Chapter 4: Temperatures Rising

Lucy was surprised how enticing and seductive Celeste could be in her hungered display. Lucy swallowed hard before continuing.

“I thought that, um, it was like some sort of frenzie? Like you bite someone, and a sort of, like, animal instinct takes over?” Lucy tucked her hands under her legs to help keep herself firmly planted in her chair. It had been almost two years since her nasty breakup with Amanda. She never thought she’d feel this sense of attraction towards someone again.

“I suppose it could be described that way. It’s similar to when you’re with someone physically. You feel the passion and heat, all your instincts telling you to keep going, but you aren’t incapable of stopping should that become necessary.” Lucy stared hard at Celeste, imagining herself in such a situation. She wasn’t sure, actually, if she would stop.

“I suppose I’ll just have to,” Lucy started before trying to swallow the dry lump in her throat. “I’ll just have to practice.”

“There you go. I’m glad you’re feeling better about this. I’m sure Veronika is waiting for you.” In a moment, Celeste changed from sensual and intimate to the formal head mistress once again. Lucy forced herself to smile weakly and say goodbye before heading back out to the hall.

“What was that about?” Veronika asked, standing just outside the door. Veronika placed her hands on her hips and looked halfway between concerned and annoyed.

Lucy shrugged and started walking toward their room with Veronika trailing behind her.

“I was just helping her with books. She looked like she was struggling,” Lucy answered, off handedly.

“Okay ‘Ms Teacher’s Pet’. You were just overly nice, that’s all.” Veronika caught up to her and linked arms with Lucy. “So there’s this party happening off campus later. Do you want to go?”

“Like a vampire party?” Lucy tried to wrap her brain around what that might even look like.

“Well, yeah, it’s not like we are going to go to any more human parties. That’s just a wild massacre waiting to happen!” Veronika’s boisterous laugh made Lucy feel uneasy. She did her best to chuckle along, halfheartedly.

“Yeah, alright. I suppose it would be good to meet some different people, others, like, vampires ....” Lucy’s voice trailed off as she let her mind wander.

“Great! Maybe you’ll even meet someone there! That girl you’ve been secretly crushing on that you won’t tell me about….” Veronika offered with a smirk and a raised eyebrow.

“Veronika! Right now, it’s just a small nothing feeling. If it turns into something more, I’ll let you know. So what is it like, you know, dating as a vampire? Anything drastically different I should know about?” Lucy questioned, rubbing one arm with her other. Veronika gave her a curious look.

“Well, there are different sorts of kinks that can happen, if that’s what you mean. When you go out to ‘dinner’ and say Italian, you’ll drink blood from an Italian man instead of, like, lasagna. But otherwise, it’s mostly the same.”

Lucy glanced at Veronika from the side, perturbed that such gruesome conversations came so easily to her. “How long until I get used to grim comments like that?”

Veronika scoffed.

“You’re a vampire now. We might not be the evil Dracula vampires that slay entire villages like in stories, but you’re still a blood drinking -”

“Monster.”

“I was going to say creature of the night. Girl, you’ve got to get past this. You’re not some terrible monster.”

Lucy sighed and shoved her hands in her pockets. She knew Veronika was right, but she couldn’t help feeling icky about it still. Veronika wedged her arm through Lucy’s again and walked them forward.

“Let’s just go to this party. We’ll have a great time, and you can forget all your stress and worries for a while. Start to normalize being a vampire in your mind, okay?”

Lucy smiled and nodded, trying to believe she could actually normalize her new reality.