Vampire in Los Angeles - Supernatural City Book 3

1 Maya

September 2006

The loud crash of glass smashing against the wall jarred Maya from her sleep. Panic-ridden, she looked around her room, the small night light plugged into the corner her only source of illumination. It did little to dissipate the shadows clawing along the cracked and faded pink walls.

"You fucking drunk son of a bitch!" The muffled cry from the next room startled her further, and she pulled her teddy bear closer. The poor thing had seen better days.

Maya sat up from the pile of blankets and stuffed animals, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. She never fell asleep before the rest of the house. It wasn't safe. Her mommy and Jim fought too much. With panic, she looked at the bedroom door, hoping she remembered to lock it when she entered. Her only other escape was the small window sitting over her toybox.

A man responded, his voice too low to hear what he said, and there was another loud thump from the living room. More shouting and crashes ensued. Maya knew what was coming next.

Jim and her mommy would yell more though she didn't know how much time she had before the next phase of their fight. After yelling, mommy would throw things, and then they would start hitting one another. By the sounds coming from the other room, she guessed they were already at the last stage. Soon the cops would show up, their red and blue lights disturbing the fragile peace in the small housing project.

Her bedroom door rattled as someone tried the knob. "Leave her alone!" Maya heard her mother yell. It was time to get out of the house. If she stayed, she would become the next target for Jim's abuse. He knew hitting her would make her mommy even madder, and that was all he cared about when he'd been drinking.

Maya grabbed the sweater off the end of her bed and threw it over her head while Jim pounded on her door. Her heart raced at a hummingbird's pace as she climbed on top of the splintered wooden box and unhooked the locks over her window, her small fingers struggling with the force necessary to pull the latches open. She didn't know how much longer her door or the lock would hold and she needed to be gone before he got through.

After what seemed like an eternity, the last latch popped open, and she was able to lift the window enough to wiggle out. The screen fell out long ago, the unwilling victim of a stronger than normal earthquake. Pressing against the bars protecting the window, Maya pushed them far enough from the sill that she had space to squeeze her small body through the bottom. She dropped onto the grass, and the bars snapped back into place just as she heard her bedroom door give way.

Cowering in the bushes to the side of her window, curling herself into a ball and trying to blend in as much as possible, she stilled her breathing as Jim threw things around her room in frustration. She crossed her fingers and hoped he wouldn't think to look outside. The bars across the window made it seem like an impossible escape.

"Where is the little brat?" Jim yelled at her mother. Maya didn't wait around to hear her mommy's reply. She crept from under the bushes and around to the back of the house. Sprinting across the small barren yard, she hunched her shoulders and tried to stay low, creating the illusion of a small animal instead of a child. She did the same across the neighbor's yard, making no sound so as not to disturb them.

Once she reached the road out front, she stuck her small hands in her pockets and walked casually down the sidewalk towards the park a few blocks down. It must have been later than she thought because darkness engulfed the world. The residents of the area who normally stood on their porches, socializing and watching their children play in the streets, were nowhere to be found. It must be why she had fallen asleep.

Maya tried to stay out of the light under the streetlamps. She didn't want to call attention to herself as she crossed to the other side of the block where the park started. Half-way in, she sat on one of her favorite benches hidden amongst a tall outcropping of trees and watched the late-night traffic pass her by.

She knew most of the people walking through the park at this time weren't here for the best reasons. Drawing her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them, she observed a group of young men by a swing set. They were a local gang who hung out here often and considered this their turf. If you walked through the park, and they didn't like you, they would harass you until you either left of your own free will or by ambulance. She had watched their antics many times. Her mom and Jim fought a lot and Maya spent more time in the park than she should.

The men ignored her presence, acting like she wasn't even sitting there. Of course, to them, she wasn't. There was something odd she could do with her mind. Maya always knew what people were thinking, but it was more than that. If she didn't want anyone to see her, she made herself blend into the background. She didn't know how it worked, but she remembered the first time she accomplished the feat.

It was a night much like this one, in this exact park a year or so ago. The details were hazy in her mind, and it was hard to remember. She was sitting on a bench further along the outskirts where the grass turned into dirt. At first, Maya was afraid to move further into the park. Mommy never wanted to come here during the day; she said it was dangerous and to play with her dolls instead. But then mommy met Jim, and in her opinion, the park was safer than he was.

So, Maya came here to escape. One of the men tried approaching her, and she could see he had bad intentions in his thoughts. He was a member of one of the local street gangs, and they weren't above taking lost little girls off the streets home with them. She wanted him to go away, to leave her alone, to not even know she was sitting there. The oddest thing happened. He stopped mid-stride and frowned at the bench as if she disappeared into thin air.

Maya caught his thoughts. He was confused. One moment a small girl was sitting on the bench and the next she was gone. He wrote it down to a bad acid trip and strode away to return to his friends. She had no idea what she'd done to make him think she disappeared, but she tried it again with another stranger, and they changed direction, ignoring her as well.

Over the next year, she improved her skills. Now people didn't even try to approach her. It was as if she were part of the park like a bench or trash can. Things that existed but no one paid any attention to. She found she preferred it this way. Sometimes the thoughts running through the heads of the grownups walking by were scary.

She sat here and waited. If she could stay out long enough, mommy and Jim would be asleep by the time she made it home. Or, better yet, the police would arrest Jim for the night, and she wouldn't have to worry about trying to avoid him. She always slept better when he wasn't in the house.

Most days she would wait until he would go to his job at the factory to sleep, but that became impossible when she started going to school a few weeks prior. The teacher always got mad and called her lazy when she fell asleep during the day. Her favorite part of school was recess, but only because she could hide in a corner and nap until the bell rang. There were teachers on the playground, but if you didn't make a fuss and snuck away quietly, they never noticed you.

Maya yawned, covering her mouth with her hand. She was exhausted and by her estimate, still had at least an hour before she could go home and sneak back into her bedroom.