It’s cold in here. I shiver uncontrollable while sitting on the cold floor of the abandoned warehouse and rubbing my hands over my arms to get my blood flow. It’s foolish I know. I can’t get it flow anymore. My body is no longer alive and never again will it be that way. What will I tell her? How can I ever see her again while being like this? I’m just an undead monster that drinks the blood of the living. Oh she will be terrified if she ever meets me again…
I was a human too not a long time ago. I dated with a beautiful girl who loved me back with same intense as I do love her still. Everything changed only a week ago when I was returning home after I had walked her to her father’s. Something attacked me and I was soon overpowered and pressed against the hard asphalt of the road. Then I felt a sharp pain on my neck and realized that my attacker was biting me. I screamed and trashed to get a way but in vain. I lost my conciseness after a short while and when I woke up I was here in this warehouse and I was alive no more.
I don’t know who turned me to this monster but I know that it was a vampire. Call it as the racial memory if you like. I know everything that is essential to me to survive. I can’t go into the sunlight or it burns me, I have to feed regularly from living humans or I will grow weak, I will die if the wooden stake is stabbed through my heart or my head is cut off. So would a human too but for us vampires there is only three instantly killing things; wooden stake, decapitation and sunlight. We can’t go to churches or be near crosses as they make us weak. Holy water is poison to us but it won’t kill us immediately. This is not a problem to me. I hated religion after all.
I’m confused. I feel myself powerful and superior and, at the same time, dirtied and ill. I yearn to see her again but I’m too afraid to face her. She is such a strong willing woman. She would probably accept that I have changed into something that shouldn’t even exist without even blinking an eye but at the same time she would say goodbye to me. I can imagine how she would be the one to end my unholy existence. Oh, I should not think that way…
I keep my distance to everybody. She and my parents must have reported me as missing person already as it has been a week since they saw me last time. In this week I have already killed two innocent girls as I needed to feed but I have no control how much I can eat before my victim dies. It’s under working still. I don’t want to be a killer. I have never harmed anyone in my life. But I’m not alive anymore, am I?
***
He’s been missing a week now and nothing has been found. I don’t even know is he alive or not. He disappeared just after he had walked me home and never got to his. It’s so frightening… The fact that if he had not brought me home he would still be here with me is bothering me. He would had gone home sooner and not disappeared like this… I’m the one to blame if something has happened to him…
I have cried so much in these days that I have no more tears to cry. Only dry sobs wreck my body as I lay on my bed and think of him. He is my everything. He’s the one who brought the happiness and joy in my life and now he’s taken them with him.
I can’t just sit here while police is doing nothing to find my love. They suspected that he had run away as he was quite a loner. Sure he lived alone apart from his family and had not too many friends but he would have told me if he was going to somewhere. Oh God, I’m thinking him as a goner! Oh no, no, no… He’s still alive and well somewhere. I have to think that way. I have to believe in him.
As I dress myself to go out I look at the mirror and see a flash of him in there lying on the plain floor not breathing and pale. God, no!
I run past my parents sitting on the kitchen and they yell after me something I’m not hearing well. I think they asked where I was going. I’m going to find him. I have had this talent ever since from birth. I see things in mirrors. They show me the present time from somewhere not too far away. Everything I have seen has happened within 25 miles from me. I have found out that the longer they last the closer the scene is happening. This was only a flash but so are they all. This was a quite long flash so he’s not too far. Just wait for me my love. I’m coming…
There can’t be too many places with that kind of bare floor. Maybe some factory or storehouse… That’s it! There is the abandoned storehouse area not far from here. Why haven’t the police searched from there? It’s the only place unsearched within city borders. I can’t go there by foot. I need a ride but from whom? I go through my friends and suddenly I remember one of his. Adem! He has a car and he used to hang around with us. I take my cell phone to give him a call and notice that my hands are shaking. Oh, I need to calm down. I know I’m not going to like the situation where I’m going.
It takes only a moment from Adem to answer his phone and I force my voice to be clear. “Hi Adem! I need your help. I know where he is!”
He sounds a little sleepy. “What? Is it Irilia? You know who is where?”
I sigh and start over: “Yes, it’s me Irilia… I know where Tarl is.”
Now I hear him gasp: “You know?! How!? When?”
I feel a starting headache. I haven’t told anybody about my talent. “It’s not important. I need you to take me to him. Can you come and get me as soon as possible?”
Adem is quiet for a while and then I hear him rustle with something. “I come right away. I just left my apartment.”
I feel a tear slid to my cheek. “Thank you Adem…See you soon...”
I hear the smile in his voice: “Any time Irilia. See you.”
