“GOOD MORNING ALL! I HOPE YOU ALL SLEPT WELL!”

I woke up the next morning to an oddly chipper Mac. His hair was messier than usual and his skin was pinker than usual .

“Hey man, how did you sleep?” He asked with a smile.

He just seemed happier than usual.

“I slept okay. Did you hear the person who took a shower in the middle of the night?”

“That was me actually. I had a nightmare and I got very sweaty and gross, so I rinsed off briefly.”

“Oh okay, want to talk about it?”

“Ah, well-- it wasn’t actually a nightmare, but it was… somebody else’s nightmare.”

“O-Oh. right.”

“Its okay though. I’m okay now.”

“You said that before when you weren’t okay. Prove to me that you really are.”

“Uh… well I’m just not hungry. They gave me another blood bag to calm me down in the middle of the night, and one this morning too.”

“Fair enough.”

I decided to believe him.

“So I have another question. I know you must be getting sick of them by now.”

“It’s okay, ask away.” he smiled.

“So, I just want to know. I know you’ve been thinking a lot about, uh, killing people lately, so I was wondering. And I don’t care either way, I just want to know.”

“Know what?”

“...Do you, like, still feel guilty? About drinking blood?”

He paused.

“Yes.”

I nodded, looking around the room briefly.

“Do you still want to live together and get a nice apartment downtown and stuff?”

I recalled our plans and goals for the future.

Mac looked over at me, so I looked at him.

“Yes. I still care about you. I know it’ll be different than our original plan though. You can’t cook dinner for us anymore. I won’t be able to hold a job for a while, or finish college. There’s no way I can become a doctor like this. At least, not for a long time. I guess i could try selling my art. And it might be awhile before I can be trusted around humans in general. And if I turn you you won’t want to cook anymore. Your bass will be too loud for you play.”

He right about all that. I didn’t know what I’d do with myself. I had no other talents besides those.

“I don’t know how we’d support ourselves. Well I have one idea, but it’s not really an option.”

Now i was curious.

“What is it?”

He shook his head,

“ you won’t like it, and like i said, it’s not an option anyway.”

“Just tell me what it is. Maybe we can work it out. I’m open to anything that would keep us afloat.”

“Rafael told me that a lot of vampires get money by robbing their victims.”

I swallowed,

“Oh.”

“I told you.”

Silence.

“Would you ever do that? If it was the only option?”

He looked to the side.

“I mean… if there’s no other option, there’s no other option.”

Something seemed off about him today.

“What’s up with you?”

He shrugged.

I got the sense that he was hiding something, and I didn’t want him to have to hide anything.

“You can talk to me, you know. About anything.”

He wouldn’t look at me,

“No, I really can’t. Last time I tried that it caused something bad.”

“But nothing bad happened. There are people here to keep me safe. Don’t you get it? It’s going to hurt our friendship if we don’t communicate.”

He didn’t say anything at first.

“It’s not like im going to leave you.” he told me after a few moments. His chipper mood seemed to have faded.

“What’s going on, Mac?” I pushed.

“Just let me have my privacy, god damn.” he muttered.

I looked at him, and then I scoffed.

“Fine. have your privacy.”

I stormed off to the other side of the room.

Later that day, Mac sat next to me. I raised an eyebrow, putting on the least amused face possible.

“Howie… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t push you away. I’ll talk to you, but you have to promise not to freak out. I won’t leave you, so you have to promise you won’t leave me either.”

He looked me in the eyes firmly.

“I would never.”

I made it clear he was completely serious. Mac seemed upset by something then.

“What’s wrong?”

He put his face in his hands.

“I lied to you. I didn’t have a nightmare last night. I slept beautifully.”

I felt confused and annoyed. There was no reason to lie about that.

“Why?” I let my annoyance into my tone.

“I… did something else.”

A got a sinking feeling in my gut.

“What did you do?”

He looked up from his palms and there were tears in his eyes.

“The night before last, Rafael was talking to me about hunting. You know, hunting… humans. He coaxed me, describing it in a way that made it sound wonderful. He made me picture it, and just as he got to the best part he pushed the bag into my mouth and made it feel real. He says drinking from blood bags is silly, that hunting is so much better.”

“And?”

I already knew what he was going to say.

“He convinced me to give it a try,” he murmured.

A tear ran down his face. He glanced up at me, stealing a glance below my face and then back to my eyes. Even when he was crying in shame, he still couldn’t stop looking at my neck-- wanting to hurt me. I hoped it didn’t show how spooked I was. It occured to me there was no way he didn’t know it. I didn’t freak out though. I couldn’t judge him; I didn’t know what it was like. He sat very still, not even breathing.

“Who was it?”

“I don’t know... Some guy at waffle house.”

“You went outside?” I asked, raising my eyebrows in awe.

I wanted to go outside. He nodded.

“Rafael took me out. He did most of the work; I was too distracted by everything. Imagine being in a store full of shiny new basses. Amps too, and other music stuff that you really want. But the store smells like shit, and it’s really strong.”

I could sort of understand what he was trying to describe.

“Okay. well... how were they?”

He took a shaky breath and swallowed,

“Amazing. I loved it.”

his voice cracked. he rubbed his eyes.

“Change the subject before I--”

“Want to play chess?” I offered.

“Sure.”

Dayo called us over for breakfast.

“After, I guess,” he muttered, “is it cool with you if you eat breakfast without me?”

“Uh… sure,” I got up smiled at him half heartedly, “Thanks for sharing. For the record, I’m not mad.”

He smiled slightly despite his tears.

Mac went to his room and I built up the courage to sit next to the vampires for the first time since the incident with Keith. They usually sat at the table even though they weren’t eating.

“Hey guys. How’s it going?”

“‘How’s it going?’” Yosef mocked, “Can’t you come up with something more interesting to ask?”

“Like what?”

He raised an eyebrow and smirked,

“How about ‘how was the universe created?’ ‘How is it possible that some infinities are bigger than others?’”

I rolled my eyes and smirked back,

“I don’t care about that shit.”

“Language,” called Ashely flatly.

“My bad, crap. Anyway, I wanted to know if it’s getting any easier to, you know, not eat me.”

Yosef shrugged,

“Yeah.”

Mabel agreed.

“Cool. So can I ask you guys for some advice?”

“Knock yourself out,” replied Daren.

“Of course,” Mabel agreed.

“So I want to help Mac feel better. I don’t know how to make him feel okay though. Should I encourage him to do… stuff? Let him make his own choices? Discourage him from stuff?”

“Don’t encourage him,” Daren started, “He’ll fall off the deep end. But don’t discourage him either, or he’ll feel worse and possibly start resenting you.”

Then Yosef spoke.

“Letting him make his own choices is the best thing you can do. Ask him what he wants you to do. If he asks you to try and keep him in his right mind, discourage bad behavior. But otherwise don’t. If he turns on humanity, there’s nothing anyone can do to stop it. It’s a matter of who he is deep down.”

“He won’t turn on humanity. I’ve known him for almost 5 years. I know everything about him, as he does me.”

Yosef put his hands up,

“Whatever you say. I’m just saying becoming a vampire can change people. You may have known him before, but maybe not anymore.”

Keith slid his notepad over to me:

Let him make his own choices. If he’s anything like us, he’ll make the right decisions in the end.

I nodded and slid it back. I didn’t know that he was like them. He wasn’t like anyone I’d ever met. But that didn’t make him a bad person.

“Thanks for the help. I just want the best for him.”

Yosef rolled his eyes and mumbled something lower than I could hear. They all giggled.

“What?” I demanded.

“Nothing.”