by Rae, Nikki
Myles catches me just as my hands are pressing against the cool metal of it. “I thought I’d find you here,” he says. His hand on my wrist is something that sends warm webs through my body, but I can’t turn around. “Where are you going?”
I can’t speak. It’s all too much and his touch is the thing that will make me fall apart.
“You can’t go out there,” he says, coming even closer so I can feel his breath on the back of my neck. “There are only more people outside.”
I gulp, sliding my free hand from the metal and finally turning to face him. He’s in the same jeans and T-shirt he was wearing this morning, but then again, I haven’t had time to change either. Maybe he’s been lying awake too. Unable to even toy with the notion of sleep because of me. The same thought I had in the office with Evan pops up: Good.
“Come upstairs with me,” he says. Though he’s not demanding anything, I can’t find it in me to fight.
He doesn’t speak again until we’re in front of his door. “I thought we could talk.”
Gently, I pull my arm free from his hand, and before I can concentrate on how empty it leaves me feeling, I say, “You said when I was ready.” I hear his keys as he unlocks the door. “And I’m not.”
“I know,” he says. “But I don’t think you’ll ever be ready.” He opens the door and stares down at the keys in his hand for longer than necessary. “And the longer I wait, the harder it is to figure out how to tell you everything.” He glances up. “And Evan called me. Told me what happened.”
I cross my arms over my chest as I follow him inside, knowing that when I leave, things are going to be different. I’ve known deep down for a while that Myles has been hiding things from me, but that doesn’t make it any easier to deal with.
It’s weird being in his apartment when the last time we were here we were so close, probably as close as we could be at the time. I’m sure having a vampire drink your blood is up there on the list of “close”; being turned by someone you love is probably right above that. Everything is in the same place it was before: the living room set up the same as mine only neater, his big white dog sleeps on the couch before he realizes I’m there and comes over for a little petting before he returns to the floor to resume his nap.
“Do you want to sit?” Myles finally asks. He motions to the couch but I pull out a stool from the counter. “You want something to eat?” I can’t help noticing the surprise laced in his voice. “Drink?”
“No thanks,” I say.
He seems unsure of where to start as he pulls out the stool next to me.
“What did Evan tell you?” I ask when he doesn’t say anything.
Myles blinks a few times, lost thought. “That you were unstable,” he practically whispers. “He wouldn’t tell me more than that.”
I take in a breath and wonder why I need to breathe at all. “I don’t want to talk about it,” I decide. I know it’s stupid and childish, but something tells me that once I start talking about what happened with Evan, I’ll tell him what I thought towards Jade. I can’t deal with that, not out loud, anyway.
“I want to know what you have to say,” I tell him to steer the conversation away from me. “I want to know why you lied.”
I watch as he swallows hard, maybe trying to decide if he should let the subject of Evan and I drop.
“There are a lot of things you don’t know about you and I,” he says. “But I want you to know that the only reason I’ve kept the things I’m about to tell you a secret was to keep you safe. Okay?”
Now I swallow hard. “Okay.” I barely hear it.
Myles takes in yet another breath. When he lets it out, the words follow in a breeze past my face. “I knew who your father was.”
I was staring at the counter, but my eyes travel back up to his in record time. “What?” My lungs are on fire. Like nothing but a puff of smoke could have left my mouth.
“Try to stay calm,” he says. “I know it’s hard.” He reaches out but keeps his hand from coming into contact with mine. “Emotions are stronger when you turn.”
“Are you trying to say I’m overreacting?” Even as I say it, I can feel how hot the words are on my tongue.
“No,” Myles says quickly. “But I don’t want you to shut me out before I’ve told you everything. You deserve to know this. All of this.”
I pause for the longest time. “I’ll try to not freak out.” My face grows hotter, betraying what I’ve just said.
“Your dad was a lot like you,” he says, sounding like he’s struggling to connect the words in order to keep talking. “He wanted to protect you because of it.”
I stare at him. “What do you mean?”
“Evan was right when he said your blood was different.” Myles pauses for a long time, and I’m not sure if it’s because he’s letting it sink in or if he doesn’t know where to go from here.
I think of Evan’s words: It will not work. She is too different...“Different how?” I ask.
“When Michael infected you the first time, I exchanged our blood,” he reminds me.
“Yeah,” I say. “I had a cut on my head. You cut yourself.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “You pressed the two together so his blood would go into you and not me. I was there.”
“I know,” he says. “But ever since then, I haven’t been able to feel what you’re feeling.”
“Okay...” I know this, too.
“And after the first time Evan bit you, the same happened for him, only he couldn’t feel anything from anyone. After the second time, he couldn’t take pain away from Ava when she was feeling it.”
“So what are you saying?” I ask. “My blood makes your abilities go down?”
“Kind of,” he says. “In small quantities, your blood makes it so all of our vampire abilities diminish.”
“In small quantities?” I ask. “Are you saying that in big quantities...what, you can’t read anyone’s thoughts or emotions? So what?” I’m starting to get annoyed. What does this have to do with him knowing my father and not telling me about it?
