Lust for Life (34 page)

By the looks on their faces, I’m doing all right.

We walk down the aisle just as we practiced, in time to the music, but not so precisely
it looks dancy. My father beams with delight, even though he’s not in the spotlight
himself. On the right side of the aisle, Shane’s family seems endless.

Halfway down I see Shane. He’s gazing at me like I’m the world’s biggest stack of
pancakes. Except with more respect.

My mom peeks out from the front row. To my surprise, she’s not crying. Then again,
she wouldn’t want to ruin her makeup.

When we reach the head of the aisle, Monroe goes to stand beside her, and she hugs
him as he passes. He actually accepts the embrace. Miracles abound.

Shane takes his place beside me, looking younger and hotter than ever in his black-on-black-on-black
tuxedo. He leans over and whispers, “Is that your dad in the back?”

“He busted in at the last second. I almost put that ‘something borrowed’ to good use.”

He smirks and glances at my thigh, where the holy-water pistol is safely holstered.
“Sorry I missed it.”

“He wanted to walk me down the aisle, which would’ve totally taken away my moment.
I was like, ‘Fuck that.’ ”

Of course, the music fades just as I am finishing that sentence. Our mothers let out
soft gasps, but the rest of the crowd laughs. My face feels redder than the roses
in my bouquet.

Which I just realized I’ve been holding backward the entire time. The plastic holder
thingie is facing forward. Crap. Maybe the photographer can edit out my idiocy.

Then again, seeing the backward flowers might be a reminder of all I’ve been through
to get to this point—scratch that, all
we’ve
been through.

I barely hear the warm words of welcome from the officiant, the same Unitarian minister
Lori and David used for their wedding. She says something about marriage being a bold
and courageous step, and I have to avoid Shane’s eyes to keep from cracking up.

Franklin reads a Keats poem with more feeling than I ever would’ve expected. I notice
he tries—and fails—to avoid meeting Adrian’s eyes.

We light a unity candle, something we wouldn’t have dared to do as vampires, then
the minister turns to us for the vows. Shane and I flipped a coin to see who would
go first.

“Will you take this man to be your husband,” she asks me, “to live together in the
promise of marriage? Will you love him, comfort him, honor and keep him, in sickness
and in health; and, forsaking all others, be faithful to him as long as you both shall
live?”

I take a deep breath from my core, just like my mom always taught me, so that all
the realms can hear.

“I will.”

34

You Know You’re Right

We indulge our families by spending Christmas with them in Maryland, and then it’s
honeymoon time.

On the way to our ultimate destination, we take a few days’ layover in Seattle, where
Shane’s idol, Kurt Cobain, spent his final years.

It’s a dreary late December afternoon when we touch down at Sea-Tac Airport, twenty
degrees colder than normal, and raining, naturally. But he wants to see everything,
walk in Kurt’s footsteps, drink in the clubs where Nirvana and Hole played.

The next day is windy but sunny, so we take a bus then walk to the neighborhood where
Kurt Cobain lived his last few months. Because the area is inhabited by the insanely
rich, parts of the road have no sidewalks, and we nearly get mowed down by more than
one Mercedes.

“This is it,” Shane says as we pass a high hedge wall on our right. “The park is just
up ahead.”

“Park?”

He gives me an amused look. “Viretta Park. Where all the vigils and memorials are
held.”

I’m relieved that we have a public place to go instead of just gaping at some stranger’s
house. Courtney Love sold the place years ago. Can’t say I blame her.

We come to a high wooden gate. Shane pauses. “The greenhouse where he died—” He shifts
his jaw. “Where he shot himself. It was behind the left edge of the house. Courtney
had it torn down.”

He takes my hand and we keep walking. After another hundred feet, we come to the grassy
park, which is a lot smaller than I imagined—maybe two hundred yards across. It slopes
uphill, and a trail leads back through the trees. I’m glad it’s cold out, so that
we’re the only ones here.

Shane leads me to a bench at the center of the park.

“Whoa,” I whisper when I see what people have done to it.

