The restaurant brimmed with life. I tied the knot to go to Silver Plate with Hans, a restaurant for the wealthy. He protested at first, saying that the place was full of judgemental types who would look down on us, but after telling him that wasn’t the case – I ate there multiple times – because nobody dared to judge me.

I wore a long black silk dress, it curved to my legs but it didn’t stick to them. It had a large V-neck showing a significant part of my breasts. I didn’t have much on my chest, but hey, I will show it off if I feel like it. My silver earrings were silver half moon shapes. I wore black lipstick, but a shade lighter than I normally had. I couldn’t be overly gothic at a place like this, but it is a style I can’t simply abandon.

We decided to meet up at seven PM, and he arrived precisely on time. I mean that in the most literal way possible. Hans stepped on the sidewalk as soon as the clock hit seven, accurate by the second.

Very punctual.

He wore a black tuxedo which hid his scrawny physique. Hans would be more attractive if he hit the gym and maybe ate a little more. He seemed like a real lightweight. He was short for a Dutchman, but way taller than me. He had a large bouquet of flowers in his hands–red and black roses.

“Wow, you’re exactly on time.” I greeted him with a smile..

He handed me the flowers and smiled from ear to ear. “Wouldn’t want to make you wait any longer than necessary, darling.”

“Darling?”

“That is what you’re supposed to call each other right? It is less cheesy than ‘baby’.”

He was right about that. Hans never went on a date before, it is only natural that he’d act so awkward. Hans isn’t a social guy, in class he used to be silent and sit somewhere in the back with Andy. The latter hadn’t shown up to school for a week. Hans said it’s because he is a lazy person, but why now? He would’ve been more absent this year.

“Hans, please you don’t have to be so slimy. You know I won’t do that with you. It is our first date, calling each other sweet names comes later.”

He let out a sigh of relief. “Phew, that is nice. Then I can be myself.”

Poor guy. He really hadn’t been lucky in the game of love, or had anybody to explain it to him. “Please, just act like yourself and don’t try to conform to me.“ –I sniffed the flowers– “These smell amazing though.”

“I know I should be myself, it is just that you’re kinda, uh, maybe, out of my league.” He stammered.

“Hans, you know that isn’t true… Was Damien yapping about my love life to you? ”

He nodded. Fucking Damien, I felt like smacking him when I saw him again. “He tends to exaggerate this stuff. To him that is some sort of sick humor. It is all BS.” I reassured him.

He checked my body up and down, but didn’t stare at my breasts for too long.

Thank God he didn’t.

Hans opened his mouth, but a man bumped into him. He fell quiet instantly.

I grabbed him by the arm –making sure to not squeeze– and he winced. “Something wrong?” I asked.

“Nah, just sudden touches from strangers, especially in public,” He quivered. “They freak me out.”

“You’ll be okay.” I led him into the restaurant, he let me pull him along. The inside of the place was gigantic. There must have been three hundred or so people in this room alone. A large golden chandelier hung over them like a god deciding their fate.

It could choose to illuminate the room and let the people have a pleasant evening, or it could snap off, fall down, and kill a bunch of people.

This is why I chose a place not under the chandelier. I seated myself and Hans went to sit in front of me. He fumbled with his bow tie.

It may come as a surprise, but I do genuinely have an interest in Hans. if he hadn’t asked me out I would have never gone on a genuine date with him. It did come as a godsent, given the Connor situation. If Hans found out his plan of turning me into a personal babymaker when we got married, he wouldn’t let that happen. He’d stand up for me. Connor could kill him easily, but I’m around seventy-five percent sure he wouldn’t take that risk.

Hans’s father is Jacob Julians, the minister of defense. If he found out his son got murdered, he’d easily blow down Connor’s entire estate. Even a powerful vampire family like him is no match for the mighty WEF army.

Either way, Connor would back down or go down.

Hans stared at me, I stared back. He wasn’t staring directly into my eyes. He looked a tad bit beneath it, like Vanessa always did. He had a stoic look on his face, weird for someone glimpsing at a girl’s neck. He folded his hands together and put his elbows on the table. He covered his mouth with interlocked fists. Fortunately a waiter came to break the awkward silence.

“What may be your order?”

Hans remained silent and kept staring.

“I’ll have the spaghetti.”

