Running From Forever

by K. Aten

  Keller nodded and choked back the ball of emotion that was lodged in her throat and waited because Sarah’s body language made it obvious that she wasn’t finished.

  The taller woman swallowed then looked back into those too-familiar blue eyes. “Keller, I—” She stopped awkwardly and abruptly kissed the startled blonde. Every bit of emotion and passion she felt, she shoved down that line of connection and hoped that Keller would understand. When they slowly pulled away again, Keller’s eyes were swimming in tears. Their world seemed to fall away when Sarah opened to her completely. “I love you, Noble Keller.” That was when the tears finally fell, running into mouths that were opening and searching. The barrier that Keller had been maintaining between them to protect her reticent lover, washed away with the force of their emotions.

  “I love you too, Sarah Colby. Always.” They held each other for a few minutes, just letting it sink in and getting the tears under control. Sensing that Sarah was at her limit for emotional admissions, Keller changed the subject. “So, are you guys staying until close?”

  “Yeah, I think that’s what Annie was planning. I just have to give her a ride home when we leave.”

  “Or, you could let her take your RAV4 and we can get home faster to celebrate the fact that you finally told me you loved me.”

  Sarah blushed and laughed self-consciously. “Or I could do that. I’ll see what Annie wants to do when we catch up with her.”

  After giving Annie her keys, Sarah took Keller to the dance floor and didn’t let her leave for an hour. The music and heat of their close movement was erotic but the throbbing sexual energy that Keller was pushing through their connection had her ready to explode. Finally, when Keller could no longer take the teasing, she led them to the bar for a break. They chatted with Annie and a few of their mutual friends for a while before heading back to the dance floor for more torture. In the middle of their sexual haze, Sarah was surprised when the ugly lights came on. She looked at Keller and her sister in shock. “Holy shit, I didn’t realize it was that late! Where did the night go?”

  Annie snickered. “Apparently down your pants. Jesus, Sarah, I couldn’t even dance by you two, you were practically throwing off sparks!” The next words were said in a singsong voice. “Awkward for your sister.”

  Sarah laughed and tugged Annie’s earlobe. “Come on, we’re not that bad.” She then turned to a smirking Keller. “Are we?”

  Keller grinned. “I think we are.”

  Sarah groaned and covered her eyes. “Great.”

  The bar manager waved them to a table. “Come on, let’s sit over here and finish our beers. One of the perks of being the manager is that we don’t have to leave at two with everyone else.” Once they were seated, she directed a smile at Annie. “I don’t know about you, but it’s nice not helping clean up, for once.”

  Annie made a face. “But I feel so guilty.”

  Sarah took a swig of her beer. “I don’t.”

  Annie swatted her on the arm. “Shut up, you!”

  They were still sitting at the table when Big Teddy and Lynne walked up. Keller looked at her watch, then back up at them. “Oh shit, when did it get so late?”

  Big Teddy laughed, a sound like a bass rumble coming from his chest. “I don’t know little K. We just came over to tell you that me and Lynne are the last two left. I can walk her out and come back for you three if you like.”

  Keller waved off the idea. “That’s all right, Ted, you can go ahead and leave. We’ll all walk out together and I’ll set the alarm when we go. Have a good night you two.”

  The bar seemed eerily silent once Lynne and Teddy had said their goodbyes. Annie was first to finish her beer and the sound of the empty bottle hitting the table was loud to their ears. “Come on, slowpokes, I’m all warmed up now and I want to go home and have some hot sex with my hotter girlfriend.”

  Sarah set her own empty bottle down and promptly plugged her ears. “I don’t want to hear that, la la la—”

  “Oh please, spare me! You and Keller were practically scrumping like bunnies on the dance floor! What kind of example are you setting for your little sister?”

  Keller snorted. “This is coming from the woman who apparently christened every room of her house with the previously mentioned hot girlfriend.” Annie blushed and Sarah cracked up laughing. Keller stood and collected the three empty bottles. She put them in the recycling can before waving them toward the door. “Are you two clowns ready to go?”

  Sarah jumped up. “I just have to get my messenger bag from your office. I’ll be right back.”

