There’s a strange place where theory and rule don’t seem to meet.  For example, I know everyone has their own personal rules.  They might not think of them as anything more as idiosyncratic guidelines that work for them, but they’ve got them.  Having a little obsessive-compulsion is like having a few rules too many so that they get in the way, but us regular folks with our low-level neuroses have rules, too.  I think having too few rules is also a sign of illness, so playing in the median (so to speak) makes sense, too. 

When you know what you think is just a theory and it might not work along those lines, you’re a little hesitant to put your foot down and draw a line.  (I like my metaphors shaken, not stirred.)  Gravity, for example, seems to work a certain way, except when it doesn’t.  Magic’s a lot like that, at least, for my small window of observation.  I can’t say anything is possible or impossible for a certain practice, but I’ve got some good rules of thumb that I expect. 

Ivan made a simulacrum.  It was a particularly disturbing situation, as my nightmares recall.  It wasn’t a fully active one, so it was more a shell that looked like him, but I had to add that to my list.  Wrapping a spell into a shape is on those lines.  So maybe it’s easier than I thought, but really, the Red Poets are the real deal.  There are stories about the Cold War that would chill your bones, and that’s even knowing that most practitioners aren’t political. 

I think it makes sense; when you’ve literally seen or even been in the middle of empires rising and falling, whoever is in charge is likely a temporary situation.   Just as they aren’t political, they’re also not especially concerned with local legislation.  I sometimes think Maggie’s headed that way with her disdain for the laws of traffic, let alone physics. 

But, and you knew I was actually going somewhere with this, one of the unwritten rules is usually to not get involved with something so vulgar as law enforcement.  That’s why my brain was protesting that this situation got the police involved.   That subconscious mote was raising flags and complaining, “You don’t do that.  It’s trouble.”  Ordnance aside, an investigation could certainly be considered an act of Will, and it has its repercussions. 

It didn’t actually mean something rogue.  I mean, for all that I know we have home ground advantage, when it comes to mortal and practitioner, well, the whole, “And they lived happily ever after,” usually means someone’s died to make it happen.  Werewolves kill people.   Vampires kill people.  Fairies don’t even notice that what they’re killing are “people.”   (That’s actually one of the reasons they’re pretty darn scary.  At least werewolves and vampires are generally aware of their status as predators, and thus the relationship they have with their victims, both internally (the parasite that takes over the host) and externally (their foodsource)). 

Humanity needs every advantage it gets.  Sure, we do terrible things to ourselves, but don’t be fooled – that’s not unique to our species by any means.   (Sometimes I think all we need to do is point out that, indeed, that behaviour is horrible, so we should stop doing it.   Of course, generally anyone who does is martyr’d in some fashion.   Egads, but I’m a cynic some days.) 

So, the “No Poking the Policeman” rule is good in theory, but a lot less a rule in practice, I guess.  I wasn’t sure how it revised my estimate of the forces that had me in their wake.  The whole Jedi Mind Trick is a slippery situation anyway – I don’t see anything wrong in using it for the little things, but then it grows into this.  Into what happened with Sylvia’s roommates… the, “No, I wasn’t speeding, Officer,” slides right into darker places.  Where do you draw the line? 

Of course, the easy flat line to draw is the, “Don’t lie,” rule.  Lying is bad.  Is theft a form of lying?  Of course it is.  If I convince you that these leaves are a couple Benjamins, it’s definitely theft… by lie.  I’m not saying that all practitioners are as bad as that, but it’s like the paintbrush that says all authors are drunken madmen with the sole purpose of misleading you.  If art is illusion, all art is lies.  We’re doomed, poets, lovers, magicians, and sane men all.

