Free Bloods Gem by Gloria Conway

anything to hang onto. We spent
a few hours there enjoying the many titles loaded into each wall
unit.
    Struck by Moonlight
so unded interesting. A love
story about vampires and werewolves. Obsessed with love stories and
romantic movies, made me realize the money I spent prolonging my
agony, kept me entertained, yet still depressed.
    A month came and went. I avoided Chris like
the plague, but I had been working for my sister Tania, who had
just opened a fashion shop with handmade jewelry and clothing. She
had always had a talent for designing things to fit modern styles.
Always fashionable no matter the season.
    Since I was little, she had dressed me
up in what she had created and half of the
dresses were not bad considering I wasn’t much into
dressing girly. She hand crafted me a ring when I was ten and I had
never took it off.
    I often told her anything and everything
happening in my life, but when we moved to Arkansas and I was in
driving distance of her.
    We did not spent much time together, but I
knew that would change. I wanted a closer friendship with her and
planned on doing something, which was why I agreed to work in the
shop when I had time.
    I admired my sister. She was
successful, beautiful and creative, but looks nothing like
me. She had shoulder length black hair
and big green eyes. I often wondered if we shared the
same father, or if either of us were adopted. I never asked mom
about it, because I knew she would flip. Not that it mattered much,
our father was never around. He had left when I was only five, but
we never brought it up. I figured the less we knew the better and I
believed Tania agreed with her silence.
    On Monday I decided to work
o n mine and Chris’s essay that we were
assigned on my first day of school. It was not due for another
month but there was not much done on it yet.
    So I got on the internet to research the
history of vampires. There was a ton of crazy stuff on there.
    Jotting down notes on everything I thought
relevant, I also remembered to cite references, but was interrupted
when the house phone rang,
    “ Crap!” The internet disconnected and
the ringing rattled my brain.
    Mom answered the phone. “I'll go check,” she
said.
    “ Knock, knock,” she said, at my
door.
    “ Yeah?” I answered.
    She cracked the door so I could barley see
her eyes through the crack, “Phone call for you.” Before I could
ask who it was she shut the door.
    I marched to the living room and picked up
the phone. “Yeah?” I answered.
    “ Faith.” I froze, thinking this was
the only person in my unlucky life that I wanted to hear from right
now.
    “ Please open your front door” he
asked.
    “ Why should I? Give me one good
reason.”
    He sighed in the phone. “Because I love
you.”
    I gasped. No
guy had ever said that to me, and Chris didn’t really know
me. I decided to open the door to explain
to him why I was so upset.
    He stood there, a mountain of roses covering
his face. I smiled. Looking down, I blushed.
    Stepping outside I let the door close behind
me. He set the roses down, and took my hand, looked me in the eyes.
“Faith, I’m truly sorry for what I said and will never bring it up
again until you do. Accept my apology?”
    I was speechless, and also surprised he knew
why I was angry. His apology was the best I’d ever heard. How could
I not forgive him?
    I decided to tell him my reason for avoiding
the subject and why I was so angry. He stood listening, not phased
when I told him that I had never been intimate with anyone
before.
    “ I had a few days to think and I
realized I made you uncomfortab le,” he
said. “I’m not worried about it faith. I just want to be with
you.”
    I smiled and he held out
his arms for me to come to him. He held me a moment, then mom
stepped out. “Faith?”
    I jumped, startled and
turned around. “Hey mom this is my boyfriend Chris. Chris, my mom
Darla.”
    She looked down at the
roses. “Well he must be doing something w rong or
right,”