Post by silent.lullaby on Dec 5, 2009 0:34:06 GMT -5
Dusk .::Chapter 02::. Two Hearts Beating
Mother dabbed at her eyes with Father’s white handkerchief with his initials sewn in red that he’d pressed into her had before he left. She always got all weepy when he went away for a while. She took a few deep breaths as my siblings and I stood in the doorway watching her. “Okay,” she let out a wavering exhale, and then inhaled again and put on a fake smile, “what do you kids want for dinner?”
Despite that we don’t need to eat, most of us enjoy it. Food is delicious, and our sense of taste is better than humans. All of our bodily functions work, we aren’t the reanimated corpses the old legends led you to believe. Our bodies are like human, veins which blood travels, a digestive system, a brain. One main difference in the body, of those born vampire (this doesn’t apply to those that are turned) we have a second, slightly smaller heart, that is positioned on the opposite side. We can survive with out one heart, it’s another reason why we’re so hard to kill. You have to destroy both hearts or we can heal.
After much debate, and mother worrying herself about father, and making dinner, we ended up ordering Chinese food. “Pass the rice please,” Angelique said in her sickeningly sweet soprano voice. Tobias picked up the rice and passed it over, she promptly thanked him. “Do you think Father will be able to convince the council to keep St. Viktor’s open?”
Tobias shrugged his broad shoulders, “once the elders have it in their mind to do something, they do it.”
“I don’t want to move,” Angelique whined. “All my friends are here.”
I grabbed an egg roll and took a bite savouring the flavours before I spoke, “there is a possibility we could go to St. Markus’s.” I mulled the thought over as I took another bite. St. Markus’s was over in another district, a boarding school for vampires and werewolves. They took people from all Covenants, we’d have to live with roommates of our own species and gender, of course, but we could come home on the weekend. We wouldn’t have to move.
“It’s a seven hour drive.” Tobias said thoughtfully, the decision of schools didn’t worry him, he was already done. He attended a college in the area though, and may have to leave it if there wasn’t another Covenant for him to join. If you don’t have a Covenant, you’re unmonitored by your kind, this can lead to temptations and territory wars.
Mother shook her head as she took a scoop of chow mein. “Lets talk about something different shall we?”
After dinner Angelique and I threw out the tins and little folding boxes our food had come in and put the dishes in the dishwasher. Angelique went up to her room, and I could faintly hear her music playing as I started up a pot of coffee. Tobias blurred past me and I wondered where he was headed in such a hurry. I heard the great roar of his motorcycle coming to life and it left the driveway.
“Pour me a mug,” Mother said as she silently stepped into the room. I nodded and she sat down at the kitchen table and looked around. “I just got this room perfect.” I didn’t say anything. “Why would they...” I tilted my head and my mother chewed her bottom lip as she looked up at the ceiling mulling over whatever question she hadn’t fully asked. She shook her head as if it would clear her mind, “you have plans tonight?”
I nodded, “I seen Wolfgang at the store.” I felt sorry for him, despite his rugged good looks, being a werewolf with the name Wolfgang sure did get him a lot of grief. “He wants to go down to the Ashnite Mines tonight. Apparently there’s a few wolf bands playing.”
Mother frowned, “you know I don’t like you going there.”
I sighed, “I’ll keep close to Wolfgang, and he said Skyler, Harmony and Hayden are coming too. There will probably be lots of kids from school too.” Mother rubbed her temples, “come on, we might have to move soon and I won’t get to see them anymore.”
Mother sighed, “fine, fine.” She stood and was over to me in a blur. She gently touched my shoulders and kissed my forehead, “be safe young one.”
“Of course I will,” I replied. Being inhuman didn’t mean I couldn’t get hurt.
“No drinking, no drugs, no sex.” My mother said sternly as she tightened her grasp on my shoulders demanding my attention.
I rolled my eyes, “I know mom.”
“And no eating any humans that might show up either,” she said with a little grin.
