"Here we go again,
We're sick like animals,
We play pretend
You're just a cannibal
And I'm afraid I wont get out alive.
No, I won't sleep tonight."
- "Animal" by Neon Trees


Rain fell steadily, making the dead night sky even blacker. For humans, it would be impossible to see through the darkness. This was the problem the human I was hunting had.

I looked past the human and saw my creator, Dan, standing in the shadows of an empty alley. The human was walking on the sidewalk, unknowingly heading straight towards me. The human wore layer upon layer of clothes; a trench coat; and old, ripped-up shoes that looked two sizes too small on its big feet. It had shaggy hair and a scruffy beard; both had not been trimmed in quite some time. Though it was raining, it had no umbrella.

It was a beggar. It would not be missed.

I could hear its blood pulsing through its veins, spiking the intensity of my hunger. I felt it walk closer. Fifty feet…twenty feet…ten feet…

I sprang, knocking the beggar to the ground. It let out a scream which was quickly silenced as I sank my fangs into its throat. The heartbeat gradually slowed as I sucked. The heart finally stopped, providing me with my own personal high.

Dan approached me and I pulled away from my kill and kissed him lightly, leaving a small blood smear on his lips which he licked off as he smiled.

“You’re getting better at this every day.” He said, taking his place beside me and our dinner.

“I owe it all to you,” I smiled and leaned back, giving him room to drink his fill.


My name is Kristen. I am a vampire. I was turned a few months shy of my twenty-second birthday. That was seven months ago. I’m the newest to join the vampire world.

The night I was turned I was in a really bad car crash. The driver was pumped full of drugs and alcohol and ran head-on into a tree. I hadn’t known the guy very well, but I had been living on the streets and needed a ride to a McDonalds- someplace warm. The guy was killed on impact, I barely remained conscious. If Dan hadn’t come across the wreckage, I would have died. He saved my life by making me part of the undead.

We spent a few years constantly moving around the North American continent before stopping in our current, semi-permanent residence in New York City. We were able to stay unnoticed longer in big cities.

During those first few years of traveling, Dan taught me the ways of vampires- separating myths from facts.

Vampire rule number one: human blood is a must. We could survive a few weeks off the blood of animals, but we were weak without feeding from humans every few nights.

Vampire rule number two: Sunlight doesn’t kill us. It does, however, make us uncomfortable and restless if we stay in it too long. Because of our sensitive skin, the sun feels about ten times hotter to us than to humans.

Vampire rule number three: all vampires have superhuman speed and strength, as well as the ability to compel people. Compulsion is when you make others’ thoughts your own, and all vampires could do this to some extent. We required these abilities to overpower our victims.

Also in those first months Dan and I fell in love. We had felt it for some time, but had ignored the impulses to touch, or kiss, or acknowledge the cliché butterflies-in-the-stomach feelings.
We had finally given in to each other in a field in Arkansas.
It was a night in late summer. I was lying in the grass, propped up by my arms. Dan was pacing in front of me, clearly agitated.
“Why can’t we?” I repeated the question he still hadn’t answered.
“We just...we just can’t do it,” he breathed. “I’m your creator.”
“That doesn’t make any difference.” Maybe it did, I wasn’t too sure. I hadn’t been a vampire for long, but I didn’t see why that would be frowned upon by these ‘vampire elders’ Dan had mentioned once or twice. Apparently, they were the leaders of the vampire world.
“If we want to be together…don’t you think we should?” I hesitated before continuing, my voice barely audible even to vampire ears. “I want to be with you.”
He stopped pacing and looked down on me. “It’s just that you’re practically a baby to the rest of the vampire world.”
We did have a major age difference; he was two-hundred-and-twelve years old. I was three months. Usually, age doesn’t matter much in the vampire world, but when you’re a newborn it does. And boy, was I a newborn.
I took his hand in mine and pulled him into the grass beside me. “If you’re worried about what other vampires will think of me, don’t. I mean, we haven’t run into any other vampires since you created me. Three months of constant travel and we haven’t so much as run into a sign of any others.”
I remember looking at him, and then him looking at me, moments away from kissing…

