I was doing a good job of hiding how scared I was until that moment, but I lost that shield as I slid out of my hoodie. Screw it. They could keep it. I shook them loose and ran for Nana’s front door, all sense of acting brave out the window. I just wanted my nan. I heard them mock me as I ran off, but I didn’t care. Let them call me a fairy.

As soon as I was through the front door, I sighed. The door closed, bolted shut, I leant against it and took a deep breath, taking in Nana’s hallway with her potted ferns and her dreamcatchers. the windchimes tinkling in the breeze. Then I heard her voice, shook the tears from my throat, wiped my eyes, but it wasn’t enough. She saw right through me as usual and Nana Sky pulled me into her arms and squeezed. I stayed there for a long time. When you find the family you’re supposed to have, you know because they know not to say something.

He came toward me, skin an awful shade of almost-wet gray. He didn’t speak. He snarled. I said goodbye aloud to Nana Sky and froze as Post charged towards me.

Suddenly, someone grabbed me from above, pulling me up to safety, giving me time to quickly kick my boot straight into Post’s face. As the arms pulled me onto the slate roof, relieved and giddy with surprise, I noticed I was looking over at Cute Devon, big cheesy grins on both our faces. He looked down at me. “Cute Devon,” I said, too late to change it. “Hi,” he said back, that dreamy hair, the blue, blue eyes, like an elf in one of those movies.

“Did you see that?” I asked him, excitedly.

“I was actually right here, yes. I don’t think he’s getting up anytime soon.”

“Right. Thank you. That was amazing!” I looked down at the roof, could feel my skin blushing, getting warmer in my cheeks, “That’s my room,” I told him, pointing down at the skylight by his feet. My teeth were biting my bottom lip to stop it from quivering. “Do you want to come in?”

I slid my way through the skylight, lowered myself down onto the carpet, careful enough not to wake Nana. “What the Hell was that thing?” I asked.

“Zompire. Haven’t you heard of them?”

“No, but the name is genius.”

I reached out my hand to pull him through the window. I swear I felt a literal spark as we touched. “Buffy’s people in San Fran have been tweeting about them. This is how vampires are now. It’s like they lost their Bluetooth link, or something,” he told me.

The first time I heard her name.

I thanked him for his help, took my scarf off – not suggestively – and explained who Garron and Post were. Cute Devon told me that the old rules didn’t seem to apply anymore. And then he complimented me on my room.

Not that it was much. Battered Queen poster on the wall, old lava lamp in the corner, broken. Nothing special. But as I sat on the bed, he moved to look about. It was at that point I asked him who Buffy was. Who in San Francisco? He was surprised when I didn’t have a clue in the slightest. So I asked him what her deal was.

He said she worked in a coffee shop, but his sister had met her. She used to be THE Vampire Slayer. The definitive article. As in there was only one, I think, which seems like a really silly way to win a war, but whatever. Cute Devon explained that she was doing smaller stuff now, but she still helped people in SF. I wondered how he knew all this, but he told me that he studied all of it: the demons, the vampires and the forces of darkness. And more than that, he had been looking for Slayers. I assumed he was talking about Katie, if I’m honest, but his handsome face convinced me otherwise.

STOP!

I know what you’re thinking! Only women can be called to be Slayers! It’s always the pretty ones! Is he your Angel or your Spike? How could you know a single thing this Devon guy told you is even true? Why believe him? Because he was hot? Well, yes, but that’s not the only reason. I told him point blank that Slayers are called and have special powers, but he explained again how the rules might have changed.

Before we could talk more, my skylight shattered! Post! How he got in I don’t know! Thought they had to be invited, but shows how much I knew back then. He pinned Devon to the ground, overpowering him. I raced for my underwear drawer (no jokes please) and threw it at Post, but it shattered completely against his head. Thinking was never his thing, but it was mine and I picked up the shattered side of the drawer, the piece that seemed the sharpest and easiest to use and took position.

I think I counted to three, but honestly, I don’t remember. I remember swinging my arm down. I don’t remember the specifics, like how hard I had to push through the letterman jacket or his shirt, let alone skin and cartilage. I don’t remember the moment he dusted and disappeared.

I do remember the smell though. That smoky, musty stink, as if someone had just put a bonfire out in my mouth. I landed straight on top of Cute Devon, our faces almost touching, our lips so close.

I could feel him underneath me.

And right at that moment, in answer to all my questions about embarrassment, and things going solid and it getting worse and should I ask him to move, all went down like a lead balloon, as Nana Sky stuck her head through the loft conversion hatch and asked if she was interrupting us!

I was horrified. He laughed it off.

The next day, I took him out for a ride, to the field, overcast by the planes going over. My quiet spot where I could imagine escaping California for something better, something worth more. We lay on the bonnet of the car, just like me and Katie always did, just talking. We’d been doing the math. There could be hundreds or thousands of zompires in our local vicinity alone, I told him. Devon had suggested fighting back somehow, but he thought, quite rightly at the time, that there were too many.

God, I wish I’d listened to Cute Devon just then, REALLY listened.

He told me that the zompires were not my responsibility, but I shot straight back at him, no hesitation. My family lived in Santa Rosita. His sisters too. Could we really just leave our friends and families to a horde of bloodthirsty monsters? By next weekend alone, it could be tens of thousands, I told him. “By the time we get to Buffy, it could be unstoppable.”

That and there was one flaw: I was not an actual vampire Slayer. When I told him that, he changed his tone. “What makes a ‘real’ Slayer?” he asked. I explained the best I knew from what I read in magazines and stuff: that they’re called, and strong and have speed and strength and all that bloody jazz. And they’re always exclusively female. He looked at me laughing, told me I punched and ran like a girl, so that was already there! Smarmy idiot. Smarmy, smart, gorgeous and chiselled. But an idiot. I took it as a compliment. He must have seen the look on my face, because he made sure that I knew he was flirting.

“So you’re willing to try?” he asked, extending his hand. “I’ll be the Watcher and you’ll be the Slayer and we’ll be magnificent together?” Instead of shaking my hand, he linked his fingers with mine, that electric spark going straight to my head, making me dizzy. I smiled at him and told him okay.

And that’s the first part of how it started folks. Me and Cute Devon. A boy. Another Boy. Summer Night. Summer Day.

Something new begins…

I’d so watch that movie.

Catch ya, next time!