“Same for me.” Hans said, his voice muffled by the interlocked fists in front of his mouth. He drank a bit of water, then continued staring.

The waiter left with our order. “Hans, eyes up here please.” I said.

“Huh?”

“You’re staring at my chest.” I knew he tried his best to keep his eyes above that level, but I needed to wake him up somehow.

His face shot up and he flailed his arms, almost knocking over his glass of water. “I was staring at your neckline. I am so sorry that you thought that. I swear I live a bit in my own world sometimes.” He said quickly. My wakeup call worked.

Boys are sometimes very scared of being creepy, or going too far without meaning to.

This mentality emerged when people don’t have anyone to teach them about romance. I had my big brother before he left, Hans has Jacob Julians, who got divorced ten years ago.

This is why boys like Hans are scared of asking out or simply complimenting girls. They are afraid that they’ll be perceived as creepy because they don’t know how much is too much. Hans was nervous, and probably had a form of autism. I am not a psychologist, so I can’t say for sure. He shares certain traits with Vanessa, like not wanting to be touched and not making eye contact.

At the end of the day, everyone’s pot has a fitting lid.

Hans’s pot

My pot…

Or my lid. I can be either.

I chuckled at his reaction. “You’re fine, Hans. First dates are nerve racking, I sure remember my first one. Yikes.”

He drank his water with large gulps before he could accidentally knock it over. He fixed his posture and looked at my face, still not directly in my eyes, but he got out of that weird trance.

“I think it is pretty funny how you’re willing to go on a date with a guy who has no experience whatsoever.”

“That doesn’t matter, Hans.”

He slightly pouted his lips. “Alright, tell me more about that first date.”

I readied myself to tell him a story.

“So I was more than a year back now, and this handsome athlete asked me out, and being a fifteen year old girl I accepted it. We went to the cinema on our first date and afterwards we went to his house. I slept with him that night already.”

Hans's eyes widened. “You regret it?”

“Yes I do!” I exclaimed. I closed in to whisper, “It was like he was scared of me. Like… I gave him a blow job. Is it okay if I talk about this with you?”

Hans nodded, blood filling up his cheeks.

I continued. “So during all that he didn’t talk or touch me at all. He just stared down at me with wide alien bug eyes. Then we got to the actual sex part, and he was just way too rough. I was hurting but thought that was normal for the first time. Next week he broke up.”

“Jesus.”

“Eh, the first time almost always sucks, even with a considerate partner. I have had friends with benefits who were more fun than that guy.”

Hans let out a quiet gasp. “Wait…” He rubbed his temples. “You do the thing with friends?”

I took a sip of water. “Haven’t for three months now, and don’t worry. I won’t do so as long as I’m seeing you.”

Hans grimaced. “How do you do that? Getting your friends that far.”

Such an innocent boy.

“Well, not everyone wants it. I understand it if you don’t want it. For me it is just fun and it is also stress relief. We laugh a lot, and share some personal things after.”

“So what Damien said has some truth to it.” He teased me.

“Yeah, but he does tend to exaggerate it.”

“Don’t tell me you slept with him.”

“Oh I’d combust into flames if that happened. He is an annoying one, and a virgin.”

“Hey!”

“No I don’t mean it like that. I just don’t want someone to give their virginity to me when they’re just friends with me.”

“Ah, understandable.”

The waiter came back with our plates of spaghetti drenched in sauce and speckled with meatballs. He placed it in front of us.

“Enjoy your meal.” He said as he walked off.

“Don’t tell me what to do.” Hans said softly, the waiter couldn’t have heard.

It almost made me spit out my water. I swallowed it and tried to hold in my laugh to not disturb the other people in the restaurant. Hans did the same with me. His ‘holding laugh back’ face was adorable, I will admit that.

“Your eyes are very pretty.” He suddenly said, it shook me out of my laughing fit.

“Really?”

“I know saying your eyes are blue like the ocean and getting lost in them is cliche, but it’s true. I have brown eyes so all you would see is probably a bunch of poop or something.“

Now I laughed so much my ribs were hurting. I did not know if Hans meant it to be funny, but I couldn’t help it. Several people turned heads at us, but they smiled, probably thinking about what a cute young couple we were.

Hans ate the spaghetti with a satisfied look on his face. Boys always love making girls laugh. It gives them confidence.

“But really, you have nice eyes.” He mused.

“You do too, they’re definitely not poop.” I said.

