Under the Giant Oak

What was I going to do with that boy? Seriously, I had no flipping clue. Things had been. . . different, I would say, around the house recently. Pete's work thing is ending soon. So, him and Patrick will be leaving in a week. I'm going to have to say, I'm going to miss those fools. They were pretty damn fun.

Ronnie, on the other hand, has been acting different. He seems less stressed, but at the same time, he seems more stressed. When it is just the two of us, he's fine, better then fine actually. I hate to admit, but we do kind of make a charming couple. Plus, we aren't like those disgusting couples you see that are all over each other every second of every day. But, when we are in public, he seems high strung, like he just wants to kill everyone single person that looks his way. They're lucky he doesn't.

I was alone right now. Pete took Patrick out of the house for a change. He was a good dom. No wonder they have been together around seventy years and still act like they just met. Ronnie, well, I had no fucking clue where he is. I woke up this lovely Saturday morning, and he wasn't there. Which was fun for me. No, I'm lying. It wasn't, not even a little. I almost had a panic attack.

I really wanted to get out of the house. Ronnie and Pete found a human last night that wasn't the nicest it could have been to another fertile, so it is currently in the basement awaiting a long and painful death. It was bound to wake up at any moment, and I don't know if I had mentioned this before, but I'm not good with screaming.

There was a slight chill in the house, and it was creeping up my spine like a snake slithering up a tree. It was spring time, so it shouldn't be this cold in the house. I have no idea how to work the heater, so I wasn't going to attempt it in fear of breaking the poor old thing.

My dingy coat was hanging up in the corner not too far from me. Grabbing it and slipping it on, I sighed in relief at the almost instant relief it brought my frozen arms.

Lots of people think that vampires are naturally cold, and therefore do not need heat. They are what I like to call fucking idiots. If they ever saw a vampire in real like, they would know how completely wrong they are.

Vampires created their own body heat just like humans. It didn't heat our skin the same way though. All of the heat was sent to the core of our body to what is what I guess you could call our "heart". We naturally have a higher temperature than humans. It doesn't seem like it, but we do. So, if we get a fever, it would be devastating because our cooled skin should make that virtually impossible.

On the subject of the "heart" though. Well, it doesn't pump blood because we don't need blood to survive, not in our veins at least. Vampires don't need lungs, but we do need oxygen to keep our cells from rotting. That's why burning is practically the only way to kill a vampire. It starves the body and cells of oxygen. Our "heart" pumps venom through our body that carries a high concentrate of oxygen through our body. That's how if a dom bites a fertile, they get a mark on their skin. It was the venom.

We drink human blood because we don't use lungs. Human blood has oxygen in it, and we drink it to get to the oxygen. We would suffocate without blood, not really starve. It would take a very long time though, almost about twenty or so years.

I dug my hands into my pockets to try and create a small sense of warmth for them. My hand hit a crumbled piece of cardboard paper. I pulled it out and instantly recognized it. It was the card Linda gave at the party. It seemed like eternities ago, but yet here was the card.

I flipped it over to see her home phone written on the back. It was the card to her mate's torture business. I read the numbers on it over and over again. I didn't really have anything better to do, and she did seem like she was somewhat of a cool person to hang with. It was the middle of a Saturday. She was probably busy, but I was so bored, I had to try.

I got up from the cocoon of blankets I had formed on the couch and made way to the lovely wall phone in the kitchen. Ronnie's mom liked vintage things. Apparently only having one phone in the furthest room of the house at all times was vintage. I nearly miss every call because of this phone.

Quickly dialing the number scribbled on the back, I paced the small space I had to move. Ugh, why did I do this again? I didn't even know her that well. She probably isn't home anyways. With my luck, she is.

It rang once than twice and three times. I sighed. She wasn't going to answer. I waited for the fourth ring, and the second the annoying voice mail started playing I heard a grumbled "Hello?" from the other side of the phone. It definitely wasn't Linda's voice.

