Early Sunsets Over Monroeville
“Chase?” I called from the foyer of our apartment. “Come on! If we don’t leave soon, we’re going to lose out on good camping spots!”
“Sabina,” Chase said, poking his head out of our bedroom. “Calm down. If we get on the road in an hour, we’ll still get perfectly acceptable camping spots.” I crossed my arms and huffed, my lips sticking out in a pout that I know Chase can never resist. “Oh, Sabina, you know that always works,” Chase said.
I smiled devilishly. “Yes, I do know, that’s why I use it.” I backed up and stood by my overstuffed backpack that I had placed by the front door. “Can we please leave soon?”
Chase sighed and stepped out of the bedroom into the hall where I could fully see him. “Sabina,” he said, pointing to his naked chest and sweatpants, “I just woke up about ten minutes ago. The soonest I can give you is leaving in an hour.”
“Are you packed at least?” I asked, shifting my weight onto my right foot.
“Yes, Sabina. If it makes you feel any better, you can come up here and pack all our bags and camping gear while I take a shower and get dressed."
I sighed and started up the stairs while Chase reentered the bedroom. I caught him for a moment while he was picking out clothes, and said, “It’s gonna be cold where we’re going, Chase, so make sure you dress in lots of layers.”
He turned to me and smiled, taking my face in his hands and kissing me sweetly. “Of course, love. How am I going to keep you warm if I’m not warm myself?” I grinned and kissed Chase back. “Now you start packing the car so we can leave as soon as I tie my last shoelace, okay?”
I nodded and kissed him one last time before I left the bedroom. I sighed quietly to myself and thought ‘This is going to be a great weekend.’
-----
“Which turn, sweetheart?” Chase asked me, slowing down as we turned onto a narrow dirt road.
I consulted the campground map in my lap. “The second one, it’s on the right. There should be a sign that says ‘Monroeville Campground Check-in.’”
Chase almost missed the turn because we didn’t realize how far up the turn was or how small the sign was. After almost taking off the passenger side view mirror, we rolled up to the check-in post, a slightly rusty iron gate barring our entrance into the campground. “Hello?” Chase called.
It was ten minutes before a deathly pale figure appeared inside the small building. He was tall, thin, and so pale he looked white. His mop of pitch-black hair made his skin appear even whiter. “Good morning,” he said in a raspy voice.
“Yes, hello, my girlfriend and I are looking to check-in for a weekend,” Chase told him.
“Ah, yes, of course. Unfortunately, all the spots here in the front have been occupied, so you two will have to find a space further in the back. I apologize if this is an inconvenience,” the pale man said.
I frowned, but Chase didn’t see. “Oh, that’s alright. How much for a weekend?” he asked, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket.
“Payment will be due at the end of your stay. Lunch will be served in a half hour in the center hall, and dinner is at seven nightly. Please enjoy your stay.” The creepiest looking smile then came across the pale man’s face.
“Oh, come on, Sabina, it’ll be fine,” Chase said, turning to me. He then leaned in and murmured in my ear, “Besides, if we’re in the back, that’s less people that will hear your screams.” I gave him a devious smile and he winked at me. “Come on, then. The sooner we set up, the quicker we can get lunch. Thank-what the?” Chase had turned back to the pale man at the check-in post, but he was no longer there. “Weird.”
“Come on, Chase, baby, let’s go at least park the car and we can get some food in our stomachs before we start setting up the tent,” I said. Chase smiled at me and pressed down lightly on the gas pedal. Our little Jeep crunched over the small rocks that other cars had tracked in from the other campsites as we rolled further and further back into the forest campground. I could see a bit of worry on Chase’s face as we continued to roll further into the forest and the trees were getting thicker and thicker, blocking out more and more light.
Chase looked at me and took my hand. “It’ll be alright, Sabina, we’ll park right here, right behind this other tent. We have those lanterns we can hang up in the tent, remember.”
