I walked around behind the gazebo peeking into the thick (yet well-trimmed) foliage. "Stevie Rae?"
Eyes glowing a horrible rust red, she stumbled out of the bushes and lurched toward me. "Give me the blood!"
Ohmygod, she looked like an absolutely crazy person. Hurriedly I reached into my bag, jerked out the bag of blood, and handed it to her. "Hang on a sec, I have a pair of scissors in here somewhere and I'll"
With a really disgusting snarl, Stevie Rae tore open the little lip of the bag with her teeth (uh, fangs is more like it), upended the bag, and gulped down the blood. When she'd squeezed the bag dry she dropped it on the ground. She was breathing like she'd just run a race when she finally looked up at me.
"Ain't pretty, is it?"
I smiled and tried my best to ignore how horrified I really was. "Well, my grandma always says that correct grammar and good manners make one more attractive, so you might want to drop the 'ain't' and try saying 'please' next time."
"I need more blood."
"I got you four more packets. They're in the refrigerator at the place you're going to be staying. Do you want to change your clothes here, or wait till we get there and take a shower? It's just down the street."
"What are you talking about? Just give me my clothes and the blood."
Her eyes weren't such a bright red, but she still looked mean and mad. She was even thinner and paler than she had been the night before. I drew a deep breath. "This has to stop, Stevie Rae."
"This is how it is with me now. This isn't going to change. I'm not going to change." She pointed to the outline of the crescent moon on her forehead. "It'll never be filled in and I'll always be dead."
I stared at the outline of her crescent moon. Was it fading? I thought it definitely looked lighter, or at least less distinct, which couldn't be good. That did shake me up. "You're not dead" was all I could think to say.
"I feel dead."
"Okay, well, you kinda look dead. I know when I look like crap I usually feel like crap, too. Maybe that's part of why you feel so bad." I reached into my bag and pulled out one of her cowboy boots. "Check out what I brought you."
"Shoes cannot fix the world." This was a subject Stevie Rae and the Twins had argued about before, and her voice held a hint of the old exasperation.
"That's not what the Twins would say."
The familiar tone in her voice flattened out to expressionless and cold. "What would the Twins say if they could see me now?"
I met Stevie Rae's red eyes. "They'd say you need a bath and an attitude check, but they'd also be unbelievably happy that you're alive."
"I'm not alive. That's what I keep trying to get you to understand."
"Stevie Rae, I am not going to understand that because you're walking and talking. I don't think you're anything like deadI think you're changed. Not like I'm Changing, as in becoming what we're used to recognizing as an adult vampyre. You've made a different kind of Change, and I think it's harder than the one that's happening to me. That's why you're going through all of this. Would you please give me a chance to help you? Can't you just try to believe everything might turn out okay?"
"I don't know how you can be so sure about that," she said.
I gave her the answer I felt deep in my soul, and knew the moment I'd said it that it was the right thing to say. "I'm sure about you being okay because I'm sure that Nyx still loves you and she let this happen for a reason."
The hope that flashed in Stevie Rae's red eyes was almost painful to look at. "You really believe Nyx hasn't given up on me?"
"Nyx hasn't and I haven't." I ignored her smell and gave her a firm hug, which she didn't return, but she also didn't jerk away from me or take a bite out of my neck, so I figured we were making progress. "Come on. The place I found for you to stay is just down the street."
I started walking, believing she would follow me, which she did after only a slight hesitation. We cut around the grounds of the museum and came out on Rockford, the street that runs in front of it. Twenty-seventh, the street Aphrodite's mansion (well, it's really her crazy parents' mansion) sits off of runs right into Rockford. Feeling more than a little dreamlike, I walked down the middle of the road in the darkness, concentrating on shrouding us in silence and invisibility, with Stevie Rae following only a couple of feet behind me. It was dark and seemed preternaturally silent. I glanced up through the winter branches of the huge old trees that lined the street. I should have been able to see an almost full moon, but clouds had rolled in, obscuring all but an indistinct glow of white where the moon should be. It had turned cold, and I was glad that my changing metabolism protected me from the whipping wind. I wondered if weather changes bothered Stevie Rae, and I was going to ask her about it when she suddenly spoke.
"Neferet won't like this."
"This?"
"Me being with you instead of with the others." Stevie Rae seemed really agitated and was plucking nervously at one hand with the other.
