Blood Lines

wrong?"
    'I spent the day locked in that room with you, that's what's wrong!"

    'You what?"
    'How could I leave? I couldn't open the door without letting at least a little sunlight in and as I was supposed to be preventing you from incinerating yourself, it would definitely defeat the purpose if I fried you instead. So I was stuck."
    Her laugh sounded ragged. "At least you've got a master bathroom."
    'Vicki, I'm sorry…" He stepped forward, but she raised both hands and he stopped again although the blood moving under the delicate skin of her wrists beckoned him closer.
    'Look, it's not your fault. It's something we both should've considered." She took a deep breath and settled her glasses more firmly on the bridge of her nose. "I can't stay with you tonight. I've got to get out of here."
    He needed to feed and he knew he could convince her to stay; convince her in such a way that she'd think it was her idea. Although he didn't really understand, he took hold of the Hunger and nodded. "Go, then."
    Vicki snatched up her jacket and purse and almost ran for the door, then she paused one hand on the knob and turned back to face him, managing a shaky smile. "I'll give you two things as a bed partner, Fitzroy; you don't snore and you don't steal the covers." Then she was gone.
    As the day had claimed him and all he could feel was the press of her lips and the life behind them, Henry had envisioned how this new intimacy would change things between them.
    Reality hadn't even come close.
    Vicki sagged against the stainless steel wall of the elevator and closed her eyes. She felt like such a git. Running away's a big help to Henry, isn't it ? But she just couldn't stay.
    Exhaustion had kept her asleep until mid-afternoon, but the hours between waking and sunset had been some of the longest she'd lived through. Henry had been more alien to her, lying there, completely empty, than he'd ever been while drinking her blood. A hundred times she'd made her way to the door, and a hundred times she'd decided against opening it. It's a bedroom on Bloor Street , she'd kept telling herself. But a trembling streak of imagination she hadn't known existed kept answering, It's a crypt .
    When the elevator reached the ground floor, she straightened and strode across the lobby as though overstretched nerves didn't twang with every movement. She nodded at the security guard as she passed his station and for the first time in over a year went gladly into a night she couldn't see.
    'Yo, Victory!"
    Some things she didn't need to see. "Hi, Tony. Good night, Tony." She felt him touch her arm and she stopped.
    Squinting, she could just make out the pale oval of his face under the streetlight.
    He clicked his tongue. "Whoa, you look like shit. What happened?"
    'Long day." She sighed. "What are you doing around here?"
    'Well, uh…" He cleared his throat, sounding embarrassed. "I got this feeling that Henry needs me, so…"
    In order to be here now, he had to have gotten the feeling before Henry had the need. Wonderful. Prescient ex-street punks. Just what she needed to make the day's experience complete. "And if Henry needs you, you come running?"
    Even to her own ears her voice appeared sharp, and she was embarrassed in turn to realize that its edge sounded very much like jealousy. Henry had needed her and she'd left.
    'Hey, Victory, don't sweat it." As though he'd read her mind, Tony's voice softened. "It's easier for me. I didn't really have a life till he showed up. He can remake me any way he wants. You've been you for a long time. It makes it harder to fit the two of you together."

    You've been you for a long time . She felt some of the tension begin to leave her shoulders. If anyone could understand that , it would be Henry Fitzroy. "Thanks, Tony."
    'No problem." The cocky tone returned. "You want me to nail you a cab?"
    'No."
    'Then I better get upstairs."
    'Before you split your jeans?"
    'Jeez, Victory," she could hear the grin in his voice, "I thought you couldn't see in the dark."
    She listened to him walk away, heard the door to the building open and close behind him, then made her way carefully out to the sidewalk. In the distance, she could make out the glow of Yonge and Bloor and decided to walk. City streets had enough light for her to maneuver, even if she couldn't exactly see and at the moment she didn't think she could handle being enclosed in another dark space.
    A dozen steps away from the building she stopped. She'd been so