Unrequited (3 page)

As he studied her, she turned, and he found himself meeting a green-eyed gaze. Ashton was totally fixed on him. Her face was as expressionless as it had been when he met her, and she seemed to be daring him to look away. Will faltered and quickly looked down at the floor. When he looked back up a moment later, Ashton had returned her focus to the principal, and she didn’t look at Will again.

When the assembly was over, Will walked back to his classroom, still thinking about the silent exchange. He opened his door, and the students scuttled to their desks. First period was world history, and the class was filled with students he knew from the previous year.

“Mr. Leighton, how was your summer?”

“Are you gonna coach again this year?”

“Do we have to do that French Revolution project you made the class do last year?”

The students were firing questions at him. Will suspected part of it was first day excitement, and part of it was an attempt to delay any real school work. Nevertheless, he answered the questions one by one.

“I had a great summer. I read several books, watched a lot of movies, and worked on my tan.” The last remark got a laugh. It was universally remarked on by the students that Mr. Leighton didn’t appear to spend a lot of time outdoors.

“As for your second question, I will be coaching again this year, but instead of the junior varsity boys, I will be coaching the varsity girls.” The boys in class groaned, but the girls all gave an excited sigh. It was also universally acknowledged by the girls in school that Mr. Leighton was the most handsome teacher they'd ever had.

“And finally, yes, you will have to do the French Revolution project. It's become tradition to torture you all with guillotines and powdered wigs.”

The class laughed, and Will began filling them in on what they could expect for the rest of the semester.

***

Across the school, in an English Literature class, Ashton was trying to pay attention to the teacher. Instead, she kept thinking about the assembly, and the blue-eyed man that had stared at her. She recognized him as “Mr. Leighton,” and she also recognized something else about him…something very familiar. It was the same feeling that had put her off balance the day before. Was it possible? Could there really be a vampire teaching at Belle Ridge?

Part of her wanted to find out. There was something comforting about a kindred spirit, but a bigger part of Ashton wanted to stay far away from him. The world she belonged to now was scary and unknown, and the person who had done this to her was not the type of person she wanted to associate with. And for all she knew, Will Leighton might be the same type of vampire that had attacked her. For that matter, he may have
been
the one who attacked her, but as soon as she had that thought, she dismissed it. Something about Will told her he wasn't the bad sort.

“Ashton Wallace?” The teacher was calling her.

“Oh, yes, ma'am, I'm here.” Ashton tried to turn her attention back to class.

Lunchtime finally arrived, and Ashton made her way to the cafeteria. She didn’t really want any food, but she also didn’t want to stand out by declining to eat. A couple girls from her English class had taken her under their wing and were insisting she sit with them at lunch.

“Sarah and I are so glad to have some new blood this year. I swear, I get so tired of talking to the same ol' people with the same ol' gossip,” a girl named Aimee was saying, while Ashton tried to decipher the meat substance sitting on her lunch tray.

Sarah and Aimee seemed nice. They actually seemed a lot like the girls Ashton had been friends with back at Mount Clara. During lunch they filled Ashton in on everything from who the cutest boys were to which girls had become trashy over the summer. According to Aimee and Sarah, most of the girls were now trashy.

“This summer I saw LouAnn riding around with at least five boys in her car, and she was the only girl,” Sarah said in a whisper while cutting her eyes over to a blond girl whom Ashton assumed must be the now-trashy LouAnn.

“That's nothing. I heard the real reason Tabby Miller's parents decided to home school her wasn't because she was making poor grades, but was really because she's about five months away from a stork visit.” Aimee sat back in triumph, knowing she'd delivered the biggest gossip at the table. The other girls became very animated, all joining in, many of them insisting they had suspected a pregnancy all along.