I severe the connection and stand there waiting for Adem to come. Wait for me, my love…
***
[Tarl’s POW]
I’m hungry again. I can feel my fangs sharpen as I think of blood but I can’t go outside just yet. Sun is still up. I’m relaxing on the floor eyes closed. Finally I have accustomed to my new body temperature. I’m not feeling cold anymore. I only hope that someday I can accept this being I’ve become or I’ll go mad with self disgust. I hate to kill and I hate the feelings the fresh blood is waking inside me. It makes me to yearn more of it and it makes me want to kill. It is such a refreshing feeling that I fear I might to give into it…
A sound of car makes me open my eyes. Is someone bringing something to the newer warehouses? No one would bring anything to this one. The roof is leaking and rats are living here with me destroying everything in their search for food. I close my eyes again listening to the voices coming from outside. A door slams shut and then another. So there are two persons. My hearing is better now after the transformation and I hear a male voice that my brains insist that I know.
“Where in here he is? How did you get the information?”
Oh no! It can’t be Adem… They can’t have found out where I am… I stood up from the floor and stare towards the door as if there was some monster coming my way. In one sense of mind there is.
“He should be in that old one.. I’m not quite sure…”
This voice is branded in my mind and now it’s screaming me to run away quickly. Irilia can’t find me like this. I’m still wearing the clothes I had that day and they are covered with blood and crime now… I’m pale as a corpse and my eyes are red as the thirst of blood is driving me in frenzy. I might even kill them if they come here! Oh god, help me… I don’t want to hurt them…
I need to get away. I need to hide…
“Then let’s look are you right.”
I hear them coming and start to search for the place to hide myself from their eyes. I have no powers to affect their minds or anything like that as I’m very young vampire. I hid myself beyond the old crates and hope they won’t look here. If they do I don’t know what I’m going to do. I so hope that Irilia doesn’t see me like this… It would be the end of her love to me… I can’t lose it… I need you so much…
“Empty…”
I hear them walking inside and I have a flash of envy. I can never again walk under the sun…
“Tarl! Are you here?!”
I cringe as I hear her calling my name. I can hear her sorrow and worry. I can feel her fear. I’m not worthy of them anymore. Go away, my darling… Live your life in the sunlight…
“He’s not here.. Let’s look at the other warehouses…”
Yes, listen to Adem… Go with him… I feel a tear sliding down my cheek. Yes.. You deserve much more than a living corpse… I have to let you go…
“I’ll just take a look around…“
I shut my eyes as I resign to my destiny. I’ll lose you now. Don’t come here my love… Don’t look at the beast I’ve become… I want you to remember me as I was while still alive, as I was a week ago in that beautiful night…
“Oh...my...God… Tarl…”
I hear her voice near me. I know she sees me sitting here back against the old wood crate my eyes shut. I might seem quite dead to her.. Maybe I should play dead.. She could bury me and go on with her life…
“Tarl… What has happened to you…?”
I feel her touch on my cheek where the tear slid a moment ago and finally I open my blood red eyes. I’m so sorry my darling.. So sorry I couldn’t keep my promise to go on a picnic with you last Saturday… So sorry I couldn’t ever give you the ring I had to ask you to marry me… So sorry you have to see me like this…
“Oh, Tarl… Why didn’t you come home..?”
I just look at her as her words are digging in. Come home? As the way I am? I open my mouth and too late I remember my long fangs. She saw them at once; I see it in her reaction. She sighs as I say what I have been thinking…
“I’m sorry Irilia… I didn’t want you to see me like this….”
***
[Irilia’s POW]
He looks so tired sitting there on the cold floor. I can’t describe the happiness I’m feeling while seeing him again but in the same time I’m sad and I want to cry. He isn’t my Tarl anymore.. He’s something else now. At first he didn’t answer me but as he says he’s sorry I feel like the damn broke inside me. I drop to my knees right next to him and weep while hugging him as hard as I can.
“Tarl…. I…I missed you so much…” My voice is so weak.
I feel him tense under my touch and then his hands come to rest on my shoulders as he pushes me away. I don’t understand.. Why are you distancing yourself from me?
“Don’t come too close Irilia.. I might hurt you… I don’t want to do that…”
His voice is quiet and he seems so sad and lonely. Just now I realize that his clothes are stained with now dry blood and I caress his cheek gently.
“I’m not afraid Tarl… Are you a vampire now?”
He gasps as I make my question. I guess he didn’t know I knew about this other world. I’m not afraid of it.
“Yes…” There is so much hesitation in his voice. He seems to hate himself right now.
I smile to him and wipe my remaining tears away. “It’s ok. I don’t fear you.”
