The Embrace (21 page)

After Gabriel stopped talking to me I spent longer on the hunt, venturing further in to the dark corners of town. I enjoyed the peace that came with being alone. When I wasn’t with Gabriel, I didn’t have to think about him.

When I was in the apartment I could feel Gabriel’s presence on everything. Everything he touched seemed to be an extension of him. Any progress I had made in trying to forget him had been swiftly destroyed by his sporadic desire for me, but being in the same home as him certainly didn’t help.

I felt as if I was being strung along but I couldn’t leave, even if I wanted to. Hunting under the neon lights of the city was the only escape I had. I had been a vampire for months by that time, so I was beginning to get used to seeing the world through supernatural eyes. I was more confident on my own than I had ever been before.

It had been several weeks since I’d seen my stalker and I hadn’t felt them around me at all. It seemed like no one wanted to be around me anymore. I realised how pathetic my life had become. I was so desperate for affection that I even prayed for a stalker to show himself. 

I decided to take a tour of one of the quieter areas of London, just outside the city centre. London is known for the hugely populated centre but it has a large and varied landscape. I loved the smaller suburbs just as much as the vibrant core.

I found myself wandering on a shadowy path. There were trees hanging over the path in a canopy, giving the air a stillness I found refreshing. The buildings lining the pathway were impressive, and I imagined they would be very pricey. A few benches were dotted along both sides of the path, each with little plaques dedicated to some rich person who wanted to be immortalised in any way possible. It was far from my own level of immortality, but it was the best their money could buy.

I had already fed once that night. My meal had been a naive Japanese tourist who found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time. I hadn’t used compulsion on him at all, but he had felt more like a light snack than a main meal. If I stayed out all night, as I’d been doing most of the time, then I might have to find another victim.

For the time being I wanted to relax. I sat down on one of the close benches and looked around the scene in front of me. Something about the place seemed vaguely familiar. I had been to London a few times as a child, with family friends and school trips, but I couldn’t resurrect this area from my memory. It was far too posh for my family and it didn’t seem like the kind of tourist trap we would have visited.

My thoughts were disturbed by a quiet tapping noise. It was the distant sound of footsteps, a signal that someone was approaching.

As the steps grew louder and the drumming of the human heart started, I tried to decide if I should leave. There was a little rumbling in my stomach that told me I could use another meal and so I decided to try my luck.

I knew I was fairly well hidden in my spot on the bench. The seat itself sat under the shadow of a large tree and I could guarantee I wouldn’t be seen from where I sat. I decided to stay where I was and spy on the approaching human in private. This kill was purely a top up and I didn’t want to waste my time on someone who didn’t meet my desires.

I waited patiently as the footsteps grew louder. Finally my potential victim appeared on the pathway and I got my first look at his face. He was tall and had a wide build, not muscular but large enough to be comforting.  His brown hair was swept aside in what I was sure was a fashionable style, but his clothes seemed too colourful, almost comical, ruining the effect.

When he turned to face me I realised who he was. The slope of the nose, the thin lips and the warm yet insecure eyes were unmistakeable. His name was Jared Foster and he was the only living creature I had ever dated.

Don’t get me wrong, Gabriel is the only being, human or otherwise, who I have ever loved. The feelings I had for other people never came close to the way I felt about him.

From the age of 13 I dreamt about Gabriel. Most girls hit puberty and fantasise about being whisked away by the latest pop star or the attractive boy at school, but I had someone of my own. I had been mocked for my refusal to join in with the flirting and gossiping about local boys, but I found it pointless when I knew I had already experienced the kind of relationship they would never understand.

Many of the girls found my lack of interest strange, but it was more complex than they realised. It wasn’t that I didn’t find other boys attractive, far from it. I found many of the boys quite charming, Jared Foster being one of them, but when I pictured Gabriel everyone else disappeared. He had a glow which made everything else fade, like a great work of art placed next to a crude child’s drawing. I didn’t discover his true nature until I was 15, but I always knew he was someone special.

I couldn’t tell anyone about him. I knew that our relationship was something to be kept secret long before I knew why. Despite the secrecy, I never felt insecure. He visited me every 3 or 4 months and every time he assured me that he would return as soon as he could.

Long before I knew his true nature, I understood the reasons for our secrecy. For a start it would be impossible to tell anyone where we met. I had met him when he saved me from a murderer, but I had always insisted to authorities and my family that I didn’t know who had saved me. If I ever wanted to introduce him to anyone, that would raise more questions as we could only meet at night.

Even if we managed to bypass all of those questions, I was never clear on our relationship status. I knew I loved Gabriel with enough intensity to view him as my soul mate, but physically he was a 25 year old man. It would be incredibly disturbing for a 13 year old girl to introduce people to her 25 year old boyfriend, and I knew no-one would understand.

Over time I accepted that it was unlikely I could ever reveal our relationship or friendship, or whatever it was we had. It was just too complicated to ever talk about.

When I was 17 years old Gabriel and I kissed for the first time. I remember it perfectly. It was a the most love and tenderness I had felt in years. I had avoided any offers from young men in the 4 years since the massacre, just in case Gabriel ever returned my love. I was saving myself for him, as irrational as that seemed.

He visited me one night and called me down to the garden. We sat together for the whole night and just before he left he kissed me on the lips. The moment seemed to last for hours yet it was still over too quickly. I could have sat with my lips pressed against his for the entire night.

Even as a vampire, sitting alone on a bench because Gabriel had shunned me, I could still remember the excitement that first kiss had raised in my heart. My human blood had raced around my body, my breath caught in my throat and a fire seemed to rage through my skin.

