Chapter Text
Maz’s 24-Hour Diner seemed like a normal enough place.
That’s what Rey had thought of it when she walked in that first day, application and resume in-hand, anyway.
It reminded her of the many hole-in-the-wall mom and pops that lined the dusty streets of her hometown in Jakku. The ones whose sanitation regimens might have left a little to be desired but still served up the biggest and best burgers and burritos for miles.
That was what drew her to it initially; the familiarity. That and the fact that the building, all squat and flat and covered in brightly buzzing neon, stuck out like a sore thumb against the tall, sleek skyscrapers that surrounded it and reminded her a bit of herself.
She fell in love with it the moment she crossed the threshold and Maz had hired her on the spot; surely having sensed the match made in vinyl-wrapped heaven.
The job had suited her just fine in the beginning, but then life started kicking her ass.
Bills, tuition, rent, food, art supplies; her expenses just kept building higher and higher and higher until it felt like they'd walled her in on all sides - so, she’d asked Maz about working the night shift.
It paid more according to the rumblings she’d heard from other servers and freeing up her daytime hours would allow her to pick up a second job at the car shop down the road from her apartment; a good idea all around, in her opinion - though the frycook’s stricken expression when she’d brought it up for the first time had her second guessing that a little.
She still remembered, even two years later, Maz’s eyes when she’d asked. They’d narrowed in clear, cutting appraisal, and she’d looked Rey up and down at least three times before nodding sharply once and pulling her into the broom closet that served as a manager’s office.
It was there, in that tiny room lit only by a single flickering overhead bulb, that she learned Maz’s Diner wasn’t really a normal place at all. It was actually very, very strange.
There’d been so many rules in the first days and weeks and months of working the night shift that it had seemed almost impossible to keep track of them all.
She’d actually written them down (along with a few tips she’d picked up along the way) and kept them like a nifty little survival guide in the back of her notepad she could refer to when in doubt.
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Never pet a werewolf you don’t know. This is considered very rude.
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No outside potions or draughts allowed. Customers don’t have to throw them away, but they can’t drink them in the diner.
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You’ll hear a banshee coming from a mile away. Serve her (a paying customer is a paying customer, afterall), but make sure to grab a pair of earplugs from under the counter. These can be offered to any customers with auditory sensitivities as well.
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Limit blood to three bags per vampire per day. We don’t want anyone getting blood-drunk (or to run the blood banks dry).
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If the sky starts to glow red, turn off all of the lights and escort the customers into the kitchen. The bell on the counter will ring several times - do not check on it. You can release everyone once the glow has subsided. It’ll feel like you’ve been waiting for about an hour, but no time will have actually passed. This doesn’t happen often.
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If someone comes in between the hours of three and four claiming to be a salesman, don’t engage. Don’t buy anything they’re selling. If they refuse to leave, threaten to get Chewie.
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We’re never out of ambrosia. If it looks like we are, leave the cooler and come back. Check behind the rice, that’s usually where it’s hiding.
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Don’t accept tips of any kind from fae; especially food. That’s how they get you.
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Be alert. Be prepared. And be ready to serve anyone (or anything) with a smile.
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No refunds. No exceptions.
It had been a shock to the system, certainly, learning that the monsters and goblins and ghouls she’d read about in stories and seen in film were actually very real, but Rey was, at her core, a survivor, and had adapted quickly. Surprisingly quickly, according to Maz. Some folks she took on to work after sundown couldn’t make it past the first night.
Rey had, and then some. She’d been working the night shift for two years now and had loved every strange, magical second.
In that time, she thought she’d seen just about everything the diner could think to throw at her. She’d helped reattach a zombie’s arm and had re-wrapped a mummy’s ancient bandaging. She’d met ghosts who knew Coruscant when the roads were made of packed dirt and gravel and had been bitten by her fair share of pixies. She’d survived at least one red glow and really, truly thought that she understood both the supernatural world and her place in it.
But then she met him.
🎃🦇👻
The night had started off just as abnormally as any other. She’d shown up and clocked in on the fifty-year-old punch clock Maz absolutely refused to replace and had gotten to work prepping the restaurant for the turnover from average dive to paranormal eatery.
