by Atha, DL
Waiting now had a new edge. It was still fear but now with a touch of anticipation. Hoping to beat him at his own game, doubt played simultaneously with the possibility of survival on the edge of my mind.
Could I really beat him physically? Emotionally, he had the upper hand on me and even if I was turned before he killed me, he had age and experience on his side.
Information became a priority and I vowed to myself to find a way to draw it out of him, and tomorrow I would spend more time on the Internet. Surely back in the recesses I could find something to help me. Where there was fiction, there had to be fact.
The dining room clock struck seven, bringing me back to the present. He still wasn’t here and I began to get nervous. Was he not coming? What would happen if he didn’t? Maybe he had moved on. Had I been inoculated to the degree that my immune system couldn’t recover and I would still turn? I had so many questions and no answers.
I left the sunroom and walked back into the kitchen, grabbing a couple of colas as I passed the fridge. I downed one quickly, carrying the second in my other hand. Regardless of what happened, I wouldn’t have to count calories any more. I smiled at the thought and drank the second soda just as quickly as the first.
Having nothing to do but wait, I walked aimlessly through the house. Ending up in the den, the piano caught my gaze and I had the sudden urge to play it. Sitting down, my hands flew over the keys to a few popular songs. I hadn’t played in a few days, but despite the lack of a warm up, I played with pretty good precision. Must be a side-effect of the virus.
I was half-way through a metal ballad when I experienced the familiar terror the vampire brought with his presence. The hairs on my neck and arms stood up; my sixth sense knowing that the predator was behind me. My hands stopped in midair and my breathing, as well as my heartbeat picked up, and I had to fight to bring them under control.
Letting my hands drop back onto the keys, I resumed my playing knowing that he hadn’t moved. I could feel his gaze on my back, but didn’t stop until the song was over. Slowly I turned around and found him sitting in a period piece of furniture.
The chair, which had come with the house, was an antique and most of my friends who had sat in it found it to be very uncomfortable. Asa, apart from his clothes, looked like he belonged in it. We sat looking at one another for several moments but didn’t speak.
Finally, I turned back to the piano and played one of Chopin’s Nocturnes. Night music at least seemed appropriate for him. As I played the piece, I contemplated how to become more exposed.
I was fairly certain, or at least as certain as one could be about vampire physiology, that his saliva contained the virus. No doubt his blood did as well. Probably every bodily fluid did to some degree, some fluids holding higher viral concentrations than others.
Finally, I decided the best course of action was to simply be exposed to as many bodily fluids as possible. How to seduce a vampire became the million-dollar question.
Just thinking about it made me nervous. I slowed the tempo of the nocturne to give myself more time to devise a plan. My hands were sweating and my heart was pounding. I was sure he could hear it; I could almost hear it myself.
Luckily Chopin had spared no paper on this piece and its length gave me time to get ready for what I was about to have to do.
I could still feel him behind me although my hair was at least no longer standing on end, but the sensation that his eyes were burning straight through me and my scheme remained. He would surely realize what I was doing, but it wasn’t exactly like I had anything to lose. There was only one way to find out and so playing the final chord of the piece, I turned slowly around to face him.
Sitting on the piano bench, I stretched my legs out in front of me and leaned back on the keyboard, pulling my arms up to rest beside me. I flashed what I hoped was a seductive smile at him. “You’re late so I thought maybe you had moved on.” I had a fleeting wish that I had put on something more appealing as the scrubs certainly left much to be desired in the wardrobe category.
His face held that smile of his that was both sadistic and seductive at the same time. “I had to stop and eat first.”
He smiled even more when he said it so I guess my face showed a little of the surprise I felt. So he had already fed? That had to be a really bad sign, but it almost seemed as if he was baiting me. I decided to play along.
“So I guess that means I get a night off from being the main course?” I asked as nonchalantly as I could while I turned back to the piano, trying to act disinterested. But he was beside me before I could finish turning and pressed my back up hard against the keyboard.
“Tonight you are the dessert. I am in no hurry for the next three evenings to come to an end so I really must be careful.”
“I think slow is what I have in mind as well,” I murmured, to him as I leaned in to him, lifting my face to his. Pressing my lips to the coolness of his, I kissed him gently, but made it clear what I wanted. Reminding myself mentally of my goal, I pushed him back into his chair, placing my arms on either side of his head.
Parting his lips with mine, I ran my tongue over his lips and then over the tips of his fangs. Tasting sweetness on them, I suppressed as a shudder as I realized that the sweet taste was his newest victim’s blood.
Sensing in his body language that he was about to bite me, which would cut my exposure too short, I pulled away and began to trail light kisses down the right side of his neck as he whispered into my ear.
“You must have enjoyed our time together. Can you not wait to experience that again? I must have left you wanting more,” he murmured into my ear.
“I want some more all right,” I whispered, continuing my onslaught of his throat and switching to the other side. Stopping only long enough to grasp the hem of his shirt, I pulled it off quietly laying it on the floor beside us.