I smiled weakly at him, noticing the blackness around our Jeep even though it was hardly even noon. “This is really gonna screw with our sense of time,” I remarked.
Chase laughed and pecked my cheek. “That’s my girl. Now come on, let’s go get something to eat.”
-----
We were sitting at dinner that night after we had set up our tent and parked the Jeep next to the tent. “Chase, I don’t know about this place. It seems kind of creepy,” I murmured to him over our mediocre plates. I had remarked to him after lunch that the food was like high school cafeteria food, and Chase had just told me it was food nonetheless. We didn’t really know the area around the campground, so we didn’t want to waste our gas just driving around.
“Sabina, sweetheart, just give it a chance. Let’s just stay one night, and if you still think this place is creepy tomorrow morning, we’ll leave, okay?”
I smiled and took another bite of the overcooked chicken served to us tonight. “Okay.”
Later that night, we had lit a small fire on our campsite and these two young children came and sat down across from us. “We haven’t seen you here before,” one said.
Chase answered before I could gather a comprehension of these two random children sitting down across from us out of the blue. “Yeah, we just got here this morning.”
“And you’re back here? That’s pretty adventurous,” the other child said.
“The guy at the check-in post told us all the spots at the front were occupied, so that’s why we’re back here,” Chase told the other boy.
“What do you mean, ‘adventurous’?” I asked.
The first boy looked at me with a haunted face. His eyes looked sunk into his head, and he also looked deathly pale like the man at the check-in post, but his hair looked bright blonde in the firelight. “Have you not heard the stories of the far back forest of Monroeville Campground?” he asked. I shook my head. “Well. Many of them involve accounts of people being attacked by vampires.”
“Vampires?” Chase repeats. The first boy nods. “Vampires aren’t real,” he scoffs.
“Oh, so you’re one of those people,” the second boy said, rolling his eyes. He sounded annoyed.
“What are you talking about?” I asked, frightened.
The first boy looked over at the second boy and they exchanged unreadable looks. “We have to get back to our campsite now, but at least now you know about the vampires that are still rumoured to lurk in these parts,” he said, standing up.
The second boy followed suit, and right before they left, he said, “All the accounts say that the first vampires start on the prowl for fresh humans around nine o’clock.”
I checked my watch as their snickers faded off into the darkness. “Chase.” I bumped his arm. “It’s nine o’clock right now.”
Chase hugged me to him awkwardly. “Sabina, sweetheart, those are just stories that those kids were told by their parents. They’re not true. Vampires aren’t real. We’re gonna be fine tonight.”
I smiled up at him weakly and then just stared back into the dying fire as Chase kissed my temple and got up to throw another log on the fire, sending up a shower of sparks.
-----
A loud thump woke me in the middle of the night. I held my watch up to the dim lantern we kept on at night, and it read one o’clock. I heard hushed whispers, and I judged they were about fifteen feet from our tent. I shook Chase hard, and he rolled over and groaned loudly. “Chase!” I hissed.
“What, Sabina?” he answered groggily.
“There are voices outside our tent!”
“It’s probably just people going to bed. Go back to sleep, Sabina.”
“Chase!” I hissed again, hitting his shoulder.
“Ow!” he yelled. “What the hell, Sabina?”
“Chase! What if those stories that those kids told were true, and there are vampires outside our tent?!”
Chase sat up, and was about to speak, but the voices outside the tent spoke again, and they sounded closer. “Shit, Sabina, we have to get out of here.”
“Where are your keys?” I asked, getting out of my sleeping bag and pulling on my jacket.
Chase grabbed my arm. “No, the Jeep would be way too loud. Just get your shoes and we’ll get out of here as fast and as quietly as we can.” I sat back down and listened for the voices again. “What are you doing?” asked Chase. I looked at him. “We have to get out now!”
