Rachel Caine & Kristin Cast & Claudia Gray & Nancy Holder & Tanith Lee & Richelle Mead & Cynthia Leitich Smith & P. C. Cast (2 page)

“Well, there go your profits! You're charging—what?—three bucks a show? I know people around here are cheap, but do you have any idea what, say, electricity alone is
going to cost? It's summer. It's Texas. Think: air conditioning.”

Honestly, I hadn't considered that. It's not like I have an MBA or anything. I just graduated from high school a couple of weeks ago. I used to mow lawns in the summer, but this will be my first real job off the ranch. I may have been over-ambitious.

“Plus,” Ginny goes on, “insurance, taxes, and you might want to advertise the place as a tourist attraction. The founders of Spirit were key players in the early days of the Republic, and historical tourism is becoming—”

“Enough.” She's a politician's daughter, all right. Opening the door wider, knowing I'll regret it, I say, “Come in. We'll talk.”

Ginny quiets as I lead her through the service hallway. It
is
hot in here. Muggy.

I wonder what, if anything, she knows about the building's tragic history, its lingering reputation. A teenage girl—Sonia Mitchell—was found dead in a storage closet in 1959. Another girl, Katherine something-or-other—Vogel maybe—went missing for good. She was new in town, like Ginny, and her body was never found. Both girls worked at the theater. And again, like Ginny, both girls were sixteen.

Everyone hereabouts has heard the story. Partiers have busted in over the years, too, and every now and then a whole pack would run out hollering about a ghost.

There's no denying that the theater has an eerie quality to it. Over the past week, I've seen the letter “S” written in the dust and wiped it away again and again. Once or twice, I
could've sworn I heard a soft voice coming from somewhere in the building. Enticing, musical, feminine . . . I'm starting to hear it in my dreams.

As Ginny and I enter the lobby, I don't give her the satisfaction of cranking the air conditioner immediately.

Instead, I take in my new business, trying to see it the way tonight's customers will. It's a grand old place with a huge antique crystal chandelier, built when cotton was king. Granted, the gold and crimson wallpaper is faded, and the blood-red carpet is worn. So are the red upholstered seats in the screening room—both on the main floor and up in the balconies. But there's still a romance to the place, a whisper of the past.

Besides, my mom loved it. Every time we passed by, she'd say the Old Love was a ghost of the glory days of Spirit, a reminder of who we'd been and could become again.

“Do you know how to run a register?” I ask Ginny, gesturing.

She's already playing with it. I only have one, set at the ticket counter. It's an older model that I ordered off eBay.

“Hmm,” Ginny says, scanning the lobby before brightening. “I know! We can lay out candy and popcorn on the counter, post prices, and provide a box with a slot in it so that people can pay on the honor system. Like at the library for folks with fines on overdue books.”

That wouldn't work in most places. In Spirit, it'll do fine.

“There are some boxes in my office,” I say, impressed despite myself. After a pause, I add, “Why do you want this job anyway?”

Ginny shrugs. “I could use the money.”

That makes two of us. The thing about living forever, I suddenly need a long-term financial plan. And, I realize, so far as Ginny is concerned, there aren't any other jobs within walking distance. I bet she used to have a flashy car. I bet it was repossessed.

I can't help wondering if there's more to her being here than that. Not to be conceited, but I'm fairly good-looking. I've got Mom's blue eyes, and they stand out against my deep brown skin, slick black hair, and the sharp features I inherited from whoever was my dad. I'm wiry but solid enough from working on Uncle Dean's ranch.

Outside Spirit, girls are always flirting, not that I know what to say back.

The locals, on the other hand, they pity me. When my mom died, everyone said what a shame it was for me to be orphaned at only ten. They saw my bruises in the years that followed. And they knew what Uncle Dean was like.

For a long time, I thought sooner or later somebody would report him to social services—a preacher, a teacher, the school nurse—but it never happened.

I guess most folks were as scared of Uncle Dean as I was.

Ginny is looking at me with an oddly knowing smile, and I realize she's waiting for my decision. I can't help thinking she may be useful. I can't help wondering if she has a boyfriend. But spending quality time around that flesh-and-blood girl is intrinsically problematic. The flesh is a problem. The blood is a problem. At any given moment, it's a toss-up which is worse. “Okay,” I say. “You're hired.”

The chandelier rattles, distracting us both.

“Drafty,” Ginny says, glancing around. “But where's it coming from?”

She asks too many questions. “I turned on the air conditioner.”

It's a lie.

After a ridiculous amount of negotiation, I agree to ten cents above minimum wage, send Ginny home to change into a white button-down shirt, black slacks, and black shoes, and tell her to come back in a couple of hours.

Unlocking the door to my cramped office, I'm less than thrilled to realize that I may need to hire a second person. Someone local. Quiet.