The first step of that was, of course, switching out the OPEN signs. Maz’s had two of them, the red, flickering one used for daytime, and the night-shift one. They were identical in appearance, but the second one was charmed to keep nosey humans (ones who weren’t ‘in the know’, at least) away.
The second step was checking on Chewie, the night cook, and ensuring he didn’t need anything from her. Rey never saw him enter or leave the diner but he was always there by the time she arrived and was gone before she left. She didn’t know exactly what he was, either (besides big and hairy), but it seemed rude to ask at this point, so she didn’t.
The first patrons of the evening usually started arriving by that point, and that was when the real job began.
It was half-past three in the morning and Rey had had her eyes out for the Salesman (as he’d shown up just about every other night that week so far) when he came in, the collar of his long wool coat (black, like the rest of his attire) pulled up high around his jaw.
The night blew in behind him, crisp with the scent of early autumn, sending the first few napkins atop each stack on the counter flying around the diner like leaves.
“Sorry - Sorry,” he said, collecting the few dirtited napkins near him and handing them over to Rey who’d been busy picking up the ones that had scattered elsewhere.
“Please, don’t worry about it.” Her fingers brushed against the tips of his chilled ones (her first clue) and she shivered. “Not your fault, just the wind.”
Then, she offered him a smile - the brightest she could muster so late at night. He looked like he needed it.
“I should really get something heavy to set on top of those. Why don’t you have a seat - any table you want. I’ll be right with you.”
She did a quick loop around the restaurant, filling cups with coffee and muck and whatever else each particular diner wanted and grabbing plates from the window in front of the kitchen.
The customers at table four practically growled at her when she set their steaks (raw, per their request) down in front of them and she snorted in response.
“Settle down, both of you. No need to bite my head off.”
“Sorry, Rey,” one of them replied with a heatless-snarl. “It’s been a long week.”
“I’m sure it has been,” she nodded, the waning moon outside catching her eye through the window. “But mind your manners, Snap.”
Her roommate’s boyfriend was a werewolf too, so she understood very keenly just how rough the week of a full moon could be, but it was still no excuse for rudeness.
Most of Maz’s nighttime clientele were regulars, and she knew the faces (if not the names) of almost everyone who frequented the restaurant at this point. Snap was one of those and she knew that his bark was miles worse than his bite, so she let it slide.
She didn’t know him; the man who had just come in. He was new.
He’d sat himself in the furthest booth from anyone else - probably would have sat in the bathroom if there was a table in there - and he flinched when Rey came near. She made a mental note not to approach him from behind again and pulled the pen and pad from the pocket at the front of her apron.
“Welcome to Maz’s,” she said. “First time?” She already knew the answer, of course, so it was no surprise when he nodded a shy ‘yes’ . “Awesome. What can I get you tonight, sir?”
He peered up at her over the rim of his drawn collar. She noticed one of his hands holding the side of it, keeping it in place over the lower half of his face (this was her second clue).
She knew better than to point that out to him. Newbies were liable to run when called out and this one, she could tell, was already meantally halfway out the door. His fingers were pale and shaking - though there was probably a reason other than nerves for the first part.
“Do you have a menu?” He asked. It sounded like he had something in his mouth or like he was trying to balance a marble on the tip of his tongue, but she understood him well enough.
Rey tried to keep her smirk from being too teasing. “Do you really need one?”
His eyes were dim. Though she could tell they were normally brown, the irises had dulled to a muted near-grey and his pupils were little more than pinpricks in the centers of them. He must have been starving, poor thing.
“I, um, I guess I -” he looked down at the table; searched the linoleum surface like it might have been the menu in question. “I guess not. I heard that you - that this place, this diner - that you served… um… ” He swallowed thickly and his voice cut off into an inaudible whisper.
“I’m sorry, sir, what was that?”
His shoulders tensed beneath the thick material of his jacket and he splayed his fingers wide across the table, like he was steadying himself. “I heard that you served…”
Again, he barely breathed the last word - and Rey was fairly certain she knew what he was asking for (all signs pointed to one thing), but, in her line of work, fairly certain was never certain enough.
“Sir, I’m sorry, I can’t hear you.”
“Blood,” he hissed, turning to face her fully and neglecting to adjust his collar as he did so. “I heard that you served blood.”
He was handsome. That was her first (and possibly only) thought as she took in the whole of his face fully.