I scrambled to the door of the tent, and fumbled to open it as quietly as possible. The voices that were quietly conversing in the background now stopped. They were replaced by almost inaudible footsteps, and I looked at Chase with wide eyes. He made a motion to move fast, and I just unzipped the tent, stomping my feet into my shoes. I stood up and got out of the tent, but crouched down to help Chase. “Come on!” I hissed. “I can hear them getting closer!”
“I’m hurrying, Sabina!” Chase hissed back at me.
“Turn the lantern out, too,” I said.
“No,” Chase said. “If we leave the lantern on, whatever is out there will still think that we’re in here.”
“This is one of the many reasons I love you,” I said, bending down to kiss him as he got out of the tent.
“Thanks, sweetheart, but I don’t think this is the perfect time for professions of love.” Chase stood up and looked around for the source of the voices and footsteps.
We didn’t see anyone for about five minutes, and Chase was about to suggest to us that we start quietly moving out of the campground, but then there was a figure that appeared in my peripheral vision. I whipped around and the figure came out of the trees and into the dim light that the lantern in the tent was giving off. I tugged on Chase’s sleeve, and he started to say something, but was cut short when he saw the figure in front of us. He slowly bent down to put his lips to my ear, neither of us taking our eyes off the silent figure in front of us. “Sabina,” he whispered, “Run.”
With that, we both took off down the narrow dirt path. We paid no mind to all the things we left behind; the only thing we were worried about now was getting out alive. As we ran, I looked back to see the pale figures were running after us - and they had their teeth bared like they were out for blood. “Chase!” I yelled breathlessly.
“What, Sabina?” Chase answered.
“Those creatures…there are vampires after us!”
“Sabina, vampires-“
I cut him off. “They have fangs, Chase!” I shrieked.
“Just keep running, Sabina!” Chase yelled back to me.
Unfortunately, we were running out of breath, and a few feet later, we were stopped in the middle of the dirt road. I dragged Chase into the trees, which were finally beginning to thin out the slightest bit. “Chase,” I panted. “Chase, I think we’re getting closer to the entrance, the trees are thinning out.”
“Sabina?”
“Chase?”
“Where do we go when we get out?”
I didn’t have time to answer as one of the vampires lunged through the trees, fangs bared and very sharp. “CHASE!” I screamed, and flung my foot out. I meant to aim for the vampire’s stomach, but instead my foot collided with its face, knocking it backward and off of Chase. I screamed something incomprehensible at it, it gave me this confused look, and then just walked away quietly. I quickly turned back to Chase, who I saw was kneeling on the ground, his head hanging down. “Chase?” I asked quietly, kneeling down next to him.
He looked over at me, and he looked a little haggard, but that was understandable seeing as we were running for our lives just a few minutes ago. “Sabina,” he said calmly.
“Are you okay? Are you hurt?” I asked.
“My arm hurts,” he said.
“Let me see it,” I said. Chase held his arm out to me and I saw that there were two clear puncture marks. I gasped and tried to pass it off as a deep breath, which Chase didn’t notice either way.
“Is it okay?” he asked, sounding a little distant.
I hesitated before answering, but only for a second. “Yeah, you’ll be fine, it’s just a little bite. Come on, let’s get you to a hospital or something,” I said, standing up. I held out my hand and Chase took it, standing up. He looked slightly wobbly on his feet, and I was beginning to seriously worry. “Come on, Chase, sweetheart,” I said, waving my hand in the direction we had come from.
With the rest of the vampires off of our tails, we had stopped running, but we continued to walk quickly up the rest of the path out of the campground. Chase collapsed after about an hour of walking. I squealed and kneeled down next to him. “Chase! Are you alright?”
He didn’t answer right away, but he looked extremely pale. I shook him once, twice, three times before he finally stirred. He looked up at me and his beautiful blue eyes were now bright red. I stood up and started slowly backing away from him. “Sabina, sweetheart,” he said. “Why are you walking away from me?”
“I didn’t know you could change from just one bite,” I murmured. When Chase stood up and started walking toward me, I looked around and redirected toward the check-in post, the only building in sight.
