Bitten

Lou's P.O.V

I mindlessly wandered through the halls of my hell hole of a school; eyes blankly staring around the walls, reminding my brain of all the things I’d seen every day for the last 5 years. A silent sigh escaped my lips as I remembered I was only here for a couple more months and then it would all be over: my ties to this dump would be cut forever. My fingers gently curled around the cold door handle as I stepped into my form room; still in darkness since I was the first person there – as usual – the lights hummed to life after I’d hit the switches and I began the routine of removing my numerous layers of clothing that I had donned to protect me from the Arctic chill that was hanging over my town, and every other Northern city, permanently these days. As I pulled my jumper over my head a familiar smell hit me and stunned me for a few moments. It was his smell, the indescribable musky smell that I had been surrounded in on Saturday night, and even some of Sunday morning. Until he disappeared that is. After hanging up all my things and putting my bag away I drifted back out of the room, in search of someone I actually liked.

Nate’s P.O.V

‘I’m not happy with this at all. All this blood, it’s going to drive me insane. The hundreds of different scents, all of them so inviting in their own way – but Daniel has helped me so much, I’d never forgive myself for letting him down. And Mother, what would she think? She’d be so disappointed in my lack of self control… I suppose I just need to try and focus on my studies, even though I’ll undoubtedly know all the answers for all the lessons. If only I had someone I could share my suffering with, why hasn’t Daniel given me a sibling? Or even a mate? Thankfully I just have to complete two months or so in this ridiculous place and then I can drop this whole charade and get on with eternity. Oh eternity, how it holds no excitement for – what is that amazing smell? How did I miss this when I first stepped onto the grounds? It’s coming closer; surely it’s not possible for one human to hold such a powerful scent in their blood. Oh my, it can’t be. It just can’t – the girl from Saturday night….Louise, that’s it. The alcohol must have covered her blood’s scent while it was in her system; what will I do if she recognises me? After all we were intimate on Saturday – I don’t even know why I did that, I can’t form any bonds between myself and these humans – not when I’ll be leaving so soon; it’d be too suspicious. I guess I’m going to have to keep myself hidden from her as much as possible, even if her blood is hypnotic, but then again it’s not just her scent that’s so enchanting.’

I silenced the voice inside me then did my best to shake Louise, and the scent of blood, out of my head and hurried to the office before Louise could see me to get my timetable. I silently wandered into the Reception area; I noticed the couple of people I walked past unable to stop staring, especially the girls, I didn’t need to be psychic to know what they saw when they looked at me. I stopped in front of the pine reception desk and rested my arms on the chest height surface; the woman behind the desk peered up at me over her black, almost frameless glasses and had to do a double-take to make sure I was actually there. She must have been in her late thirties, with shoulder length chestnut hair and eyes that were a matching shade of brown. It wasn’t until I spoke that she seemed to realise I wasn’t just standing there for the entertainment.

“Hi, I’ve just transferred here and I need my timetable.”
She paused in thought for a second and frowned slightly as she began typing on the computer to her right before turning back to me and relaxing her face.

“Yes we’ve got your timetable, Nathaniel Townes right? But you’ll have to go through into the office to pick it up from Mrs. Caine.”

I smiled and nodded before turning on my heel and heading for the door to the office, I glanced through the glass as I knocked and cracked the door open; there was only one woman in the room so I assumed she was Mrs. Caine – her dark eyes stared at me through her thick framed mahogany coloured glasses, but it wasn’t the stare I was used to, she didn’t seem to notice the stunning appearance that hid my darkest secret. She ran her hand through her chocolate bob and it was then that her scent hit me like a door. I recognised the smell – or at least one very similar – and then suddenly saw the resemblance; her nose had the same bump in the middle of the bridge, her eyes were the same shape and she frowned in the same way. Louise’s mother looked at me again – this time slightly agitated, clearly not used to having young men stood in her office in silence.

“Can I help?”

Her voice had the same ring to it as her daughter’s but without the string of profanities or slang terms that followed Louise’s sentences.

“Erm yes sorry – I’m Nate Townes, you apparently have my timetable. Oh sorry, my full name is Nathaniel.”