  While she was gone, Keller leveled a gaze at Annie. “Are you okay to drive, A?”

  “Not to worry, I’m good. I only had a couple drinks all night. I was mostly drinking water the whole time I was on the dance floor.”

  “Okay then, as long as you’re safe. Thanks again for taking Sarah’s RAV4 home. She—” She swallowed the unexpected lump of emotion. “Um, she told me that she loves me tonight.”

  “No shit?”

  “No shit. It was—amazing.”

  Annie pulled her into a quick hug. “That’s awesome, Keller, seriously. I’ve never seen her this happy before and no matter what, I’m glad you two met each other.” She laughed. “Could she have picked a less romantic place though?”

  Just then, Sarah reappeared with her bag slung across her body. “Hey, hands off my woman, brat!”

  “Oh whatever! Keller’s like a sister to me and you know it.”

  The three women were laughing when they walked out the front door. But as soon as they got outside, Keller swore. “Shit!”

  Sarah looked at her with concern. “What’s wrong?”

  “I forgot that I was going to bring my laptop home to work on the budget. You guys stay here, I’ll be right back!”

  Sarah pointed at her RAV4 that was conveniently parked right across the street. “I’m just going to walk her to the SUV, I promise.” Keller nodded then dashed inside. There was a vehicle coming from a few blocks away, probably someone making their way home from another bar. They started across the street knowing the car would have to stop at the stop sign.

  Annie got Sarah’s keys out of her pocket and then promptly dropped them. The force of the snap ring hitting the pavement popped it open and half a dozen keys fell off. “Goddamnit all to hell! Why do you have so many keys anyways?” Sarah stopped with her and bent down to help pick them up. She laughed and started to defend herself when she was cut off by the squealing of tires. Both sisters looked up in time to see a rusty pickup truck speeding toward them, not at all braking for the stop sign. Time slowed and the last thing Sarah remembered was pushing Annie out of the way. The front of the truck caught Sarah at both midthigh and across her lower ribs. The force of the blow caused rusted metal from the fender to gouge into her inner thigh and raked across the front of her left leg. The singer was spun around, blood arching outward as she fell. Annie lay on the ground in shock for critical seconds while the truck sped away.

  Keller walked out in time to see the entire thing and it only took a second for her to see the license plate number before the truck disappeared around the next corner. Her attention was pulled away by Annie’s scream. “Sarah!” The younger sister looked up at Keller, her hands bloody from trying to stop the flow from Sarah’s femoral artery. There was already a large puddle under the unconscious woman. “Keller, do something!”

  When Keller knelt she realized the nature of Sarah’s injury and immediately grieved. The blood loss already had the heartbeat she was so familiar with fluttering. She turned helpless tearfilled eyes to Annie. “There’s nothing I can do, Annie, her artery is severed! She’s bleeding too fast—” She looked down and added her hands to the younger woman’s, hoping the extra pressure would be enough but knowing it wouldn’t be.

  She was surprised when Annie pulled away and slapped bloody hands against her chest. “I said help her, dammit! Don’t let my sister di
e!” When Keller hesitated she added, “I know everything, do it!”

  Aware she possibly only had seconds before Sarah’s heart stopped completely from lack of blood pressure, she immediately bent down to her slashed leg. It was easiest to get blood from the wound for obvious reasons. After drinking just enough, she quickly cut her own wrist open and forced precious drops into Sarah’s mouth. They both waited, hoping the fast moving virus would overwhelm Sarah’s immune system and go to work. Seconds ticked by and the blood slowed to a stop. Another minute was lost with no discernable change and Annie stifled a sob. Then, when even Keller was on the verge of giving up hope, Sarah’s chest rose off the ground as her back arched and she gave a great gasp. Keller immediately lifted her and ran toward the bar and through the door that she hadn’t yet had the opportunity to lock. Annie grabbed the keys and stared at the large pool of blood for a few seconds, then ran after her. Back in Keller’s office, Annie found her sister lying on the leather couch completely still. Keller was on the phone. “Yeah, I’d like to report a truck that tried to hit me outside Club Diversity. Yes, I did get the license plate number.”

