Fatal Attractions

Chapter Twenty-Seven

     I awoke feeling weak and decrepit. Not only because my limbs were tied to a chair, and my neck was sore from having to sleep upright with my head down. But also because I awoke with the acknowledgement that I was nothing to these people. They didn't care about my well-being, all they cared about was their revenge, and their form of that was my death.

     I no longer felt like a person. I felt like a wounded animal being tortured by a bunch of teenagers because they had nothing better to do. I slowly lifted my head, my stomach letting out a low rumble in the silence of the barn.

     "Sounds like someone's hungry." I turned my head and saw Summer perched up on the same hay bale Charlie had lounged on, her legs crossed lady-like and a wide smile across her face. She now wore a pastel pink blouse with short ruffled sleeves, pale blue jean shorts and white Chuck Taylor's.

     "Great, it's you," I sighed and turned my head away from her.

     "What, you're not happy to see me?" she hopped off the hay bale and began to strut towards me. "I hope there's no hard feelings, Lena. I got a little... testy yesterday. I hope you forgive me." She leaned down in front of me, hands on her knees, and smiled at me. I wasn't buying it.

     "Is there gonna' be a shift change soon, or is everyone else awake?" I asked. She twisted her lips and stood up straight.

     "It's just Charlie and I. And you. Jack and Kyle went out to get breakfast. It's a good thing they did, you're probably starving, aren't you?" she pouted down at me and walked away. I watched her leap down to the bottom floor, then my eyes moved to Charlie. He sat against the far wall, reading a book. I didn't understand why Summer couldn't have gone with to rest of them to get breakfast.

     For some reason, I favored Charlie out of all of them. I didn't trust him or think he was going to do anything to stop Jack from killing me in the end, but he was easy to talk to, and I didn't feel jumpy around him. That put him at the very bottom of my shit list at the moment.

     He lifted his eyes from the pages of his book to me. If I wasn't mistaken, I could've sworn I saw a ghost of a smile on his lips. He moved his eyes back down to his book, leaving me alone with my thoughts. 

     "Breakfast is served!" Jack's voice echoed through the barn. He marched in, Kyle in tow, both of them carrying white plastic bags. They both set their bags on the floor and began removing their contents. While they placed white styrofoam containers on the ground, I saw Charlie stand up and walk over to the loft. He disappeared from sight, and then reappeared at the top of the ladder. Before I could ask what he was doing, he began untying my restraints.

     "Charlie, what do you think you're doing?" I looked down and saw Jack staring up at us, the other two vampires too consumed in their food to notice. Charlie continued untying me and didn't acknowledge Jack until he was finished.

     "How do you expect her to eat with her hands behind her back?" Charlie asked, turning towards Jack. Jack remained quiet and turned back toward the food. It took me a moment to realize there were stacks of pancakes in the containers. My stomach let out another rumble as I watched the vampires scarf down their food.

     "Do you want it to get cold?" Charlie asked, eyeing me. Without giving me a chance to respond, he moved himself down the ladder. I followed suit and went over to join the group. They were all sitting in a messy half-circle, eating away at stacks of pancakes with plastic forks. An unopened container sat in the middle of all of them. I slowly moved forward, reaching down for the container, feeling like a wild animal taking claim to its food.

     No one even spared a glance at me as I picked up the container and backed away from the group. I backed myself into a far corner and slid down to the floor, nestling the container of food in my lap. As soon as I flipped the lid open, the sweet aroma of butter and syrup evaded my senses, making my mouth water.