"Relax, Neferet won't know you're with me, at least not until we're ready for her to know," I said.
"She'll know as soon as she gets back and sees that I'm not with the rest of them."
"No, she'll just know you're gone. Anything could have happened to you." Then a thought hit me that was so incredible I stopped like I'd run into a tree. "Stevie Rae! You don't have to be around adult vamps to be okay!"
"Huh?"
"It proves you've Changed! You're not coughing and dying!"
"Zoey, I've already done that."
"No no no! That's not what I mean." I grabbed her arm, ignoring the fact that she immediately pulled it from my grasp and took a step away from me. "You can exist without the vamps. Only another adult vampyre can do that. So it is just like I said. You have Changed, it's just a different kind of Change!"
"And that's a good thing?"
"Yep!" I wasn't as sure as I sounded, but I was determined to keep a positive front for Stevie Rae. Plus, she was looking not-so-good. I mean, even more not-so-good than her usual yucky look. "What's wrong with you?"
"I need blood!" She wiped a shaky hand across her dirty face. "That little bag wasn't enough. You stopped me from feeding yesterday, so I haven't fed since the day before. Itit's bad when I don't feed." She tilted her head weirdly, like she was listening to a voice in the wind. "I can hear the blood whispering through their veins."
"Whose veins?" I was as intrigued as I was grossed out.
She made a sweeping gesture with her arm that was feral and graceful. "The humans sleeping around us." Her voice had dropped to a husky murmur. There was something in the tone of it that made me want to move closer to her, even though her eyes had flushed a bright scarlet again and she smelled so bad it made me want to gag. "One of them is awake." She pointed to the huge mansion to the right of where we'd stopped. "It's a girl a teenagershe's by herself in her room "
Stevie Rae's voice was an alluring singsong. My heart had started to beat hard against my chest. "How do you know that?" I whispered.
She turned her burning eyes on me. "There's so much I know. I know about your bloodlust. I can smell it. There's no reason you shouldn't give in to it. We could enter the house. Go to the girl's room and take her together. I'd share her with you, Zoey."
For a moment I was lost in the obsession that heated Stevie Rae's eyes, and in my own need. I hadn't had human blood since the taste Heath had given me more than a month ago. The memory of that one exquisite drink lingered in my body like a tantalizing secret. Completely mesmerized, I listened to Stevie Rae spin a web of darkness that was catching me in its beautiful, sticky depths.
"I can show you how to get in the house. I can sense secret ways. You could get the girl to invite me inI can't go into a person's home now unless they invite me first. But once I'm in " Stevie Rae laughed.
It was her laugh that snapped me out of it. Stevie Rae used to have the best laugh ever. It was happy and young and innocently in love with life. Now what came out of her mouth was a mean, twisted echo of that old joy.
"The apartment is two houses down. There's blood in the fridge." I turned and started walking quickly down the street.
"It's not warm and it's not fresh." She sounded pissed, but she was following me again.
"It's fresh enough, and there's a microwave. You can nuke it."
She didn't say anything else, and we came to the mansion in just a few minutes. I led her around to the garage apartment, opened the outside door, and stepped in. I was halfway up the stairs when I realized Stevie Rae wasn't behind me. Hurrying back down to the door I saw her standing outside in the darkness. All that was clearly visible of her was the red of her eyes.
"You have to invite me in," she said.
"Oh, sorry." What she'd said before hadn't really registered with me, and now I felt a jolt of shock at this further proof of Stevie Rae's soul-deep difference. "Uh, come on in," I said quickly.
Stevie Rae stepped forward and ran smack into an invisible barrier. She gave a painful yelp, which turned into a snarl. Her eyes glowed up at me. "Guess your plan won't work. I can't get in there."
"I thought you said you just had to be invited in."
"By someone who lives at the house. You don't live here."
Above me, Aphrodite's coldly polite voice (sounding uncomfortably like her mother) called out. "I live here. Come in."
Stevie Rae stepped over the threshold with no problem at all. She started up the stairs and had almost reached me when Aphrodite's voice must have registered on her. I saw her face change from expressionless to slit-eyed and dangerous.
"You brought me to her house!" Stevie Rae was talking to me, but staring at Aphrodite.
"Yes, and why is actually easy to explain." I considered grabbing her in case she started to bolt, and then I remembered how weirdly strong she'd become, so I started to center myself instead, wondering if my affinity with wind could be used to have a breeze slam the door shut before she could escape.
