The nicest girl in school
Julissa Bella, or Jewel
for short, was one of the most beautiful girls in Venice Beach, Los Angeles; she
just didn’t know it. Her days were spent being bossed around by her wicked new
stepmother, Miranda Minchin. Miranda had pale skin and long black hair and teeth
that were fluorescent from spending too long with her dentist. Jewel’s
stepmother also spent hours at the most expensive salon in town to make sure
her glossy locks were just right. The truth was, Miranda was a vampire. In a
moment of madness, Jewel’s father had married her. So far, Jewel and her dad
had remained human. They were O generic and Miranda and her girls only drank
the rarest blood types.
When Jewel arrived to stay, Miranda was
busy organising a sweet sixteenth for her vampire triplets: Vanity, Charity and
Patience. They were closer to two hundred years old but had been turned at
sixteen, so they never aged.
Jewel’s stepsisters were the worst ‘teenage
girls’ imaginable and constantly taunted Jewel, often trying to scratch and ‘pretend
bite’ her, just to scare her a little bit more. Because of this, Jewel had
tried to contact her mom who had originally agreed to let her stay with the
Minchin sisters (before Jewel knew the truth). Jewel’s mom was on a study trip
off shore (she was a marine biologist) so Jewel just had to wait it out. Of
course, her dad had also left to ‘go to a conference’ in San Francisco a few days
ago, which is why Jewel was stuck with her wicked step-family, alone, for the
weekend.
“Guess what little sister?” Charity said
when Jewel arrived. “Your blood is so deeply unappealing we’ve decided not to
make you one of us.”
“Why aren’t you smiling? We’ve decided not
to bite,” Patience said, “even though I’d like nothing more than to rip out
your wrist vein right now; your dad pays the bills and he might not like it.”
“Yes,” Vanity said as she checked her red
gloss in the mirror, “mommy has asked us to show some restraint.”
Jewel’s eyes widened as they grabbed her
suitcase and threw it into the spare room at the top of the stairs.
“Now, get in there and when we decide
you’ve learnt how to behave, we might let you out.”
That was when Miranda returned from her
stylist. She opened the door to Jewel’s room (it wasn’t so bad – there was an
ensuite and a flat screen), and pretended to be all politeness. Miranda had
other ideas besides locking Jewel up. She was throwing yet another sweet
sixteenth for her girls and wanted to turn Jewel into the maid, since the
previous one quit after Max bit her. Max was Miranda’s chubby toddler son. He
liked to sleep a lot and run amok when he woke.
With Jewel’s unofficial help, Miranda
intended to throw the party to end all parties on Saturday night. That only
gave them the week to prepare. Builders had arrived and made the necessary
renovations to the patio. They were also extending the ball room out to the
pool area.
Miranda had warned her girls before the
carpenters arrived, “not one of them is to disappear. You know how the neighbors
talk.” The last time Miranda had required renovations (back in 1969 when she
was married to her sixth ‘husbee’ - that was Miranda’s word for all her
husbands) the girls had drained a plasterer. It took Miranda six hours to clean
up the mess! Miranda liked to keep up appearances at any cost.
Jewel was terrified of her new stepfamily
and sat on her bed, unable to decide what to do next. She had no friends in the
neighborhood and she couldn’t drive, yet. She was stuck here until her mom
returned from her working vacation.
The only thing she was allowed to do was go
to school and babysit her little half-brother, Max. Max was a toddler, but
Jewel, who was almost sixteen, loved to take care of him even though he was
extremely naughty.
Max was half vamp, half bro and still had
his ‘puppy fat’ as Miranda called it. He had blonde sticky up hair and often ran
away and hid in the middle of shopping malls. He sucked on a bottle of plasma
and threw shoes out of car windows. If strangers got too close, he tried to
bite them.
In the mornings, before day care, he threw
tantrums. He hid toys in his pockets to throw at unsuspecting people, leaving
Jewel red with embarrassment.
Jewel’s
stepsisters attended a select local school that had recently become like a
freak show since vamps took over. Venice Beach Hall was practically off the map
and the outside of the building didn’t look sunny or welcoming. It looked grey
and creepy, more like a reform school or a haunted house. Jewel only had to
endure it for eight weeks and it had to be better than home. At Miranda’s
place, Jewel washed the dishes just like her stepmother asked her to and dried
them as well. If she was reading, Miranda literally placed a duster in her hand
while her stepsisters sat on the table, floor and window sill barking
instructions. Jewel wanted to run away but there was nowhere to go and she had
no money until her dad returned. Besides, school started tomorrow.
That night, as Jewel cried herself to
sleep, the housekeeper Jacinta, brought her in milk and cookies.
“Don’t worry dear,” she said. “I’m like a
fairy godmother and your life is about to change for the better, forever.” When
she woke up, Jewel wondered if it had all been a dream.
She dragged on some vintage jeans and a red
sweater only to be confronted by her stepsisters slurping blood smoothies.
“Want one?” Charity asked.
Jewel was silent.
“Never mind,” Patience replied, “we have
to motor.”
Vanity checked her gloss in her gold and diamante
compact. Their little brother Max slurped on a bottle full of thick, red,
liquid.
“He’s not?”
“Oh, not exactly.” Patience said, (she
could be quite nice when she wanted to be). “He’s just a half – so he eats real
food as well.”
“He loves sweets,” Patience added. The
sisters walked in front of Jewel.
“You have to walk behind us,” Vanity
informed Jewel, “because we are more important and prettier.”
It wasn’t true. Jewel was a very pretty
girl, like I said; she just didn’t know it yet.