As she started to walk round the room; searching for timetables, my gaze drifted over the objects on her desk. It was mainly covered in papers – letters and memos for staff and students – but then the occasional personal object would be sticking out of the mountains of work: there was a pen in the shape of a green fluffy bird; a long, elegant feather sticking out as it’s tail. The green caused a fresh memory to flash around in my head – it’s was pretty much the same green as Louise’s eyes when she’s exceptionally happy. Something she had been on Saturday night…

“Here it is dear – you’re a bit late for your first lesson but I can get you a note sorted to hand in to your teacher.”

Mrs. Caine’s voice dragged me out of my hallucination, I couldn’t decide if I was grateful or not, and handed me my timetable and a scrap of paper with her neat, rounded handwriting on it. I smiled and thanked her before heading out the door in search of my Art class.

Thanks to my over-sensitive hearing I didn’t need to wander for hours or ask directions to the class – I could hear the teacher talking from Mrs. Caine’s office – I took a few small breathes to get myself used to the smell of blood that constantly hung in the air around me and pushed the door open. As soon as I stepped through the door I wanted to step straight back out, because sat near the back of the room was my downfall – my only genuine temptation. And she was staring right at me. Doing my best to ignore her I strolled up the teacher standing at the front of the class; he was only about thirty, his hair mousy brown and long enough to cover his ears, as he looked at me her pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose and rubbed the stubble along his jaw line with paint covered hands.

“I’m sorry I’m late – I had to go get my timetable from Mrs. Caine.” I slowly held out my note to him and couldn’t help noticing Louise straighten up in her seat when I mentioned her mother’s name.

“Oh it’s fine… Nathaniel, I’ve hardly started the lesson – just take a seat where you can.”

I barely smiled as I wandered alongside the tables, pretending to scan for an empty seat – since I had already seen every available one and who it was sat near when I first walked through the door – my eyes fell on Louise and the space next to her, she was looking down at her desk; the spikes of her hair arching over her head like a mane as she sat playing with the long extensions that fell past her shoulders. I couldn’t sit with her, but I’d never be able to sit away from her – so I settled with sitting alone at the desk behind hers. Louise’s head shot up as my stool screeched against the floor and her eyes were quickly on me; by now they were her usual hazel colour, but then quickly turned round when our gazes met.

The rest of the lesson dragged on in heavy silence as the entire class worked away on their projects, I had finished the work I needed to do for the lesson and was absentmindedly drawing on a spare sheet of paper when I heard Louise switch her iPod on and begin playing The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. I admit that although there has been some incredible music throughout the decades, modern alternative music has won me over quite a bit. I looked back at my paper and frowned; I’d only been aware that I was drawing – so when I looked down and saw her laughing up at me I almost fell off my stool. The drawing was a memory of Saturday night, she had been laughing hysterically at something and the moment I had just drawn was just as she had been calming down but then just giggled slightly again; I could even hear her laughter ringing in my head as the sound of ‘Your Guardian Angel’ played through as well. My inner annoyance had cause me to start biting on my lip piercing – something I got just for the sake of getting really – I couldn’t think like this about a human, especially one that smelt so divine. But she was in my head and I couldn’t get rid of her; she had even plagued my mind when I was away from her, she had been so at ease with me – even when I tried to warn her against being around me. She had stopped pushing my self-control, but was always within arms reach.

All this had begun to irritate me, so when Mr. Sumpner had let us out of class I hurried to collect my belongings and leave the room as quickly as I could. Instead of going to my second class, Science, I headed up onto the football pitch and found a tree to hide under while I attempted to clear my head. It’d be too easy for me to make it to class on time and even if I didn’t I still had the note from the beginning of the day. I sighed heavily and tipped my head back to rest against the tree; I watched the light filter through the leaves for what felt like hours, but was probably not even minutes, searching for shapes in the gaps. Ironically enough, the most common shape was a heart – I dropped my head forward and sighed again.

“You barely have a heart, how can you love?” I muttered to myself, and then growled at myself for suggesting I was in love – love wasn’t something that occurred between a 110 year old vampire and a 16 year old girl.

‘But you know she’s not a girl really; she’s a young woman you can’t stop thinking about’ a voice inside my head mumbled, I growled again; but this time it was because that, underneath it all, the voice was right. But I couldn’t love Louise – I risked exposure, hurting her, killing her. I shuddered at the last thought, but I was right; if I fell for her – it would mean telling her about me, about my family. And what if she ran off screaming to the police or something? Or what if I crushed her when I only meant to touch her face? I’d never be able to live with that on my conscious.