I had to get the police report and the insurance claim, and, well, my neighbors hadn’t actually said anything, but that was just a matter of time.  I sighed as I got more bus tokens out of the bag I kept on the dresser.  I had bought the bag for my dice, but then my collection grew out of it.  (I took a moment to imagine a little tag on the inside that was like a size tag on clothing, but meant for dice.  “6XS – will hold eleven twenty-siders, or fifteen six-sided cubes…”)

I moved things aside so that I could look out the window.  There was still debris and staining and stuff, but much of it had been cleared away.  Light reflects into my room from windshields usually around this time of day, but… huh.  There had been a note on my windshield when Ro had picked me up.  I shrugged.  Probably had been a flier for the local church, but while people rarely move past the fence into the parking area to leave them, we get soul subscription drives every 8 months or so.

I went back to look up the routes and connections.  Things were starting to get a bit darker earlier.  I found another jacket in my closet, courtesy of being a native.  Really, people who live in Colorado don’t just have one jacket, or even one of a single type.  This one was a leather windbreaker I usually wore out to ball games.  It wasn’t the shiny black biker style, just a soft brown cow type, I guess. 

I was sliding my phone into the pocket when I realized I had somehow missed a call.  It was from Sylvia’s phone number.  Curiouser and curiouser, indeed.

I let it simmer and brew.  Were there any other common aspects of the incidents besides myself, and, well, what I do? (You know, the Portal thing.)  The Shadow King didn’t count – he was my fetch for now.  I had to expect him to follow up on the things I had interest in, but I hoped that he would be more personally involved in the Witch War rather than spending his myriad energies interfering with me.  Of course, there was a small part of me that shouted, “But they’re my witches!”  I didn’t listen to it.  That’s a whole can of worms for introspection for which I didn’t have the energy to turn the can opener.  (I have a lot of friends and family with electric can openers.  My house even came with one.  This always surprised me, but I did finally come to the consideration that as one got older the things I took for granted were not as simple.)

The Gillikins were still interested in me.  They were a Court, no doubt, but not interested in Small things.

The Small Court got my number (so to speak) from my friend Thomas. Thomas had no interaction as far as I knew with any of the other groups.

The Red Poet Society had paid me off, so I took them off the list of interests, except that there was a Schroedinger’s Dragon at the other side of any Door I might open.

The -cubi just existed.  As far as I knew, except that they carefully protected themselves from me… and who set that up, I wondered?  I still thought there was something involved with the Messenger.  I didn’t trust my instincts, so much, but… She didn’t vamp me.  I mean, she made an effort,  but despite the discussion Matana’s other being had with it, there was a bit of a half-hearted nature to the attempt.

Matana and Ed.  I shook my head.  I had to do a little thinking about that.

Why do a man and a woman go out to something if there wasn’t any attraction?  Except you can have intellectual attraction, I guess.  I mean, I sounded just like a neanderthal, but I think my brain was searching for an angle that made sense.

I had to admit, the vampire thing distracted me.  I couldn’t accept her as a person because she had made a choice not to be one.  It wasn’t like a physical disease she contracted unwillingly, but more like an addiction she chose to feed.  Truly, I didn’t know if she could get help.  She could get dead, sure, but once a vampire, well, the “cures” I knew of got pretty ugly.

Matana as herself was an attractive woman.  Don’t think I didn’t have the urge to tell Ed six times in the conversation that I’d seen her stark naked.  It’s not something I was likely to forget.  I just wasn’t going to forget that she was the evil, evil, undead O!

(Which didn’t work to replace “undead” with “victim of a parasitical other-dimensional creature,” because then scansion was broken and left crying and alone in the dark.  And poets might like it that way, but scansion doesn’t.  Scansion likes to be all sunshine and flowers.  I think.  I stopped writing bad teenage poetry the second my sister got into it.)

Ah yes, my sister.  No connection, I hoped.  As far as I knew I really was the family mutant when it came to the supernatural.  Which isn’t to say they were complete nulls on the scales of Wot Bumps In De Night, but that their focus wasn’t strong enough or their will in a shape to get results.

Like most of us.  Peredur’s nonsense aside, I didn’t even understand wizards.  Vasilisa was pretty amazing.  I’d love to pick her brain for hours and hours just to talk technique and theory, really.  That much I got from Artur.

