Chapter 7 - Love and the Past

I felt a lot better by the time I had to go home. I was even smiling and laughing again. Of course knowing that someone somewhere, was planning to come after me sometime soon was driving me crazy. I never let it show. Being with Daniel just made me too happy to care. As long as he was by my side, nothing in the world could get to me. If it tried, I wouldn’t let it.

I loved that about him. The ability he has to somehow make me careless. Even in the most dangerous situations. I haven’t gotten that “not right” feeling since the night I met him. I took that as a definite good sign. Either that or a really bad one, but I stuck to the good one more. His kisses were even more amazing. He kissed me again before he left me today, and just like before, electricity shot straight through my veins, making me feel like I would start glowing like a light bulb at any moment. It was also as if the electrical currents somehow drew me to me. It was more like a magnet than electricity though. It was so hard to pull away, not that I wanted to.

I had another nightmare again that night. Well, not another one, the same one just different. This time instead of seeing from my own eyes, I was watching it happen from across the room. It scared me just as much, but this time I could clearly see it was definitely not Daniel. I didn’t wake up in the same panic as I had the first time, since I realize it wasn’t anyone I knew. I tried not to think about it until I was with Daniel again. It was the only time I could think and talk about it without freaking out.

The morning started like every other day had been like since Lilly was born. Kind of a two year pattern that hasn’t been broke. Wake up, get Lilly up, get dressed, eat breakfast, play around the house for a while. The only difference is I was in Oregon and I hung out with a vampire. My grandparents were both out for the day. I wasn’t exactly sure where they were or when they’d be back, but it was nice having the house alone with Lilly.

We were just about to get ready for lunch and I was having Lilly help me clean up the toys that covered our room. We were laughing and playing. No one made me laugh the way she did. She was walking over to her toy box with a toy that was a bit too heavy for her, but she did her best. She leaned over into the box to set the toy down lightly when, and I’m not sure exactly how except she was as clumsy as me, she fell into the toy box. She was laughing and so was I, but I soon noticed that we weren’t the only ones laughing. I jumped and turned to see that Daniel was standing behind us in the door way, just barely poking his head in to watch, so we couldn’t see him.

“Oh! When did you get here?” I yelled.

He laughed and stepped into the room. “About fifteen minutes ago.” He said adding that amazing smile afterwards.

“Ah, I see. Next time some warning.” I said laughing a little too.

“I just didn’t want to interrupt. You girls were having so much fun, I was enjoying watching. I was doing fine at being quiet, but when she fell it, I couldn’t help but laugh.” He was still laughing while he walked over to me and put his arm around my waist.

“Yeah, she’s a nut.” I said and smiled at Lilly who was still in the toy box looking at me. “You need help Lilly?” I asked and she nodded.

 I walked over to her and lifted her out. She held onto me more tightly than normal, but I realized after a second that she never actually met Daniel, she was always asleep.

“Oh yeah. Lilly this is Daniel.” I said walking back over to him. “Daniel, this is my Lilly.” I said with a smile.

“Well hello Lilly. You are beautiful, just like your mother.” He said and I could feel myself blushing.

Lilly smiled at him and reached for him. That took me by surprise, she was never so calm while meeting new people. I figured this would’ve been worse than normal. I was happy to have been wrong.

Daniel reached out for her and held her. Both of them smiling at each other. It was kind of weird, but also nice. I don’t exactly know why it was weird. I just ignored it.

I cleaned up the rest of the toys while Daniel and Lilly played a little on the floor. He would move a few feet at a time with his amazing speed and Lilly would chance him, giggling and squealing. I didn’t even realize I had stopped, but I was just staring at them. Staring at how happy Lilly was. Even Daniel was happier then I’d seen him before. It occurred to me then, that he probably hasn’t had many chances since he was human to play with children. It was a nice sight to see. The two people I loved, even though one I sort of just met, happy in front of me. It made me happier too.

Hours had passed and I wasn’t quite sure how many. The sun had started to go down and that meant that my grandparents would be home soon. I had made dinner for me and Lilly, while Daniel just sat at the table with us and talked. Lilly couldn’t quit smiling at him. I don’t know what it was about him, but it was like she loved him already too. Of course children were somewhat easy when it came to that. It was about an hour after dinner Daniel said he had to go. I knew he had to, but I didn’t want him to. But my grandparents wouldn’t like it too much coming home to him being here.

