“What is it, Sera? Is it the baby? What's wrong?” Paul asked, worried.
“I'm fine, honey. No, it's not the baby. I forgot my purse in the car.”
“Oh,” Paul breathed. “I'll go get it for you.”
“No, no. I'm fine. The walk will keep my legs from going to sleep.
Sitting like that for too long isn't good for me, I don't care what the doctor's say.”
“Be careful and hurry back. Love you.”
“I love you too, and I will be right back,” Sera promised as she hurried away.
There it is! Sera thought as she caught sight of her purse on the front floorboard. Exactly where I left it. I am such a ditz. She shut the door before turning and heading back towards the front of the restaurant when suddenly the parking lot light shut off, sending her into a world of darkness. Caught off guard and unable to see, she stood there, dumbfounded.
What in the world? I can't see a thing. I hope I don't trip.
Suddenly, a shape began to solidify in the blackness in front of her, followed by a voice.
“Hello, pretty lady. Need some help?” the silhouette called.
Thank goodness. “Yes, please, if you wouldn't mind. Do you have a flashlight or something? I can't see anything.”
“No, but then again, I don't need one. Here, let me help you. Take my arm,” the voice replied close by.
A face appeared in front of her, seeming to come from thin air.
Shocked, Sera automatically took a step backward.
“Well, well,” the husky voice chuckled. “Dinner…and a snack. I didn't realize you were pregnant. What a good night this turned out to be.”
“Please,” Sera stuttered, suddenly very afraid. “If you could just help me back to the front of the restaurant, my husband's inside waiting.
Please.”
“Oh, I'm afraid that's just not possible any more, not in your state. I didn't know tonight was going to turn into such a good night for me.
I thought I'd have to go out after I was done with you to find someone else to fill me up, but, since you're with child this is really all I need. What an exquisite night. I'm so lucky to have found you out here, all alone. It's been decade's since I had such a delectable treat! I'm really going to enjoy this,” the once handsome stranger sneered, advancing into full view. His face seemingly grotesquely contorted, teeth bared. “You, on the other hand, are not.” Before Sera could scream, the savage beast leapt at her, attacking her throat with its teeth. She could feel the warm blood flowing out of her gaping wound, but could not feel the pain itself.
Oh my God. I can’t feel anything. I must be in shock. I'm going to die, aren't I?
She tried to scream for help but only a feeble squeak spilt out, barely audible, from her mouth. Her eyes began to fall shut on their own accord and her limbs grew heavy, numb.
Paul?! Oh God, my baby! My Adelin! Help!!
Then the world shifted into blackness and her along with it.
Chapter Three
May 30, Present Day
“A delin,” Dad chides, startled by my outburst.
“What?! You know I’m right!” I shoot back, defensive.
“Adelin,” Dad says more forcefully, his face grave. “If not for Marissa, then things with your mother- and you- would’ve been a lot worse. I would have lost you both.”
I turn to face Dr. Thorne harshly. “Thanks for killing my mother so I could live.”
“Adelin!” Dad chokes, appalled.
“Well…..” I trail off.
“Adelin,” he repeats, softer. “There’s something else you need to know.”
“What, that I only have twenty-four hours to live? Why don’t you just let her kill me now to save me the suffering?” I spit out sarcastically.
Dad sighs deeply, taking a moment to close his eyes and steel himself before continuing. “Your mother’s alive.”
“Bull—”
“I know this is hard to believe, but it’s true. Your mother is alive.”
“What about the disease? I thought you said it killed her?” I demand, angry.
“It’s….complicated,” Dad mumbles, looking to Dr. Thorne for help.
“How complicated, like the disease didn’t kill her but she didn’t want me around so she left?”
“No, Adelin, your mother loved you- loves you- more than life.”
“Then what, where is she now? Why isn’t she here, with us?” I choke out, tears beginning to sting my eyes.
