Misty Rose: Nature
Chapter 31
Despite feeling like shit during the day, I woke up just fine at sunset. Guess that’s another way humans and vampires are different, and maybe not a bad way for once. But it was probably for the best because I got maybe thirty seconds to wake up before the entire night became about the party and Kaitlyn’s plans. I took a look at what she’d laid out and groaned.
“Oh, god,” I said. “You’re doin’ the bubblegum princess again.”
“Yep,” Kaitlyn grinned at me.
“Do you hafta do that one?”
“Yep.”
I groaned again. Bubblegum princess was what I called a costume Kaitlyn put together the first year we were roommates. It was… mostly some of her more frilly party clothes. This bodice thing with a lot of frills and cleavage, skirt with way too many ruffles on it, total candy raver gear and accessories and boots, and it was all… bright and pastel. Matching makeup and spray hair color, of course. And the whole fucking thing was coated in spray glitter that would come off and get literally everywhere for weeks. I’d find glitter in my food. And other places. It was like sand.
I took a look in a shopping bag sitting on the bed, and yep, it was full of spray glitter. Including a couple of cans of the stuff you use in arts and crafts projects. “At least take it outside before you spray it up this time,” I said. “That stuff sticks to everythin’ like glue.”
“It is glue,” Kaitlyn said, messing with some of her costume pieces.
I sighed at her. I’d told her last time that the costume looked like a fairy princess that had been attacked by bubblegum ice cream, but that only encouraged her. I also thought it made her look underage, but I wasn’t going to say it, especially after Violet. And Kaitlyn had wound up eating way too much sugar and taking an upper and being pretty much impossible to deal with until she’d finally crashed like a day later. Then she was still impossible, because she was actually worse with hangovers and shit than I was. “No uppers this year, please,” I said. The rest I could deal with, but that… no.
“No uppers,” Kaitlyn said. “I promise.”
“Thanks. I’m gonna go get cleaned up.”
It wasn’t like vampires get sweaty or anything but… I still liked to be clean, and preferred to shower every night if I could. Vampires can still get dirty, of course, and dusty. Some stuff sticks to dead vampire skin worse than to humans, maybe because human skin makes all those oils and stuff. Vampire skin doesn’t. So a shower was also a chance to check if anything weird was on me and get rid of it. Like, say, half dried blood because I was a messy eater still. Half dried blood is gross.
When I was done getting clean, I came back out. Kaitlyn was still messing with her costume, so I went over to my closet and started looking through my clothes. Got to be honest, I wasn’t really feeling like doing a costume. I mean, I was already going to be pretending to be a human, you know? And going as a vampire just seemed like a really stupid idea. Maybe I could get away with one of the vampires from that stupid movie Kaitlyn made me watch, but I didn’t really feel like humping any bedposts, and the movie had been made before we were born so I didn’t think anyone would get it and really, really didn’t want to have to explain it to anyone. So I was looking to see if I had anything that would at least be kind of a costume so I wouldn’t have to do anything harder to deal with.
Unfortunately, that meant I was basically standing around in just my underwear, which was apparently too tempting of a target because Kaitlyn sprayed me right in the small of my back with some of her glitter spray. That shit’s cold. Think I must have jumped high enough to almost hit my head on the ceiling because Kaitlyn started giggling and sprayed me again.
“Jesus, Kaitlyn!” I said, turning around to glare at her.
Kaitlyn just grinned at me and gave me another blast, right in the chest. I jumped back, but she followed me, still spraying me in bare places with that damn glitter spray. I kept trying to get away, which ended up putting me right next to the bed and the shopping bag. That was when I made a mistake I would regret for the next few days. I grabbed another can of glitter spray and started spraying her back. Yelling “Glitter fight!” probably didn’t help either.
“Bring it!” Kaitlyn said, firing back with her own can.
I sprayed her on the stomach and she shrieked like a little girl. “Hah! Suck it up, princess,” I said, grinning. Then she made me jump by spraying me on the chest again. Like I said, that stuff was cold when you sprayed it. We went back and forth like that for probably fifteen or twenty minutes, chasing each other around the apartment and spraying each other as much as possible. I was already wearing a whole can, and Kaitlyn used up another can on me, and I got her with a whole can as well. But it was when Kaitlyn’s third can went dry that she finally looked at it and stopped.