Once we drained the kill, we quickly disposed of the body and returned to our hotel room. By the time we got there, water was dripping off of us, leaving a trail behind. I hope it dried before any of the staff saw and yelled at us about the mess. Again.
I unlocked the door of our suite and flipped on the light switch.
“Wait,” I had barely stepped into the room when Dan grabbed my arm and stepped in front of me.
“What is it?” I asked. Dan was standing still and ridged, blocking my view of the room. “Dan?”
“I knew it!” I jumped and yelped at the foreign voice. “I knew there were vampires here!”
I stepped out from behind Dan and saw a man standing in the doorway that connected the “living room” to the “bed room”.
He looked like he was in his late thirties or early forties. He had light brown hair and hazel eyes. He was big without being fat and very tall.
“He’s a vampire, Kristen.” Dan whispered to me. I could see it; the man was paler than any human and he was inhumanly beautiful, as all vampires were.
The man smirked. “You guys were surprisingly easy to track down.” I could see he was clearly pleased with himself. His eyes turned to me and his smirk seemed to grow. “Ah, a Newborn. No wonder you weren’t difficult to find.”
I didn’t like this guy.
“Who are you? What are you doing here?” Dan demanded. His voice was surprisingly strong; he usually had a quiet and gentle nature. As he spoke, he pulled me closer to him.
The stranger saw this. “Ah, I see. You’ve gone and created yourself a little sex object. And a pretty one at that.”
“I’m not a sex object.” I growled. Dan squeezed my arm sharply. Be quiet.
“Who are you?” he repeated, clearly trying to control himself.
“Name’s Loren,” the vampire held out his hand but Dan didn’t take it. “I was just passing through when I came across one of your kills. You really do have to hide the bodies better. As for why I’m here,” Loren walked over to the couch and sat, totally at ease. “It’s not every day I come across fellow vampires. One does get lonely in the big, bad world, especially when you’ve been on your own for three hundred years, give or take a decade. And, traveling with…” he cocked his head slightly, “companions, seem quite appealing after all these years of solitude.”
“We don’t want your companionship.” Dan retorted.
Loren tsked. “Now, now, there’s no need to be rude. I think it’d be rather fun.” He smiled, showing his fangs. “And, I can assure you, I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.
“This is our territory!” Dan’s voice was like ice.
“And I’m now a part of it.” Loren’s words were still lightly spoken, but underneath them was determination. Dan and I both saw that.
And that was how Loren joined us.

