Chicago, 1918.
Chapter 1
I can feel myself dripping with sweat. My blanket has gone from white to a dirty mix of green and brown. The pillow I am laying on is the only thing they refresh every now and then, so the illness won't spread. I don't think that is the truth, more like a theory. But I don't care, I am asleep most of the days, and whenever I wake up I have no idea what time it is. Not that a clock would help, my vision is unclear, I can't move my head to the side if I would want to. I am dying, and there is nothing I can do to make it less painfull or less disgusting.
I wonder if they left the bodies here just to rot, or would they bring them to a place where they could burn us? They won't bury us and give us nice ceremony, we don't have the money. Or the people to attend to our funerals. The only person I have left is my mother, Elizabeth Mason. Our father was the first of us to pass away. He got infected by the Spanish influenza in early spring, somewhere around the 4th of March. It didn't take long, he got very weak very fast and we didn't have money for medicine. When he died, my mother and I, we knew we had to get ourselves vaccinated. So we would be immune to the illness. When we got to the local hospital it was chaos. Everyone screaming, people crying, dying. It was dangerous to even be there. There were posters everywhere saying that you were entering the building on your own risk. It didn't matter if you were already infected, you could die in there. I remember my mother crying, holding my shoulders and telling me we would be fine, we would be okay. I also remember screaming at her, telling her to go in there with me, so we could live. I kept screaming and crying as we walked away from the hospital and I can still see her there, holding me close to her, as if someone would steal me from her.
It was only five days later that anyone infected by the Spanish influenza was called out to gather at that same hospital. So we could be treated there, they said. It wasn't like I believed that they would acutally get us better, but it wasn't pretty when they told us we had to stay here until it was over, and they couldn't give us all medicine so they would give no one. To keep it fair, so to put it.
I try to close my eyes again, thinking about anything gives me a headache. I think I threw up like four times today, if I'm correct on the time. The puke doesn't get far, because turning my head without help from a doctor is impossible. I hear my mother waking up now. She's mumbling. Not being able to talk is one of the side effects of dying. I can hear her coughing. Coughing leads to throwing up. That's her fifth time today. I don't mind suffering as much as seeing- hearing- someone else suffer. I flinch by the sound of the door opening, it's too loud for my ears. A pang goes all the way through my brain and it feels like my prefrontal cortex has been fried. I hear a doctor- I assume- walking towards me but I keep my eyes on the ceiling, the pain is less that way.
"Hello Edward," a female voice says- the doctor. She's keeping her voice low. "Let's clean you up a bit." At this I manage to shake my head slightly. "Eliza...beth," I breath. "Mom." The doctor seems suprised, I never really try to talk to anyone. "Alright dear." She whisperes. I close my eyes.
Chapter 2
I can hear a choir sing to the beat of a piano. The sound comes from the church at the end of the street. I imagine being in that church again. Laughing, and playing. Singing along to the songs. I never believed in God, but I loved going to church. I don't think going to church means you believe in God, I think it means respecting the fact that other people get their strength from such an admiration for someone else. Whoever or whatever that someone may be.
Today is worse than ever. The pain in my body has spread. Headache. Cramps. Nose bleeds. I have a fever. I can feel it. Now and then a nurse walks in to check on me. I can hear my mother cry when a nurse tells her something she doesn't tell me. This is it.
I'm going to die today.
When I wake up somewhere around noon- I can tell it's noon because the room is lit by the sun outside- I feel something is terribly wrong. I'm paralyed from my toes to my belly. I can still move my right arm and my head but it's not much. It's not enough. I look up from my toes to the ceiling, I spend most of the days staring at the ceiling and I never really mind, but now I'd rather die than look at blue paint for another minute. My mother isn't crying anymore, but she's also not sleeping. Is she at peace? Should I be?
I fall asleep and I hope never to wake up again.
But I do.
I hear my mother, "Save him. Do-," she sighs,"do it." I can't make sense of her words, but I don't know if that's because I'm dying. I didn't imagine dying would feel like this, it feels as if I'm floating, but not a good, dreamy way. Instead I'm floating down, not in water, but on a bed of stones. I hit my head, I break my foot, my back is bleeding. I can feel the pain. But it's not real. There's someone there, next to me. I can feel his presence. He moves his head closer to me, so I don't have to put effort in looking at him. His face is pale, too pale. I'm certain he's paler than me. His hair, a soft blond color, collar-length covers the golden pupil of his left eye. He's around his twenties, I estimate.
"Edward," he says, slowly, like my name shouldn't be spoken out loud, "would you like to live a little longer?" At first I don't get it- no, not just at first. I have no idea what he means. Do I? Do I want to live longer? If I say yes will I live on with the Spanish influenza and will I have to go through the same pain I've went through now? Or will I be healthy, able to live a life without worries? All these questions go through my mind as he touches my cheek. What is he capable of?
