prompt: Set your story in a playground: two characters are having a serious conversation while on the seesaw/in the jungle gym/on the swings.
available at Reedsy
The two women sat in the unlit park, gently rocking their swings back and forth. What should have been a comfortable silence between them grew tense.
The younger appearing of the two wore a little black dress with a name tag that read “Heather Markham.” Her red hair was piled in a mess of natural tight curls above a pale, unlined, freckled face with bright green eyes. She stopped her gentle swinging and looked at the other. “I was hoping you’d remember our spot.”
The other woman, wearing a smart suit and a name tag that read “Jocelyn Josephs.” Her bobbed medium brown hair was shot through with hints of grey. Around her large, deep brown eyes, the start of crow’s feet showed in her olive skin despite all her efforts to hide them. “Of course I remembered. It’s like you haven’t aged at all.”
“That’s why I had to leave early. I was making people uncomfortable.”
Jocelyn laughed. “Some things never change. ‘Creepy Heather’ they used to call you.”
“I never understood why you hung out with me,” Heather said, “even though they started picking on you when you did. But, thank you for that, Jo. Without you I don’t know if I’d have made it.”
“You were the most together person in my entire life at that point. More than me, for sure, and my parents were off in ‘Last Days’ conspiracy theory land somewhere.” Jocelyn switched from swinging to rotating side to side in the swing. “Did you know my dad was a flat-earther — way before YouTube trolls, hell, there was no internet then.”
“What?!” Heather nearly stood from the swing. “That’s nuts.”
“Biblical literalist. Even where it contradicted itself. Especially where it contradicted itself.” Jocelyn chuckled. “Every time I’d point out an impossible contradiction in the Bible, he’d just say, ‘Through God, all things are possible,’ as if that solved it, and then he’d smack me for backtalking.”
“Shit. Sorry I brought it up.”
“You didn’t, silly. I brought it up. I’m over it.” Jocelyn sighed. “I wish we’d stayed in touch after we went away to college.”
“Yeah.” They swung in silence for a few minutes before Heather said, “Speaking of remembering our spot, you wouldn’t happen to have a joint, would you?”
“No, but,” Jocelyn said reaching into her purse and pulling out a bag of gummies, “I do have edibles. Start with a quarter of one and give it half an hour or so to hit.”
Heather laughed, taking the offered treat. “The creepy twins strike again. Edibles at the forty-year reunion.”
“This is nothing,” Jocelyn said. “Howard Mc-What’s-his-name was doing lines of blow in the bathroom with anyone who wanted some. Gathered quite the crowd.”
“Coke-bottle glasses Howard? McSween? The scrawny band and theater kid? That Howard?”
“Yeah, that Howard. He’s bald on top now. Still as small and scrawny, but his suit looked expensive as hell. Showed up in a limo — the private kind, not the hired kind. License plate was ‘HOWARD4.’”
“Wow. So how did you find out he was doing blow in the bathroom?”
Jocelyn laughed. “It was the women’s bathroom!”
They laughed at the incongruity of it and returned to swinging in silence. The half-moon peeked out behind the broken clouds that drifted across the sky.
“Did you ever get married or have kids?” Heather asked.
“No. Dated a few guys, and a few girls, but nothing ever lasted.” Jocelyn didn’t dare to tell Heather that she was the reason that no one else measured up. “Honestly, it’s made it easy to focus on work, since I cut my family out right after high school.”
“Sounds lonely,” Heather said. “For obvious reasons, I’ve avoided long-term relationships.”
“Do you think anyone other than your parents knew we were together, then?” Jocelyn asked.
“No. I think they were too busy calling my mom a witch and saying we were freaks.”
“I’m just glad your parents were cool with us,” Jocelyn said.
“They were cool with anything involving you. They still ask about you all the time.”
Jocelyn looked at Heather, an unasked question in her eyes.
Heather reached over and grabbed the chain of Jocelyn’s swing. “I know you want to ask about my appearance, but don’t know how.”
“Well, yeah, at first. But then I remembered your parents both looked so young compared to mine.” Jocelyn put her hand on Heather’s. “You started out with good genes.”
“Well, yes and no.”
“What do you mean?”
“What makes us look young has a certain…downside.” Heather turned her hand over so that she was holding Jocelyn’s.
Jocelyn squeezed her hand, noticing that it was cool. “Don’t you dare tell me you’re sick! Do you need a kidney? You can have one of mine. I hear they can do liver transplants with only part of a liver if you need that. Bone marrow is a no-brainer.”
Heather laughed. “Thanks for that, but no, I’m not sick per se, but….”
Jocelyn raised an expectant eyebrow. When no follow-up came, she said, “Heather Helen Markham, if you don’t tell me now, I’m going to start calling you ‘HeHee’ again.” She sang the ‘HeHee’ in a Michael Jackson impersonation.
“Anything but that.” Heather took a deep breath. “I guess I’ll just come out and say it. I’m not aging for the same reason my parents don’t age. We’re vampires.”
“Ass! I thought you were being serious.” Jocelyn poked at Heather’s arm, looking for a playful reaction. When it didn’t come, she was at a loss for words.
“I am being serious.”
The look on Heather’s face told Jocelyn that she was, indeed, serious. “How long have you…thought you are a vampire?”
A soft smile crossed Heather’s face. “I don’t think I’m a vampire, I am one — a born vampire. We age like regular humans for the first twenty or so years, then we pretty much stop — unless we don’t feed.”
“But — you eat food, you drink wine, you even had an edible, I saw you in the sun earlier this evening. It doesn’t make sense.” Jocelyn shook her head. “Maybe I’m imagining this.”
“You’re not imagining anything, Jo.” Heather grabbed Jocelyn’s hand again. “What you see in the movies is bullshit. We don’t turn to dust in the sun, we can eat and drink, we just need a couple quarts of human blood once a month or so to keep us healthy. Without it, we age rapidly and starve to death, regardless of whatever else we eat.”
“It’s not funny anymore, Heather.” Jocelyn pulled her hand back and crossed her arms. “Quit playing and tell me what’s going on.”
Heather sighed. “Can you see the top of the play castle tower over there?”
“Yeah. Why?”
Before Jocelyn could blink, Heather was gone from the swing next to her and crouching atop the tower. “This,” she called out.
Just as fast, she was back in the swing next to Jocelyn. “W—was that a magic trick? Some kind of illusion?”
“No. Look at my teeth, tell me what you see.”
Jocelyn looked. “I see your teeth, they’re normal like alwa—” she cut off as Heather’s canines seemed to grow. From the close view, it was obvious they were sliding down, then the angle shifted as they locked into place. She reached out and touched the tip of one and found it sharp.
Heather’s eyes shone in the dim moonlight. Her canines shifted their position again and retracted into her gums. “Say something.”
“Why? Why are you telling me?”
“There are two ways that vampires come to be. Some are born, like me. Some are made, like my mother.” Heather took Jocelyn’s hand in her own again and held it with a gentle touch.
“Are…are you asking me to…?”
Heather looked into Jocelyn’s eyes. “I’m saying, if you want to be a vampire, I’ll do it. I can’t think of anyone else I’d want to hang out with for a few centuries.”
Jocelyn watched the reflection of the moon in Heather’s eyes. She tried to weigh the consequences of the offer.
“You don’t have to decide right away,” Heather said. “I can wait as long as you need.”
Jocelyn looked at her former lover and still favorite person in the world. “I’ve already decided.”
