“They didn’t run out of oxygen. They’re on Earth. You don’t run out of oxygen,” Bobby rolled his eyes at me. “But nobody knows why they’re dead. Some of the crew is still unaccounted for, but both the lifeboats are still attached, so they don’t know how they could’ve gotten off.
“Officials are trying to keep it under wraps, but rumor has it that they were all mutilated. Like really gory, horror movie stuff. Throats ripped out and all that. Anderson was talking to a guy that had been there, and he was just about puking talking about it.”
“Holy hell. Really?” I leaned forward, staring more intently at the TV. “No way. That kind of thing doesn’t happen in real life. Do they think the crew had something to do with it?”
“Maybe, but they’re not counting on having any survivors at this point,” Bobby said. “They had a crew of thirty, but only twenty-four bodies.”
“That’s pretty messed up.” A chill ran down my spine, and I shook my head. “It’s really creepy.”
“Yeah, I know,” Bobby agreed somberly.
“Where was the tanker coming from?”
“I don’t know,” Bobby shrugged. “I think like Europe or Russia or something.”
“Okay, so be honest,” Milo said, walking into the living room and breaking up our intense fascination with the television. “How does my hair look?” He ran a hand through his dark brown hair and did a little twirl, but it didn’t look that much different than before. Mae had mostly just done a trim.
“Sexy, as always,” Bobby grinned at him. He set his sketch pad aside, momentarily forgetting about his homework assignment. Milo sat down on the floor next to him, and in between kissing and flirting, they started talking about the tanker crash on the television.
Personally, it creeped me out too much, so I decided to go outside and play with Matilda. I had to bribe her with three dog treats to get her to leave Jack’s side, and I was starting to think maybe she loved him more than I did.
The stone patio out back was slick from a slushy snow that was coming down. It was November, and this was the first snow of the season, so I knew it wouldn’t last long. Matilda skidded through it, but she didn’t seem to mind. Very little in life seemed to upset her, other than Jack’s absence.
I couldn’t shake the news story. I glanced back through the French doors at Mae and Jane talking and laughing, and spending time with them might’ve been almost as creepy as hearing more about the dead crew. I let the snow flakes melt in my hair and tried to forget all about it.
- 29 -
Jack went back to sleeping in the den, but he woke me up while it was still light to see if I wanted to go apartment hunting with him. I knew that I should, but daylight was still hard on me.
Besides, I didn’t really want to. The thought of moving didn’t thrill me, but I pretended it did. I told him to take lots of pictures for me and fell back to sleep.
I kept having dreams about the oil tanker crash in Canada. An unseen monster slaughtered them, tearing them apart. Everything was splattered with blood and viscera. It was horrendous. I wanted to scream and throw up.
The crew members were crying and pleading for their lives, but nobody listened. They could do nothing to save themselves. After all the crew was dead, total silent blackness enveloped the ship. That turned into an image: huge brown eyes, ones just like Milo’s.
I woke up and wanted to scream, even though the last thing I saw hadn’t been scary. It freaked me out, though, in the worst way.
As I tried to catch my breath and remind myself that everything was okay, I thought about how weird it was that vampires had dreams. The Lost Boys had not prepared me for this. In fact, I was starting to think that whoever wrote it had never met a vampire in his life.
Since I couldn’t shake the dream, I got up to enlist some assistance. I considered Jane, but she needed her rest. Mae was probably with her anyway, and, I didn’t feel like talking to her. I went next door to Milo’s room, and I went in without knocking. I made sure to listen in first, and Bobby wasn’t there, so I knew it was okay to intrude.
“Hey, wake up,” I said, walking into his room.
It was a little messier than I expected it to be, but that had to be all Bobby. The clothes strewn about appeared to be his, and his art supplies clogged up the floor. Milo lay in bed at a weird angle with his feet dangling off the side.
“Why?” Milo mumbled, his face buried in his pillow.
“Cause.” I jumped on the bed next to him harder than I needed to, making it bounce him up.
“Why are you even up? You’re never up before me.” He rolled onto his back so he could face me. “What time is it?”
Flutter
“It’s six. It’s not that early,” I said. “Where’s Bobby?”
“School. He has a night class,” Milo yawned. “Where’s your better half?”
“He’s… out,” I answered vaguely. Milo didn’t even notice I tried to be secretive, but I decided I couldn’t keep it from him anyway. “Okay. If I tell you something, you promise not to tell anyone?”
“No.” Milo wasn’t intrigued by the prospect of a secret, and I hated him for it.
This happened all the time growing up. I wanted to tell him a secret, but he never cared, so he never had to agree to any provisions. His apathy was pretty tricky.
“No, you actually do wanna know this, but you can’t tell anyone. Not yet. I’m just not ready for people to know,” I said.
“I’m still telling Bobby,” he said, stifling a yawn.
“Fine! Tell Bobby,” I sighed. “But come on. You have to pretend to be excited about this.”
“Why?” Milo raised an eyebrow. “I can’t imagine what you’d tell me that was exciting. My room is right next to yours, and I know that you slept alone last night, so… it can’t be that good.”
“Ugh!” I groaned. “Good. Now I’m glad that we’re moving out. I’m sick of your attitude.”
“You’re what?” That got him. He sat up, propping himself up with his arms, and looked at me. “What did you say?”
“Jack wants us to move out,” I lowered my voice so Mae wouldn’t be able to overhear. “He’s out looking at apartments right now.”
“When you say ‘us’ you mean….” He waited for me to fill in the blank.