Mallory Reads "One Word Answer"

In the third short story, One Word Answer, Sookie is paid a visit by someone with bad news. Yeah, yeah, what else is new, right?

The story begins with Sookie Bubba raking leaves. And before you’re like, wait, Bubba can’t be outside to rake leaves, you should know that it is about midnight. Why is Sookie raking leaves at midnight, you ask? Well, because she doesn’t like to rake leaves alone. She prefers to have someone to talk to. I guess Bubba was lurking around so she thought, cool, I’m gonna go rake! Yeah, I don’t know. Anyway…

A black limo pulls into the driveway and Bubba runs off into the woods. Out of the car steps a very large man.

He was six feet tall, and he was made up of circles. The largest circle was his belly. The round head above it was almost bald, but a fringe of black hair circled it right above his ears. His little eyes were round, too, and black as his hair and his suit. His shift was gleaming white, but his tie was black without a pattern. He looked like the director of a funeral home for the criminally insane.

Also, he is not human. But not a vampire. He is looking for Sookie because he has a legacy for her. Which means someone is dead. But who? Her cousin Hadley. We’ve heard of her. She was in to drugs and stuff and left when she was a teen. There was an “unfortunate incident”. Code for: a vampire did it. But a vampire didn’t kill her. She herself was a vampire and was staked.

The man’s name is Mr. Cataliades and he is from New Orleans. After searching for other brains in the car, Sookie asks who drove him. Waldo the vampire. He gets out of the car and Sookie wishes he hadn’t. He looks old and wrinkly and very creepy. She offers the two a drink and they want to come inside. Wisely, she denies that request.

So they will conduct the business outside. It seems that Sookie was Hadley’s sole heir according to her will. Apparently, Jason brushed her off when she really needed help once and she’s the grudge holding type. Also, Hadley was a maiden to the Queen of Louisiana.

Bill comes sneaking up, attempting to intimidate the visitors. Bubba must have gone to fetch him. Mr. Cataliades does not seemed thrilled to see him. Bubba walks up and the visitors have that shocked look. Bill has to quickly explain to call him Bubba and all. Then Sookie fill him in one what the men are doing at her house. At midnight.

The Queen and Hadley were…friendly with each other. So who would kill her? According to Waldo, it was the Fellowship of the Sun. This is what went down. He and Hadley had gone to the Cities of the Dead Cemetery (above ground crypts in New Orleans) to conduct a voodoo ritual. They were attempting to raise the dead. Legend says that the blood of the dead can raise the dead…at least for a few minutes. So like, if you wanted to talk to them or something. They were trying to talk to Marie Laveau (famous voodoo queen.) Hadley thought she was related to the woman through her dad’s side.

My cousin Hadley, the cheerleader, had become a vampire lesbian voodooienne. Who knew?

Waldo says that they were attacked and fought but the Fellowship managed to stake Hadley. Sookie and Bubba neither one believe his story. How did he and Hadley not hear the humans coming? Well, Waldo says, humans are always in the cemetery so how was he to know they were planning an attack. Mr. Cataliades informs them that Waldo and Hadley were both the queen’s favorites.

His tone suggested that any favorite of the queen’s was above reproach. But that wasn’t what his words were saying. I looked at him thoughtfully. At the same moment, I felt Bill shift beside me. We hadn’t been soul mates, I guess, since our relationship hadn’t worked out, but at odd moments we seemed to think alike, and this was one of those moments.

Haha, Bill. Y’all are NOT soul mates. Happiness.

She gets all of her guests something to drink and they sit outside to discuss Hadley’s will. She left Sookie all of her money and the stuff that is in her apartment. But Sookie is still interested in how Hadley died. Waldo acts all offended that she doesn’t believe him. Then she asks him what happened to him. (Not very nice, but you know.) Mr. Cataliades says he was punished by the queen. She made him stay in a tank of saline solution for a few years. Holy junk. But that’s why he’s all wrinkly.