On the dead list, I hoped.  I wouldn’t have wanted him to be alive in all that fiery anger.  On the other hand, he would have been very tough to kill.

Life and Death were not Small things.

What did the Small Court want me to wish for?  That was really what was getting to me about the messengers.  Clarity.  I could wish for clear answers and solutions to my problems.

Alas, those weren’t Small at all.

What other forces were at play?  Troll Knights of the Small, the messengers of Christmas Present and Future, or at least Solstice Present and Future, to give a dumb Dickens allusion.

Man, I didn’t know Ed was gay.  I mean, I still didn’t, somewhere in my head.  Easy for me to presume that he was just like me, I guess.  I still didn’t know if it was supposed to change anything between us.  I mean, on one hand, he’s still a good, good friend.  On the other, if I don’t acknowledge the difference, am I being a bigot?  I can never tell which side of the line is good for acknowledging I’m an idiot and yet not perpetuating further idiocy.

I guess if he wanted me to treat him differently, he’d say something.  Something about how he wanted to be treated, I guess.  I mean, besides not offering to introduce him to interesting women (which, with the kind of girls I was running into, was probably a blessing anyway.) In the meantime, I’d just consider him Ed.

I still had a dinner invitation from the Questor.  I wanted to do that, but I think my quest was pretty self-evident.  I needed to walk the veils at the eight corners of Monaco and see what Small thing was needed to put things to right before it became a Big problem.  After that I did need to ask.  I needed to ask the Questor what to do about the Dragon.

Because then I could sleep again, and not worry that I would wake up there in the dark with her, or see Doloise again, or smell Ivan burning.

And Rohana.  I needed to know what was going on with her.  Two wonderful nights, or days, or whatever this was, wasn’t a relationship, I guessed.  I didn’t want to push, anyway.

And my insurance company was going to raise my rates.  I’d have to call the agency again and get another job soon.  Not to mention rent another car, if they’d do business with me again.

Cops acting strangely…why did that get stuck into my head?

“Sometimes I am happy that I’m not in your shoes.”

“You wouldn’t fit.  My family has always had big feet.”

“Not even with extra socks?”

“Hah!”  I grinned. “I do want to point out that you’re still breaking the essential rule.  You’re going out with a vampire.”

“She’s interesting.  She’s educated.  She’s not human.  That sounds like it should be the tagline for a movie.  It’s not really a matter of life or death, is it?”

“Life or death are not small things.”  I stopped cold, and repeated that sentence to myself mentally, adding the capital to the S.  I swore.

“What?”

“Nothing.  I just can’t tell if someone’s misleading me, flat out lying, or trying to get me into trouble.  Or any combination.”

“Meaning they’re not all the same thing?”

“Intent?”

“As they say, that doesn’t make it magical.  Um, unless, of course, in your world it does.”

“Freakin’ magical.  Well, that’s disingenuous, and it has to do with applying will, which belief by itself rarely does.  Philosophy.  Forget it.  OK.  You try to convince yourself that the dark powers are not manifest and clouding your mind.  I’ll sit at home and be moody about sending you off to your doom.  Don’t do it twice.”

“You have some weird hang-ups.”

“Most people say, `Good-bye,’ but sometimes I do push them far enough to just drop the receiver.”

“And you’re old school.  These days we just hit a button on the screen or flip the lid closed.”

I smiled wryly.  “I’ll call the local equivalent of the Frog Brothers if you don’t make it home by what time?”

“I’m fine, Mom.”

“Midnight it is.”

“Huh.”  He gave it a fair guffaw.  “Fine.  And I’ll call you if I end up dead.”

“You’d better.”

We said our goodbyes and I got off the phone.  I set it down next to the computer and completed a perfect headdesk.  Life and death are not Small matters.  So was he playing with me?  They wanted me to go somewhere and do something.  I had presumed the whole time it was a matter of closing a door.

