Life Starts After Dark

Skylar’s POV

I could not bring myself to fall asleep, and I wasn’t quite sure why. Maybe I was afraid of what dreams I might have when I closed my eyes. That was certainly something to worry about. I could not afford to have any more confusing dreams. I was afraid I might go insane if I had any more of those.

I wanted more than anything for what happened last night to be erased. Sam was so hurt and angry with me. What was I going to do about that?

I watched as the day wore on, and heard the sounds of the day. Children laughed as they ran along the gravel road and into the cemetery to play games among the dead. I heard that chatter of baby birds in a nest that sat in the tree outside my living room window. Floorboards creaked as the house warmed up in the morning sunlight.

I rose from the couch, and my bones seemed to creak in protest as I moved for the first time in hours. My eyes were burning and sore, and my face was sticky and stiff with the salty tears that had dried there.

I went out onto my porch, and sat in the old wicker chair that stood halfway in the sunlight against the house.

The sun felt so natural and right after it seemed to have been absent from me for so long. I had slept in so late lately and been up so late into the night, that the sun had almost become a foreign figure to me.

I remembered shortly afterward, why I was not very fond of the sun. My pale skin had started to turn red, and soon it would burn. So I ran back inside as if I was a vampire in need of a dark place.

And the dark place I chose was my own closet. Why I needed to be there, I wasn’t sure. I just closed the door behind me, shut my eyes, and pretended to be detached from the rest of the world. Was this what it felt like to sleep in a coffin? Were vampires really dead to the world, as I felt I was now? It was a peaceful feeling.

What would it be like to be a vampire? Would I miss the sun? I was sure that if ever I became a child of the night, the sun would be missed. What about food? I knew that I could never eat regular food again, but it wouldn’t exactly be appetizing to me, would it? But to feel such intense power? That must be liberating in some way.

I mentally kicked myself for thinking about such things. I could never be a vampire. That was insanity.

So I got out of the closet, and got back to the real world.

I had forgotten my two weeks notice to Sam, but I no longer cared about it. I couldn’t go back there now. I couldn’t look at him, and know that I would leave in two weeks.

I needed to think, but thinking seemed to become very hard lately. I wasn’t sure what were the right things to think about, or if I should even bother using my mind at all. Maybe I should just let the rest of my body take the reins and tell me what I needed to do. That seemed like an incredibly foolish thing to do, but I could see no other option.

So I let go, and let my heart decide for me.