Get your party on
The party was in full
swing by the time the trio arrived on the dance floor. Everyone stopped and
stared for a moment ‘cos they all looked so fine. Marco was nowhere to be seen.
In the middle of Vamps Shake It, a
little boy ran through the ball room and out towards the elaborate guest house.
Max was dressed in a cape and wore fake fangs. All the teen vamps and most of
the normals laughed as he ran through the crowd.
“Max has escaped from his babysitter again.
I’ll go get him,” Jewel said.
Jewel pulled off her tiara and gold
slippers, she worried her little brother would unlock the fence and get into
the pool. He was so devious.
As Jewel ran after her half-brother she
dropped her shoes. They changed instantly from gold to glass on the ground.
“Max! Max!” Max had a terrible habit of escaping
from his bed, creating drama for the whole neighborhood.
Jewel’s brother led her into the guest
house, opened up for the party that was taking place.
Suddenly, Jewel saw her stepsister, Vanity,
sipping a drink.
Jewel was clearly recognisable without her
mask.
“What are you doing here?” Vanity asked.
“I escaped. I’m looking for Max. He’s run
away.”
“How can you blame him? The décor in his
nursery is at least ten years out of date!”
Vanity replied.
They were standing near the pool now.
“Hey, I’m looking for the girl who…”
Jewel and Vanity looked up. They could
hear Marco’s voice outside.
“He’s mine,” Vanity snarled. That’s when
she employed her most powerful vamp magic to trap Jewel. Vanity pushed her
stepsister into the pool and encased her in an air bubble. Jewel was able to
breath underwater but unable to swim to the surface.
Vanity smoothed her dress, pulled on Jewel’s
mask and walked over to Marco, “I’m here!” Vanity said.
“But you’re not…”
“Give me that!”
Vanity
stuffed her feet into Jewel’s shoes. They immediately turned black and weeds
grew over them in hideous, winding tangles, cementing Vanity’s feet to the spot.
Vanity screamed just as Marco saw Jewel waving under the water. He dived in
like the princely hero he was and released her.
Marco pulled Jewel from the bubble as she
gasped for air.
“Thanks,” Jewel said. They noticed Huck and Ruby in the distance
pulling Max out of the family tree house.
“Should I release her?” Marco asked,
glancing at Vanity.
“Maybe, in about an hour.”
Marco laughed.
“Thanks for saving me,” Jewel said.
Out of the corner of his eye, Jewel could
tell Marco was checking his reflection in the water, again. This wasn’t how she
imagined getting with Marco. Her perfect man wasn’t supposed to be vainer than
her. She wondered how he could possibly be a vampire – she was sure most of
them couldn’t see their reflections.
“You know, Jewel, I totally think you are
the hottest girl in school.”
“Wow, that’s awesome Marco.” Jewel was
confused. Wasn’t he supposed to be too cool to say something like that? Weren’t
there rumors he was a prince? So far he was really not living up to Jewel’s
expectations. Who cared if he was so rich he owned Milan?
Then he leaned in and for a moment, Jewel
thought he was either trying to bite her or kiss her. He kissed her.
It wasn’t what Jewel expected. How was
this dude dating or boyfriend material if Jewel didn’t feel a real
connection?
As it turned out, the kiss wasn’t
whatever Marco expected either. Jewel and Marco looked at each other a moment
and realised they made better friends.
“So you’re not?”
“What?”
“A vampire?”
“Are you kidding? I learned some powerful
magic from my nanny but I’m not a sucker! I only came to Venice Beach Hall School
because it has a good music program.”
“Oh.”
Jewel could hear Vanity screaming in the
distance.
“You better release her.”
When Jewel returned to the ball room, Huck
and Ruby were laughing and dancing the night away. By then, the adults had
moved to the pool party and all the (invited) kids from school had the ballroom
to themselves. They were jumping up and down to the beat.
That’s when Jewel noticed him.
Riff, the lone guy from Venice Beach Hall,
dressed head to toe in black. Illuminated by party lights, he looked way too
cool to join in. Jewel wondered why he was even there. He stood next to a
guitar in a case and sipped a red drink waiting for the DJ to finish his set. Then she realised, Riff was the music, the ‘after-DJ’ music. It was close to midnight when
he stepped on stage.
Riff noticed Jewel from across the room.
How could he not? Jewel was the girl he’d
spoken to once. He tried to smile at her a few times and she’d smiled in
return, but he got the feeling she never really noticed him. Jewel was the one
girl in school he’d been trying to get close to all week. He could never just
walk up to her and tell her the truth.
It was kind of ridiculous that he couldn’t
speak to her easily, but unless he was performing on stage, he was shy. At
school, he wore glasses and read a lot and kept to himself. On stage he could be anything. He stopped
being what he was, shy.
In the future, he wanted to form a band.
At the moment he played mostly at birthday parties and weddings but he had
dreams, big dreams.
It was almost midnight, time for him to
play ‘Happy Birthday’ to the spoilt tramp of a stepsister who had gone outside
with that equally self-important Marco dude. Riff wanted to play something
wild, a song everyone would remember, something by some of the famous bands he
listened to; but he knew that would get him thrown out and he wanted to stay
close to Jewel. He’d never met anyone like her. He could hear her heart, her
blood thumping in her pure veins.
Meanwhile, all anyone wanted to hear was, ‘Happy
Birthday’. Riff’s hearing was more than acute, it was perfect. He found it hard
to sing or play an ‘off’ note.
He put down his drink, walked onstage at
midnight and played with abandon.
Everyone stopped what they were doing to
listen. Riff was so good. He made ‘Happy Birthday’ sound like Mozart – if
Mozart had composed in the twenty-first century.
Everyone except Vanity (who was busy trying
to remove weeds that kept growing around her shoes) was stunned.
As the song ended, all the party guests
could hear Vanity and her sisters arguing.
“He was ours too…”
“You never should have monopolized him…”
“How could we expect any better?”
“You
are our sister and should show some loyalty!”
“Really? Game on sister!”
“Game on, then!”
Vanity had finally managed to remove most of
the weeds and started throwing them at Patience who in turn covered Charity
with them. The Minchin sisters were physically fighting in the garden and
creating ‘quite a scene’. Miranda Minchin tried to stop them until they all
bundled into the pool, thrashing hysterically.
Meanwhile, the film crew from Vamps Gone Wild filmed everything. Miranda
would hate the publicity, Jewel realized. Her father was sure to see how badly
behaved they all were. Maybe he’d finally come to his senses. Maybe, but Jewel
wasn’t holding her breath. She’d miss Venice Beach High when she returned to
her real home. But until then, she’d get to see Riff every day. Now that was
something worth waking up for.
The guests began to leave after Patience
and Vanity started throwing their rocks and shoes at each other. It wasn’t a
sign of appreciation. Some missed and shattered the ball room windows. Then the
lights went out because Charity had ripped the wires.
“I saw him first!” Patience screamed.
“The prince is mine; we’re going to prom
together!”
“Are you kidding? He’s totally mine!”
The voices of the spoilt girls could be
heard across Venice Beach as Marco tried desperately to climb over the wall. He
wondered how in the world they had come up with the idea that he was a prince?
Sure, his family were rich but they’d been trying to buy titles for years – it
had never happened.
