Bride (Ali Hazelwood) by Ali Hazelwood

            He’s an architect.

            I’d forgotten. Or perhaps I never had a clear idea of what it meant. But looking at these drawings, I feel it as something solid and heavy in my stomach—the love Lowe has for beautiful shapes, exquisite places, interesting sights.

            He’s only a few years older than me, but this is not the work of someone who’s untrained. There is expertise here, and passion, and talent, not to mention time, time that I cannot imagine he has to dedicate to beauty and pretty drawings now that he’s the Alpha of his pack, and . . .

            It’s too much. I’m thinking about this—about him—way too hard. I shut the sketch pad too forcefully and place it back where I found it. It causes something that was at the very end of the notebook to slip out.

            A portrait.

            My heart halts as I scramble to lift it up, expecting—no, sure— that I’ll find Serena’s smiling face on it. The pouty lips, upturned eyes, narrow nose, and pointed chin; they’re all so familiar to me that I think it must be her, because who else’s face would I know so well? It can only be Serena’s, or . . .

            Mine.

            Lowe Moreland has drawn my face, and then stuffed it at the bottom of his bottom drawer. I’m not sure when he observed it long enough to pluck this level of detail out of me, the serious, detached air, the tight-lipped expression, the wispy hair curling around the cusp of an ear. Here’s what I do know: there is something sharp about the drawing. Something searing and intense and expansive that’s simply not there in the other sketches. Force, and power, and lots of feelings were involved in the making of this portrait. Lots. And I can’t imagine they were positive.

            I frown. I swallow. I sigh. Then I whisper, “I’m not a fan, either, Lowe. But you don’t see me doodling you with horns in my diary.”

            I fold everything back in the drawer, making sure it’s exactly how I found it. On my way out, I let my fingers trail on the bookshelves, wondering once more just how bad my next year with the Weres is going to get.



* * *





            The following day I sleep until late afternoon. I’m tired enough that I could go longer, but there’s something going on outside, on the usually calm lakeshore. It involves screaming laughter and charred smells, and I drag myself to the window to check it out, making sure to avoid the direct light still filtering in.

            It’s a barbecue, or a potluck, or a cookout—I never quite got the difference, despite Serena’s explanations on the nuances of Human social get-togethers. Vampyres don’t really build community this way, by assembling without an agenda. Our friendships are alliances. I didn’t encounter the concept of hanging out, of spending time with someone for the sake of it, until my Collateral years.

            But I can count over thirty Weres. Hanging around the lakefront, grilling, eating, swimming. Laughing. The loudest are the children: I spot several, Ana among them, having a rollicking good time.

            I wonder whether I’m invited to partake. What the reaction would be if I made my way downstairs, waved at the guests. I could borrow a bikini from Juno. Pour myself some blood on the rocks, sit at a table in the shade, ask my dinner companions, “So, how about them football players?”

            The idea has me chuckling. I settle on the windowsill, still in my pajama shorts and the worn tank I got from a team-building exercise at work two years ago, staring at the gathering. And at Lowe, who has returned home.

            My eyes are immediately drawn to him. Maybe because he’s . . . well, big. Most Weres are tall, or athletic, or both, but Lowe takes it a notch further. Still, I’m not positive his looks are what center him so insistently.

            He is . . . not charming, but magnetic. His full lips curve into a small smile while he chats with some pack members. His dark brows furrow as he listens to others. The corners of his eyes split into a web of crinkles when he plays with the children. He lets a young girl beat him at arm wrestling, gasps in mock pain when another pretends to punch him on his biceps, shoots a boy into the deep water to his unabashed delight.

            He seems beloved. Accepted. Belonging, and I wonder what that feels like. I wonder if he misses his partner, or mate, or whatever. I wonder if he gets to draw much these days, or if the pretty houses mostly stay locked in his head.

            He definitely does not look like he is just recovering from being ill, but what do I know? I’m no pulmonologist.

            I’m about to push myself off the sill and start my night when I spot him.