When Sasha is walking home from school, he stumbles across the smallest and most adorable dog in the world.
Leo kisses him.
"If Marlo and I someday think the relationship is a really really bad idea will you at least listen to us?"
"Course." Sasha kisses him back. "You guys are my sanity check on lots of things. And I love you and care about what you think."
"I love you," he says, and kisses Leo again, and heads back to his room to put shoes on and grab Asher.
"What kind of supernatural is Leo, anyway? Some kind of fairy? He looks kind of like Lilith."
"I mean in the"-- handwaves-- "supernatural senses thing. The one where Marlo shines so bright he hurts to look at."
"That makes more sense. I wonder what Marlo looks like to people who aren't vampires, I should ask Leo — apparently when he isn't in human form he's even brighter."
"Not to look at, or he'd have mentioned it. Maybe to be around but not in a supernatural way, I don't think."
"Oh, well, that sucks. I don't want to hurt him."
Asher somersaults to his feet.
"....it's sort of private and I'm not sure how much I should be sharing but it isn't you hurting him, it's — there are things that cause him to be a way he would rather not be and recently they often involve you, just because both of the times he's been around you have been really stressful in pretty similar ways."
"Because there's a lot happening and he doesn't really understand what's going on but he obviously has to do something about it, and the something that needs to be done often turns out to be more vicious than he prefers to be when he has time to think about it. The fact that I'm getting hurt is part of it but 'people need to be punished' is not really the thing."
Asher scoops Sasha up in his arms. "Because I was like 'maybe I can hurt anybody who hurts Sasha, and then Marlo wouldn't have to be in confusing situations' but I think judging by what I thought when I was human that would not help."
Asher carries him outside the house and then starts to run. The houses blur. "Vampire transit!"
He liked being pinned against the wall when he was hypnotized, does he like it now?
(Things Sasha might notice about Asher's house now that he's less hypnotized: It's big, especially for a single person. Almost every wall is covered with bookshelves. There's a barre and a mirror in the living room. The kitchen features a really nice tea set.)
He does like getting pinned against the wall.
"So vampires do show up in mirrors, then?"