“See the funny thing about eyes is-” My head drowned out Hans’s voice when I saw something behind him.

A man entered the restaurant. He stood out from the majority dressed in dresses and suits–He wore a black leather trench coat and carried a very long guitar case. Maybe it was a cello. He had short blond hair above a pale face and black cargo pants. However the thing that made him stick out like a sore thumb the most, was the fact that he towered above everyone in the restaurant. He must’ve been seven feet tall.

He briefly spoke to one of the waiters. From this distance I couldn’t hear what they said. The giant had a stoic expression. I looked past Hans and saw him moving towards our table. He walked with slow, wide paces. His combat boots sounded louder the closer he came.

A vampire? He was pale enough to be one. Did Connor or my father send him to spy on us?

His eyes were fixated on the back of Hans’s head. He put two hands on his briefcase, but froze when he made eye contact with me.

He had light blue eyes, lighter than even mine. I looked at him with a fearful expression. Then put my palm on Hans’s hand. The giant was seemingly shocked by this. He definitely recognized me. His face angrily twisted and he turned around. He walked off with the same wide and slow paces.

What just happened? The man’s eyes were so focused on Hans. Did I just save his life?

“-And that is why he went blind! Isn’t that crazy?… Marlene?”

He had alerted me. “Oh, sorry, I thought I recognized someone and my eyes wandered off.”

“Oh I guess my story about the occipital lobe wasn’t that interesting. The brain’s pattern searching is really interesting by the way. I remember being with my mother in the mall at five years old and accidentally grabbing a stranger’s hand because I thought it was her. It is surely cringeworthy to look back upon.” He said in a somber tone “I miss her.” He said, his voice trembled slightly.

“Your mom?” I asked.

“Yes, she divorced my father when I was six. I used to see her a lot, but she has a boyfriend. That boyfriend was not a nice guy, he committed crimes. He caused my mom to lose all custody. I am forbidden from seeing her. I know she is a criminal and I shouldn’t like her, but she just understands me in a way my dad doesn’t.”

A sting hit my heart. “Hans, it is totally normal to want to see her again.”

“But the supervisor said it was better to not see her again.”

“You were how old then?”

“Ten.” He said softly.

“He got inside of your head, Hans,” I couldn’t get the tall man out of my head. I still felt his eyes on me. “It isn’t your fault.”

His mouth moved all the way to the left corner. He looked and sounded like he was holding back tears. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore. It just brings me back to the bad times.”

“Alright,” I comforted him by touching his arm. “Just know you might be able to see her one day.”

He nodded and took a large bite of his food. “How about your parents. They still together?”

“Yes.” I said. He couldn’t find out too much about them, not yet.

“What are they like?” He asked. He almost finished his plate.

I was about to lie to him, but a loud high pitched voice cut me off before I could speak.

“I WANT MY TEDDY!”

I looked over at the table the noise came from. I saw a small girl with blond curly hair jumping up and down on the ground. She couldn’t be older than five years old. Her face filled itself with anger and her mother put a fuzzy brown teddy bear in her bag.

“Honey, if we are going to eat, you need to put Teddy away for a bit, else he will get dirty.”

“TEDDY EATS WITH ME!” She threw herself to the ground and trashed about.

I rolled my eyes at the sight. Kids having tantrums were so funny. The only reason a kid would throw repeated tantrums is because the parents give in. It shows the child that the tantrum is the way to get what they want. These parents obviously didn’t follow through in the past. The child floored herself and screamed and trashed about.

What a mess for the parents.

My eyes drifted back to Hans, I wanted to say “Oh boy, what a sight!” but his look was worrying to say the least. He clutched onto his knife and fork, his knuckles whiter than a vampire’s skin. I could hear him grind his teeth and his eyebrows were crossed onto his face. His knee bounced onto his foot and wiggled up and down.

“Hans,” I tried. “Are you okay?”

“A-aah.” He blurted out, his voice soft.

“Come on, Hans. It isn’t so bad.”

“It is, fucking hell. I have to stop it.”

“Hans, please don’t.” I grabbed onto his arm. He breathed heavily and had his cupped hands against his ears.

“This is why I initially refused to go here. I can’t really handle this kind of thing.” He struggled to get the words out his throat.

He couldn’t stand certain sounds, the same as Vanessa. His aversions to touching and eye contact were prime examples of autistic traits.

