Chapter 6
When I wake to the sound of my alarm the next afternoon, I’m spread-eagle in the middle of my queen-sized bed, the fitted sheet coming off the mattress and a random striped sock on the floor in front of me.
Just like anyone else. Because, disappointingly, I don’t sleep in a pretty satin-lined coffin, despite what books and movies might say.
In fact, I should point out right now, that pop culture vampire lore gets as much wrong as it gets right.
I mean, yes, obviously I cry blood and drink blood.
I don’t age and sometimes my little fangs emerge.
Yes, I can hypnotise people (though it’s a bit hit or miss, so I’m pretty sure I’m doing it wrong).
Yes, my senses are more finely tuned than most—I can smell a person’s blood type, hear their heartbeat, see in the dark, and zoom in on details—but mainly it’s nothing sunglasses, deep breaths and a good pair of noise-cancelling headphones can’t fix.
Yes, my circadian rhythms are totally messed up, and yes, fine, I’m a teensy bit obsessive . . .
But that’s about it.
I run cool, not icy cold. I can’t fly. I’m not that quick, nor strong—I’m downright clumsy at times.
I don’t need an invitation to go inside.
I can bleed. I feel pain. I show up perfectly well in photographs and mirrors.
And I can’t turn into a bat or mist or anything else.
In fact, the only power I do have (aside from my questionable hypnotism skills) is a total dud—sometimes I’ll touch a person and be able to see their memories.
This life, last life—anything goes. (Yes, humans get multiple lives while I’m stuck with this one—so unfair.) I have no control over it, no idea what it is for, and honestly, it’s a bit of a mindfuck.
Yet, those inaccuracies are the least of my grievances.
I pull out my earplugs, take off my eye mask and reach for my phone.
No new messages.
But the little white digits on my phone say it’s 3.30 pm. I do some quick maths. That makes it eighteen and a half hours since we last spoke; and my hair still smells like the cedarwood and musk of his cologne. Everything aches.
I swallow hard as I look through my bedroom doorway towards the living room window.
A thin band of late afternoon light creeps in around the edges of the heavy-duty blinds.
And as I look at it, I think: Here we go again, for the 55,016th time.
Another dusk, another moon, another night just like every other night that’s gone before and every night that will come after, forever, and ever, and ever and ever . . .
Lucky me.
Because I have what everyone thinks they want, eternal life, and all I want, even after all these years, is to die.
Which brings me to my major bugbear with vampire stories.
If this were a book or a TV show, I could just wander out into daylight right now and explode or burst into flames or something. Sunlight is supposed to kill me.
But nothing in real life is ever that simple.
Turns out, I can’t die. Ever. Not even in the ways vampires routinely die in literature.
None of it works. Not a stake through the heart, not beheading, not crucifix nor holy water, not garlic, not silver, not starvation, not fire and certainly not sunshine.
All sunlight does is make me tired, foggy and even more irritable.
It’s like putting my head underwater—everything, every sense, is muffled and I can’t think straight.
And yes, I’m sure. Following my foray into the river and subsequent attempts after Hans left, I made it my mission to figure out how vampires die.
How hard could it be? I thought. But I’ve tried almost everything now; every method more than once.
I am quite literally stuck here on this earth.
Just me and AI and Tinder and every other money-making advance that masquerades as ‘progress’ until it screws up the world even more than it already was.
Stuck here, watching the oceans fill with plastic and waiting for the apocalypse to finally come.
But as I lie in bed, staring at the strip of sunlight that won’t kill me, I think, Okay, so it is what it is. Let’s assess the damage.
One: Jonathan is my soulmate; the only person who could ever love me despite what I am. Two: I went a little hard and fast and scared him off. Three: I have to get him back. Four: I can with Daphne’s help.
Because Jonathan didn’t plan on breaking up with me last night. He was getting a bottle of wine for us to drink when I pushed him to it. I think back on the scene, assessing it for signs of hope.
I was following him into the kitchen, looking at him, wondering why he’d been so quiet all week.
Telling myself it was just because of work—he and Baxter had been developing a property app and were in the thick of getting funding—while also telling myself it was important to share my feelings, tell him when I was hurt.
Then . . . I tripped.
The contents of my bag scattered all over the kitchen tiles and Jonathan crouched down to help me gather everything up.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked, gently touching my arm, like I was a delicate flower, not dead inside with bones that never break and flesh that heals in moments.
I nodded, and I should have just left it there. But instead, as he handed me my lipstick, a rogue business card and two loose tampons, I said, ‘It really hurt my feelings that you didn’t reply to my texts this week. It’s not hard to text back, Jonathan.’
And there was an edge to my voice as I said his name, an edge I’m not proud of.
An edge that wouldn’t have been there if I were well adjusted and didn’t have abandonment issues of epic proportions.
But the thing is, I do have abandonment issues of epic proportions.
Hans left me the moment I stepped out of line.
Freddie (my only other relationship before Jonathan—more on that later) left me.
And, worst of all, my sire left me. Because he never did come back. So yes, I have issues.
When Jonathan wasn’t replying to me last week, I assumed it meant he was going to leave me too.
Not great. Not healthy. But I can’t change any of that.
I can only do better. Which means letting Daphne help me.
But right now, I need to get ready for work.
I trudge to the kitchen to get some breakfast. But as I get to the fridge, my gaze catches on the bin.
Poking out the top is the nappy from last night, the one with the empty blood bag inside it.
I really don’t want to go and get blood right now, I’m seriously not in the mood, but it’s already 21 December.
And Es—my blood connection and friend—is finishing up work today and won’t return until the 27th.
I’ll have to go get some before work. I really can’t afford to be hungry over the holidays, especially not when I’m feeling like this.