Lilly was quietly playing in our room while watching some cartoons. Daniel and I were sitting out on the porch slowly saying goodbye. It felt like he had just gotten there, though I knew he didn’t. We talked about the day, and how much fun he had. He told me what I already had guessed about him not being around children for a long time, and how it was nice playing with Lilly. It was then he told me how old he really was. Though he was stuck at age 23, he has been a vampire for, going on 77 years. That surprised me a little. I don’t know why it did, but I guess I figured he would of at least looked like he was from that time period. He fit in well. We had stopped talking and was just sitting in silence for few minutes and the next thing he said completely surprised me, as he had done a lot today.

“Rayanne, I don’t know if I’m wrong here, but there’s something I have to tell you.” He paused for a minute, struggling with what he was trying to say. “I love you.” He finally said. And once again I completely stopped breathing.

I searched for the words to say back, though it shouldn’t of been so hard. I knew what I felt and I knew what I wanted to say. Why was it so hard? I stared at him, waited till I caught my breath. I was finally able to say what I want- needed to say. “I love you too.” I said it so fast; I hope it didn’t sound as slurred to him as it sounded to me.

Apparently he understood. He smiled, wrapped his arms around me, and sighed happily. I leaned into him and at the same time he dropped one arm, put it under my chin to make me look up at him, and he kissed me. It was the same kiss as usual, powerfully holding onto me with just his lips. Right when I was really enjoying the kiss he pulled away.

“I really better get going.” He said and it sounded like he didn’t want to pull away either.

“O-ok.” I said wrapping my arms around him in a hug. I let go of him and he stood up. I walked him out to his car, he gave me one last hug and a kiss on the cheek. “I love you.” I said again with a smile, happy to be able to say it now.

“I love you too.” He said while holding my hand tightly. Then he got into his car and drove away.

I went back inside just as my grandparent got home. It was about eight-thirty pm. I went to my room, sat down and played with Lilly some more before it was her bedtime. She was still glowing with happiness and I got to thinking about why her liking Daniel worried me. I still couldn’t understand why it bothered me, except for the fact that he was a vampire. It was ok for me to be with him, well more than ok, but for Lilly to be so comfortable with him, well that alone was good enough reason to be uncomfortable. I felt bad for thinking that way, so I just stopped thinking about it. Daniel wouldn’t hurt her, I was sure of that.

After all that thinking, the time flew by pretty fast. It was time to put Lilly to bed and I had no idea what to do. My grandparents didn’t say anything to me when I walked through the kitchen, of course Gramps never did, but Grams just looked up and smiled then went back to her crossword puzzle.

I was just getting ready to sit at the dining room table when my phone started vibrating. I looked down and it said Daniel. What the hell?  I thought. I never put Daniel’s number in my phone; hell I never even gave him mine. I flipped it open and answered it.

“Hello?” I asked sounding as confused as I was.

“Hi. Sorry, I should have told you I got your number out of your phone and then added mine.” He said sounding guilty.

I laughed, “Yes, well that would’ve been a little less confusing. What’s up?” I felt odd at how casual I sounded, as if I was just talking to a friend.

“I was curious, is it too late for me to come see you?” he asked.

“But you just left.” I whispered, my grandparents may have been old, but I didn’t know how good their hearing was. “Not that I’m complaining or anything. I just don’t want you to get sick of me.” I added. I didn’t want him to think I didn’t want to see him, when it was the opposite, I really wanted to see him again. It was getting obsessive.

“Yeah I know, but your grandparents don’t know that.” he said then laughed. “Plus, I could never get sick of you Rayanne. You can’t get sick of someone if you truly love them.” I could almost hear the smile in his voice when he said that. I couldn’t help but smile too.

“Well then, no it’s not too late. I would love for you to come back over.” I admitted.

“Ok, be there in a sec.” he said and the line went dead.

A sec? I thought looking out the window. Sure enough he was pulling into my driveway and I sprang out of my seat for the door.

“He’s here so late?”  Grams asked just and my hand touched the door.

“Uh, yeah. I asked him if he could wait till Lilly was asleep.” I lied.

