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“Vampire or werewolf?”
Jade paused, her cursor blinking at the end of the sentence she had just typed: By looking through the lens of the Green Knight, the story becomes about the importance of life over honor rather than the need to approach death willingly. She peeked over the screen of her laptop at the form of her best friend and roommate, sprawled out across their lumpy sofa. Kit had her phone in both hands, held up over her face, and was studying it intently, as if some profound news was scrolling across it.
“What?” Jade asked, not certain she had heard correctly. Kit twisted her head on the arm of the couch and Jade, as per usual, felt a little jolt at having her intense blue eyes on her.
“Vampire or werewolf?” Kit repeated, with a small measure of impatience.
Jade frowned and dropped her gaze back to her term paper in order to give herself a moment. “What about them?” she prompted, idly wondering what had set Kit’s mind on that particular path.
“Which would you rather be?”
“Uh. Neither.”
“What?” Kit sat up so she could hang one arm over the back of the couch and looked at her with a surprising amount of perplexity. “Why?”
Jade squinted at the screen and tried to figure out how she wanted to start the next sentence. It was difficult to ignore the expectant stare directed at her though. “Because one, they’re not real. Two, they’re not real. And three, I like being a human.”
Kit rolled her eyes. “It’s a hypothetical question Jade. Hypothetically, would you rather be a vampire or a werewolf?”
“Hypothetically, I’d like to finish my paper so I can pretend this class doesn’t exist for the rest of the week.”
“Come on.” Kit wheedled and Jade was quite aware that if she didn’t answer now, it was in danger of becoming the sole topic of the evening. So, she shrugged her shoulders and said the first thing that came to her head.
“Fine, vampire.”
“Ugh, you didn’t even think about it,” Kit protested. “Be serious.”
Jade’s eyebrows shot up. “You want me to be serious about the question of whether or not I would prefer to be a vampire or a werewolf?”
“You’re being serious about some writer who’s been dead like 300 years right now. How is this any different?”
“It’s not worth 25 percent of my grade for one thing.”
“Come on Jade, please?”
Jade sighed as Kit resorted to one of the most powerful tools in her arsenal, finely honed over a number of years; a puppy dog expression that mixed her big liquid blue eyes with her full pouting lips and Jade found herself agreeing almost immediately.
“Okay, fine.”
At least that particular capitulation was harmless enough and not likely to drive Jade into the thornier emotional areas she had been trying so hard to avoid as of late. She turned from her laptop and mentally considered all the aspects of the two contrasting creatures that she was familiar with. Her hands itched to make a pro/con list for a true comparison, but she had a feeling it would take too long for what Kit clearly intended as a quick question.
Of course, these days Jade wasn’t all together certain she understood Kit’s intentions. The other girl had been strangely secretive and withdrawn the closer they got to the end of the year. Jade wondered if it had anything to do with Kit going home for the summer. Secretly, she wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that Jade was not. Wishful thinking there.
She exhaled sharply again, reminding herself she was not doing that anymore. She was not thinking secret thoughts about Kit. She was over the long-standing pining she had been carrying for years and was fully embracing their friendship for the wonderful thing it was. She didn’t need or want anything more than Kit was willing to give.
“Vampire,” she concluded with a nod. Kit blinked, obviously not expecting the answer.
“Really?” she asked, her voice high with doubt. “But they’re so—okay, but why? Like, why not a werewolf?”
There was an odd sort of urgency to Kit’s voice and Jade couldn’t imagine what was causing it. What could be so important about the choice in a silly, nonsensical poll? But it was important to Kit, that much was apparent. And if it was important to Kit—
“Well,” Jade began, combing back over her thoughts, “traditionally, a werewolf doesn’t have total control of themselves, right? Every full moon they’re forced to change and then they go off and murder the first person they run across.”
“Yeah, but a vampire has to drink blood to survive. So, they don’t really have control either?” Kit countered. Jade shrugged.