“Oh, shit,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
I didn’t get it right away, so she held up the can. Thing is, there’s a difference between craft glitter, like you use on clothes and stuff, and cosmetic glitter, which is what you put on your skin and hair. When you’re talking about craft spray glitter and cosmetic spray glitter, craft spray glitter is thicker and comes in stuff that’s more like glue than the body spray kind. And Kaitlyn had accidentally grabbed a can of the craft glitter spray and used up the whole thing on me. On top of two cans of cosmetic glitter body spray. So a lot of my bare skin looked like something you’d see in arts and crafts made by little kids, especially little girls too young to know when something was tacky.
“Jesus Christ,” I said, dropping my can of the body spray stuff and holding my arms out to the sides so they wouldn’t stick to my body or something. If I was still human, it’d probably hurt like fucking hell, but as a vampire, it was just a kind of annoying itch. “I look like a fuckin’ Christmas ornament.”
“I’m really sorry,” Kaitlyn said.
I sighed. “What’s it say to do if you get the stuff on your skin?”
Kaitlyn turned the can over, lookin’. “Um… it doesn’t say.”
“Great,” I said. I looked down at myself. Well, at least it seemed to be drying pretty fast, so maybe I wouldn’t have to worry about being sticky until I got the shit off me. Kaitlyn put down the empty can and got up her phone. Looking up what to do online.
“Okay…” Kaitlyn said. “Um… mineral oil, vegetable oil, some kinda industrial adhesive remover… lots of nail polish remover…”
“None of which we have,” I said. “Least not enough for this.”
“True…” Kaitlyn said, looking at me now with the sort of thoughtful face that always seemed to show up before she suggested something kind of crazy. And that’s pretty much what happened. “Or… we could even it out and make that your costume.”
“What?” I said. “Glitter? That’s my costume? No!”
“No, dumbass,” Kaitlyn said. “You’d be wearing clothes.” Then she grinned at me. “But just using glitter like body paint to cover your naughty parts would be interesting too.”
I shut down that idea hard. No way was I going to a party dressed in nothing but glitter, and there was no way Kaitlyn was going to make me do it. But when we started going through possible outfits, we ran into another snag. Anything much more covering than my underwear got really badly itchy really quick because it sat on top of the glued on glitter. Oh, and the underwear I was wearing was pretty much ruined too, and I’d have to get it off before it stuck completely.
“God damn it,” I said. “Even my sack dress is too itchy.” I’d been through most of the clothes I owned by then, and a lot of them I didn’t even need to try to know they wouldn’t work.
“I’m really sorry,” Kaitlyn said. Looked like she meant it, too.
“Yeah, well… I can’t go in just my underwear.”
“I know. Or you could…” Kaitlyn gestured at my dresser.
“What?” I said. Then I got it. “No. Not the stripper outfit.”
“Why not?” Kaitlyn asked.
“It’s… it covers less than my underwear,” I said. “I’d get cold.”
“You’re a vampire.”
“I’d still be cold.”
“Well, you need to wear something. Or just stay home.”
She had a point, but I didn’t like it. The halter top and booty shorts would at least cover enough to have me not be naked, but that was just about it. They wouldn’t be itchy either, least not like anything else we’d tried. But even for Halloween, going out wearing that little would be seriously embarassing. I’d feel like a stripper, or like a backup dancer for a rapper. Neither of which would get me the kind of attention I wanted to deal with. But… thinking about it also made me realize something else. The reason I was freaking out wasn’t just not being comfortable wearing that kind of thing. It was also because… in the back of my head, my Savage part was talking to me. Well, not like actual words, more like this… faint feeling that the outfit wasn’t a bad thing. Like… that it’d make it easier to lure in guys, get them off guard. Then I could bite them. Which was… well, more attractive as an idea than I was entirely comfortable with, you know? I usually tried to ignore that part of me, and mostly it just slept. But now it was awake. Enough to like the idea of the outfit, anyway.