  Annie sat next to her sister and stopped listening when the bar manager recited the plate number and vehicle description. She watched in equal parts awe and worry as the scrapes across the unconscious woman’s cheek began to heal. When she moved the ripped pants out of the way, she could see the leg was healing as well. She looked at Keller when the smaller woman walked over to the couch. “What did they say, and why did you tell them you were outside Club Diversity?”

  Keller sat down closer to Sarah’s head. “They are running the plate now and are sending a couple units to the address that is registered to the truck. I didn’t give them our club name because I didn’t want them to come over here and ask questions.” When Annie gave her a confused look, Keller elaborated in a voice gone rough with a heavy accent that the younger had never heard her use. “There is a big fucking puddle of blood on the road out there, Annie!” She waved a hand toward her battered-looking lover. “And how do we explain this? In less than a half hour she’s not going to have a mark on her but it certainly looks like someone died out there. The state of her blood covered clothes certainly fit the part of a victim.”

  Annie nodded her head at the practical reasons. “Oh, I didn’t think of that.”

  The bar manager sighed and ran a hand through her hair. “Unfortunately, that is the least of our problems right now.”

  “What do you mean? Sarah’s alive and the cops are going to get the guys that did this. It’s good, Keller, we’re all good now! Aren’t we?”

  Keller shook her head and gazed down at her only love. “No, we are definitely not good. I did the one thing she was most afraid of and now I’ll never get her back. If we’re apart long enough, our immunity and healing will be compromised. That means we could be killed by something as simple as a goddamn cold!” She turned distraught eyes to her friend and employee. “Don’t you see? This was all for nothing! My choices were to let her die and die soon after, or save her and let her kill me anyway!” She buried her face in her hands, not caring about the nearly dry blood liberally coating them. Both women were suddenly startled to hear Sarah’s voice.

  “K—Keller? What’s going on?” She looked up at the two women with confusion swimming in her eyes and then looked around the room. “How…how did I get here? I don’t remember…”

  Seeing the pain in Keller’s eyes, Annie explained. “Sarah, there was an accident and you were hit.”

  Sarah looked up at her in alarm and then glanced down at her own clothes. “What the hell? I feel fine, what happened to my clothes?” Upon further inspection, she noticed the damp feel of blood soaked jeans then looked at the blood on Annie’s and Keller’s hands. But if that wasn’t enough to tell her the truth of the matter, the guilt written on Keller’s face was. She spoke quietly at first. “What did you do?” Keller’s eyes filled with tears but she didn’t answer. Sarah sat up and took hold of the front of her girlfriend’s shirt. Her next words were a yell. “WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO, KELLER?”

  Annie placed a hand on her sister’s tensed arm. “She saved your life, Sarah!”

  Feeling betrayed and lost, Sarah turned cold green eyes toward her. “This is between me and Keller, stay out of it, Annie!”

  “No, this is between all of us! She only did what I asked her to. She was going to let you die and I couldn’t lose you, Sarah, I just couldn’t!”

  Sarah abruptly stood and walked away from the couch. “You both knew how I felt about this, how could you?”

  She turned, and Keller’s heart broke at the look on her lover’s face. Sarah was going to run. It was written all over her face. “Sarah, please! Can we just talk about this?”

  Sarah screamed in rage and pounded her hand down on Keller’s steel top desk. Then she instantly sobered at the large dent left by her fist. “Fuck.”

  Annie stood and slowly walked toward her. She reached a comforting hand out as she spoke. “Sarah?” Sarah spun around and batted her hand out of the way. Annie cried out in pain and cradled her hand while backing away.

  Seeing what she had just done to her own family, her breath left her in a gasping sob. Turning tormented green eyes to Keller she lashed out. “This is your fault! I hope you’re happy.” And with those last words, she grabbed the keys that Annie had dropped on the couch, and ran from the room.

  Shock kept the remaining two women silent for a minute and then Keller quickly walked over to Annie. “Are you okay?”

  The younger woman gave her a pained look. “I don’t think it’s broken, but it hurts like hell. What about you?”

