***

Elijah was running.

His breathing and heart were going wild. Sweat formed on his brow and temples, but he didn’t care. He needed to get away. For whatever reason he felt that if he should stop, he would be dead.

Suddenly someone grabbed his arm and yanked him to the ground. Against the backdrop of a starry night sky, a shadow moved towards him. With each step, the shadows pulled back like a curtain to reveal under the starlight Leora.

Was it Leora?

Leora was now taller than him, and she sported gleaming red pupils against the black scleras. The shadow that fell on her usual soft face was angular and they framed a very sinister smile that showed off her fangs. She flared her black nails of her right hand into razor sharpness that could tear flesh with ease.

“Fuck!” Elijah pointed his athame at her.

A bolt of green energy shot out from the tip of his athame and hitted Leora on the chest. Immediately, she fell into dust. Elijah letted out a long relieving sigh.

It was over.

Suddenly, his neck was yanked to the side. A pair of fangs sank into his neck. He screamed and flared his arms, even stabbed--in what for sure felt like flesh--with his athame blindingly, but that did not stop the pain of his blood being sucked out.

Then the sucking stopped and he was tossed away like trash. He rolled on the ground before his back smacked into the concrete wall, he assumed, of a building. The sickly sensation of blood running down from his neck and down his chest had him put a hand over two fresh piercing wounds on his neck. When he looked up, he saw who had attacked him.

Leora grinning with half of her face covered with his blood launched herself forward, mouth opened and aimed at his throat once again.

“Leora, no!” he screamed.

“No, what?”

Elijah opened his eyes to see Leora standing in her work uniform, arms crossed, in his doorway of his bedroom. For a moment he wasn’t sure if Leora was going to attack him. He looked at his bed stand to see his athame. Then his eyes darted back to Leora.

“Hey man, your door was not locked,” said Leora and then she scratched her head. “Um, yeah, you called my name. Well, screamed it. I kinda thought maybe Elizabeth sent someone to off us or something since we haven’t given her answer for two weeks.”

Elijah shook his head. “Sorry, I was having a bad dream.” He looked back at Leora and wondered why he even had that dream. Was he not over what happened in the museum? “We’re not going to do it. More than likely we would be killed,” he said. Also it was a complete waste of time. He had looked up Abaris and consensus among the scholarly witches was that he was a fake, probably trying to get out of his debt.

Leora rubbed her chin. “Okay, I don’t want to know what that dream was about. So, you’re going to get ready?” She thumbed at the digital clock hanging on the wall over his desk.

“Fuck, I’m late!” yelped Elijah and he made a mad dash to his closet. He grabbed whatever clothes that littered around his room before turning to Leora. “Do you mind, please?”

Leora rolled her eyes. “As if I would be looking,” she mumbled before taking a quick glance at Elijah and then closing the door behind her as she left.

Elijah quickly changed. When he stepped out of his room, Leora was sitting on the breakfast bar’s stool drinking blood. The plastic blood back crackled as she sucked in more blood.

He felt a chill down his spine but he does not show it. Instead, he crossed the room and picked up his backpack that was on the couch. He checked the front most pockets. “Where’s my keys?” he demanded.

“The hell would I know? You threw it somewhere when we came back from my work yesterday,” said Leora.

“Help me find it,” he barked.

“No,” said Leora defiantly.

“Then you’re walking to your work, not that you even need a ride,” grumbled Elijah as he searched the couch.

Leora watched Elijah struggle for a while before walking over to him and then reached down the crevice between two cushions. “Why are you being mean to me today?” she asked as she retrieved the keys.

Elijah didn’t want to tell her, based on his nightmare, he was afraid of her and that frustrated him because he shouldn’t be. Afterall, it was a dream. “Not at you. I’m just fucking late for class,” he said. He snapped the keys from her hands.

Leora pursed her lips. “Hey, just let me know if I am doing something that’s bothering you. I can’t mind read you. I think,” she said.

Elijah caught the end part as she headed for the door. “You think?”

Leora, following him, shrugged. “I don’t really have anyone to teach me how to be a proper vampire. Apparently I am an embarrassment according to Elizabeth,” she said glumly. They exited their apartment and headed for the garage. “In any case, I am not sure what my special ability is.”

“Special ability?” Elijah almost stopped but kept moving until they reached his car. The doors had been replaced. “Isn’t it a little obvious what it is?” he said, astonished.

