were immortal but Vampires could be killed. She often wondered if her Succubus side would outweigh her Vampire side if it ever came down to someone Hell-bent on killing her. Not enough to test the theory though.

But living so long also had its limitations such as watching anyone she chose to get close to die and not being able to do anything about it. So to say that she was hardly ever in the Christmas spirit would be an understatement.

"How do they look from down there?" Demetrio's voice brought Catriogwyn out of her gloomy thoughts.

Looking up at the Genie standing on his ladder she looked at the lights he had recently hung, "They look amazing, Dem! But don't you think we might be overdoing it a bit?"

Demetrio slowly made his way down the ladder, "There is no such thing as overdoing Christmas, Cat. Listen, I know you're new to this whole celebrating a holiday thing but why don't you just sit back and let the master do his work?"

Catriogwyn gave him a smirk, "When did you become such a smartass? I remember when you were more comfortable in your tiara than out in the world."

He returned her smirk with one of his own and gave her a knowing look, "It's not that I preferred to be in my tiara as opposed to being in the world, it was more Prudence didn't want to have to explain why a young man was living with her in this big house. You know how small minded people can be."

She gave him a nod of acknowledgement, "Touché, darling. But it's okay for the town to think what they may of me, is that it?"

Dem chuckled, "No, of course not, beautiful. It's just you don't really care what these people think of you because you haven't lived here your entire life. Now, let's plug these babies in and see how they look all lit up."

The Hybrid watched her companion walk into the home they shared and waited to see the splendor that was supposed to be the lights.

After five minutes of waiting she walked up the porch steps, "Can't find an outlet?"

"What? They're not on?" Dem replied in exasperation.

Cat stepped off the porch and looked back up at the lights, "Um, nope. Not so much as a flicker. What are you doing?"

"Damn it! These lights do this every fucking year," Dem's mutters met Cat's ears as she stepped onto the porch again.

She shook her head, I don't think I will ever understand what the big deal is with decorating the entire house, inside and out, for Christmas.

Instead of saying what she was thinking to her mate, however, she chose to ask, "Why don't we just go to the store and buy some new lights? You can think of it as our first Christmas purchase together."

Dem appeared on the porch in front of her, "Buy new lights? These lights work perfectly fine. I just need to tweak them a little bit. If you give me a few more minutes I'll have those flickering pretty patterns for you."

Cat shook her head, "Babe, they're not working. At all. And I'm not sure any amount of tweaking is going to breathe life back into them. I think it's time we retired these and bought some new ones. If you want me to take the celebration of this holiday seriously then maybe it should start with purchasing some new items. I mean, we were going to buy a tree anyway, weren't we?"

The Genie tilted his head to the right, thinking over what his partner had just told him, "Ye-e-eah. But that's different because you buy a new tree every year if you use a real one. If you don't want the real deal then you can go to the store and buy a plastic one that you can reuse year after year. The lights are also supposed to be reusable but I guess you're right about these. Prudence used them every year for as long as I can remember."

Cat watched as Dem thought over what she had proposed they do for their first Christmas together and saw it on his face when he had settled on a decision.

He gave her a wide smile, "Okay, let's go get some new lights then. And while we're doing that, we should get some more outside decorations, the tree that we were just discussing and the lights for it as well as some new ornaments. Although you might want to go through the ornaments that Prudence left up in the attic before we spend money on new ones. Some of the antiques are really gorgeous and would be at home on any tree."

She returned his smile, "Well then what are we waiting for? Let's go get our tree and some lights. We'll wait on the ornaments until I have a chance to go through the ones Prudence left. And why, exactly, do we need more outdoor decorations?"

Dem gave her a wicked smile, "To make sure we win the decoration contest this year, silly. We need a lot of decorations to finish decorating the outside of the house as well as the yard."

Cat stopped on the bottom step and turned to look at him, "What decoration contest?"

"The whole town drives through the neighborhoods voting on the best decorated house of the year and on Christmas Eve they all gather at the town square for the mayor's yearly announcement and watch the trophy be passed on to the new winner for the year. It's really quite something. Prudence has won the last two years. I want to make sure we stay on the winning streak and take that trophy home again this year," he said over his shoulder as he took the porch steps two at a time on his way to the car.

She watched him walk to the car with her mouth slightly agape, "Why on Earth would humans drive around town looking at decorated houses and then vote on the one they feel is the better decorated? Not to mention the fact of gathering around waiting to hear the results from the mayor? Who only apparently comes out this time of year, I might add. It seems absurd."

Dem opened the passenger side door and looked back to Cat, "You know, I've been meaning to thank you for waiting until the first to decorate the house. Prudence would start decorating right after Thanksgiving dinner, which always came with its own set of problems. Are you coming? I'd like to get the shopping done before the sun goes down. I really want to get the house decorated today."

Giving him a dirty look Cat made her way to the car, "Yes, yes. I'm coming. I'm the one with the money, remember? Let's just get this over with."

He smiled at her from across the top of the car, "Oh, don't be such a Grinch, Cat. It's going to be fun. I promise you."

She rolled her eyes as she climbed into the car, not really sure how Dem figured shopping for anything was fun.