Mr. Westin’s class finished with a few more vampire historical talking points. Zoe was exhausted again. Dinner went by as a blur and with no scheduled activities in the evening, Zoe found herself alone in her room, sitting at her desk trying to gather her thoughts. Unable to make any headway she tried to clear her mind while laying on top of her bed. The rooms were unusually cold so it should have helped keep her awake, but as soon as she was laying her mind drifted off to sleep.
Josh had to know what Zoe meant by asking that question earlier. So, he quietly crossed into the human’s side of the mansion and up the stairs to the girl’s floor. Luckily, there were nameplates, and he could easily use those to find Zoe’s room. In her room he didn’t even think twice about questioning Zoe, he just quietly knocked on her door. Zoe opened it and let him in, but she seemed off. Saying things that didn’t make sense. Maybe she was sleepwalking? She walked back to her bed and tucked herself in and fell asleep. What the heck Zoe, I needed to ask you stuff, Josh screamed in his head. Instead, he decided to look around her room and see if there was anything that could clue him into who Zoe was, or perhaps there was something he could use against her.
Her room was cluttered. Josh saw clothes left in piles here and there and papers all over her desk. The humans weren’t permitted to bring electronics, which was unfortunate for Josh because that’s where secrets could be found. There was nothing in the room that could help Josh quell his fears, except Zoe who was sleeping lightly underneath her comforter. He had no choice, he had to wake her up. It was barely even an hour after dinner, why was she already asleep?
“Zoe, wake up,” Josh said sternly near Zoe’s ear. When she didn’t move, he began to shake her.
“Huh, what?” Zoe finally said waking from her sleep. She really woke up when she realized that Josh was in her room. “Uh, Josh, what are you doing in my room?”
“I need to ask you something, could you just get up?” Josh demanded.
“What?” Zoe said sitting up in bed, grabbing a bottle of water to drink from her bedside table.
“Why did you ask about delaying a vampire’s test out of this school?” Josh cut straight to the point.
“I was just curious. You, vampires, are so strong that there had to be something we humans could do to protect ourselves. But it doesn’t matter, the school’s priority is clearly you guys, you would get any number of chances, aka humans, to pass the test.” Zoe admitted.
“But that would take time Zoe, I want to know whether you would do that to me?” Josh asked sounding cornered.
Zoe was caught off guard. Thinking about it, how she did ask the question back then may have sounded like she had beef with her partner, he probably took it the wrong way. It would be better to clear the air right now.
“No, Josh, contrary to your beliefs, I actually trust you. I think that if you bite me right now and drink my blood, I would be fine. I was just gathering general knowledge from Mr. Westin. I didn’t need it, but I could share it with any of the other human students if they were concerned with their partners.” Zoe replied with a yawn. “Do you feel better now?”
“Yeah, ha, ha …” Josh said, pulling the chair from Zoe’s desk to sit down next to her bed so he wasn’t domineering.
“Well, what now? What do you do for fun in your free time? As you probably noticed I have nothing to entertain myself with. And I think you owe me something for barging in here,” Zoe said finally waking up.
“I listen to music in my room, play video games, watch movies,” Josh replied, uncertain of what Zoe was implying.
“Okay, sir, take me to your room. You got to see mine, which is embarrassing seeing how messy it is. Now I get to see yours,” Zoe exclaimed.
“Are you sure about that? It's where all the other vampires are,” Josh nervously laughed.
“Yeah, it's fine if you are there,” Zoe said brushing off Josh’s attempt at trying to avoid Zoe getting her way.
“Okay, let's go, hurry up,” Josh sighed.
Zoe gathered a bag and filled it with some snacks and a bottle of water and indicated to Josh that she was ready to leave. Josh opened the door to her room and peeked his head out to look right and left of the hallway. The hallway was empty, but not quiet. Some of the girls had gathered in a room and were giggling. Josh and Zoe needed to hurry in case they look for Zoe. Josh grabbed Zoe’s hand and pulled her down the hallway, towards the stairway. They quickly traveled down the stairs to the boy’s floor, scurrying past the closed doors to the vampire’s side. Once Josh had reached his door, he quickly opened it, pulled Zoe into the room, and then before closing the door looked around to see if anyone had seen them. Zoe was trying to catch her breath because she ran through the mansion in about a minute thanks to Josh. Josh pulled away from the closed door, sighing from relief that they made it to his room, without being noticed. He saw Zoe trying to catch her breath, laughing at how weak humans are.
