| Fan Fiction |
| By Lidia: |
| But He Can |
| +But He Can+ by Lidia Sequel To: My Kind Of Joy Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters used, and most of the story lines taken came from Anne Rice's books. Sorry to those who were disappointed that David died, but I couldn't use Anne's plot exactly! :( I hope you'll forgive me. Spoilers: All the way up to The Tale Of The Body Thief, then it starts to change. Rating: PG for now. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "What I said to you at the time was the truth. I couldn't do it. I can't bring someone into this! Not even if that someone is a mortal man with you inside him. I simply could not." "I know all that." Lestat de Lioncourt and Louis de Pointe du Lac--The Tale of the Body Thief ~~~~~~~~~~ Louis' Point of View Of course I again went to take up residence with Lestat. How could I not? Had I refused, he would have harped on me until he merely forced me to move in with him again. It's not that I didn't want to...but why would I want to stay in the Rue Royal again? So many bad memories, so many things that I think about as I near the inevitable sleep in the morning. I imagine that I can still hear Claudia's ringing voice before I fall into the death sleep. I can still feel her little fingers curling around my hair before her tiny body went limp. I don't think Lestat understands this. It's always better when he's here. He gives me something to concentrate on when there is nothing else for me. But he's not here. And I think I have an idea why. I just hope that I am wrong. It could ruin every chance that Lestat and I ever had together. It would confirm that in fact he hadn't forgiven me, and perhaps...he doesn't love me anymore. A few nights ago I began to realize that on my nightly hunts I was being followed. It had been over a week since I had last seen my beloved maker. I was in a silent fit of joy, thinking that perhaps he had come back. If merely for a little while. It always made me happy to see him. But soon after I realized I was being followed, I began to recognize the quiet and almost undetectable presence. I caught in my peripheral vision, a streak of auburn hair tonight as I walked to the flat again. Just a flash of ivory skin, a glimpse of amber eyes. I didn't see him again until the next night, until he had decided to show himself. He looked resplendent in the modern clothes he chose to wear tonight. The brown velvet complimenting his features immensely. I myself was bedecked in a ragged black sweater and faded black jeans. But I hadn't changed for nearly a week. "Armand." I said as he came into my line of vision. He had come into the flat while I was unaware, and perhaps he still thought he was invisible. "Louis." he said simply. He looked like he had come to tell me something. To be the bearer of bad news as it were. "Why have you come?" I asked, turning to look out at the night streets through the small pane of glass in the window. "If it is to see Lestat, he has not yet returned from his latest venture--" "I know, that is why I have come." "And why is that?" "He went to David Louis." "Da...David?" I asked almost uncertainly. Why would I have to know this. I had known already that he would want to visit his dear friend. The man that had helped him back into his body when I could not...would not. David deserved Lestat's company more surely than I did. "To make him." Armand said quietly. Why was he telling me this? Well, it was better to hear it than to be surprised when I see David roaming the streets among us. "How do you--why--?" "He went tonight, I came to...warn you." Armand said gently. I felt his hand on my shoulder, the fingers applying just the slightest amount of pressure. "I came to invite you to Miami. To the Night Island. Daniel and I have been...estranged, and I could use some company. As could you now, I am sure." I almost went, but I was reminded of all the times in the past. My time with Armand had been torture. The constant tries at intimacy, but my love for my dead maker, and my numbness at the death of my daughter succeeded in being the wedge between I and this unearthly cherub. I knew what he wanted...and now I could not give it to him. All the times I had run from him at the lightest touch or the slightest suggestion of something more than platonic between us. And now wasn't going to change. I shook my head...and he was gone. I think he understood. I had to be alone. To be Louis. To be the Louis everyone expects me to be. Quiet...brooding Louis. ~~~~~~~~~~ I was not angry with Lestat...merely disappointed that I had yet again missed a chance at capturing his heart. But how could one vampire such as myself truly do so? He was the Brat Prince of Vampires, as free as an uncaged bird..never to settle. He was constantly fleeing from the past to some new venture. Some new thing to hold his attention before he began to loosen their hold again. And as the stretch of nights grew longer, and Lestat wasn't showing up, I knew that David had been made. And for the first time in over a century, I didn't want to be the Vampire Louis that everyone knew so well. The desperate, brooding Louis that hung on Lestat's every word, every gesture, every action...every consequence. But I hadn't anything to occupy my mind with...until I thought of what I had been doing before I had been informed of this heart breaking mishap by Armand. The search for a desk very like the one which had once stood in the parlour over a hundred years before. I had begun with malls, then gone onto antique stores, and of course the flea markets. I even went as far as to