I realized I’d been thinking about this for a little too long when Kaitlyn gave me a weird look. Like she… I don’t know, somehow knew I was dealing with vampire thoughts, and was actually a little… excited by it. So I guess the last time we talked about it didn’t really change much. But I could tell she wasn’t going to let this go unless I was… more of a bitch than I wanted to be because it’d ruin the night for her. So, yeah, I more or less rolled over. But I wasn’t going to just be a total doormat.
“Okay, fine,” I said, sighing. “But you gotta promise me somethin’.”
“Sure,” Kaitlyn said.
“If I wind up… takin’ a huge hit of V again, you gotta stop me.”
Kaitlyn looked at me for a bit, then nodded. “If I can. Or I’ll get Ferret to do it.”
“That works too.”
“I promise.”
Well, at least that took care of if I went all vampire at the party. Now I just had to deal with being coated in industrial glue and glitter and going out wearing a stripper outfit. The glue was mostly dry now, which wasn’t exactly comfortable, but wasn’t horrible, which is probably why the next thing Kaitlyn did was pick up the second craft spray can again.
“What’s that for?” I said, lookin’ at the can.
“Your glitter is uneven,” Kaitlyn said. “I’m gonna fix it so it looks more like a costume.”
“Ugh,” I said. “Fine. But not the face.”
“Nope. Gonna use the regular stuff on your face and hair.”
At that point, I just gave up. This was happening and I didn’t really seem to be able to fight it. So I just stood there for a few minutes while Kaitlyn put more of the horrible craft glue spray on me. But I have to admit, she did make it look better. Like something you’d see done professionally and not just by two girls having a glitter fight. Of course, it did mean I was standing in the middle of our apartment in my underwear with my arms out. And of course, that was right when Ferret let himself in.
When I saw him, I screamed. Then I screamed again because what came through the door looked half wolf rather than half rodent. But the voice that came out of it was Ferret’s.
“Oops! Sorry,” he said, then turned around quickly.
“Shut the fuckin’ door!” I said. Wasn’t like anyone was there, but I did have neighbors that might be out there, and it was hard enough to seem normal without them seeing me half naked.
“Oh, right, sorry,” Ferret said, closing the door finally.
“Jesus, Ferret, this is why you knock,” I said. “So I can put somethin’ on!”
“You’re covered in glue,” Kaitlyn said. “It’s still sticky.”
“Or… go in the bathroom. Or whatever,” I said, rolling my eyes.
“You’re not naked, y’know,” Kaitlyn said.
“No, but… ugh,” I said. “He should still knock.”
“Sorry,” Ferret said again, still facing away.
I sighed. It’d be like fifteen minutes until the glue was dry enough to put something over, which would probably itch like hell anyway. “You may as well turn around, Ferret,” I said. “You aren’t gonna see anythin’ more than you already have, and I’m gonna hafta get used to this anyway.”
Ferret just nodded and turned around… then walked past me and Kaitlyn and sat down on one of our stools. And still didn’t really look at me. I could have hugged him for that. Except for the glue. Meant he could tell I wasn’t comfortable and didn’t want to make it worse. Then Kaitlyn impressed me, too.
“I accidentally used the wrong kinda glitter spray on Misty,” Kaitlyn said quietly. “Wearing real clothes is really uncomfortable for her right now, and she doesn’t like going out half naked. But she doesn’t want to stay home and ruin our evening. So she’s going to wear what she can, but she’s going to be uncomfortable, and she wants us to keep an eye on her. In case of problems.”
“Not a problem,” Ferret said. No one said anything for a bit, then Ferret went on. “I can sort of understand. I’m so used to being invisible because I don’t look human that I almost feel naked when people can actually see me.” He gestured at his now wolf-like face. “Even when I have something like this. I still feel… exposed. And it makes me uncomfortable.”
“Not quite the same,” I said. “But thanks. For me it’s… the stripper thing.”
Ferret nodded. “Makes sense. For me, it’s the people screaming and running away thing.”
That also made sense. I didn’t think Ferret looked scary, but I knew who he was, and I’d gotten used to having a friend that looked like a human shaped ferret. Most of the time, anyway. What he had on then was pretty impressive. It looked real, and it seemed to move with his face.