"Edward." He says again. I can hear my mother crying softly in the background. What does she know about this man, how long has she known him? He looks like a doctor, but is he? I have to decide.
I decide I trust him.
I lift my right hand off the bed, it's the only arm I can move, the rest is still paralyzed by death. I close my eyes as I search only with my hand for his face. Instead his hands find mine. I flinch when I feel them. They're cold. Ice cold. He holds my hands tight but at the same time kindly, like he's scared he'll scatter them. He holds them there for a while. I open my eyes and look at the doctor. He places one of his hands onto my forehead and at first it feels nice but then it's too cold. Like walking in the snow on barefeet. Or having your hands stuck under ice. It doesn't feel natural anymore, it hurts. I moan softly, not too loud. But he hears it. He knows it hurts. Quickly he takes his hand off of my fore head.
"I'm sorry, Edward. I have to cool you down before I change you." He's right. I am cooled down. My headache is gone now. The doctor sighs. "Are you ready?" I look at him, frowning. Change you? Into what? Suddenly I'm scared. My heartbeat races and I can feel my body glowing again. He touches my cheek. "I'll be very carefull." He whisperes. He turns my head slightly away from him and holds my hand down on my stomach. His expression changes, first it was kindness that was spread all across his face. Now it's something completely different. Like he's.. thirsty for something. His head moves to my neck, his mouth opens.
And then he bites.
I scream.
Chapter 3
The pain is excruciating. Pangs go through my body like snakes. My head burns. I feel my legs again but I wish I didn't. My head is everywhere. I move it again and again. I shake it. I'd do anything to lose this pain. I am shut out from the world. I'm alone. Dying. I have to be dying. I scream again. Every move hurts my body but I can't lay still. Not with this agony. Fire is rising up in my head and spreading itself. Frying every part of my body. If this is how it feels to die it's not what anyone could deserve. I can't remember anything. Or anyone. I don't know where I am, or why. Nothing makes sense anymore. It feels like my body is full of holes, flames streaming in through my bloodstreams, getting warmer and warmer. It's unbearable. I want it to stop. It needs to stop. I open my eyes but I can't see. All I see is red, like there's blood on the inside of my eyelids. It feels like that, the blood is everywhere. The blood is in all the wrong places. And where there's blood, there's flames. The fire feels wrong. These flames don't live on the wood of a campfire, or the paper from old magazines. It lives only on fuel. And we're not running out of fuel. This fire will never stop. It'll eat me alive. Although it feels like that, I know that's not the truth. Because I can still feel all my limbs, and they are in the right places. For now.
I want to die now. I have to. I don't want this, any of it. I want to get rid of the flames. I tell them to leave, and never to come back. This is not where they belong. This is not fair. It's just not fair. But they don't listen. They will never listen. They are laughing at me, as I burn. My soul is on fire. I can't remember my name, or my age. I am a boy. Chicago. Mom. That's all I know. That's all I need to know. I'll remember that. I have to remember that. That's all I have left. I can't let the fire kill me. I can't just give up. I will fight. Because if I fight, I'll survive. And I want to survive. This is not the end. I keep telling myself these things as someone pours more fuel on the fire. It rises again and it compared to this it felt like it had never been here before. It has emerged. Someone has made these holes and I will find that someone. I will kill that someone.
Boy. Chicago. Mom. I am still alive. It feels as if hours have passed. I am going to die. But I don't mind anymore. I want to give in. I want to let the weight of the world drop on me and turn me into nothing. There is no reason for this. Nothing can change this. This will continue until I give in. Until I let go of the hand I'm mentally holding. Because there is no hand to hold. There is no one. Everyone has left me to die and no one is rooting for me. There is no one to tell me to hold on. No one telling me I'll make it. But also no one telling me it's okay to let go. Maybe that's even worse. I will not allow myself to let go of this hand. As the fire rages on and I scream and groan I know I'm close. I open my eyes again. Still nothing.
Another pang.
I'm confused. I don't understand it. This is no normal pain. It's not like breaking a leg or falling off your bike. It feels like falling off a building but instead of dying you're still alive as you hit the ground. And you feel every broken bone, and every part of your body that has been ripped open. It feels like your body is being dragged across a rough wooden wall. Over and over, your back scratched at all places. It feels like falling into sea, but instead of in the form of a pencil. You fall flat. Your face and stomach bang onto the water. You're under water than, you've survived the crash but you can't move. Because that's how much it hurts.