“Oh ok. Are you going anywhere with him?” she glanced at his car then back at me.

“No, I don’t think so. We will probably just hang out outside tonight. If that’s ok with you?” I asked suddenly unsure how she felt about me seeing Daniel, which before I had thought she was ok with it.

“Yes, it’s ok, I was just hoping you would stay in tonight. You’ve hardly spent any time home since you’ve been here.” She said then looked back down at her puzzle.

“Oh, sorry. I just don’t know what else to do. I mean, I met someone and I really like him, so I didn’t really think much otherwise.” I said, suddenly feeling bad.

“No need to be sorry Rayanne, I’m glad you found someone and I’m also glad you spent the day with Lilly. ” she said, only looking up at me halfway through what she was saying. “Will we get to meet him?” she asked and it caught me off guard again.

“Sure, if you want. I didn’t know if you wanted to or not. How about tomorrow?” I wasn’t sure about that, but I wanted her to know him, and soon know how I felt about him.

“Tomorrow sounds great. Now go ahead and go. Don’t keep him waiting much longer.” She smiled and went back to her puzzle.

I ran out the door and out to his car. He was still sitting in it and as I reach him the passenger door flew open, so I climbed in and closed the door.

“Are we going somewhere?”I asked. I wasn’t prepared to be leaving.

“No, I just figured you would be more comfortable in the car than sitting outside. It’s starting to get cold.” He said looking up to the trees as they swayed hard in the wind.

“Oh, yeah. That works.” I said and laughed a little. “So what there something you wanted to talk about?” I asked, curious to why he wanted to come back over so fast.

“No, not really anything specific, I just wanted to see you again.” He said as he reached over and held my hand.

“Oh ok.” I said smiling, just being with him, not even really talking, was fine with me.

“It’s just that, since we’ve been open about how we feel, though I find it kind about the situation, but no complaints, I find it harder to be away from you now.” He said, sounding a little embarrassed.

I liked I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. “Yeah, I know what you mean.” I said, smiling again.

He stared at me for a second and slowly leaned closer. His hand that held mine slowly pulled me closer to him. A second later his lips touched mine in such a gentle way; it seemed to only make that usual feeling stronger. Before I was really thinking, I was pushing myself harder against him, completely ignoring the middle compartments blocking me. He had both his hands in my hair, also pulling me softly against him. I felt the need in his kiss now, as he crushed his lips a little harder into mine. It hurt a little bit, but I ignored that too. Next thing I knew I was moving over onto his lap, facing him with my hands gripped into his hair, still pulling him closer. I could feel his hesitance as I pulled him, which let me know he was as close as he could get without hurting me, it somehow still wasn’t enough. At that point I lost control of my breathing and he moved from my lips kissing down my neck, allowing me to gasp for air.  I pulled a little tighter on his hair and he released a soft moan, while he was kissing lower down my neck. His hands moved from my hair down to my lower back and then went up a little under my shirt. Touching my bare skin made me shiver. The next thing I knew he was gripping my shirt and slipped it over my head and went back to kissing my neck. This time when he went lower, he went down to my chest and kissed from one side to the other. I brought his face back up to mine and pushed my lips up against him, while also pushing my entire body against him harder. He held me a little tighter and this time the moan came from me. His hands continued to move up and down from my waist to my hair, touching every part of me. I almost couldn’t take it anymore.

Suddenly he stopped and pushed me gently away from him so my back was against the steering wheel and I wondered why I didn’t feel that before. I was quite unaware of a lot of the things until that moment and I realized why he had stopped. He didn’t want to go any farther than that, because it would have been harder to stop. My breathing was still hard as he handed me my shirt to put back on.

“Ugh.” I growled to myself as I climbed back over to my seat.

“What?” he asked. He sounded kind of angry.

“You can’t just do that to a person.” I said laughing, hoping to help get rid of his tone.

He did laugh too, “Sorry, I just… well I don’t think were ready for that yet and well, I don’t think we can.” He sounded upset, but not mad. Just that what he said bothered him.

“Oh? Why not?” I was confused after all that, now he tells me we can’t go farther and I didn’t see a reason why not to.

“I’m stronger than you think Rayanne and not in the right ways.” He said. When he saw my confusion he continued. “My strength is much too dangerous in the way that I could hurt you, but body strength crumbles when I feel you up against me.”  He said looking out the window.

