"Are you going to feed without him?" Evra asked.

"Probably. I'll slip into one of the rooms late tonight and take some blood from a sleeping guest. I'll use a syringe." I wasn't able to close cuts with spit like full vampires could.

I'd come a long way in a year. Not so long ago, I would have jumped at the chance to skip a feed; now I was feeding because I wanted to, not because I'd been told.

"You'd better be careful," Evra warned me. "If you get caught, Mr. Crepsley will have a fit."

"Caught? Me? Impossible! I'll breeze in and out like a ghost."

I did, too, at about two in the morning. It was easy for someone with my talents: by sticking an ear to a door and listening for sounds inside, I could tell how many people were in a room and whether they were light sleepers or deep sleepers. When I found an unlocked room with a single man snoring like a bear, I let myself in and took the required amount of blood. Back in my own room, I squeezed the blood into a glass and drank.

"That'll keep me going," I said as I finished. "It'll get me through tomorrow anyway, and that's the important thing."

"What's so special about tomorrow?" Evra asked.

I told him about meeting Debbie and arranging to go to the movies.

"You've got a date!" Evra laughed with delight.

"It's not a date!" I snorted. "We're just going to the movies."

" Just?" Evra grinned. "There's no such thing as just with girls. It's a date."

"Okay," I said, "it's kind of a date. I'm not stupid. I know I can't get involved."

"Why not?" Evra asked.

"Because she's a normal girl and I'm only half human," I said.

"That shouldn't stop you from going out together. She won't be able to tell you're a vampire, not unless you start biting her neck."