Chapter two: Winter meets Summer
In nearly two hundred years of being a vampire, I hadn’t strayed from my usual hunting style, but I had grown weary of the same monotonous regime.
The hookers and prostitutes of dark alleys were what I usually preyed upon; no one would miss them when they vanished. This time would be different. I wanted fresh, untainted blood, and the best place to find it would be a place that young people frequented; college was my first choice.
The best part about being a vampire is the art of deception; to make humans believe almost anything I wanted them to with just one look. I used this ability to gain access to the campus, and the classes where I hadn’t registered; best to leave as little evidence behind.
I would simply slip in and choose my next meal, wait until he or she was alone, and make my move; the problem was when I found it, something unexpected occurred.
I found a batch of young blood heading for Dr. Harpy’s class, and I followed them. I sat in the back so that I had a clear view of my selection. One in particular caught my eye; it was a young woman with long, dark brown hair, intently focused on the droning of the old man in the front of the room.
I swiftly moved to a seat closer behind her; no one would notice my sudden change of seating, humans were too slow.
Twenty minutes into the lecture, her head jerked up, and she turned and looked at me. Her eyes met mine, and I held her focus trying to put her under my control. Something in her eyes stopped me, I wasn’t sure what it was at the time, but I released her.
How strange, why stop when it would be too easy to lure her away into the darkness, where no one would see my attack; where I would easily overpower her. She needn’t feel any unnecessary pain; I was good at not prolonging my victims’ suffering.
Something about this young woman intrigued me, so I settled for an old bum living under the freeway overpass.
I decided I would watch her; find out more about her if I could. In the weeks that followed all I could gain was the name Summer Braden, she lived alone in an apartment close to campus, and didn’t waste time on frivolous things; she used most of her time to study.
She became more aware of my presence than any other human ever had before. I could tell she was nervous by my constant position behind her in her classes; she also had a curiosity about me that I could see every time our eyes met.
This was ridiculous, why was I playing with my food? I needed to get this over with quickly before anyone could get suspicious. During class, I stole a book from her bag that was hung so invitingly on the back of her chair. I would use this book to get closer to her; not that I needed it; I just had to be patient.
I waited until she was alone by her vehicle, and called out her name. Silently I dashed to stand right behind her. It startled her to have me that close.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you” I soothed; that seemed to calm her a little. She hesitated for a moment; she was still a little shocked as she coughed out her reply.
“It’s alright” she said, as her eyes slid up to look into mine. Eyes that I hadn’t looked too closely at before, but now I could see them perfectly. Eyes that I hadn’t thought of in two hundred years.
This caught me off guard, my plan was to get her attention and drag her away, I hated catching my prey with their backs turned. I wanted them to have the chance to fight, to run, to get away if they could, they deserved that much. None of them ever did of course, whether it was denial or fear that rooted them to the spot, they made it a little too easy for me.