I have a recurring nightmare that there’s a door between life and death that someone will blast open some day.  It’s not the kind of nightmare that has places and events and people, it’s a feeling.  It was a sentence that crawled into my brain and down my spine one day.  I kind of believe in reincarnation, meaning that it’s more a revolving door, but even if it only opens up once, it’s a door that should stay closed.

Simulacrum, simulacrum… it sounded kind of like a girl’s jump-rope beat for a moment.  I guessed I could go and try to look at the body or something.

I busied myself with the more mundane tasks, trying to talk to the insurance company again, making payments over the phone and internet, and checking my gaming calendar.  My GM was due to come back into town.  I also looked at the phases of the moon, and some of my favourite Fortean almanacs.

There’s this bit in Ghostbusters where they talk about the end of the world.   For all that it’s a comedy, there’s a serious moment about, “What if it is?”  I mean, for all that I didn’t believe a bit about the whole concerns about 2012 (seriously, the only worry I have is the worry I have this and every year: that some person is going to flip out and do their best to destroy everything, and even then, there’s a lot of Everything to try to destroy) there was a lot of activity with which I was suddenly in touch.

I am actually surprised that I don’t have to suspend my disbelief so much at books where the protagonist finds themselves the center of a plot that destroys the world.  First, I am a tiny bit of a “personal world” viewpoint type, where we do have our own worlds that are under attack by our own insecurities, let alone that of others.  Second, I think that it’s like the bit about having an open mind and not trying to have it so open that rationality falls out: the more you are aware of happening, the more you know about other things.

I like to watch the news, although I hate the “packaged” feel of so much of it.   I vote, and I encourage other people to do so.  It’s important.  (It does matter.  I’ve seen too many stupid things get put into place legally by a margin of less than a thousand people.  I might not know a thousand people well enough to change their minds, but I definitely know a hundred who could have helped change that.  Besides, supernatural beings rarely vote, so I like to think of it as a way we keep our world ours.)  I keep my ears open at various jobs, and while I might not always appreciate the spin on a certain issue, I might learn a lot about what the opponents to my viewpoints have to say.  

(By the way, I am rapidly growing to be a disciple of the school that says you call bigotry and bullying what it is.  This is something changing in me that I would have to explore.  Maybe being nearly et by a Dragon is enough to put some steel into a spine?  Or at least fragments of Dragon teeth, enough to plant a warrior?  Nah.)

All of this is to say that I was beginning to think there was something to the timeline for which I was drafted to do a Small thing.  There were signs of something big on the horizon.  I wished I’d seen them sooner to know that something big was going to try and eat me, but without thinking there was some kind of cosmic conspiracy (the only fulcrum of my life is me: the Smalls and the Gillikins and the witches and the Shadow King and the -cubi are not all part of a net of incidence) I had a feeling something was truly shifting and, well, us small practitioners kind of just needed to learn how to keep our head above the waves… how to get to metaphysically-higher ground.

“Let me try saying this a couple of different ways, Ed.  She’s a vamPIRE.  She’s a VAMpire.”  I tried to put different stresses on the syllables.  “I don’t think you’re really getting it.  VAM-PIE-er.”

“I think I heard you the first time.”

“Yes, but hearing me and understanding the problem are two different things entirely, as noted by the fact that I’m not hearing, `Oh.  Yeah, gotcha, E.  That was a dumb idea.  I’ll go give blood to Bonfils or something instead.'”

“Do you even read those books?” he asked.

“Bonfils is like the local blood center, not a series.”

“No, I know that.”  He sighed.  “I meant those books on your shelves.  You know, the ones with all the sex and the immortality and the blood all that.”

“Uh,” I paused.  “Yeah, but they’re just kind of my guilty pleasure.  I mean, not that I should be ashamed of anything I read.  I mean, really, my vampires don’t sparkle.”  I thought, remembering.  “They might glow, but no sparkle, for sure.”