  Keller looked at her with hundreds of years of sadness. Her voice was barely loud enough to be heard. “It’s definitely broken and I—I’m not sure what to do about it.”

  Casting one last glance at the dented desktop, Annie grabbed her boss’s arm and led her toward the door. “Come on, there’s no point in staying here. She’ll come back when she’s ready, I know she will. She’s alive and we have to focus on that.” As they walked out the door of the club, the storm that had been building over the city finally broke. Cold rain poured over them as they made their way to Keller’s car. Neither one mentioned the blood that was rapidly washing from the street in dark rivulets.

  Chapter Ten

  “IT’S BEEN TWO fucking weeks, Keller, where is she!” In Keller’s office with the door shut—they certainly didn’t need anyone hearing this conversation—Annie was going out of her mind with worry. She sat on the edge of Keller’s desk and ran her fingers over the fist-sized indention. Neither one of them having heard from Sarah since the accident. Annie ran a hand through her hair in frustration. Keller had called Sarah’s clients to let them know that Sarah was ill and on a temporary leave of absence but that didn’t help Annie’s situation. Her relationship with Jesse was suffering because she hadn’t told her about Keller and Sarah’s—condition. Her girlfriend could sense that something was wrong. “I’m really struggling with Jesse because she doesn’t understand why we aren’t out looking for Sarah. She also knows I’m keeping something from her and its killing me to hurt her like this.”

  Keller sighed and looked up at her friend. The similarities between Annie and Sarah were enough to make her ache with loss every time she was in the same room with the younger woman. She certainly didn’t want to cause problems in Annie and Jesse’s relationship on top of everything else. “So tell her, A.”

  Annie snorted. “Yeah right! She’s going to think I’m playing a joke on her, especially since we just watched that new vampire movie that’s in the theaters right now. She’s never going to believe me, Jesse is way too practical.”

  The bar manager stood and put a comforting hand on Annie’s shoulder. “So we’ll tell her together. I’m pretty sure I have a few tricks that will make her a believer.” She motioned toward the door. “Come on, let’s go. You’re done with your paperwork for the day
and I’m not going to be productive at this rate, we may as well bail. Lynne and Sal are in charge tonight, between the two of them things should be well in hand.”

  It was nearly dinnertime when Keller parked in front of Annie’s house. Annie pulled into the driveway next to Jesse’s little car. They walked inside together and heard Jesse call from the kitchen. “Hey, babe, you want our Friday night usual?” She came through the door and was startled to see Keller. “Hey, Keller, you want to stay and have dinner with us? Have you heard anything from Sarah yet?”

  Keller shook her head sadly and Annie spoke up. “Actually, that’s what we’re here to talk to you about.”

  Her girlfriend walked the rest of the way into the living room while the other two took off their coats and hung them up. “What do you mean you want to talk to me about Sarah, what’s wrong with her? Do you know where she is?” The confused look on her face suddenly turned to one of panic. “Oh my God, something has happened to her!”

  Annie rushed over to reassure her and they all took a seat in the living room. “Something has happened but she’s okay. It’s— well, there is something I need to tell you about Sarah, or Keller needs to tell you because it involves both of them.” She gave her boss a pleading look and Keller took over.

  Keller stared straight at the younger woman, who swallowed nervously. “I want you to listen to me now and just hear me out. Please, save all your questions for the end. Okay?” When Jesse nodded back at her, she told the story of her life. Even Annie didn’t know a lot of it, just some of the highlights that pertained to her vampirism. When Keller finished, Jesse sat stunned.

  She laughed and spoke in a voice laced with quite a bit of skepticism. “You guys are fucking with me! Annie put you up to this, right?” Keller merely stared long enough to make the younger woman nervous, then got up and went into the kitchen. She figured it would be easiest to repeat the same demonstration she used with Sarah all those months ago. She had a large knife and a handful of paper towels when she returned. Seeing the knife, Jesse jumped up from the couch. “What the hell, Keller? Stop playing around, this isn’t funny anymore!” She turned to Annie, who was looking back with the most serious expression she’d ever seen. “Annie? This is a joke, right?”