Free Blood Candy by Matthew Tomasetti

back of what looked like
a moose. She squinted at the picture; it was indeed a moose and the
kid was crying his little head off.
    “That’s my father,” Medium Dave
said.
    Candy backed away from the table and nearly
knocked over a picture. She glanced back at the photo of the kid
sitting on the moose and noticed the one next to it was a photo of
a young man in a Navy uniform. The man in the photo strikingly
resembled Medium Dave and she presumed it was his
father.
    “Oh,” she said. “Is this your mother and
sister?”
    “Yeah.”
    His phone rang and he wandered off into
another room to answer; it didn’t seem he wanted to talk about his
family anyway. Jimmy came over to take a look at the photos as
well.
    “He never told us much about his family,” he
said. “Then again, he never told us much of anything.”
    “What exactly are the Misfits?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean who are you? It’s odd you don’t know
anything about your friends.”
    Jimmy glanced over his shoulder. “I know
plenty about them,” he said, but then his face sagged into a frown.
“I’ll tell you another time. I don’t want to talk about it in front
of the others.”
    Candy was about to ask why when Medium Dave
came back into the room to announce the Mullins would meet with
them at a bookstore at seven o’clock. The Misfits then set about
coming up with a plan. They decided everyone who wasn’t going to
meet with the Mullins would wait near the bookstore. Felicia would
watch the front, Were-Jew would scout the inside as backup, and
Melvin would wait with the SUV just in case.
    “Sounds good,” White Paul said impatiently.
“There’s nothing to eat in here. I’ll be back in a few.”
    Jimmy opened the back door and motioned for
Candy to follow. The backyard was spacious, with plenty of trimmed
bushes and a garden and a shed. It was the perfect model of
suburbia. They walked together to the side of the drained pool.
Candy gazed out over the yard.
    “Are you sure you want to do this?” Jimmy
said.
    “No. I’m terrified.”
    He put his arm around her shoulder. “Maybe we
shouldn’t.”
    “No. He’s after me and I don’t think he’s
going to stop. I had a dream about him, but it wasn’t a normal
dream.”
    Jimmy frowned, looking as if his mother had
taken away his favorite toy. “What kind of dream?”
    “I don’t know. I don’t remember what happened.
All I know is how it felt, and it felt real, like he was really
there with me in the dream. Like he was in my head with
me.”
    Jimmy glanced out over the lawn, remaining
silent.
    “I’m scared and I want this to end,” she
said.
    He pulled her into his arms. “I’ll be with
you.”
    “Before yesterday I didn’t know vampires
existed. Why did this have to happen to me?”
    “Everything will be fine. I won’t let anything
happen to you.”
    Candy imagined him as a wolf, as someone who
could truly keep her safe, and it made her feel better. Then again,
she had watched Tinch run away from Rupert and Vivian.
    “What do you know about vampires?” she said.
“Are they the same as in movies and books?”
    “Kind of. I don’t read cheesy vampire books,
but the classics got them fairly right on. They drink blood and
will do anything to get it. They have to have it or they die. And
as you know, they can charm people. Tinch calls it ‘glamour’ and he
says to never believe anything they say.”
    “Do they kill people when they drink their
blood? Would he have killed me . . . ?”
    “Normally they don’t, but that’s not the
point. They always hurt people.”
    Candy thought back to the previous night with
Rupert. She felt ashamed that she recalled the pleasure from that
moment so much more vividly than anything else.
    “It felt good,” she said awkwardly. “It was .
. .” she shook her head. She didn’t know how to express herself, or
if he wanted to hear it.
    “That’s how they do it, how they addict you,”
Jimmy said. “The first time is good,