“That your birthday is tomorrow? About an hour ago. This is me. I figure things out. Seventeen.” He rushed over to stand right in front of me. “So we need to do something after school tomorrow to celebrate your birthday. What would you like to do?”
It had been a long time since anyone celebrated my birthday. When I was young, we did some things to celebrate, mostly clowns in big public places with a lot of video games. But it had been years since that place closed down, and eventually, Mom gave up celebrating my birthday. Maybe she’d forgotten it altogether.
“Nothing.” I shrugged. “I don’t really celebrate. I mean, if you said happy birthday, that would be good enough.”
He shook his head. “All right, so I’ll come up with my own plans for you. Get everyone else involved. That’ll be great. Did you know that the five of us were all born within one week? I mean…the vamp dads really planned things well, didn’t they?”
“So much can go askew with pregnancies. Early deliveries. Late deliveries. How could they possibly have known how it would go?” We got to the basketball court. “What if something had gone wrong?”
He grinned at me. “If something had gone wrong, that would have meant we weren’t really the five. That we weren’t carrying the souls. Or whatever. It happened. It just makes them believe they were right.”
That was interesting. Still, it begged the question I had to ask him. “Do you believe that’s who you are? The guy in the prophecy?”
He dribbled the ball on the court. “How would I know? I mean…conceivably, if I’m carrying around the soul of a dead vampire who is going to wake up and be in my body, how would I know the difference? Seriously? It’s like asking a person who is left-handed, hey, what’s that like? How would they know?”
I scrunched up my nose. This was like the scenario he’d handed me the first night. It was almost like Griffin was challenging me again, trying to see how I’d consider a problem. The newest strange thing was that I didn’t mind it at all. It should have felt annoying and maybe even a little violating that he threw these things at me. Instead, it was as though being around Griffin woke me up a little bit in a way that I wasn’t usually. I had to consider what I said with him sometimes, and I sort of liked it.
My hands tingled. “I don’t know that what you say is exactly true. Left-handed people are frequently forced to write with their right hands. Or at least they used to be. There are absolutely left-handed people who might be able to tell us what it is like to be right-handed and vice versa.”
He stopped dribbling the ball. “Just because they were forced to be right-handed doesn’t mean they ever stopped being left-handed. They were just left-handed people being forced to use their right hand.”
“Maybe. Or maybe they thought they were right-handed because they weren’t told differently. And then one day they were given the chance to use their left hand, realized they were left-handed, and it changed everything for them. So they were right-handed. And then they were left-handed. But both were true for different periods of time.”
He tilted his head. “So what you’re saying is both existences are true because they were both true for a period of time. Okay. I’ll accept that. But then the argument remains. I can’t compare until I’ve had both experiences. And then I’m afraid I won’t care. Things like that aren’t interesting to a vampire. So the original vampire question remains. Do I think I’m carrying the soul of a dead vampire? Sure, why not? It’s certainly more interesting than not carrying one.”
I groaned. “I think it’s pretty interesting both ways. All right, so you dribbled this thing.” I attempted to do what he’d done. I bounced it, and it came back. Okay, that was simple enough. But then I attempted again. The basketball seemed like it had a mind of its own. It simply didn’t want to stay where I wanted it to go.
Griffin cleared his throat. “It’s supposed to be fun, but you’re staring at it like you want to do the ball harm.”
“I’m finding it frustrating.” I stopped dribbling. “And we shoot, right? The ball has to go into the hoop.”
He nodded. “If you’re not dribbling, you have to pass or shoot. Move too much without dribbling, and the other team gets the ball. So shoot.” He nodded toward it. “Let’s see if you can.”
How hard could it be? I aimed, and…the ball went nowhere near the basket, just under it, as it fell behind and not through the hoop. Okay. So, it was a lot harder than I’d thought it would be.
“I’m really quite good at throwing a baseball.” I smiled. “This might not be my game.”
“Miss once and done?” He raised an eyebrow at me as he retrieved the ball. It took him a second to return to where he was farther away from the hoop than me. In an easy moment, he’d made a basket with the ball. “I did this for hours. Days. I’d stand here and just shoot the ball until I made it. Until I almost never missed. Even then, sometimes I missed. The others got tired of playing with me. I think Ace called me obsessive. I needed to know that I could do it. That I could make a basket more than I missed.”
I walked over to him. “Is this part of making it count? Of knowing you were here?”
“This is part of me having to be the best at everything.” His grin, this time, was sardonic, some of his cocky was gone. “Maybe the vampire in me was a real egomaniac. Maybe we’ll blame him.”
I put my arms around his waist. “Maybe you’re just a really smart, talented, athletic, good-looking, eighteen-year-old guy. I think you’re all egomaniacs, a little bit.”
“I fucking love talking to you.” He picked me up, and I squealed at the unexpected momentum. He bent us both over. “Pick up the ball.” As I was in his embrace and bent over, I really didn’t have a choice but to comply. Once I had it in my hands, he swung us both up until we were right next to the hoop. “Dunk. I’ve got you. Put the ball in.”
I dropped into the net with a whoosh. Maybe it was the sound, but I couldn’t help my grin. “She shoots. She scores.”
“And the crowd goes wild.” He let me down, bringing me toward the ground so that I slid against his body. My nipples hardened at the contact, and I caught my breath. “Maybe I brought you here to make sure you’d remember me correctly—as a little fucked-up.”
“Griffin…” I touched his cheek. “We’re all a little fucked-up. And I don’t even have the excuse that I’ve been on a death march toward vampirism since birth.”
His mouth stroked against mine. “I like that description. I like how you think. I like everything about you. I thought I was good with this happening. It was inevitable. But now? I want to fight it. I want more time.”
“Fight it.” I kissed him again, and his body hardened against mine, his arms holding me tight against him. “I’ll fight it with you.”
“Inevitable. I know you know what it means, but I am going to save you. Or maybe you’re going to save yourself, sort of.” He kissed the end of my nose. “You are getting a birthday cake. I’m going to make it for you.”