Chapter Nineteen
Title: Cravings
I spent about two days in that bathroom.
Annie brought me food.
Apart from converstions with her, I tried to keep my mind blank, willing the cravings away, a sort of meitation.
It's worked before.
But this was so much worse than the off and on cravings I get sometimes, like it got after the first week of going cold turkey, when I shut myself in a room and refused to open the door or any windows until I had got used to the ache in the back of my throat.
But I'm not getting used to it.
It's only because Annie needled me for six hours straight that I attempted a temporary fix.
I probably shouldn't have done it in front of Annie, but I wasn't thinking straight.
I just shrugged off my jacket, leaving me in a black vest, arms bare, took off an anti-foxhunting badge, sterilized it with a lighter and and dragged it across my forearm in a small jagged line.
I drank about a pint.
It was only after I'd finished that I notice Annie's face and realized what the first part of that ritual would have looked like, and the ease with which I'd done it.
But there were no words of comfort I could offer, not when I'd done that after trying so hard to un-darken their view of vampires (damning Anne Rice and Stephanie Meyer all the way), so I just told her;
"That'll last about an hour."
And shrugged my jacket back on.
***
Now I'm in George's room and I doubt it'll last half an hour, because he makes me . . . hungry. The idea of discreetly peircing my finger and sucking on it flits across my mind, but I don't want to take any more blood from my bloodstream in case it affects my . . . judgement.
But as agitated as the Vampire in me is at seeing him again, the human side has brought my attention to the absence of the twisted ball of darkness that had been building without him. To a relief. A weight that has been removed.
He's looking at me curiously, asking me where I've been (and why I'm wearing sunglasses.)
I'm surprised Annie hasn't told him everything she knows (or thinks she knows.)
I want to stay away, keet the foot of the bed as a barrier between us, but I can't bring myself to speak from under the crushing emption bearing down on me and I should be able to do something while I'm here. To say . . . something.
I sit at the foot of the bed and look at him. The memory of him I had been holding onto so desperately as incentive to dull the craving is off. If my memory can deform that much in tow days, I'm scared of what could happen if . . .
Tears escape from under my glasses.
I am as shocked as George at their presence.
But they take away the last of my will to stay composed and I collapse against the bed, sobs choking, spluttering from me as broken, seperate sounds as they get trapped and freed from the back of my throat.
I throw George's comforting hand from my shoulder.
I'm already gripping the bedsheets in an effort not to move any closer. I can't take more temptation.
So Goerge is quiet and still as I shake and choke in front of him.
And all this time, I'm certain there has not been a speck of brown in my eyes.
I spent about two days in that bathroom.
Annie brought me food.
Apart from converstions with her, I tried to keep my mind blank, willing the cravings away, a sort of meitation.
It's worked before.
But this was so much worse than the off and on cravings I get sometimes, like it got after the first week of going cold turkey, when I shut myself in a room and refused to open the door or any windows until I had got used to the ache in the back of my throat.
But I'm not getting used to it.
It's only because Annie needled me for six hours straight that I attempted a temporary fix.
I probably shouldn't have done it in front of Annie, but I wasn't thinking straight.
I just shrugged off my jacket, leaving me in a black vest, arms bare, took off an anti-foxhunting badge, sterilized it with a lighter and and dragged it across my forearm in a small jagged line.
I drank about a pint.
It was only after I'd finished that I notice Annie's face and realized what the first part of that ritual would have looked like, and the ease with which I'd done it.
But there were no words of comfort I could offer, not when I'd done that after trying so hard to un-darken their view of vampires (damning Anne Rice and Stephanie Meyer all the way), so I just told her;
"That'll last about an hour."
And shrugged my jacket back on.
***
Now I'm in George's room and I doubt it'll last half an hour, because he makes me . . . hungry. The idea of discreetly peircing my finger and sucking on it flits across my mind, but I don't want to take any more blood from my bloodstream in case it affects my . . . judgement.
But as agitated as the Vampire in me is at seeing him again, the human side has brought my attention to the absence of the twisted ball of darkness that had been building without him. To a relief. A weight that has been removed.
He's looking at me curiously, asking me where I've been (and why I'm wearing sunglasses.)
I'm surprised Annie hasn't told him everything she knows (or thinks she knows.)
I want to stay away, keet the foot of the bed as a barrier between us, but I can't bring myself to speak from under the crushing emption bearing down on me and I should be able to do something while I'm here. To say . . . something.
I sit at the foot of the bed and look at him. The memory of him I had been holding onto so desperately as incentive to dull the craving is off. If my memory can deform that much in tow days, I'm scared of what could happen if . . .
Tears escape from under my glasses.
I am as shocked as George at their presence.
But they take away the last of my will to stay composed and I collapse against the bed, sobs choking, spluttering from me as broken, seperate sounds as they get trapped and freed from the back of my throat.
I throw George's comforting hand from my shoulder.
I'm already gripping the bedsheets in an effort not to move any closer. I can't take more temptation.
So Goerge is quiet and still as I shake and choke in front of him.
And all this time, I'm certain there has not been a speck of brown in my eyes.