Suck It Up and Die (7 page)

“Don’t worry,” Morning said. “I know a shortcut.”

Morning led Portia, Sister Flora, and Cody up a side street toward First Avenue, where they could meet the parade. The sound of a roaring lion leaped out of Portia’s thigh pocket.

As she dug out her cell, Morning gave her a curious look. “That’s a new ringtone.”

“Cody found it for me,” she explained. “It’s the roaring lion that begins every MGM movie.”

That was another thing that hit Morning’s jealousy button. Cody knew tons about Portia’s great love: movies. And when it came to electronics and making stuff, he was as tech-heady as
Iron Man
’s Tony Stark. Morning just hoped Cody didn’t know how to write code in Portia’s heart.

Portia answered her phone. It was her mother, Penny, reporting that something had come up at work and she would be joining the parade when it passed by her office on First Avenue.

As Portia hung up, the group beat the parade to where Allen Street became First Avenue. Because they were still downtown and it was a weekday, there were no parade watchers yet. Morning looked down the street and watched the phalanx of paraders moving toward them. A crimson banner stretched over their heads, proclaiming
VAMPIRE PRIDE PARADE
.

As the parade came closer, Morning saw that the letters on the banner were formed with real olive branches, sprayed white. It was a touch Rachel had suggested to counteract the boldness of the banner’s lurid red.

Rachel was front and center in her flowing dress. The front row was mostly Leaguers. The signs they carried ranged from prideful statements—
BORN & MADE IN THE USA
—to political messages:
VOTE VRA
and
NO BITES = RIGHTS!

But Morning was surprised by how many vampire wannabes and wanna-bleeds were also in the front. Their sweatshirts, T-shirts, and costumes announced a different message:
THE BITE STUFF, BLOOD DONATION CENTER
, and
HOW ’BOUT A PIECE OF NECK PIE?
A guy in full cowboy regalia had a sign on his ten-gallon hat:
SAVE A COW, BITE A COWBOY
. Morning muttered under his breath, “Is this a pride parade or a pickup scene for the fanged and the fangless?”

Portia snagged his arm and pulled him into the street. “Don’t be a pooper. If the VRA’s gonna pass there’s gotta be more than just Leaguers under the big red tent. After all, Leaguers can’t vote anymore.”

Morning resisted the urge to remind her that, being stuck at sixteen, he would
never
be able to vote even if the VRA
did
pass.

The front row of paraders welcomed the foursome with a shout-out. They fell in next to Rachel as Sister Flora moved down the front row to join some friends.

“Thank Godness,” Rachel announced, beaming at Morning and Portia, “the first couple of Leaguer-Lifer love is here!” Flipping her long black hair, she shouted to the paraders behind her. “It wouldn’t be the first pride parade without the first outie!”

Even though Morning cringed every time he heard Rachel’s dorky nickname for him, he focused on a more important matter. “Yeah, but can it be the first parade without the first Leaguer, Mr. Birnam?”

Rachel shrugged. “Truth is, not surprised.”

Coming on top of her text-message syntax, her blithe dismissal of the father of Leaguer liberation was more than Morning could take. “You know, Rachel, you don’t have to do your goofy-doofy, I-couldn’t-grow-fangs-even-if-I-worked-in-a-slaughterhouse act with me. I knew you when you had real chi, not the kind you get from”—he jabbed a finger at the jewelry rack around her neck—“crystals on chains.”

Rachel arched a brow and slid a look to Portia. “Ouch, he bites.”

“Tell me about it,” Portia bounced back.

They shared a laugh, which only stoked Morning’s ire. Before he could spin a comeback, Rachel dropped her voice and confided in him.

“I’ll tell you why Mr. B’s making himself scarce. If you read his parade-day post, you might’ve noticed what he mostly talked about was the past. I think he knows he’s played his part, and he’s ready to pass the torch.”

“Ha!” Morning blurted. “To who?” He swept a hand, presenting Rachel. “Lady Vava?”

Portia gestured to Cody to get his camera on Rachel and Morning.

Without acknowledging his dig, Rachel gave Morning her positive-energy smile. “No way.
You’re
his fav.”

He scoffed. “Now I know whatever mind you once had has been sucked out by a brain vampire.”

“Too funny,” Rachel chirped, giving him a playful punch. Then she shouted down the line to Sister Flora. “Yo, Sister Sis. Morning
is
the chosen one, right?”

Flora pointed heavenward. “Besides
the
chosen one, yes, Morning’s
my
chosen one.”

“Mine too,” Portia piped up, taking Morning’s arm. “But my money’s on him retiring from the spotlight as soon as he becomes a firefighter.”

“Even better,” Morning added, “how ’bout I kill the spotlight after this parade?”

“Not gonna happen,” Rachel retorted. “When Portia made”—her hands stretched an imaginary marquee—“
Morning McCobb: The Jackie Robinson of the Vampire League
, fame put a lock on you tight as your lock on Portia.”

Rachel’s flattery cued a question Portia had been waiting to ask. “Rachel, Cody and I are making a new documentary on the Leaguer rights movement, and you’re pushing so many hot buttons on
The Shadow …
could we interview you sometime?”

“Don’t even ask,” Rachel answered with a hand flip. “I owe your mom so big-time.” She suddenly threw an arm around Morning. “She’s almost made me as famous as the superstar, the legend, outie numero uno!”

Morning shrank out of her grip. Rachel was too beautiful to have cooties, but she had something that might be just as contagious: personality shifting disorder.

Portia didn’t miss Morning’s creep-out as she tried to seal the deal with Rachel. “Cool. When’s good?”

