Burikaesu (4/22)
I could feel his cold breath on my skin. It made every hair on my body stand on end in fear, but this cool sensation was strangely comforting to me. While I feared for my life, I couldn’t help but think that I was longing for this kind of contact. I flinched back in fear when he raised his voice, my breathing was fast and I could feel my heart pounding, but when I looked at his face, he looked lonely and upset.
“I’m sorry,” he said backing away. His fangs were still out and I could get a good look at them this time.
“I can’t believe that I’ve been living with a vampire the past 5 days….” I said under my breath.
“I’m not a vampire,” he turned away from me, disgusted.
“What are you…?”
“I’m not a vampire,” he said again.
“Yeah, yeah. I heard that 5 times already.”
“2-“
He became quiet when I approached him, raising a hand towards his fangs. I wanted to…touch them. His muscles tensed when my hand got near but his body didn’t move much. They were actual fangs, real bone. I didn’t bother to try and pull them to see if they were fake, as much as I wanted to. The last thing I should do was make him angry. Vampires had strength, from what I remembered about myths. I could be subdued within seconds. At this moment I looked up at his eyes and noticed how soft the golden color was.
“I can’t believe you were letting him get so close to you, Sho! Just bite him!” A whiny voice was coming from the window by my bed.
“I would be, if you weren’t here right now, interrupting me, Aiba!” he yelled as he turned towards the window.
‘He really was going to bite me! I would have become a vampire!’ I panicked internally. I looked to where the new guy had come in.
“YOU!”
“Yo!” he said. It was the same guy who had come looking for Sakurai earlier when I went down for tea. “So, is this your play thing until it dies again?”
He was very rude and extremely happy. I didn’t like hearing my name (indirectly) in the same sentence with the word ‘die’ or ‘death.’
‘Play thing?! Oh no, sir. Not me!’
“No, he’s just someone. I was just about to drain him when you interrupted me, stupid!”
“Drain?” I didn’t quite know what that word meant in vampire land but I sure didn’t like it. I was going to hide behind Sakurai but when he said that he was going to ‘drain’ me…screw that. Friends come 3rd, family comes 2nd, and I go first. But before I could even think about moving, Sakurai grabbed my arms with one hand and my hair with the other tossing my head back and exposing an area of my neck. I was too scared to move. His mouth moved closer and then I felt a stinging pinch in my neck. I could feel two flows of blood down my neck onto my collarbone. Next thing I knew I was on the floor with my eyes open watching Sakurai jump out the window after the other guy, leaving me paralyzed.
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“Nino! Hey Nino.”
I could see that Sakurai came back a few minutes after he left. He came over to me only to see that I was completely immovable and absolutely out of it. If I could move I would have kicked him to next week.
“Damn it, Nino.”
He lifted me up on to my bed with great difficulty. It wasn’t that I weighed so much, because I didn’t. He just seemed to be incredibly weak. When I caught a look at his face, he looked panicked, as if he didn’t know what he’d done to me. If I could speak, I would have yelled his head off. I started to feel sensation again starting in my upper body and then spreading to the lower half. I breathed really heavily and then coughed as I took in too much air. He had sucked something out of the holes I had in my neck, because whatever it was, it was depriving me of oxygen and I surely would have died, I slowly felt it. He wiped off his mouth when he was done and my hand shot up to my neck where he bit me.
“What…In...Hell...Was...That?!” The blood kept flowing from my neck and it wasn’t going to stop for a while and I certainly didn’t feel like dying from blood loss. He slowly inched closer to my neck again when I put my other hand up, stopping him.
“No! No more. I don’t feel like being bitten again!”
But that didn’t stop him. He lightly removed my blood soaked hand and placed it on my lap. I really didn’t have the strength to stop him and so I just let him get closer. Something was stopping me from pushing him away. I probably had enough strength to push him away but I couldn’t. It was as if my body was saying ‘trust him.’ He then put his mouth to my neck again, and started licking the holes. I was feeling dirty and sensually aroused by this simple act that it sent shivers up my spine. I just let him continue, because for as mad as I was, I was enjoying it too much. It had been months since something like this had happened. Of course, she wasn’t a vampire who’s tried to kill me three times. We were having a much needed make out session after a heavy week at work and one thing lead to another and we were almost having sex. It didn’t get that far but soon after, we had broken up and haven’t spoken to each other since.
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I woke up some time later in my bed, completely changed into pajamas. I didn’t remember changing myself, but I was curious to see where my blood soaked clothing had gone. I had been sleeping for quite some time because when I looked, at the clock on the shelf behind my bed, it read 1 a.m. The sheets felt a little heavy when I tried to position myself differently. Sakurai was lying down beside me, sleeping as well. There were still some things that had never gotten explained. I untangled myself from the bed and got up to walk around. I felt weak in my limbs and my neck was definitely bruised, but when I felt around for the holes there was nothing there. Some thoughts kept floating around my confused mind. How was he able to go out in the sun, without dying? How he was so fast and yet had absolutely no strength? What did he do to me? Why do his eyes change color when he morphs? I made myself smile at that joke but then went back to thinking.