see if there was a modern desk that could fill the requirements, but I hadn't yet to see the desk which I had so loved. Eventually it came to me. To use the sources that Lestat continuously uses when he cannot get the job done himself, or is far to busy or lazy to do it himself. I went online and used the closest search engine I could find (I admit I am not very skilled with the Internet) and typed in "Local Antique Dealers". I clicked the first link and put my area code in the box suggested. I was greeted with another screen of links and I again picked the first one to grab my attention. "Mona Riverside-New in the business but eager to please! If you just let me know what you are searching for, I will physically come to you and we will search together to find the perfect suitable item! You can call me at the phone number listed below or email me at [email protected]!" She sounded interesting, so I saved the information and turned the computer contraption off. I couldn't quite figure out how to shut it down, so I merely pulled the plug from the wall. I would come up with a way to fix it later. I walked down the lonely hall way to my day time crypt and lay down in the small confines of my coffin. My thoughts remained on Lestat for some time, but as I started to concentrate on how to describe the desk to the antique dealer, I gradually began to fall into the death sleep. ~~~~~~~~~~ Lestat's Point Of View As you probably guessed, my laughter at my own stupidity didn't last long. Not with my David lying dead at my feet. The blood tears on my face were already beginning to dry, even as fresh waves of tears flowed down my cheeks. For the first time I looked around the room. I hadn't even realized amidst the blood drinking that we had moved at all. I felt as if we had stood in place the entire time. But as I surveyed the damage, dear David must have struggled terribly. There was a broken mirror, pieces lying everywhere, a table overturned, the computer was lying on its side, the copy of Faust lying directly beside it. The chair that David had been sitting on while we talked on the porch lay on its back. Quite suddenly I couldn't take the confined space of the little room, and the site of David, David who had helped me win back my body crumpled on the floor. I turned and went out. I went back up to the gardens. The mood was risen very high, and I walked up the gravel path to the very edge of the highest point and stood there looking down on the thin ribbon of white beach and the soft soundless sea. At last I sat down, against the trunk of a great dark tree with branches spreading over me in an airy canopy, and I rested my arm on my knee and my head on my arm. I don't know how long I sat there. But any moment, I felt as if I should be expecting a changed David to walk from the room shouting at me. To see him revitalized with my blood. How I regretted not changing him! How I regretted killing him. There had been a choice and I made a decision. And it was right, whether I believed it or not, he was not meant to be a vampire. Not David, never David. I think I stayed there until the sun started to rise. My vampiric instincts causing myself to dig into the ground and bury myself in the soft earth for the day. When I awoke, covered in soil the next night, I merely stayed where I was. I had no intention of "going to ground", but I was too heartbroken to rise. I stayed this way for several weeks, and I really had no idea what to expect from Louis when I got back. But I had never expected what I came home to. ~~~~~~~~~~ Mona Riverside's Point of View I hefted all the books I had in my arms so that I could levy their weight and free my right hand to unlock my apartment door. A few locks of brown hair fell in my face, and wiping at their irritating presence caused me to drop all the files and books from my grasp. I groaned in frustration. All the papers had slipped from their safe hold in the numerous manilla folders. I had been in real estate and antique dealing for nearly three months and I was still the clumsiest person on staff. Most of my clients found me too young to deal with their "important matters". I was fresh from college, well, a fresh drop out from college. I really hadn't been able to handle the amount of homework and carrying two jobs to pay for my apartment, tuition, and essentials...working nights and going to school during the day. Finishing my homework two minutes before class, sleeping through lectures...it had all snowballed when I began to fail the simplest classes. My family had disowned me at sixteen when I had gotten myself pregnant. Of course I didn't have a child now, how could I have handled that burden now? I had been relatively small and below average weight at sixteen, and apparently, I wasn't physically ready to be with child. It had been still born, and I can't say that I was the saddest person in the world at that time. At sixteen I was still carefree and ready to be wild, not entirely ready for the responsibility of caring for another person. Even now, at nineteen, I still barely think of my lost baby. I was too busy. I was so close to being fired, so I had decided to possibly go freelance. I wasn't anything extraordinary if that's what you think. A beautiful child surviving on their own since sixteen, surviving through a lost child and supported herself with two jobs and still making it through two years of college. For I was nothing special, and I still am not. I have dull brown hair, but when I brush it just right, it shines almost auburn in the light. My eyes are brown, flat, and nothing to stare at. I am still