Burning Souls (F.T Sequel)

Chapter Three

I shift when I feel the first rays of the morning beginning their ascent above the high-top city buildings and flooding my bedroom with light through the window. The clouds have miraculously dispersed, and I can only detect a heavy wind outside from in here by catching the faint bristling of the window pane. After miraculously managing to take small sips at a time from the bottled-blood last night, I feel much better physically, and the empty bottle has been discarded in the trash bin. However, mentally, I'm still exhausted. I heard Hunter come back into the apartment in the middle of the night while I was playing around on my laptop, but the TV turning on in the living room had been an obvious indication that he was in no mood to talk. When I had tiptoed out of the room to ask him something and caught him staring at the TV screen soundlessly with a pile of bloody rags on the floor, I had merely retreated back into the safety of my bedroom without a word. I didn't want to know if the blood was his or somebody else's then.

The sky lightens as morning replaces the dark and haunting night, and a smile actually appears on my face when I can acutely hear the sound of birds chirping down below in the quaint park next to my apartment building. I swing my legs over the edge of the bed and stretch lazily as I stand up, closing the screen of my laptop and watching it with a mournful expression.

Bye dear laptop, time to face the real world...

I grab my cheap robe from the hook on the door and slide it on to conceal my thin camisole and boy shorts underneath, padding slowly over the wooden floor boards to get to the bathroom and wincing every time they creak loudly. Hunter isn't on the couch anymore, or anywhere in the living area, and the mass of bloody rags that had been on the floor are gone, with no signs of apparent staining. I reach for the knob and nearly scream when it turns by itself and the door opens. It nearly crashes into me but I take a reflexive step back, bumping into the wall. Hunter exits the bathroom with a few water droplets sliding down his naked upper body. Very naked upper body. He only sports a single towel around his lower half and leaves wet footprints on the floor when he advances on me silently. I freeze when he runs a finger down my cheek. It feels warm against my skin.

"Good morning little E." He says casually, and despite my frozen state I have the urge to slap that stupid nickname out of his memory.

"H-hi." I stammer. God I sound stupid... "I'm umm - just going to - umm, go do - umm... stuff." I cringe at the embarrassment that my words do to me, but he just chuckles lowly and shakes his head, taking a step back to free me from his closeness. I mutter a curse under my breath which I'm sure he heard from the way he smirks at me, and quickly close the bathroom door behind me. The mirror is completely fogged and the room has steam rising to its ceiling. Like my usual routine, I take a quick shower, leaving my clean hair from the night before out of the water. I dry my body and pull on a matching black lace bra and knickers. I don't know why, but unmatched underwear stresses me out. I hurriedly slide into my denim jeans and a grey, over-sized jumper, not really needing anything else to conceal myself from the outside world's chilly temperatures.

Hell, I could even walk outside in a bikini and not feel anything, but I suppose that that would raise suspicion that I don't want. I leave my blond hair in the messy ponytail and nudge the door open with my foot. I grab my boots and step into them, and when I stand back up I nearly crash into a sweater-clad hard torso. Hunter looks at me curiously and I mutter an apology, avoiding his stare and the manly cologne following my senses no matter how far I stray from him. I duck away and hurry towards the kitchen, feeling his eyes burning into the back of my head as I open the fridge and find it completely stacked with blood.

"I took the liberty to fill it up. I hope you don't mind." He fills in, and I can practically imagine him tilting his head at me.

"Umm..." I begin, reaching in for a bottle and twirling it pensively around in my hands. "Thank you." The words come out as a mere whisper but when I turn he smiles at me, before heading towards the front door with a casual swagger. With a sigh I crouch down and open up a cupboard where heaps of brown paper is stacked, pulling out a sheet of it. I stand back up and mechanically wrap it around the clear glass bottle of blood, tying it off with a plastic band. It would be tragic if humans saw me drinking its contents. They would either think me to be a hopeless alcoholic, or... well... a crazy psychopath.