Ninovan (Hypernaturals 10)

The Talk

"Dad, I need to ask you a question. A serious one." Nakoma stood next to the chair I am in. I folded my computer up, code forgotten because of the tone of her voice.

"Sure, Honey. Have a seat." I indicated the easy chair to my left, and Nakoma flopped down.

"I can't ask any of my mom's about this. I want your point of view. The other side of it."

Nakoma is not looking at me. Instead, she fiddled with her turquoise bead necklace. She is really nervous, and her scent echoed her posture, her tone of voice, everything about her.

"Nakoma, I made sure you know everything about me because I want us to be able to have complete, open, honest conversations. Why ever you are so on edge, you need not be with me. Really. There is nothing we cannot talk about." I assured her.

Nakoma looked at me, still wound tight, but said: "I know. That is why I came to you about this."

I waited, leaning forward, my entire attention on her. I forced my mind to not speculate, even though it still did, in the background.

"There is this guy I know. I have been seeing him at school and stuff. Study together. Go out for dinner early, sometimes at a taco place near the school. Movies, and sometimes it's a group and sometimes it's just us two."

Oh boy. After the sex talk, this is the big one, and I am here alone. Nakoma watched for this moment. I waited, but I have a pretty good idea of what is coming.

"He wants to have sex." She said, squeezing that out through her obvious fear.

"Of course he does. Naturally." I agreed, as mildly as my inwardly quaking self could manage.

That seemed to be the right thing to say because she looked up and me and asked puzzled: "Of course he does?" Whatever she thought I might say, that wasn't it.

"He is at your school, so he is close to your age. Around sixteen. Right?"

"Yes. I am a month older than him." Nakoma said, and one mental nightmare scenario about some thirty-two-year-old pervert evaporated.

"So: yes: he wants to have sex with you because he is a sixteen-year-old boy. I was one so I know. Sex is all they think about. A cute girl walks into view on the sidewalk, and the hormones rage. No false modesty here: You are a cute girl. You are a little more than cute, technically. A blessing and a curse. If you are nice to him, and you are friends, it gets more intense. All that boy can think about is getting you naked. Not one time, not some fleeting random thought, but getting your clothes off you every ten minutes. That is how sixteen-year-old boys operate. Sixteen-year-old boys do not need owner's manuals. They only have one thing on their minds. If I had to guess, back when people married at fourteen and died at thirty, the hormone thing driving that evolved to be sure that babies got made. I am reliably informed that teenage girls are also walking collections of hormones." I waited to see how she took that.

"So, what exactly then? We are out of control? Do our bodies decide? We don't have any choices?" Nakoma asked

"No. This is the age where you learn to have your mind and common sense rule over your urges. Those tingles and the feelings like your breath is heated, and that feeling like when people look at you, they know you are turned on?"

"Uhmm... Yeah?" Nakoma allowed, not sure she wanted to admit to that.

"In Vampiredom, that is the tool that is used to overcome a human's resistance to a Vampire getting close. If a human scents one of us, we take over their body by overcoming the mind. What you are feeling, taken to a much higher, even worse level. Overwhelming. That is what happened to Morgan when I stole her back from Siren Song. Her mind and body had no choice. In that moment, only I did, and only barely. Think about how you are feeling, but at a white-hot scalding level of intensity. It is complicated, but the brain is the ultimate sex organ, and there is a feedback loop between it and your body. Your body desires sex. It tells your brain that. Your brain desires sex, it tells your body. You have to learn to channel that. Direct it to someone that deserves you. If you only listen to your body, you'll have sex with every cute boy there is."