under weight for my height and age, but not grossly so. My skin has a slight tan from being outside all day showing my clients "perfect places to settle down and start a family". I kicked the folders and extra papers through the door, running my fingers through my hair to keep it out of my face. I became frustrated when it came around in front of my face when I bent to pick up all of the documents I had dropped. I stomped off to the tiny bathroom and grabbed a pony tail holder from the nearest reach on the sink. I screamed when the cockroach fell from the soft material. I watched it scuttle across the floor for a moment before taking up my slipper and slamming it over the roach. It made a little slapping noise before I heard the resounding crunch of the insect. I jumped again when I heard the ring of the phone in my dining area. I got up and ran to it just as the answering machine was starting to pick up. "Hello?" I said, out of breath as I picked up the phone. "Hello, is this Mona Riverside?" a rich French accented voice said on the other end of the phone. "Yes and who is this?" I asked. A possibly customer! I knew my adds on the Internet and in the newspaper would pull off. "Louis de Pointe du Lac, and I am in need of your help." And with those words, those small words, my whole life took a huge turn. For better or worse, I wouldn't have given it up for the world, had I choice to do it over. ~~~~~~~~~~ Mona Riverside's Point of View Again ~~~~~~~~~~ "Louis de Pointe du Lac, and I am in need of your help." I heard him say, the soft lilting voice calming my over-anxious nerves. "Really?" I asked, the tone of my voice sounding for all the world like the little twit I knew I was. "Yes." He said, and I could almost hear the slight impatient edge around his words. "I am in need of you antique expertise." "Anything specific that I could work with?" I asked, taking up a pen and grabbing the nearest newspaper to jot down any notes I could. I had to get this job, this could possibly be my last chance at working as an antique dealer. I so enjoyed this profession too. "An oak desk, as close to the 19th century French design as possible, large but not overly�" I took down the notes as fast as I could, listening for several minutes as he tried to give me every detail. Finally I stopped him, unable to write any longer. "Is there any possible way I can meet you to discuss this? It seems you really have chosen what sort of desk you are looking for, and we may be able to find it if we work together. I'll look over what you have given me tonight in all my sources, and if I find anything, I'll let you know and we'll go look together. Is that alright?" He paused for a moment, seeming to take in my offer, and his voice hesitated again before consenting and saying his good-byes. When I had hung up the phone, I had had the last straw with my hair. It was too long. I made a mental note to myself that first thing tomorrow morning, I was going to get it cut off. Nearly to my lower back it was by now. It was always in my way and I couldn't take it anymore. I gathered all my hair into my hand and wrapped it into a bun, holding it there with the ponytail around my wrist. I walked to the entrance of my apartment and began to sort through the fallen documents, collecting all the small scraps of paper and sheets full of typed text. When I had sufficiently gathered all I had dropped, I walked back inside, pushing the door shut with my foot and flipping on the light switch. A dim light filled the little foyer before the light bulp made a popping noise and went out. 'I need to get light bulbs tomorrow too.' I thought, throwing my bundle onto the table and walking to the little living area. When I flopped down on the sagging couch, I heard the resounding groan as it strained to keep up my weight. I looked down at the toe of my dirt covered boots and the tip of my white socks coming out of them just onto my ankle. I hated being poor. I desperately needed new clothes, new shoes, new everything�new life. ~~~~~~~~~~ Louis' Point of View ~~~~~~~~~~ I woke the following evening, my thoughts straying from Lestat once again to my impending task for the evening. I was not entirely dead to technology, for I knew enough to use the telephone. I picked up the receiver and found the antique dealer's phone number. I dialed the number quickly, and was saddened to hear the beginning of an answering machine. It was proper courtesy to leave a message on these contraptions as much as I hated them. Before I could begin to speak to leave the necessary information, the phone picked up to give me a lovely feminine voice. She sounded young, but serious. Ready to get the job done, yet so surprised that I had called all at the same time. The conversation was going well, considering I hadn't spoken to anyone outside of Lestat, Armand, or other vampires since I had spoken to the mortal Daniel so long ago. I was taken off guard by her interruption in my description. "Is there any possible way I can meet you to discuss this? It seems you really have chosen what sort of desk you are looking for, and we may be able to find it if we work together. I'll look over what you have given me tonight in all my sources, and if I find anything, I'll let you know and we'll go look together. Is that alright?" I hesitated, it would be fine to meet with this mortal, but I didn't really like having extra mortals out there knowing me. I consented, and placed the phone back on the hook. I looked around the empty flat, wondering what I could do for the rest of the night. Unfinished, More Posting Soon Fan Fiction Home |