Not taking my eyes off his body, I kissed along his chest, following the line between his pectorals. His skin was cool to the touch, but when I looked up, I could see the growing lust in his eyes. Feeling it in my bloodstream as well, I knew I would soon run out of time, and I would be as hungry as him.
Leveling my most sincere expression at him, I told him, “I decided if I’m going to die, I might as well have as much fun as possible. I’ve been single a while and I had forgotten what I was missing.”
Placing my lips back on his, I kissed him as languidly as I knew how. “The other night was amazing,” I whispered into the pale skin of his neck as I finally broke contact. “I’m not sure how you were able to do that. I was terrified, yet I couldn’t stop myself.”
He laughed slightly, low and throaty, at my comment. “It is my bite. It drives human women wild. And the more I want them, the more they want me. Practically begging me to kill them.”
His words repeated in my mind. He was right in a way, except it wasn’t the bite. It was the saliva again. Pheromones or sex chemicals, whatever they were, they allowed women to experience his desire and orgasm. Pretty impressive spit. I remembered that I had begged a little too the first time.
His hands were everywhere now and although he hadn’t bitten me yet, I knew that his growing excitement was leading that way and I couldn’t help but shiver slightly with the anticipation.
Reaching back up, I entwined my hands in his thick hair again and pulled his mouth back to mine. I slid my tongue quickly and harshly across his left fangs, creating a small gash that quickly oozed salty blood.
I felt the change in him almost instantaneously. The semi-control that he had commanded over himself moments before vanished as quickly as I had spilled my blood in his mouth.
I massaged his neck and shoulders while I straddled him, his lips warming to the temperature of mine until I felt I couldn’t tell where I stopped and he started. The kiss became harder and more insistent, his tongue curling around mine. And as I expected, the cut continued to bleed although slowly because of how small it was. I had done the right thing as he couldn’t pull his
mouth away from mine.
Pulling away from him as the cut finally sealed over, I could now see his fangs more clearly as his lips were pulled back for the first time tonight. They were more extended than they were earlier. I couldn’t look away from the sharpness of them as he lifted my right arm to his mouth.
As he kissed the inner aspect of my elbow, chills started at my neck and raced down my back. I shivered in expectation despite myself. His arrogance concerning human women was well deserved. Still watching me, he pierced the soft skin overlying my brachial artery and I gasped at the pain. Several drops ran down my right arm and landed on the ivory piano keys below, brilliant red against the sharp white. He brought my other arm up and did the same thing. There was a quick sharp pain with each bite, but now his pheromones had reached critical mass in my cerebral circulation and all thoughts of pain, or anything else for that matter, were gone.
My blood flowed like a gentle tributary down both arms and he followed it with his mouth, consuming it as he made several smaller bites along its path. Reaching up with one hand, he easily pulled my t-shirt apart at the seams. I was wearing a newer red bra. I had thought of the irony when I pulled it out of my closet. It accentuated my skin nicely. He sucked his breath in slightly.
“How I love that color,” he murmured to himself. Pulling it slowly off of my shoulders until my breasts slipped out, he dropped it to the floor with one hand while he cupped me with the other.
He removed my panties just as easily and lifted himself off the chair to push his pants down. My eyes slid down his muscular abdomen. Pulling myself up on him while I looked up to watch his face, I slid myself down the length of him. He gasped slightly and I did too as a thousand nerve endings seemed to catch fire internally, spreading down my legs and simultaneously up into my lower abdomen. Starting to move up and down, I had only just begun when I climaxed so thoroughly that I had a few heart palpitations.
Certain that the enhanced sensations were part of the conversion process, I questioned whether or not my circulatory system could handle the change. But I didn’t have time to consider it long for he started to move himself. His strong strokes brought me to climax over and over until finally, with quite a bit of force, I felt him shudder and come inside of me. When he was finished, I nearly collapsed onto him and without thinking, I rested my forehead on his shoulder. I half expected him to flinch from my unintentional casual contact, but he didn’t and I continued to rest. For the first time, I noticed he had a scent. I hadn’t noticed it before. He smelled somehow manly and spicy at the same time. Always suffering from allergies, I had never had a particularly strong sense of smell, but apparently that was changing now.
Sitting up, I took in a deep breath through my nose. I could smell the scent of sex and the slight mustiness of the old house. Smells that I had never particularly noticed before tonight. Glancing down at him, I saw he was looking at me intently.
“You made me lose my breath. I’ll be okay in a couple of minutes,” I lied, telling him the first plausible excuse that came to my mind.
“I have that effect on humans. I always make them lose their breath, one way or the other,” he replied with a slight smile on his face. Then he pushed me off into the floor. Hitting my head on a nearby bookcase as I fell, my vision tunneled. I tried to hang on, but lasted only a second or two and then everything went black.
eight
I awoke not immediately knowing how much time had passed. Finding myself in a different room than where I last remembered was very disconcerting and it took a few minutes to reorient myself.
When I finally recognized I was in my bedroom, I sat up and swung my legs down. My feet touched the carpet and shock caused me to jerk them back before they were even flat on the floor. A multitude of increased sensations had burst onto the soles of my feet and I was unprepared for the heightened sensorium. I had never realized how thick and soft the carpet was and putting my feet back down, I ran them back and forth through the carpet until they were warm from the friction.