Leora scrunched up her eyebrows. ”Umm…,” she said. She felt a wave of embarrassment.

“Ai yai yai! It’s the sunlight! It doesn’t hurt you,” said Elijah. He wanted to throw his backpack at her.

“I could have more than one. The forums didn’t say only one per vampire,” said Leora. Then she tapped her chin and frowned. “Unless you were a shitty one. They have zero special abilities, apparently.”

“I said the online crap is wrong.” Elijah went into this car as well as Leora. He continued. “Just read my books.”

“But you lock your room,” lamented Leora.

“Fine, I’ll stick my books in the living room,” said Elijah. He started the car, and they drove off.

They were silent for the majority of the drive. Leora requesting to turn on the radio were the only words that were spoken. When they reached the Golden Arches that Leora worked at, he lowered the music. Leora was busy looking at her phone, but her eyes were not of one busy looking at something. She was hurt.

Elijah felt bad. Despite living together, she wasn’t all that terrible. In fact, her and Marcus were the closest things he’d considered as friends that weren’t forced upon by his mother or fake friendly with him because of his status.

“Hey, sorry, about being an ass to you,” said Elijah softly.

“It’s cool. You said it wasn’t at me,” said Leora as she looked up from her phone with a big smile.

He let out a sigh before shaking his head. “I had this bad dream. It was you, but not you. You were taller and evil looking with red eyes. You bit me. For whatever reason, I can’t shake that. It’s stupid, I know,” he said.

Leora chuckled. “As if! I don’t hurt my friends.”

Elijah nodded. Somehow that relieved him. “Same,” he said.

Leora’s eyes lit up, but before she could say anything, Elijah’s attention was somewhere else.

“Elijah?” Leora followed his line of sight.

Elijah felt the world just stopped, and he held his breath at the sight of the red haired man exiting the Golden Arches. “Nothing. Get out,” he barked. He wanted to get away as quickly as possible.

“Okay, but I you’re going to pick me up--” started Leora.

“Yeah, yeah, at seven. Gotcha,” said Elijah and he pushed Leora out of his car.

Leora just shook her head as Elijah reached over to the passenger’s door and snapped it shut. She watched him drive off, wondering if him admitting they were now friends somehow embarrassed him? She chuckled before turning around and heading into the Golden Arches.

***

Leora entered her workplace through the back. It was protocol that all employees did that. Once inside, she checked in and then went to the lobby for the usual meeting of employees before they sent off to do their jobs.

In the lobby, she spotted a skinny man with a funny mustache named Lenny, the manager’s assistant, standing in front of the employees. She frowned. Usually it would be Jones. She went to a gap between a man and a woman in the crowd of employees.

“The manager is at an important meeting today so I am in charge,” said Lenny before anyone can ask why Jones wasn’t there to address them as usual. He started to go over the goals for the day.

Leora moaned along with her coworkers. Nobody liked Lenny. He was the kind of dude who didn’t believe anyone was competent and, like a little squirrel, would look over your shoulder to tell you how to do things right even if you were doing them correctly.

Kip, a slender guy with wonderful black hair thick hair, nudged Leora with his elbow and leaned over. “This is gonna be an interesting day,” he whispered.

“Ugh, yeah, how did that guy become an assistant?” drawled Leora. She thought Kip or, as she looked over to the other side of her at a strawberry orange haired woman with freckles named Lacy, should have been assistant manager.

“Ass kissing,” grumbled Lacy. “We should just revolt.”

Leora wasn’t surprised with Lacy’s displeasure. The strawberry head woman had complained to her how her and Kip had been at Golden Arches far longer than Lenny, but somehow the guy got the job. From what she has seen of Lenny, she couldn’t help but wonder that too.

“And that is all. Any questions?” said Lenny. His eyes zoomed at where Leora was standing.

Leora shifted uneasily, and she seriously was thinking of taking the chance and hypnotizing Lenny if he was planning to squirrely over her shoulders all day, but his eyes then went to Kip.

“Good. Kip, today I am going to be watching your performance. You’re not in trouble, but Jones wanted me to make sure everything was going smoothly,” said Lenny.

She was relieved but at the same time felt sorry for Kip whom she saw his eyebrows twitched and Lacy rolling her eyes.