Most vampires were (one of the perks of life after death, she supposed) but he probably had been before he turned too. The glamor of magic could only ever enhance what was already there, after all. It could sharpen the cut of his cheekbones, but he had to have the foundation first.
His lower lip, pale now and almost unfairly plush, was riddled with holes from where his fangs - the ones that refused to retract - had dug into them. They’d heal once he fed, but until that time, they would remain open and painful-looking.
“Oh,” Rey pressed the tip of her pen to a fresh page. “Of course. What type?”
He blinked at her for a moment, and Rey couldn’t tell if it was her bright response or her question that confused him, but he seemed more than a little lost.
“Type?” He repeated. “Um…” Glancing around, he gulped down a chest-full of air. “Human?”
“No,” Rey snorted. “You know; A, B, O, negatives, positives - what blood type?”
“Oh. I, uh, I hadn't really considered that… what do you recommend?” He asked, like she was some kind of bodily liquid sommelier.
“I wouldn’t know. Never been fond of the stuff, myself, I’m afraid. I’ve heard it’s an acquired taste,” she winked.
He smiled and, if he’d still had any blood left to rush to his face, Rey thought that he probably would have blushed, as well. “I suppose it is.”
“From what I’ve come to understand, everyone has their own preference.”
“Oh. I guess I don’t know mine. What do you have?”
“All of them,” Rey sighed and tapped the end of her pen against her pursed lips as she thought. “AB negative is the rarest blootype, right? Let’s say it’s probably the best tasting too and go with that. Sounds good?”
“Sure,” he agreed with a nod. “Sounds good.”
She didn’t even bother asking him whether he wanted it heated or not. He was probably too hungry to care at this point, but most vampires she knew preferred it that way (it was more realistic like that, she guessed), so she warmed the bag in a big pot of boiling water before bringing it out to his table.
He stared at it for a moment, wide eyed and slack jawed, before looking up at Rey again. “Do you have a glass?”
It was sweet, his request, and Rey had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling too widely. “Of course.”
She grabbed a clean glass from behind the nearby counter and then set it and a straw (just in case) down in front of him.
He picked at the corner of the bag with his nails for about half of a second before giving up and biting a hole into the plastic with his teeth. His hand shook as he poured the viscous, red liquid into the cup and then trembled even more violently as he delicately set the straw against the glass’ edge.
“Thank you,” he said, his voice rough.
It was Rey’s cue to leave. As a server, and just as a person, in general, she knew that, but, for reasons she could not comprehend, she stayed right where she was. It was like her feet were rooted to the ground.
He wrapped his lips around the end of the straw and sucked - tentatively at first and then harder when the blood proved to be thicker than he’d anticipated.
She could see when the first drop of it hit his tongue. His pupils blew wide, stretching out to cover nearly the whole of his irises and he exhaled a sharp, shuddering gasp.
Hesitant no longer, he ripped the straw from the glass, tossed it to the ground, and brought the rim up to his lips. He downed the rest in a few deep gulps, blood trickling from the corners of his mouth as he did so.
Rey had seen vampires feed before, but never had she seen one so ravenous. So absolutely feral. In fact, the rigid manners and general fastidious nature of most vamps was something of a joke between Maz’s nighttime staff.
The glass fell to the tabletop, forgotten, when he was done with it, and then he turned his attention to the bag. He tore into it with his fangs, licked up every drop, and growled low in his throat when there was no more left.
Rey let out a small gasp, either in shock or horror (even she wasn’t quite sure) and his eyes, big and black and hungry, locked solidly on hers.
The lower half of his face was stained a deep red and his fangs were still out, but they weren’t puncturing his lip anymore. He breathed around them, his lower jaw limp, and inhaled deeply through his open mouth.
Something pulled taut inside of her when he did that, a string tied to her very center. It dragged her closer to him, step by step, until her lower abdomen was pressed to the table’s lip.
Her arm extended of its own volition and turned upward, exposing its soft, pale underbelly.
Somewhere inside of her mind, something screamed that she needed to run, that she was in danger, but its voice was too quiet to hear over the soothing rush filling her ears. It was like water. A stream over time-smoothed river rocks; gentle and slow and mesmerizing.
