I was on my knees next to Haven’s body, and I didn’t care about anything that was going on around me. I didn’t care that my brothers- all three of them, were fighting off this monster. I didn’t care that it would probably get away alive. I didn’t care that the pool of blood surrounding Haven’s body was slowly starting to stain my jeans. I only cared about Haven. I couldn’t lose her. I loved her. But I knew that this was the end. There was no possible way to save her, she was already gone.
She was lying on the ground, my own personal snow white. Her long brown hair was fanned out around her head, but the tips were tinted red from blood. Blood was everywhere. I had never seen so much blood in my life, and I’m a vampire for God’s sake. It was soaked into the carpet, so much that it would never be able to be washed out. Her neck was the worst; the creature had left it a ravaged mess. I could barely bare to look at it. I stared into her eyes, for they were open, and thought I saw a glimmer of something. Something that looked like life. For a second I almost felt myself getting excited, but another look at her mutilated body brought me back down to reality. There was no way to save her. You could not recover from an injury like this. Haven would die in my arms and there was nothing I could do about it.
I felt tears well up in my eyes, and I wiped them away with the back of my hand. When I brought it back down there was new blood on it, only this time it was my own. I had heard that vampires cried blood, I just never had a reason to. I had never felt this much pain in my life. My heart was shattering into a million pieces, and there was no one there to pick them up. The only woman who could was laying lifeless beside me.
“Aaron.” I felt a gentle hand on my shoulder and looked up to see Danny standing over me. His face was a mixture of concern and depression. They must have chased away the creature, I realized. Sure enough, when I looked around the room I saw Ryan and Damian standing next to each other, whispering. They had the same expression as Danny. “Aaron, if you’re going to try it you have to do it now. If you wait even a little bit longer it will be too late.”
I looked up at him, confused as hell. If I was going to try what? It was already too late, how did he not see that? Haven was as good as dead. He didn’t know what he was talking about. And then… he did. The realization hit me like a brick to my head. No, no, no. I couldn’t be forced to make this choice. It wasn’t fair. I couldn’t live with myself either way. I had two choices.
I could let Haven die. I could hold her while she passed onto the afterlife. I could call her parents and tell them that Haven was murdered, like the other girl and the teacher. I could mourn her forever, and live my life alone.
Or I could save her. If you could really call it ‘saving’. It’s more like I could damn her to eternal life. I could turn her into one of us, one of the undead. I thought back to the time we talked in bed, and remembered she had told me that she didn’t want to be a vampire. But I also knew she wouldn’t want to be dead.
How was I suppose to make this choice? Why did I have to make this choice? Even as I thought, Haven grew colder and paler by the second. Danny was right, I needed to decide soon, or else it would be too late, if it wasn’t already. I looked into her face, her beautiful, dying face, and made my decision. I couldn’t lose her. As selfish and cruel as it was, I could not bring myself to go on without her. If she died, I would die too. Making me decision, I set my jaw in determination, and looked up at my youngest brother, who was still standing next to me. As if reading my mind, Danny pulled out his pocket knife and gingerly handed it to me. I stared at it only a second before I brought it down on my wrist.
The pain of the cut was nothing to the pain I felt in my heart, and I didn’t flinch as I dragged the blade along the pattern of thin veins on my wrist. When I was sure it was deep enough, I brought my arm down to Haven’s mouth, making sure the blood flowed into it. To my relief, she managed to swallow it, although there was no guarantee that it would work. When she had had enough, I pulled my wrist away.
“Here.” Damian said, his voice gentler than ever before. He quickly walked over to me, and it took him only a moment to heal the slash. I mumbled a thank you, but my eyes never left Haven. I scooped her up in my arms; she weighed almost nothing. It was only a couple of minutes before her breathing slowed to a stop and her pulse disappeared all together. I stood up and laid her carefully on the couch, not caring that it would be soaked in blood soon, like everything else.
“She’s gone.” I said aloud to the room, and the three other men nodded solemnly. I stumbled into a chair and rested my head in my hands. “What do we do now?”
“We wait.” Danny said. His expression had changed into a determined one.
“What if it doesn’t work?” I asked. I didn’t dare to hope.
“Then at least we tried.” I nodded, but I couldn’t stand thinking about what would happen if my venom failed.
“How long do you think it will take?” I asked again, and Damian was the one to answer this time.
“There is no way to know. It could take a couple minutes or a couple days. Haven’s in pretty bad shape. It might take awhile.” The other guys sat down, and we all started the long process of waiting for the outcome of Haven’s life. Or, well, death.
~
We waited for four hours. Four silent hours, of doing nothing but watching Haven. I had never been more anxious.
“Look, Aaron.” Ryan whispered, and I was snapped out of my reverie. I followed Ryan’s eyes to see that he was staring at Haven. The change that she was undergoing was fast and miraculous as my venom worked its way through her veins. It started at her hair, darkening it as the venom moved through its waves. Her face was next. Her skin became paler, but it was no longer a deathly-white. Her face became angular, more predatory. I knew that under her eyelids her eyes would be turning silver, and cat-like. The changes to her body were subtle, she grew muscles where there had been none before. The gaping wound on her throat healed itself, leaving not even a scar behind. In fact, all the scars she had ever gotten would be erased, she would have a fresh start. The transformation was an incredibly painful one, yet she remained completely silent throughout it. I knew what it is like to be trapped in your mind as you go through this horrible transformation. When it was all done, she laid there, still as silent as ever.
“Well, it worked.” Ryan said, eyeing Haven with wonder. I knew my look mirrored his.
“Yeah.” I was almost breathless. I was taken away by this new, inhuman beauty of the girl I loved. The girl that would probably soon wake up to hate me. I grimaced at that thought.
Haven laid there silently and unmoving for about ten more minutes, before her eyes opened and she let out a gasp.