"Is someone there?" The person asked.

"Um, yeah, hi." I replied awkwardly. I was never good with phone conversations.

"Hi. Who is this?" They said impatiently. I heard a twang of a British accent coming through and knew at least I got the right dom.

"This is Max Green. I'm calling for Linda?" It wasn't supposed to be a question, but this guy scared me shit-less, like he should.

"Oh, you're Ronnie's mate. Hold on one second." He said without the extra gruffness on the other side. I heard him call Linda's name, and then she replied back to him. There was a shuffle of the exchanging of the phone, and then she came on.

"Hello?" She asked.

"Hi, Linda. It's Max Green. We met at the party a couple weeks ago." I said. She met so many people. I doubt she remembered one lonely fertile she met at a party nearly a month ago.

"Max? Wow, it's been a while. Didn't think you would call after our last little meeting. What can I do for you?" She asked.

"Well, you said I could call anytime, and we might be able to hang out. Ronnie's out right now, and I don't have much to do. Hope I didn't catch you at a bad time." I said with my awkwardness once again coming out.

"Oh, no, not at all. Oli and I weren't doing much anyways. It will be nice to have a fresh face. Would you like to come over and see the place where the biggest torture industry on this coast started?" She asked with a sly hint in her voice, almost daring me to say yes.

"Um, sure. I'd love to stop by for a visit. Where do you live?" I asked giving into the temptation she was presenting to me.

"1350 Assault Drive. The irony, right?" She chuckled. I laughed back. It was quite ironic.

"You aren't too far from me. I should be over in around twenty minutes." I said.

"Okie dokie. See you then."

"Bye." I replied hanging up the phone. I can't believe she just said okie dokie.

I left a voice mail and a note for Ronnie near the door because the damn man wasn't answering his phone. I told him where I was going when I'd probably be back and all that crap that I'm sure he would want to know.

Almost falling down my steps, I walked to the bus stop right up the street. And, yes, I know. A bus stop for a fertile in the middle of the day with no dom to protect them? So scandalous.

I ride the bus all the time, and just because I happened to have a mate now, doesn't mean I can't ride the bus.

The bus wasn't different today then any other day. Which was nice. I needed something constant right now. Everything was changing too fast. Things never really changed in my life before. Well, after my parents kicked me out for. . . That wasn't important. It will never happen again, so it doesn't matter anymore. All that matters is what is happening now.

Standing people swayed with the bus as it rolled down the road. There was plenty of room for them to sit, but they didn't want that. They were in a rush. Rushing people don't sit. They stand up and tick, waiting for the moment wen they can continue to rush. Things never stopped. Sometimes, I wished they did, but that was a dream I knew was never going to come true.

There was a short distance between the house of horrors, as humans called it, and the germ infested bus with humans being weary of the few vampires that were there. We were too good for the bus, they though, or at least, that's what they think we think. Humans were usually wrong, so i didn't dwell on what they though for very much.

The house standing in front of me was the most amazing thing I have ever seen. It wasn't really a house. It was more of a Gothic styled palace. It was too magnificent to be a mansion. Old money was definitely involved in this house.

High, pointed iron gates surrounded the property has the very gloomy house stood within its boundaries. There was an eerie feeling to it. I understood why humans feared this house.

The wind blew, and the trees rustled too close to the gate. It creaked and groaned under the new pressure but then silenced one the wind stopped. I felt like I was going to walk into a horror film with the dead grass the the creaky steps. The gate was left open which made in even more ominous.

There wasn't a door bell. There was a door knocker but no bell. I picked up the grand gargoyle that presented itself as the entrance into the house and banged it once and then twice.

This was going to change my life. Something was going to happen in this house that was going to make my life either better or worse. What was going to happen, I didn't know. All that I knew was I was standing in front of one of the world's worst doms in history's house, and the apparent gleam in the gargoyle's eyes.