by Ariana Kenny
Chapter 12 The Future
Cassie must have seen me because she arrived home through the window as I walked through the door. She kept her distance from me and I didn’t close it. She made eye contact with the floor and I tried to breathe regularly, because we both knew what was happening.
“Cassie” I opened the uncomfortable conversation between us, and she had already started to cry. “You know I love you, right.”
“I know.” Cassie agreed, though she still had a hopeful tone to her voice as she kept looking at the floor. When she spoke again, I understood why. “Isn’t there any way we can make this work? There must be a way. I’m not ready to let you go yet.”
“We both know the answer to that Cass.” I couldn’t help it, she teared up and I instinctively went over to hold her to me. I didn’t want to do this either, but had to so I tried to push past my feelings, and I just went with my head.
“We’re living two different lives Cassie. I can’t accidentally kill someone. I’m not going to be able to let my family go, as much as I love you, and I know I can’t keep them if I change to be like you. Cam and Violet already want to move on, I know that, and I can’t change yet, I’m not ready, and I don’t know if I ever will be.”
Brushing away tears she looked up at me as she confirmed what we both knew. “I know I can’t give you a life” she said. “I can only offer you endings. The end of your family, the ability to end other peoples’ lives, the end of you being able to grow in to anything you want to be, and the future you could have. I know all that, but I didn’t want to think about it.”
I put my head to her head. “I love you Cassandra.” As she pressed her head into mine, her hair smelled like fresh leaves and I knew I was going to miss her so much.
“Go to sleep with me one last time?” she asked, and I couldn’t refuse. We walked into the back bedroom, to our room, and lay down together. I held her while she brushed her fingers across my face. “I need you to know, because you’ve been drinking from me, if you stop straight away, you’ll be sick. I can come back, every couple of days, give you some more until you’ll be alright without it.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think if you come back, I’m going to change my mind.” This was hard enough already. The thought of seeing her every couple of days and going through this again was not an option.
“It will be harder than you think.” she said with worry etched in to her face “Besides, if you changed your mind I could live with that.” Cassie smiled weakly, and I pulled her closer. As the dawn cracked the evening darkness I was aware of Camille, Violet and Elias coming back, and I drifted off to sleep with the smell of fresh leaves.
When I awoke again, it was dark. As I suspected she has probably influenced me to sleep while she cleared out. On the table was a vial filled with blood, and a note saying “drink me.” I smiled to myself remembering the first time I had drunk from her. I wandered out and noticed that the flat looked the same, but it was silent and I knew they were gone. The place felt empty even though everything was left untouched. I hoped I hadn’t made a mistake. I also wasn’t stupid. This was going to be hard.
What I didn’t realise was how hard.
I spent the next two days getting more and more nauseous, until it became so bad I couldn’t sleep. There were no more dreams, just blackness when I did sleep, and I began to think I was imagining things too. One night I stumbled from the bathroom, there was a storm and I thought I saw something black slither down a building across from me in the crack of a lightning bolt. Another night, I swear I could feel Cassie on the outside of the building as I slumped against it. I thought I could smell her, that smell of hers, though when I rose to my feet shaking and sweating and opened the window, I couldn’t see her anywhere.
I almost thought I was going mad until one night as I was laying in bed, sheets soaked with perspiration, I sensed her again and knew it wasn’t my imagination. It had only been five days but everything else about the last few months was fading. Except that smell, and the sense I had of feeling her skin against mine. That was still there. I thought I would die if I lost that too. And here she was.
“I know you’re here.” I said unmoving into the darkness. I felt her weight sink down on the bed and she stroked my head.
“I hate seeing you like this.” Cassie’s tone was tortured. “You didn’t drink what I left you. I brought some more in case, the old stuff won’t be good anymore.”
I sat up and faced her, with her bright shining eyes staring intently back at me. I stroked her hair back from her face, and she pressed her face into my palm.
“I miss you.” she said.
“Me too, but this has to be it, Cassie. I can’t see you again. I don’t know what’s real and not anymore.”
“I hoped we might still be friends…” she replied. I withdrew my hand and she looked pained.
“You and I can’t be friends Cassie.” With that I lay back down. I heard her sharp intake of breath and wished I had said that differently, but by the time I sat up to correct myself by adding: “I can’t just be friends…” my words were lost in the darkness. She was already gone, a fresh vial left rocking on my side table. I opened the top draw and pulled out an old shark’s tooth necklace and pulled out the leather tie it was on. I secured it well around the top of the vial and then around my neck. I felt better instantly feeling the glass against me.