But he was still a favorite? What happens to those who are not her favorites? Sookie suspects that Waldo may have been jealous of Hadley, who had gained the queen’s attention. He says it would have passed, as it always does when the queen tires of someone. But Mr. Cataliades says Hadley was different from the others. She may have lasted longer. And Waldo would have been SOL. Was he jealous, she wonders? Desperate?

Waldo goes angry vamp mode and so does Bill. Then Mr. Cataliades pulls out some silver something or other and pins his hands behind his back. Then he tosses a stake at Sookie. Bill catches it. Then the man states that the queen thought Sookie should be the one to kill Waldo. She knew all along Waldo was guilty. This seems to deflate Waldo.

Sookie gets the stake and steps close to Waldo, but can’t kill him. The only time she had staked a vampire, it had been life or death. But now… she just can’t. So she tells Mr. Cataliades to put him in the trunk and take him back to New Orleans. Whatever the queen will do to him will be worse. Bill and Bubba offer to kill Waldo but she says no. Waldo starts yelling mean things in an attempt to get them to kill him. He doesn’t want whatever the queen has in store.

But Mr. Cataliades says the queen will not be happy if he takes Waldo back. Sookie’s says not her problem but Bill assures her that it will be. But Waldo jumps out and tries to bite Sookie. So quick as everything, Bill stakes him.

Then the limo door opens and out steps the queen.

She was beautiful, of course, but not in a fairy-tale princess sort of way. I don’t know what I expected, but she wasn’t it. While Bill and Bubba scrambled to their feet and then bowed deeply, I gave her a good once-over. She was wearing a very expensive midnight blue suit and high heels. Her hair was rich reddish brown. Of course, she was pale as milk, but her eyes were large, titled, and almost the same brown as her hair. Her fingernails were polished red, and somehow that seemed very weird. She wore no jewelry.

Sookie starts to introduce herself but the queen already knows who she is and tells her this. She’s not exceptionally friendly. Shocker. Then she says she doesn’t see what all the fuss is about. She starts asking Sookie questions: was she going to send him back? He forced them to kill him? He was scared to come back to the queen? Yes. Yes. Yes. Did she plan the whole thing? No comment.

The queen says they will meet again. Sookie wonders if Hadley and Waldo ever managed to talk to Marie Laveau. The queen doesn’t know and says Sookie and Bill can try to contact the dead voodoo lady when they visit New Orleans.

I started to point out that unlike Hadley, I wasn’t dead, but I had the sense to shut my mouth. She might have ordered me to become a vampire, and I was afraid, very afraid, that then Bill and Bubba would have held me down and made me so.

I’m so glad she has such confidence in the supposed first love of her life. Of course, I imagine Bill would want her to be a vampire. Otherwise a relationship could never work, like I’ve said. I hope this isn’t some kind of foreshadowing. I do not want Sookie to become a vampire.

The queen gets back in the limo. Waldo is disintegrating.

Where’s Waldo? All over my yard…

LOL. She thanks Bill and Bubba for their help. Then Bubba asks if she knew the queen was in the limo the whole time. She did. She sensed another empty space in the vehicle besides Waldo. But she pretended she didn’t know. She assumes the queen must have masked herself from Waldo somehow cause he definitely didn’t know she was there. Bill wonders if she knew Waldo would try to attack her. She thought he might.

“So.” Bill caught my arms and looked down at me. “Were you trying to make sure he died all along, or were you trying to send him back to the queen?” “Yes,” I said.

One-word answers never hurt.

I’m kinda confused. So Sookie was trying to get Waldo to attack her? Since she knew the queen was in the car?

Well, either way, now Sookie has an unknown amount of money and some stuff. She just has to go to New Orleans and get it. Perhaps she will venture there in the next book. Also, now we’ve met Mr. Cataliades and he will be important later.

Until the next short story… now on to Definitely Dead.