"How could you explain it! You know I hate Aphrodite." Then she did look at me. "I die and now she's your friend?"
I was opening my mouth to assure Stevie Rae that Aphrodite and I hadn't exactly buddied up when Aphrodite's haughty voice interrupted me.
"Get real. Zoey and I are not friends. Your little nerd herd is still intact. The only reason I'm involved at all is because Nyx has a totally bizarre sense of humor. So come in or go the hell away. Like I care" Her voice trailed off as she stomped back into the apartment.
"Do you trust me?" I asked Stevie Rae.
She looked at me for what seemed like a long time before she answered. "Yes."
"Then come on." I continued up the stairs with Stevie Rae following reluctantly behind.
Aphrodite was lounging on the couch pretending to watch MTV. When we entered the room she wrinkled up her nose and said, "What is that disgusting smell? It's like something died and" She looked up and caught sight of Stevie Rae. Her eyes widened. "Never mind." She pointed to the rear of the apartment. "Bathroom's back there."
I handed Stevie Rae my bag. "Here ya go. We'll talk when you come out."
"Blood first," Stevie Rae said.
"Go on back and I'll bring a bag to you."
Stevie Rae was glaring at Aphrodite, who was staring at the TV. "Bring two," she practically hissed.
"Fine. I'll bring two."
Without another word, Stevie Rae left the room. I watched her move down the short hall with a weird, feral stride.
"Hello! Gross, nasty, and totally disturbing," Aphrodite whispered. "Like you couldn't have warned me?"
"I tried. You thought you knew everything. Remember?" I whispered back. Then I hurried into the little kitchen and got the bags of blood. "You also said you'd be nice."
I knocked on the closed bathroom door. Stevie Rae didn't say anything, so I opened it slowly and peeked in. She was holding her jeans, T-shirt, and boots, and was just standing there, in the middle of the very nice bathroom, staring at the clothes. She was partially turned away from me, so I couldn't be sure, but I thought she might have been crying.
"I brought the blood," I said softly.
Stevie Rae shook herself, rubbed a hand across her face, and then tossed the clothes and boots onto the top of the marble counter by the sink. She held out her hand for the bags. I gave them to her, along with the pair of scissors I'd grabbed from the kitchen.
"Do you need help finding anything?" I asked.
Stevie Rae shook her head. Without looking at me she said, "Are you waiting around because you're curious about how I look naked or because you want a sip of the blood?"
"Neither." I kept my voice perfectly normal, refusing to get pissed at her when she was so clearly baiting me. "I'll be out in the living room. You can pitch your old clothes out in the hall and I'll throw them away for you." I shut the bathroom door firmly behind me.
Aphrodite was shaking her head at me when I rejoined her. "You think you can fix that?"
"Keep your voice down!" I whispered. Then I sat heavily on the opposite end of the couch. "And, no, I don't think I can fix her. I think you and Nyx and I can fix her."
Aphrodite shuddered. "She smells as bad as she looks."
"I'm as aware of that as she is."
"I'm just sayin', ugh."
"Say whatever, just don't say it to Stevie Rae."
"Then for the record I just want to say that the girl doesn't feel safe to me," Aphrodite said, holding up her hand like she was taking an oath. "I have two words for her: time bomb. I think she'd even freak out your nerd herd."
"I really wish you'd stop calling them that," I said. God, I was exhausted.
"You have geek-ends," she said.
"Huh?" I had no clue what she was talking about.
"There are weekends where your whole gang gets together to watch marathons of Star Wars and Lord of the Rings movies."
"Yeah, so?"
Aphrodite gave a melodramatic eye roll. "You not getting how geeky that is proves my point. You guys are definitely a nerd herd."
I heard the bathroom door open and close, so I didn't bother to tell Aphrodite that, yes, indeed, I knew exactly how geeky those movies were but that geeky could also be fun, especially when you're dorking out with all your friends and eating popcorn and talking about how totally hot Anakin and Aragorn are (I kinda like Legolas, too, but the Twins say he's way too gay. Damien, of course, adores him.). I grabbed a garbage bag from under the sink in the kitchen and crammed Stevie Rae's disgusting clothes in it, tying it up and then opening the apartment door and tossing it down the stairs.