“So… how’d you do all that?” I asked. Changing the subject was fine with me. Kaitlyn finished up with the glitter glue and picked up the actual glitter body spray.
“Prosthetics,” Ferret said.
“Close your eyes,” Kaitlyn told me.
“What, like… false legs and stuff?” I said, closing my eyes. Kaitlyn started spraying my face and neck and hair with the stuff you’re actually supposed to use, which felt much nicer. Less itchy.
“Not quite,” Ferret said. “It’s the stuff they use in movies to make humans look like animals and monsters and whatever. Or like a werewolf, in my case.”
“It looks good,” I said, then spit a couple times because I got spray in my mouth.
“Don’t talk when I’m doing your face,” Kaitlyn said. I’d have stuck my tongue out at her except she’d probably spray it with glitter.
“Thanks,” Ferret said. “It also means I can go out in public. Half man, half wolf makes people think of costumes. Half man, half ferret is usually too weird for people to think it’s a costume.”
“Mmmhmm,” I said. Kaitlyn was spraying my face again.
“I’ve done this before,” Ferret went on. “I don’t even have to blur myself out, which is nice.”
“Huh?” Kaitlyn said. Ferret raised a wolfy eyebrow at me. I just shrugged at him. Victoria had told me about that, but Kaitlyn was still doing the glitter on my face. Then she moved on to spraying my hair again, so I could talk. I guess she wanted to know, but Ferret wasn’t going to tell her.
“Some vampires show up blurry in cameras and mirrors when they want to.”
“You don’t,” Kaitlyn said.
“Nope,” I said. “Don’t know how.”
Ferret got off his stool and walked over to pick up Kaitlyn’s phone from her side table. Then he handed it to Kaitlyn, who stopped inflicting glitter on me. “Here,” Ferret said. “Point the camera at me, then look at Misty.” I got a look at Kaitlyn’s phone over her shoulder, and yeah, Ferret was completely blurry on the screen, like he was out of focus or something. Then his image slowly started clearing, and we could see him just fine on the screen. After that, Kaitlyn pointed her camera at me. It was kind of stupid, but I started to feel like people were taking pictures of me in my underwear. Of course, this was Kaitlyn, so she might have, but I didn’t hear her phone make a click noise. I still felt like I should cover up. And run and hide. “You don’t know how to fade out?” Ferret asked me.
“Nope,” I said. “Don’t even know where to start.”
“Hmm,” Ferret said, getting up to look over Kaitlyn’s shoulder at her phone. I felt even more like I should run and hide. “Okay. Try being blurry then.”
“How?” I asked him.
“Think blurry thoughts,” Ferret said.
I tried. I really did, even though it felt about as stupid as it sounded. Kaitlyn handed Ferret her phone and went back to spraying on more glitter. I was starting to feel like some kid’s school art project.
“Hmm,” Ferret said.
“Didn’t work, did it?” I asked him.
“No,” Ferret said. He didn’t sound disappointed in me, but I still felt like he was.
“Guess you don’t get to hide from cameras yet,” Kaitlyn grinned at me.
I rolled my eyes at her. “You done, glitter girl?” I asked.
“Almost,” Kaitlyn said, then grabbed a little plastic box from her dresser and started sticking those larger glitter shape things on my face. Just using the normal body spray stickiness, thank god, but it still meant more glitter stuff on my face. I closed my eyes and put up with it. After a little bit, she put the case down again and gave me a slap on the ass. “All done. Go get dressed,” she said.
I looked at the damn halter top and shorts where they were laying on the bed. Then I sighed and picked them up. Got to be honest, I wished I’d never bought the damn top, but… if I didn’t have the outfit, I’d be stuck at home covered in dried glue tonight. Walking to the bathroom was not all that fun because the glue pulled on my skin in weird ways, but I wasn’t going to change in front of Ferret. I had to move slowly, so it took a little longer than I’d have liked, but I got into the outfit eventually.
When I came back out, Kaitlyn was poking at Ferret’s face. “Wow, that really does seem real,” she said, grinning at Ferret, who was grinning back. I decided to not poke Ferret’s face too. After a moment, Kaitlyn glanced at me and pointed at her dresser. “Put those on too,” she said.