Within the next few years, I need to sew up an understanding with the good people of Spirit. They may not know what I am, but they'll figure it out over time. On the off chance that Ginny's daddy's “revitalization” plan works, I'll be here for generations. I need to reassure them that my presence is no more threatening than the fact that Edwina Labarge collects snow globes or that Betty Mueller talks to her dead husband or that Miss Josefina and Miss Abigail have been “roommates” for more than thirty years.

I'll need front people, I realize, so that the customers who drive in from nearby towns don't notice that the “young” owner never seems to age.

Inside the office, I hit the ceiling-fan light, and begin sifting through the old newspapers and boxes, looking for one that will do for the concession stand.

The headline of a yellowed copy of
The Spirit Sentinel
from June 13, 1959, catches my eye. It reads “City Mourns Daughter; New Girl Missing.”

I lift it, studying the black and white picture—Sonia's dimple and laughing eyes. I trace the hairline around her lovely face. Sixteen forever.

I never want to be the kind of monster that destroys innocence like that.

Reaching into my small half-fridge, I grab a bottle of blood, pour a quarter of it into a Texas A&M mug, and pop that into the microwave on the shelf.

Seconds later, I close my eyes, savoring the taste, pushing back the disgust.

I've been this way for only a few weeks.

It's funny. I used to roll my eyes at all those media stories about the trouble kids get into on the Internet. How every generation of grown-ups assumes that whatever's new—from flapper dresses to rock-and-roll to the World Wide Web—is automatically a sign of the apocalypse. My theory was that parenthood triggered amnesia followed by paranoia, though I had to admit it would've been nice to have someone who cared.

Not long after Uncle Dean cracked one of my ribs, I heard at school that there was this guy in Athens, Georgia, selling a “power elixir” on the 'net. I figured it was some kind of steroid cocktail. Probably risky, but it's not like my life was all that safe to begin with. Anyway, the guy supposedly
supplied a vat of the stuff to the Varsity football team in El Paso that took state last year.

It was so easy. I “borrowed” Uncle Dean's MasterCard and put in my order. The vial arrived overnight in a box packed with dry ice.

I remember thinking as I unscrewed the cap,
What the hell?

Nothing could've been more appropriate.

Blinking back the memory, I reach for the bottle to pour myself more blood.

Someone has used a finger to write something in the condensation on the glass. It looks like the letter “S.” It wasn't there a moment ago. She's getting bolder, making a bigger play for my attention. It's flattering, I admit. “Sonia?”

“What do you think?” Ginny asks, straightening the newly poured paper cups on the concession stand counter.

“Not bad.” I have to give her credit. In Ginny's make-do theater uniform, complete with ponytail, she looks like the picture of all-American wholesomeness. She also had her mom swing by Wal-Mart (two towns north) and they picked up ice, several two-liter plastic bottles of coke (diet, regular, Dr Pepper, Sprite), and several discounted packages of candy bars. It's quite the display of enthusiasm, of
spirit
, you might say.

She grins and grabs a black marker to write out prices and instructions for paying on the honor system. Ginny
brought the marker and poster board with her too. I set the box from my office on the counter before she got back. It's already been wrapped in bright gold paper, another Wal-Mart purchase.

My gaze lands on the skin over her jugular. Luckily for Ginny, I'm able to buy fresh-shipped “provisions” from the same site that sold me the original dose.

The night I buried my uncle's body behind the barn, I received an e-mail from the vendor, telling me I qualified for “special customer status” and giving me a code to log in for future purchases. What I found was a series of pages within the site that included a long question-and-answer document about our kind, information on how to mix various blood-wine blends, and from there, an online dating service (“Love That Lasts”) extended to all registered members at no additional fee. I admit to clicking through it, despite everything amused by the ads for growing your fangs and shrinking your thighs and finding your “eternal consort.” I have
no
intention of going there.

I may be an easy mark, helping to finance some other fiend's long-term retirement. But I got what I wanted. Now I can defend myself against anyone.

I just had no idea that the price would be so high.

Looking out the theater window onto Main Street, I'm pleased to see a line has already formed—a handful of teenagers and a county deputy with his wife.

This week, I'm showing
Phantom of the Opera
. I've scheduled
The Haunting
with Vincent Price,
Ghostbusters
, and
Ghost
for the three weeks after that.

I'm taking advantage of the place's spooky rep. I hope Sonia doesn't mind. More and more, whenever I fix a loose board or vacuum the carpet or add Crème Caramel potpourri to the ladies' room, I can't help wondering if Sonia approves. I can't help feeling like I'm trying to impress her.

School has been out for a couple of weeks now. The newness of summer has already worn off. Football players and cheerleaders are in double practices, but they're done by sundown and eager to blow off steam. I should be able to pack in the locals and folks from nearby towns, if only because there's nothing better to do.