Tara was the first up the stairs, finding the door to her youngest brother’s room open. Inside she saw her mother fussing, looking in this drawer and that, under his bed and in his wardrobe.

“Mom,” Tara asked from the threshold, “Are you looking for something?”

“Your brother better pray I find it..”

“You mean ‘don’t’ find it’?” Tara asked, her thoughts wandering to pornography or drugs.

“No, I want it to be here.”

Tara looked over her shoulder to see Chrissy enter her room and started to walk backwards. There were more important things than whatever her mother was up to, such as not letting anyone in her room unsupervised for too long.

“Oh, well. Good luck… We’ll be in my room,”

Mrs Brooks didn’t respond, continuing her search for something she was sure would not be in the room.

Chrissy had taken the desk chair just like last time and Tara was glad she had had the presence of mind to shut the bottom drawer, though inwardly cursed the fact that she lost the key to it years ago.

She looked at the drawer, to Chrissy, the drawer, Chrissy... Drawer… Chrissy.

Chrissy made a face, then gently reminded Tara, “The map?”

“Oh, right!” Tara said, ducking under the bed to get out the giant roll of paper, rolled it out on the floor and knelt next to it.

Chrissy followed her example, studying Tara’s work with wide eyes, tracing her finger across the many locales Tara had dreamed up. Suddenly she stopped, arched her brows, and turned the map upside down/

“Hey!”

“What?”

“This map looks familiar.”

Tara shrugged, she wasn’t going to mention her creative process. Chrissy could figure it out on her own time.

“...Can I copy it?” Chrissy asked, the original thought forgotten a second later, “We can use it for D&D.”

Tara took a moment to consider it, then shrugged, “Fine. I’ll get you a pen … cil.”

She glanced at the drawer that held the treasure trove of writing utensils, shuffled over on her knees, opened it while not breaking eye contact with Chrissy, and grabbed an assortment, which she dropped in front of the confused girl.

“You okay?”

Tara slammed the drawer, “Sure.”

Chrissy, unsure how normal this was for Tara, simply stared to inspect the pencils, meticulously checking each one until she found one to her liking.

“I’ll get you some paper,” Tara said as she did, and got up, “Just a minute. Please don’t touch anything…”

She ran down the stairs, getting a yell from her mother not to do that, invaded her father’s home office, and took one of the large sheaves of paper he used to dream up advertising, then ran back just as fast.

She was panting when she returned, then was immediately concerned when she saw Chrissy smiling, an odd conspiratorial look on her face as if they shared a secret.

“What?” Tara asked, catching her breath and already worrying. The drawer was closed.

“I figured it out!”

“What?” Tara replied, her heart racing.

“The map!” Chrissy called and Tara was glad she was too out of breath to let out the sigh of relief.

“The map! It’s this place!”

“How’d you guess,” Tara wanted to know.

“I looked at the map a lot before coming here.”

“...why?”

Chrissy smiled wide, apparently not at all embarrassed, “I wanted to see if I could find where the bats are.”

“Bats? Have you found them yet?”

“No… Have you ever seen any?”

Tara nodded, “I know where you can see them. I’ll show you some day.”

“Great! ...Can I use the desk to draw?”

“Sure,” Tara said, rolled the fresh paper out for Chrissy, then sat down on her bed, unsure what she should be doing while Chrissy worked.

“Hey, Tara?”

“Yeah?”

“Can you write a little about all the places. It’ll help me put monsters in them…”

Tara was nonplussed at the question, but it gave her something to do. She took a still empty notebook, grabbed the one pen she’d left on her desk, and sat down again, wondering what to write.

She decided to start with the school, otherwise known as the lair of the evil Sorceror Swile…

A few hours had passed, with the girls only occasionally finding something to discuss about their work.

Chrissy hummed to herself as she did, while Tara had taken to muttering to break the silence. She was now on vampires, populating their lair, trying to figure out how vampires would repurpose a hobbit hovel.

As soon as Chrissy heard the word ‘vampire’, the humming stopped and she carefully listened, especially when Tara mentioned somebody named Christine. An idea struck her.

“I’m going to the shi… bathroom,” she said, got up and left without asking where it was.

Tara barely noticed, tapping the paper with her pen as she tried to figure out the lore.

“What if,” she started a thought out loud, then stopped it deciding it was stupid and kept thinking, not noticing the shadow in the doorway.

“Can vampires drink hobbit blood?” she wondered out loud, barely noticing the extra weight being added to her bed.

There was a moment of silence as she noticed the sound of breathing and the quick stifle of a giggle.

“No,” Chrissy whispered in her ear, “But vampires can drink human blood.”

Tara was still processing this when there were suddenly two hands on her shoulder, followed by Chrissy giggling as she jokingly placed her teeth to Tara’s neck.

A moment of silence.

Tara processed what had happened.

Then a shriek to wake the dead reverberated around the house.