At 11:45 on the evening after Jeremy brought KerriAnne back to life, he waited for her to come at midnight, wishing he could believe she really would.

When Sister Amanda had asked where the KerriAnne’s body was, he’d glibly explained that since her foot stuck beyond the barrier, the vampires had pulled her out and eaten her. The nun had seemed aware that something was wrong and he’d cringed from her obvious caring. But she’d been equally on fire to tell the world about how being at home with God or Jesus or whatever could let you walk among vampires and so she hadn’t pressed him.

He’d endured the rough good-natured companionship of his friends as Satsuki, the oldest, gave them all a ride home in the morning after incoherent interviews with reporters. He’d endured his parents’ cautious hugs and, after a daylong sleep full of feverish dreams, had also endured a dreadful evening where they tried to “bond” with him like parents are supposed to do.

But 45 minutes ago they’d taken their evening dose of cold medicine and bade him goodnight from across the gulf that neither he nor they could cross. Their feet had climbed the carpeted stairs and just a few minutes ago the sounds of their muted conversation had trailed away.

Jeremy climbed the stairs and listened at their door like a criminal. He heard heavy breathing. Neither of them snored but they’d drugged themselves to sleep for years now. He could stage an orgy downstairs, he thought daringly, and they’d never hear.

Nervous, horny and disgusted with himself, he tiptoed back down the stairs to the living room. The house was an old Victorian with high ceilings and big bay windows. No vampires were visible at any window now that everyone knew, thanks to Charla Thorpe, that the sanctity of home included the view.

If he went back up to his old bedroom (he now slept in the downstairs room that had been “the TV room”), he could sleep in his old bed with the shade up and not be bothered by a single vampire. He remembered with harsh graininess those nights of torment five years ago just before Alec’s death, and new rage filled him. When KerriAnne showed up, he’d stab her in the heart as payback – but then there’d be no chance that she could help him find that bastard, that bastard vampire who had first whispered, “Push him out to us and we will let you live.”

He remembered the moment, the exact look of that older vampire with his crafty, slightly fat face with its soft white moustache, the velvet tone of his voice, the full, hungry lips.

His cheap digital watch said 11:56. Never did four minutes crawl by as slowly as these did. The black numbers read 11:59 forever. But at last they flickered to 12:00.

There was no knock. Trembling, he peered out one of the three squares of glass set into the solid red front door. He saw only the Spanish-style houses across the street, wavering in the uneven glass. He went to the bay windows in the living room, looked up and down the dead, empty street.

He’d known even as he made her promise to come to him that she wouldn’t. What had made him think a girl would keep a date with him?

Shocked, he raged, This is not a date! She’s not a girl. (He remembered cute, blond Cherise at summer camp: his fumbling, trembling hands had pressed his handwritten email address into her palm and she’d said she would write him but she never did.)

For another half hour he kept watch. Then he crept into his bedroom, heart full of hate. His parents had bought him a double bed when he’d changed bedrooms, and they slept upstairs, as if they couldn’t bring themselves to care what he did. As he lay alone, staring at the darkened ceiling, his hands curled into hollow fists.

♦

That had all been weeks ago. Now he put down his smart phone: nobody was listening to his vodcast, anyway. It was the night after Lavinia put on her flying show and the world was on its way to loving vampires.

It was two in the morning; his brain was white with exhaustion. Nobody would be up for online chat. Raymond and Cindy, the founders of Earth is a Home back in upstate New York, would be awake in a few hours, but that wasn’t now.

He heard a small click from the street outside.

His heart beat faster. It’s her, she couldn’t find the house, she’s been looking for it for weeks and she finally found it. Even knowing it wasn’t so, he couldn’t help peering eagerly up and down the street.

A flicker of movement, just a retinal image, came from the pepper tree in front of the house. He peered, heart hammering with excitement and dread. He was sure someone was standing behind the tree.

For long moments nothing stirred. Then a white face peeped from behind the twisted trunk. It instantly flicked out of sight again.

Jeremy felt his legs go weak. She was there, she was outside his house. What was he going to do?

Her face appeared again. When she saw him watching, she stepped out from behind the tree with what seemed like – shyness? He realized that she was trembling as she stood with her hands at her sides.

In a daze, he saw his own hand lift and motion toward the door.

At the sight of KerriAnne’s supernatural glide up the front stairs, Jeremy came to his senses, ran to the door and made sure the bolt was thrown.

The doorknob rattled.

I told her I’d let her in, he remembered. She has her invitation. She’s trying to come in.

If he unlocked the door, a vampire would walk into his house.

For a moment he thought, it’s my parents’ house; my invitation wouldn’t even count. But there were countless stories that proved otherwise. Just three weeks ago (he wondered now if it had been triggered by that nightmare rally) a boy had Jeremy’s own age had live streamed the moment he invited the vampires into the house where his family was eating dinner. Jeremy had seen it just before it was removed. The table had had a slick black and white vinyl checkered cloth, he remembered, and a single piece of Kraft macaroni had flown through the air during the massacre.

His invitation would count. If he unlocked the door. He touched the wooden stake which he always wore on his belt.

The chunk which the deadbolt made as he unlocked it seemed enormous.

The knob turned of its own accord and the door swung open.

KerriAnne was the most beautiful woman Jeremy had ever seen, with her soft Asian eyes and dainty upturned pixie nose like an anime character. Her silk blouse, still torn over the heart, was perfectly preserved by the vampire magic (whatever that actually was).

She kept her hands at her sides, looking at him as though he were the object of her heart’s desire, waiting for him to tell her what to do.

Heart pounding with excitement, mouth dry, he reminded himself harshly that he was using her to help find that other vampire, that she was a monster.

“Follow me,” he said, keeping his voice cold. He turned, took a few confident steps.

His heart froze at the rush of sound behind him. Full of dread, he whirled around.

She struggled at the threshold as if she were caught in a fog of spider webs. Her baby eyes filled with tears.

I’m being given one more chance to turn back, he realized.

Her face held what seemed to be genuine distress and longing. All he had to say was, “Welcome, come in.”

To a vampire. Here at the doorway where four years ago the vampires had destroyed his kid brother.

With shock, he realized he couldn’t remember exactly what Alec had looked like. His face usually had a sneer. But in that last instant, it just held wordless pleading.

She was talking nervously in a little girl voice, telling him exactly what he had hoped was true. “I’m so sorry, I failed, I did bad, I couldn’t find the house and then I found it but, but, I was afraid….”

Her voice trailed off. She spoke with fright and some other energy that he didn’t understand but which excited him. “But I’m here now. Please? Please let me come in and make you happy. Please … let your humble servant please you how … however you want.” Her words came in a breathless gasp.

Jeremy was thrilled to his core. And did she – did she mean her offer the way it sounded? He didn’t want to assume...

With delighted shock he realized that he didn’t have to worry about what she was thinking. The ordinary rules didn’t apply. He could dictate what would happen. He didn’t have to worry about disrespecting her as a person!

Flushed with the unexpected power, he said, “Come in, come in now.”

With a charming gasp of excitement and a dazzling smile, she leaped across the threshold and flitted toward him like a moaning wind.

As her cold arms snaked swiftly around him, pinning his hands to his side, Jeremy remembered too late the wooden stake still holstered on his belt.

He’d let himself think he wouldn’t need it.