The floor of the room was clear of clutter, the desk only had a laptop and mouse on it, and there was a tv with a game console. Zoe couldn’t find anything left out of place, even Josh’s bed was made perfectly.
“Wow, your room is very clean!” Zoe exclaimed.
“Yeah, your room is the opposite!” Josh replied. “So, what do you want to do?”
“We could watch a tv show or movie,” Zoe responded, looking for an out-of-the-way spot to set her bag down.
“What, I thought you just wanted to see my room!? You want me to entertain you?” Josh freaked out a little bit.
“Yeah, why not? We should learn to get along since we are partners,” Zoe said.
“Ugh, fine. What do you want to watch?” Josh asked reluctantly.
“Well, let’s see, why don’t we watch your favorite movie?” Zoe asked.
“My favorite movie? Why?” Josh was so confused.
“Because you probably have that movie available to watch and it would be a good way to get to know you,” Zoe explained.
“Whatever. I’ll set it up. But you better be okay with horror,” Josh said smiling.
Zoe knew Josh wasn’t going to show her his favorite movie. That was fine. She just wanted to see what he liked. A horror movie wasn’t bad either. Zoe loved jump scares and enjoyed the music and set in some horror movies. Before Zoe left her house, she just started to watch the movies at night by herself. It made the experience much more terrifying. She didn’t quite believe in the supernatural, but watching these movies alone made her feel otherwise. Zoe asked Josh where it was okay for her to sit. He pointed towards the giant bean bag, he had in front of his tv. It was the width of a couch and gray, but comfortable.
The horror movie Josh had set up was one that Zoe had never seen. Before the movie started Josh turned off the lights. He was hoping it would help scare Zoe enough to get her to leave. Josh didn’t realize that it only made her more excited to watch the movie. The movie’s story set up was good and it completely captivated Zoe, so much so that when the first scare arrived, she got chills all over and had to start covering her eyes with her hands like when she was a little girl. Josh laughed at Zoe’s reaction. Zoe heard him laughing but didn’t care. She was enjoying the movie, the fright.
Everything was going okay, until the first jump scare. Josh didn’t know that Zoe screamed at jump scares. The first jump scare appeared causing Zoe to scream. Her scream lasted barely a half-second before Josh had a hand over Zoe’s mouth. But she was still screaming although muffled because the movie was scary, and Josh’s action was scary. When the scene passed Josh was able to remove his hand from Zoe’s mouth. She was laughing at how ridiculous the whole situation was. It was funny to her how she forgot she couldn’t scream, or else people would come. But the movie had just started and now she had to hold her hands over her mouth to muffle her screams, so to deal with the terrorizing visuals she curled up into a ball to hide one eye using Josh’s arm and the other faced the tv.
When Josh felt Zoe, pressing her head up against his arm he looked at her with a ‘what are you doing face’. She whispered, “I can’t shield my eyes if I am holding my hands over my mouth.” During the rest of the movie, little squeaks escaped Zoe’s hands anytime something scary happened, while Josh was forced to deal with the awkwardness of how close Zoe was to him. Josh could hear Zoe’s heart race and pause to the different scenes in the movie. He had never been close enough to a human to hear their heart like this. Zoe’s easily manipulated heart was tempting his vampire instinct to activate. Fortunately for Zoe, Josh wouldn’t activate. Unfortunately for Josh, who was still concerned about getting too close to people, vampire or not, was beginning to have fun spending time with Zoe.
Towards the end of the movie, Zoe wasn’t as scared and stopped pushing her head into Josh’s arm. Josh was finally able to relax and decided to turn on the lights immediately after the movie ended.
“Did you enjoy the movie?” Josh asked sitting back down on the bean bag.
“Yeah, it was so scary, it was fun!” Zoe replied excitedly. “If you want, I’ll go back to my room, if you’ll escort me to the human side, of course.”
“Yea that’s probably best, you don’t want to be missing for too long. I’m sure we can talk more later,” Josh said.
He walked Zoe to the entrance of the human’s side of the mansion. Zoe whispered to Josh, “Till next time. Have a good night.”
“Good night,” Josh replied as Zoe turned to walk down the boy’s hallway to the stairwell. When Zoe disappeared into the stairwell, Josh returned to his room.
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