Anything For Rachel

Calvin.

It's so dark here. Why isn't there any light? I feel the warmth. Somewhere close, there's a sweet seductive warmth that I want to be beside...how far is it...my mouth waters, my throat burns. Actually, all of me burns. I need that warmth I feel. I need that warmth within me. That's the only way to make the darkness go away. Make the pain go away. Where is it?

"Calvin." An angel whispered my name, pulling me from the darkness like my savior. My eyes finally opened and I could see the warmth I was following. My Rachel. She looks scared, not of me like before, but for me now. "Are you ok?" She whispered.

I forced a nod even though the movement makes spikes of white hot pain stab all over my body. I can't let her see how bad the pain has gotten. She'll only push harder if she knows, and I don't know how much longer I can resist. The pull is almost too much even now, just her body so close to mine, not even touching me, but the warmth rolling off of her calls to the monster within me, begging me to come and take what could be mine.

The pain would be gone.

The little voice won't stop tempting me.

It's ok, just do it. She wants you to.

No. I won't.

Stop fighting, take what you want. You've wondered for years what it would be like.

I brought my hands up to my ears, pressing on them as if that could drown out the insistent temptations to taste her blood.

Blood. Blood. Blood. Blood.

I groaned, and the sound coming up my throat made the sandpaper in my lungs and esophagus scream out in more fissures of pain.

I flinched away from her touch, my eyes focusing back on hers instead of the rushing of her blood right beneath the surface of that perfectly thin and beautiful skin that covers her neck. It would be easy. Quick, just a few sips, then I'd be ok.

"Calvin?" She whispered my name again, pain in her voice, but a different pain than the one that's slowly taking control of me, inching me out of my own body until nothing is left here but the bloodthirst and the darkness. No more Calvin. No more Rachel. Just.... "Please?" She begged, tears on the tops of her cheeks that a part of me so badly wanted to reach up and wipe away, keeping something so sad away from the beauty of her, but the other part of me, the part becoming stronger and stronger as the days slip by in this cabin...that part of me wants to rip into her. "Let me help you."

I want to, my dear, my sweet, my queen, but I can't. I won't do it.

"I could make you." She said suddenly, and my eyes refocused on her face again, that look of determination creeping in. It is usually one of my favorite sights, the power within Rachel bubbling to the surface to be admired, but right now, it was a frightening thing.

I used all the strength I had left to lurch away from her, rolling myself to the far side of the bed. "Octavia, someone, stop her." I snapped, my voice coming out as a raspy whisper.

Rachel looked angry, but Octavia was at her side, watching her closely, ready to stop anything crazy that Rachel might try to do. "Calvin, why?" Rachel cried. "I just want to help you! Why can't you just let me be there for you?"

I turned away from her, the smaller side of me unable to take the heat of her stare. I tried to swallow, but the pain was too strong, so my words came out as a choking crackling whisper.

"I've already told you twenty times, Rachel." I snapped. "I won't do it! End of story!"

"No!" She yelled. "Not end of story!"

"I don't want to, Rachel." I told her again. "I need to keep that part of me separate from us. I don't want that to be any part of our relationship. You aren't a meal to me, you're my soulmate, and I know you want to do this, but I can't." I wasn't even sure if everything I was saying was understandable with how I was having to force the sound out of me, but I kept on. "Rachel, I have explained to you before, if we were to be blood bonded, then every time I'm near you, I'd want your blood. It could never be a one-time thing. Your blood already calls to me without the bond, and I would be powerless to resist it if were bonded." I told her. "Another thing, you'd feel things for me, so much stronger than what you do now."

"Why is that a bad thing?" She yelled. "I already love you more than anything, why does it matter?"

"Rachel!" I screamed, my eyes changing momentarily, and I felt Cromley's large hands pinning my shoulders down to the bed to be sure I wouldn't go after her in my anger. "The point is that I don't want to have a manufactured pull over you. I want my connection with you to be real, based on the love we have for each other and nothing else! Why can't you understand that?" I yelled hoarsely. "I need to know that you love me for the right reasons, and I want you to have the power to leave me, should that ever be something you wanted to do one day. I won't feed from you! That is the end of this conversation!"

Rachel burst into tears, and Octavia hugged her to her side, but I could see in the tenseness of Octavia's expression that the hunger was beginning to get to her as well. I hated to see Rachel unhappy, especially knowing that I'm the one who made her that way, but this wasn't something I was willing to budge on. I'd never in my life dreamt that I'd find a true love like the one I share with this perfect woman, and I refuse to let it be tarnished by my hunger for her blood. What we have is real, and I will never do anything that will put our feelings for one another into question. Whether it makes her angry with me or not.

"Just starve then!" She yelled. "I can't believe you're being like this! I just want to help you, Calvin. I just wanted to be the one to save you for once instead of you always doing it for me. I wanted to help you." She cried. "I need you to be ok. You have no idea how painful it is for me to watch you lying there and wasting away. I hear you cry out in your sleep and you won't let me do the one thing that would make you better." She shook her head and pulled away from Octavia, staring daggers at me, which I preferred over the crying. She can hate me for it all day long, but I can't stand when I'm hurting her. "If it were the other way around, and I was the one who was laying there suffering, you'd do what it took to take away my pain." She called me out.

I closed my eyes for the shortest of moments, picturing it, but then I shook my head, trying not to notice the bone breaking pain, and I opened my eyes again, even though the desire to just leave them closed was intensely strong. I looked across the bed to where she was standing angrily with her red cheeks, and her arms folded across her fast heaving chest. "No, I wouldn't." I told her truthfully. "I would want to, just like I know that you do, and it would hurt me so much not to be able to." I whispered, the last of my breath coming up. "But I wouldn't do it, not if you asked me not to." I told her weakly. "You begged me to never take away another one of your choices, and I learned from my mistakes. I will never make decisions for you again, and now I'm asking you to do me the same kindness." I said lowly, low enough I wasn't sure her human ears could hear me. "Don't take away my choice here, Rachel. I love you, but please..."

I knew that turning her own words back against her was a low blow, but I needed to make sure that she understood.

The last thing I saw before the darkness crept back up and yanked me under, into the hell of the fiery pain and despair, was Rachel rushing away from the bed, her face in her hands and the bathroom door slamming behind her.

Darkness, so much of it. Everywhere. Is this hell? Am I dead? 

No...death wouldn't hurt this badly.