Bloodbank

Eighteen

An alleyway was the first respite Scott found from the midday sun, and so we stopped there. I didn't know how far we had gone, the streets blurred for my tears and the smoke off Scott's fair head. Now, as I looked at him, his forehead and neck were red and blistered, flesh coloured drips forming and running down his temples. He was melting; melting like Nathan. Nathan, who was no more than a puddle in the desert now.

Scott quickly found a water pump on the alley wall; I would've said it were convenient, but I had no doubts that he knew the city like the back of his hand. Before it had melted off, that is.

He quickly stripped himself of our supply bag and his shirt, unbuttoning it to reveal his alabaster skin was now red and irritated as the blood that still ran down my neck. His eyes constantly flitted between tending to his own burns and the small trickle of my neck, his breathing haggard and his thoughts presumably millions of miles away from Nathan. But my consciousness had been left behind, with Nathan, and his final warning. I crumpled into a heap in the shadowed alley, dry sobs racking me, shock settling in at how much had changed in those few short minutes. Nathan was dead. Mason had found us. I shivered as I realised that nowhere in the city was safe, and then chided myself for thinking about anything other than Nathan. Nathan, who had been kind to me before he even knew my value. Who always knew what to say, to do, to make me more comfortable in this world that seemed determined to do the exact opposite. Nathan, who had been dismembered before my very eyes.

I was barely aware of Scott beside me, who had dampened his t shirt and was wringing it out, dripping cascades of water onto the cobbled street, spreading along the cracks between the stones. He pressed the wet shirt to his burned torso and head, but I could hear him hissing as the water contacted his skin. If we were in any other situation I would have delighted in tending to him myself, wiping the water against his muscular, bare chest. But these were dire circumstances, and I instead watched the water navigate the street, reaching and curling around my feet. I didn't realise Scott was even speaking until he softly touched my shoulder, and I recoiled instinctively.

"Pass me one of the blood mixtures," he said, voice softer than I had ever heard it.

I nodded, reaching for the emptier bottle, before thinking better of it. I cleared my throat and said, "No, you need more than that," craning my neck to the side and removing my sweat stuck hair to allow him access.

But to my surprise, he declined, muttering something about me nearly passing out mere moments before. I shrugged, and passed him the bottle. He took a sip, careful not to allow the bottle to touch his lips and taint the stock, and swallowed, but I could see it written on his lips how unsatisfied he was. In his weakened state, he would need more, and soon. 

"We should find a new place to stay," he said, voice low as he played with a strand of my hair, his shirt still in his hands and his skin still raw. I shivered, looking into his emerald green eyes.

"It's still sunny." I swallowed, my empty stomach and shock and low blood manifesting in dizziness that tilted the alleyway and took me to my knees.

"I know," Scott murmured, "I need you to find somewhere."

I shook my head, throat now also dry, the tears that refused to come earlier now spilling over, "I can't be alone," I sobbed.

"You can. I need you to be," his bony, cold fingers wiped the tears across my cheeks, and he pulled my lips to his; a kiss I didn't even attempt to reciprocate. I looked at the ground, closed my eyes and prayed that when I opened them again I would be somewhere safe, somewhere with Nathan.

But when I opened them, I only saw Scott's eyes, pleading and empathetic and anything but sad for the friend we'd both just lost.

His hand cupped my cheek now, "find a house, it doesn't matter if it's occupied, just get inside and find me something to cover up with. Find some food, and come straight back."

"But what if a vampire lives there? They'll steal me or give me to Mason or worse, I can't."

He nodded encouragingly, "look for signs of humans. Open curtains in the sunlight, heavily locked doors, tended gardens."

I realised that he wasn't being heartless, not at all. That perhaps he mourned in a different way to me, that practicality and desire to survive was overriding his grief in a way that I could never achieve.

"Nathan sacrificed himself for us. We can't waste that."

He didn't choke on his name, like I would have. But I couldn't deny that he was right. I nodded slowly, and he pulled me to my feet. I bent over the water pump and drank deeply, the cold seeping down my throat and filling my stomach until I could find food.

Scott's hand was in mine, and then I was under the relentless sun and his arm had dropped to his side. Steeling my courage, I took one more look at his face, and then turned and stumbled into the dusty suburbs alone.