Chapter 21: Epilogue

Five months later

Rain drummed on the tin roof. It was blissful white noise, lulling me back to the dreamless sleep that Hunter was determinedly elbowing me out of.

"Mommy," he whispered, elbowing me again.

I grunted. I had laid down with him to read his bedtime story sometime earlier and we had both fallen asleep before I could finish. It had been a big day. Lots of prep out at the community farm for a new season of planting. Hunter and a bunch of the other kids from around town had spent the day following Johnny and Lotte, the vet, around the farm helping them tend the animals.

"Mommy, Pammy's here."

I grunted again in acknowledgment and reflexively reached out with my mind. A void was at the door.

"Okay, okay," I grumbled swinging my legs out of bed but only after Hunter prompted me again mentally, rather than speaking out loud. My thighs and glutes complained pleasantly as I got out of bed. They were sore from squatting and tilling soil all day.

I walked through the house via the kitchen and put the kettle on, yawning. The power was still on so it meant it was still before nine pm. I pulled on my favorite knit cardigan, the pale gray and chunky one that always hung in the hallway with the coats and bags, and flicked on the standing lamp by the door, then the porch light.

I unlatched the door, kicking it open with my toe as I pulled my bed hair back into a high pony. Pam had only visited two nights earlier. I was surprised she would be back so soon. I planned on teasing her for not getting enough of me.

I froze when I saw the figure standing at the other side of the door.

Eric.

He was drenched with rain. His hair hung in thick ropes, his pale blue t-shirt and jeans turned shades darker thanks to all the wet. I noted, somewhat stunned, that he was wearing flip flops. It was cold outside; it was still February, some nights it got as low as 30. Not exactly flip-flop weather.

"Hey…" I said. I finished tying my hair back and pulled my cardigan protectively around me. I hadn't seen him since the night I'd rescued Hunter. Since the night I'd killed his maker and told him to honor our agreement to leave me alone forever.

"Hey," he said.

He looked exactly as I remembered, except wet. Wet and devastatingly handsome. That was the way of vampires, wasn't it? Unchanging. Frozen in time. He'd always look exactly as I remembered him.

"I thought you were Pam," I said stupidly. The shock had my heart clattering around inside of me, a dodgem car battering against every wall inside my chest.

Pam never mentioned Eric during her visits. I'd asked her not to bring him up and she had agreed with a smirk. We'd since both studiously avoided the topic. I'd needed to not think about him. I needed time to deal with the trauma of that week back in September. I needed to untangle the mess Ocella had made of my heart and head.

If I ever asked Pam about her life, she never included a mention of Eric, though it often felt like she wanted to bring him up… Her sentences would occasionally trail off in a meaningful sort of way, or she'd make an off-hand comment accompanied with a knowing look. And then there were the recurring jokes about my love life being deader than a vampire. But I always followed it up by calling her a bitch. Lovingly, mostly.

Now here he was, Mr. Unmentionable. Standing before me and impossible to avoid.

"Pam did inform me of her social calls." Eric's lips pulled into a tight, strained smile.

"Is that why you're here?" I ventured. "A… social call?"

"If you will allow it."

I felt Hunter moving down the hallway, eager to see Pam. He had taken a shine to her, oddly. She tolerated him with eye rolls and sarcastic quips, but he loved when she visited. Her silent mind was a big appeal. She also let him brush her hair as a 'treat'. It was pretty freaking hilarious.

"Hang on a sec," I said to Eric and shut the door in his face.

I ushered Hunter back to his bedroom, telling him it was Pam's friend and that it was grown-up time now and he needed to sleep. I let him pick a plush toy from the shelf and tucked him back in, turning on the red mushroom night light beside his bed. He settled happily.

I was nervous. Unsure how to absorb the presence of the tall, handsome vampire at my door.

I enjoyed Pam's company regularly. She had shown up out of the blue some weeks after I'd returned home with Hunter. I had sworn off vampires but when I'd seen her at my doorstep, I was shocked and my southern manners kicked in as habit. She'd traveled all that way to visit with me, I could hardly send her away.

And maybe I had missed her and Eric just a little bit too.

Pam and I had sat out on the back patio, and over the course of the evening, she and I had struck a tentative friendship. She painted my fingernails with the nail hardening polish she'd brought with her, informing me my chipped nails were ghastly. She'd come back for a visit nearly every week since.

In that time since, and much to my surprise, Pam had become my closest girlfriend. And she declared more than once that I was her best friend too. Though, the way she said it made me feel sort of like a yappy purse dog that she could boast about and occasionally dress up. Either way, she was definitely one of the only people I could let my hair down with. I think Pam was mostly impressed with my murder rap sheet than my girl talk ability. She'd told me she included Bill on my list of kills. Said that he was so dull, his final death was the most exciting thing to happen his whole existence.

I splashed water on my face and cleaned my teeth in the bathroom. From my bedroom, I retrieved a shirt from the chest of drawers. Finally, I fixed myself a mug of tea. I tried not to rush. Eric had lived a thousand years. I figured he could handle waiting a few minutes for me.

