CHAPTER 10 GABRI DID IT

Jessica groaned, disappointed.

So close, so close.

And I’m so thirsty.

She opened her eyes to see Todd turn toward the screams and begin to run over the dune, his sandals kicking up sand, sliding as he made his way over the soft, grassy hill.

By the time Jessica descended the dune, a crowd had gathered around the distressed girl. The hushed voices of the concerned and curious onlookers were drowned out by the girl’s hysterical sobs.

Jessica made her way to the front of the circle. A man and a woman had their arms around a teenage girl’s shoulders, trying to calm her. When the girl removed her hands from in front of her face, Jessica saw that she was plump and round faced, with crimped black hair down to her shoulders. She was dressed in black spandex bike pants and an oversize pink T-shirt.

She stopped sobbing, but her shoulders continued to heave.

“Try to tell us what happened,” the woman holding her urged. “Try to tell us.”

The girl opened her mouth to speak, but burst into another round of sobs. She held her hands up to her face, then lowered one hand gingerly to her neck.

“What’s going on?”

“What happened?”

“Is she hurt?”

The voices of the crowd grew louder as more onlookers joined the circle. Jessica searched for Todd, finally spotting him on the far side of the crowd.

“It bit me,” the girl finally managed to get out through clenched teeth. “It bit me.”

The voices quieted, the questions stopped as people pushed forward, straining to listen.

“A mosquito bit her,” a teenage boy behind Jessica joked in a loud whisper, and his lanky companion snickered.

“A bat!” the girl cried, pointing to the sky with one hand as she continued to hold her throat with the other. “It swooped down. It grabbed on to my shoulder. It bit me!”

Jessica heard hushed cries of surprise, of horror. A little girl at the back of the crowd burst into tears. Her father quickly picked her up and started to walk away from the circle.

“Get her to a doctor,” someone called out.

“I vant to bite your neck!” the teenager behind Jessica said softly to his giggling companion, doing an exaggerated Bela Lugosi vampire imitation as he grabbed his friend by the throat with both hands.

“That’s not funny,” a tall, dark-haired girl said sharply. “That bat might have rabies.”

“You might have rabies!” the boy snapped back. His friend thought it was a hilarious comeback.

The man and woman were leading the girl off the beach in the direction of town. She had stopped sobbing but was still holding her throat.

“Where are your parents?” the woman was asking the girl.

“I don’t know,” Jessica heard the girl reply, her voice high and frightened. “I don’t know.”

“We’ll get our car. We’ll drive you to the hospital,” the man said.

The girl said something, but they were too far away for Jessica to hear. As they made their way off the beach, the crowd of bystanders came to life. Everyone started talking at once. Some people, Jessica saw, were frightened. Some were horrified. Some were shaking their heads in disbelief.

“What happened?”

“Did the girl fall or something?”

“What’s going on?”

“Did someone drown?”

Hushed voices, confused voices, rising over the steady rush of the ocean waves, mingled with nervous laughter.

Fixing her face in an expression of fear, Jessica started to tremble as Todd made his way to her. “Jessica—are you okay?” he asked, concerned.

She hugged herself and shook her head. “Oh, I just hate bats!” she exclaimed. “They’re so creepy.”

Todd took her hand. “You’re ice-cold!” he said, squeezing it.

“That poor girl,” Jessica cried with a convincing shudder. She raised her hand to her throat, as if imagining what it would feel like.

“It’s like a vampire or something,” Todd said.

“Please—stop,” she said, holding on to his arm. “I’m really scared.” Warily, she turned her eyes up to the dark sky, as if searching for bats. She smiled as Todd put his arm around her trembling shoulders.

Gabri did this, Jessica thought bitterly as she pretended to be frightened.

Gabri was the bat. Gabri bit the girl.

I know it was Gabri.

He saw that I was having success with Todd. He saw that I was about to taste the nectar for the second time. And so he created a diversion. He knew I couldn’t succeed with a girl screaming her head off a few yards down the beach.

What a dirty trick.

It’s obvious that Gabri will do anything to stop me.

Well, you can’t stop me, Jessica thought angrily, her anger serving to renew her determination.

You can’t stop me, Gabri. You’re too late.

Two more sips of the nectar and poor unsuspecting Todd is mine.

She gazed timidly at Todd. Look at him, she thought, forcing herself not to laugh out loud. Poor baby. He’s madly in love with me. He thinks this is the luckiest summer of his life.

I wonder if he’ll still feel so lucky when he finds out what he’s become. I wonder if he’ll still feel lucky when he knows he’s an Eternal One, unable to die, unable to live.

So thirsty. Always so thirsty.

She sighed and pressed her face against his arm. Her mouth suddenly felt so dry. She could taste the nectar, ruby dark, thick and warm.

“Come on, Todd,” she whispered. “Take me away from here. I’m just so . . . scared.”

He nodded, holding her close, and she led him away into the darkness.

Date: 2015-04-20; view: 665