"Vile," Aphrodite said.
I plopped down on the couch, ignored her and stared, unseeing, at the TV screen.
"Are we not going to talk about it." Aphrodite jerked her chin in the direction of the bathroom.
"Stevie Rae is a her, not an it. "
"She smells like an it."
"And no. We're not going to talk about her until she joins us," I said firmly.
CHAPTER 13
Refusing to gossip with Aphrodite about Stevie Rae, I went back to staring at the TV, but after a while I could not sit still, so I got up and went from window to window closing the shutters and the thick drapes. That didn't take long, so I headed into the kitchen and started to dig though the cupboards. I'd already noticed that the fridge had a six-pack of Perrier, a couple of bottles of white wine, and a few bricks of that expensive imported cheese that smells like feet. There were some packages of butcher-paper-wrapped meat and fish in the freezer and ice cubes, but that was it. The cupboards had a bunch of stuff in them, but it was all rich-people food. You know, imported tins of fish that still have their heads on, smoked oysters (eesh), other strange meat and pickled stuff, and long boxes of something called water crackers. There was not one can of decent pop.
"We're gonna have to go to the grocery store," I said.
"If you can keep Stinky locked back in the bedroom, all you have to do is get into my parents' on-line account with Petty's Foods. Click what you want from the store. They'll deliver and charge it to my parents."
"Won't they freak when they see the bill?"
"They won't even notice," she said. "The bank pays it directly. It's no big deal."
"Really?" I was amazed people actually lived like that. "You guys are rich."
Aphrodite shrugged. "Yeah. Whatever."
Stevie Rae cleared her throat and Aphrodite and I jumped. The sight of her made my heart squeeze hard. Her short blond hair was wet, and it hung around her face in familiar curls. Her eyes were still tinted red and her face was thin and pale, but it was clean. Her cloths were baggy, but she looked like Stevie Rae again.
"Hi," I said softly. "Feel Better?"
She looked uncomfortable, but nodded.
"You smell better," Aphrodite said.
I glared at her.
"What? That was nice."
I sighed and shot her an obvious you're not helping look. "Okay, how about we talk about coming up with a plan?" I meant it to be a rhetorical question, but Aphrodite spoke up right away.
"What exactly are we planning about? I mean, I know Stevie Rae has, uh, unique issues, but I'm not sure what you think can be done about them. She's dead. Or undead dead." She glanced a Stevie Rae. "Okay, I'm not actually trying to be mean, but"
"It's not mean. It's just the truth." Stevie Rae interrupted her. "But don't pretend that you care about my feelings now any more than you did before I died."
"I was trying to be nice," Aphrodite snapped, sounding the opposite of nice.
"Try harder," I said. Then, "Sit down Stevie Rae." She sat in the puffy leather chair beside the couch. I ignored my headache and sat on the couch. "Okay, here's what I know." I ticked the points off on my fingers. "First, Stevie Rae doesn't have to live around adult vamps anymore, so that means that she has completed a Change." Aphrodite started to open her mouth and I hurried on. "Second, she has to have blood, even more often than normal adult vamps." I looked from Stevie Rae to Aphrodite. "Do either of the two of you know if adult vamps go crazy if they don't drink blood regularly?"
"In Advanced Vampyre Soc we've learned that adults need to drink blood regularly to stay healthy. That's mind and body." Aphrodite shrugged. "Neferet is the prof for the class, and she's never said anything about vamps going crazy if they don't drink. But that might be one of the things they tell us only after we've made the Change."
"I didn't know anything about it till I died," Stevie Rae said.
"Can it be blood from any mammal, or does it have to be human blood?"
"Human."
I'd asked Stevie Rae, but she and Aphrodite answered at the same time.
"Okay, well, besides having to drink blood and not having to be around adult vamps, Stevie Rae can't come in someone's house unless she's invited."
"By someone who lives there," Stevie Rae added. "But that's not such a big deal."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
Stevie Rae turned her red-tinged gaze one me. "I can get humans to do things they don't want to do."
With an effort, I didn't shiver.
"That's not a shocker," Aphrodite said. "Lots of adult vamps have such strong personalities that they can be very persuasive to humans. That's one of the reasons they're so damn scared of us. You should know about that, Zoey."
"Huh?"