The only light I had was coming from the moon and it illuminated everything in my room, except for my bed. When I looked around, my eyes went right for the lump lying in it. It was a funny sight, a sleeping vampire. I didn’t feel threatened at all by him, even after confirming my so called ‘nightmare.’ I started to think I should apologize to him for all the things I’d done. I still couldn’t tell if he was trying to help me or injure me but after what had happened earlier, I’d say it was something else. He didn’t come here to hurt me and he didn’t come to protect me…well maybe protect, but there was still something funny about the whole situation.
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Surprisingly enough, I had the day off today. I wanted to sleep as long as I could, because while I was sleeping at night, I was sleeping with one eye open aimed at Sakurai. I didn’t really have that problem after last night; I did let him stay in the same bed as me, after all. I planned on sleeping till the after noon.
I heard a knock coming from my door and then the most annoying voice I never wanted to hear ever again so early in the morning. The door opened to reveal my sister. It stirred both me and Sakurai, who was still sleeping next to me, but he was a little closer to me now than before.
“Good Morning! ~ Rise and shine~”
“Nee-chan!” I whined, cracking my voice and throwing the covers over our heads.
“Don’t be such a freak. Find a girl friend already and you, Mr. Caster, your bed’s down there,” she said and then stormed out of the room and shut the door with her leave.
She didn’t like it when I was overly involved with my male friends, I really didn’t care what happened. They were my friends after all. I rolled over to face Sakurai and told him that it was completely normal for her to do that. Ohno and I would often share the same bed, cuddle, in fact and she would be much worse. We weren’t lovers or anything close to that; we just enjoyed each other’s company and took it a little further than most friends would. I didn’t expect her to be home though. She had a job in another city and moved closer to it because living it Tokyo made her trips long and she wouldn’t get home until late then get up early the next day to go back. She was older than me and looked almost exactly like me. We got along but had our usual sibling quarrels, we didn’t share as much love for each other as Ohno and his sister did. They were inseparable.
I threw the covers off our heads since it was starting to become warmer the longer we stayed under them.
“So-“ I started but was interrupted by the vibration and ringing of my phone. I grabbed it and opened it up. I got a e-mail from Ohno. Finally! The message’s contents were:
From: Ohno
Subject: I’m Sorry!!
Entry: I’m so sorry about this but can you keep Sho-kun a few more days? We were heading home but then found a really nice place to film so we are staying in America another day or so. I’m really sorry!!
I frowned a little when I read the message but then thought about how good could come out of it. I could reintroduce myself to Sakurai; I was a jerk to him when we first met after all. Then maybe he’d tell me what I want to know.
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Later on that day, during dinner, my sister kept making a fuss about us sharing a bed. Mom kept trying to hush her; she was blowing up a problem that was only the size of a grain. It annoyed me but Sakurai seemed to be enjoying himself. He actually ate food tonight which got me even more in thought. He really might not have been a vampire like I suspected. My pride was hurting. He made me see that I was an absolute jerk. I’ll even admit it to myself. I was, but no more!
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By 7 p.m. that night, my sister had left, my mother was cleaning up from dinner and the two of us were sitting alone in my room again. He had his hands on 3 different newspapers sitting on my bed and mine were filled with a guitar on the floor by the bed frame. I had a piece of paper and pencil in front of me. I was planning on writing a new song but I was having trouble coming up with words to write down, let alone, a tune to play it to. I then picked up the pencil and started writing but then soon after I erased it. I didn’t want it to be like “Rakuen.” I wanted it to flow. I racked my brains over lyrics for a few minutes and then just started to play chords and improvise trying to figure out the sound of the song.
“You okay over there?”
I looked up to see him looking back and forth between the 3 papers and jotting something down. I didn’t say anything. My back was starting to cramp up so I stood and looked over his shoulder.
“Notes from reading a newspaper?” I questioned.
“I am a news caster after all. Monday night I have to go into Nihon and broadcast,” he cleared his throat. “You may call me a monster but I still have a job.”
“I wasn’t going to call you anything.” I put my plan in motion. “What are you?”
“I’m not a vampire, if that’s what you want to know,” he looked up at me, smiling.
“Then what are you? I’m tired of being jerked around.” I sat on the bed next to him, trying to be as nice as possible. It seemed to be a sore subject for him. Why? I didn’t know. He rolled his eyes and dropped everything he was doing to stand up. He looked back at me after he walked over to the door.
“Not here,” he sighed. “We have to go else where.”