“Sabina, baby, why are you walking away from me? I love you,” Chase said, holding his arms out like he wanted to hug me.
I know he didn’t. I also knew that he didn’t mean it when he said he loved me. He was just another one of them now, and I knew I had to get away from him, no matter how much it hurt me.
I turned around and began to sprint towards the check-in post. I heard Chase call after me and I think he started running after me as well. I threw open the door to the check-in post, thank God it was unlocked, and slammed it shut behind me, just as Chase hit the glass of the window. I locked the door the instant I had slammed it shut, and I heard the jiggle of the doorknob as Chase tried to open it. “Sabina!” he called. “Sabina, let me in, I love you!”
I winced as his words hit my ears. I knew it wasn’t the same Chase I loved, but it still looked like it, so I was surprised when I turned around and there was a pistol lying on the desk. It was just lying there, like it was waiting for me to pick it up and use it on my vampire of a boyfriend. ‘No,’ I thought to myself, ‘He’s not your boyfriend anymore. He’s not Chase anymore, he’s just a shell of who used to be Chase.’
As these thoughts ran through my head, I picked up the pistol. Not knowing how to figure out if there was ammunition in it, I aimed at the wood of the door and pulled the trigger. A loud shot went off and buried into the wood of the door. I looked at it, slightly smoking. I guess there was ammunition in it, but I wasn’t sure how much was left, so I lowered the gun as Chase began to smash his body against the door in repeated attempts to get in.
I squealed with each crash, and watched as the hole I shot into the wood of the door began to crack. I continued to watch as the cracks spread up the door and into the glass. It wasn’t long before the glass suffered its fatal crack, and it shattered, the pieces falling down. I watched as vampire-Chase’s arm reached in through the broken glass hole and unlocked the door.
“Does anything matter if you’re already dead?” I muttered to myself as I aimed the pistol at the monster my boyfriend had become. I fired and the shot buried itself in the left side of his chest, and he collapsed over the frame of the broken glass. I let the pistol fall from my hands as I sunk down onto the dirty floor, my mind blank.
“Sabina,” Chase said, poking his head out of our bedroom. “Calm down. If we get on the road in an hour, we’ll still get perfectly acceptable camping spots.” I crossed my arms and huffed, my lips sticking out in a pout that I know Chase can never resist. “Oh, Sabina, you know that always works,” Chase said.
I smiled devilishly. “Yes, I do know, that’s why I use it.” I backed up and stood by my overstuffed backpack that I had placed by the front door. “Can we please leave soon?”
Chase sighed and stepped out of the bedroom into the hall where I could fully see him. “Sabina,” he said, pointing to his naked chest and sweatpants, “I just woke up about ten minutes ago. The soonest I can give you is leaving in an hour.”
“Are you packed at least?” I asked, shifting my weight onto my right foot.
“Yes, Sabina. If it makes you feel any better, you can come up here and pack all our bags and camping gear while I take a shower and get dressed."
I sighed and started up the stairs while Chase reentered the bedroom. I caught him for a moment while he was picking out clothes, and said, “It’s gonna be cold where we’re going, Chase, so make sure you dress in lots of layers.”
He turned to me and smiled, taking my face in his hands and kissing me sweetly. “Of course, love. How am I going to keep you warm if I’m not warm myself?” I grinned and kissed Chase back. “Now you start packing the car so we can leave as soon as I tie my last shoelace, okay?”
I nodded and kissed him one last time before I left the bedroom. I sighed quietly to myself and thought ‘This is going to be a great weekend.’
-----
“Which turn, sweetheart?” Chase asked me, slowing down as we turned onto a narrow dirt road.
I consulted the campground map in my lap. “The second one, it’s on the right. There should be a sign that says ‘Monroeville Campground Check-in.’”
Chase almost missed the turn because we didn’t realize how far up the turn was or how small the sign was. After almost taking off the passenger side view mirror, we rolled up to the check-in post, a slightly rusty iron gate barring our entrance into the campground. “Hello?” Chase called.