Our day-to-day lifestyle changed once Loren declared he was staying with us. The three of us stayed in our hotel suite from sunrise to sunset. It felt more and more cramped every day. Loren wasn’t pleasant to be around. He seemed to target me in particular, making not-so-subtle sexual remarks every chance he got. Dan would threaten him, all of us knowing he couldn’t really do anything to Loren. Loren out aged Dan by roughly a hundred years- he was a lot stronger.
We were all killers; it was what made us vampires. We fed off the scum of the human world, people with high-risk lives who wouldn’t be searched for. Dan and I killed quickly, mercifully.
Loren was different. He got his kicks from torturing his victims, both mentally and physically. Dan and I always looked the other way. We couldn’t do anything about it.
He had been with us for about two months when he attacked a young prostitute.
He threw her against a brick wall on the far side of an alley. The girl screamed as her bones cracked on the impact.
“Shut up! Someone’s going to hear!” I glared at Loren but he wasn’t looking at me. He was too focused on his prey.
“Nonsense,” Loren threw himself on top of the girl. “Even if someone does hear, and does see us, that just means more snacks for us.” He silenced the girl anyway, shoving a few of his fingers down her throat, gagging her.
“Just shut up and get it over with!” Dan called from where he was finishing up the girl’s ‘customer’ that he and I had shared.
The girl’s shrieks, though muffled, would still be audible to human ears.
“Relax,” Loren cooed. I wasn’t sure if he was talking to us or the girl. “We have all the time in the world.” In one swift motion, he reached down and tore the girl’s shirt off her body. She thrashed and kicked and tried to cover herself, but she might as well have been fighting against stone.
I felt my body stiffen. “What are you doing?”
“I have to feed on her anyway, so why can’t I have a little fun first?” He leaned down and bit one of her breasts, and she screamed around his fingers, which were still in her mouth.
“Stop it!” I cried. I was rooted in place, unable to look away from the scene unfolding before me.
Loren resurfaced, a small trickle of blood dribbled down his chin. “She’s a w***e. Scum. Her life means nothing.” He toyed with the girl’s skirt. “I’m just doing what she charges others to do. I’m just not paying.”
“Oh God,” He was going to rape her!
I looked at the girl. She couldn’t be any older than eighteen or nineteen. Her cheeks were stained with mascara which her tears had smeared. She was scared. So, so scared. I could sense the quickness of her pulse. I’ve never seen anyone so terrified.
Suddenly, Dan was beside me. “Let’s go, Kristen.” I looked into his eyes. They were strong and determined, but, at the same time, they were gentle. I took his hand and we ran back to the hotel, too fast for humans to see us.
I didn’t realize until we got back into the safety of our room that I was crying. That girl could have easily been me, back when I was human. I had lived on the streets. I had begged and stole and would have done anything for a meal or somewhere warm to stay. I had never been so thankful that Dan had been the one to find me, and not someone like Loren.
“I hate him,” I cried, wiping away the pink-tinted tears as they left my eyes. I hated crying in front of people, especially Dan. I didn’t want him to think I was weak. But, this time, I couldn’t help it. Tears rolled freely down my face.
“I know, I know,” Dan hugged me close and brushed my hair out of my face.
We stayed like that, still and silent, until Loren stumbled in nearly an hour later. I had a feeling that if the sun wasn’t minutes from rising, he would have taken longer. Completely ignoring our presence, he fell into the couch and turned on the television to ESPN.
It had clearly been a good night’s work.
I couldn’t stand the sight of him. He disgusted me. I walked into the bedroom; sat on the edge of the neatly made, moderately used bed; and rested my head in my hands.
I hated him more than I’ve ever hated anybody. In the two months he had been with us, my hate had been bubbling up into what I felt now: fury. I wished he would leave; that he would go far away and I would never hear from him again. I wished that it could just be me and Dan again.
My thoughts were interrupted as Dan entered the room, clearing his throat. He shut the door behind him and turned to face me.
“I’m sorry, Kristen.” he whispered.
I sighed. “You don’t have anything to be sorry for. It’s not like it’s your fault Loren is with us.”
“Isn’t it?” he replied bitterly. “If I was stronger, he wouldn’t be a problem. I could get him out of here.”
“He a hundred years older than you,” I said. “That’s a major difference in strength.”
Dan was silent for a few moments before replying. “I just don’t like seeing you this way.”
He walked over and sat next to me on the bed. I took his hand in mine and gave it a small squeeze. “Hey, don’t worry about me. I’m not exactly a fan of his, but we just have to wait him out. Soon he’ll get bored with us and leave.” As I spoke these words, a nagging voice in the back of my mind argued with me. What makes you so sure? It could be decades before he “gets bored”. I bluntly pushed the pessimistic voice away.
“If anything,” I continued. “I have to learn to keep him from getting under my skin.”
I leaned in and kissed Dan softly. “Don’t beat yourself up, okay?”
“Okay,” he agreed, returning my kiss.