After that night my dreams of Gabriel lost some of their purity. I was a hormonal teenage girl and all I longed to do was kiss him again. I wanted him to tell me he loved me and throw his arms around me like a couple in a cheesy romantic comedy. I wanted him to be with him in a way I’d never considered before.

Not long after that visit Gabriel came to me again again. He usually left months between visits but this was a matter of weeks. He sat me down on the patio, the same place once stained by my mother’s blood, and kissed me in the way I had already become addicted to.

I was bathing in bliss, until Gabriel told me the real reason for his sudden visit.

“I’m afraid I won’t be coming back for a while.”

“How long?” I asked, trying not to show how terrified I was.

“About a year.”

After that everything became a blur. I could barely live without him for 3 months, let alone a whole year. He was the only thing that had kept me ticking along since I was 13, and I was terrified by what might happen if I lost him.

I think I cried, but I’m not sure. I can’t remember much after Gabriel told me he wasn’t coming back. He said he would visit me again but that he had “business” to attend to. I didn’t know what this business was, but I felt insulted that it was more important to him than me.

I gripped his hands for the whole of that night and tried to pin him to the patio. I was willing to fight to keep him with me if it came to that. Of course my weak arms were no match for his incredible strength. I could barely match him after I was changed, let alone as a human.

Before he left he turned to me one last time, watching as I let my tears take over.

“If anything happens to you I’ll be able to feel it, and I’ll come running. Anything. I don’t know how long it will be and I don’t want you to regret anything about your life.”

I didn’t know where he was going with this. I was trying to ignore him, thinking that if I didn’t listen then it couldn’t be true.

“While I’m away I want you to live. I want you to get a boyfriend or some friends. I want you to act like a normal teenager. I won’t hold anything against you, I promise. If you choose to stay with me when I come back, then the slate will be clean. Just enjoy yourself, Louisa.”

Then he was gone.

It took me months to realise Gabriel was telling the truth as I had half expected him to be lying. I hoped desperately that he would dash back and kiss me, proclaiming that the whole thing was just a test, but he didn’t.

Jared was just another boy at my school. He was a pleasant kid, amiable and sweet and completely in love with me. He had asked me out once already. Despite me being a bit of an outcast he had asked me to the school disco the year before, but of course I had refused.

When Gabriel left I was completely shaken. I had often imagined him coming back but 3 months passed without any contact. The longest we’d gone between visits was 4 months, but in those times I had always known he was thinking about me. Now I couldn’t feel anything, and that was when I realised that I had to make a plan for a life without him.

When the Christmas ball arrived I decided to take Gabriel’s advice. I still thought about him almost every minute of the day, but I wanted to move on even if it was just to spite him.

I approached Jared and asked him to the ball, much to his surprise. I was known around school as a bit of a pariah when it came to boys. I had enough friends to get by but I had never once shown interest in a boy, yet here I was asking one of them out without any warning. I think it caused quite a stir but I was more interested in Gabriel’s opinion than my school friend’s.

If I had been a normal girl Jared would probably have seemed quite attractive. Even I could see a pleasant sweetness behind his eyes. In another world I may have asked him out with more serious intentions, and we might have made a good couple.

We attended the ball together and everything went well. He was a lovely boy and never said anything offensive, but his conversation was trivial. I guess I managed to fake interest in him because he was still infatuated with me by the end of the night.

Even though the date went well, my nights with Gabriel had left me craving something no human being could provide, something more mental than physical.  I tried to forget him and focus on my new start. Jared was one of the nicest men I knew, and when he dropped me off at home that night I found myself saying yes to a second date.

Eventually, I let him kiss me. I don’t know if he ever realised my affection was purely for convenience, but he seemed happy either way. Our first kiss was exactly the same as every experience with Jared: sweet yet lacking anything extraordinary.

We dated for several months after that. As the days went by I became certain that Gabriel was never coming back. It reached 6 months without a peep from him and I had settled in to life as a “normal” girl. Jared was not only fulfilling Gabriel’s final wish to me but also acted as a comforting force. He loved me when no one else did, and I had convinced myself that was what I needed.

Our relationship seemed to boost my popularity to a more healthy level. I had previously been the strange, frosty girl whose family members were murdered. While I dated Jared, they referred to me as “the murder girl.” It probably doesn’t seem that positive, but it was a step up from my previous level. 

Although our relationship never approached the strength of my bond with Gabriel, I settled in to life with Jared. We had been going out for 6 months when we attended the summer dance. It was a yearly ritual at the school and something I’d never been interested in, but I went with Jared to fulfil the role of a dutiful girlfriend.

That night Jared took me back to his home. He told me his parents were at a gathering in a nearby town and so we had the place to ourselves. If I wasn’t so far removed from normal teenage behaviour I would have been wise to Jared’s plans, but I was oblivious.

We lay down together on his bed and he told me he loved me. I kissed him to avoid lying to him in a fake gesture of love and for the time being he was satisfied.

I let myself become numb as Jared put his hand on my skin. The rest of the night was a blur. Jared was caring and considerate but I felt nothing but shame. Gabriel had told me to get a boyfriend and but I still felt like I was betraying him.

When I looked into his eyes all I saw was Gabriel. I tried to imagine him in Jared’s place to make the experience easier but Jared’s attempts were shaky at best, ruining my thoughts of Gabriel.

I pretended to enjoy myself. I kept going with the act that had formed the basis of our whole relationship. After it was over I let myself fall asleep in his bed but my shame hadn’t eased.