After a few more examples of girls who had gone bad, the subject turned to school activities. As they were starting to list off which clubs were the “good” clubs to belong to, Ashton felt a slight tingle course through her. She knew
he
must have walked in, and she was right. Will Leighton had come into the cafeteria and joined a group of teachers at a table in the center of the room. He appeared to be carrying a sack lunch. Ashton wondered what was inside, and was curious to see if he was as disinterested in food as she was. It would be one more clue to Will's identity.

Ashton stared down at her lunch tray and started to move the food around with her fork. Eating was hard to describe. It wasn't that food didn’t have a flavor anymore, it was more like the flavor had diminished to such a low level she could barely taste it. It took all the joy out of eating. That, paired with the fact that food was no longer a necessity, made the entire act of eating a bit of a chore. Ashton did it anyway, for appearance sake, and took a bite of the mashed potatoes she'd been playing with. It was still hard to get used to the lack of taste, and for the first time, she wished she could actually savor a school cafeteria meal.

She watched as Will pulled a sandwich and an apple out of his lunch bag. It was a full five minutes before he finally took a bite of his sandwich, and when he did, she watched his face. If Ashton wasn't mistaken, his chewing was merely an act. He wasn't enjoying his food. He wasn't even paying very much attention to it. It was like he was sitting there, acting a part in a play, and his role required him to eat.

“You're staring at Mr. Leighton. I can't blame you; he is captain of the S.S. Dreamboat.” Aimee nudged Ashton and laughed.

“Oh, no, I just thought he looked familiar.” Ashton was trying to focus on her food, and praying for a change of subject.

“Of course he looks familiar. You see him in your dreams every night, or at least you will soon. We all do.” Sarah smiled brightly and placed a curly fry around her finger.

“Will Leighton, I would be honored to be your wife.” She waved her potato-ringed finger in the air and everyone at the table started to laugh. Ashton couldn’t help but laugh too, and she realized it was the first time she'd laughed since she moved to Belle Ridge.

Chapter Four

Ashton let out a deep breath when the final bell rang. She felt exhausted, and was ready to go home and put this day behind her. She had begun mentally keeping an infinite calendar, where every day's end was another day closer to finding some means of adjusting to this new life. It was all so strange, but at least she could put an “X” through this day. In many ways, life was as it had always been. She slept, she woke, she went about the routine of daily living, but she wasn't really living. Some nights she would lie awake thinking of the day when her little brother would suddenly appear older than she did. Even now, she pictured a not-so-distant future where she would have to stay away from her family, lest everyone figure out she was something less than human. There was just no way of explaining a girl who didn’t age.

As she walked to her car, Ashton noticed a young man leaning against it. He was the boy from her government class. They'd talked just a little before the class had started, but she couldn’t recall his name.

“Hi…” She still couldn’t remember.

“Jackson Stanley Truitt, but you can just call me Jackson, it would be a little odd if you called me anything else.” He smiled, his arms crossed casually across his chest as he leaned against the old powder blue VW bug Ashton had been driving since her sixteenth birthday.

“Jackson, yeah, sorry I met so many people today. I'm still trying to put the right name with the right face.” Ashton shifted her stance to try and appear as casual as Jackson.

“No apology necessary, I just wanted to see how you liked your first day here at Belle Ridge. We're a small school, but a good one.” He was still leaning on the car, and had a slight twinkle in his eye.

Ashton could be mistaken, but she was pretty sure Jackson was interested in more than her opinion of the school. Boys were going to be a problem. She'd turned a few heads before, but now there was something about Ashton that seemed to attract most of the male species.

It was easy to ignore the guys she knew she would never see again, but it was going to be hard to ward off the ones she would have to see every day at school. There was no way she could date ever again, because there was no way she could ever tell anyone she had become a vampire. Who would believe it? Even if they did believe it, who would want to be with her?

As Ashton stared at Jackson with his sandy brown hair and his boy-next-door face, she wished she could date him. Wished she could just pretend to be a normal high school girl. She certainly didn’t like the idea that Charlie was the only boy she would have ever kissed in her life.

“I like Belle Ridge just fine. Everyone's been really nice. I think I even made a few friends already,” she finally said.