Despite the two cups of coffee she’d downed at the beginning of her shift, her eyelids felt heavy. Her limbs felt heavy. The diner around her felt heavy. It closed around her, pushing and pulling her muscles in the most relaxing way.
Sleep, a louder voice inside of her cooed, it’s low, natural lullaby growing more overwhelming by the second. Sleep now and you won’t feel a thing.
“Stop that, you!”
Something, a shout and a thwacking sound, snapped Rey from her daze and thrust her back into cold, halogen bulb-lit reality.
The vampire, who seemed just as stunned as she felt, had one massive hand wrapped around her forearm. His touch was warmer than before, but only slightly.
Maz hit him again with a rolled up menu and he flinched backwards, releasing Rey to rub the tip of his nose with his palm.
“No compelling the waitstaff. If you’re still hungry, you’ll have to order another bag, just like everyone else.”
Rey pulled her arm back to herself and clutched it tight against her chest protectively. “You were compelling me? Jerk.”
“Compelling? I -” his eyes filled with a sharp, intense fear and he scooted across the green and mustard-yellow vinyl until his back hit the wall on the other side of the booth. He glanced between Rey and Maz quickly, looking very much like a cornered animal. “I don’t know what that means. I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to -”
“Hush,” Maz snapped her fingers, and whether forced to do so by magic or simply by the authority in the old witch's tone, the vampire’s lips clamped shut around his frantic apology.
She crawled up onto the table, sat on the very edge, and pulled the vampire’s face up to hers until they were nose-to-nose. She stared him down, studying him, maybe, and Rey had seen Maz do a lot of strange things in the few years she’d been working for her, but never anything quite like this.
The vampire, for his part, did not move. Not an inch. He wasn’t even breathing.
Actually, Rey wasn’t sure if vampires needed to breathe at all - but that thought was far from her mind as she watched her employer pull up the soft (if shocked) skin of the vampire’s lids to get a better look at his eyes.
“How old are you?” Maz asked after a while, her gaze steady and unblinking.
It was a rude question to ask any vampire, even Rey knew that much, so she knew that if Maz was asking it now, she must have had a very good reason.
“Th-Thirty two.”
“No,” Maz held his chin, angled his face up and to the right, exposing two faintly-pink pinpricks on the side of his neck, and frowned. “When were you turned? How long ago?”
“Oh. Um, a week, maybe? I’m not sure. The first few days kind of blended together.”
“A week?” Rey balked - and that seemed to surprise him. He turned to look at her but Maz snapped his face back to hers without hesitation.
“Just a baby,” she tutted. “Where’s your coven, youngling?”
“Coven?”
“Your clan. Your family. Your - whatever it is you call yourselves. Your people.”
“I -” he swallowed around something thick in his throat - his confession, maybe. “I don’t have anyone.”
Rey’s chest tightened in painful commiseration. She knew all too well what that was like, but she couldn’t even imagine what effects that kind of loneliness would have on a brand new vampire. Her anger with him (or, whatever dregs of it she’d had left) all but melted away completely.
Nodding, Maz pulled away and leaned back with a sigh. “As I feared. Here,” she waved her hand through the air and magicked a wet nap between her middle and index finger. “Wipe yourself off.”
“Thank you.”
“A newborn vampire alone in the world is a very dangerous thing,” Maz said. “You can’t control your hunger or the new power brewing inside of you.”
“I know,” the vampire frowned down the bloodied wipe in his hands, a look of pure disgust filling his features. “I don’t want to hurt anyone, but I don’t know how to stop myself. I’m a monster.”
No, Rey wanted to say. You’re not. You can’t be. You’re - but she didn’t know what he was. She didn’t even know who he was. She didn’t know him, so she didn't say anything.
“I’ll be back,” Maz said, turning to her. She pointed a single finger at Rey and looked her hard in the eyes. “Don’t let him go anywhere.”
Rey nodded in understanding, even as she wondered how she was meant to stop any (newborn or not) vampire from doing anything at all.
When Maz returned, she had a small teacup in-hand. The liquid inside - whatever it was - was a thick, sickly dark green and its bubbles fizzed with bright magenta sparks when they burst.
“Here, drink this,” she said, setting it down in front of the vampire.
“What is it?” He asked, eyeing the contents of the cup just as skeptically as Rey had.