“She says she wouldn’t drink my blood.”

“Maybe she has some kind of discerning appetite, then.  That doesn’t mean you don’t whip her up into some kind of frenzy and she forgets she’s a gourmet.”

“Uh.  I don’t think it’s like, `Ah, a fine type A-,’ blood sommelier thing.  I think she can’t drink my blood for some reason.”

“What, she only feeds on virgins?  Only drains the humours of your eyeballs?  I knew leaving you two in the car alone was a mistake.”  I got up and started pacing.

“Look.”  I could tell something was bothering Ed.  “It’s not like that, anyway.”

“What, you’re looking for the cheap and fast route to power?  Sure, let some kind of otherworldly parasite strip you of your soul, slowly.” I think I was even more angry than I sounded. “If you’re thinking of suicide, can I recommend some better methods?”

“Whoa, hold on!  I think I have some rights here, E.  I think I have a better idea of the stakes, if you ignore the unintentional pun, than you think.”  He was sounding pretty heated, too.  “I am not asking you for permission.  I am asking you because you might have some solid safety advice.  You are the closest thing to an expert I know.”

“And I appreciate it.  But the advice of this expert is leave the heck alone.” 

“Are you jealous?”

I stopped cold.  “What?  What the heck does that mean?”

“I know you’ve got a girl, but do you have something against me being happy?”

“No… that’s ridiculous.”  I sputtered.  “I want you to be happy.”

“Good.  That makes two of us.  And I ask because you’re completely wrong.”

“I think I am the expert you asked.”

“So.  In other news, um, E, did you ever figure out that I was gay?”

I couldn’t say anything.

“I take it from your stunned silence that you didn’t.”

“But you like girls.  I mean, really like girls.  When I went with Maggie that night you were chatting up some cute students.”  I sounded like an idiot.  “I know I sound like an idiot, but…”

“Yeah, you do,” he said, but I think it sounded like there was a smile.  “Just because I’m gay doesn’t mean I can’t have friends who are, you know, female.  It’s not like it’s my whole driving concept or anything.”

“Um.  Yeah.  I guess.  Why is this conversation suddenly so weird?”  I sat back down at the table.

He laughed.  “It doesn’t need to be, I mean, I did call you up on my lunch hour and ask you about taking a vampire on a date, but you had some major assumptions, bro.”

“Is this an occasion I should send a card for or something?”

“Beer and pizza still work, but, no.  Look, nothing’s really changed, it’s just that you don’t have to worry about me putting any big moves on the vampire.  I’m not coming out to you to confess my secret love or anything.  You’re my brother, dude.   If I’m laughing it’s because I finally have something in my life you find weird.”

I had to laugh at that, too.  It eased the tension a little.  “Okay.  So.  Um.  Let me focus for a moment.  You just basically want to know if it’s cool to hang out with Matana or if she’s going to go all batty on you and freak out for your blood or whatever it is she eats.”

“I get the feeling that hanging out with a vampire is kind of like hanging out with a tiger.  They’re a really big cat, but that doesn’t mean that even if they’re laying on your lap one moment that they’re at all tame and won’t go for your throat the next.”

“Well, I don’t know about tigers, but a tame vampire is a sad and sorry beast indeed.”  I took a moment.  “Vampires aren’t sexy, Ed.”

“Hey, I don’t think witches hold any kind of particular attraction.”

“Some of them are… wait for it… enchanting.”

“Ugh.”

“Seriously, though, no, no garlic aftershave, no ultraviolet flashlights, the thing you really have to remember is that the more human they act, the better able to control themselves they are all over.  So, if she’s eating human food, she’s a lot less vampire than ones who can’t drink wine.  If she’s flashing fang, she’s piqued in some way.  That’s one thing the books have right.  If you were going to have to meet her after dark, I’d be worried.  If she’s fine in sunlight, she’s in control.  If she goes bat, she has to keep most of her mass, but she loses her clothes.  I know, it’s kind of stream-of-consciousness.  Basically, if you notice anything unusual be on your guard, but that’s kind of true of any date.  Girls or otherwise, I guess.”

