Beth
What is up with those two? Something's going on, that much I'm sure of. Mick just keeps saying it's 'vampire stuff', and that I don't need to worry about it. I may not work as a reporter anymore, but I'll alway be one at heart. And nothing gets a reporter's curiosity up more than being told that something's not her business. 'Her' being me. Mick knows me well enough that he should know better. I mean...really.
At first I thought maybe I was imagining it. I mean, it's not like there was anything glaringly obvious. It was mostly just little things, small differences that I started noticing. Taken all together, though, these small nothings became....something. And I simply have to know what it is. Not just for me, of course. For Mick, too. Of course.
It has him all wound up. Mood swings worse than any woman during her 'special' time. No joke. One minute, he's agitated and nervous, then when I see him again later or the next day, he's just fine. Calm, relaxed. And bouts of depression off and on. And besides his sudden moodiness, there's something else. He seems to be having periods of sleeplessness and he's hinted at an occassional lapse of appetite. A bi-polar vampire? I think not. If he were human, that stuff wouldn't be a big deal, but I've learned a few things about vampires by now. And a vampire that has no appetite for blood is definately not normal. So I feel that as his friend and his possible 'something more', it's my duty to do what I can to help him. Right? And if I happen to satisfy my own curiosity at the same time, then so much the better. Right?
At one point, when he became worse than ever, when it lasted five or six days, I really started to worry. He wasn't sleeping or feeding, as far as I could gather, and he actually started to look kind of bad. And that moodiness? Wow. Off the charts. I know vampires suppossedly aren't susceptible to illnesses, but I was starting to wonder. I tried asking him, but he about took my head off. He apologized later, but it was still totally unlike him. And during the bad time, he seemed to be trying to avoid me. Wouldn't take calls or answer the door. And he didn't come to see me, either. I just 'happened' to be hanging around his apartment at one point when he left and then returned, and that's when I saw how bad he suddenly looked. And I was not staking out his place as he is convinced I was. Just hanging out. Near his building. And of course once I followed him up to his place after revealing myself- uh, I mean running into him- he did the gentlemanly thing and let me inside. I can be quite persistant. Unfortunately, he's just as stubborn, and he revealed nothing.
I finally broke down and went to see Josef. I wanted to know what he knew. And if he didn't know anything about it, I figured he should. I thought that at the very least he could help Mick where I couldn't. They have a lot of history.
Of course, he denied knowing that anything was going on with Mick and promised to look into it. I wasn't sure whether to believe him or not, you never know with Josef. That man is cool as ice. But as I said, I'm persistant. I never got him to admit to anything, but after enough pestering he assurred me that he knew Mick was fine, or would be soon. And I'll be damned, but the next day Mick was back to normal. So yeah, he knows something. Then he told me to leave him alone and mind my own business. Since my common sense can occassionally override my tenacity, I left. I have no delusions about my importance to Josef. I know he only tolerates me because he cares about Mick.
Then I sat down with my thoughts. I tried to recollect everything I'd seen or noticed in the past couple weeks. At first, I came to the tentative conclusion that maybe there were problems between Mick and Josef. That would definately affect Mick, close as they are. I did make a connection between Mick's mood swings and his visits to Josef. I'd noticed that he'd been seeing Josef alot more often than he usually made a habit of. Maybe he was busy trying to work things out.
But after thinking about it a little harder, I realized I had the timeline backwards. Mick's moodiness always happenned before his visits to Josef. It was after the visits that Mick seemed to feel better for two or three days. And there was something different, just a little, about the way they interacted with each other now. It was something I'd noticed the few times I'd been with Mick and Josef had appeared or the couple times I'd accompanied Mick to Josef's home or office. But now that I'm consciously thinking about it, I just can't quite put my finger on what it was exactly that I'd seen that was different. What I needed was a chance to observe them together again. That was going to be difficult, though, because after that last bad period Mick had, he'd suddenly become reluctant to let me come with him when he visits Josef. Maybe Josef said something to Mick about my little visit, but if so, Mick hadn't mentioned it. It's like he's trying to keep those two parts of his life separate. The vampire part and then the part that includes me. Like he doesn't want the two halves to collide.
So I really only have one option, right? Ambush Mick and force it out of him.
TBC
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