More than a park bench, it’s a shrine. Covered in graffiti, it expresses the love
and grief of a thousand fans, and another thousand, faded and shrouded, beneath those
marks. I have the strangest urge to kneel before it.

Instead I sit beside Shane. He’s shoved his hands into the pockets of his sweatshirt
and sits hunched, his brow knitted in thought or memory, I’m not sure which. His eyes
are open, so I assume he’s not praying.

“Damn it,” he whispers. “I meant to bring music.”

I pull out my phone and bring up the MP3 player. “Which song do you want? I can have
it downloaded in one minute.”

He chuckles. “I love the present more and more each day.”

I open the MP3 player’s online store. “Which song?”

Shane takes a long breath in and out. “It’s weird, but
I kinda want ‘Where Did You Sleep Last Night,’ even though it’s a Lead Belly cover,
not one of their originals.”

“It was the last song Kurt played live before he died, right?”

“The last one recorded, yeah, at the
Unplugged
concert.”

I don’t mention that it’s at the end of the first CD we ever listened to together,
or that I already have it on my phone, or that while he was at boot camp I played
it every morning before going to sleep. Shane knows all that. This place isn’t about
me or about us.

I find the song, place the phone on the bench between us, then hit Play.

The guitar comes crisp and clear from the tiny speaker. As if indulging us, the wind
stops and the trees ease their rustle just as Kurt begins to sing.

I stare out at Lake Washington and farther, all the way to the Cascade Mountains.
They’re the same blue-green as everything in this city: the lake, the Seahawks’ uniforms,
even the seats on the bus. The color of comfort.

All that blue-green couldn’t comfort Kurt Cobain. For some reason that Shane understands
but I don’t, Kurt slipped into that darkness and couldn’t climb out or find a way
through. People who loved him dragged him out time after time, the way Regina did
for Shane sixteen years ago, but he kept sliding back.

Will Shane fall again, now that he’s human? The blood tests showed his pancreas was
normal, but what about his brain chemicals?

Without looking down, I place my thumb against my wedding band, which already feels
like a part of me. If
the darkness comes again for Shane, I’ll be there to help him fight it. And if it
ever comes for me, he’ll be there to guide me through, like a shaman in the shadowy
underworld.

When Cobain starts to scream, I close my eyes and let the magic of his pain flow through
me and out, just like Kashmir’s vampire nature. But this magic leaves no burns, only
tears.

Kurt takes that last breath before the final two words, and I hear Shane beside me
pull in the same breath.

I open my eyes into the blinding sunlight as the voice pours forth. It fades with
an ache so raw and deep, I feel like I’ll never breathe again. Then the guitars, drum,
and cello come in, sending us out with strength, then applause and a final “Thank
You.”

Did the people in that audience know how lucky they were? Did they know they were
witnessing a farewell? Did Kurt’s bandmates know? Did
he
know?

Shane hands me two tissues. I take one and give the other back. He blows his nose,
then coughs, as if he wasn’t crying, he just has allergies or a bit of a cold. Men.

Then I hand him a black marker so he can write a message on the bench. He takes it
with a nod of thanks.

While he’s writing, I check out some of the other notes. Most are simple: snatches
of Nirvana lyrics or Bible verses, or just “RIP” or “I Love You.” Some are from those
at peace, others from those with still-sharp grief. One person spelled out KURT with
bright-colored Fisher-Price alphabet letters glued to the bench. A bouquet of sunflowers
is stuffed between two of the bench slats, and a black garter belt is tied to the
end of one of the boards.

I look at the house, its brown roof peeking over the edge of the trees that shroud
it. Kurt’s voice still rings in my head, even as the wind starts up again and rustles
the spruces.

Shane reaches into his pocket. “I wanted to leave something that meant a lot to me.
Something I’d miss, that would be like leaving a part of me behind.”

He pulls out a string of dark-blue Mardi Gras beads, the one he used as a rosary when
he was a vampire, since he couldn’t use a strand with a crucifix. Pieces of tape are
stuck to the beads at certain intervals to indicate where the Our Fathers are substituted
for the Hail Marys.

“Are you sure?”

