Footprints of a vampire

- ALIZ’S P.O.V –

I couldn’t tear my shock stricken gaze away from the gun the man was holding, it was the first time I’d ever seen a gun in real life and I had to admit, my internal organs were shivering. My heart thumped faster as my body tensed and the fight or flight predicament came into place, I was ready to bolt my way out of there but as usual my body was frozen in fear.

“We have to get out of here.” Matt whispered to me carefully, his brown eyes never leaving the gun either.

“Oh, no you don’t.” The man with the big black shoes spoke; he shrugged the gun behind him after seeing us and eyed us up carefully, his eyes lingering on my face for the longest.

I wanted to kick myself; I was waiting for some sort of decision from my body, but nothing was coming, it was like I was hitting a brick wall every time I tried to focus on staying or running. I bet it was all messed up due to the fact that Matt and I swapped bodies, great more consequences!

“Tony?” I heard Matt jest in an amused voice which was surprisingly casual and calm. My head snapped up to glare at Matt; it was just like him to know a crook like Tony.

The man who had shoved the gun in his back pocket, double took Matt and peered at him carefully. I wanted to kick Matt now, why did he have to speak out; Tony obviously wouldn’t know who I was.

“You. Girl, how do you know my name?” Tony asked suspiciously edging towards us.

Matt glanced at me quickly raising his eyebrows and tensing his jaw, I shook my head quickly glaring at him, I did not want to get involved, heck if my bottom didn’t feel glued to this bench right now I wouldn’t even be here! I caught on quickly and suppressed the urge to cry out with fear.

“Tony.” I began in a shaky voice, Matt punched my back lightly, and I cleared my throat instantly.

Tony walked closer and then grinned.

“Matt m’boy, it’s been too long.” He pulled me into a hug and I contorted my expression at the stench of cigarettes and body odor, he released me and I stared back in an uneasy manner trying to inhale fresh buckets of air without making it too obvious.

“It sure has.” I tried not to splutter.

“Well, run along now, you don’t want to know Tony’s big boy business now do you?” His tone became serious once more.

“Of course not.” I jumped off the bench, finally I wasn’t paralysed anymore, and I grabbed Matt’s hand and pulled him out of the clearing in a hurry not even taking a glance backwards.

“I can’t believe you know someone like him!” I hissed as we approached the school once more.

“Who Tony? He’s alright.” Matt replied at ease.

“Alright? Alright? He had a gun and there was some drug deal going on down there! Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t report this to the police right now?” I felt exasperated.

“Because Tony can have you killed even if he’s sitting on a cold bench in a lonely prison.” Matt replied giving me an annoyed look.

“Oh, well that’s a good enough reason.” I shuddered.

We made our way to the canteen and I sighed inwardly thinking about this mess that we were in, it wasn’t even showing any signs of getting better in fact it was just getting even more dramatic and worse. I nonchalantly followed Matt as he made his way to a table, I wasn’t even paying attention when I sat down and when I snapped out of it I found myself sitting with Nikki, Jay, and Matt.

“So we’re thinking of going to the movies tonight, why don’t you two join us?” Jay asked before sipping his drink.

“No.” I replied firmly.
“Sure.” Matt replied firmly at the same time.

And just as I kicked him under the table, he kicked me and we both snapped our heads towards each other glaring.

“I’m grounded for the whole getting arrested incident and you, don’t you have to rehearse and practice your singing?” I gritted my teeth trying to get my point across to him as clearly as possible.

“But, I can get away for a few hours.” He smirked hoping to get me into more unnecessary trouble!

Can’t you sneak out? You sneak out all of the time.” Jay rolled his eyes at me.

“Oh, I have, have I? Well, I’m just not sure I can this time – they were pretty angry with me and –” I began.

“Like thats stopped you before, we’ll see you at 7 then.” He laughed getting up, his hand enclosed gently around Nikki’s hand, Nikki beamed at Matt and allowed herself to be lead away by Jay leaving Matt and I sitting there.

“I think you should lighten up, Aliz.” Matt whispered to me casually before taking a sip of his coke.

“As long as I’m stuck in your pitiful body, I will not lighten up!” I hissed looking around agitated, we seemed to be drawing a lot of attention just by sitting there looking angry at each other.

I was sure he was ready with one of his rude and witty comebacks when I heard his phone buzz through the sound of the light chatter in the canteen, we got up simultaneously and made our way to a quieter place.

“Hey, Harry.” Matt answered whilst putting the phone on loudspeaker so we could both listen.

“So Aliz, I know you might be feeling a little bit disappointed with the Disney theme.” He started.

I frowned, I knew it would bring a lot of money, but I didn’t want to sing those types of songs, not for the rest of my life.

“Just to make things a bit clearer, the ‘ask me’ song is just a tester if you wish. I spoke to the producers and they have some good connections, Luke said he was going to invite a representative from a well known label to hear you too. So kid, you know what this means, if you impress them with the ‘ask me’ song then that’s all you need, they’ll sign you up immediately and then you can talk about your album!”

A huge number of emotions rushed through me at that moment, it could happen for me right here in this town, not many people get chances like this one very often, I felt nervous and excited at the same time and a little sick.

“Aliz, this is your one shot, practice hard and make us all proud kid, I’ll hang up now.”

Matt and I exchanged a beam, our eyes both twinkling with what could be, what could happen and we momentarily forgot that we were stuck in each others bodies and the fact that we sort of – hated each other! But then reality came tumbling down on me like an avalanche. Panic fused with every fiber of my being as I looked into his brown eyes, this was not going to work. I needed to sing, I had to sing, only I could really put the feel and emotion that needed to go into that song and I was afraid of losing this opportunity. Matt frowned back at me and opened his mouth to speak when Amy came bustling around the corner with her group of friends who all looked as equally as annoyed as each other.

“There she is! She provoked Cassie – it was her! Aliz!” Amy screeched angrily.

Naturally, I backed up a little and then remembered that I should be fearing for his safety, not mine, I stopped and walked forwards defensively in front of Matt.

“And where is Cassie?” I asked.

“Matty, haven’t you heard?” Amy spoke in a tiny fake voice, I resisted the urge to gag, Matty?!

“No, clearly I haven’t.” I rolled my eyes; we really didn’t have time for this!

“Oh Matt, it’s all Aliz’s fault! They took Cassie away! She’s getting professional help; they say she’s not right in the head because she tried to kill Aliz!” Amy crooned.

“Well, she deserves it then, she did try to kill Aliz.” I spoke defiantly.

“But she’s perfectly fine! If I were you Matt, I’d stay away from her.” Amy pointed at Matt angrily.

I glanced at Matt who wore an expression of sheer delight and amusement.

“You better watch it Aliz, you won’t get away with this.” Amy tossed her hair and bounced away with her friends looking angry.

“Great. Just what I need, I suppose I can thank you for yet another enemy?” I snarled at Matt, it was his entire fault!

He narrowed his eyes at me and I knew he wanted to say something.

“What?” I snapped watching a few students put there books in their lockers.

“Nothing.” He shook his head walking away.

I hung back thinking, did he actually feel guilty? Was he feeling guilty? I was in his body but I wasn’t in his mind, he probably wasn’t even feeling guilty at all, slowly I dragged my feet after him.