Totally a Vampire Thing || ONC 2024 ||

Chapter 11. Am I a Human After All? (Cruz)

Even when I was eleven, and Grandpa filled me with the fear of vampirism, I secretly thought that flying might be worth it. 

Flying was freedom to my juvenile mind. Freedom to fly away from all the new things I couldn't understand and my parents were fighting about.

From the d-word and a sinking feeling Mom and Dad hated each-other because of me. After all, I did somehow kill the coyote to save the neighbor's cat I used to play with, because Dad didn't let us have pets. In hindsight, given how Corazon turned out, it was for the best.

From our sudden move from bustling and lush Seattle to a tiny, suffocating place in Mississippi.

From Grandpa I never knew I had. Grandpa who was telling grim tales that became far too real as I matured. And mature I did, fast, for Grandpa's tales didn't wait on Corazon and me to have a childhood.

Under Grandpa's tutelage I understood I couldn't fly away from my nature, only fight it. I did that too, even came to be proud of it...until Freida tore down my hard-won achievements.

She did it laughing, never caring how much it hurt. I didn't think vampires gave much thought to pain after a century or two of undeath.

Like Freida's callus treatment, my boyhood wish to fly mocked me. The excitement wasn't there anymore. If I tumbled out of the sky, so what? I was already dead—Freida did the honors. But I held Zoe's life in my arms. Failing to fly was just another way I could bring her to harm. So, I had no choice but to fly.

The final collapse of Freida's mausoleum sent the biggest shockwave after us, sending me cartwheeling through the air.

Zoe screamed.

"Don't worry, I have you!" I shouted over the sound of crushing stone and pops of air and sand.

She stopped crying, smiled shakily and relaxed in my embrace, trusting the safety of the first ever flight by a freshly turned vampire. Which was far more trust than I had in myself, even though she was my feeder and my only source of sustenance in this world. Logically, I had to keep her alive to keep myself alive.

But there's no predator less logical and more insatiable on Earth than what Freida had made from me. Grandpa had a cautionary fable about it. A Fledgling with his first feeder is like a scorpion who stung a frog carrying him across the river. It only shrugged when both of them died as a result: I am a scorpion; that's what I do.

Oh, Zoe, Zoe...I clutched her tighter, smelling her shampoo, her sweat and her blood. Absorbing her heat. Listening to her heartbeat. The mortals' bodies had so much going on every second. I was so boring next to her, like a glass of still water next to a shaken can of soda.

A dune popped out of nowhere, on-rushing into my face. Okay, fine, it was there all along, and I got distracted thinking about Zoe Green.

I pivoted, lost the updraft, lost the altitude, lost my balance.

"Brace! We're going to crash!"

I flipped over, praying only that I would hit the sand first and shield Zoe from the impact. Then something glistened in the corner of my vision.

Water!

I called upon every ounce of magic and intuition to swerve toward it. My back hit the surface of the water, and I yelped, because it was harder than concrete. A fountain erupted on both sides of me, drenching Zoe, but otherwise she seemed unharmed...once we resurfaced from the deep. She was spitting and gasping for air, and I tried to keep my grip on her.

"Cruz! I can swim!"

Water splashed around her, reflecting in her enormous eyes. "Oh. Sorry. I guess with the mausoleum, and the explosions, and the flying I...ah...got used to— I mean, it wasn't a long enough time to get used to something, but...but..."