It was ten minutes before a deathly pale figure appeared inside the small building. He was tall, thin, and so pale he looked white. His mop of pitch-black hair made his skin appear even whiter. “Good morning,” he said in a raspy voice.
“Yes, hello, my girlfriend and I are looking to check-in for a weekend,” Chase told him.
“Ah, yes, of course. Unfortunately, all the spots here in the front have been occupied, so you two will have to find a space further in the back. I apologize if this is an inconvenience,” the pale man said.
I frowned, but Chase didn’t see. “Oh, that’s alright. How much for a weekend?” he asked, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket.
“Payment will be due at the end of your stay. Lunch will be served in a half hour in the center hall, and dinner is at seven nightly. Please enjoy your stay.” The creepiest looking smile then came across the pale man’s face.
“Oh, come on, Sabina, it’ll be fine,” Chase said, turning to me. He then leaned in and murmured in my ear, “Besides, if we’re in the back, that’s less people that will hear your screams.” I gave him a devious smile and he winked at me. “Come on, then. The sooner we set up, the quicker we can get lunch. Thank-what the?” Chase had turned back to the pale man at the check-in post, but he was no longer there. “Weird.”
“Come on, Chase, baby, let’s go at least park the car and we can get some food in our stomachs before we start setting up the tent,” I said. Chase smiled at me and pressed down lightly on the gas pedal. Our little Jeep crunched over the small rocks that other cars had tracked in from the other campsites as we rolled further and further back into the forest campground. I could see a bit of worry on Chase’s face as we continued to roll further into the forest and the trees were getting thicker and thicker, blocking out more and more light.
Chase looked at me and took my hand. “It’ll be alright, Sabina, we’ll park right here, right behind this other tent. We have those lanterns we can hang up in the tent, remember.”
I smiled weakly at him, noticing the blackness around our Jeep even though it was hardly even noon. “This is really gonna screw with our sense of time,” I remarked.
Chase laughed and pecked my cheek. “That’s my girl. Now come on, let’s go get something to eat.”
-----
We were sitting at dinner that night after we had set up our tent and parked the Jeep next to the tent. “Chase, I don’t know about this place. It seems kind of creepy,” I murmured to him over our mediocre plates. I had remarked to him after lunch that the food was like high school cafeteria food, and Chase had just told me it was food nonetheless. We didn’t really know the area around the campground, so we didn’t want to waste our gas just driving around.
“Sabina, sweetheart, just give it a chance. Let’s just stay one night, and if you still think this place is creepy tomorrow morning, we’ll leave, okay?”
I smiled and took another bite of the overcooked chicken served to us tonight. “Okay.”
Later that night, we had lit a small fire on our campsite and these two young children came and sat down across from us. “We haven’t seen you here before,” one said.
Chase answered before I could gather a comprehension of these two random children sitting down across from us out of the blue. “Yeah, we just got here this morning.”
“And you’re back here? That’s pretty adventurous,” the other child said.
“The guy at the check-in post told us all the spots at the front were occupied, so that’s why we’re back here,” Chase told the other boy.
“What do you mean, ‘adventurous’?” I asked.
The first boy looked at me with a haunted face. His eyes looked sunk into his head, and he also looked deathly pale like the man at the check-in post, but his hair looked bright blonde in the firelight. “Have you not heard the stories of the far back forest of Monroeville Campground?” he asked. I shook my head. “Well. Many of them involve accounts of people being attacked by vampires.”
“Vampires?” Chase repeats. The first boy nods. “Vampires aren’t real,” he scoffs.
“Oh, so you’re one of those people,” the second boy said, rolling his eyes. He sounded annoyed.
“What are you talking about?” I asked, frightened.
The first boy looked over at the second boy and they exchanged unreadable looks. “We have to get back to our campsite now, but at least now you know about the vampires that are still rumoured to lurk in these parts,” he said, standing up.
