All Together Dead

I’d gone through my own soul searching over this issue, even before Claudine’s lecture, and I wasn’t going to permit anyone else to second-guess me once I’d made up my mind. Getting the clothes was okay. Working for the vamps was okay…as long as I didn’t turn humans over to get killed.
    “We’ve been friends for a coon’s age,” Tara said quietly. “Through thick and thin. I love you, Sookie, I always will; but this is a real thin time.” Tara had had so much disappointment and worry in her life that she simply wasn’t willing to undertake any more. So she was cutting me loose, and she thought she would call JB that night and renew their carnal acquaintance, and she would do that almost in memory of me.
    It was a strange way to write my premature epitaph.
    “I need an evening dress, a cocktail-type dress, and some nice day clothes,” I said, checking my list quite unnecessarily. I wasn’t going to fool with Tara anymore. I was going to have fun, no matter how sour she looked. She’d come around, I told myself.
    I was going to enjoy buying clothes. I started off with an evening dress and a cocktail dress. And I got two suits, like business suits (but not really, since I can’t see myself in black pinstripes). And two pants outfits. And hose and knee-highs and a nightgown or two. And a bit of lingerie.
    I was swinging between guilt and delight. I spent more of Eric’s money than I absolutely had to, and I wondered what would happen if Eric asked to see the things he’d bought. I’d feel pretty bad then. But it was like I’d been caught up in a buying frenzy, partly out of the sheer delight of it, and partly out of anger at Tara, and partly to deny the fear I was feeling at the prospect of accompanying a group of vampires anywhere.
    With another sigh, this one a very quiet and private one, I returned the lingerie and the nightgowns to their tables. Nonessentials. I felt sad to part with them, but I felt better overall. Buying clothes to suit a specific need, well, that was okay. That was a meal. But buying underthings, that was something else entirely. That was like a MoonPie. Or Ding Dongs. Sweet, but bad for you.
    The local priest, who had started attending Fellowship of the Sun meetings, had suggested to me that befriending vamps, or even working for them, was a way of expressing a death wish. He’d told me this over his burger basket the week before. I thought about that now, standing at the cash register while Tara rang up all my purchases, which would be paid for with vampire money. Did I believe I wanted to die? I shook my head. No, I didn’t. And I thought the Fellowship of the Sun, which was the ultra right-wing anti-vampire movement that was gaining an alarming stronghold in America, was a crock. Their condemnation of all humans who had any dealings with vampires, even down to visiting a business owned by a vamp, was ridiculous. But why was I even drawn to vamps to begin with?
    Here was the truth of it: I’d had so little chance of having the kind of life my classmates had achieved—the kind of life I’d grown up thinking was the ideal—that any other life I could shape for myself seemed interesting. If I couldn’t have a husband and children, worry about what I was going to take to the church potluck and if our house needed another coat of paint, then I’d worry about what three-inch heels would do to my sense of balance when I was wearing several extra pounds in sequins.
    When I was ready to go, McKenna, who’d come back from the post office, carried my bags out to my car while Tara cleared the amount with Eric’s day man, Bobby Burnham. She hung up the phone, looking pleased.
    “Did I use it all up?” I asked, curious to find out how much Eric had invested in me.
    “Not nearly,” she said. “Want to buy more?”
    But the fun was over. “No,” I said. “I’ve gotten enough.” I had a definite impulse to ask Tara to take every stitch back. Then I thought what a shabby thing that would be to do to her. “Thanks for helping me, Tara.”
    “My pleasure,” she assured me. Her smile was a little warmer and more genuine. Tara always liked making money, and she’d never been able to stay mad at me long. “You need to go to World of Shoes in Clarice to get something to go with the evening gown. They’re having a sale.”
    I braced myself. This was the day to get things done. Next stop, World of Shoes.
    I would be leaving in a week, and work that night went by in a