Enchanted Dreams (13 page)

My eyes kept wandering over him, examining and admiring him as if I were committing him to memory. I dropped kisses everywhere I looked. He moaned in pleasure, especially when I dipped down and flicked my tongue over his hard-on. Seeing that he liked this, I began to lick it from its base to its tip, running my tongue over the various engorged veins that swelled up all around it. There was one in particular that I noticed bulged and throbbed more than the others. I let my tongue linger over it a moment, fascinated and thrilled and terrified by it all at the same time. Up and down I kept sliding my tongue, sighing gently as I poured my breath out over him.

With sudden, irreversible decisiveness, I raised my lips up over my teeth and swiftly and deftly drove one of my highly sharpened incisors deep into the large, bulging vein I had just seconds ago been lustfully running my tongue over. I was able to pierce it flawlessly in that first, precise thrust, and instantly afterward clamped down over him with my lips while pulling vigorously with my jaws. Vincent's blood gushed forth instantaneously, shocking me with how quickly it filled my mouth. I had a strong urge to gag, but I forced myself to swallow the blood in huge gulps, trying desperately to ignore the sickening, coppery taste of it. I knew that the poison—or whatever it was he had infected me with—had not yet had time to take effect in my system, but this was my one and only opportunity. Before poor Vincent had even had time to cry out in surprise, I think I must have swallowed over a pint.

Vincent was taken utterly by surprise. Just as I had anticipated he would, he froze, uncertain about what to do. He could hardly jerk away or strike me while I was still so precariously attached; even in his shocked state, he was aware of the dangers in that. But it was actually much longer than I expected before he was even able to cry out for me to stop.

I released him after his second cry, immediately scurrying off the bed and retreating to a neutral corner of the room. I don't know if it was his second cry that stopped me, or the fact that I simply couldn't take any more. I was struggling to keep down what I had swallowed, fighting wave after wave of the dizzying nausea.

Once I had disengaged myself from Vincent, he, too, jumped up from the bed. However, he was clearly still quite vulnerable, falling down once before managing to secure his footing. He awkwardly cupped his hands over his groin with a look of distress. His eyes shone with rage, but he was disarmed—for the moment.

"What the hell are you?" he yelled. He kept glancing down distractedly, opening his hands periodically to examine himself. As far as I could tell, it seemed as if the bleeding had nearly stopped. The incision had been remarkably small and clean, just penetrating the vein.

"I'm sick, remember?" I said. "Like you, I want to live."

"What?"

"I want to be a vampire."

"So you bite my
dick?
"

"I was afraid you would be too strong to restrain if I bit you anywhere else," I said sheepishly. "I am sorry."

"You're
sorry?
" He appeared to be too astonished for words. "Get out."

"But…"

"Get out!" he yelled again, louder this time. "I should kill you." But he was paler than usual and seemed weak and woozy. Even as he said this, he leaned back on the wall for support.

"I was careful not to hurt it," I said, picking up my clothes from the chair where I had left them and moving toward the bathroom so that I could dress in private.

He was examining himself again. "How did you…What did you pierce me with?"

I stopped to look at him. "I filed my teeth down."

"You
what?
"

I sighed. "I filed my teeth down. You know, with a nail file."

"Let me see."

I took a deep breath and then raised my lips up over my teeth. My two incisors were shaped into two frighteningly pointy fangs, more terrifying even than those of the vampire. I had filed so much of them away that all around the nerves were exposed. That's how I was able to learn to talk while barely moving my lips. The pain when the air hit those nerves was an excellent reminder.

"When did you do that?"

"I did it after I saw you that first night."

"You went home and filed down your
teeth?
"

"No, I…well, yes, I began filing them down a little at a time. It hurt too much to do it all at once."

"With this in mind?"

"Well, yes, actually, I was hoping it would happen something like it did." I looked at him regretfully. "Does it hurt much?" I asked. "I didn't want to hurt you. That's why I filed them down so much."

