The Vampire's Moon

The vampires and werewolves took my parents from me, but they also gave me my life.
My mother was a vampire, my father was a werewolf. I am a mix of the two breeds, a half and half. I don't need blood like most vampires, and I don't change like most werewolves. I can change when I want to like other werewolves, but I'm not forced to under the full moon like they are. While all vampires need blood, I don't. Unlike them, I don't have super strength or grace.(My mother said I would get super strength one day, since sometimes it can take years for a vampire to tap into themselves deep enough for the power to come through.) I do have superior eyesight, and have night vision like them. I am not immortal either, though I will be one day, since vampires and werewolves become immortal once they lose their virginity. Unlike other vampires, who are technically dead since they have no heart beat, I am living. I also can sense when another of my kind is around- which the other species are unable to do, but since I'm a mix I'm ultra sensitive to their presence. I only need limited amounts of sleep, a few hours a night. Normal vampires only sleep once or twice a week, but werewolves sleep every night like most people do.
Vampires can go out in the sunlight, I just don't because I don't like it. I am sixteen years old, very pale, and I have straight black hair. My eyes are a deep emerald green, and I have long fingers. I bite my nails, so they are very short. I am tall, and I'm not skin and bones like other girls. Anorexic freaks. I do have some meat on me. I do not wear clothes like everyone else, turtle necks with long sleeves only to cover the scars. When my mother was killed by another vampire, I got bitten on the neck when he tried to drain me after he got her. When my father was killed by another werewolf who trespassed on our territory, the werewolf bit me on the arm when I attacked him after he got my father. I prefer to keep these marks covered, rather than explain the two side-by-side silver dots on my neck and the row of teeth marks on my arm. The only people who have seen them are my foster parents, and they think it's a snake bite on my neck and a regular wolf bite on my arm. If they only knew.
I am an outcast amongst fellow students at school. I have no friends, and sit by myself at lunch in the shade of one of the trees outside. (The warmer months they allow us to sit outdoors for lunch instead of indoors if we wish to.) My only friends are the ones in the stories I write. I keep them in a large five subject notebook. I have written several stories, and of course I write poetry, too. My stories are the only glimpse inside my mind anyone is going to get, but of course no one has read them. I don't let them. Someone once tried to look inside, and I slapped them upside the head with my math text book. I don't like to be messed with. I don't raise my hand in class, but I like to think I am smart. I often go into deep thought several times a day, just sitting with my eyes closed and my mind open to the possibilities. To everyone else, I'm the weird meditation girl. I don't care. I don't need them, all I need is my thoughts. They are what bring me happiness. These thoughts are what occupy me as they first come into the courtyard where the other students are having lunch.
I was sitting under the usual tree, eyes closed, as I thought about my latest bit of writer's block with my current book. It is during this thought process that I am overcome by a sensation of cold chills down my spine, and a slight prickling feeling along my skin. Cold chills is the sensation that alerts me to a vampire's presence, while the prickling alerts me to werewolves. I looked around, trying to find the sources of my uneasiness. There, towards the entrance to the grounds out back the school, two boys stood with girls surrounding them on all sides.
I instantly knew which was the vampire, because when I looked at him, the cold chills were amplified. He was, in my opinion, the most attractive of the two. He had blonde hair with streaks of golden brown, and eyes that glittered a bright sky blue. He wore what looked like a black silk shirt, but if it was real silk, I didn't know, because to find out I'd have to ask him, or touch it. I didn't think either of those things were going to happen. He wore black jeans with the shirt, and black Nikes with those. He had his ears pierced, and in one he had a silver cross, while the other beheld a black stud earring. And, I don't know why, but I was willing to bet he had his tongue pierced too.
The other boy was the werewolf, since he set off the prickly feeling when I looked at him. He had long chocolate brown hair and eyes, which he tied at the nape of his neck. His skin was actually very tan, and it looked even darker when compared to the vampire's skin, which was a cream color. You could tell the werewolf tanned, but the vampire didn't. Hello? Didn't he know vampires could tan? Did he just not like going out into the sun, or something?
Anyway, the werewolf wore a camo-shirt, and jeans with holes in the knees. He wore hiking boots, and he had a small tattoo of a rose just beneath his left ear on the side of his neck. Around his neck hung a gold chain, with a black arrow head dangling from it. He, along with Dracula over there, both appeared to be about seventeen, but it was likely that they were older, since they were probably immortal.
Most people would think that the vampire would be burning right now, but I regret to inform you that in truth, the sun, garlic, holy objects, and virtually every other myth about them is false. The only ways you can kill a vampire are by chopping off the head, draining all the blood, or burning them to death.