Aphrodite raised an eyebrow. "You've Imprinted with your human boyfriend. How tough was it for you to persuade him to let you have a little suck." She paused, smiling wickedly. "Of his blood, I mean."
I ignored her stankness. "Okay, Stevie Rae has that in common with Changed vamps, too. But vamps don't have to be invited in to someone's house, do they?"
"Never heard of anything like that," Aphrodite said.
"It's because I'm soulless," Stevie Rae said in a voice totally washed of all emotion.
"You are not soulless," I said automatically.
"You're wrong. I died and Neferet figured out a way to bring my body back, but she didn't bring my humanity back, too. My soul's still dead."
I couldn't even stand to think that what she was saying might be possible, and I opened my mouth to argue with her, but Aphrodite was quicker.
"That makes sense. It's why you can't come inside a living person's home without being invited. It's also probably why you'll burn up if the sun hits you. No soulno standing against the light."
"How did you know about that?" Stevie Rae asked.
"I'm vision girl, remember?"
"Thought Nyx abandoned you and took the visions away, too," Stevie Rae said cruelly.
"That's what Neferet wants people to believe because Aphrodite had visions about herand about you," I said pointedly. "But Nyx has no more abandoned her than she's abandoned you."
"So why are you helping Zoey?" Stevie Rae shot the question at Aphrodite. "And don't give me that crap about Nyx having a sense of humor. What's the real reason?"
Aphrodite sneered. "Why I'm helping is my own damn business."
Stevie Rae sprang to her feet and moved across the room so fast that her movements were one big blur. Before I could blink she had her hands around Aphrodite's throat and her face pressed close to hers. "You're wrong. It's my business, too, because I'm here. Remember, you invited me in?"
"Stevie Rae, let her go." I kept my voice calm, but my pulse was pounding like crazy. Stevie Rae looked and sounded dangerous and more than a little crazy.
"I've never liked her, Zoey. You know that. I told you a zillion times she was no damn good and you should stay far away from her. I don't know why I shouldn't snap her neck."
I was beginning to worry about how bugged Aphrodite's eyes looked and how bright red her face was turning. She struggled against Stevie Rae, but it was like a little kid trying to break the hold of a big, mean adult. Help me to get through to Stevie Rae. I sent up a silent prayer to the Goddess as I began to center myself so I could call the power of the elements to me. Then words whispered into my mind and I quickly repeated them.
"You shouldn't snap her neck because you're not a monster."
She didn't let go of Aphrodite, but Stevie Rae turned her head so she could look at me. "How do you know that?"
I didn't hesitate, "Because I believe in our Goddess, and because I believe in the part of you that is still my best friend."
Stevie Rae released Aphrodite, who started coughing and rubbing her neck.
"Say you're sorry," I told Stevie Rae. Her red eyes pierced me, but I lifted my chin and stared right back at her. "Say you're sorry to Aphrodite," I repeated.
"I'm not sorry," Stevie Rae said as she walked (at a normal speed) back to the chair.
"Nyx has give Aphrodite an affinity for earth," I said abruptly. Stevie Rae's body jerked like I'd slapped her. "So by attacking her you're really attacking Nyx."
"Nyx is letting her take my place!"
"No. Nyx is letting her help you. I cannot figure this out on my own, Stevie Rae. I can't tell any of our friends about you because if I do it's only a matter of time before Neferet knows everything they know, and even though I'm not sure about much, I do absolutely believe Neferet has gone bad. So basically it's us against a powerful High Priestess. Aphrodite is the only fledgling besides me who Neferet can't read. We need her help."
Stevie Rae narrowed her eyes at Aphrodite, who was still rubbing her neck and sucking air. "I still want to know why she'd bother to help us. She's never liked any of us. She's a liar and a user and a total bitch."
"Atonement," Aphrodite managed to gasp.
"What?" Stevie Rae said.
Aphrodite glared at her. Her voice was raspy, but she was definitely regaining her breath and had gone from being scared to being pissed. "What's wrong? Is the word too big for you? A-T-O-N-E-M-E-N-T." She spelled it. "It means I have to make up for something I've done. A lot of somethings, actually. So I have to do what I didn't do beforewhich is to follow Nyx's will." She paused and cleared her throat, grimacing in pain. "No, I don't like it any better than you do. And, just by the by, you still smell bad and your country-ass clothes are stupid."