“Um, E, I don’t know if you’re in any position to say how a normal date goes.”

“I had a normal date, just last ni… oh, no I can’t say that.”

“What happened?”

“Um, a planter came to life and gave me a riddle.  Oh, and the Sylvia thing.  Which I’m still trying to piece together.  But other than that, we had dinner and, um, we talked like people do.  So…”

“Like people do.”  He chuckled.

“Yeah, yeah.”  I sighed.  “I want to say this is the tail end of some of the weird stuff, but then more weird stuff just keeps on hitting me.  Did I accidentally subscribe to the real speculative fiction club and not just the book portion?”

The first thing I did was, of course, to go obsess.

Type some keywords into Google to find out how to make a simulacrum and the three main thematic topics seem to be regarding “artificial” intelligence, religion, and gaming.  (I put the word “artificial” in scare quotes because I’m one of the people who side on the opinion that intelligence is intelligence, mostly because I generally hold the idea that creation doesn’t just have to be a frothy flesh conundrum.  Of course, recent arguments against in-vitro fertilization just seem to be a new form of bigotry to me, too.  You know, we really don’t have to make anyone else in the world feel like they’re subhuman.  Unless they’re a Nazi.  Those are apparently still fair game.)

The old school version has to do with mandrake roots, calling demons, and making your homunculus sweat it out.  I don’t know all the details.  I do know that I had never seen anyone but Doloise do it with so little preparation without it being an illusion or shadow.  (A shadow is a version of you, usually fueled by something you leave behind in it… kind of avatar-like as well.  They’re hard to explain, but they make sense magically, and most things written down to “ghost activity” is related to shadows instead.  Death being a traumatic event, usually some guilt is left behind.  I’ve heard of pornographic shadows, too, but I’m trying to get rid of the -cubi influence.)

I stopped reading for a moment and tried to think through it.    Out came the notepad and pen.

1.  I did not want to make Rohana unhappy.

This was important.  I circled it and then underlined it a couple of times.

1-Counter: I was in potential danger.

Alright, that seemed fair enough.  Presuming she didn’t want me to be hurt, and that would make both of us unhappy, I had my reason for pursuing this.    How was I in danger?  I would have to explain that.  Well, because a Small thing told me so.  Kind of like hearing it from a Little bird.

Could I trust that Small sense? I had a Little feeling, sure, but that’s easy enough to produce an illusion for, I guess.  (Subtle, though.)  (I’d have to suggest that for my secondary character when my GM got back into town.)  (“I’d like to give them the feeling that this was the right way to go, the right thing to do.”)

2. Do not refer to this as “the Clone Wars.”

I knew as soon as I typed that in that it would be stuck in my head that way.  There may be things in life that don’t make Star Wars references, but I was probably unfamiliar with them.  Maybe some kind of naval reference? No, they have ships. Dog training? Hah!  Refrigeration repair?  Locksmithing?

(“Lovely bit of clerk.”)

So, it was at least posited by Master Small that my simulacrum turned into a host for the Shadow King.   I remember that Doloise had dismissed it when we got back from the haunted house, but I had been practically sick with fatigue at that point.  I just knew it wasn’t around after she did something with it, but she could have turned it into a pancake flipper and I would have maybe grunted, “Neat.”   Besides, it implied far more concern with cause and effect than I had any reason to believe Doloise had at that point.

3. Doloise had grown.

That wasn’t on the list of things I had to consider, was it?  I mean, with what she was, I don’t think considering her as an individual was entirely fair, but I had seen change.

I typed the words, “I think she died free,” and then erased everything.  That hadn’t been my real focus, after all.

Fine.  Let’s go back a step.  Who were the players?