“That was only when you were human.” Myles runs a hand through his hair. “And now that you’ve turned...your blood has changed. Become stronger.”
“Does that explain why I don’t want to drink blood?” I blurt out, and once I’ve started, I can’t stop. “Why I can eat food...why my heart and lungs are still working?” I ask. “But my vision is clearer, I can hear more than humans.” I have to pause. That’s the first time I’ve said “humans” like I’m not part of that group.
“That could be why.” He doesn’t look at me.
“So what, I’m half vampire and half human?” Half normal?
Myles looks down, shaking his head. “That’s not what I’m saying at all,” he says. “There’s no such thing.”
“How else would you explain it?” I ask.
“Your vampire traits will probably just take longer to develop. Someone with blood like yours hasn’t been fully turned before.”
“Someone with blood like mine.”
“Sophie,” he says quietly, his hand twitching on the counter, but not coming any closer to mine. “There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re not half vampire,” he says. “You’re the antidote for vampirism.”
I blink a few times, not sure where to go from there. “Huh?” is a good start.
“Your father carried a rare gene, one that’s only been seen a few times.”
“My father.” I repeat the word like it will make the fact of Myles knowing him more real. At once, I want to him to keep going and the conversation to come to a screeching halt.
“Yes,” he says. “He was a donor.”
My head starts spinning now. My blood, antidote, my dad, what else? “This is way too much.” I move to stand up but my legs are too heavy.
“I know,” Myles surprises me by saying. “It’s a lot to have kept from you. But you need to know it all.” He takes in a breath. “That’s how we found out about him.”
/> “Wait.” I hold up a hand like it’ll stop him. “Was he your donor?”
He stares at the countertop then back up at me. “For a little while. He was the last human I fed from directly.”
My hands clench into fists in front of me and it’s incredibly hard to keep my arms from shaking.
“No,” I say, because I think I know where this is going and I don’t know if I want to follow him there.
“You have to understand,” he says. “The only way blood like yours will work as an antidote is to turn you.”
“Because that makes it stronger,” I repeat what he said before.
“Yes,” he says. “But a vampire would have to drain you in order to be human again.”
I squeeze my eyes shut at his words, but it isn’t enough to stop him.
“Michael found out about your father...”
“Wait. Michael?” I ask. “He’s involved in all of this too?”
Myles nods, but doesn’t say anything for a few seconds. “He heard about the antidote. He went after your dad.”
I swallow. Blinking only causes red spots to appear. Keeping my eyes shut makes the spots bleed together into one solid color.
“Your father asked for my help,” he continues. “I was the only vampire he trusted, and he wanted me to make sure nothing happened to his family.”
For some reason, those words clear my vision momentarily. “What did you do?” I whisper, but I don’t think he can even grasp the weight of those words.
“He left,” he says. “And I stayed close, keeping an eye on you, your mom, Jade, and Laura.”
“Wait.” I hold up a hand again, repeating that same word over and over again. “So my father…” I have to pause at the word, unable to face the fact that I’m using it–with Myles of all people. “What did Michael want with him?”
“He wanted the antidote,” Myles says. “He wanted to be human. More than anything.”
I take in another deep breath. “So he went off to chase my dad wherever the hell he went, and you, what, babysat?” I have to stare at the countertop, concentrating on its smooth surface.
“Your mom knew me,” he says. “She knew the situation. I came over a lot when you were little. If something suspicious popped up, you’d move, and I’d follow you.”
My chest tightens and I force myself to glance at him. “That doesn’t make any sense,” I say. “We only moved once, when Mom met Adam.”
He shakes his head. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you.” He takes in a breath now. “Do you remember the first time you met me?”
I don’t know what this has to do with anything but I answer anyway. “Yeah. You came in to the bookstore where I worked with Alex and Adrienne.”
He shakes his head. “You met me before. Talked to me, even.”
I stare directly at him, wondering what’s he’s trying say. “Where?”
“You bumped into me at the hospital,” he says. “A few days before we officially met at your job.” Myles shifts his gaze to my fists and doesn’t look back at me until my palms are flat against the counter.
“Your eyes were burning, and you dropped your bag,” he continues. “You wouldn’t let me help you and I couldn’t figure out why at the time.”
My mind wanders back to the end of last summer, when I was forced into going to Dr. Helmet’s office and we tried out experimental eye drops. Then after we tried them, how I fell and someone tried to help me up when I banged into them. I never thought twice about it, never knowing what it could have possibly meant.
“So?” My voice shakes. “We kind of saw each other before you introduced yourself?”
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m just nervous...that doesn’t have much to do with the other times you saw me.”
“Other times?”
“Times that you don’t remember because I wouldn’t let you.”
“What?” I ask, my hands clenching back up again. “What do you mean you wouldn’t let me?”
“Sophie,” he says. This time, his hand touches my fist. I let it happen, but I’m not sure for how long I can allow it to stay there. “Tell me what your earliest memory is.”