The second boy followed suit, and right before they left, he said, “All the accounts say that the first vampires start on the prowl for fresh humans around nine o’clock.”
I checked my watch as their snickers faded off into the darkness. “Chase.” I bumped his arm. “It’s nine o’clock right now.”
Chase hugged me to him awkwardly. “Sabina, sweetheart, those are just stories that those kids were told by their parents. They’re not true. Vampires aren’t real. We’re gonna be fine tonight.”
I smiled up at him weakly and then just stared back into the dying fire as Chase kissed my temple and got up to throw another log on the fire, sending up a shower of sparks.
-----
A loud thump woke me in the middle of the night. I held my watch up to the dim lantern we kept on at night, and it read one o’clock. I heard hushed whispers, and I judged they were about fifteen feet from our tent. I shook Chase hard, and he rolled over and groaned loudly. “Chase!” I hissed.
“What, Sabina?” he answered groggily.
“There are voices outside our tent!”
“It’s probably just people going to bed. Go back to sleep, Sabina.”
“Chase!” I hissed again, hitting his shoulder.
“Ow!” he yelled. “What the hell, Sabina?”
“Chase! What if those stories that those kids told were true, and there are vampires outside our tent?!”
Chase sat up, and was about to speak, but the voices outside the tent spoke again, and they sounded closer. “Shit, Sabina, we have to get out of here.”
“Where are your keys?” I asked, getting out of my sleeping bag and pulling on my jacket.
Chase grabbed my arm. “No, the Jeep would be way too loud. Just get your shoes and we’ll get out of here as fast and as quietly as we can.” I sat back down and listened for the voices again. “What are you doing?” asked Chase. I looked at him. “We have to get out now!”
I scrambled to the door of the tent, and fumbled to open it as quietly as possible. The voices that were quietly conversing in the background now stopped. They were replaced by almost inaudible footsteps, and I looked at Chase with wide eyes. He made a motion to move fast, and I just unzipped the tent, stomping my feet into my shoes. I stood up and got out of the tent, but crouched down to help Chase. “Come on!” I hissed. “I can hear them getting closer!”
“I’m hurrying, Sabina!” Chase hissed back at me.
“Turn the lantern out, too,” I said.
“No,” Chase said. “If we leave the lantern on, whatever is out there will still think that we’re in here.”
“This is one of the many reasons I love you,” I said, bending down to kiss him as he got out of the tent.
“Thanks, sweetheart, but I don’t think this is the perfect time for professions of love.” Chase stood up and looked around for the source of the voices and footsteps.
We didn’t see anyone for about five minutes, and Chase was about to suggest to us that we start quietly moving out of the campground, but then there was a figure that appeared in my peripheral vision. I whipped around and the figure came out of the trees and into the dim light that the lantern in the tent was giving off. I tugged on Chase’s sleeve, and he started to say something, but was cut short when he saw the figure in front of us. He slowly bent down to put his lips to my ear, neither of us taking our eyes off the silent figure in front of us. “Sabina,” he whispered, “Run.”
With that, we both took off down the narrow dirt path. We paid no mind to all the things we left behind; the only thing we were worried about now was getting out alive. As we ran, I looked back to see the pale figures were running after us - and they had their teeth bared like they were out for blood. “Chase!” I yelled breathlessly.
“What, Sabina?” Chase answered.
“Those creatures…there are vampires after us!”
“Sabina, vampires-“
I cut him off. “They have fangs, Chase!” I shrieked.
“Just keep running, Sabina!” Chase yelled back to me.
Unfortunately, we were running out of breath, and a few feet later, we were stopped in the middle of the dirt road. I dragged Chase into the trees, which were finally beginning to thin out the slightest bit. “Chase,” I panted. “Chase, I think we’re getting closer to the entrance, the trees are thinning out.”
“Sabina?”
“Chase?”
“Where do we go when we get out?”