There was the Witch War.  I was reluctantly forced to say I was involved just because I knew some of the witches, but I was going to stay out of it as much as possible.  If they started calling up things from Beyond, I was kicking doors closed whenever and wherever needed.  Well, needed and if I could find them.  That meant the Shadow King and the Messenger were involved.  Fine.  They had some kind of deal and until I could get rid of the karmic vulture or whatnot (I’d heard of dogma, but that was man’s best friend) I was stuck worrying about the Shadow King’s propensity to be near me and mine.

Oh, and Peredur wanted something from me.  He wanted to make me a wizard, as far as I could guess.  He wanted to change me, and that was enough.  I didn’t know why he would meddle, but I got his attention.  This wasn’t anything about Naul or the Red Poets, I was pretty sure.  And I was supposed to come up with a good Small favor.

The phrase caused me to snort in laughter.

The phone rang.  It was Ed.

“Hey-a,” I answered.

“I’m on lunch.  Why did you have the police call and interrogate me?”

“Is it lunch already? I needed to prove I was where I said I was.”

“And you were. It was weird.  I’ve talked to cops before, and this was like talking to robots.  I mean, I thought it was only the FBI that did not have a sense of humor, at least according to Men in Black.”

“Or simulacra.”

“Isn’t that a kind of baby formula?”

“Uh, no.”  I had a wild Soylent Green thought for a moment, and then shook my head.  “Means clones. They beat you up verbally or anything?”

“Nah, ‘sall good.  Asked if you were abusive and hated women.”

“You told them `Yes,’ right?”

“Of course I did.  You’re practically Jack the Ripper.”

“If I told you that they killed Sylvia, only it wasn’t really her, but a clone, what would you think?”

“I’d think that the stress had finally done you in,” he said after a moment.  “Sylvia?  Is that who it was about?”

“Uh.  Yeah.  They never mentioned her?”

“She’s dead?”

“That’s under investigation.”

“You move fast.”

“Why didn’t you tell me you’d seen me in the hospital?”

“Oh.  That.  Well…”

“Yeah, that.”

“I didn’t want to make you feel bad.  I know, it’s dumb, but there hadn’t been anything I could do except fill out some forms.”  He sighed.  “So I told them if you’d turned for the worst to call, but Maggie was there giving me the frigid shoulder.  I told them to stop trying to call your mom.”

“Thanks,” I said.  “I’ll need your side of the story, sometime.”

“Hey.  That reminds me.  What do I need to know about dating Matana?”

“She’s a vampire.”

“Yeah.  Do I wear a garlic aftershave?”

“She’s a vampire.”

“Got that.  It’s not a date-date, it’s a scientific lecture thing.  Crosses?  Silver?”

“She’s a vampire.”

“Obsess much, E?”

Far be it for me to ignore advice from something not quite as tall as my knee.  I can’t read omens, but there are definitely times where it makes sense to do that thing where you lose a yard or two just so you can punt the ball ahead.  Hey, I was a nerd – I don’t have to know football terms.  (Oh, I’ll watch the local team, but the last few years have been hard on the old enthusiasm glands.  If they are, indeed, glands.  I know I have a bejeebus reservoir for moments the bejeebus might be scared out of me, so why can’t I have enthusiasm glands? 

This may be why I failed anatomy.  I’m not that kind of doctor.)

So, before I fonged the ball into enemy territory, I did a little more picking up, stripped to my boxers, grabbed a couple of the graphic novels I had been accumulating, and headed to bed.  I thought about checking my e-mail and bank account and all that, but I knew if I started noodling on the computer I would stay up too late, and really, I wanted to earn my +2 hat of “Sleep before Midnight.” 

It made sense at the time, which showed you just how tired I was.  I did make a dent in my pile before I fell asleep on a glossy page.   I might not keep them in “collector’s condition,” but at least I don’t drool on them, right?

Somewhere in the night, I was moved gently off the book, and a blanket was moved over my shoulders.  I heard a couple of various audio “alarm on” references, and then something very sweet and warm snuggled up against me.  I had enough consciousness to think, “I hope it isn’t Peredur,” before sleep embraced me like it was a threesome.

