Falling to Pieces

We all stood in black onto of a hill. It was twilight, a mystical time of day for it was between day and night. Sort of like me.
I'm not human.
I'm not Vampire.
I'm in between.
Lindsey was in Joel’s arms crying hysterically as the flames grew higher.
“Vampires cant really be buried,” Joel had told me at the beginning of the funeral, “We’d never decompose, and we cant leave any trace of our existence behind.”
“Hence the cremation,” I asked.
“Exactly,” He whispered.
Ryan was like my little brother, and I missed him so much. It hurt Lindsey the most though, they were always so close.
Afterwards, Joel took my hand and led me away from the people crying, the death, into the forest.
“How are you?” He asked.
I knew what he meant at once.
“I’m fine,” I assured him.
He traced the scar on my neck with his cold fingers that didn’t feel so cold anymore. “Any regrets now?”
I shook my head and smiled. “None at all.”
Joel pulled back and searched my face, I searched his eyes. I saw the ancient sadness of his own pain, due to the vampire venom. He was so set that the venom ruined people, but for me it saved my life.
“Not yet,” he whispered.
“Joel, you saved my life,” I said.
He shook his head. “I couldn’t save all of you.”
“Its enough to keep me alive,” I told him, looking down.
‘For now Rose, but what if…?” he trailed off.
“No!” I hissed in my new snake-like voice, “I don’t want to hear it.”
He didn’t say anything.
A month ago he almost killed himself to save me.
I had woken up on a bed in an empty room…without Joel. I stood up and saw myself in the mirror in front of the bed. I had pale skin, paler than when I was sick. But I saw life in my eyes, in my blue-violet and gold eyes. I looked like Andy now.
I walked out into the hall and followed it down to the door at the end of the hallway. The door was cracked open. I took a breath, that I didn’t need, for my lungs no longer worked. I placed my gold eye in the crack and saw Joel in a bed with tubes attached to him. The vampire doctor, Nell, was looking at charts. Lindsey sat next to him in a chair, holding his hand. She looked up and saw me.
Joel’s head turned and he smiled, despite everything he smiled.
I pushed open the door and walked in, but didn’t go to him. Everything was so different. The noises that would have just been a hum were now echoing in my ear drums. I heard everything. The air going in and out of Joel’s nose, shaky.
A soft thumping noise…
“Rose,” he breathed, careful to keep his voice soft, or maybe that was all that he could get out.
I looked at him. My vision was better too. I saw every pigment in his violet blue eyes. Each strand of his hair.
And then the realization that I almost lost him hit me harder than I would have thought possible with someone without a heart. I felt my cheeks dampen.
Joel’s eyes dimmed. “Its okay.”
Even now he was trying to comfort me. Even now when I was immortal like him, I was still incapable of helping him. I still wasn’t enough.
I walked over to him and took his hand that held needles. “You could have died.”
He grinned. “Could’ve.”
Lindsey rolled her eyes.
I kneeled down next to his bed. “You know what?” I whispered.
“What?”
“You cant give me crap about smoking now,” I whispered.
He grinned, but it fell. “Rose you’re not fully immortal.”
I looked up at Nell. “I don't understand.”
“The werewolf venom in you covers your heart,” Nell said.
The faint thumping noise…
“Which means you still have a blood flow,” she said.
“Which means leukemia is still in you,” Joel whispered.
Everything tilted.
“Hey you love birds,” Lindsey said in a hoarse voice, interrupting my thoughts, “We’re leaving. We need to get on the plane to North Dakota.”
“Why North Dakota?” I asked.
“We haven’t been there yet,” Joel said.
We walked out on the hill and looked down at Ryan’s gravestone. There were eight other stones, all the vampires. And my own was included.
Rosella Carters
1991-2009
“Its so they think we’re dead,” Joel said, “We don’t exist.”
I tilted my head to the side. “The Velions?”
“No,” he said, “The humans.”
I pictured Thomas coming to my grave, thinking I was dead.
“How did we die?” I whispered to him.
He grinned. “Car accident.”
I rolled my eyes. “How original.”
“And how would you fake our death?”
I smiled. “Well a huge gory fight, with blood drenched carpets and stained walls.”
He looked at me, the grin had fallen. “Don't let that stuff get to you.”
Joel Carters
1991-2009
I looked at him, then at the gravestone. I closed my eyes and imagined putting flowers on his grave. It was an eerie feeling of what could have happened.
“Come on Rose,” he said, “We have to go.”
And then I took off running into the forest, keeping up with him.
One of the things we were equal at.