All of the air leaves my lungs. “I–” I say. “I was at the park and...”
“You got burned. Someone carried you away, out of the sun.” He pauses. “And when you asked your mother who it was, she said it was her?”
“Myles,” I warn, though I’m not sure what I’m warning him against.
His eyes bore right into mine now. “We can take memories away. We can change memories to something that didn’t even happen.”
“No,” I say. “It was my dad, before he left us.”
“No, Sophie,” he whispers, and I want to throw him across the room. “It was me.”
My world blurs and then turns completely brown before singeing into deep red. I can’t blink it away or keep my hands from shaking, searching for something to wrap themselves around and squeeze. “Myles,” I say. “I don’t think I can take this right now.”
I’m reminded of last winter, him playing the photo album game with me–how he kept asking me to remember things I couldn’t remember. All this time, could he have been the reason why?
My vision blurs again and when I open my eyes, everything in Myles’ apartment is there, only turning neon colors, too bright. Too much light in the room. My pulse begins pounding, making my body shake. I want to run fast and far.
His hand tightens on my fist, steadying me. “I’m sorry, but there’s more.”
I try pulling away, but he has me. He won’t let go.
“Things were calm after your father left,” he says. “I came to visit less and less, and he checked in with me at the same day and time every week to ask how his family was. When he didn’t call at a scheduled time, I began to worry.”
I almost choke on the words, but I ask, “What happened to him?”
“Michael...”
Michael killed him. He doesn’t have to say anything else; I just know it.
How is it possible to feel bad about someone dying that you never really knew? Someone who abandoned you?
“Michael tried to have someone turn your father, and when Michael drained him for the antidote, he didn’t become human. It almost killed him instead.”
“Why?” I barely hear it.
He shrugs. “We think it’s because of his blood being poisonous to humans...or maybe he’s not meant to be human,” he says. “Nature has a way of weeding those things out.”
“I can’t.” The brightness of everything in the room only intensifies. A white plate on a drying rack in the kitchen nearly blinds me. But then I think, no. “I need to know the rest,” I say out loud.
Myles nods. “When your mom found out about your father, she asked me to do it. To take away all of the memories. From her, from you, and your brother and sister. It was supposed to be like I never existed.”
I rub my eyes with the back of my hand. “How old was I?”
“Nine.”
I open my eyes to glare at him, incredibly angry at what he’s done, what Michael’s done. Not just to me, but my entire family. Thankfully, he looks normal and I can keep eye contact. “And you just did it? Wiped my brain free of any trace of you or him.”
“It was the only way to be sure you were safe.”
“Is that why I don’t remember things? Why half of my memories are missing?”
“It’s easier with younger minds, but it depends,” he says, pausing too long to look at me before continuing. “Your brother and sister remember things that happened during those years that don’t involve me or your father just fine.” He thinks for a moment. “I think your mind just adapted to forgetting things you didn’t want to remember; my taking your memories away was something that triggered that in you.”
I sniff. I can’t cry now. “And my mom?” I ask. “How did she deal with it?”
“She doesn’t remember me,” he says, “But it was impossible to g
et everything about your father out of her.” He swallows. “Her mind made up its own scenarios as to why he left.”
“And they were all bad.” I have to keep talking. If I don’t, something bad will happen.
Myles nods. “I think it was the way she coped with it. Her subconscious also saw your sun allergy as a threat, because in her mind, that’s what made your father leave...”
That explains why she pushed so hard to fix me.
Finally, I free my hand from his and place them both in my lap, afraid they’ll come crashing through the countertop if I don’t move them away. “So why did you come back?”
“Michael,” he says, and I flinch at the name. “He was putting the pieces together. He found your medical records and thought you could be another carrier.”
“So you came and went to my school?” I ask. I want to stand up again, but I’m afraid of my knees buckling. “You became my friend?”
“I went to the hospital first. I had to make sure you had the gene.”
“And I do.”
He nods. “Then I decided that getting close to you was the only way.”
“Only way to what?” It comes out as a whisper.
“To get you to leave.” He’s looking right at me, but he seems so far away. Adrift. “To get you to a protected place.”
“You brought me to New York to get away from him.” I realize.
He’s silent. “I’m sorry.”
My hands start to shake in my lap, and my stomach turns. “Everything...” I say. “Everything you did...”
“Sophie,” Myles says, trying to get me to calm down. “I lied about a lot of things, but I never lied about how I felt.”
I figured that now I’m a vampire, or a “delayed” vampire, or whatever the hell I am now, tears are supposed to be cold, but they’re warmer than anything I’ve ever felt. “You can’t say that,” I snap. “You just can’t.”
“I love you, Sophie.” The words are like he’s twisting a knife between my shoulders. “I don’t expect you to trust me anymore. I don’t expect you to forgive me. I just needed you to know everything so you could protect yourself.”
“Was it always your plan to turn me?” I blurt out, swiping at the tears that won’t stop.
