Lonely Monsters

seventeen

I slept, and heard shouting the closer I got to consciousness. No one was actually yelling, it's just my head hurt and my phone was singing at me. "Oh geez..." I reached over to climb over Rick towards my phone, only to find there was no Rick. Or Barry.

"Oh." I rubbed my eyes, staring at my clock. It was almost noon, and no one called me except-- "Frigga?"

"What did you do," her voice drilled into my head.

"I'm sorry?" I smacked my lips and looked around my room. I climbed out of bed and found my clothes hanging in the bathroom. I reached out and touched them to check how damp they were. They were bone dry. "Crap... What day is it?"

"You blacked out?" Frigga snapped at me, exasperated. "What did you do Tuesday morning!"

I walked over to the sink and began brushing my teeth. I coughed a bit and found dried blood up my noise and between my teeth. My blood, black blood, crusted and hard. ".....I went on a date." I said, mouth full of foam. I spat and gargled, clearing the gross taste of dirty mop water out of mouth. I set my phone down and pressed speaker. "Why? You miss me?"

"No, Where did you go! You left the house without telling anyone!" Frigga was so very mad, "And who did you go out with, Meela!"

"Just some guys, geez. Had some food, didn't throw it up, walked around, had some drinks." I looked at myself in the mirror and groaned. My eyes had deep dark rings under them and my skin had the green glow of a healing bruise around my brow and the bridge of my nose. I looked at my gums-- and a tooth fell out. "Fuck."

"Meela," Frigga's voice was fresh out of patience today. "Did you go to New Orleans?"

I looked at the phone, "Why?" My mind was still muddled. I rinsed the sink, then filled it with hot water as I began to lather up my face. My hair smelled of sweat and would need a wash too. In fact, all of me smelled like sweat. I had to have slept for more than eighteen hours. Crap.

"Because I have a Vampire coven on my ass, a Witch's Family demanding blood and a handful of hunters sharpening their pikes!" Frigga shouted. "And someone said they saw a woman, with a mean attitude, bleeding black, beat a Fledgling unconscious."

"...I'm not mean..." I said quietly, rubbing my cheeks with a soft exfoliating cloth and lemon-mint facial wash.

"For no reason." Frigga ground out and I almost tore the wash cloth in half.

"bullshit!" I snarled, "What are people saying?"

"That you ran in on Coven territory and started a fight with a Beta and some of her subordinates." Frigga relayed.

I threw the foamy cloth in the sink and slammed my palms on the granite counter top. "They are fucking lying. You wanna know what I did last night? I went out on a date with two guys. They showed me around, bought me food I could eat. One of them pissed me off, and I walked to cool down-- two seconds later I'm in some gloomy street and this blonde cow is grinding on on guy. And I was like, 'Crap. They're gonna screw right here, I better book it.' and I looked harder and the guy's crying."

I gripped the counter, sucking in a breath. "She had bit his throat, all over, red is everywhere-- and she had no intention of changing him." I remember the look that broad had in her eyes. It was the same look you see in those crime movies where the murderer was going to do something awful to their victim. "She wasn't gonna eat him either. She was gonna bleed him and leave him in the alley for the rats."

"What guy?" Frigga asked, I heard her shuffling papers and scribbling notes. "What did he look like?"

"Like a college football player. Big dude. White." I closed my eyes to imagine him. "....Dark brown hair, blue....? Eyes. Probably almost six feet if he was standing-- When I saw him he was leaning on some boxes or trash cans... He's alive right?"