Bloodsucking fiends: a love story

morning, right?"
    Rivera was looking at the doughnuts. His stomach lurched at the thought of eating one. "Yeah, he lives across the street from where we found the body. He works at the Marina Safeway – was working at the time of the murder."
    Cavuto raised an eyebrow. "The kid was staying at the motel where we found the old lady."
    "You're kidding."
    Cavuto held out the notes for Rivera to read. "List of guests. A uniform talked to the kid, said he was at work, but no one confirmed it."
    Rivera looked up apologetically. "I can't believe I missed that. The kid was a little squirrelly when I talked to him. His friend did most of the talking."
    Cavuto gathered up the papers. "Go home. Shower and sleep. I'll call the manager of the Safeway and make sure the kid was working at the time of the murders. We'll go there tonight and talk to the kid."
    "Okay, then let's ask him how he's getting the blood out of the bodies."
    Tommy had spent two hours trying to explain the difference between vowels and consonants to Simon before he gave up and sent the cowboy home to wax his truck and watch "Sesame Street." Maybe Simon wasn't meant to read. Maybe he was meant to be all instinct and no intelligence. In a way, Tommy admired him. Simon didn't worry, he took things at face value as they happened. Simon was like the strong, free and easy Cassady to Tommy's introspective, overanalytical Kerouac. Maybe he would put Simon in his story of the little girl growing up in the South. The story he would be working on if he weren't worrying about Jody.
    He sat all day on the couch, reading The Vampire Lestat until he couldn't concentrate anymore, then he paced the apartment, checking his watch and railing to Peary, who listened patiently from the freezer.
    "You know, Peary, it's inconsiderate of her not to leave me a note. I don't have any idea what she does while I'm at work. She could be having a dozen affairs and I wouldn't even know."
    He checked the almanac eight times for the time the sun would set.
    "I know, I know, until I met Jody, nothing really ever happened to me. That's why I came here, right? Okay, I'm being unfair, but maybe I'd be better off with a normal woman. Jody just doesn't understand that I'm not like other guys. That I'm special. I'm a writer. I can't handle stress as well as other guys – I take it personal."
    Tommy heated up a frozen dinner and left the freezer lid open so Peary could hear him better.
    "I have to look to the future, you know. When I'm a famous writer I'm going to have to go on book tours. She can't go with me. What can I say, 'No, I'm sorry, but I can't go. If I go away my wife will starve to death'?"
    He paced around the turtles, who were struggling in their crates. One of them raised his spiny head and considered Tommy.
    "I know how you guys feel. Just waiting for someone to eat you. You think I don't know how that feels?"
    When he could no longer look them in the eye, he carried the turtles into the bathroom, then returned to the living room and tried to get through a few more chapters of The Vampire Lestat .
    "This is wrong," he said to Peary. "It says that vampires don't have sex after they are turned. Of course it only talks about male vampires. What if she's been faking? You know, she could be frigid except for when she drinks my blood."
    He was working himself into a frenzy of sexual insecurity – something that felt familiar and almost comfortable – when the phone rang. He yanked it off the cradle.
    "Hello."
    A woman's voice, surprised but trying to not to show it, said, "Hello. I'd like to speak to Jody, please."
    "She's not here," Tommy said. "She's at work," he added quickly.
    "I called her at work and they said she left her job over a month ago."
    "Uh, she has a new job. I don't know the number."
    "Well, whoever you are," the woman said, losing the pretense of politeness, "would you tell her that she still has a mother. And tell her that it is common courtesy to tell your mother when you change your phone number. And tell her that I need to know what she is going to do for the holidays."
    "I'll tell her," Tommy said.
    "Are you the stockbroker? What was it… Kurt?"
    "No, I'm Tommy."
    "Well, it's only two weeks until Christmas, Tommy, so if you're still around, we'll be meeting."
    "I'll look forward to it," Tommy said. Like I look forward to a root canal, he thought.
    Jody's mom hung up. Tommy put down the phone and checked his watch. Only an hour to sunset. "She's alive," he said to