I took a closer look at Hans. I felt the vibrations of his shaking legs and decided I had to get him out of there. I stopped a waiter by calling out to him. “Sir, we have to get out of here. Can I pay up front and take the food with us?”

“I can… pay.” Hans said. He sounded tired. The screaming child was now rolling over the floor and still screaming for her teddy. I could understand, I still have plushies in my bed.

“Shush, Hans. You were right, we shouldn’t have come here. I’m sorry.” I told him.

“Ah, don’t mind it.” He got up from the table. I put the money on the table and grabbed Hans by the arm. The waiter put the food in the bags. Spaghetti in a paper bag.

Yummy.

I grabbed Hans by the arm and took the two bags in the other. I guided him to the exit. Sweat stood on his back, he looked like he would faint any moment now. Some fresh air would do him good. Once near the exit Hans inhaled the air from inside sharply and his face lit up.

I called a taxi. It arrived within three minutes. We got inside and I stuck my fork in the now lukewarm spaghetti. Hans still breathed heavily, but he seemed to be calming down. He had his hand on his chest. His eyes were teary, I couldn’t tell whether it was from emotion or tension.

***

The girl’s screams reminded me of Andy. The screams he let out before his chest got drilled through by the hardened hand of the vampire sounded like the girl’s, just more desperate and lower pitched. I felt ashamed for putting Marlene through it all.

“I’m so sorry.” I said softly. I facepalmed and sighed.

“Don’t worry, the place was kinda boring anyway.” Marlene said with her mouth full. She munched on the red stained strands of spaghetti while looking at me with those mesmerizing blue eyes.

God, even with sauce covering the edges of her mouth she was so adorable.

“You still want some?”

Andy’s limp corpse being thrown to the floor crossed my mind. “No thanks, I’ve had enough.”

“Fine, you look like you could use it though.” She continued eating.

“I should work out, gain some mass.”

“You need to eat for mass.”

Marlene’s head perked up. “Hans, maybe this is a bit personal, if you don’t want to answer it’s fine.”

I grinned. “Ask away.”

“Have you ever been tested for Autism, or any other neurological disorder?”

That was an odd question, but I answered honestly. “No, my parents were too busy with divorcing to notice any of those things anyway. If I do have it. I don’t give a shit. Little I can do about it.”

We were rudely interrupted by my ringtone. Birds chirped in my pocket and I fumbled with the phone in my hand. I looked who called; it was Nazril.

Shit.

“Hans Julians.” I said with doubt in my voice.

“Hans, they’re coming! Godverdomme!!”

Oh, I haven’t heard that word in a long time. It was the Dutch word for “Goddamnit.” Most people over thirty spoke fluid Dutch here, but I knew a few words. English has become the dominant language here since Bridger took over. I processed what Nazril said, then got scared.

“Who are?”

“THE FUCKING ASSASSINS, THEY’RE IN FRONT OF MY DOOR TRYING TO GET IN.” A loud crunching was audible in the background.

I looked at Marlene, who could maybe hear Nazril’s frantic screaming from where she sat. “I am going home from my date now, I am in a taxi with the girl, I’m sure they won’t atta-” I quickly switched so Marlene wouldn’t hear. “- Uhh approach me.”

“Stay with the girl, Hans. I really have to go now.”

“Hey, wait.” He hung up.

Sweat instantly stood on my back and the hair on my neck stood up straight.

“Who was that?” Marlene demanded.

“Friend.”

“Andy?”

“No, another one.” My voice cracked on the last word. I rubbed the bridge of my nose with two fingers and grabbed Marlene’s hand. “Can I sleep over at your house tonight?”

She raised her eyebrows.

“Like, my dad is pulling an all-nighter anyway.” I said.

She frowned for a moment, then gave me a soft smile. “As long as you keep those hands to yourself until I say otherwise.” She said.

I awkwardly put my hands in the air. “I wouldn’t dare.”

She softly interlocked her pale hands with mine and stared into my eyes. Normally I’d look away, but now I managed to be entranced for a few seconds.

Truly eyes to be lost in.

“If you aren’t too crazy, I might let you touch a bit near midnight. My parents aren’t home either. You need to be a good boy though.”

The moment she winked a tingle coursed through my entire body.

Now there’s hoping the assassin didn’t want any witnesses tonight.