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Celeste’s house has all the traits of a haunted old mansion, without actually being haunted – at least I haven’t encountered any ghosts so far. There are mysterious locked doors,twolibraries, a regular kitchen and a kitchen for the servants – without the servants – and a basement with lots of unidentifiable flasks, herbs, and creepy bits floating in jars. But its biggest miracle is the enchanted window in Celeste’s bedroom, which is why I spend most of the afternoon sprawled on her bed in the sunshine, reading a history on vampires I found in one of the libraries, and drinking tea.
Out of the corner of my eye I watch the sun creep towards the horizon and toward the moment I will have no excuse for staying any longer. Not only does the thought of my mattress back home make me feel gross but this whole room is like a refuge from the ugly, dirty, dangerous city – and the fear that comes with it.
“You’re interested in history?”
I look up from my book. “The history of how the present times came to be so shitty, yeah.”
Celeste laughs. “That book won’t help you much there. You’d have to read my whole library to even make a start on an answer.”
I leaf through the pages thoughtlessly. How could someone living in this kind of house, with clothes like hers, understand what answers I’m looking for? “Ok, history is complicated. But like…” I sigh. “There has to be a reason it’s so hard.”
“What isit?”
“It just feels like the system is rigged if you’re a vampire. Either you’re already rich, in which case you can buy blood and keep getting more rich, or you’re poor and you can literally never improve your situation because you’re useless without blood, so you can’t make a living, and without any money you can’t buy blood, so you become more useless…” Catching my breath from my ramble, I throw my hands up. “And the city won’t help you. So your only option is to just attack someone in the street. And then they track you and lock you up and say,Vampires are statistically more likely to be violent than any other race.” I do the last bit in my best posh-asshole-imitation voice.
Celeste smiles sadly. “I think the system is rigged against anyone who doesn’t have money, not just vampires.”
“At least before being turned I was just ordinarily poor and not also completely dependent on other people.” I rub my temples.
“What did you expect it to be like?”
I look up to search her face, thinking I’ll find the same condesciension that usually comes when I talk to people about this. Her expression is unreadable.
“I didn’t expect anything. I didn'tchoseto be turned.”
“You were addicted to venom?”
This is what people think. You either get yourself turned into a vampire because you're delusional and want to live forever, or you’re an addict who’s taken it too far. I shake my head. “No. My ex turned me. I didn’t realise what she was doing until it was too late.”
Celeste narrows her brows. “How do you turn someone without them knowing?”
I bite the inside of my cheek. “By choosing someone stupid.”
Celeste opens her mouth to respond but seems to think better of it. She gets up from her chair and walks over to the bed, where I'm lying on my belly over the book. She cautiously sits down beside me. “It's not stupid to trust someone you love.”
I sigh. “It is if you chose the wrong person.” Sensing that I’m in for a long conversation, I close the book. “Growing up in a small Christian community in the Sunshine Belt, I didn’t know a single vampire before I met Casey. My church basically pretended vampires didn't exist and if they were mentioned it was only to make it clear that they're an abomination and going to hell.” With a frown I remember some of the dryer sermons. “There was no education about how being turned works because it only happens to sinners anyway, apparently.”
“Hmm.” She tilts her head, sunlight like a halo around her.
It's hard to focus with Celeste looking at me so intently. “When I left and moved here I knew nothing. I didn't really get what being a vampire meant.” I frown. “I didn't understand all the crazy ups and downs Casey had, flying high as a kite one day and then crying and smashing plates the next. When she told me how desperate she was for blood, I let her drink mine as often as I could. She never explained the whole turning-through-venom part to me.”
“Didn’t you notice that it made you feel high?”
“I did but she just said she couldn't control it. And if I said no, she'd sometimes just lose it and start yelling and crying. She said she needed me, that if I didn’t help her nobody would. Didn’t I love her anymore or why did I want her to starve?”
Celeste makes a face and shakes her head.
“I tried to break it off a few times but I always took her back in the end. Eventually, I started noticing weird stuff. I felt weak and had cravings for raw meat… sometimes I could suddenly hear voices or strange sounds, which later turned out to be the TV from two flats over. Even when I confessed to her that I was scared I was losing my mind she didn’t tell me what was going on and kept giving me her venom.”
I fiddle with my hair, trying to keep my nervous hands busy. “In the end, we had a huge fight. I just knew that she was lying to me but then I thought maybe I was having a mental break or something. She called me paranoid. I kicked her out.”
“But it was too late?”
“It’s technically possible to reverse a transformation if you’re still alive. But even if I knew what was happening, I couldn't have afforded all the blood transfusions and the hospital care. And I didn’t know. It was terrifying. I had all these… crazy violent thoughts, or I’d wake up after breaking all the furniture with no memory of what happened. And my bodyhurt.” I shudder at the memories. “She called and swore up and down that she’d change. First thing she’d do was take me to the hospital to get me help for mymental health.So I let her back in.” Without noticing it, I lift my fingers to my forehead, feeling for a scar that is no longer there. “That’s when she killed me. She said it would be perfect – we could be together forever now.” I wince as I remember my human body collapsing and watching my blood pool around me on the floor.
Celeste brushes a strand of hair from my cheek. “Tell me you’re not still in contact with that woman.”
I shake my head. “Realising what had happened made me terrified of her. For weeks after she’d come banging on my door, yelling at me to stop being dramatic. I just sat on the floor and cried until she left again.”
