If I Die By Sunrise

Tender is the Night

Jerry broke out of our shared stupor to wipe the blood off my neck. Neither of us was quite ready to come down from our high yet. It was all so weird and exciting and new at the same time. And so completely mind-blowing.

So the familiar shrill chime of a cell phone going off was enough to surprise us both. I blinked through the daze as the vibrations tingled up my leg.

The cell phone was an invention of Peter's, tiny and convenient, it was made to be strapped to any part of the body that was the most accessible, it even had a vampire feature, where it was completely undetectable by the undead, if I ever figured how to go about doing that.

When I left I tried to destroy anything that could be traced to our temporary sanctuary. I must've forgot about the stupid thing. Shit.

With a speed only he could conjure, Jerry ripped the phone from my ankle. It dangled helplessly from his hand. A small smile crept across his lips as he admired the creativity and probable genius behind such an invention.

A voice spoke through. It was Amy who sounded both frantic and angry at the same time. "Charley is that you? What were you thinking going there to fight Jerry by yourself? Do you realize how stupid, how dangerous this is? If you're dead Charley I swear. Charley? Charley?"

Jerry leaned in closer to me, crimson streaking down his chin. His voice held a charm no human I knew possessed. "Go ahead Charley. Tell her how you can't go home because you're my eternal slave."

I gave him my hardest glare before turning to the distracting device. It was tempting to calm Amy down, to assure her that everything was fine even though it wasn't. But I knew I couldn't trust her or anyone else to not try to rescue me. It was a risk I absolutely could not take.

I turned away from the instrument ignoring Jerry's satisfied chuckle. "I thought so." He said and crushed the phone into nothing more than dust. The relief I felt was indescribable. "It's a shame though. She's a nice girl. If you'd been in a better mood we could've probably had some real fun." I pressed my eyes closed to drown out the soothing, but condescending lull of his voice. Not everyone had a happy ending. But that was it, my ending, not anybody else's. No one else deserved to go down the path of this nightmare.

He undid the rope binding me to the chair, or what was left of it, but kept my hands bound. To think that this was seriously still for safety measures was comical. The only person in any obvious danger was me.

"We need to get some food in you." He spoke and it sounded like he meant it more to himself than me. I allowed myself to be dragged into his spectacular, wholly unnecessary kitchen.

I must have an unknown deity out there in the universe who looked at how utterly pathetic my life was and decided to grant me a stroke of luck. Because as naïve as I was, there was no way I was going to believe that it was normal to just emerge from a vampire's feeding virtually unscathed. But there I was scratch-free, with only a rumbling stomach.

Either Jerry was doing me a favor by not scarring me, or thinking of more creative way to scar me.

"It's an out-of-body experience you know?" Jerry says as he prepared what seemed like the ingredients for lasagna.

"What?" I hadn't realized I spaced out.

"An out-of-body experience, it's sort of like an epiphany except it's more focused on the present and you're conscious of way more than any regular person is. It's what you get when you faint and black out." Jerry stirred the sauce without looking at me. An edge that wasn't there before filled his voice. "Don't pretend like you haven't had it.

"And you know this how?" I raised an inquiring eyebrow as I struggled with the abominable knot binding my wrists.

Jerry's expression was still unreadable. Having a captor who was hard to read wasn't exactly a warming box of cookies. It made it impossible to find stable ground but so much easier to stumble into surprises. Especially with someone as volatile as Jerry, who playfully kept his psychosis hidden at convenient times.

He placed the lasagna in the oven. His expression had hardened into a frown. "I tasted your blood."

I coughed on perfectly good air.

"What?" It could've been a trick of the mind, but for a second Jerry looked uncomfortable. "I tasted it in your blood. I really don't know how that was possible kid. But the strange thing," His irises morphed into the crimson pools I came to know so well. "is I liked it."

Off went the warning bells. Inconspicuously, I tried to reach for the nearest sharpest object, which were all unfortunately nearer to Jerry. "I mean as if I need more of a reason to kill you kid." His expression switched to pensive as if he tried to weigh the morality of all this. Silently, I prayed to the universe to give me a break.

It occurred to me after the first ding of the oven, that there was no way I was going to eat with my hands bound. Second, food was a romantic concept for me like dreaming. As far as performing as a normal human being went, eating and sleeping were out my window. The idea to resist had certainly crossed my mind but I hadn't remembered the last time I managed to get anything down my throat, and pushing it seemed to be more deadly than just giving in. Besides, I couldn't make this anymore easier for Jerry than being half-starved and energy drained and all the more fallible. He served the lasagna square in front of me.

Stupidly, my mouth began to water as the smell caressed my nose. My attempt would probably be a waste. I knew the second it hit my tongue I'd lose it. Jerry didn't seem to be bothered by my hesitation. He freed one of my hands but hung around. I got the feeling he was worried that I wouldn't eat. I took a spoonful to my lips and strangely, remarkably it went down easily. Thank you, Universe.I didn't chance it. I inhaled every bite as if my life depended on it.

"Of all the people I could've had to join my resistance. The only one I wanted was you kid." My demon with the black hair said, twirling an apple in his hand.