I lay there with my eyes closed and prayed that it would come out right, that I would have the right match—B negative, whatever that meant.
After I sat for twenty minutes in a waiting room looking at magazines a nurse returned with a form. “Take this back to Dr. Bennington,” she said. The envelope was sealed.
In the elevator, I ripped the envelope open. I couldn’t wait. I didn’t understand most of it but there it was— “Blood type: O positive.” I wouldn’t be able to donate my blood to help Kurt. When I found Bennington and handed him the ripped-open envelope, he could tell by the look on my face that I wasn’t going to be a blood donor.
“It was a long shot,” Bennington said. “B negative or O negative are okay, but nothing else will work. Besides, you’re not old enough to give legal consent. It would be up to your parents.”
“No it wouldn’t,” I said. It was my body, not theirs.
Maybe I couldn’t give Kurt what he needed. But I was determined to make sure he had enough blood until the stupid system could come up with something to really fix him up. At school the following day, I asked everyone I knew what type of blood they had.
“What are you, some kind of vampire?” Dorfman asked. “Besides, I don’t know stuff like that. Hanging around hospital beds is making you weird.”
“What do you want to know for?” Leach asked. “It’s personal even if I did know.”
“I’m doing a project for biology,” I lied. “It’s a survey, okay?”
But he just walked away.
I got a few answers from girls I knew. They seemed less uptight about it than the guys. A couple of teachers laughed at me but told me what kind of blood they had.
Nobody had the right type.
I guess the doctors were right about one thing: It wasn’t going to be easy.
By the end of the day I was feeling beat. Scared too. I was just closing my locker when Jason showed up. He came up so close I could smell his breath, and I knew then that he had been drinking. He had his stupid motorcycle helmet under one arm and a big grin on his face.
Some girls thought he was cute, but I knew the guy was a jerk. Ever since his birthday, he’d been a jerk with a motorcycle, which was twice as bad.
“What do you want?” I asked him.
He ignored my question, as if I should be flattered that he had stopped by to talk. “I hate wearing this thing,” he said, handing the helmet to me. “The law has no right to say what’s safe for me. It cuts down my vision. Besides, on a bike, you’re supposed to feel free.”
“Right,” I said. “Now buzz off.” I’d overheard Jason talking non-stop about his motorcycle all week. Everybody was impressed but me.
“Aren’t you gonna ask?”
“Ask what?” I snapped.
“You know. My blood type. The guys think your little game is really weird. Dorfman says you’re a vampire.”
“Give me a break.”
“Does it have something to do with loverboy?”
“No.” There was no way he was going to trick me into saying anything about Kurt. “Just a biology project.”
“No it isn’t,” Jason insisted, breathing boozy breath all over me again.
“It’s none of your business. Take your helmet and go ride your tricycle off a cliff, okay?” I shoved the helmet at him, but he wouldn’t take it.
Instead he pulled a folded piece of notebook paper out of his pocket and dropped it in the helmet.
“Read it,” he said. “And tell me if I’m the one you’re looking for. I charge twenty dollars a pint. But you have to promise not to leave teeth marks.”
Kurt started to walk away with that cocky dance that he did. “Take your helmet,” I said, walking after him.
“No way. It messes with my freedom and interferes with my style.”
I wasn’t about to chase after him. I opened my locker and had to squeeze the stupid helmet in with all my books and gym stuff. I wasn’t even going to look at the note or play along with his stupid game but as I was slamming the locker shut, the paper fell to the floor. I picked it up and unfolded it.
There was a big goofy drawing of a female vampire that I guessed was supposed to be me. And underneath it was simply: “B negative.”