axeslade | (no subject)

At school again, but quick update to Vase Full of Blood

Usually I slept extremely light, a habit gained from the time in my life when I had to be ready to fight at a moment’s notice in case someone realized what I was and decided to drive a stake through my heart. That morning, however, I slept far past daybreak. In fact, I probably would have stayed asleep until I needed to feed if it hadn’t been for an intoxicating smell that wafted towards my nostrils. It wasn’t Pam’s drug-like perfumed scent. It was the smell of cooking meat.

I woke immediately when I smelled the blood dripping from the raw meat, snarling low in my throat until I managed to pull myself back enough to recognize that it wasn’t human blood. It was pig’s blood. Tempting, sure, but not as much. It was like a hamburger placed beside a T-bone steak. It was good, but I could resist. But who the hell-

My sleep-clouded mind cleared as another smell mingled with the blood. The smell of --- (yeah, I haven’t quite figured out what Pam’s blood smells like) all intermingled and intensified. When I was mortal I hardly would have been able to resist. Now, it a sleep-drunken state and with my increased senses, it was almost more than I could take.

And if the pain of holding myself back from drinking what must have been the sweetest blood I ever would have tasted based on smell alone, the pain I felt when she walked out carrying the food must’ve been enough to kill a mortal man.

She looked different than she had last night. I don’t know how. She was wearing the same worn pink tanktop, the same tattered blue jeans. Her hair was tied back in a messy ponytail now, and it looked like she had put a little gloss on her lips, but that was it. Maybe it was the sunlight. I rarely saw women in the sunlight-it wouldn’t kill me to walk among them that way, but it would be rather painful-so seeing Pamela bathed in hues of gold and pink, her eyes glittering like gemstones as the sun moved across them…

“I made you breakfast,” she chirped, unnecessarily, as she set the plate down on the coffee table in front of me and then sat down at my feet.

“Oh…oh, thank you,” I managed to stutter as I sat up, taking the proffered fork from her delicate fingers and trying my hardest to ignore the supple leg that was pressing against my foot.

“You really didn’t have to do this, though,” I said a moment later through a mouthful of sausage. She giggled a bit when I tried to excuse my rudeness and shook her head, making her ponytail bounce back and forth.

“You saved my life last night and gave me a place to stay. The least I could do is do your grocery shopping and cook you breakfast.”

I swallowed quickly, eyes flying wide in amazement.

“You-you went shopping?”

She rolled her eyes.

“What, do you think a fairy left all this? You fridge was completely empty.”

Of course it was. I would occasionally buy meat when someone got suspicious of all the people who had been attacked, but those times were few and far between, so there was no reason for me to keep any stores.

I didn’t need to explain that, though, because another thought rushed into my mind.

“You went out alone!” I exclaimed. She grinned, stabbing a piece of sausage with her own fork and popping it into her mouth. She chewed and swallowed it, thankfully, before she began speaking.

“I go out alone all the time. Last night was a fluke.” She stared at the plate while she said this, though, giving me the feeling that what had happened last night was far more commonplace than she’d ever admit.

I sighed heavily, forcing myself up from the couch.

“I’m sure your boyfriend’s wondering where you are. I should get you home.”

She frowned at this, but nodded.

“Yeah, he’s probably furious. You done eating? I’ll do the dishes…”

“No!” I said, a little too quickly. Part of me wanted to keep her here as long as possible, but more of me knew that the longer I kept her here, the worse the hunger would get.

“I mean,” I started again, calmer this time, trying to kill the shock that had filled her eyes.

“I’ll clean up. You’ve done enough, I really should get you back. I’m sure your boyfriend will be giving me a black eye as it is, don’t want him knocking my teeth out too,” I said, teasing, just to see her smile.

“All right. Just lemme get my purse,” she said, turning to go back towards the guest bedroom, but not before giving me a quick kiss on the cheek. I was grateful to see her darting away from me, knowing that if we had stayed within inches of each other for one moment longer, I would have spilled her sweet blood all over the couch.

We didn’t talk as we walked to her apartment. Partly because I didn’t wish to find out more about her for fear of getting attached, and (mostly) because Pam wasn’t volunteering anything.

I grew nervous, though, as we crossed through the middle-class but relatively calm part of town to a slum that made the alley I’d found her in lass night seem swanky. Unconsciously, I draped the arm I had previously been very careful to keep inches away from her across her shoulders. And, this time, she didn’t make any mentions of my bruising grip.

Pam eventually guided me towards a building that looked like it should have been condemned centuries ago. “Home sweet home,” she said, laughing a bit too loud and tugging me a long.

We climbed up two flights of ramshackle stairs, went down a hall that smelled of cat urine and other unimaginable noxious things, until we stopped at a door. 18B.

“Well, this is my stop,” Pam said, shoving a stray lock of hair behind her ear. She smiled sweetly, then leaned forward and gently kissed my cheek. This time I only inhaled a little and held my breath. This was getting easier every time.

“Thank you again, Ambrose,” she whispered gently, pulling back so I could see the gratitude clearly shining in her eyes.

“The pleasure was mine,” I murmured, instinctively lifting her hand and kissing it. It was then that I noticed what I should have noticed long before. A small, yet very distinct, bruise on the inside of her wrist. That, if nothing else, made me hold back from puncturing her sweet blue veins. What-

Thankfully she pulled back then, and without another word went into her apartment and slammed the door. She shut it before I could glimpse much of the rooms, but there was no way she could keep me from noticing the odor. Smells that, much like blood normally did, overrode all the other rank smells around me. Two heavy smells which both made me growl low in my throat. The first was toxic. A drug, which one I couldn’t tell and didn’t care to. The second, the collective smell of the seeds of numerous men. Digging my nails sharply into my palms to keep myself from busting down the door, so sharply that the skin broke and reformed many times as I did, I stormed back down the stairs and out into the street.