The burning to death part proved to inspire me for a story, so I gathered up my notebook, my most precious item, and started to continue a story I'd been previously stuck on. This was about a girl who loved a vampire, but he betrays her for power. She decides to enact revenge on him for his folly. I was at the point in the story where she's about to kill him, but I hadn't decided what form I wished the death to be in yet. Suddenly, I knew. She would burn him alive, even as he begged for mercy.
To some this may sound sickening, dark, and twisted, but that's just how I am. Only on one occasion have I ever written a story about good vampires and werewolves, and I wasn't about to show it to anyone. Ever.
I had just about finished when the bell rang, so I gathered my things and made my way to gym. I bumped into someone in the hall on my way, and dropped my books. I crouched down and began to gather them up.
"I'm sorry, let me help you," said the person I had bumped into.
"No, I've got it," I said.
"Please, let me help." Before I could protest, the person crouched down beside me to help me pick them up. It wasn't a prep or a jock, it was the vampire, and I hadn't been paying attention enought to his presence to detect him before he'd bumped into me. A stupid mistake, but enough to anger me nonetheless. Which was fueled just by him being near me because of what he was.
I narrowed my eyes. "No." I snatched the books from his hands and gathered the rest quickly. I stood, and he stood with me.
"What's your problem?" he asked, his brow furrowed in a way that made it so he looked annoyed and intrigued at the same time.
"Nothing," I said acidly. I kept my mouth closed, afraid my fangs might pop out. They only do when I'm angry, though I don't need them at all. I didn't need him knowing that I had them, though. That would not be a good thing.
"Fine," he said just as acidly, the intrigued look gone from his face so that now he just looked angry.
I felt a growl form deep in my throat, werewolf side effect, but I repressed it and walked on. In gym I didn't have to change, I had showed the gym teacher my scars and he believed the same thing as my foster parents. He didn't force me to change, knowing how much of a scene scars like this would cause. I was especially thankful for this today. I had walked up to the gym teacher, Mr. Balbarez, and was asking him things about today's gym class. Mr. Balbarez is the closest thing I have to a friend in this school, and he liked me.
"So Mr. B, what are we doing today?" I asked. He was on the far side of the gym near the boy's locker room, looking over today's schedule.
"Not much, Michelle. Dodge ball, it looks like," he said.
I smiled. I loved dodge ball. It was my favorite game because you got to hit people with balls without them getting mad, and it's pretty much a free for all the way we played. Every man for himself. Throw two balls into the middle of the room and once you get hit, you're out. Last man standing wins. Basic rules such as, if you catch the ball the person who threw it is out, can't hit anyone in the face, etcetera, applied.
"Awesome," I said, and smiled. It was times like this that I truly was happy. A rarity for me.
The old man grinned. "I know it's your favorite game," he said. "But please, go easy on them. None of the girls in this school but you can even throw a ball, much less hit someone! Don't kill anyone, okay?"
I laughed, one that wasn't bitter like almost all the others I'd ever had in my life since I was ten. "I'll try not to!"
It was then that my fun gym class turned terrible. Who else walked out of the boy's locker room, but the vampire and the werewolf. Why did they have to be here, my only sanctuary outside of writing? I turned on my heel before they could notice me, anger seething inside me, and walked to my appointed spot against the wall for attendance. I sat and closed my eyes.
I made myself calm down before the fangs popped out, and instead thought about my book. I would have the betraying vampire say, 'Please! I love you! Don't do this to me!'. Then the girl would say, 'If you loved me, why'd you leave?'. When he remained silent, the girl would say, 'Exactly.'. Then she would light him on fire and he would burn. Most people wouldn't find this entertaining, but I'm not most people. I have a dark side. Tuning into this side of me, I chuckled darkly.
"What's so funny?" asked a voice.
I looked up to see werewolf boy standing next to me along the wall, vampire boy next to him. I looked away and ignored them. Werewolf boy was the one who had spoken, and when it was obvious I wasn't going to answer, he got an angry look on his face.
"Okay class, the name of the game is dodge ball," said Mr. B. "Does everyone know how to play?"
The class nodded, pretty much everyone loved this game. Class favorite. I wasn't surprised vampire boy and his werewolf buddy knew how to play; honestly, who doesn't know how to play dodge ball?
"Okay then, lets get started." He walked over to me and I stood up. "Here Michelle, you can start us off." He winked and handed me the two black balls. "Remember though, don't kill anyone."
I grinned, another rarity. "Thanks Mr. B!"
