It was too much to bear now, meeting Charlie’s eyes; Mila could not endure it. As the girl turned her stricken gaze up at her, the vampire felt another painful twist of the knife. She was suddenly looking down at the floor, at the edge of the couch, the glass in her hands, anywhere but at those watery blue eyes that seemed to simultaneously plead for an explanation, but also gape at her in disbelieving horror.
When Mila finally worked up the nerve to look at that ashen face again, she found that Charlie was looking defiantly up at the ceiling, refusing to look at her. She felt crestfallen at that. She realized that the girl had no intention of accepting the glass of water so she slowly lowered it again, reluctantly because she knew Charlie probably needed it. Despite her awful uneasiness, Mila still moved with her familiar grace and charm, still managed to look poised even with her tousled hair and smudged red hand. She ran the clean one through her hair distractedly as she tried to think of what to say.
“Charlie-..” she tried carefully.
”Oh my god…You were going to kill me.”
Mila froze.
“I-..”
”You were going to kill me.”
The way she said it, sharp and accusing, made Mila visibly flinch. She felt its sting like a slap in the face. She looked up at Charlie in earnest now, despite the fact that the girl sill wouldn’t look at her and was still making feeble efforts to move away.
“No! No I-… I never wanted to k-..” She couldn’t say it out loud. “I mean, I didn’t want to-... Just now, that was an accident!” Her words came out suddenly, uncharacteristically desperate and jumbled as she tried to find the right way explain herself. But the explanation was hardly better than Charlie’s accusation. She hadn’t meant to kill her, but she had meant to use her until they went their separate ways. …Or until… ‘until she’s all used up!’ a horrible voice in her head finished, making her cringe. She thought of Charlie’s beautiful singing voice, and then imagined being the one to stamp it out of existence. Worse even, to siphon it slowly and painfully away…
She was still gazing at Charlie through all of this, as if to silently beg her to at least look at her, even if it was just to glare at her. The refusal to do even that cut Mila deeper than a vicious look might have done.
”And I was going to let you.”
’Yes, because you’re wonderfully trusting and sincere. You’re a rare creature in this modern age,’ Mila answered silently, wanting more than anything to touch the girl’s knee, to do something. Instead, she looked down at her own hands that were clutching the glass and saw that they were shaking.
“There was nothing you could have done to prevent it.”
Why me?
Mila felt Charlie’s reluctant gaze turn toward her and she quickly looked up again, desperate to meet her eyes. With her hunger satiated, she had a glow about her, which softened her features and made her appear young and vibrant, though the effect was dampened somewhat by the anguished expression on her face. She met Charlie’s glance with large eyes that implored her not to look away again. She seemed like she was trying to choose her words carefully.
“…It was chance. At least, at first.” She blinked, but continued to hold Charlie’s gaze for as long as she could. “I knew you were looking for a roommate. I…pretended to be in distress so that you’d feel like you’d helped me. So you’d trust me.” She fiddled with the glass in her hands. “I did everything I could to win your favor. And on the first night, after I-.. a-ah.. after that, I was hooked. I didn’t know it would be so powerful, or that I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from…” She swallowed and looked away, a melancholy expression on her face. “A small taste every night. You were never supposed to find out…” She was sure this was not a comforting thing to add, but she said it anyway, speaking around the lump in her throat, her voice growing softer until it was just a timid whisper. “…I know what you must think of me, for doing this. It’s just that…I would rather not kill people…”
If she’d thought her fellow blood sucking peers would have laughed at her for keeping a pet, she knew they would be rolling on the floor now at the way she was kneeling at the girl’s feet, confessing her sins, wracked with guilt about what she had done and what she’d planned to do. ‘Guilty?? For feeding??’ they’d sneer. They’d point out that Mila had the girl now. Charlie was weak; she wouldn’t be able to prevent the vampire from tying her to a bedpost and using her as a personal blood bank whenever she liked. She might even play with her now while she was still in a daze. Humans could be so entertaining when they didn’t have enough blood to pump oxygen to their brain. She shuddered at these thoughts, and at the fact that she’d allowed them to cross her mind at all. Even she had standards. She seduced and manipulated… but she wasn’t evil… Somehow, she was not sure Charlie would agree with that just now. Or if she even agreed with that… Despite her reluctance to kill haphazardly, she’d be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy the hunt. It was an undeniable thrill to ensnare people with her charm. Certainly she was a monster to Charlie and to any other human who had the misfortune of becoming her plaything.
Mila had watched uneasily as Charlie had propped herself up. She’d been caught between trying to dissuade her from moving, and wanting to help. She’d done neither, resolving to sit silently as the girl made the painful effort of raising herself up to a sitting position.
“You’re exhausted. You should sleep,” she said quietly, rising to her feet. She reached for the blanket they had shared not too long ago. “You must be cold..” She moved it closer to Charlie, wishing she could wrap it around the girl’s slender frame. She knew better than to put her hands on her though, thinking how much she’d hate to see Charlie shudder at her touch.
Mila left the blanket within easy reach and moved into the kitchen. It had been all too easy to notice Charlie’s quick glance at the island counter when Mila asked about her phone. The vampire had looked in the same direction and had spotted it immediately. She’d felt relieved that it was out of the girl’s reach. And then she’d felt wretched because she knew that Charlie must have realized her own mistake – that she’d inadvertently given up her last hope of contacting the authorities anytime soon. When the girl had questioned her about asking, Mila had given her a gentle look that said ’You know why.’
She returned with Charlie’s cell phone in her pocket and a damp cloth. “For your hand,” she murmured, gesturing to her blood stained fingers. Her own were clean now. Mila doubted her roommate would take the offered cloth, but she couldn’t stand to see the ugly red on the girl’s slender white hand. With hesitation, she sat down beside Charlie, twisting the cloth absently in her hand. She would probably regret what she was about to try.
“Please, don’t pull away. I’m not going to do anything.”
She looked at Charlie earnestly and then pointedly at her bloody fingers. Very carefully, she took her slim wrist in her hand, holding it gently in her strong grasp, and began using the warm, wet cloth to wipe the blood away.
Tlaloc