Shane doesn’t answer, just ties the beads around the end of the bench and lets the
end length dangle. He taps it to set it swinging, then straightens up.

“Ready to go?”

•  •  •

Shane and I arrive in Hawaii early in the evening on New Year’s Eve, with plenty of
time to drive to our resort. We greet the brand-new decade at a luau with a few hundred
strangers turned friends.

But as the night turns to dawn, we leave them all behind and walk down the beach,
far enough that the only light is the one in the eastern sky stretching over the sea.
Despite the cool ocean breeze, we take off our shoes to feel the powder-soft sand
between our toes.

Our gait is unsteady due to the shifting sand and the multiple mai tais. So, hands
linked tight, we wobble like children, waving our arms for balance. Something only
humans have to do.

Without a word, Shane tugs me to a stop. The horizon is glowing now, every color from
red to green and back again. A pair of small offshore islands flanks the spot where
the sun will come up. Perfect.

We sit together on the sand, pressing our sides together, knees to our chest to keep
out the breeze. I loop my arm over Shane’s knee and rest my head on his shoulder.
He wraps his arm around my back, pulling me closer.

There’s no music here, and for once, I don’t need any. All I want to hear are the
waves of the ocean and the breath of my husband.

My husband. That’s so unreal. Almost as unreal as the rays of sunlight streaking up
ahead of the orb. Any minute now it’ll be here.

Shane clears his throat. “I’m going to ruin this with words, okay?”

I squeeze his leg in response.

“Soon I’ll be spending lots of time in the dark,” he says. “Guiding people out, I
guess.”

“Are you worried you’ll get stuck there yourself, like that other agent?”

“No. That’s what I’m trying to say.” He lifts my hand to his lips and gives it a soft
kiss. “Because of you, there’s no darkness I can’t escape.”

I don’t respond, thinking that’s an easy thing to say when one is sitting on a Hawaiian
beach, waiting for the sun to come up.

“I’ll tell you that every day if I have to”—Shane shrugs—“and you can believe me or
not. You can believe whatever you want, or nothing at all. That’s where your power
comes from, and even if it didn’t, I’d never take that away from you.”

With that, I release my last worry about the two of us. I let it streak across the
sky and dive, flaming, into the red-orange sun emerging from the ocean. Then I lift
my chin to meet Shane’s kiss.

My belief and faith in the rest of the world—in all the worlds—will probably always
waver. I’ll always question, always examine, always argue. It’s what I do.

But Shane accepts and loves all that I am and all that I’ll become. Young and strong,
old and weak, and every state in between. In the chill of the dark and the warmth
of the sun, he’ll be there.

Of that, I have no doubt.

Acknowledgments

Wow—how do I thank all the people who’ve traveled with me on this seven-year journey,
from May 2005, when I first had the nutty idea of vampire DJs, to this moment in summer
2012, putting the final touches on the final book?

Thanks first to all the readers. Your passion for music, for vampires, for Ciara and
Shane and all the gang has been an inspiration. Special thanks to the 250+ members
of the WVMP Street Team—you rock!

Second, to the fine folks at Pocket Books, especially my ever-patient editor, Ed Schlesinger,
who should win an Awesomesauce Award (though I don’t know what that would be shaped
like), and to Jennifer Heddle for her brilliant guidance of the series through the
first three books. Also to editor Megan McKeever, Louise Burke, Don Sipley, Renee
Huff, Jean Anne Rose, Nancy Tonik, and Rory Panagotopulos.

Third, to my beta readers/critique partners who helped me eviscerate, shape, and eventually
rebuild the manuscript until it became the bionic book you see here today: Rob Staeger,
Karen Alderman, and Stephanie
Kuehnert, and to Cecilia Ready, who knew the story before anyone else. Also, thanks
to the reviewers, bloggers, and book discussion groups who speculated on how the series
would end. One of you was right.

Thanks to my agent, Ginger Clark, for understanding how much this series has meant
to me.

Lastly, to my family, who are still waiting to get their Jeri back from Deadline Valley.
To my husband, for his love and patience, and for learning how to cook ten times better
than I can. And to my dog, Meadow, who was always at my side. Long may you run.