I closed the front door behind me quietly when I stepped back out onto the front porch. I felt for Hunter's presence, he was already drifting back to sleep. Eric was leaning against the porch railing facing me, arms crossed, feet crossed at the ankle. A strange thrill ran through me.

"Here you go," I said, handing him the dry shirt.

"You kept this?" he asked, unfolding his black t-shirt with a quizzical eye.

"I may or may not have accidentally brought it home with me after our little trip." I cupped the hot mug with both hands. "Oh, don't give me that look," I huffed.

Eric chuckled and I joined in too after a beat. He peeled off his wet t-shirt and hung it over the rail to dry. I cooled my tea with puffs of air as I watched him from under my lashes. Perfect muscles, each defined and smooth and familiar. They whorled and pulled taut as he put the dry t-shirt on.

I wondered how much he hated me. I couldn't blame him if he did. It was because of me that his maker was dead, and to a lesser extent, Alexei too.

I didn't regret ending Appius Livius Ocella. But knowingly taking the life of someone, undead though they may be, still made me struggle with my own opinion of myself. Even if it was done for the right reasons. Then there was Barb the were-falcon. She haunted my dreams frequently. Eric's bloody, tear streaked face did on occasion too. I just really wasn't cut out for killing people. I could only imagine Pam's disappointment.

I gestured beside us to where a small table and two wrought iron chairs sat facing the garden. We settled across from one another, staring out to the front yard. Rain dripped off the eaves and my lawn, thick and lush, was well overdue for a mow. From the towering wisteria, a tire swing hung from fraying rope.

"I-"

"So-" We both spoke at once and then laughed awkwardly. I groaned internally, this was difficult.

"You go," I said.

"You're well?" he asked and turned to me, hooking his arm casually across the back of his chair.

"I am, actually. Life is good." I smiled. "I've been working shifts down at the farm preparing for the spring planting. It's good, hard work. And there's been talk of extending the power by a couple extra hours in the evenings. We've had an engineer move to town, he's working at the hydro station now."

"And your boy?"

"Hunter's good too." And he was. Strong-willed, smart as a whip, sweet and mature for his age. Though, the last trait was likely just an inevitable side effect of telepathy. "He remembers you, you know," I said. "Remembers some of the stories you told him. Stories about frost giants and bloody wars and black birds that traveled the world."

I tried to sound disapproving. It wasn't exactly appropriate material for a four-year-old, though I found it hard to care. Hunter couldn't remember Ocella or Alexei, or even that night he was snatched from his bed. What he did remember was a fun vacation, where he met a tall man with long hair and a silent mind who told him exciting stories. What Eric had done was a blessing.

Eric nodded, looking pleased with himself. "Every boy should know the sagas."

"Did you settle back in Florida?" I asked, curiosity getting the better of me. I had wondered.

"No. I've been in Atlanta with the community there. It's been mind-numbing, but a stable existence."

Ah. He was still with Pam, then.

"May I?" he asked, gesturing to my right arm. I frowned in confusion but realization sunk in a moment later. I told him it was okay and removed my arm from the cardigan sleeve. He took it gently in his broad hands. His fingertips traced the thickened scar tissue on my arm. It formed an almost perfect letter O. The burn had healed well, thankfully - but Ocella's brand would remain forever on my arm.

"There are few things I regret as much as this," he said quietly.

"It's not your fault," I said, stilling his hand with mine. "I don't blame you. So there's nothing to apologize for."

His jaw clenched. He obviously thought different. I shifted uncomfortably and slipped my arm out of his grasp and back into the knit cardigan.

"I don't regret killing your maker," I said watching carefully for his response. "There just wasn't any other viable alternative. For me and I don't think for you, either. I know you can appreciate that. But I am sorry for any pain I've caused you."

"Ocella taught me everything about being a vampire," Eric said evenly, his gaze shifting back to the garden. "He taught me how to feel, how to hide, when it was safe to be with humans. He taught me how to make love with men, and later he freed me to make love with women. He protected me and loved me. He caused me pain for decades. He gave me life, but now he is dead."

"He is," I said. "Because of me."

He nodded slowly and turned back to me. His eyes shone. "You freed me."

The snarl of tension that had existed inside my chest since that damned night began to unfurl. I blinked back tears.

"The passage of time had changed him," Eric said. I wasn't sure if he was making excuses for Ocella or just looking for reasons to ascribe to his maker's demise.

"Maybe it wasn't him that changed. Maybe it's you?"

"Maybe," he said with a ghost of a smile.

"Do you think it was fate or coincidence?" I gestured between us. "Bon Temps. Meeting in Florida… Everything with Ocella."

"Fate is an overrated concept. The future isn't predetermined, it just is."

"Is it really that simple, though?" I brought my knees up to hug them.

"Do you think it was fate that almost eight billion humans died? That hundreds of thousands of vampires met the true death as a result?

"No. Definitely not." Fate wouldn't be that cruel. It was the fairies that were.

He nodded as though that proved his point. I wasn't so sure… Maybe it did.