The fire has reached my heart. It has made it something else. Not a part of my body anymore. The flames have stolen my heart. And I have to fight to get it back. I place my hands on my chest. I want to rip out my heart. It has to stop. Kill me. I want to say. Please, please kill me. I can't do this. I hit my chest over and over I want to get it out. I don't want to breath another breath. But instead of finding my heart, my hands find the fire. It's like I'm holding them in a campfire. I want to get them out. I have to, they'll burn untill they're nothing. First my fingers, then my wrists, my arms.
But there is no campfire. So there is nothing to get my hands away from. I can't hide them from the flames and hope they won't find them. I can't hide my heart from the pain. The pain has me in it's grip. The pain is me. I am nothing but pain. I want to be seperate from the fire and the pain, but there is nothing else. It's me and the flames.
We are one.
I have lost contact with the world. I don't know where I am, who I am or who did this to me. I'm not even sure if I'm still alive. I only know that I want this to stop. Now. I cannot take another minute of this devastating pain. I want to wake up, open my eyes and actually see something. I have decided to keep my eyes closed for as long as the pain remained, but it's almost impossible. Something about screaming forces you to set your eyes wide open. I know it doesn't help, screaming. It doesn't take the pain away, it doesn't make it less. It might even make it worse, but this misery forces me to open my eyes and let my voice sing on the highest note possible.
And then it's gone.
The pain is gone. The fire has been burnt out. Like someone ended it with water. I feel my arms again but this time they don't hurt. They lay peacefully by my side. They touch steel. I move my fingertips to see if I can find any sign of where I am before I open my eyes. My fingers slide around the corner of the table, but find nothing. The air in the room is fresh. But something feels weird every time I take a breath full of it. There's something with the air, or with my lungs, I can't tell. It feels like I don't need the oxygen. As if it doesn't matter anymore. It doesn't have a function. But there's more. My body feels different, like I'm in someone else's. It's not mine. It can't be.
Then I open my eyes.
Troutdale, 1918
Chapter 4
I can see the air. Every little piece of dust is visible to my eyes. Every crack in the white paint that covers the ceiling and walls. All the things in the room that have been touched are marked with fingerprints. All the fingerprints are the same, that means there's only one person that has touched any of the paintings, the books. I can see the torn covers of those books. I can even see the little cracks between the parts of the letters. I look down, to my barefeet. I am still wearing my hospital outfit. There are some loose treads you wouldn't notice with normal eyes. Before I decide to walk over to the cupboard, I'm already there.
As I am examining the room, I am distracted by something. There's something wrong with my throat. It burns. Not like the fire spreading itself in my body but it feels as if something is causing crude burns in my throat. I grab my throat. I want it to stop. I've had enough pain. There's a loud bang. Like someone putting a book down or a cup of coffee, but the volume has been turned up too high. I flinch. Something touched me. I look around hastily but there's nothing there. And then it happens again. And again. I try to avoid the invisible thing but then I realize what it is. It's dust I saw when I woke up. I sigh. Someone is coming up the stairs. I think. I hear footsteps and I hear them coming closer. I look around before I realize I'm searching for a window. Do I want to flee? The door opens and someone comes through. When I see his face I remember everything. It's the same man that I saw in the hospital the last night I was there. His hair looks shorter, but his eyes are the same. The same calm expression on his face. Different clothes. The doctor looks different and at the same time completely the same. I remember his face when he reached for my neck, his teeth sinking into mine. His hair touching my jawbone as he drank my blood. The pain he caused, the fire he set up. It almost suprised me, as he looked so kind. The second thing that strikes me is that the doctor is completely and utterly perfect. There are no words for him. No flaws, no unplucked eyebrows or grey hairs, no split ends on his white hair. When he reaches his hand up, like he wants to wave I can see that the fingerprints were all his indeed.
"Edward," he speaks, differently than the last time he said my name, quicker. "How do you feel?" How do I feel? I feel like my heart as been ripped out and my throat has been ripped open. I reach for my throat again. "What have you done to me?" I am suprised by the sound of my voice. It's clearer. Also suprised by the anger. But I'm not angry. Am I? I look to my side, out of the window at the trees. They're a beautifully green color. As I decide again to walk over to look at them more closely- although I wouldn't have to, I can see anything I would want to see from a distance I shouldn't be ablet o see everything so clearly- I'm already there. I bump into the window and take a step back. I fall on the ground. What is this? It feels like everything I do, every move I make, just goes ten times faster and ten times harder. "I'll explain everything. But there's something you have to do first, Edward. Can you tell? Can you tell what it is that you want to do?" I immediately know what he means. My throat. It's the only place where the fire still rages. But should I know what I need to do? What I want to do? I know what I feel and somehow I have an idea of something I could do to get rid of it but I can't bring it into words. It's absurd but logically. It's disgusting, it's.. it's not human. But I know it. And I want it.
"I need to hunt," I say.