“Whenev,” Rachel tossed off. “But right now is about gettin’ everyone juiced for the media at Fourteenth Street.” She raised a hand over her shoulder. “Bullhorn!” A Leaguer plopped a bullhorn into her hand. Rachel keyed it and burst into a rapping chant. “We walk in light, no longer bite, we’re in the fight for what is right!”

The paraders answered her call. “VRA! VRA! Pass it now is what we say!”

“Your blood we spurn, we don’t turn, we done our provin’, now
you
get movin’!”

“VRA! VRA! Pass it now is what we say!”

“Rights and freedom, we all need ’em, we want our sequel of bein’ equal!”

“VRA! VRA! Pass it now is what we say!”

At Fourteenth Street, Ally Alfamen sat in a viewing stand having her makeup touched up before beginning her live coverage of the parade. Ally had formerly been the perky host of
Wake Up America
and had become the network’s anchorwoman shortly after she covered Morning’s second CD. It was a CD seen by billions, and the one that had convinced the world Morning wasn’t some vampire poser; he was the real thing, and the real thing could CD into any living form: including an apple tree in full blossom.

Ally faced the camera. “Today, the Big Apple is a little redder. Why? We’re about to witness the first Vampire Pride Parade. In addition to being a celebration of our blood-drinking minority, it’s a parade reminding us that their integration into society will not be complete until Congress passes the Vampire Rights Act and restores equal rights to our Leaguer citizens.”

The big screen behind Ally filled with a shot of the
parade. “So far, the biggest surprise is who’s
not
leading the parade. There’s the usual ‘Leaguerati,’ as some call them, such as Morning McCobb and Rachel Capilarus, but the president of the IVL, Luther Birnam, is mysteriously absent. And where is the woman who’s the Lifer linchpin behind the Leaguer movement: Penny Dredful? This is her day as much as anyone’s.” Ally’s face warped into a disapproving frown. “It’s certainly more Penny’s day than some of the other Lifers in the parade.”

The screen cut to a group of goth wanna-bleeds at the front of the parade waving VRA signs. The shot panned across the messages on their T-shirts:
VAMPIRE RECHARGING STATION, PRICK ME! PRICK ME!, PREY FOR ME
, and
I WANNA THREESOME: MY NECK, YOUR FANGS
.

Down the line, Morning spotted the cameraman shooting the goths. Glancing at a street sign, he realized they were two blocks from the heavy media coverage at Fourteenth Street. “Don’t you think we should get the goths off the front line?” he said to Rachel. “I mean, ‘Prey for me’ isn’t exactly the message we wanna send.”

Portia directed Cody to get his camera back on Rachel and Morning as Rachel shook her head. “ ‘Pray for me’? I think it’s super we have vampires from all faiths.”

Seeing that many Americans might not catch the spelling trick, Morning moved on to a more glaring example. “What about ‘Prick me! Prick me!’? Is that—”

“If you ask me,” Rachel replied, “it’s the most beautiful message in America.”

He was momentarily stupefied. “What message is that?”

“The message of free expression, that
all
voices, mortal or immortal, have a right to be heard. And I don’t know
about you, Outie-One Kenobi,” she said, poking Morning in the chest, “but the last time I checked, we can’t step into a voting booth, onto a playing field, or even onto Main Street to open a lemonade stand.”

Drake and his cameraman emerged from behind them, where they had been getting shots. “Hey, Rachel,” he interjected, “if the VRA passes and you
can
open a business, will it be a rent-a-vampire thing? You know, someone has a special problem, so they hire one of your vampires to CD into something that delivers the solution?”

“
The Shadow
already loans CDing vamps to companies for free,” she explained. “It’s a game show. The companies make the big bucks, not Penny, or me, or anyone else.”

“Exactly,” Drake said, following up. “But if you
could
turn CDing vamps into a business, you could make millions, right?”

“I don’t think God made me a vampire to make millions. He made me a vampire to become an Earth Angel.”

“An earth angel? What’s that?”

Rachel shot him a wink. “Saving it for a bigger media play, Drako. But for now, I’ll land in the money tree of capitalism and sing it to you in ka-ching. Leaguer vampires are like an untapped source of energy. So, if you discovered a giant oil field under your backyard, would you just leave it there?”

Morning answered. “If tapping into it ruined everyone else’s backyard, I’d leave it there.”

Portia jumped in. “C’mon, Morn, don’t be naïve. Someone would drill in sideways and take the oil anyway.”

The double shot of her patronizing tone and her taking sides with Rachel made him snap, “Like who, your mom?”

Portia jerked back, stunned.

He desperately wanted to suck the words back.

“Whoa,” Rachel said. “Below the belt-us.”

“I—I didn’t mean it like that,” Morning stammered.

Portia glared at him. “I know
exactly
what you mean. You’re saying my mom’s making tons of money off Leaguers ’cause she’s the only one who can own the business. You’re saying she’s gouging vampires.”

Cody lowered his camcorder. “Porsche, maybe I should stop shooting.” He gave a head toss toward Drake and his cameraman. “And maybe you should—”

“No, camera up,” she ordered. “If our doc ends up being nothing but the story of a couple of chronology-crossed lovers, you might as well get the second the clocks went out of sync.” She whipped back to Morning. “Yeah, my mom’s made gobs of money repping Leaguers and creating
The Shadow
.” She threw a hand at a glistening office building up ahead. “She bought her building with it and the whole place is filled with well-paid Leaguers. She’s the biggest donor to vampire causes in the city, and she’s gone to Washington countless times to lobby for the VRA. She’s totally on your side. She’s fighting for Leaguers like Rachel to go into business on their own, and for Leaguers like you to marry who they want!”