“Oh. Ok, well then I guess I’ll just have to suffer through this again later. Thought I really don’t think you could ever actually hurt me.” I asked trying to get him too look at me.

“Rayanne, look at your lips.”  He said while lowering the visor to show the mirror. I looked into it and my lips looked a little red and puffy.

“Oh, well that’s nothing. It was probably from me pushing into you, I’ll remember not to do that next time.” I said, trying to make him see that it wasn’t a big deal.

“Next time I might not be strong enough to stop it from happening. If I do that I could end up completely giving into my senses and end up killing you. I can’t allow that to happen.” He said. And I could tell that was the end of that conversation. I wasn’t going to win now, but you can’t expect to kiss a person like that and expect them to never want to do it again.

We sat there in silence for a few minutes while we adjusted ourselves, and trusted that we weren’t going to do it again. I thought of the couple questions I had for him and decided now was as good of time as any to bring them up.

“So, if you don’t mind me asking. How exactly did you become a vampire?” I decided to ask this first. He just looked up at me wide eyed for a second and then looked back down at the steering wheel. “Was that a bad thing to ask?” I suddenly wasn’t sure if I should have asked.

“No, I’m just surprised you asked. Although there was no reason for me to be, I should have known you would ask someday.” He said laughing a little.

He readjusted his position so he was facing me without so much effort. And cleared his throat, which I knew he didn’t need to do, but I knew it meant he was nervous. “Well, it was when I was 23 of course, and I was walking home.” He stopped for a second and his eyes narrowed a little. I could tell he was thinking hard about something. “Hmm, why don’t I start differently. I was 23 and it was the year 1932. I was living in a small town Arkansas with my parent’s. I had a pretty good life. Wonderful family, one brother, one sister, my mom and my dad, we were all really happy. I had a job that I used to help my parents pay for things and my Mother had actually just found out she was pregnant with a fourth child, so that money came in good use. Luckily I had plenty saved up. I had just met a beautiful girl, who had seemed to actually like me as much as I liked her. It all had happened one evening when I was on my way from seeing her. Elizabeth.” He smiled as he said her name.

“I was walking home, happy as could be, she had just told me how she felt about me. It was then I heard noises as if I was being followed. It wasn’t a long way home, but the trees lining the road made it darker than it actually was. I started walking faster, just in case, but the follower sped up as well. I started to panic and then, before I decided to, I was running. I ran as fast I could, but not fast enough. She, whoever she was, ran straight past me, so fast I couldn’t even see her, and stopped right in front of me.

Before I could even tell myself to slow down and stop running I slammed right into her, falling flat onto my back. She laughed, and it was loud and clear. I had never heard a laugh like that, but it sent chills down my spine. I tried to move, but I was frozen. She seemed to enjoy me just lying there flat on the ground, scared. It was so dark at this point and from my angle I couldn’t even see what she looked like. She reached down, picked me up by the shirt and held me at her eye level. It was then I could vaguely see her long curly black hair, her pale skin, and her glowing, almost black eyes. They still had a hint of red to them. She was beautiful, but more in a terrifying way than an admirable way. I held perfectly still, practically still frozen the way I was, when I was on the ground and well… That was the end of my human life.”

“I had it all going for me, then it was ripped away by some sadistic vampire, who forced me to live my life as she did hers. To this day I still have no idea why she didn’t just kill me. Why turn me into this...” he stopped for a second to point at himself. “Then just leave me with no clue with what to do with myself.” He stared out the window, completely lost in his memories. When he started again, it was almost a whisper. “Everyone just thought I disappeared. I finally left the area because I couldn’t stand watching my family and Elizabeth grieve over me. So I traveled around, about 3 years ago I found this place and decided to stay.” He looked up and smiled at me.

I felt horrible after hearing that. Knowing all he had and then it was all taken, well more like stolen away from him. The way he looked at me, his eyes happy, yet still filled with pain. I reached over to him and wrapped my arms around him, holding him as close to me as I possibly could. I hated to see that amount of pain in anyone’s eyes, especially his.

Author's Note

I'm new at writing and I except any criticism. I just ask that you please be nice about it. There may be some grammar errors, but I haven't made things final yet.