"Some combination, I think, of it not occurring to them and it seeming undignified. Or generally not appealing."

"For that matter, there are probably enough night-shift jobs for perfectly standard gainful employment to be an option."

He shrugs. "I have no special expertise in vampire psychology."

"You have more than I do," she points out.

"And yet, I cannot tell you why it is that so few of them get jobs."

"Did you ever consider it? Getting a job?"

"Not really," he says. "Sustained lying annoys me."

"What would you have to lie about? I don't think applications usually have those 'are you a human' questions like online registrations for websites sometimes do."

"At some point, something relevant would come up. Pretending I wasn't a clone was amusing; pretending I'm not a vampire would be the same at first, but I would get tired of it very quickly."

"Fair enough." Bella muses as they walk. "I can probably keep living with Charlie for a good long time, but if anything - supernatural or otherwise - happens to him, or if I ever just plain don't want to live with my dad anymore because I have somehow made it to age twenty-seven and it's getting old, I wonder how Slaying and a job would interact. I'm thinking not so well. School I don't care about cutting in an emergency even if I haven't had to yet. If I wound up doing that with a job they could fire me."

"Alas that we can't connect me to my inheritance and solve all these petty problems."

"The issue being that you were enough of a public figure that you'd get attention if you showed up and demanded it? Or you don't think they'd give it to you? I mean, you do still look like yourself."

"It would have been too upsetting at first, and after all this time not only am I no longer quite sure where the money has gone, I am fairly sure I will be accused of murder if I turn up to collect it."

Bella winces. "Eegh. Maybe Jarvis can just do computery stuff and steal it for you. It ought to be yours anyway."

"I'll ask."

"And then you can get me a corsage," she says lightly.

"Ah, romance."

She kisses his cheek. "It's not strictly necessary, but."

"If you would like a corsage, then you shall have a corsage."

"I would only like a not-stolen corsage," she clarifies. "So, only if you can afford it or come to be able to afford it."

"Noted."

Here is the brick place. Bella designates the first hour of her time as playing-with-fire time. She can reliably contain the blaze as long as she's not too distracted by anything more than conversation, and she keeps it in midair so if she does lose it it will vanish before touching any surfaces they would not like torched. After this hour, sparring!

Sparring.

Also victory kisses that, after tiredness is achieved, melt pretty smoothly into other things.

He does love those other things.