Chapter Text
Jasper breathed in the crisp night air as she leaned back against the wall, the entrance to the bar just few feet away. It was just that time of night when people that had work tomorrow were leaving, and the the people that didn’t had yet to show up. But she knew one that would show up soon.
Like clockwork, a lithe woman turned the corner and started towards her at a brisk walk. Pearl. Same time every week, on the dot. This time she wore a long, blue coat -that matched her eyes, Jasper noted- and a pink scarf.
Jasper waited, trying to determine what sort of mood Pearl was in. Some days, it was all fluttering eyelashes and honeyed words. Other days, it was all sass and fire, words biting just soft enough to be playful.
“Hey there, Tiger.” Pearl drawled. So it was flirty this time. “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.”
Jasper huffed a laugh at the cheesiness. Two could play at that game. “Your eyes don’t have to be sore for me to be the best you’ve seen today.”
“You have a point there.” She clasped her hands behind her back, bobbing up on her toes, “How is it today?”
“Quiet, but that’s gonna change real soon.”
Pearl pressed a cold, lingering touch to her arm as she walked past, throwing Jasper a wink as she disappeared inside.
Despite how short their conversations were, it made Jasper’s mondays a lot better.
It wasn’t long before Pearl came back out. That wasn’t odd, but it was odd for her to come out alone. Everytime she left, it was with someone on her arm. Jasper’s eyebrows knit together. “No luck?”
“None.” Pearl sighed and leaned back against the wall.
Jasper gave a sympathetic hum and a gentle pat on the shoulder.
“I suppose I should be happy. This way I can spend more time out here with you.” Pearl murmured, aiming a smirk at Jasper.
Jasper’s heart gave a clumsy throb and she looked away with a snort. “Always the charmer, Pearl.”
The giggle that slipped out of her brought a smile to Jasper’s face. They watched the cars go by, pondering where they might be going. Pearl thought that the minivan full of kids was on it’s way to McDonald’s. Jasper thought the pickup truck was on it’s way to the concert on the other side of town. Neither were surprised when the nice sports car pulled into the bar’s parking lot.
Finally, Pearl let out a sigh. “I wish I could get drunk right now.”
Jasper tilted her head, forehead wrinkling. They were right outside of a bar. She opened her mouth to say so, but the noise inside crescendoed with a bout of yelling and breaking glass.
Jasper whirled and marched in. She spotted the tangle of violently moving bodies and strode over to systematically break it up with hands in collars and a few stern words.
When she had shown most of the troublemakers the door, she turned for the last one. She suspected that he might’ve been the one to start the brawl. He had a sheen of sweat over his face, eyes glossy from drinking. But the most concerning feature was the glass bottle he held above him, ready to break over her head.
Before it could happen, her eyes caught a flash of pale blue behind him and he stopped, let out a grunt, and fell over; unconscious.
Yellow eyes narrowed as she looked around. Nothing in the bar was that shade of blue. Except Pearl’s coat. Curiously enough, Pearl was nowhere to be found.
Her pondering was cut off by the owner declaring they had to close up until the damage was fixed. Jasper sighed and got to work. It was gonna be a long night.
When Jasper woke up the next morning, it was with a groan and a scramble out of her blankets when she saw dim light leaking through her window. It wasn’t that big of a deal, but it was always better to go jogging before the sun came up. Fewer cars to hold her up, fewer people to go around, and cooler temperature to keep her comfortable as she ran.
At least this way she got to see the sun start to peak up over the mountains.
She tore her eyes away from the sunrise to fix them in front of her, but caught sight of something else.
Jasper had never seen Pearl anywhere besides the bar. But here she was, leaning against a wall in the same blue coat and pink scarf.
Jasper was sorely tempted to stop and talk, but resolved to keep schedule. All she had to do was keep her cool.
That plan failed spectacularly.
Her foot caught on something and she let out a grunt as she pitched forward. Her eyes closed tightly, but before she could hit the ground, lithe arms wrapped around her and brought her to an abrupt stop.
Her eyes opened slowly, staring up at Pearl with an apology on her tongue. But her tongue turned to lead when Pearl gave her a sly grin. It was… different than her other grins. Wider, more real, and with a lot more teeth. Teeth that were long and sharp at the canines.