“We, all of us, Marissa, your mother, and I, decided it would be better this way. There were….side-effects from the disease…..” Dad trails off, suddenly looking uncomfortable.
“So, you decided it would be better for me to grow up thinking my mother was dead?!” I spit harshly. How could he have kept this from me?! Didn’t I deserve to know my mother was alive? My whole life I had thought she was dead, now I know she just left me.
“It was dangerous for you to know.”
“Yeah, how so?” I scoff.
“Adelin, it’s not your Dad’s fault,” Dr. Thorne cuts in. “If you want to be angry at someone then be angry with me. I’m the one who did this.”
“Marissa….” Dad warns.
“Paul, she needs to know,” Dr. Thorne says, waving her hands dismissively at my dad. “Would you rather she found out on her own? No, I didn’t think so. Adelin, the side-effects your dad was talking about, they’re not normal. That’s why it was dangerous for you to know until now.”
Bewildered, I sit silently before calmly asking the question they are both waiting for. “What side-effects?”
Dr. Thorne levels her gaze at me before speaking. “Your mother is not ‘normal’ anymore. She is what we call ‘Immortal’, like me.” My gaze flicks back and forth between the two of them, trying to gauge if they’re serious or not. Dad sits silently in the high-backed armchair on my right, his face impassive while Dr. Thorne continues looking at me placidly. “Immortal? You can’t be serious?!” I burst.
“Honey, we’re not joking. Marissa is telling the truth,” Dad replies, unaffected by my outburst.
“Is this some sort of joke? Wait….have you two been drinking?” I ask, eyeing them both suspiciously, suddenly reminded of our last New Year’s party.
“I thought this is how you’d react, so, I’m prepared to prove it,” Dr.
Thorne says, standing. I sit quietly, confused, while she walks out of the room. My confusion only deepens when she returns a few moments later holding a large, shiny kitchen knife in one hand. The light in the room bounces off the blade eerily as she raises it and brings it down, hard and fast, across her open palm.
What the fuck?! I watch in horror as a smooth gash appears, instantly swelling and overflowing with blood. She raises her mutilated hand in front of her chest to give me a better view, which causes several crimson drops to splatter down on the thick beige carpet at her feet. My eyes are transfixed, frantic, as the blood flow seems to ebb and then stop completely as the tear in her flesh heals itself shut. I blink several times, unsure of what I had witnessed.
When I look again, the only evidence of the cut is the drops of blood staining the carpet.
My brain, unable to process what I just saw, begins to calculate the odds of getting my cell phone and dialing 9-1-1. I have no idea what I would say. Help , there’s a crazy person with a knife? Or even if I would be quick enough to place the call before she attacks me.
“Still don’t believe me?” Dr. Thorne asks, smiling grimly. She glances down at my purse, where my cell phone waits, then back up at me. “How about this then…..you’re afraid if you do believe me then that would mean your mother chose to leave you.”
“What are you now, my psychiatrist?” I snap. “Dad, come on, you can’t be serious,” I say, glancing at him.
He looks back and forth between the two of us, a weary look on his face, before climbing to his feet. “I’m going to make a pot of coffee.
You two can sort this out.”
> Was he really going to just leave me in here with some lunatic holding a knife?! Sensing my unease, Dr. Thorne places the knife carefully in the center of the small coffee table. Maybe it would just be easier to play along? Just long enough until I am able to get her out of the house so I can reason with my dad….. “I know what you’re thinking, Adelin….” Dr. Thorne trails off.
“Fine,” I exhale, throwing my hands up in a gesture of defeat. “You can read minds. You’re Immortal. What else can you do?”
“What about this?” In the blink of an eye she disappears from the couch and is standing, elegantly poised, at the opposite end of the room. Unable to suppress it, a gasp escapes my open lips.
“What the fuck! How did you— What are you?” My eyes narrow as I try to make sense of what I just witnessed. Did she really just do what I think she did? Maybe it was the light playing tricks on me or she moved when I blinked….