Another few days passed and my withdrawals cleared up enough for the wedding, I acted as best man and everyone noted Cassie’s absence. I played everything down so as not to ruin the time they still had to celebrate before the baby arrived, which, it turned out was the next day, not the week later that they had hoped. I still kept imagining Cassie was there, behind me on the street, watching me through a window, but I knew after the last time we spoke that I wasn’t going to see her again.
I tried to work, but had problems concentrating and had suddenly realised I had no other friends left. My instincts were not what I was used to either without the extra help from Cassie’s blood.
My family was still sound though, and as I came back from the haze of leaving Cassie, something happened that made my choices feel right in spite of the pain. On the way to the hospital to visit Evie I got a call from my father telling me that my mother had been in an accident on the way back from work. She had been taken to the same hospital as Evie. When I saw her I was so pleased I could just be there for her, in the middle of the day, to sit and talk with her to distract her through the tests, and to hold her shaking hand until my father got there. I was glad I hadn’t had to let that go.
When my father arrived I saw in him the familiar strength and compassion that I had appreciated for so many years as a child. He always loved me, but through my adolescence and college years we had grown apart as I went in a different direction than he expected. I looked forward to getting to know him better, and left the two of them alone, in the emergency room to head to the maternity ward.
Anton and Evie were over the moon, and seeing them with their newborn son, I felt like things were moving on somehow. I had made the right choice. Still I couldn’t bear to take the vial off from around my neck, and I decided that there it would stay day and night until I was ready to let her go completely.
The next day I picked up my mother from the hospital around 5:00, after visiting Evie and the baby who were due to be discharged the next day. We were driving back making conversation, about babies of course. Evie had chosen James as a name over many others strongly hinted at, but it was the tense expression on her face that had me concerned.
“You OK?” I asked.
“Just a little nervous after the accident. I jump at everything. Your father can’t stand it.” She pleasantly tried to joke.
“That’s OK, it’s normal. You’re going to be a bit off for a while, then you’ll get back into it. How long before the car’s back in action?” I deliberately slowed the car but hoped she wouldn’t notice. Given everyone el
se on the road was passing us, I doubted my chances.
“Next week – Anton is taking care of it for me but is waiting on some parts.” She was quiet for a moment and there was a silence between us. “You miss her.” She stated out of the blue. My jaw clenched.
“I do, but it just wouldn’t work. She and I are very different….people.” After saying that, I was the tense one.
“I thought I saw a future with you two.” she sighed.
“Some things there’s no future in, no matter how hard you want it.” That sounded philosophical and vague enough to keep her satisfied I thought. I was wrong of course. Irritation and impatience tainted her voice. “So make it work, if you want it, make it happen. What is it anyway, what happened? You two were so in love, or so I thought”.
“It’s a lot of different things.” how the hell was I going to explain this one.
“Can she not have children – I saw how she was with Evie and the baby. I don’t need grandkids from you if you don’t want – I want you to be happy.”
“It’s not that.” I felt pained and empty without her. Not a single piece of me didn’t miss her touch, her smell, her voice every day, every moment. The physical withdrawal might be ending, but I still had a void inside me. This wasn’t helping.
“You can always adopt…I won’t mind.” My mother taunted me.
I glanced at her briefly and the amused expression on her face. “You are terrible.” I said as I pulled to a stop at the crossing.
A man in black was walking slowly across with the crowd but slowed and came to a stop in front of the car. I felt a chill take my body at what I saw.
“Isn’t that Michael?” My mother asked. She smiled and waved. As my attention focused in on him, he just grinned at me, pale. I stopped breathing and watched, hypnotized.
I snapped out of my trance as a car honked its horn behind me. Michael just stood there. My mother’s voice changed from curiosity to concern; “Is there something wrong? He looks different. He looks sick.” He did. He looked detached, cold, and just like Belil standing there dressed in black boots, dark pants and a dark blue shirt.
He winked at me and I panicked. I pulled the car in to the opposite lane swerving around Michael and taking the corner, fast.
As I strained to see behind me, I could see my mother agitated beside me, but I didn’t see the van that was coming towards us swerve, screech and plough in to my side of my car.