“God damn it!” I shouted and slammed my fist into the trunk of the tree; the tree made a dangerous cracking sound and when I pulled my hand away I could see the deep hole I had left, and the thick cracks that were spreading away from it. I quickly ensure the tree was steady and raced off to my next lesson – sitting with only my own thoughts for company was more agitating that being in the same room as her.

Striding through the corridors I swiftly dodged around the people that kept almost crashing into me as the moved in both directions round the maze of a school. I was about to shoot round the corner to my class when I heard a male voice mumbling,

“That stupid bitch has got it in for me I swear, I’m not going to Alton Towers because apparently she didn’t get my permission slip. That’s bullshit; Mrs. Caine doesn’t know what the fuck she’s doing, incompetent bitch.”

I contemplated stepping in and saying something – since I had felt that Mrs. Caine was doing her job pretty well and didn’t deserve to be treated like that. But a familiar voice beat me to it.

“What the fuck did you just say about my mum? Well, spit it out Belling. I am not gonna let you call her an incompetent bitch just because you fucked up. I’d like to see you do her fucking job 5 days a week and every day of the holidays you stuck up twat!”

I looked round the corner and saw this boy, Belling, flinch away from her slightly – but then he straightened up when he realised his friends were watching very closely.

“You’re mum fucked up, not me – just because she’s a useless woman.”

“You fucking piece of shit! Don’t you DARE say that about her. She’s a million times the person you are!”

There was a loud smack followed by a cry of pain which lead to a string of profanities as Belling fell to his knees whilst clutching his face – she must have got a good swing on his nose since I noticed her flexing her blood covered knuckles; I felt my head lighten as the smell of the blood reached my nose, but thankfully it wasn’t her blood on her hand since I was pretty sure there would have been trouble if it had been. I moved back round the corner while I composed myself, then stepped round again and started towards Louise to move her on to her next lesson; I knew her mother wouldn’t appreciate her daughter’s temper too much. But once again I was stopped as one of the Science teachers stepped in front of me to confront Louise; the tall, agile man swiftly moving to the boy’s side to check his face before turning on her.

“Louise Stewart! What on earth do you think you’re doing? His nose is quite clearly broken! Get to Mrs. Featherstone’s office NOW.”

Louise simply rolled her eyes and walked off; but not before spitting at Belling and kicking him in the side as she stepped over him – this got her another glare and more shouts from her teacher. She shoved past me to get round the corner and then span on her heel when she noticed how solid I felt; it was then that she realised who she’d stormed past. But unlike every other time that she saw me, she held my gaze before growling slightly and continuing on her way. This change made me curious, so I chose to skip my lesson and walk with her to the Headteachers’ office, for about five minutes she never noticed me following her, until my bag brushed against a door as I passed and she abruptly turned round to face me, taking me slightly by surprise; her eyes were a chocolate brown, I sensed this meant her mood was quickly darkening.

“What do you want Nate? Because as you might not have noticed, I’m not in the mood for games.”

Her sentence made me stop and think; ‘what did she mean by ‘games’?’ I decided to simply brush it off and continued behind her – only this time keeping a couple of strides between us. I saw her flick a look to me out of the corner or her eye and then return to staring at the floor whilst grumbling to herself. I almost lost her just as we reached the entrance to the Reception – which I knew led to the Headteachers’ office – as she suddenly swerved down onto the Languages corridor and broke into a quick jog towards the doors at the far end; flinging one open as she threw her body into and then ran up the stone steps two at a time, now I had to quicken my pace to keep my eyes on her and only just saw her disappear down the side of the Science and Maths block: when I finally managed to catch up to her we were walking alongside the tall, green metal fencing that ran round the perimeter, well out of view from any of the windows in the nearby school building. Louise followed the fence along the side of the football pitch to a very familiar patch of grass and a very familiar tree; I accidently bumped into her slightly when she stopped suddenly – however, the effect it had on her was entirely different; she stumbled forward and would have fallen to her knees if she hadn’t caught a stump of a branch that was sticking out of the tree.

“Shit! I’m so sorry Louise, are you alright?”

When she turned to face me I expected her eyes to still be the colour of her mother’s and for her to explode in a fit of rage at me for even breathing near her, but I was completely wrong; grey tears were streaming down her face and her eyes were an unusual amber colour, the large, oval, bloodshot pools of gold stared up at me – wide in pain.

“God damn it Nate! He says all that and you just have to go and nearly floor me. What’s wrong with you?”