"C'mon," I said at last, standing up. I'd had enough gloomy talk. I slipped my feet into the knee high rubber galoshes that sat beside my Welcome doormat and grabbed a flashlight from inside the door. "I want to show you something."

Eric followed me in the rain around the side of the house and down to the back garden. Hunter and I had marked a path through the yard with solar lamps in a variety of colors, like a dim rainbow runway leading to the far end of the garden. At the very back beside the large vegetable patch, was a steel framed hot house. I opened the door and stepped inside and out of the rain. It was coming down steadily and percussive against the clear plastic paneling. Eric ducked under the door frame and looked around curiously. I reached to the side and switched on the solar-powered fairy lights which were strung along the ceiling beam.

"What is it?" he asked.

I shone the flashlight at the aluminum planting table that ran along the right-hand side of the hothouse. It was covered in seedlings, but I focused the light on ten small plastic seedling pots in particular.

"I'm growing oranges from the seeds in the fruit you gave me," I said, grinning broadly up at him. "It'll be years before any of them bear fruit but so far so good." I set the light down on the table and felt the soil of the nearest seedling with my fingers, checking to see it was still moist enough. The damp granules of dirt clung to my fingertips.

Eric stroked my cheek, I looked up to see him smiling at me softly. "Mi media naranja."

"Sorry?" I asked, only then noticing how enclosed the confines of the hothouse were, how close he was to me. I could smell him, the faint scent of his cologne. I resisted the urge to press my face right into his shirt and breathe deeply.

"In Spain, it's how one refers to their lover. The literal translation is 'my half-orange'. My other half."

"Oh." The rush of blood in my ears rose over the sound of pattering rain. He took my hand and gently brushed the dirt from my fingers.

"You are never far from my thoughts, Sookie."

"Even after all I've done?"

"You acted bravely and decisively for yourself and for your child. I'm proud of your actions. You're a remarkable woman."

"I don't know about that," I said with a nervous laugh.

"I do." He said it so surely I wanted to believe him. He pulled me into his arms and I molded against him. My hands automatically slipped under the back of his t-shirt, unable to resist touching him. He inhaled deeply, I did the same.

There were nights after Hunter fell asleep that it was all I could do to fend off the cobwebs of loneliness. Eric had opened a part of my heart that neither Hunter, nor any other person I knew could fill. A taster of love that had shown me what I had been missing out on my whole life. I'd loved and hated him for it, all in the one mixed up confusing heap.

"Why did you come all this way?" I asked.

"I had to see you."

"Hugs are that hard to come by in Atlanta, are they?"

"I broke our deal," he said. "Do you care?"

"No." The word left my lips before I was aware I'd even answered him.

"You can't deny how right this feels," he murmured into my hair. I closed my eyes. I felt cocooned in his arm. No, not even a little part of me could deny it.

"Is it my blood? Or my telepathy? Is that why?" Doubts about his interest prickled the insecure corners of my mind. I knew it a little pathetic and typical, but I needed to hear it. I'd had over five months to percolate and recall our brief fling in every which way... It had inevitably led to doubts.

"I have feelings, Sookie. Ones that no self-respecting vampire should. I die for the day with you as my last thought and when I wake you are the first thing I see in my mind. It's you, the person you are, not your blood or your gift." He lifted my chin with his finger so I could look him in the eyes. "And what of me? Now you no longer feel the effects of my blood in your system…" He trailed off, a shadow of uncertainty in his voice.

"Some days I hate you," I whispered. "I hate that we only had those two nights to really be together and I hate that all this horrible shit happened and then you were gone. I hate that you made me feel things I can't unfeel and that I now have to pass the rest of my life with only the memory of it." My voice cracked.

"It's fine if you want to hate me." He cradled my face, wiping some of the residual raindrops away with the pads of his thumbs. "But I'll be happy to jog your memory." He brushed his lips against mine.

I leaned into his kiss, running my fingertips up along the column of his spine. His skin was cool and damp from rain. He backed me up against the metal table, a little seedling tub toppling over the side. I really couldn't find it in me to care. He lifted me onto the bench and I wrapped my legs around him, kissing him more urgently. Five months of longing, of confusion and hurt, coalesced into a single moment's kiss. The intensity scared me, but it was too late. The straps had burst, that suitcase of emotion was undone.

"You'll let me visit you again," he said against my mouth. It wasn't a question.

"Yes, please," I breathed. "I might even invite you in next time."

Eric grinned triumphantly and I kissed him again before he could spoil the moment with the smart-ass comment I just knew was forming on his lips. I pressed him tighter to me, hooking my ankles together behind him and kissed him for all I was worth.

I was always a last word kind of girl, anyway.

A/N: Thanks to everyone who has read this story! A special thank you to all the reviewers who left their thoughts, comments, critiques, and feedback. All appreciated. You guys rock my socks.

Eric's quote about Ocella is taken directly from Dead in the Family. Hard to top Eric's original monologue. Thanks to CH for creating these awesome characters for us to enjoy and play with.

I've had a few reviewers ask about a sequel. All I can say is ... Yes! But please be patient... I need to finish writing it first.