It spun us around and when we came to a stop my mother was holding the side of her head with blood leaking through her fingers. I felt shaken and weak. The vial from around my neck had been knocked free from my shirt and tellingly tapped against my chest. I struggled with my seatbelt to free myself before I started to become aware of the screaming. In the distance, but not far enough away, there was shrieking and a sense of panic set in for me. I struggled more fiercely with my seatbelt until it gave way and leaned over to my mother.
“Are you alright?” I yelled at her, frustrated and fearful. “Are you alright?!” I pressed.
“I’ll be fine, I just cut my head.” she sounded groggy. As she turned to face me reassuringly her expression changed as she saw out the front window. I turned in time to see the dark body of some kind of animal hurl itself at the window. Its claws tore into the bonnet and it let out a shriek, smashing at the glass windshield as it did.
I braced my foot against the glass when another one of those things launched at the vehicle from my side. I knew where I had seen these before, back in the cave where we had freed Violet. These were the Old Ones, free, roaming the streets, wreaking havoc. I strained against the paws smashing at me, trying to grab me through the shatter proof glass. Giant claw like paws grasped the side of the car and the two of them worked together to throw the whole car through the air. We landed upside down and this time my head struck the side of the window.
My hearing went in and out and my body tingled as I hung, suspended by my seatbelt. I could barely see but turned towards my mother’s direction anyhow. The vile knocked against my face as I laboured to see straight. My mother lay unconscious beside me. I reached out to shake her when a giant claw smashed through what was left of the glass and grabbed her by the neck. She was dragged out, seat belt snapping and she vaguely came to. She was grabbing at her neck, a horrified look on her face, not even enough time to scream before she was pulled from the car. I tried to pull it together as quickly as I could. I dragged myself from the car. Blood was streaming from my head as I searched desperately around for her.
I saw three of the creatures, one of whom was feeding on some poor guy laying on the road near me, another tearing at the side of a car like a can opener through a can of soup. A third dragged an all too familiar body away from me.
I didn’t need to think about it. I grabbed the vile from my neck, pulled the cap off and tilted my head to drain the contents in to my mouth. At least I could be fast, be strong.
As the first drop was about to find my mouth, my hand was knocked and bones felt like they broke. I heard the glass shatter. Turning, I saw Michael standing before me, reaching out to grab me with one hand about the collar and the other at my waist. Before there was time to think about what was going to happen next, Michael threw me against the underside of the bridge nearby. My head felt like it was split, I felt broken bones and sharp pains shoot through my core as I crawled to my hands and knees in an effort to rise. He was there in an instant of course, wrenched me up, and grabbed my neck.
“You left me to die.” he said flatly. “You left me behind!” He yelled. “And now look at me.” He threw me across a car on to the road and was standing over me before I had settled to the ground. “I suppose I should thank you really. I am stronger than ever. The world’s at my feet. This is just the beginning. I just can’t seem to get over you, your betrayal. How could you! I called you brother.”
“I didn’t mean for you to die.” I stammered. He leaned in close to me. I tried uselessly to pull myself away, but he held me fast before he spoke again, quiet, determined and emotionless. “I am going to break you, Matt, like you broke me.” He picked me up and smashed my back over the wheel of my upturned car. I heard a crack and the feeling in my legs left me. “I’m going to make you beg to die.” he grabbed my face and brought his to mine, “And after this you’ll wish I killed you.”
He walked away and left me bloodied and broken when one of the creatures, one of the Old Ones appeared above me. It bit into my shoulder and I howled with pain. Michael was there in a fraction of a moment and pulled it from me. He hissed at it: “No, not him. I wanted him alive.” The thing raised its head and shrieked before running off. As the black took me I saw Michael give me one more indignant look before leaving “Oh well. I guess your dying will just have to do.” Through my blurred vision I saw the same amulet Belil had worn around Michael’s neck. My blood streamed into my eyes, and then I couldn’t focus anymore. I could hear my heart beating, fast from panic, then more slowly, then hardly at all. The noise of chaos faded. I dreamed I saw her face - worried for me at first. I dreamed she came to me and lay with me. We were in a soft white bed and sunlight streamed through the window behind us as she smiled at me. At least that was the last thing I would see. She stroked my face, kissed me, and I disappeared into the dark.