Dirt, clay, and mud drenched the tires and painted the white pickup brown. The edges of the outer patch that held the tear in the metal on the driver's side of the bed together could barely be seen and the grill needed to be washed. But there was a slight smile on the goddess' face as she pulled into the driveway of her private residence and pulled around back. She rolled up right next to the lawn, glancing at the welding torch standing in front of the garage and wondering for a brief moment why it was between the two doors rather than in front of the one directly before her. She let it go, however, as she had probably moved it herself and forgotten. After more millennia than she could count of life, a deity's mind wasn't exactly perfect anymore.
The slamming of the truck door was not the first indication to a strange woman inside the large house that the mistress of his this home had at last returned. A black tapestry of stars topped the night-darkened mix of long shadows and hidden beauty, yet to the ancient vampire, it was as plain as day. Her lily-white skin was paler even than her lovely white dress, an old-fashioned Sunday best completed with diamond-covered fairy-shaped earrings, a dazzling diamond necklace resting comfortably between her ample breasts, and a pair of cute white sandals topped with daisies. Her golden-blonde bun left no stray hairs to be played with, and her nails were unpainted but perfect.
The mistress of the house was far less elegant. Unlike the vampire whose mind she sensed as she stepped inside, her face bore no freckles. Her steel-toed American flag Converse sneakers weren't completely clean, but neither were they filthy. Her form-fitting Wranglers had dirt stains on them and a few rips here and there in the legs, but they were as treasured to her as a chest of Spanish gold was to a pirate. Her black t-shirt bore the image of a happy Yoshi waving around Mario's hat - clearly marking her as a fan of Nintendo. The metroid earrings didn't hurt that image either, though unique among this apparent set was the bracelet on her left wrist: several lines of seashells strung together beautifully. Then, of course, there was the choker she wore: interlocking bronze plates flashing just below her blood-red hair. Her nails were painted a dark green and her hands were clean as they tossed her keys onto the small table. She locked the door behind her and turned to the woman. She didn't bother flipping on the hall light; she could see as well as the vampire in the darkness.
"What are you doing here?" the goddess asked the creature of the night.
The vampire did not smile. She seemed rather cold, though perhaps that was merely a marker of her undeath, yet graceful and elegant as she slowly stepped forward. While the goddess' voice was slightly deeper than that of a typical woman's and as strong as her body, the vampire's voice was smooth and coy like the babbling of a gentle brook as it sang nature's lullaby.
"I keep a legal investigator on retainer who keeps tabs on anything - or anyone - that might somehow trace back to me. It seems an attorney recently opened an investigation into the property I own, located at this address."
Ah, so that was it. At last, the owner of the property had been found.
"So it's you," the goddess said nonchalantly. "When I got a notice in the mail saying my house's value had been frozen in light of something like forty thousand owed in back taxes, I hired a lawyer to investigate. Turns out the last owner's will had a loophole thrown in for good measure: in the event of the property's sale prior to his death, the title would be split in half. I own the house, but I didn't know it wasn't part of the property; no one did. My attorney's been searching for the owner of the property to settle this while the state charges me a fee to let me keep living here. Basically, I'm paying rent to the landlord of a house I own."
The goddess did not sound at all happy about this, but her tone was relatively neutral. This was where the negotiating began. The goddess knew of the vampire and the vampire knew of the goddess, but neither had actually met the other before. Yet this was no casual visit; this was a meeting to determine if some arrangement could be made. Honestly, the vampire could care less about the Montana property; it was only sixteen square acres of barren land, though the garden upon it and the field for the goddess' grazing horses had obviously been put to very good use. Then again, this was the goddess of the earth, Gaia; it wasn't surprising that she could make things grow where others had not.
On the other hand, the vampire was pretty good at making things grow herself. She'd had more than three thousand years in which to learn a multitude of skills. But she still saw no use for the property herself, and so she was willing to make a deal.
"I could pay the back taxes easily. I could transfer the title of the property into your name. But yours is a strange situation, Gaia. How far you have fallen," she said, this last almost in a whisper as she shook her pretty head. "Showing off your body to mortals for a paltry few greenbacks. It is clear you cannot buy the property from me. Perhaps we can make another kind of deal."
The goddess was slightly offended.