I went over to look. She’d gotten out these… huge button earrings. They looked like huge round vintage diamond things, but they were fake. Rhinestones. She’s also gotten out this rhinestone choker she usually wore with the giant earrings. I sighed but didn’t complain. They did go with all the silver glitter I had plastered all over my skin, and Kaitlyn having me borrow her jewelry usually meant she was going to insist. So I put them on, then turned around and looked at Kaitlyn and Ferret.
“You look like someone from Burning Man,” Ferret said.
“You’ve been to Burning Man?” I asked him.
“No,” Ferret said. “Deserts and vampires don’t mix. But I’ve seen pictures.”
Kaitlyn came over with still more glitter spray. The normal stuff. “Gotta touch up a few places where you’ve got too much skin showing,” she said.
“So, like… everywhere?” I said. Kaitlyn ignored me.
“It does look good,” Ferret said.
“I’m gonna need shoes,” I said. “And not my Lucite heels.”
“Chunky boots,” Kaitlyn said.
“You’re not serious,” I told her.
“Black leather,” she grinned at me. “And I wanna see you not fall on your ass wearing them.”
“Fine,” I sighed. Ended up needing Kaitlyn’s help getting them on because I couldn’t sit down just yet because the glue wasn’t totally dry and I didn’t want to get glitter on my bed.
“Yeah, that does look good,” Ferret said when I’d gotten them on. “What’re they called?”
“Um…” I said, looking down at them. “Platform chunky heel boots. Seriously.”
“Oh,” Ferret said. “I always thought women’s shoes had more complicated names than that.”
“They do,” Kaitlyn said. “Misty just doesn’t wear anything that doesn’t sound like it looks.”
“Don’t you have a costume to put on?” I asked her.
Kaitlyn grinned at me and put the cap back on her glitter spray. “All done here, so yeah,” she said. She picked up her own costume and headed towards the bathroom. “She’s still sticky,” Kaitlyn told Ferret. “So hands off her for at least ten minutes.”
Ferret grinned at Kaitlyn and saluted. When Kaitlyn closed the bathroom door, he looked at me and cleared his throat. “I’m not actually going to… you know,” he said.
“I know. It’s fine,” I said.
“Seriously, though, it does look good,” Ferret said.
“Thanks. Feel a little weird like this, but… I can deal with it.” I looked in the mirror on the closet door. Glittery hair, glittery lipstick and eyeshadow, and little patterns of glitter stars on my cheekbones leading up beside my eyes… and of course, most of my body was showing and covered in silver glitter. And the jewelry. Was kinda surprised Kaitlyn didn’t try to glue another rhinestone thing into my navel, but maybe she’d forgotten. Then the black leather halter top and matching booty shorts. Yeah, I was going to be popular at the party, at least with the guys. The girls would probably hate me.
“Alright. And yeah, I’ll keep an eye on things for you.”
“Thanks.”
Ferret and I chatted while Kaitlyn got her own costume on. Didn’t take as long as I remembered the bubblegum princess taking last time, but we still ended up leaving later than we’d intended. Which was fine, the party wasn’t going to be over until like three in the morning. Kaitlyn talked about her costume with Ferret a bit while she finished off getting ready, and yeah, it still looked like a fairy princess that’d been attacked by bubble gum ice cream, but Kaitlyn seemed happy so I didn’t feel like teasing her about it. Then we headed out, by which I mean we started leaving but Kaitlyn and I both had to go back for things we forgot, which was actually pretty normal for us in these sort of situations. One of which was to glue a big old rhinestone into my navel because I guess I couldn’t even get away without that. Kaitlyn also made me take a big shaker of glitter in my purse. Sometimes I swear she was a fairy or something in a previous life. Or a unicorn maybe.
Once we’d all finally gotten everything done, we went to Ferret’s car. Which actually turned out to be a van, but like, one of the nice ones that’s more like a big short limo than a work van. Or maybe it was a big minivan. I was worried about getting glitter all over the inside of his car, so I tried to sit on the edge of the seat with as little of my skin touching it as possible, which wasn’t easy. But yeah, we were finally on our way… a werewolf, a bubblegum princess, and… whatever the hell I was going as. I just had to hope no one actually asked me what my costume was supposed to be.
