Vampire Blood by Kathryn Meyer Griffith

anymore. I don’t want to.” Jenny wouldn’t meet her eyes. She could feel her face turning red, probably even brighter than her sunburn. Of all the people in her life, she couldn’t be angry at Maude. Maude had been her mentor, her teacher, her friend and her most devoted admirer. They understood each other.
    “That’s what you say. When are you going to stop acting like a little nitwit and go back to what you’re really good at?”
    “Never.” Jenny’s answer, so full of finality, stunned the older woman for a moment.
    Maude exclaimed, “That’s nonsense. You were once a best-selling novelist, Jenny. A Summer’s Night was excellent, for horror.” Maude’s tone was cajoling.
    “If I could write like you—” Maude let out the breath she’d been holding, exasperated at the distant look on Jenny’s face. “You have a great gift, child, and you can sit there and tell me with a straight face that you’re never going to use it again? That’s almost a sin.”
    “In your eyes, Maude, not mine. So I wrote a bestseller once. So what?” Her voice held a tired note. “Whatever I had once is gone, and you know what? I don’t care. I don’t want to waste anymore chunks of my life at the damn typewriter or the computer. Doesn’t anyone understand that? I don’t owe anyone anything. It’s my life, and I don’t want to write anymore, that’s all,” Jenny said through gritted teeth, turning her head away, wanting to be left alone about it.
    For Maude, it finally soaked in. “Sorry, Jenny. I shouldn’t have said anything. It’s just that A Summer’s Night,” her face filled with awe, “to this day, I’m still haunted by certain passages of it. It was so beautifully written, so believable. Your characters touched something in me.” She shook her head. “I guess it’s only selfishness that makes me want you to write another story,” her voice was apologetic.
    Jenny rubbed her eyes and strained neck, sorry she’d snapped at Maude the way she had. The woman meant well. She just didn’t get it.
    From downstairs, George’s gruff voice could be heard swearing good-naturedly at the washing machine. Something clanked to the floor, a tool perhaps, and the metallic sound echoed throughout the house.
    Jenny’s eyes returned to the door. How much time had passed since she’d come in? Twenty minutes? Her dad should have been in by now. His lemonade was warm. Was she going to have to go out and drag him inside to eat and take a rest? Her eyes were gazing through the windows again.
    It was then the scream echoed in the still afternoon, and Jenny, her heart plunging to her feet, bolted from the kitchen and flew out the door towards it.
    Her father wasn’t on the walk board. She found him lying, panting and groaning, in a heap behind a bush under the scaffolding.
    “Dad!” Jenny wailed and ran to kneel down beside his body, afraid to touch him.
    “Are you all right?” she cried. “Is there anything broken?” There was blood coming from somewhere, but she couldn’t tell where at first. There were ugly scratches on his face from the bushes.
    Maude stood gaping at him from behind her, her face white.
    “Naw, don’t think so, Jenny,” he moaned, looking up at her, dazed, pain and disbelief racing across his weathered face. “I got so dizzy. I fell,” he muttered as if he couldn’t believe it. He clutched his right arm closer to his side. “My arm hurts.” He winced as she barely touched it.
    “Oh, Dad! I knew this would happen. You fell. You actually fell!”
    “No joke,” he snapped back at her, annoyed. He was visibly trying to pull himself together, make light of it. “I’m fine, Jenny. Just a sore arm, that’s all, a couple of scratches. I’ll be okay. Heck, I’ve fallen countless times in my life. No big deal. Your mom always said I had bones like rubber. I bounce and never break a thing.” He attempted to smile, but instead, pain suffused his face.
    “Sure, you’re just a rubber band