“You should Irilia… As much as I hate it I can’t control my urge to drink blood…”
He looks directly at me and I see his crimson eyes and his need to feed soon. I know I should go away now but for some reason I want to stay. I want to keep him close to me and oddly enough I want him feed only from me. So I make my mind and move my hear away from my neck.
“Take my blood Tarl… It makes you stronger again.”
***
[Adem’s POW]
I stand watching how Irilia offers herself to Tarl. It is dangerous to be a food source of a vampire. I know as I’ve done that once in my life. She fed from me and I was nearly dead as she stopped. She turned me then. They don’t know from it and they never will. I’m too old to be detected by a vampire this young or a young seer as she is. My sire is still around too but she wasn’t the one who did that to Tarl. She wouldn’t dare to turn my friends.
I feel Tarl’s fear and hesitation. He is such a caring person who should never have been experienced this side of world. He’s struggling with his urges and morals but as a vampire I know the urges are going to win as they keep us alive.
“No! Don’t do that!!”
I wake from my musings and see Tarl scramble away from Irilia his face contorted by disgust and anger. I want to go to him and slap him on the face. It’s the greatest sign of trust a vampire can get from human when the fragile being offers its blood. I force myself to stay still and follow the situation through.
“Tarl.. Please.. I don’t want to lose you…”
Irilia is so strong woman. She knows about this other world, I see that now, but she still doesn’t know how much of us there really are. She is following Tarl now not cornering him but still staying close. I wonder when his urges make him attack her.
***
[Tarl’s POW]
No, please Irilia… Don’t do this to me…. I can’t drink from you… I try to back away but she follows me. My hunger grows stronger every moment and I can clearly see the pulsing vein on her neck. This is too much for me. I can’t take it anymore. I let her come closer offering herself to me.
“I’m so very sorry, my love…” I whisper in her ear just before I bite her with my fangs.
Oh God how sweet her blood is in my mouth. It’s sweeter than honey and rich as wine. I’m addicted at once. I need more and more but I have to stop. I don’t want to kill her… But how can I stop? The crimson liquid is taking over my senses and I feel my hands gripping her arms as she tries to move away.
“Tarl…” Her voice is weak.
I have to stop! I force myself to move away from her neck and I remove my hold from her arms. She slumps forward in my arms as I reflectively catch her body. Is she dead or just unconscious? Have I done it? Did I kill her with my greed? No, no..Please…
“Wake up Irilia, please, wake up…” My voice is hoarse and pleading.
I caress her beautiful serene face and soft curly hair and notice she is still breathing. The relief flushes over me and tears come flooding from my eyes.
“I’m sorry, so sorry…” I whisper it over and over again cradling her in my arms.
She’s still alive. My mind is so relieved. I didn’t kill her… I managed to stop in time.
“Tarl.. Honey, what’s wrong?” She whispers so faintly that I nearly miss her words.
She watches me and raises her hand to wipe away my tears. Her skin is so soft. I missed it. Now I realize it more than ever. I can’t let her go…
“Irilia… I…” I can’t say it to her… Not anymore.. It would chain her to me…
“I love you Tarl… It doesn’t matter what you are.” She is so much stronger than I am. She has chosen already…
“I love you too Irilia…But I…” I have to make sure she understands that I’m a horrible beast now.
“No buts, my love, I love you as much now when you are a vampire as I loved you as a human… Please come home with me…”
There is so strong determination in her voice that I nod before I realize what I’m doing. Her smile at that moment reminds me from the sun I’ll never see again. I don’t miss it as long as I have her. My own little sunshine…
Suddenly I hear the door closing once again and look up alarmed. No one there anymore.
“It was only Adem.. He brought me here… He awaits us in the car.”
She is so calm and collected now, resting in my arms and I let my body calm down too. My hunger is no more, it is satisfied for now.
“The sun will set soon…” I know she knows what I mean and I feel her nod.
“Our life is going to be different now Tarl, but we can make it. Don’t ever leave me again..” She looks at me her eyes showing her grief and fears what I caused.
“I’ll stay as long as you want me Irilia.” It’s easy to make that promise now. After my words the silence is our only companion as we sit together and enjoy our closeness once again. I feel her warmth seeping to my cool body making my stilled blood to warm and flow once again.
No more loneliness, no more fears, no more hunger. I’m still dead but I’m alive too. She makes me live.
We reach for each other and lock our lips in deep kiss just as the sun outside of the abandoned warehouse sets down and starts my day time. She smiles me like a sun and I kiss her once again.
“Let me show you my world, Irilia.”
She takes my hand then and presses one more kiss to my now warm cheek. “Let’s explore it together, my love.”
***
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