He was still too angry to worry about making me feel better, although I could see that I hadn't hurt him as much as might have been expected. I had only used the one incisor, and it was a precise, smooth cut that pierced the artery just right.

"I'm sorry," I repeated, moving once again toward the bathroom so that I could dress.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked suddenly.

"I have leukemia," I replied, assuming he was referring to my terminal illness.

Vincent allowed me to leave there alive.

I trudged home in the dark, feeling sick and tired and miserable, and without any knowledge of what would happen next. I was getting weaker by the minute. Doubts filled my head. Had I ingested enough of Vincent's blood to become a vampire? But I wondered if that even mattered. If what Vincent told me about his own account of what happened was true, then my plan to drink vampire blood may not have been necessary at all, although it was most certainly the thing that got me out of there alive. And perhaps it had provided enough sustenance to get me through. But was I a vampire? And what about my disease? What if being bitten by Vincent didn't rid me of my disease? Would I simply remain sick for a longer, perhaps indefinite period of time? Clearly I had not thought all of this through. The night I first saw Vincent I instantly and thoughtlessly clung to the idea of what he was. But I suddenly felt that, no matter what I did, I would never be like him. And I was more depressed than I had ever been before in my life.

By the time I got home, I might have done away with myself then and there if I had had the strength.

I've been sick all of my life, as I have already indicated, but even so I was not prepared for the incredible pain I would feel in the days that followed. I was certain that I would die, and wished time and again that I had just allowed myself to die that night in Vincent's arms, happy and sated. I wondered about him continually in between the bouts of anguish.

Next came the hunger, and that's when I knew I would live. But I realized once again that I had not really thought through the details of my plan. Where was I supposed to get someone to feed on, for example? And would I actually be able to pull it off? Biting Vincent had been one thing, for I was careful not to actually harm him, but to take a life? Of course, as my hunger grew, this problem vanished. How long, really, can a person fast when sustenance is everywhere around them? I grappled with the idea of leaving the first one alive, to live if he was able. But in the end I could not. Another instinct warned me that this would be compounding the wrong. Perhaps that is what Vincent felt, as well.

I have always been rather pale and drawn, but not in the lawless, youthful way of the vampire. I nearly fell in love with myself in those first weeks. I'm ashamed to admit that I would look at myself in the mirror for hours. Not that I was beautiful, even then. But my skin, without the sickly tinge, was lovely! My drab green eyes suddenly seemed bright and fierce. My lips and cheeks were rosy with health. Oh, to have good health! Are you healthy? Rejoice! I virtually skipped when I walked from the exuberance I felt.

And suddenly, men were approaching me! I never did get used to that. I continued to be reserved and uncertain around them, but now my shyness seemed to make me more desirable. And that suited my needs. But unlike Vincent, I wasn't able to be intimate with them. I found that I always ended up killing them before we were able to consummate it. It would end in a kind of relief for me. It may be a good thing that there aren't more women like me out there, or I think men would be dropping like flies. Perhaps it was the men that I chose. Like Vincent, I felt the need to single out someone who seemed a bit more killable. It is a terrible thing to decide who to kill, and I would have preferred, if I'd had the know-how, to scout around for child molesters or other evil beings but, then again, who am I to judge?

I hated it, but I needed it. Like Vincent, I went as long as I could between feedings.

I thought of Vincent all the time. He had become such a huge part of my life. He was the one who gave me life, in a way, for this was the first time I had lived. I wondered morning, noon and night how he was and what he was doing. But I was afraid to approach him. I couldn't bear to see hatred in those dark, beautiful eyes.

Oftentimes, out of habit more than anything else really, I would find myself standing on his street. But I always picked up my step when I passed by his house. I could no longer watch him through windows. Sometimes I would wander into a nearby park and sit, for a while, on the swings—something I was never well enough to do as a child. Other times I would walk up and down the side streets, wondering what he was up to. I could almost imagine that I was with him, by just being in the neighborhood where he lived.

"You're alive!"