I recognized the now familiar warm stinging sensation again in my mouth and now enveloping my throat and continuing on down into my abdomen, almost like I had swallowed whiskey. I reveled in the sensations for I knew I was making progress.
Getting up, I walked into the living room and found Asa intently studying my cell phone. I had a moment of panic before I realized that I hadn’t called Ellie.
Looking up at me as I walked towards him, he pointed towards the phone, saying, “Teach me.”
I nodded slightly, feigning disinterest. My head hurt and I wanted to scream at him for throwing me on the floor, but I was so happy about the ongoing conversion that I was able to hide my anger at least momentarily. I taught him the basics in a matter of minutes, my heart dropping as he realized how much could be hidden on a phone. I wasn’t surprised when he crushed it easily in his hands.
I sounded almost cheery when I told him, “I didn’t have anything to hide, Asa.” Smiling at him, I put the cell phone in the trash and began to look for the car keys. “I’m absolutely starving. Can we go eat?”
Looking at me reprovingly, he asked, “Do you not eat during the day? You should be keeping your strength up for me.”
“Thanks to my new vampire hours, I party all night and sleep most of the day, and besides, I’m not much of a cook. So, come on, let’s go eat, please. I mean, let me go eat. That way, I’ll have plenty of energy for you to suck out.” I smiled at him as I said it and he gestured towards the door but didn’t look happy about it.
Grabbing a jacket off of the back of a chair, I folded it over my arm, still feeling too warm and tingly to put it on. Walking into the garage, I was surprised to find Asa waiting at the driver’s door of my car.
“Tonight, I am going to refresh myself with driving,” he told me, “but I forgot to get the keys.”
Sighing, I took one last look at my car while it was still whole and tossed him my key ring. Sliding into the passenger seat was a new experience. It had been a long time since I had ridden with anyone else, let alone a vampire.
I gave him directions to a city located in the opposite direction from where we had previously gone. He didn’t want us to be seen together repeatedly by the same humans so I chose a steakhouse to the north side of the county. But by the looks of things, we were never going to make it there.
“We’re as slow as a funeral procession,” I groaned out loud, but mostly to myself. I must have really been developing a morbid sense of humor because I laughed out loud at my unintentional joke. “At this rate, we won’t make it by dawn and you’ll burst into flames in the sun. Go ahead, slow down some more.”
Continuing at his snail’s pace and still never even sparing me a quick glance, he muttered, “You humans act invincible, which makes no sense given the fact I can snap your bones with one hand.” His voice held a shade of anger.
Now it was my turn to be snide. “For someone who’s invincible, you drive like you’re made of glass,” I retorted back at him.
“You ARE made of glass so be careful,” he shot back, making it clear he was tired of my driving commentary.
Silence ensured as we made our way through the mountains. Coming to a straight stretch as we exited the foothills, I gestured at the two-lane road that would lead us into town. An old country store, just about to close, marked the turn off.
I was angry, restless, and emotionally labile which seemed a new constant for me. “Please pull in here. I’m so thirsty, I don’t want to wait till we get into town. It’s a pretty long drive still,” I tried to ask politely, but it sounded a little strained. I wasn’t used to having to ask anyone’s permission for something as simple as a drink.
Surprisingly, he did what I asked without saying anything. He very carefully parked and reaching for the door handle, I started to get out of the car but before I could, he pulled me backwards into the seat.
“Do not draw attention to yourself.” His voice was hard and the grip he had around my arm was e
ven harder. He wrapped one strong hand around my neck, cutting off my breathing. I nodded with as much movement as his grip would allow. Slowly, his hand relaxed and pulling my arm out of his grip, I stepped out of the car, slamming the door angrily behind me.
This old store had certainly seen better times. The building was squatty but long. The interior had never been well lit and the paint on the walls might have been bright forty years ago. Now it was dingy and the old concrete floor was cracked with age. But with age sometimes came nostalgia and that is what had kept this place open through the years. A woman in her mid-seventies sat behind the counter appearing to be oblivious to my presence, but I knew better. She had, like any blue-haired southern woman, eyes that wouldn’t miss a thing.
I walked up to the counter with two twenty-ounce sodas and a couple of candy bars; she rang me up without saying anything but the amount. I handed her a ten and she counted out my change.
Never making eye contact but instead unnecessarily bagging my snack food, she asked, “You need any help?”
I cringed slightly at her words. She must have noticed our exchange in the car.
Drawing attention to my situation hadn’t been on the agenda for the night and I did my best to sound calm and reassuring as I answered. “No. I’m good. We were just playing mostly. But thanks.” I could tell she didn’t believe me, but there was nothing else I could do so I wished her a good evening and walked back out to the car.
Asa was still sitting in the car, with the windows rolled down and the engine off. I knew he had been listening to see if I had said anything to the clerk.
Getting into the car, I twisted the lid off of one of the bottles and drank until I had emptied over half of the bottle without stopping.