“I told you Adelin, I’m an Immortal.”
“So, what, you’re a vampire?” I question uncertainly as I glance uneasily towards the kitchen where Dad is hiding. Does she really think she’s Immortal? Really?! I can’t believe my dad would leave me alone with a complete psycho. “Look, I don’t know what you’ve been smoking but there’s no such thing as immortality- everything dies.”
“What do I have to do to make you believe me?”
“Um….can you fly?” I ask picking the first thing that comes to mind.
“No.” She answers simply.
“Do crucifixes hurt you?”
“No.”
Damn, there goes that plan. I was really looking forward to hurting her, at least a little bit. “What about garlic or holy water or sunlight?”
“No, no, and no.”
“Then what can you do?” I ask frustrated. I’m sick and tired of playing this game with her.
“Well, I already showed you that I heal and I can read minds, at least the gist of what you’re thinking. There’s not really any discernible difference between us and mortals- we’re pretty much the same, we just have some heightened senses and a few extra attributes. I know this doesn’t make any sense and you think I’m just some crazy person but I need you to at least try to believe me. Please.” At least she was starting to make a bit of sense now and not acting so off her rocker. I decide to appease her. “So….you’re serious?
You’re a vampire?” I ask, attempting to sound believable.
“Yes,” she replies with a smile.
“Do you drink blood?” My nose wrinkles up in disgust at the thought.
“Yes…and no. Relax,” she says with a laugh. “I’m not going to attack you- or drink your blood. Yours, or your dad’s.” Was he one of them? “No, your dad is mortal,” she replies reading my thoughts as she slowly, cautiously, walks back across the room to sit in the chair Dad had occupied. “Look Adelin, I know this is a lot to process, especially this late at night, but you need to believe me.”
“My mom,” I start uncertainly, “she’s like you….a vampire?”
“We prefer ‘Immortal’ but yes, for the most part, your mother is one of us. Although, she was made into what she is and I was born this way.”
Is my mom crazy too? Does she think she’s a vampire as well and is now locked up in some insane asylum? “Then why did she have to leave if she’s alive?”
“It was necessary. She didn’t want to put you in danger- from herself or others. Imagine growing up with a mother who had so-called ‘super powers’ and never aged. Kids like to talk, what if you’d told someone your mom was a vampire as you call it? Do you think it’d be easy to pack up and move, start over, every few years as people realized there was truth in what you said? She did it for you, to make sure you grew up with as normal a life as she could ensure.
And what if she had hurt you? Made Immortals suffer from horrible bouts of blood-lust…especially right after the change. What if she had attacked you, or killed you? Or your dad? She’d never have been able to live with herself. She did it to protect you. She loves you- still, even though you’ve never met.”
Dad appears in the doorway, holding three coffee mugs in his hands. He hesitantly surveys the scene before him, Dr. Thorne relaxed into the armchair, me rigid on the couch, before he tentatively walks over and places the cups on the table to sit down beside me. “Are you all right?” he asks me as he eyes Dr. Thorne carefully.
“I’m…..”I falter, glancing at my hands sitting numbly in my lap.
“What about the disease? You said I have it, does that mean— Am I going to become….like you?” My eyes flash to Dr. Thorne, horrified at the thought. I didn’t want to go crazy! What if this disease was real and I start thinking I’m a vampire as well and I attack someone and they lock me up forever?
“That depends entirely on you.”
“Huh? I don’t understand.”
“You have a choice, Adelin, one your mother did not. She was attacked by one of us and was close to death when she arrived at the hospital. I only turned her because of how distraught your father was. I knew what had happened to your mother, that her attacker was an Immortal, and I wasn’t about to let her suffer and die when there was something I could do to prevent it. She was made into what she is, you were born.”
“What difference does that make?”