It was unlikely a human would be invited to the Ashnite Mines, it’s a vampire/werewolf hangout and we try to keep it that way, but it wasn’t impossible that one might hear about it and show up. It’s happened before. “I won’t,” I replied with a little grin. I turned and poured us each a steaming mug of coffee.
“How’s your blood levels?” She asked.
I felt awkward, “fine mom, under control.”
“You haven’t had any in a few days.”
“Mom!” I whispered harshly. I didn’t like talking about my feeding habits to anyone. Call me sensitive.
“You should have a blood pack before you go.” I took a sip of coffee as she studied me. “Unless you plan on necking with Wolfgang.”
“Mom!” I shot one of my piercing glares through my crisp blue eyes at her. “I’m not going to bite him!”
“He’s a handsome young man.”
I stepped around my mother, “I’m not listening to this.”
I heard my mothers tinkling laughter as I walked down the hall and turned to go up the stairs. Mother liked to tease me since I admitted a few years ago that I had a crush on him. Since then though, he had grown more handsome, built more muscle, gotten more tan, and gotten a full foot taller. He’d also gotten a bit more of an ego, and had become a bit of a ladies man.
In my room, I put my coffee down on my desk took my phone and plugged it in. I popped a burnt CD into my laptop and pressed play. I smiled as light classical music filled the air. I had to admit, as nerdy as it may be, I love it.
I swallowed back the last of my coffee and head into the bathroom. To my right was a counter covered in makeup, skin cleansers, Q-Tips, hair elastics, and other various hair products, two sinks, a wide mirror, to my left is a glass shower tub and past the wall of the shower is a toilet. Straight ahead is another door that leads into Angelique’s room, I locked it.
Turning on the water to let it warm up, I striped out of my clothing before opening the glass door and stepping over the tub edge and closing it behind me. I pulled out the lever and the water falls down on me. I used my favourite melon shampoo and conditioner and I washed up with a citrus scrub.
I get out of the shower leaving damp foot prints as I unlock Angelique’s door and step through my door and into my room. The grey plushy carpet dries my feet the rest of the way. I open my walk in closet and grin. Oh the options.
Being on the council gives my father an income that is easily lived off of, he also is head of corporation working on artificial blood that can sustain us, which has had little success. Not that he needs to work, over centuries, he’s collected quite a large sum. Mother works as an highly successful interior designer, between the two of them, we live well.
I bite my thumbnail while I ponder what to wear. People expect vampires to wear corsets, lolita styled skirts, chains, or stunning gowns in blood red and midnight black. I grab a pair of cut off light denim shorts from the drawer and a white t-shirt that reads ‘only a vampire can love you forever.’ Personally I would have never picked out the thing, but Harmony got it for my birthday laughing hard when I opened it.
Stepping out of my closet I toss my clothing choices onto the bed and grab my yellow bikini from my drawer before closing the closet door. I pull on the string bikini and put the shorts and T over top. I walk over to my desk and look outside, the sun in it’s final moments of the day. I inhale deeply as dusk settles in and I feel the changes in me. My vision sharpening, I feel more awake, my hearts seems to have come out of their calm slumber, thudding more regular intervals.
My phone flashes, and I open it. A text that reads: I’ll pick u up. U almost ready?
I hit reply to Wolfgang: Gimme twenty. And hit reply. I bent down and twirled the combination to my desk safe and pulled it open. Inside had a few things that I felt needed to be guarded. My money, since Angelique had stolen a few twenties from me. My family ring, I felt scared wearing it out, afraid I might loose it. Everyone else in the family wears it, I do on occasion, but for the most part it stays locked up safe. White gold, a carefully cut chunk of ruby, white gold cased over in the shape of the family crest. A few photos of family and friends, and my collection of diaries, four of them complete, the fifth half way through.
I took out the family ring, slipped it on my middle finger of my left hand and studied it. “Vampiric,” I whispered with a lopsided grin before taking it off and putting it back in the drawer safe. I grabbed a twenty and shut the drawer hearing the tumbler lock back into place I stuffed the twenty in my bikini and went to do my hair and make up.