Page 9 of My Vampire Plus-One

“We got our invitation yesterday,” Jess said. “The girls are looking forward to seeing their cousins again.” If that was actually true, Ashley and Hannah showed no sign of it. They seemedcompletely oblivious to this entire conversation, having moved on from Adam’s cell phone to a copy ofAmerican Girlmagazine that sat spread out on the table before them.

The waiter blessedly chose that moment to appear at the table with the bottle of Chardonnay. I made eye contact with him and motioned for him to place it directly in front of me. He gave me what I thought was a nod of understanding before putting the wine right by my plate. Though that might have just been my imagination.

“Wine, anyone?” I chirped. But nobody was listening to me.

“I’m so happy for Gretchen,” Mom sighed. And then she leaned over to me and added, in a sympathetic half whisper, “You know how bad Gretchen’s last breakup was.”

I didn’t know how bad Gretchen’s last breakup was. Other than the fact that back when she was a junior in high school, Gretchen used to sneak out at night to see the nineteen-year-old boyfriend her parents didn’t know about, I knew nothing about her dating history at all. Mom had three siblings; Dad had four. Several of my aunts and uncles had been married multiple times. Our extended family was far too large to keep close track of everyone’s lives.

Gretchen had always seemed nice enough, but I hardly knew her. In fact, the only times I’d seen her since our grandmother’s funeral five years ago had been at other cousins’ weddings.

Of which, in the past five years, there had been more than I could count on two hands.

“Oh, yes,” I said, in a voice I hoped sounded at least passably sympathetic. “That breakup. Terrible.”

“She’d been single for nearly two years before she met Josh.” Mom shook her head,tskingunder her breath. “And you know that Gretchen is almost thirty-five. Aunt Sue had begun tosuspect Gretchen had given up. It’s so good to see someone who’d given up on romance find love, don’t you think?”

She gave me a knowing look that was all too familiar.

My stomach lurched.

So I guess weweredoing this, then.

It wasn’t that I had anything against dating, or the institution of marriage. Or even weddings. Four months ago, I’d attended a bachelorette party in Nashville for one of my old grad school classmates that had featured an endless stream of bars and a drag show at the Ryman that had by itself been worth the cost of the plane fare.

Weddings celebrations could be fun. Love was worth celebrating.

But that wedding trip to Nashville was so much different than this upcoming wedding would be. No one had implied there was something wrong with me for being single, or suggested I needed to do anything to change that. Half of the girls on that trip had been single, too. Or at least, I think they’d been single. In either case, I certainly hadn’t been the only one tucking dollar bills into those male strippers’ G-strings.

I wasn’t close enough to Gretchen to be included in any raucous parties she might be planning as part of the lead-up to her wedding. All I had to look forward to were little needling comments from Mom and her sisters about how I worked too hard and should date more, and a general feeling of being under a spotlight of loneliness.

I liked my life. I loved my career, my cat, my apartment. I loved my friends. And most of the time, I was completely fine with being single, since the last relationship I’d been in ended with more tears than I ever wanted to cry in a one-week span ever again.

Matt had been a CPA, like me. He had thick dark hair, wore these ridiculous librarian glasses thatworkedfor him, and made love the same way he did everything: thoroughly, and with frequent references to the Internal Revenue Code. He was almost unconscionably hot—which was part of why I’d started dating him in the first place—but our relationship left a lot to be desired. So did Matt, I came to find out, both as a person and as a boyfriend. I was devastated when I found out he’d been cheating on me with another woman, who worked at his accounting firm—even if I knew I never wanted to listen to someone talk about step-up basis while I was on the cusp of orgasm ever again.

Regardless, ever since Matt, I’d found all the satisfaction I needed out of life between my career, my friends, and my trusty vibrator.

I couldn’t tell Mom that last part, of course. I just wished she, and the rest of my family, would accept that I didn’t need to be in a romantic relationship to feel complete. My own personal history suggested I was better off on my own.

I didn’t say any of this to Mom, who was still pretending she was only talking about Gretchen’s sad dating history and looking at me expectantly for a reaction.

I went along with it, and pretended not to realize where we were heading. What was the point? I’d been putting up with this in the lead-up to every cousin’s wedding for years. Ever since things with Matt went to shit.

“Single for nearly two years,” I parroted. “Poor Gretchen. Absolutely awful.” I’d been functionally single for at least twice that long, but who was counting.

“Awful!” Aiden cried. He’d apparently lost interest in Adam’s cell phone and was now trying hard to engage with the adults in conversation.

Mom ignored him. “Your invitation should be for you and a plus one, dear,” she continued, oblivious to my mounting irritation, her voice still just above a whisper in my ear. “I double-checked with Aunt Sue. So you can definitely bring along a date. I think that would be very nice.”

Mom knew full well I wasn’t seeing anyone. She also knew I’d never been one for casual dating. Aunt Sue may have said I could bring a plus-one, but everyone in this family knew I’d be showing up alone.

The same way I showed up for almost every family event alone.

“That’s great,” I said sarcastically, and probably a bit too loudly. I grabbed for the bottle of wine again. “If I can bring a plus-one, that means I’ll be able to bring my boyfriend.”

I’d never really experienced a record scratch moment before, where conversations and ambient noise and even time itself seems to grind to a screeching halt. I was experiencing it now, though. No sooner were the words out of my mouth than Adam and Jess abruptly stopped talking. Sam was staring at me, his eyes wide as saucers. Even Aiden wasn’t looking at his dad’s phone anymore. Following the adults’ leads, he’d turned his guileless blue gaze on me.

And Mom…