"Anytime, Michelle." He blew his whistle, and the game began.
I ran and hit a prep in the back, and then a jock in the leg. I was on fire, this was my game. With my superior vision, I saw werewolf boy throw a ball at me. I spun and caught it, so he was out. I saw him give his vampire friend a meaningful look from the bleachers, and I knew he meant that he wanted pay back. Who says supernatural creatures aren't sore losers? I avoided vampire boy the whole game, and he never hit me. Eventually, it was just the two of us. We each had one of the balls and we circled each other. He threw the ball, but I dived out of the way and threw my ball at his legs. I made a direct hit, and he was out. He stared at me, shocked. My superior vampire eyesight and my werewolf/vampire reflexes obviously weren't what he'd been expecting. If he’d known, I probably wouldn’t have hit him.
I grinned. I had beaten a vampire and a werewolf. I took small comfort in that fact as I stood up, brushed myself off, and headed for the locker room since the game had taken all of class. Once I had my books I waited by the door for the bell to ring, wanting to leave. Gym was the last class of the day, and I couldn't wait to get home to finish writing this book. (It’s amazing that our lunch is so late in the day isn’t it? Who came up with the idea to have it just before our last class?!) I nearly ran out of there once the bell finally did ring. On my walk home, however, things got even worse. I discovered that my route home was the same as the werewolf and vampire’s. What sick, twisted joke was fate trying to pull here?
I was halfway down a street when they caught up to me.
"Look, what's your problem?" asked the vampire, appearing to be very annoyed.
I didn't answer, just walked forward. I should have been able to walk steadily, but fate, the irony loving thing it is, had other plans. I stumbled and dropped my notebook of stories, the werewolf getting to it before I could. I grudgingly let him have it, not wanting to provoke myself into fighting them. That would end messily.
"What's this?" he said. He opened it up and looked at all the stories and poems in it.
"You write poetry?" the vampire said, reading over the werewolf's shoulder.
"And stories," the werewolf added. "A lot of them about werewolves and vampires." He looked at the stories endings. "They always die in the end." He looked up at me, a frown creasing his brow.
"Do you have some fascination with killing werewolves and vampires?" asked the vampire. At least he didn’t beat around the bush.
I finally spoke, working to keep myself from getting angry. It wouldn’t be good if my fangs decided to join the party, or if that growl building in my chest slipped out my throat. "I hate them," I said. "There is only one story I've ever written that had good vampires and werewolves. I keep that in a special place." I almost slapped my hand over my mouth. Why had I told them that?!
"Where?"
I shook my head, heaving a mental sigh. "That I won't tell you."
The werewolf interrupted before the vampire could interrogate me further. "My name is Ricky and this is Benjamin. Pleased to meet you, even if you do hate vampires and werewolves." The change of his tone was a bit overly peppy for my tastes. He held out his hand to shake, but I didn't take it.
"Can I have the notebook back?" I asked instead. I snatched it back before he could answer, and stalked off.
Benjamin and Ricky caught up to me quickly, and Benjamin blocked my way.
"First," Benjamin said, "can you tell us why you hate vampires and werewolves?"
"Sudden curiosity?" My voice was dripping with hostility. They just didn’t give up did they?
"You might say that, now why do you hate them?" God, this guy was blunt.
I looked him in the eyes while I answered. "You tell me." Let him make what he wanted of that. If his mental capacity was high enough to contemplate those kinds of things, that is. I seriously doubted it was.
I began to walk away, but the werewolf caught my arm. When he did so, the sleeve slid up my arm partway; so a small portion of the teeth marks could be seen. I pulled my arm away, but not before they both had seen the marks. I laughed at their shocked expressions, sudden hysteria gripping me. (I swear this has never happened before. The shock and anger of having a vampire and werewolf both go to my own school, coupled with them seeing my scar was just too much for my poor brain to take in one sitting.)
"What did you expect? Of course I have reason to hate them!" I rolled up my sleeve so the full mark was exposed. They stared at it, and I laughed harder. "But that's only werewolves! Let's not forget the vampires!" Bye the time this happened, I admit I was completely and utterly out of it. I pulled down the neck of my shirt to expose my bite marks. Now they were even more shocked, and Benjamin was horrified at the two small silver dots. "These marks are only half the reason, though. I'm not going to tell you the rest. I'm not going to waste my time with a vampire," I gave Benjamin an evil look, "And a werewolf," this time the look was for Ricky. I walked off again and this time they didn't stop me. Just before I rounded the corner one thought went through my head.
Why in the hell did I just do that?!