“Alright, everyone knows what to do! Let’s make this the best day at Golden Arches,” said Lenny before clapping vigorously.

Everybody halfheartedly clapped in return and dispersed to their stations. Today, Leora had drive-thru duty again. She went through the day as usual with no Elizabeth showing up at the window again and customers were relatively happy with her service.

The hours passed by and it was one hour until seven when she felt someone tapped her shoulders. She turned around and found Jones was standing behind her. Jones was wearing a hat in the shape of a car with a large popcorn on top.

“Leora,” Jones as he clasped his hands. “You’re doing excellent services today!”

“That’s the job,” she said.

Jones chuckled. “Of course, I hired you! I have a favor to ask of you.” He rubbed his hands. “You heard of Gimme Munchies?”

“Uhhhhh,” said Leora. She wasn’t sure she was allowed to say what she was about to say, but Jones’ eager eyes pleaded with her to say something. “That’s, um, like you get when you, um, smoke y’know a joint.”

Jones’ laughed and slapped Leora’s shoulder with his thick hand, nearly knocking her over. “No, the company Gimme Munchies!” He pointed to his hat. “They are a food delivery service. Anyway, Golden Arches had bought them. That’s why I was gone for most of the day. I was getting briefed and headquarters graced us with a car. According to our database you—minus myself—has a driver’s license. So, we’re running a beta and we need a driver to deliver the food! Like now.”

Leora got the implication, but Elijah was going to pick her up and they had to leave before the sun went down. “Wait, doesn’t Lacy and Kip have one too?” She protested.

“Technically they do but Lacy got hers suspended for DUI and Kip is NOT a good driver so they both don’t count,” said Jones.

“How do you know Kip is a bad driver?” asked Leora suspiciously.

“It’s a long story,” said Jones with a wave of his hand but his eyes had that look that was all ready to gossip.

Not wanting to be stuck listening to Jones, she recalled sourly Lenny nearly running her over in a brown sedan when she was crossing the parking lot one time. “Well, what about your assistant?” Leora asked.

“He only has a permit. Besides, we aren’t allowed to employ anyone under twenty two. You’re at least over twenty two...,” said Jones.

Leora squinted her eyes. “That’s mighty convenient. Don’t you have a license and aren’t you like fifty something--”

“Hush child! I am forever twenty one!” Jones declared. “I have to go over Kip’s performance before he checks out.” He took out a bulky blue phone from his pockets somehow despite it looking like it didn’t even fit in his pocket. “Look, we got an order from one of our betas!”

“I really can’t. I gotta get home with my aunt suffering albino-ismy and all,” said Leora.

“I thought you said she suffered Albimastocraniumo?” asked Jones suspiciously.

Leora’s eyes went wide. “Uhh….” Shit, my cover is blown! Her eyes flicked red. In her most velvety voice she spoke. “There’s--”

“Whoa, I didn’t know you wore contact lenses like that!” said Jones in awe.

Shit! Shit! Just her luck. Jones was actually immune to her hypnosis, and he noticed her eyes! Panic gripped her. Should I punch and run? Fuck, but I need rent money! What am I going to do? she thought.

“You gotta tell me when you get back where to get them because I have a nephew who’s doing what you youngins like to do: cosplay,” Jones continued.

Leora let out a sigh of relief. Disaster avoided. Jones started to lead her somewhere.

“Anyway, your aunt has one of those hard pronounced illnesses. I totally understand. My grandma had this one disease that I am not even going to try to pronounce,” said Jones.

For once, Leora was glad for Jones' chattiness. She nodded. “Yeah and that’s why I can’t do this. I have to get back by seven,” she said.

They stopped in front of the back door of the Golden Arches.

“Don’t worry, it’s not going to take long,” sung Jones. He took out a set of keys and placed them into Leora’s hand. “I’ll have Lacy go give you the order as you go to the car.”

“Wait, how do I?” Before she realized it, she was out of the door. “How do I know what the car is?” her voice trailed off. She awkwardly turned around and wondered if she had to try each car with the keys in her hand to know which one she needed to drive.

Then she saw it. A blue car with the Golden Arches logo over the hood parked in the middle of the lot. It’s pristine shine was like that of a tingle sound of a bell and it told her without a doubt this was what the keys were for.

She sighed and looked down on the phone that Jones had given her. On the screen was a mark and a star blinking.