“You know,” Pearl purred, as if holding up a woman that was a foot taller and a hundred pounds heavier than her was as easy as breathing. “You should really be more careful.”
Heat rushed to Jasper’s face at the glint in her eyes and she swallowed hard at the meager distance between them.
A pained look crossed Pearl’s face and Jasper was set back on her feet faster than she could think. Pearl covered her mouth as she let out a flurry of coughs that made her entire body rattle.
Jasper pat her back gently, heat in her face fading to concern. She hadn’t noticed the bags under Pearl’s eyes and the slight shake to her hands before now. “Hey, are you okay?”
Pearl nodded, but another cough wracked her and she placed a hand on the wall to steady herself. Her eyes squinted as she looked towards the mountains. “I need to go home.”
Jasper nodded and scooped her up into her arms. Pearl gave a startled squawk and a brief flail before her arms wrapped around Jasper’s neck. She looked up at her curiously.
“Where do you live?”
Pearl gave her a small smile and started giving directions, punctuated now and then by a cough.
There were a few things that Jasper noticed when she walked in. First, it was pitch black before the lights were turned on, courtesy of the thick black-out curtains covering the two windows facing the street.
Second, it was absolutely spotless. Not a speck of dust or dirt anywhere. The smell of lemon-scented cleaner hung thick in the air, only contested by the smell of flowers that almost made her want to sneeze.
The last was when Pearl lurched over to her fridge and opened it to reveal a line of hand labeled bottle with odd letters on them. Pearl pulled one out and raised it to her lips, drinking faster than Jasper after a long workout.
“So…” Jasper looked around at the pale blue walls. That seemed to be a theme for her. “You’re like a vampire or something, right?”
Pearl choked on her drink and brought the bottle away from her mouth, staring at Jasper with wide eyes. “You seem rather… open minded about that.”
“You could just be really weird, but vampire seems to fit.” Jasper pointed to the fridge, “There’s no food, you started looking real sick when the sun came up, you have literal fangs- ”
“Okay, okay. I’m a vampire.” Pearl huffed. “You’re really blasé about all this. Usually someone would react with… I don’t know, Fear? Disbelief?”
Pearl wasn’t wrong. It was a struggle for Jasper to wrap her head around the thought of ‘vampires are real’ and all it entailed. It was even more of a struggle not to show it. So, she simply shrugged. “I’m just glad you didn’t burst into flames or something. What were you doing out at dawn?”
A faint hint of blue colored Pearl’s cheeks. “I made a miscalculation. I can usually go out and only suffer a nasty headache, but I didn’t factor in how hungry I am.”
“Because the club closed down early?” Jasper asked.
“No, I don’t think I was going to anyways. I was talking to someone, but goodness they were so dull! It was always ‘work’ this, ‘my company’ that.” She rolled her eyes, “B positive is not worth that .”
Jasper let out a chuckle, but a new thought crossed her mind. “Well, if you need blood you can have some of mine.”
Pearl’s eyes grew wide, “Well, I- are you sure?”
“Yeah, can’t be much worse than donating blood, right? Technically, I would be donating blood.” Jasper didn’t think the folks at Red Cross would approve.
“That’s very generous of you.” Pearl murmured, giving her a small smile.
Before Jasper could blink, Pearl was in front of her. That was almost unsettling, but she didn’t have time to dwell on it as Pearl took her arm. Her mood had shifted suddenly from chatty to businesslike. Pearl’s eye were cool and calculating as they inspected her arm, cold fingers tracing lightly over the veins.
“Flex your arm?”
Jasper did, gladly . It couldn’t hurt to show off a little.
Pearl straightened and motioned for Jasper to follow her. The scent of flowers grew stronger as they walked down the hall. It became nearly overwhelming near a door just barely cracked open, bright light shining out.
“What’s in there?” Jasper asked, eyes squinted against the light.
Pearl gave her a small smile and nudged the door open. The room was filled to the brim with flowers of all different types and colors. Lights lined the walls and shined down on them.
“Is that… you have a garden in here?”
“Yes.” Pearl giggled, clasping her hands together, “I love flowers and tending to then, and well, I can’t really do that outside. Luckily, there are HID lights. They don’t hurt me and they keep my flowers happy.”
Jasper hummed, staring into the the room for a moment longer before letting Pearl guide her to their destination.