Awhile later I was lying under the covers, the Loren issues totally out of my mind. I could feel Dan’s breath on my neck from where he lied next to me. I snuggled closer to him and he wrapped his arms around my body. We never said much in these times; everything that needed to be said had already been implied. I breathed in his scent. He smelled like cologne and skin and sweat. Delicious. These were the moments I could drown in.
Without warning, Dan sat up, disorienting me.
“Dan?” I pulled myself into a sitting position behind him and showered his shoulder with light kisses. “Is something wrong?”
He didn’t answer at first. I couldn’t see his face but his posture revealed he wasn’t expecting whatever had just happened. He finally spoke. “It’s my creator.”
I stopped kissing him. “Your creator? How did-”
Anticipating my question, he flew into the answer. “You know how vampires and their creators are connected?”
“Yes,” Because Dan was the one who turned me, we had a psychic connection of some kind. It hadn’t been much; I could always tell when he was nearby, and sometimes I would be able to feel his emotions as long as they were strong. He could do the same to me in return.
“It gets stronger over time,” he continued, his voice was distant. “Me and Leo have been connected for over two hundred years. When you’re connected with someone for that long, you can communicate.”
Communicate? “What do you mean?” I shifted so we were facing each other.
“It’s not like we can read each other’s minds or anything. But we can knowingly send them emotions and words.”
“So your creator just contacted you?”
He simply nodded.
“What does he want?”
“He wants me to meet him,”
“Where?”
He hesitated. “Actually, Kristen,” He called me Kristen, and with that, I knew the sweet previous moments were over and he was now serious. “I can’t tell you that.”
I laughed. “Well ok, but don’t you think I’m going to figure out where we are once we get there?”
“Um,” he hesitated again. “I have to go alone.”
I felt the smile leave my face. Dan and I had never been apart. Not ever. “Alone,” I let the word sink into me. “Why? I want to go with you.”
Dan stood up and started getting dressed. “It’s not a social call, Kristen. It’s…” he paused, as if contemplating which word was correct. “It’s business.”
“What kind of business?” I was suddenly aware of how many questions I’d been asking.
“I can’t tell you that,”
I flinched at his words. I’ve always thought Dan and I could tell each other anything.
Seeing my reaction, he began again. “It’s not that I don’t want to. I can’t. It’s vampire stuff.”
“I am a vampire,” I snapped.
He sighed, running a hand through his hair like he always did when he was frustrated. “It’s Vampire Council stuff.”
Vampire council? I was about to ask yet another question when he continued.
“The vampire world is controlled by the Elders, who all vampires answer to. They are the five oldest surviving vampires. They control the Council, along with a few other vampires who are next in line for becoming an Elder. The Council maintains order.”
“So why do you have to go?”
He took a moment before answering, deciding what he could and couldn’t tell me. “Leo is a part of the Council. We…we just need to talk about some stuff.”
“So, you’re going to leave me here to go gallivanting off with your creator, who you haven’t seen in seventy-five years, and leave me here with Loren.” I kept my voice surprisingly calm.
“I really don’t want to leave you alone with him,” I could see the truth in his eyes when he spoke. “But I need to go. I must.”
I thought about yelling, screaming, crying, commanding him not to leave me with Loren. Loren, who I hated with every fiber of my being. Loren, who showed no signs of leaving us alone anytime in the near future. Loren, who I wished would just-
Wait. The idea came to me so quickly, so out of the blue, that I could almost hear the light bulb click on in my head. I looked at Dan. I could tell that leaving me with Loren was the last thing he wanted to do. If he knew what I was thinking, he would never let me do it. I had to convince him I’d be okay. I had to convince him to leave.
“How long will you be gone?” I asked him.
“A week, maybe more.”
Now I had to sell it.
I sighed. “Well, you need to go. Your creator wouldn’t call you if it wasn’t important.”
He cupped my face in his hands. “Are you sure?”
I untangled myself from the sheets and stood before him. Naked. “You don’t have to worry about me. I’m a big girl. This sounds important.”
He looked at me, and I began to panic. He was suspicious. I should have protested, I shouldn’t have given in so fast. I just messed this up.
But he didn’t question me, and my paranoia stopped when he pulled me against him, hugging me.
“You have no idea how much I love you,” he whispered, kissing my forehead.
I inhaled. “I think I have a pretty good idea.” I knew what I had to do.
I had to kill Loren.