“A calming draught,” she answered impatiently. “Go on, drink!”
“I don’t think I can. It’s not -”
“No,” Maz interrupted with a frustrated sigh. “It’s not blood, but you can drink it. You should be able to drink most liquids, actually.”
The vampire looked up suddenly, his eyes brighter than Rey had ever seen them. “Like coffee?”
“Coffee,” Maz nodded. “Water, wine - most alcohols, really. The taste will be different than before, but they won’t turn to ash in your mouth like food.”
Not needing another word of encouragement, the vampire lifted the drink to his lips, downed it all in one thick gulp, and then coughed violently.
“Go- ah,” he hissed, grabbing his throat in pain. “That stuff is awful.”
“It is,” Maz agreed. “But how do you feel? Calmer?”
The vampire blinked at little and looked down at his hands as if inspecting them for some kind of visual change. “I guess?”
“Good. Do you have somewhere safe you can stay?”
Hesitantly, he nodded. “My apartment.”
“Do you have any roommates? Human roommates,” Maz clarified quickly.
“No. I live alone.”
“That’s very good. No temptations. Now, here’s what you’re going to do; you’re going to come back here every night and I’m going to feed you, then you’re going to go back to your apartment and wait there until the next night when you come back here to see me again, is that understood?”
The vampire nodded again. “That’s what I’ve pretty much been doing every day anyway, - besides coming here, of course.”
“It’s settled, then,” Maz said with a quick bob of her head before pointing at the vampire and sharply cocking her brow. “You still have to pay. No freebies - even for orphan vampire sob stories.”
“Of course,” he agreed and then, once Maz had left, he turned to Rey and asked, quite sheepishly, “how much do I owe you?”
“For one pint? A hundred even.”
“Dollars?”
“Mm-hm,” Rey nodded. “And that’s a steal too. It’s going for four hundred a liter these days, I’ve heard.”
“A real bargain,” he muttered lowly as he dug through his pocket. “Do you take AmEx? Fantastic,” he grimaced when she affirmed that they did and handed over a thick, black card.
Any sympathy or guilt she’d felt at the reveal of his bill faded as she weighed the heft of the slab of titanium in her hands. Sure, this guy might have been turned and abandoned, but at least he was rich. Rich rich.
It took her only a minute or two to process the card through their system and though he still seemed a bit forlorn when she returned, he chuckled (despite himself, perhaps) when she handed him his receipt.
“The Transylvanian Special?” He read aloud, a grin crinkling the corners of his eyes.
“We try to be discreet when we can.”
“I appreciate it. I’m not sure how I would explain buying pints of blood every day to my accountant.” He stood then and Rey, having forgotten just how tall he was, felt something stutter in her chest when he reached his full height. He had to be well over six feet, and the breadth of his shoulders made it seem like he was looming over her even though he was doing nothing more than just standing there. “Thank you, Rey.”
“Y-you know my name?” She hadn’t mentioned it, had she? No, she was certain she hadn’t - so, how did he know? Had he gleaned it from her mind when he compelled her? Vampires couldn’t do that… could they?
“I read your nametag,” he answered, pointing to the little silver plate pinned to her chest.
And of course he had. Duh. What was wrong with her tonight? She needed more coffee. These late nights and early morning classes were really doing her head in.
“And I’m sorry,” he continued, his eyes (which had reverted to their natural honeyed brown) cast down at the ground. “For… what happened earlier. I truly didn’t mean to - to hurt you in any way.”
“You didn’t.”
He nodded, but it didn’t seem like her assurance had actually reassured him very much at all. “No, but still… I’m sorry.”
“I forgive you,” she said earnestly and offered him her best smile. “I’ll see you tomorrow, I suppose.”
“Tomorrow,” he agreed softly before turning and heading towards the door.
“Wait!” Rey called out suddenly. The vampire stopped in his tracks and turned on his heel, his eyes wide and panicked like he’d been caught doing something he shouldn’t. He was a jumpy guy, that was for sure, but Rey supposed she would be too if she were in his shoes. “What’s your name?”
His face and shoulders relaxed at once and he grinned at her. It was sorry and small, his smile, but Rey decided that she liked it on him anyway. “Ben,” he said.
“Well, have a good night, Ben.”
“I’ll try, Rey. See you tomorrow.”
