“Wait, you live a prolonged life, like mine. The sun doesn’t harm you over time?”
“Oh, it does.” She pointed to the hat. “Why do you think so many witches are pictured with hats on?” She closed the door behind her, leaving him in the hotel room smiling despite the verbal walk down memory lane. He was actually looking forward to seeing her again.
Chapter Four
When Marie got home, she started to pack a large suitcase, unsure as to how long their trip would take. She called her mom to tell her she was on her way to her with a surprise visit soon due to work, but she left out any details. Witches never talked about the craft through any technology or phone service. She was almost done packing, but they weren’t leaving until the first of November, the day after tomorrow. For now, it was time to go to William. There were things to do before they left.
When she got to the hotel, she knocked on his door. She was dressed in jeans, her long black boots, a white sweater, green scarf and white jacket. William was wearing slacks from the sixties and what looked like a polo shirt from that era. The material was thick, but it looked soft. Despite how old his clothes were, he looked smoking hot. Marie decided to play it off. She looked at the clothes he was packing in his vintage hard suitcase.
“William, you’re better off just leaving this hunk of junk here.”
He scoffed. “Do you know how old these are?”
“Do you know how much you’ll stick out? I don’t think we need to be drawing attention to ourselves.”
He looked down at this suitcase and knew she had a point.
“The mall in Boston is open for a few more hours. We have some time before meeting our guy in New York.” She threw his car keys at him. “You’re driving.”
On the drive to the mall, Marie looked out the window, wondering about his suicidal attempts. She decided to just come out with what was on her mind. “What about decapitation? Sounds like a sure way for you.”
William turned to her. “Believe it or not, I tried it. The guy I paid didn’t swing hard enough. Left me there to die, only I didn’t die. It took ten years to heal from that one. And I was fifty-grand poorer.”
“I’m so sorry,” she said, shocked. “Did it hurt?”
“Pain is different for us. I was hungry more than anything. You know, I’ve even tried a guillotine. Had one set up in my garage. Now, I’m not much of a handy man, but it didn’t work. I don’t know what I did wrong. I tried several times, each time taking years to heal only so that I could try again.”
“It must have been awful to go through that each time.”
William shrugged. “All of it is awful, yeah.”
Marie closed her eyes, feeling his pain. When she opened her eyes again, they were wet with tears. Marie blinked them away, sniffling.
“Cold?” William asked, unaware of how she was feeling.
“Mmm, yeah. A little,” she said. It wasn’t a lie. She realized she was cold, now that he had mentioned it.
“It’s an old car. Sorry, heater’s busted.”
“It’s unusually cold for October.”
William didn’t respond. They were quiet the rest of the way to the mall.
Once inside the mall, Marie asked him his sizes. When he gave them to her, she pointed to a store where he could find a new suitcase. When he returned thirty minutes later, Marie already had three full bags and needed to make two more stops.
“Woah, do I at least get to see some of these?” he asked, peeking into the bags.
“Yes, but I don’t want to waste time. I just found out it’s supposed to snow tonight, and I want to make sure we beat the snow on our way to New York.”
“Bad news, sweetheart. The snow has already started,” he said, pointed towards one of the exit doors, where you could clearly see the snow swirling in the air.
“Shit, then let’s get out of here before it starts to stick.”
“One second. If we’re going to be traveling together, we should travel as husband and wife,” William said, eyeing a jewelry store across the way.
“William, we don’t have to. Men and women can travel together now without a problem. This isn’t 1950 anymore.”
“Vampires like to ask around. If everyone thinks we’re really married, it could buy us some time to escape. Even if it’s two or three minutes.”
“Escape? It’s that dire?”
“When we’re together, we emit a stronger presence than when we’re alone. There are plenty of vampires out there, scattered around here and there. Let’s not take a chance.”
“So, we’ll just stay at different hotels.”
William shook his head. “I’m not letting you out of my sight. I can protect you if it comes to that.”
She looked at the jewelry store. “So, you want to get wedding bands or something?”
“And an engagement ring, too.” He took his new suitcase in his left hand and took her hand with his right, leading the way.
When they entered, William set his new suitcase off to the side. He took the shopping bags from Marie and did the same. “Pick out whatever you’d like.”
Marie glanced over at the wedding bands, quickly picking two silver ones. It didn’t matter to her. It was only for show, anyway.
“Very nice choice,” the shop owner said.
William stood behind her. They tried on the rings. Both were too big on each of them.
“I can resize these. Fifteen minutes, no problem.”
“And what kind of engagement ring would you like?” William asked Marie casually.
The jeweler measured their fingers, eavesdropping on their conversation.
Marie laughed. “The man is supposed to choose it.”
William smiled. “You want me to choose it? Okay, I can do that,” he said all too smugly. He looked around for a few minutes. Marie stood off to one side as she watched him. She was feigning annoyance, but she had to admit, this was amusing.
“This one.” He pointed to a diamond ring.
The jeweler cleared his throat. “That there is a beautiful two carat diamond in a white gold setting.” The ring he had picked was the most expensive one in the store. The jeweler quickly broke out in a sweat, wondering who these two were.
Marie joined in and took a look. “William, no way. Please get something smaller. Unless you want me to get mugged.”
“Nonsense. You’ll have me to protect you.”
Marie looked at the jeweler. She shook her head apologetically. Next, he brought out a smaller diamond.
“This one is very elegant,” the jeweler suggested.
William took the ring in his hand. “Yes, I think this one will do.” William winked at Marie.
She blushed. The ring was still very sizeable and had to be at least twenty-grand.
“Please resize all three. And thank you,” William said after paying.
While the jeweler worked on resizing the rings, William whispered into Marie’s ear. “Keep it afterwards. Sell it, it doesn’t matter. But wear them for now.”
She nodded and waited off to the side with her phone as William looked at the jewelry cases. When the jeweler was done, he handed the rings to William, who then handed the engagement ring to Marie to try on. It fit beautifully. Marie couldn’t help but love how the ring looked on her finger as she held her hand up in the air.