She threw herself at me, undoubtedly to try and hit me – but instead she just collapsed into my arms and sobbed; body-shaking, heart wrenching sobs, I silently cursed myself for the thirst that almost overwhelmed my feeling of sympathy for her: what ever human emotions were left in me wanted to comfort her, to hold her and make it alright. But then the wretched monster I am wanted to simply drain her while she was weak and leave her lifeless body under the tree we were currently curled under. I made the hardest decision of my immortal life in a split second – I wasn’t going to leave her like this, I couldn’t deny myself her company anymore. I wanted to be with Louise for every second of her life; especially at times like these, and I knew I could trust her as I’d seen her willingness to accept and her comfort around me.

“Hey Louise, hey calm down. I’m sorry for bumping into you. I’m very sorry, and as for that boy – he’s very wrong about your Mother, she’s a wonderful woman and she’s doing her job very well; I should know; I saw her this morning.”

I smiled down at her as she stared up at me; her eyes were starting to darken back to their usual colour as she composed herself, she was about to touch her face to remove the tear marks but I quickly caught her hand.

“I don’t think so Louise – you’ll get eyeliner everywhere, as per usual.”

She tinged slightly pink as I brushed my fingers over her cheeks, careful not to touch her remaining eyeliner as I wiped away the smudges for her, the corners of her eyes gently creased as she smiled up at me; the sunlight catching her teeth and causing them to shine just as brightly as her icy blonde hair. I slowly dropped my hand back into my lap but then Louise quickly snatched it back up and used it to pull herself into a crouching position, she then quickly leant in and softly pressed her lips to the tip of my nose before climbing to her feet and gracefully dancing off into the sun. I was stunned by her suddenly change and restrained action of affection – maybe she remembered what I’d told her Saturday night, maybe she was just observant, I couldn’t be sure.

“Nate, are you coming? I need someone to help me with my excuse for not going to Featherstone straight away.” She called at me from the edge of the banking that gently sloped down onto the football pitch, when I remained sat there she waved at me, indicating I should follow her – before setting off along the edge of the banking, back towards the school building.

Her behaviour astounded me; she went from enraged, to sobbing her heart out and then to Little Miss Sunshine, all in the space of about half an hour – I must have been a little rusty on human emotions and mood swings – or I’d picked the most bi-polar girl in existence to fall in love with. I gracefully pushed myself off the soft grass and swiftly moved to her side; playfully tangling my fingers within hers – she didn’t even react to the coldness of my skin like I imagined she would: she merely looked at my hand, pulled a face and then smiled up at me, like she accepted me. This day was severely messing with my head, even after a century of experience.

“I don’t wanna go see her.” Louise pouted as I led her into the reception and to the bottom of the stairs leading to the Headteacher’s office; her eyebrows knitting together in her typical frown.
“Go on, if you explain what he said – politely – then I’m sure she’ll understand.” I was about to comfort her more but I felt a rather unpleasant presence behind me; and Louise’s eyes went wide as she stared over my shoulder.

“Louise Elizabeth Stewart! What have you done to Andrew Belling? And why aren’t you with Mrs. Featherstone already?”

Louise frowned and her eyes lost some of their green.

“How can you defend him? You didn’t hear what he was saying about you! I defended you, and this is what I get? I’ll leave him to call you an incompetent bitch next time shall I?”

With that she turned on her heel and stormed up the stairs, this would undoubtedly end badly with her Headteacher. When I met Mrs. Caine’s gaze I wanted to squirm away – she had a frightening stare that made me feel like the trouble her daughter was in was my fault. But as my eyes looked down at hers, I watched her face drop and she brought her fingers to her temples; rubbing small circles into the skin. She let out a quiet sigh of defeat and turned away to return to her office.

“Mrs. Caine?”

When she finally turned to face me she had a slightly crooked smile on her face and her eyes had warmed in comparison to the stare she had just given Louise, I frowned somewhat under her gaze; finding the best words for the situation.

“I was there when your daughter hit Andrew; I heard the awful things he said about you and she tore him down in your honour. I mean I know it’s not my place to say how you deal with your daughter; I just thought you’d like to hear the story from someone other than her.”

At this point I walked away, knowing it wasn’t the best idea to stand around with Louise’s mother after I had just said that – the pair would need to talk. So I headed out of the Reception in the river of people that had suddenly appeared and exited into the sun, I was in way too deep, but couldn’t imagine being anything else.