I whirled around at the sound of his voice one night and suddenly there he was!

"Wow!" he exclaimed. "And you look great! So…healthy." Vincent shook his head in amazement. "So it actually worked, then?"

"Yes." All of a sudden, I couldn't breathe. His eyes shined on me with pleasure. With
pleasure!

"I wondered," he went on. "I've been going crazy wondering, actually, but I had no idea where you lived or even what your last name was."

I finally found my voice. "I know. It was kind of…odd." I couldn't help laughing suddenly. "I was just thinking of you," I told him honestly.

"You don't say."

"Yeah, I, ah…just came from your house, actually." I laughed again. It was so wonderful to see him that I felt as giddy as a teenager.

"No kidding!" He laughed, too, and raised one eyebrow ironically. "Funny, that's the last place I would have looked."

"Are you…I mean, did your…cut…heal up okay?"

"It did! It really wasn't even that bad, you know, just kind of shocking. You're the first girl who's ever done that to me. I never expected you to be so…resourceful."

I laughed again, amazed and so very happy that he was talking to me.

"I know this whole thing started out kind of weird," I began, and then when I saw his expression I quickly amended, "Okay,
very
weird. Extremely weird. But, you know, we have this…thing in common now, and…I don't know, it might be nice…I mean, it would be nice—for me especially—if I could see you…once in a while. Or a lot." He was smiling again, which encouraged me, so I pressed on brazenly. "A lot would be better than once in a while, but either one will do."

"Well, what are you doing right now?" he asked.

"I already told you. Returning from your house."

We both suddenly burst into laughter. And we laughed throughout the rest of that night. I was surprised and unbelievably happy. For all I knew, I could have been his mortal enemy after what I had done. But it confirmed, too, what I had believed all along actually, which was that Vincent was the sort of man who would really blossom on a second date. Just as I suspected, he did yearn to be known for more than just a few hours. He wanted to be known well and appreciated for his many subtler qualities, and was actually quite demanding in this regard. What great companions we made, in the end!

And as it turns out, there is something I can tell you about vampires that you probably haven't heard before. I only discovered it myself because of my jealous nature, which made it torture for me to be alone while Vincent went out to feed. Of course, feeding did not have to involve a long and lengthy seduction, but it seemed that the two went so well together. And neither did Vincent want me out roaming the streets looking for blood. We wanted to be together. We began seeking a single victim, to share between us. It was never really necessary, after all, to drink more than a few pints during our feedings. But even this presented its difficulties. Should it be a man or a woman?

It all came about because Vincent needed to feed more often than me. He grew weak faster than I did. On this occasion I was not quite hungry enough yet. It never got easier for me to kill, so I had to have that desperate feeling in order to do it. Poor Vincent would nearly starve to death waiting for me. I could see that he was growing visibly weaker, although he still had the strength to make love. I was riding him from on top. This seemed to revive him somewhat, but I could still see the hunger in his eyes.

In that moment I wanted to be everything to him. I wanted to fulfill all of his needs, even the hunger. At the mere thought of it, my blood began to flow a little faster. I was suddenly aware of it, coursing through my veins. A new thrill filled me over what I was thinking. I squeezed him from deep within me, closing in all around his hardness, as the excitement continued to build in me. Vincent became more excited, too, and that strange, fiery light came into his eyes. I felt a rush of adrenaline as I slid my hair to one side, exposing the pulsing artery in my neck to him. There was a look of surprise on his face as I lowered my neck to his lips. I brushed it back and forth over his opened mouth, and I heard the faint hiss of his sharp intake of breath. I kept on, simultaneously moving up and down on his erection as I brushed my neck over his lips, again and again. Finally, he could no longer resist, and with a low groan he grasped hold of my head and buried his fangs in my neck, causing me to cry out. But even as he drank his fill, my hips continued to move up and down on him, and I shuddered violently as my orgasm shot through me. He took what he needed and then jerked his head to one side, gasping for air as he released himself inside me.