I guess.  I just wanted to use the phrase while no one could hear me think it.

I woke up uncommonly late, with my bladder complaining bitterly.  Truly, I hate to think it’s that sullen on a regular basis.  I really had no choice but to mollify it, which indicates that I am willing to be taken hostage by my bodily functions.  I didn’t think it was a good precedent, but sometimes civilization has a point by not letting you pee on the bed.  Or onto the floor.

I didn’t want to move as Rohana had an arm slung across me, and I was afraid moving would disturb her.  Of course, apparently my waking had inspired similar things in her, so in lieu of breaking some kind of dating urine code I slid as smoothly as I could off the bed and dashed into the bathroom.  You know, when you’ve gotta go…

A few minutes later, able to concentrate on something else than irate body parts, I returned to find that Rohana had stolen the sheets and half the blanket and all of the pillows.  Her hair was splayed behind her, dark in the little bit of light that came from the blinds over the window.

I probably spent too long just looking at her.  She fit there, in the bed.  I realized that as soon as I thought that I was doomed.

“Are you just going to look,” she mumbled from under the pillows, “or are you coming back in?”

“You have all the sheets.”

“There’s a solution for that,” she said, rolling onto her back.

If some alien observer had come in and watched what we did as art, I imagined that they would notice all the interplay between light and darkness as indicated by the sheet.  We wrestled for it at first, a linen umbilical of sorts between us.  It went over her head, and then mine, twisted and then taut, wrinkled and then puffed up by air and wafting gently down to coat curves and straight lines both with painted shadows.  

I won’t say it did or did not get messy, but it did get thrown into the laundry hamper before Ro went off and took a shower.  I made breakfast for us, and we ate in-between giggles, occasional ribald gestures and companionable silence.

“I don’t want to leave, but I do need to get back home,” she sighed.

“When shall we two meet again?” I asked, with a grin.  I knew anything else I put forward would sound terribly whiny, and I didn’t want to pressure her.

“Oh, I’m sure I’ll be around,” she said, grinning right back.  “The only question is whether or not I’ll have to knock.  You know, you might be entertaining witches or something.”

I rolled my eyes.   “I am on the witch wagon.”

“Wagon?  I thought they used broomsticks.”

“Well, I thought ‘stake,’ but then thought it was terribly tasteless.”

“You should never have a tasteless steak,” she agreed. 

“Well, I agree that they should be rare,” I offered.

She snorted.  “I don’t think I needed a medium to predict that.  So, what about Dragons?  Sleeping with any that might get jealous?”

“Do I look like a princess?” I scoffed.

“No vampires, no things that go bump in the night, no elves, no aliens, no coeds?” she giggled.

“No wonder it’s dark,” I rolled my eyes.  “What, you think I’m some kind of monk?”

“You’d be helpful around the house that way.”

“You need a eunuch?” I asked, surprised.  “You don’t live in a harem, do you?”

“Nah, just a proactive housekeeper.  Monk he see…” she winked as she trailed off.

I let out a chortle.  “Monk, he do.  Yep.  Got me.”  I stood up and stretched for a moment, then offered her a hand up.  “No, although a little fellow told me that Sylvie may still be in the picture.”

Rohana looked at me for a moment and I couldn’t read her expression.  “E, I saw her.”

“I know.  And I know it sounds crazy.”

“It sounds like you were more involved than you’re letting me know,” she said.

“It’s not… no.”  I shook my head.  “It’s weird.  I’ll let it go.”

“It’s a clone thing, right?” she smiled.

“Uh.”  I shook my finger at her.  “I said I’d let it go.  No tricking me.”

She giggled and kissed me.  “I don’t believe you, but I’ll give it a chance,” she said. 

She gathered up her alarms and purse and left.  The apartment seemed a little empty without her, but I was still smiling from the kiss.  I liked her.

Oh dear.  I was definitely doomed.