“But they get to pick where they get their blood from. And maybe don’t have to necessarily kill whatever they take the blood from? Plus, werewolves just turn into wolves. Vampires get to do bats and mist and I think other creatures sometimes, right? So, from a benefits standpoint, it’s more bang for your buck.”
A small, teasing smile took the place of some of Kit’s surprise. “Did you just do a cost-benefit analysis of creatures of the night in your head?”
Jade felt her cheeks start to flush because Kit’s teasing always tugged at something in her. She rolled her own eyes in an attempt to deflect. “No, but I could if you want. Let me just open Excel—”
“Do not do that. I have not recovered from last month’s budget session.”
Jade cheeks darkened further because she also had not recovered though she suspected it was for vastly different reasons. She could still vividly recall the sensation of Kit sat beside her, staring over her shoulder, breath warm against her ear while Jade valiantly tried to walk the other girl through the admittedly complex setup of her own personal budget.
Just looking at her computer was giving her flashbacks, so she pushed the top down and crossed her arms over it. “Should I take this to mean you’re on team wolf?”
“Yeah. Breaking out of your shell, running wild and free, howling at the moon. What’s not to like?”
“Waking up naked having rolled around the person or persons you masticated in the night and not remembering any of it?”
Kit got to her knees and leaned against the back of the couch. “Being able to smell everything. For like miles and miles.”
Jade wrinkled her nose teasingly. “Gross if you happen by the guys’ locker room.”
“At least you’d be alive. Still have a pulse.”
Jade tipped her head conceding. “That’s fair. Actually, immortality would be a definite draw back.”
“Really? You wouldn’t want to live forever? You’d have enough time to do like, everything,” Kit pointed out.
“Yeah, but you’d have to watch all your loved ones die, unless you made them vampires, too. And then, you wouldn’t really live forever. Just long enough to watch the sun become a red giant and envelop the earth and all.”
Balancing up on her knees still, Kit shook her head slowly. “I don’t know how to tell you this Jade, but you’re a huge nerd.”
There was a broken half of an eraser on the table next to Jade’s computer; without a second’s hesitation she snatched it up and chucked it. It bounced off the center of Kit’s forehead then tumbled down into the couch cushions where it was no doubt lost forever.
The mild outrage that bloomed on Kit’s face had Jade laughing. “Could a nerd do that?” she taunted with a grin.
Huffing, Kit spun back into a seating position. “Fine, pick your boring undead blood sucker,” she conceded, with enough petulance that Jade could tell she’d struck a nerve. She thought about Kit’s first description of a werewolf and the terms she had used; breaking out, running wild. Figuring she had at least a sense of what this was really about, Jade stood and came around the end of the counter. For a second, she hovered behind the couch, debating whether or not flopping down beside Kit would put her too close, over the line of her newly designated limits. Then she figured friendship was more important than keeping her heart safe.
Dropping down, she let their shoulders press together. The immediate push back made her think she’d made the right decision.
“If you don’t want to go home for the whole summer, just tell Sorsha. I’m sure she won’t care if you just visit instead.”
Kit made a grumbling sound then pressed her hands to her face, mumbled something against them.
“What?”
With an enormous sigh, Kit’s hands dropped. “I don’t want to cramp your style.”
Jade started because that was not at all what she expected to hear. “Excuse me?”
“If I’m not here you can invite Lili Cashmere over.”
Jade pulled back and gaped in bewilderment. Kit resolutely did not meet her eyes. “Why would I invite her over?”
“Uh, because she wants to jump your bones? She practically mounted you at the door of Professor Ufgood’s class.”
Jade remembered the incident and distinctly recalled it having much more of a this-person-wants-to-eat-my-liver vibe than anything Jade found particularly sexual.
“I am not interested in Lili Cashmere,” she stated because that definitely needed to be on the record. “What—”
“Well, then you know, someone else from your fan club,” Kit interrupted, still glowering intensely at the floor.
If Jade’s eyes got any wider, she was sure they would fall out of her head. “I have a fan club?” Her mind began wheeling about, trying to guess who Kit could possibly be referring to.
