Chapter 3 #2
“Only you so far. Although maybe I can make a side business out of it.”
No, I want you all to myself was the next thing that threatened to jump out of Aster’s mouth—and on any other day she wouldn’t have stopped it. But it felt different now, colored by all the jumbled thoughts in her head.
“Come on,” Sylvia said, raising Aster’s legs off of her. “Turn around.”
Aster complied too easily, not trusting her mouth. She turned so she was on her stomach, and felt as Sylvia climbed back on top of her, straddling her back.
Her hands traveled innocently up her spine, spreading out across her shoulder muscles. Pressing in, down, around. Aster let herself release a quiet breath out.
It did feel nice.
Then, Sylvia stilled.
Her hand glided gently over the ridge of Aster’s shoulder. Her fingers stopped right at the bite mark that she’d left there. Caressed it softly, not pressing down.
“Does this still hurt?” she whispered.
Aster’s entire body thrummed in response.
She’d never felt anything quite like it—her stomach lurching, goosebumps running up her arms, her legs.
It didn’t hurt when Sylvia touched the mark; it was the complete opposite.
It was like she wanted Sylvia to rip it open again.
She wanted—god, she wanted her fangs, her fingers, anything. ..
“Aster?”
Sylvia’s voice was almost trembling, like she was feeling the same thing.
There’s no way she is.
She’s just worried about me. She just cares.
“It feels fine.” Lie. “It feels amazing.”
Her eyes snapped open. She hadn’t meant to say that.
Sylvia went silent, her hands stilling.
Just as Aster was about to apologize, Sylvia pressed. As if she had read her mind, or maybe Sylvia’s mind was telling her to do the same thing, Sylvia pressed on the wound with her sharp fingernails.
Aster hissed. It was painful. But it wasn’t only painful.
She felt that pulse again, moving through her, down to her stomach.
The hiss was enough to make Sylvia stop, though. Aster had to stifle a whimper when the contact was lost.
“What feels amazing?” Sylvia asked. Her voice had taken on a sort of doctorly apathy. Aster wished so badly she could see her face, see her expression.
“Nothing,” Aster mumbled into the couch. “I misspoke.”
“Bullshit.”
Aster bit hard on her own lip. Fuck. She’d gotten herself in this mess.
Might as well be honest.
“It feels good when you touch it…” She confessed. “The bite.”
“It does?”
“Yeah.”
A long pause. Sylvia’s fingers circled around it, again and again. Edging.
“I see,” Sylvia said. There was that doctorly tone again. “Makes sense.”
Aster brightened, feeling like she was drowning in the ocean, and someone had tossed her a buoy to stay afloat. “It does?”
“Of course. Bites create erogenous zones.”
Erogenous. It was such a scholarly way of putting it, that Aster almost missed the fact that Sylvia had just called her horny.
She groaned. “Oh, shut up.”
She could practically hear Sylvia’s smirk above her. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. I mean, hasn’t it been like, a hundred years? You seriously need to come out to the club with me—”
Nope. Nope. Aster officially could not process more of this discussion.
She bucked Sylvia off of her, causing the other woman to fall to the other side of the couch with a laugh.
Aster stood up, facing the television. Her entire body was still buzzing.
She could feel Sylvia’s fingers like a ghost over her skin.
She needed to get rid of that sensation right now. Immediately.
“Come on, Aster, I was just joking—”
Aster gave her the middle finger, and disappeared into the bathroom. She shut the door behind her, slunk down to the cold tile floor, and breathed. In, out. In, out.
She had no idea how many minutes passed.
It all became a drunken blur. The bathroom tub took on an alien form, morphing in space, twisting into abstract shapes.
Her lungs felt tight, constricted. She only became aware of how tightly her fingers were pulling on the rug beneath her when the door abruptly swung open, and she released the rug—and tore an entire piece of puffy white fabric off with it.
Footsteps echoed loudly. Sylvia knelt down in front of her, frowning deeply.
“Aster?”
The other vampire’s voice sounded muffled, far away, like Aster had entered a wind tunnel.
“Aster, you’re scaring me.”
Sylvia’s hands were holding her arms now, pressing down. The weight felt good. Felt grounding. Aster didn’t realize how desperately she needed to feel that way. She wrapped her own arms around herself and shivered. Her teeth chattered, and she felt her fangs collide against molars.
Sylvia’s eyebrows lifted. “Oh.” She gave her a worried, but relieved expression. “You—you need blood. Let me go get you some. Just stay here. Don’t move.”
So Sylvia did, and she returned some vague amount of time later.
Everything felt so strange. Time felt gooey, imperceptible.
The next thing she knew, she was waking up on the bathroom floor.
Her head was in Sylvia’s lap, and the other vampire was staring at her like she was the most important thing in the entire world.
It made Aster want to explode, just a little.
But she was still incredibly lethargic.
“What the hell just happened?” she moaned, closing her eyes. The fluorescent bathroom lights were like tiny stakes. “I feel like I just took fifteen shots of straight tequila.”
“I don’t know,” Sylvia said, but her bitten lip said otherwise. She had that expression on her face that meant she was trying very hard to withhold something, and doing so poorly.
“Yes you do,” Aster muttered. “Out with it.”
“Err.” Was Sylvia blushing? No, that had to be the light. Or Aster’s eyes. “No, I really don't. I’m no vampire doctor. I think you just got… lightheaded. We seriously need to get higher quality blood. We are way too rich to be living off Walmart hemoglobin.”
A smile crept up Aster’s lips despite herself.
“We’re explicitly not rich, Sylvia.”
“We will be soon.”
Sylvia had begun to dig her fingers into Aster’s scalp, itching softly. It made Aster’s entire body relax, go limp. She felt herself wading into the ocean of sleep, drifting off like a raft.
“Very, very soon.”