Biting Nixie by Mary Hughes

Author:Mary Hughes
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
Published: 2009-01-12T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seventeen

That shut him up. We started racing to my parents’—well, I raced and Julian sort of flowed—in silence. I have to hand it to him, though. He stayed with me like a second skin, despite the warning. Although, as fast as Julian moved, I guessed he was going to dip out as soon as I was safely inside Mom and Dad’s house.

But once underway he started the old familiar refrain. “Nixie. About Nosferatu—”

The last thing I wanted was another earworm, especially not one tinged with guilt. Time for major distraction. “Dru told me you and she are just friends.”

“We are. But Nosfer—”

“Yeah, Nosy’s angry, stay in at night, lock all the doors and use garlic deodorant. I get that. I’m more interested in what made you the Betamax Stuffy-lupagus you are today. Since it wasn’t a woman?”

Julian blinked. “You’re asking what made me decide to eschew puerile behavior?”

“Uh…yeah. I guess.” Sometimes I got the feeling we both needed a permanent link to Babel Fish. “What happened?”

He was silent for several seconds. Finally he said, “I’m not proud of it.”

“Tell me more,” I said in my best Suitglish.

His jaw worked, like he was chewing something rancid. “Fine. I’ll tell you. Since you’ll just torment me until I do.”

“Torment? No way. Coax, maybe, or urge—”

“Do you want to hear this or not?”

“Um…yes.” And because his eyes were shading violet, I added, “Please?”

Julian took a deep breath. “In the early eighteen hundreds I got caught up in the Romantic movement. I fancied myself a poet.”

“Byron and those guys?”

“At first. At first all I did was hang around coffee shops wearing a big shirt, trying to get laid.”

I snorted. “Sounds like the beatnik era, minus the goatees.”

“There are cycles. Anyway, I got restless. I don’t know, maybe it was some sort of middle-age crisis. A poet acquaintance had made the transition to vampire. He said my poetry was garbage. That I was not a ‘real’ artist. William said ‘real’ art was in throwing away boundaries.”

“Who?”

“William the Bloody. You wouldn’t know him. I can’t believe I let him get under my skin. Well, one night I got drunk with him and his cronies. Turned out his brand of artistic freedom and ‘real’ art translated into slash and burn. Later I found out one of the buildings I burned had occupants.”

“Oh, Julian.” What began as an exercise in distraction now sent an arrow of sympathy straight through my heart.

Julian gave a laugh colored with self-disgust. “Fortunately for me, they were dead before I set the fire. Unfortunately for them, William and company also practiced the artistic ‘freedom’ of torture.”

I could see why Julian hated the non-conventional. I would have to rethink my view of him.

“I haven’t thought of that incident in years.” He shook his head, as if shaking the memory away. “Is that your parents’ home?”

I looked up. Sure enough, I saw the familiar bungalow. We’d have to talk more later.

Mounting my parents’ stoop, I turned to face Julian. “Well. Thanks for the ride.”

A slight smile broke through Julian’s grim expression.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.