"Aphrodite answered your question," I told Stevie Rae. "She could have been nicer about it, but you did just try to choke her to death. Now apologize to her." I stared hard at Stevie Rae while I silently called spirit energy to me. I saw Stevie Rae flinch, and she finally looked away.
"Sorry," she muttered.
"I can't hear her," Aphrodite said.
"And I can't deal with the two of you acting like big of babies!" I snapped. "Stevie Rae, apologize to her like a normal person instead of spoiled brat."
"I'm sorry," Stevie Rae said, frowning at Aphrodite.
"Okay, look," I said. "We need to have some kind of truce between the three of us. I cannot be afraid if I turn my head the two of you are going to be trying to kill each other."
"She couldn't kill me," Stevie Rae said, curling her lip unattractively.
"Because you're already dead or because I don't want to get close enough to your stinkiness to kick your bony ass?" Aphrodite asked in a sickeningly sweet voice.
"This is exactly what I mean!" I shouted. "Stop it! If we can't get along, how in the hell can we expect to figure out a way to stand up to Neferet and fix what's happened to Stevie Rae?"
"We have to stand up to Neferet?" Aphrodite said.
"Why do we have to stand up to her?" Stevie Rae said.
"Because she's fucking evil!" I yelled.
"You said fuck," Stevie Rae said.
"Yeah, and you didn't get struck by lightning or melt or anyfuckingthing like that," Aphrodite said gleefully.
"That didn't even look right coming out of your mouth, Z," Stevie Rae said.
I couldn't help smiling at Stevie Rae. She suddenly looked and sounded so much like herself that I felt a huge rush of hope. She was still in there. I just had to figure out a way to get her to be in touch with
"That's it!" I sat forward excitedly.
"You cussing is it? I don't think so, Z. It's really just not you," Stevie Rae said.
"I think you were right when you said your soul was missing, Stevie Rae. Or at least part of it's missing."
"You're sounding like that's a good thing, which I totally don't get," Aphrodite said.
"I hate to agree with her, but yeah, why is my missing soul a good thing?" Stevie Rae said.
"Because that's how we fix you!" They just stared at me with blank, dopey looks. I rolled my eyes. "All we have to do is figure out how to get your soul back into you all in one piece and you'll be whole. You might not be exactly like you used to be. Clearly, you've completed a Change that's not exactly normal."
"Clearly," Aphrodite mumbled.
"But with a healed soul you get your humanity backyou get yourself back. And that's really what's most important. All this other stuff," I made an abstract gesture at her. "You know, your weird eyes and the whole drink-blood-or-you-go-crazy issue, all that stuff can be dealt with if you're really you again."
"Is this more of that what's-inside-is-more-important-than-what's-outside shit?" Aphrodite said.
"It is, and Aphrodite you are getting on my last nerve with your negative attitude," I said.
"I think your group needs a pessimist," she said, looking kinda pouty.
"You aren't part of her group," Stevie Rae said.
"Neither are you right now, Stinky," Aphrodite shot back.
"Hateful hag! Don't you ever"
"Enough!" I flung my hands out at both of them while I concentrated on the fact that both of them needed a good spanking. Wind obeyed me and they were knocked back in their seats as a small, concentrated gale surged around them. "Okay, stop now," I said quickly. The wind instantly died. "Uh, sorry. Lost my temper."
Aphrodite immediately began to run her fingers through her completely messed up hair. "I think you lost your damn mind," Aphrodite grumbled.
Personally, I thought that she might have been right, but I didn't want to say so. I glanced at the clock and was shocked to see that it was seven o'clock. No wonder I was exhausted. "Look, you two. We're all tired. Let's get some sleep and meet back here after the Full Moon Ritual. I'll do some more research and see if I can come up with anything about missing or broken souls and how to fix them." At least I had something I could focus on now, versus flailing around aimlessly in the library. Well, that is when I wasn't making out with Loren. Ah, hell. I'd forgotten about him.
"Sounds like a plan to me. I'm ready to get out of here." Aphrodite stood up. "My parents are going to be gone for three weeks, so you don't need to worry about them coming home. There's yard boys who come twice a week, but that's during the day andoh, yeahyou'll burst into flames if you go out during the day, so them seeing you shouldn't be a problem, either. The maid service usually comes once a week when my parents are gone, to keep the house all perfect, but they only come out here when my grandma's visiting, so no problem with them, either."