Act I | part 9

The three branches danced in the wind as the cool air blew away every last leaf. Snowflakes flew to the window and disappeared as soon as they touched the glass. Winter was approaching.

Ava had already moved all of her stuff to Lynn's room and shifted her routine to match with the time he was awake. She covered the windows in her old room with even more diligence than they were initially. Still feeling guilty about the wound on her boyfriend's arm, for which she kept apologizing still.

"Don't sweat it darling." He would say. "The time you spent ignoring me hurt much more than this small thing."

Ever since they started spending more time together, Ava started noticing things she hadn't before. Like how much time he would spend reading. The small library of his was more precious to him than even his vinyl records, which were one of the few remaining possessions from his time as a human. She remembered him saying once that if it wasn't for his books, he would have probably stepped into the sunlight years ago.

In his words, as mankind developed their inelegance and realized the harshness of this world, so came the need of fiction to avoid that reality. Although that he had already seen all the  horrors life had to offer, he always spoke with optimism. Something which Ava never managed to wrap her head around.

Another thing she became aware of was how he would often sneak out to do 'house maintenance' in the basement, which she wasn't allowed in. Supposedly it being overrun with rats.

There were still the strange noises coming from beneath the bathroom tiles. He dismissed them as being just the cracking of old floorboards, but she had the feeling that there was something more to it.

"Lynn, is there something you are not telling me?" She asked him one night.

He moved his eyes away from the book he was reading. 'Kafka on the shore' by Haruki Murakami. A story he had probably already known by hart now, but kept finding new things in by each read.

"Why all of a sudden?" He asked raising an eyebrow. "If it's about the noises, I'm telling you the house is old. It could be ghosts for all I know."

"I can't explain it, but... I simply have the feeling that you are hiding something from me."

"Could it be that we've been dating only for a week and you are already getting jealous?"He gave her a wicked smile. "Don't worry the friend I mentioned earlier isn't a female."

"It's not that."She blushed."Maybe it's because there is still a lot I don't know about you. That clan of vampires you used to be a part of... What was it like? Were there any rules?"

"Rules? Yes, surely. There are three that I can think of at the top of my head." He put down his book and started pacing around the room. "No. 1:We don't kill humans, just drain them. The only exception being criminals or other evil doers."

"Seems fare." Ava was listening with interest. The moment she heard about a vampiric clan, she was burning to with curiosity.

"No. 2: No violence within the members. Pretty self explanatory." He leaned back on his coffin. His face suddenly becoming very serious."And No. 3 and some would say most egregious of all: No turning young children into vampires."

She gave an expression as if she was confused about the last one.

"They would be trapped in that body for life. Maturing mentally but not physically." His lips formed a smile again as he went closer to her, putting his index finger under her chin and his tumb on her bottom lip. "I know what you are really doing darling. You want me to put down my read and give you some attention, don't you?"

She didn't say anything. Her cheeks grew red as he gave her a kiss on the forehead. Soon he was laying on the bed on top of her.

"If you want me all to yourself, you just need to ask." He continued.

"You are the one who wants to do it every night."

"Can you blame me for it? When I have someone so gorgeous as you around, any time that I'm not inside you feels like a waste." He felt her skin getting hotter as he slid his fingers from her cheek to the collarbone. "I'll be leaving tomorrow night so until then, I'm all yours."

***

The mornings were always uneventful. While still adapting to sleeping through the day, the girl would usually stay awake up until noon. Either doing stuff around the house or reading one of the countless books from the library. Even though most of it was in a different tongue.

Lynn loved to read literature in the original language they were written. Saying that it adds more flavor to the story, as some words didn't translate well into English.

He had instructed her to always put the book back into the same place she had found it. And would get upset if she didn't. The fact that he would complain about it so much seemed a bit odd, but after all it was just one of his quirks.

Before going to bed, she searched the shelves once again. They weren't sorted in alphabetical order, but instead by genre. Within the books about modern literature, which she tended to read the most, there was only one author she recognized: Henrik Cypher. She had heard the name many times in the newspaper as it was one of the few famous authors in the district.

Now days pursuing art of any kind was nearly unheard of. Getting your hands on something more than a dictionary was a struggle on its own. A few decades after the war, schools became obsolete, leaving a quarter of the population practically illiterate. Ava had never went to a school herself, but instead spent what little money she saved on textbooks in hopes to enroll to an academy one day, or at the very least sign up for a course.

As the pages went by, her mind slowly drifted. Sending her back to that dreadful dream. Again being torn to shreds... white gate... lake... This time however the features of the person pulling her out became a little clearer. She could feel their long dark hair grazing her skin.

She was suddenly awaken by the sound of a door being slammed. The sky was still bright, yet the vampire's coffin was empty. There was the smell of cooked meat coming from the kitchen. Had he gone up to prepare dinner so early? When she went to check, the house seemed empty and so was the dinner table. The windows in the living room were left slightly open, strange as of why he would risk getting burned by the sunlight again. At least that explained the drift.

There were no traces of food on the dinner table, despite the smell. The pans next to the sink had little droplets of water on them. Leading to the thought that they were recently washed.

She heard the sound of the basement door being opened and hurried back to the bedroom. As her boyfriend came back, she pretended to be asleep. Something wasn't adding up. Abounding all hopes for direct confrontation, she decided it's best to get to the bottom of it by herself.

Whatever he was hiding, it had something to do with that basement and she was determined to find out what it is, even if she lived to regret it.