I didn’t have time to answer as one of the vampires lunged through the trees, fangs bared and very sharp. “CHASE!” I screamed, and flung my foot out. I meant to aim for the vampire’s stomach, but instead my foot collided with its face, knocking it backward and off of Chase. I screamed something incomprehensible at it, it gave me this confused look, and then just walked away quietly. I quickly turned back to Chase, who I saw was kneeling on the ground, his head hanging down. “Chase?” I asked quietly, kneeling down next to him.
He looked over at me, and he looked a little haggard, but that was understandable seeing as we were running for our lives just a few minutes ago. “Sabina,” he said calmly.
“Are you okay? Are you hurt?” I asked.
“My arm hurts,” he said.
“Let me see it,” I said. Chase held his arm out to me and I saw that there were two clear puncture marks. I gasped and tried to pass it off as a deep breath, which Chase didn’t notice either way.
“Is it okay?” he asked, sounding a little distant.
I hesitated before answering, but only for a second. “Yeah, you’ll be fine, it’s just a little bite. Come on, let’s get you to a hospital or something,” I said, standing up. I held out my hand and Chase took it, standing up. He looked slightly wobbly on his feet, and I was beginning to seriously worry. “Come on, Chase, sweetheart,” I said, waving my hand in the direction we had come from.
With the rest of the vampires off of our tails, we had stopped running, but we continued to walk quickly up the rest of the path out of the campground. Chase collapsed after about an hour of walking. I squealed and kneeled down next to him. “Chase! Are you alright?”
He didn’t answer right away, but he looked extremely pale. I shook him once, twice, three times before he finally stirred. He looked up at me and his beautiful blue eyes were now bright red. I stood up and started slowly backing away from him. “Sabina, sweetheart,” he said. “Why are you walking away from me?”
“I didn’t know you could change from just one bite,” I murmured. When Chase stood up and started walking toward me, I looked around and redirected toward the check-in post, the only building in sight.
“Sabina, baby, why are you walking away from me? I love you,” Chase said, holding his arms out like he wanted to hug me.
I know he didn’t. I also knew that he didn’t mean it when he said he loved me. He was just another one of them now, and I knew I had to get away from him, no matter how much it hurt me.
I turned around and began to sprint towards the check-in post. I heard Chase call after me and I think he started running after me as well. I threw open the door to the check-in post, thank God it was unlocked, and slammed it shut behind me, just as Chase hit the glass of the window. I locked the door the instant I had slammed it shut, and I heard the jiggle of the doorknob as Chase tried to open it. “Sabina!” he called. “Sabina, let me in, I love you!”
I winced as his words hit my ears. I knew it wasn’t the same Chase I loved, but it still looked like it, so I was surprised when I turned around and there was a pistol lying on the desk. It was just lying there, like it was waiting for me to pick it up and use it on my vampire of a boyfriend. ‘No,’ I thought to myself, ‘He’s not your boyfriend anymore. He’s not Chase anymore, he’s just a shell of who used to be Chase.’
As these thoughts ran through my head, I picked up the pistol. Not knowing how to figure out if there was ammunition in it, I aimed at the wood of the door and pulled the trigger. A loud shot went off and buried into the wood of the door. I looked at it, slightly smoking. I guess there was ammunition in it, but I wasn’t sure how much was left, so I lowered the gun as Chase began to smash his body against the door in repeated attempts to get in.
I squealed with each crash, and watched as the hole I shot into the wood of the door began to crack. I continued to watch as the cracks spread up the door and into the glass. It wasn’t long before the glass suffered its fatal crack, and it shattered, the pieces falling down. I watched as vampire-Chase’s arm reached in through the broken glass hole and unlocked the door.
“Does anything matter if you’re already dead?” I muttered to myself as I aimed the pistol at the monster my boyfriend had become. I fired and the shot buried itself in the left side of his chest, and he collapsed over the frame of the broken glass. I let the pistol fall from my hands as I sunk down onto the dirty floor, my mind blank.