Hallows: Duets

What Are The Rules?

Armin van Buuren & Josh Cumbee- Sunny Days

Ashley:

"I can't wait to see you in action," David laughs as he looks over the floating shelves Dante and James put up for me so that I can set up all my awards and picture frames. He's holding my recent addition in his hand. Kelly framed the magazine cover.

My mom didn't include my family pictures. She kept them, but she let me keep a few from when I was little along with all my cheer competition awards and my recital medals.

"Do you want to talk about what happened?" Dante asks. He's sitting on my bed with a book in his hands.

"I want to see your room," I say. The two of them look at me like I've lost my mind.

"Why?" he asks.

"What do you mean? You've seen my room. Oh, is it one of those snake things? No one is allowed in your den or some s**t?" I ask. He smiles and shakes his head.

"No, it's one of those I'm embarrassed things," he admits. I turn my attention to David.

"Is he serious?" I ask him.

"It's less embarrassing and more a reason for him to remain single," he chuckles.

"f**k you," Dante rolls his eyes.

"Oh, now I really really want to see it," I laugh. He groans and gets up. "Really?"

"Yeah, come on. Don't say you weren't warned," he takes my hand and pulls me out of the room with him. David follows behind us. When we stop at the doorway across he pulls me to him and looks down to meet my eyes before opening the door. "Once you come in here, I might be reluctant to let you out,"

"That is a risk I am willing to take," I nod. His genuine smile curves at the edges of his lips and he opens the door.

It's completely dark. I put my hand on the frame and take a step inside. My heart is beating a million miles an hour as I carefully go in. Dante turns the light dial. The lights don't turn on all of a sudden a dim glow slowly begins to light up the room and I see why he was embarrassed. Everything is black.

Right in the center of the room is a huge old Greek-like canopy bed. The frame touches the ceiling. It doesn't look like it's made of wood; marble maybe? And it's painted black. There's a black veil that covers it all the way around. What really catches the attention is the gold writing all over the frame. It's on the walls. On the ceilings. His perfect script-writing decorates big portions of the room and it's not there for show. They're poems and lyrics. His work.

In the corner, there's a T.V. set but that's it. It's just the bed, the T.V., and nothing else. The entire back wall is covered with thick blackout curtains. I go over to them and take a peek behind them. It's facing the dead orange groves in the backyard. I turn back to look at him. He's leaning against one of the big black marble bed posts fiddling with one of the buttons on his shirt.

"This is what you're hiding? Your emo boy poems?" I smile. He grins.

"Maybe I don't want them to get leaked. I have a hard time trusting people. Especially, violent little girls that like to stick their nose in my business,"

"Dante," I scold him.

"What?" he smirks.

"What have I told you about calling David names?" I sneer. He opens his mouth to defend himself but nothing comes out.

"Ouch," David puts his hand over his chest. "She has to tell you not to do that?"

"I don't call you names," he retorts.

"You just called him a little girl," I tease him.

"Shut up," he growls.

My heart stops when he takes a step and is suddenly standing in front of me. I scream when he wraps his arms around my waist and pulls me into him. David slams the door shut and it suddenly feels like I really am going to be trapped here. He scoops me up into his arms and takes me over to the bed. David holds the veil open for us.

Inside, the sheets are shiny black satin. His black bedspread is fuzzy and not spread over the bed like he'd been under the blankets before David arrived earlier. Even the pillows are fuzzy. He sets me down. The top of the canopy is covered in glow-in-the-dark ink meant to look like the milky way.

"I did that," David says laying down next to me so I'm between the two of them.

"That's why it's crappy," Dante nods. I laugh when David lifts his head up to glare at him.

"This is actually a really cool room, Blackstone," I tell him. "The reason you're single is because you're a d**k,"

"Oh, s**t," David laughs. Dante's eyes zero in on my face.

"Oh, really?" he growls. I nod.

"Yes, really,"

"Grab her," he orders.

I don't get a chance to say anything else because both of them grab me and their fingers dig into my sides. I scream trying to get away from the two of them. I am very ticklish all the time.

"No, no, no, no," I manage to get to the edge of the bed. As my hand grips the edge I'm pulled back letting out another scream. "Guys, guys, stop,"

"Okay, okay. I think she's had enough," Dante declares.

They finally stop and the three of us sit here laughing. The ugly feeling I had before is gone and I can breathe again. I sit up taking in the darkness around us and take a couple of deep breaths to settle down.

"I just looked away," I whisper. "I just f*****g looked away,"

"Hey," Dante pulls me to him so my back is against his front and I'm sitting between his legs. David crosses his legs and scoots in front of me.

"Would you rather be seeing him that way?" he asks. "Just based on how prideful you are, I can't imagine how much this is affecting him,"

"I'm not prideful," I scoff. Dante snorts from behind me. The three of us laugh. "I should be there with both of them,"

"We can do that. You know without them knowing," Dante whispers against the back of my neck.

"Anthony beat you guys to it. We've been over there a few times," I admit making them both laugh. "And Rudy has been keeping me updated at the hospital. I met his mom. She's super nice. There's really nothing else to say. It just feels crappy,"

"Does this?" Dante whispers in my ear. I inhale sharply when his tongue slides up the side of my neck.

"What about this?" David asks pulling my arm towards him. His teeth graze the pale scars on my wrists.

"Before you two get any freakier, we have to talk about this," I clear my throat and pull away from the two of them. I cross my legs and sit up straight. They both mimic me. We're touching knees.

"Are you not ready?" Dante asks.

