The Vampire's Apprentice

"I don't cower!" Norville protested. "It's just... better not to make him mad." His voice peetered off at the end of his sentence. "It's just better all around to let him yell and get it out. Mum doesn't let him talk that way with her 'cause she had enough of it with Dad, but I let him so he'll feel better. "Sides, usually he's right."
 
Kitty had enough mind to consider literally knocking some sense into him, but the height difference would have been an interesting thing to overcome. Besides, he had a point and she knew it. "That's no reason to let him treat you that way. You're not a punching bag, Norville. You're a person. If he wants to let his anger out, he'll have to find somebody else, 'cause I'm not letting him do it to you."
 
Norville stopped walking and looked at her like a shaggy, disconsolate hound dog. "Why would you do something like that?" he asked. "You don't even know me. I wouldn't want you to get hurt on account of me."
 
Kitty stopped and turned to look back at him. "I dunno." She grinned, though it seemed strange to do considering the context. "I've been in worse trouble before. I'll be fine."

Okay, that was a lie, unless one calls being homeless and almost kidnapped on multiple occasions "worse trouble," which it likely wasn't anywhere close.

But Kitty didn't have to give the outright truth, now, did she?
 
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"Mmm," Norville said, clearly unconvinced. Then he just shrugged. "It's okay. He picks it up from Mum, but she doesn't mean it. I look like Dad, and that's not a good thing. Sometimes she snaps, but it's just sometimes. He does it a lot more, and I suppose I deserve it. I am just a mutton head, but I guess that's alright. He'll be moving out in a couple of years."
 
"You're not a mutton head." She argued. "You've just got to straighten your life out a little better—get off whatever it is that's keeping you from success and do something with yourself."
 
Norvile smiled then and gently patted her shoulder. "Thanks for trying and believing. I don't think anyone else ever has, but this is what it is. And I'm okay with that." He looked up at the sky. "I gotta get home."
 
She sighed, long and lonely, almost in a depressive sort of way. "We're headed in the same direction." Kitty pointed out.
 
"Oh. Right." He started walking again and gave Sam another pat. "So what's it like working for a ghost?" he seemed completely serious.
 
The girl couldn't help but to snicker. "He's not really a ghost. Just more of a night-bird. You might see him when we get back, maybe."
 
Norville brightened a little at that prospect. "Really? That'd be cool. You're cool, so anyone you work for has to be really cool. How'd you hook up with that kind of a gig, anyway?"
 
Kitty smiled lightly at the thought, amused by the memory. "I went looking for it. Found it on that same park bench one chilly night."
 
"'Course!" She replied, waving as she continued on to her own home. Kitty replaced the leash and wondered if Mr. McCleary had discovered the gift sitting beside his computer yet.
 
Clancy was in the kitchen, and he lifted a hand in greeting. "Ah, Miss Kitty. Right on time. The house is wonderful, by the way. Those cleaners did a perfect job."
 
"Glad to hear it." She smiled, though somehow it didn't seem quite as genuine as the ones she had shared with the twins earlier that day. Kitty found a seat at the table and rested her jawbone in her palm, examining him.
 
"With the house so delightfully clean, I was thinking that we..." He paused and frowned at her. "Is something wrong?" Instinctively, he glanced down at himself, but he was as impecable as always. What could be on her mind now?
 
Kitty started to laugh. She laughed for a good moment, then went back to observing him, a huge grin plastered to her face. "Nothing at all. What was it you were saying?"
 
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