Their destination turned out to be the bathroom. Jasper sat down on the edge of the tub, watching as Pearl pulled out a bag, a first aid kit, and some tubes. Jasper’s eyes followed as she set everything up, fast and efficient.
“Is it alright if I take a pint? I usually only take a weeks worth, but that should last me a month. Maybe two if I ration it carefully. And I’ll take you to breakfast after.”
“Yeah, that’s fine.”
It was only when Pearl was swabbing her arm with a disinfectant wipe that it clicked.
“You’re not going to bite me?” That was… strangely disappointing. The thought of Pearl’s teeth pressing into her neck jumped, unbidden, to the forefront of her mind and brought a flash of heat in her face with it.
Pearl looked up at her from under her lashes, an -intentionally, Jasper suspected- toothy grin on her lips. “At least let me buy you breakfast first.”
Jasper’s face grew hotter.
Pearl’s smile faded back to her look of concentration. “It’s a lot more safe and sanitary to do it this way. Besides, bite marks can’t be so easily hidden or explained.”
Jasper hardly felt when the needle went in, but decided it would be better not to look at it. It was over quickly and a gauze pad was pressed over the mark and secured with medical tape.
“Wonderful. Now, let’s get you some food.”
Lucky for both of them, there was a cafe right across the street. With Pearl squinting and pressing a finger to her temple, and Jasper feeling, well, drained , anything farther was out of the cards.
It was a cosy little place. Pastel pink wallpaper and little tables lining the walls. They ordered and sat down in one of the seats furthest from the windows. It was a lot dimmer than the rest of the restaurant and Pearl let out a sigh of relief.
“So, do you always take blood like that?” Jasper asked. The weirdness of the situation had worn off enough for curiosity to rear it’s head.
“Yes, it tends to be a lot less suspicious. Not only that, but it makes it easy to get the right amount and keep people healthy. I can do it quickly and efficiently and even get some reading done before they wake up.”
Jasper turned that over in her head for a moment as the waiter came to give her the food she’d ordered. “Earlier you said something about B positive, what’s the difference?”
“I just like different types. They taste different, smell different.” She shrugged and motioned to the glass of orange juice next to Jasper’s hand. “Like Juice. I don’t prefer B positive like you don’t prefer pineapple juice.”
Jasper wrinkled her nose. “I see your point. What’s your favorite then?”
“I like O negative more than the rest.”
“Oh, like mine?” A small smile wanted to spring to her face. How weird was it to be proud that your blood type was a cute vampire’s favorite? “Why never try for me? It probably would’ve been easy, you’re really cute.”
Color came to Pearl’s cheeks, pink this time. “It was tempting, but you were always working when I showed up and I’d hate to disrupt anything. Besides, I prefer to keep it to one interaction, and I’d be seeing you again the next week.”
Jasper nodded. She took her time eating. She had a flurry of questions that Pearl was happy to answer. And when she was done, they scurried across the street and back to her apartment.
The smells and dimness weren’t as startling the second time around. It was actually kind of nice.
“If you want, I can come back when you start running low again.”
Pearl looked up at her, blinking. “You would? That’s very kind Jasper, but what do you get out of it? I don’t think breakfast is worth that much.”
Jasper grinned, “I get to spend more time with you.”
Pearl flushed, the pink that had tinted her cheeks spreading across the bridge of her nose and all the way up to her ears as a goofy smile lit her face. Jasper was no stranger to Pearl’s good looks and flirty banter, but it was amazing just how adorable she could be when she was flustered.
Before she knew it, her lips were pressed to Pearl’s and the scent of flowers filled her head. When she pulled back, a flush as bright as Pearl’s had made it’s way over her face. “I-uh, probably should’ve asked first.” She murmured, rubbing the back of her neck.
Cold hands grabbed her collar and yanked her back down into another long kiss, that turned into two, that turned into more until they had made their way over to lounge across the couch in Pearl’s living room.
Jasper watched the small beams of light that had managed to avoid the curtains, content with Pearl pressed into her side and her chest full of giddy feelings.
“Where’s your tv?”
Pearl looked up at her, blinking lazily. “Don’t have one.”
That was the strangest thing she’d heard all day. “If I’m coming over a lot, we’re gonna have to fix that. Immediately.”