Free Wait (Beloved Bloody Time) by Tracy Cooper-Posey Page A

love with what he gives you.”
    She threw out her hands. “Yes! I want children . A family.  Grandchildren. He can give me that.”
    She didn’t have to finish the other half of the sentence. The unspoken words hung between them, almost shouting in their silence. He can give me a family, but you can’t .
    There was nothing he could say to dispute her. So he said nothing.
    * * * * *
    Tally’s flight back to New Hampshire wasn’t until noon, and it was barely three a.m. She didn’t leave, as he expected her to. Instead she turned the TV on and glanced at him. “I would just go back to my room and watch it there. I may as well stay here.” She got dressed as CNN reported on the new millennium celebrations around the world, then settled back on the end of the bed, her legs folded up under her, the remote in her hand.
    Christian put on the rest of his clothes and sat on the bed next to her. He felt oddly old and creaky. His muscles ached like they once had when he had been at West Point and suffering through the most severe physical training he could remember.
    They watched the fireworks around the world. He wasn’t interested, but he didn’t know what else to do. He had run out of options.
    Tally pointed to the screen with the remote, where they were showing fire bursts over the Sydney Harbour Bridge. “That footage is only a few hours old, but it’s already made it around to the other side of the world. Technology is just amazing, isn’t it?”
    He stirred and forced himself to answer civilly. “Communications is going to be the next big thing. Especially when you throw the Internet into the mix. You watch. The Internet will be a huge thing. People will communicate with people anywhere in the world, and news will move at the speed they talk. The news networks will lose their monopoly.”
    “You really think it’ll be that big? The Internet?”
    He nodded. “We’ll all be wired into it by mid-century.”
    She flipped channels slowly. “That would be interesting, to be on the inside of that evolution.”
    “It would,” he agreed, staring at the images flashing up on the screen as she surfed. At least half of them were from somewhere else in the world other than America.
    Tally lowered the remote. A movie was playing.
    “What’s this?” he asked.
    “You haven’t seen it? It’s Love Bites .”
    He shook his head. “I haven’t really been near a television. Not for a while.”
    “Decades, I’m guessing. How have you kept up with human affairs?”
    He didn’t answer, because the answer was negative. He hadn’t kept up at all. He had held himself apart. Waiting.
    The heavy feeling seemed to sink into his bones and settle there.
    “You must keep up, Christian,” she told him. “You have to stay current, or they’ll spot you.”
    He nodded. “So what’s this movie about?”
    “A vampire.” She smiled.
    He rolled his eyes. “How bad is it?”
    “Bad enough you just have to laugh.”
    “I could do with a laugh right now. Let’s watch it.”
    He didn’t laugh at the preposterous storyline, or the ridiculous antics of the vampire, played by another Hamilton, but he did feel the ache lessen. His heart grew a little lighter each time Tally giggled.
    He was here with her. It was enough for now. He’d worry about tomorrow later.
    At the end of the movie, two bats flew off into the sunrise and Tally picked up the remote once more, watching the screen. She wasn’t smiling any more.
    She looked at him. “Wouldn’t it be nice if we didn’t have to keep on pretending like this? Do you think there’ll ever be a place where we will be able to be ourselves?”
    “You can be yourself with me,” he said, more gruffly than he had intended.
    “I mean, with humans.”
    “What, tell all of them?” He shook his head. “It will never happen. Real vampires instead of these tricked-out Hollywood ones would scare them and you know what humans do when they’re afraid. How did your Kyle take it when you