“For your mother it was either die or become Immortal, you can choose to remain as you are now, human, or you can become like us….” Dr. Thorne trails off dramatically as she glances at me. “You are what we call a hybrid. Your mother was mortal when you were conceived but Immortal at the time of your birth. In effect, you have both types of blood in your system and either one can win out over the other but the choice is yours alone to make. The two types of blood should have been at war with each other a long time ago, which is why we thought you were safe. Apparently, we were wrong, but that only goes to show that the human blood in you is very strong.”
“What Marissa is trying to say is that you can choose to remain human,” Dad says, startling me. I had been so caught up in what Dr.
Thorne had been saying that I had forgotten he was sitting right beside me.
“What does that mean though?” I ask uncertainly.
Dr. Thorne speaks up softly from the chair, a stoic expression on her face. “It means that you don’t have to complete the change. You can stay as you are now but you should know that if you choose that route, then you can never see, or try to contact, your mother.”
Chapter Four
Present Day
‘ W hy did you tell me about her then?!” I accuse, more angry than I had been all night.
“Adelin, calm down,” Dad gently urges. “We have decided that in order for you to make a choice you will need to know all the facts, everything about what you could become, and in order to do that, you need to see your mother. In person. We have arranged for you to meet her and to stay with her for a while.”
“What?” I question in disbelief.
“Sera has been living on a small island off the coast of Maine, near my sister,” Dr. Thorne explains. “And yes, my sister is an Immortal like me. At my request she took your mother under her wings after the change so she could look after her. As far as I can tell, your transformation is now in the late stages and is progressing like that of a pure-blood, which means you only have until your birthday in a month to make your decision or you’ll remain human. Over the next few weeks though, you will experience more advanced stages of the change as your body tries to adjust to what it may become.
Symptoms like heightened eyesight, smell, hearing, speed and strength, vivid dreams and, most importantly, a desire for blood.
There are two things you will need to know. One, don’t panic. The symptoms will either fade away or your body will adjust to them depending on what you decide. Two, you cannot, under any circumstances, consume mortal blood. If you do, the choice will be made for you.”
“Are you saying if I choose to become Immortal I have to drink blood?” I ask, my lip
s curling in disgust.
“Not on a daily basis, but yes, we do require human blood to live.
And no, you don’t have to drink it. Blood can either be injected into your bloodstream or ingested the old-fashioned way.” Dad stands up as Dr. Thorne is done speaking, a yawn escaping his lips. “I think we should call it a night,” he says between yawns.
“Adelin, this is a lot to take in. We should all get some rest and we can talk more tomorrow.”
A thought crosses my mind- if they are going to let me see my mother then I’ll have the proof I need. Maybe I will find out Dr.
Thorne iss telling the truth, and she is really an Immortal, like my mom. Or they’re all nuts and I’ll soon be joining them…. “When can I leave?” I ask excitedly as I look up at him.
“What?” he asks with a confused expression.
“You said I can see Mom,” I say defiantly. “When do I get to leave?”
“I can drive you up tomorrow,” Dr. Thorne offers with a look at my dad. “Paul, I’m sorry. I know this is difficult but the sooner the better. With the transformation taking place it might not be safe for her here.”
I look from her to Dad and back again expectantly, waiting- hoping he’ll agree. His eyes close briefly before responding, “Tomorrow is fine, but first we all need to get some sleep. Go on,” he says glancing at me, his eyes filled with sadness. “Get to bed. You can pack in the morning when you wake up. Good night, Adelin.”
“Night, Dad. Dr. Thorne,” I reply before racing upstairs to try to get some sleep.
The bright green glow of the alarm clock on my bedside table shows me it is three thirty-five in the morning as I climb into bed. I lay down on top of the pale purple comforter, too exhausted to cover myself up, and pray for sleep to overcome me. My mind is filled with a jumble of thoughts, too jam-packed for the darkness to be able to soothe me into peace. What if my mom doesn’t like me? Or doesn’t want me? How am I supposed to choose between my dad, who I’ve known my entire life, and a mom I’ve never even me?
Origins (A Black Novel, #1) Page 2