Kit did not appear at all interested in elaborating. Instead, she started to fiddle with the large rip in the knee of her jeans and took the conversation in an entirely different direction.
“Do you ever, I mean… have you ever, maybe just out of curiosity or something,” the words were coming so quickly now from Kit that Jade was having difficulty following them, “thought about if… you know, maybe… what would happen if… we dated?”
Jade could see Kit peek at her out of the corner of her eye and still couldn’t keep the shock from her expression. Kit’s shoulders slumped.
“Yeah, you’re right. It’d be totally weird. Ha, ha. Good thing we never did that.”
Jade’s ears were ringing; she felt like one of those cartoons that had been bashed in the head with an obscenely large mallet. Was Kit really asking—did she just—what just happened?
While she desperately tried to get her brain out of the blue screen it was stuck in, Kit leapt to her feet and started backing up in the direction of the front door. “I should let you focus on your uh… paper. 25 percent right? I’ll just go somewhere else for… ever,” she muttered the last bit as she rubbed vigorously at the back of her head.
Now is the time to say something! Jade internally shouted frantically.
Words? What are words? We’ve never said a word in our life, her brain helpfully supplied.
The longer Jade was stuck in her silent state, the smaller Kit seemed to shrink until she was hunched in front of the door, one hand on the handle. “Yeah, so I’ll be back later I guess.” Kit tugged the door open and disappeared through it, letting it fall shut behind her with a quiet click.
It was as if the sound released Jade from her paralysis. She shot up, bouncing off the corner of the couch and fumbled her way to the door, suddenly terrified Kit was going to be gone.
Yanking the door open however revealed a frustrated Kit still standing behind it, kicking at the cement siding of their apartment while chanting “fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.” Her foot paused in mid-swing when she saw Jade.
“Oh. Uh. Hey.”
“Hey,” Jade managed to force out, relieved to know her vocal cords were not in fact, dead.
Kit’s face twisted together in a pinched expression of regret. “I’m sorry. Just, can we forget I said anything? I shouldn’t have… I mean, I didn’t mean to… Fuck, I just—”
And Jade didn’t know the best way to stop her friend from spiraling further away from her, so she went with what always seemed to work in the movies.
She kissed her.
Catching Kit’s face with her hands, she pressed their mouths together with all the longing she had been holding onto for the past five years. It was awkward, with the way Kit’s lips kept trying to form words, so their teeth and mouths did little more than bump against each other. Jade wondered if maybe she’d made a mistake, if she’d misheard what Kit had been saying, and started to draw back, a clumsy apology of her own pushing to the forefront of her mind.
But Kit gave up on words and chased her back, walking until they were pressed together and then some, until Jade felt her back meet the solid plank of their door. And then they were trading soft, insistent kisses that grew in length and pressure. Jade could feel Kit’s jaw as it moved beneath her palms, as the other girl pushed in, opened her mouth and brushed her tongue tentatively against Jade’s lips. The quiet sound she made when Jade parted her lips in response had Jade’s head spinning pleasantly.
It felt like forever before they separated, only a few inches between them. Jade took a deep breath and, figuring no time like the present, whispered, “I’ve wanted to do that for so long.”
“Why didn’t you?” Kit asked, eyes still closed as she nuzzled their noses together.
Jade thought of all the million excuses that had gone through her head over the years. There was really only one that meant anything. “I… didn’t think you wanted me to.”
“I do.” Kit’s eyes fluttered open, and she offered a sweet, shy smile. “Would you do it again?” she asked, with an appealing hopefulness. Jade felt her own lips curve.
“As many times as you want. But maybe we should go inside?”
“Oh yeah. Definitely.”
##
Hours later, when they laid together in bed, Kit sleeping nestled beneath Jade’s chin, Jade stretched out for her phone on the small end table. It wasn’t until she’d typed in the code and swiped it open that she realized she’d mistakenly grabbed Kit’s.
Behind the lock screen was the busy graphics of an internet article: Is your crush a werewolf or a vampire?