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Previously in Technical Difficulties
Having been recently turned into a vampire for no obvious reason, Zach is staying with Ryan while he figures out how to manage in this new undead life. They've just yesterday made the happy discovery that they're highly sexually compatible, in a sadomasochistic sort of way, and they'd like to spend a few days in bed together, but stuff keeps getting in the way.
First, Ryan's stepmother, Jamila, and young stepbrother, Jerry, showed up, fleeing from Ryan's violent alcoholic father who also happens to be a cult leader. It's awkward having family for houseguests when you have a vampire in your bed who you want to have noisy sex with. Jerry has made worrying remarks about storehouses on the cult's property, holding mysterious contents for just in case the government shows up, and Ryan would like to find out what's going on. There's also been trouble with Zach's parents, who he lived with up until he got turned into a vampire. They had reported him as a missing person, and were upset when they found Zach and he wouldn't go home with them. He told them he was gay as an explanation, and although that was easier than explaining vampirism, it still didn't go over well, and it was still hard.
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Jamila shifted around on Ryan's basement couch, exhausted but unable to sleep. There was no way to get comfortable when her bones and muscles ached so badly. The blue-green numbers on the DVD player's clock were a blur to her dry, weary eyes, and the stitches on the back of her head itched. She wondered if it would be better to die and not have to feel so awful anymore. Guilt, self-loathing, and fear gnawed at her guts relentlessly.
She poked at the gigantic painful pimple on her forehead just below the hair line. Stress and sleepless nights always turned her into a horrid zit monster. Jamila rose and crept up the stairs to go pop the zit in the bathroom. She peeked over her shoulder to make sure that Jerry was still sleeping before she cracked open the basement door and headed out into the hall.
A sliver of light leaked out around Ryan's closed bedroom door. That was surprising, since he'd said he was going to bed half an hour ago. She tiptoed down the hall, heading for the bathroom door, which was right beside the bedroom. Curiosity got the better of her when she he heard voices coming from the bedroom. She paused just outside the bathroom, and barely breathed as she strained to hear what they were talking about.
"I'm serious. It won't kill us to wait another day," Ryan's friend, Zach said, though his words came out tarnished by regret.
"And I'm serious about doing it now. You don't have to breathe, do you? Like, at all?" Ryan argued.
"No. I checked."
"If I put tape over your mouth and nose, then, you won't be able to make noise, and we won't bother them."
"You're demented - you know that?"
Ryan purred, "You say the sweetest things, my dear." A drawer opened and closed, followed by the distinct sound of tape peeling off the roll.