"I've been ready for a long time. The only reason we haven't is because you wanted to wait until we were all together," I remind him.

"All right," David nods.

"What are the rules?" I ask. The two of them look at one another confused.

"What do you mean rules?"

"I don't know what we're doing. Traditionally, it's just two people and no one else. You guys have your thing and while I have nothing to say about it. I'm not going to like either of you keeping side pieces. That's not going to work for me,"

"I haven't been with anyone since the Docks thing," David admits and I want to punch him for bringing that up but I also feel relieved. In a way.

"I can't just feed on you," Dante sighs and goes back to nervously fiddling with the bottom button on his shirt. "It's dangerous. You could die. Both of you," he clears his throat. "When I feed the others, like in the shows and when we hunt. That's to feed the stone. It's part of this," he places his hand on his chest. "We feed on dark souls and it feeds our power, but we have to feed individually through violence, power, or in my case s*x in order to keep our bodies conditioned for our familiars. My reaper is brand new so she needs a little more than you and David can offer but it's not always going to be that way. Once I have control I wouldn't feed that way anymore,"

"So, the other girls stay?" I sigh.

"I understand if you don't want that," he scoots closer to me. He takes my hands in his. "If you don't want more," he swallows hard. "I just don't want you to go. I'm prepared for anything. We can be friends, just don't go,"

"I don't want to just be friends with you. I mean I haven't considered either of you just friends for a while. I just want to come up with a solution that works for us. So I'm not looking over my shoulder the way I did with Tiffany and Aubrey. People died. Aubrey is dead. I just don't want that to happen again,"

"Is there any way for us to continue this where you would be less worried about it? If I promise not to show you who-" he starts.

"No, I would have to know. Everything. It would feel ten times worse if you went behind my back,"

"It does feel ten times worse that way," David agrees. "When we started, I didn't know he fed that way, and when I found out it wasn't pretty. I left for a few weeks. It was confusing as s**t because I didn't know if I was into men or if it was just him because of what he is. So, I got his essence out of my system. It was kind of painful but it cleared a lot of s**t up for me,"

"So what was the solution?" I ask.

"We decided that it would just be us. No other guys, but we're not just into guys. At least, I'm not into other guys. So, we agreed that girls were a non-issue for both of us,"

"Neither of us," Dante adds looking at me. I laugh.

"So, no other guys?" I ask. "But girls are not off the table?"

"Exactly," David nods. "I wouldn't like seeing you with another guy. I'd hurt him,"

"I would too," Dante agrees. "Hurt him. I mean. Most likely kill him,"

"Okay, the girl situation," I nod.

"If you want, that rule would only apply to him," David points at Dante. "If we're going to do this. I want to be with you two and no one else,"

"Why does that please me so much?" Dante whispers. I laugh. "How about this? I'll tell you when I need to feed and we'll cross the bridge when we get to it. I'll be upfront about everything. Starting with this Summer,"

"You're not as discreet as you think you are. I also feel like it was a lot of me poking at you," I admit. The two of them laugh. "I also have questions. Do you feed on us every time or can you shut it off and just not feed on us that way?"

"I can shut it off with David because I've been feeding on him for a long time now but with you, it would be different. I've taken some of your essence and I can feel it inside of me. It's how I know when something is bothering you, but once we make that connection it'll get stronger. You'll be able to feel me as well.

"Not the same way I do but you'll be able to tell when I'm close even if you can't see me. You'll be more focused because I'll be taking a lot of those extra angry feelings. You'll emotionally be healthier and it's kind of euphoric," he looks at David. "You explain it to her,"

"Okay," he clears his throat. "When you give in, it's like a wall comes down. Everything in your mind right now is telling you this is wrong, but once he's fully in your system none of that is going to matter anymore. He's going to be a part of you just as much as you are a part of him. When he wants to see you, you'll know. You'll be able to feel when he's happy. When he's upset. When he's really f*****g pissed. That one is kind of arousing. At least for me," Dante and I laugh. "But you can also feel the darker stuff.

"I've never met anyone who reacts the way he does until I met you and he's not a part of you yet. The two of you will feed off one another's good and bad emotions. You'll become synced. He moves. You move. He gets angry. You get angry. It's easy for me to keep it away because we're kind of opposites but you two are almost the same person. You know where business and s**t are concerned and your music. That's where it all originally started right? The feelings you get when she plays or when you hear him sing?"

"Really?" Dante looks over at me. "You like the way I sing?"

"The world likes the way you sing. Why is that surprising?" I huff.

"You don't like the genre,"

"Okay, don't tell Anthony this, and definitely don't tell Kelly but I've been listening to everything now and I get it," I shrug. "I'm very much into Satan Couture. I like System of a Down, Nirvana, 3 Doors Down, Chiodos, you know the super dark sappy romantic stuff he's into,"

"Chiodos is Dante's favorite," David smiles.

"Aww, I love that," I nod.

"Why not tell them?" Dante laughs.

"Anthony has been very therapeutic since my parents kicked me out and if I tell him it's working, that we're best friends, and that I'd kill anyone that hurts my cupcake. He'll never let me live it down. And if Kelly finds out that Tony and I sit in the back of his Tahoe eating Mexican delights. She'll kill me. Especially now that Tony told her to f**k off,"

"Have you ever considered that I might kill Tony for any of those reasons?" he scoffs. "You kind of make it sound like you're secretly dating,"

"I find comfort in the fact that you can't without ending the world by doing so," I pat his hand. David burst into laughter when Dante glares at me with genuine anger. "Please, don't kill him. If you want to kill someone for me. Kill Carter,"