You Suck: A Love Story

just getting over the idea of being that close someone who smelled that nasty, but also being close to another man period. But after cleaning William’s neck with an alcohol swab they’d gotten from the drugstore, and consoling himself that most literary vampires seemed sexually ambivalent anyway, the blood hunger pushed him through.
    He was feeling more relaxed, now that they had the food problem solved-for a while, anyway. If his friends didn’t kill them in the next couple of days, he might even enjoy life as a vampire. Then he turned to Jody and frowned. “But I can’t help but think that it may be wrong, taking advantage of a homeless alcoholic.”
    “We could just hunt and kill people,” Jody said cheerfully. She had a little crust of William’s blood in the corner of her mouth. Tommy licked his thumb and wiped it away.
    “We did give him a nice sweater for his huge shaved cat,” Tommy said.
    “I loved that sweater,” Jody said. “And we are giving him a warm landing to sleep on,” she added, diving onto Tommy’s rationalization dog pile.
    “And if we only take a little bit each day, he’ll actually feel better. I know I did.”
    “And we won’t become alcoholics ourselves.”
    “How are you feeling, by the way?” Tommy said.
    “Better. Hair of the dog. You?”
    “Two-beer buzz, max. I’ll be fine. You want to try the experiment?”
    Jody checked her watch. “No time. We’ll do it tomorrow night.”
    “Right. So, on to the list. Looks like hot monkey love.”
    “Tommy, we need to find a daytime person to help us. We have to move out of this place.”
    “I’ve been thinking about Alaska.”
    “Okay, good for you, but we still need to find a place to live where the Animals and Inspector Rivera can’t find us.”
    “No, I’m thinking we should move to Alaska. For one thing, in the winter, it’s dark for like twenty hours a day, so we’d have plenty of time. And I read somewhere that Eskimos put their old people out on the ice when they are ready to die. It would be like people were leaving snacks out for us.”
    “You’re kidding.”
    “Eskimo Pies?” He grinned.
    Jody put her hand on her hip and looked at him, her mouth hanging open a little, as if she was waiting for something more. When it didn’t come, she said, “Okay then, I’m going to change.”
    “Into a wolf?”
    “Clothes, cadaver breath.”
    “I didn’t know. I thought maybe you’d learned.”
    Tommy thought Alaska was a great idea. Just because she was a few years older, she always acted like his ideas were stupid. “The thing with William worked,” he said defensively as he put away the supplies they’d bought at the drugstore.
    “That was a good idea,” Jody said from inside the closet.
    Now what? “Well, Alaska isn’t a bad idea.”
    “Tommy, there’s like nine people in all of Alaska. We’ll stand out, don’t you think?”
    “No, everyone is pale there. They don’t have sun for most of the year.”
    She came out of the closet wearing her little black cocktail dress and her strappy come-fuck-me pumps.
    “I’m ready,” she said.
    “Wow,” Tommy said. He’d forgotten what they were talking about.
    “You think the Ferrari-red lipstick would be too much?”
    “No, I love the Ferrari-red lipstick on you.” Hot, sweet monkey love, he thought. This was exactly why he loved her. In the midst of all of the pressure, the danger, really-she still took time to think of his feelings.
    She lifted her breasts until they threatened to spill out of the plunging neckline of the dress. “Too much?”
    “Perfect,” Tommy said, walking toward her with his hands out. “Gimme.”
    She breezed past him into the bathroom. “Not for you. I need to get going.”
    “No, no, no,” Tommy said. “Hot monkey love.”
    While Tommy watched from the doorway, Jody applied the Ferrari-red lipstick, checked it, then frowned and wiped it off, then grabbed a different tube off the vanity. “When I get back.”
    “Where?” Tommy said. Sexual frustration had reduced him to single syllables.
    She turned to him with the new coat of maroon lipstick. “To get your minion.”
    “Not like that, you’re not,” Tommy said.
    “This is how it works, Tommy. This is how I got you.”
    “Nuh-uh, you weren’t wearing that when I met you.”
    “No, but the reason you pursued me is because you were interested in me sexually, wasn’t it?”
    “Well, that’s how it started, but it’s more than that now.” And it