“Well I hope you'll include me in that group of friends.” He straightened up and moved to stand a few feet from Ashton. “I also hope you'll let me take you to the dance this Friday.” He had said exactly what Ashton had worried he would.

“Oh, Jackson, that's so nice, but I don't think I'm going to go.” Ashton looked down and moved toward her car.

“You have to go. New school, new friends. That calls for dancing.” He started to walk backward away from Ashton. “I'm not one to give up. When I see you tomorrow I'll be armed with my best arguments.” Jackson winked and turned away.

Ashton quickly got in her car and headed toward her new house. The year of anonymous living she had hoped for had gone out the window on the very first day.

“Well, why can't you go with him sweetheart?” Her mom asked as she hung a picture on Ashton's bare bedroom wall.

“You know precisely why, Mama. I can't date anyone, ever, and I don't need a picture on the wall. I told you, I don't feel like decorating this room.” Ashton had insisted on leaving everything in her room as bare as possible. Her old bedroom had been full of all the normal teenage trappings. There were posters and stuffed animals and pictures of friends on her bookshelves. She didn’t want any reminders of her old life, so she'd packed everything away except for her clothes and a few books.

“Staring at blank walls isn't good for you, Ash, and the only way to snap out of this, whatever it is, is to actually snap out of it,” she said with a whack of the hammer.

“I can't snap out of being vampire,” Ashton reminded her.

“No, but you can snap out of this solitude and bleak attitude you've developed.” She put the hammer down and sat next to Ashton on the bed. “I know it's not easy, honey, and I can't even imagine how difficult this is, but hiding away from the world isn't going to help anything. Yes, the future is uncertain—it is for all of us—but what you can do right now is live in the present. You can enjoy this last year of high school. You can date and have friends and play sports and go to dances and football games. This is the time where everything is still easy. Right now, you are a teenage girl in high school. Nobody thinks anything strange is happening. Nothing appears out of the ordinary. You are still in a normal timeline, the same timeline you would be in if last year had never happened.”

Her mom was right. This really was the only time she could live freely with her family. Someday, her parents would be elderly and her brother would be middle-aged, and she would still be young. Perhaps she should try to fit in and go about as she normally would…except for one thing.

“But dating, I just don't feel right about it. I mean, it's not fair to the boy if he falls for me, and it's not fair to me if I fall for him. There is no way for me to be with anyone, because no matter what, one day it will have to end. Plus, I'm going to be twenty soon. I'd be a cradle robber!” She buried her face in her pillow.

Her mother laughed. “You are hardly a cradle robber. You are still nineteen, and you were eighteen when this all happened, just like most of the boys in your class. Don't worry so much. Besides, most girls don't stay with the boys they date in high school anyway, so you can leave a high school boyfriend behind just like every other girl does.” Elaine gave her daughter a squeeze.

After her mother left the room, Ashton stared at the newly hung picture on the wall. It was a framed print of her favorite painting: Van Gogh's
Starry Night
. She always found the picture so dreamlike and sometimes wished she could escape to that world of blues and greens. Life right now seemed surreal, and maybe her mother was right; escaping for a time into the hum-drum world of Belle Ridge might be just the thing to do.

***

Will was tidying up his classroom. The first day was over and, all in all, it had been a good one. The students were as entertaining as ever, and it was good to see his teaching colleagues again. Granted, Belle Ridge was a fairly small town, so he'd seen many of them over the summer, but there was always something nice about the day-to-day banter during the school year.

As he made his way home, he couldn’t help but turn his mind to Ashton Wallace. There was no mistaking her special qualities. She was most certainly a vampire, and he was more than curious to find out her story. For so long he had only known his own experience, and he wondered how it would compare to hers. There was much he could learn from having a kindred being around. More importantly, he could teach her all the things he had learned over the past dozen or more decades. This road Ashton now travelled wasn't an easy one, and it was in his power to make it a little less bumpy.