You Suck: A Love Story

stir the porridge and inventory the leeches. Serfs will steal you blind if you don’t watch them. Well, enough business, let’s get to that feeding.”
    He took her wrist and pulled it to his mouth, then stopped. She was looking at him, one eyebrow sort of cocked in the air, and there was a silver ring in it, so it felt more incredulous than a normal eyebrow.
    He dropped her arm.
    “You know, maybe you should get home before you get in trouble. I wouldn’t want my minion on restriction.”
    Abby looked hurt now. “But, Lord Flood, have I offended you? Am I not deserving?”
    “You were looking at me like you thought I was fucking with you,” Tommy said.
    “Weren’t you?”
    “Well no. This is a two-way street, Abby. I can’t ask for your loyalty if I don’t give you trust in return.”
    He couldn’t believe the bullshit that was coming out of his mouth.
    “Oh, okay then.”
    “Tomorrow night,” Tommy said. “I’ll bleed you within an inch of your life, I promise.” The things you never think you’ll hear yourself say.
    Abby rolled down her sleeve. “Okay then. Will you be able to get the rest by yourself?”
    “Sure. Vampire powers. Duh.” He laughed, waving at the heavy bronze statues like they were nothing.
    “You know,” Abby said, “the man and the turtle are cool, but that woman statue, you should get rid of that. She looks kind of skanky.”
    “You think?”
    Abby nodded. “Yeah. Maybe there’s some church or something that you could donate it to. Like, to show how you don’t want your daughter to grow up. Oh, sorry, Lord Flood, I didn’t mean to say church.”
    “No, I’m okay,” Tommy said. “I’ll walk you out.”
    “Thanks,” Abby said.
    He followed her downstairs and held the door to the street, then at the last minute, as she was walking away, she turned and kissed him quickly on the cheek. “I love you, Lord Flood,” she whispered in his
    ear. Then she turned and ran up the sidewalk.
    Tommy felt himself blush. Dead as he was, he felt heat rise in his cheeks. He turned and trudged back up the steps, feeling the full weight of his four, maybe five hundred years of life. He needed to talk to Jody.
    How long could it take to find one drunk guy with a giant cat?
    He dug his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed the number of the phone he’d given Jody. He could hear it ringing on the kitchen counter where she had left it.

14 – Powers for Good
    The Emperor was sitting on a black marble bench just around the corner from the great opera house, feeling small and ashamed, when he saw the striking redhead in jeans coming toward him. Bummer lapsed into a barking fit and the Emperor snatched the Boston terrier up by the scruff of the neck and stuffed him into the oversized pocket of his coat to quiet him.
    “Brave Bummer,” said the old man. “Would that I could still hold that kind of passion, even if it were fear. But my fear is weak and damp, I’ve barely the spine for a dignified surrender.”
    He’d felt like this since he’d seen Jody outside the secondhand store, where she’d warned him away from the owner. Yes, now he knew her to be one of the undead, a bloodsucking fiend-but then, not so much a fiend. She had been a friend, a good one, even after he had betrayed Tommy to the Animals. He could feel the City’s eye on him, could feel her disappointment in him. What does a man have, if not character? What is character, if not a man’s mea sure of himself against his friends and enemies? The great city ofSan Francisco shook her head at him, ashamed. Her bridges slumped in the fog with disappointment.
    He remembered a house somewhere and that same look on the face of a dark-haired woman, but mercifully, in an instant that memory was a ghost, and Jody was bending to scratch behind the ears of the steadfast Lazarus, who had never been agitated by her like his bug-eyed brother, who even now squirmed furiously in the woolen pocket.
    “Your Majesty,” Jody said. “How are you?”
    “Worthless and weak,” said the Emperor. She really was a lovely girl. He’d never known her to hurt a
    soul. What a cad he was.
    “I’m sorry to hear that. You have plenty to eat? Staying warm?”
    “The men and I have this very hour vanquished a corned beef on a sourdough roll the size of a healthy infant, thank you.”
    “Tommy’s Joynt?” Jody said with a smile.
    “Indeed. We are not worthy, yet my people provide.”
    “Don’t be silly, you’re worthy. Look,