Illusions of Soul

If I could sleep, I would never have seen it. But I’m sure the fates knew that, knew that I would be leaning against the headboard, running my fingers through her hair, with the news muted on the television.

I didn’t need the sound. The images were more than enough.

Footage of a grisly crime scene.

A fireplace with scattered ashes where someone had been burned.

A hole in the wall, surrounded in blood, where someone had been staked.

I remember those marks well.

And outside of the house, a little girl being carried to a police cruiser, wrapped in a blanket, too in shock to cry.

She loves to sleep. She should go pro. She can sleep the whole night away, and sometimes part of the day.

But only if I’m here. She’ll wrap around me and be out in an instant.

I sneak out some nights. I have to. I have to eat. But I don’t keep it a secret. The mornings, when she wakes up to a full breakfast waiting for her on the table, she knows I’ve been gone, but she never asks me where.

I wouldn’t have to kill her.

I could taste her and she could live.

Forever.

She could travel with me. I’ve had many years of traveling alone. And I think that she wants it. Or at least doesn’t fear it. She stowed away on a ship, facing both known and unknown dangers to escape the world she lived in. She can still do that. I hold the key to being in this world and outside of it at the same time. She’d like that, I think.

But she doesn’t understand the risks.

In me, she sees passion and everlasting life. What she also sees, without realizing it, is control, an ability to make choices and renounce cravings. Willpower.

She may have it or she may not.

She may be what I am or she may be what I used to be.

There are no guarantees.

She lies still beside me. She always seems so content after, like my touch has mended something broken inside of her. She has no idea how many things I have broken in my time.

Such is the effect we have over people. If they are strong of will, they may despise us, despise what we come from and what we stand for, but they are too drawn to us to properly fear us. They want to believe that we won’t hurt them, even though their inner voices assure them that we will.

I won’t. But that doesn’t justify her lack of fear. What I am is an exception. As a rule, she should be terrified of my kind. She shouldn’t even be at ease with me. If she knew what a struggle it was, how I longed to have her in the only way that I haven’t yet, perhaps she wouldn’t sleep so peacefully.

Her neck tastes salty… and sweet at the same time.

Women. They are such a fascinating dichotomy of flavor, all allure and innocence.

And she is no different from the rest. Except for this.

I lie against her back, my breasts against her shoulder blades, my palms on the backs of her hands, pushing them down into the mattress. She is in a position of complete surrender. When I move to her neck, run my tongue up and down the vein throbbing with the ever-changing beat of her heart, she doesn’t flinch.

So many do. The may want me, want this, but they are always wary, always defensive, always waiting for me to attack.

But not her.

Either she doesn’t expect me to, or she doesn’t care if I do.

She has made a subtle mention of the holiday. As far removed from its traditions as she finds herself, it still retains a significance for her. And I know why she has brought it up. It is a gift giving holiday. I know exactly what she wants from me.

I am not unaffected by this submission. It’s something I relish every time, that complete abandon to me. I would have it no other way. Whatever she gives, I will take. But she can withhold what she wants to. I never take what isn’t mine to have. Even at my most vile, I never caused this particular brand of pain. I’ve never had to. What I really want, I am persuasive enough to get in more delicate ways.

When it comes to us, people, they always acquiesce.

Beneath my hand, her skin is crawling with life. Sweat seeps through her pours, goose bumps form in the wake of my fingertips. Her skin is fevered, not with illness, but anticipation. And, just beneath, searing blood rolls through her veins.

I can feel her heartbeat. She has an arrhythmia. I didn’t notice it on the ship, but I sense it now. Beat, beat, beat, and then a long pause that alludes to her mortality.

I wonder if she knows.

Someone else might have just been looking for a place to stay. New in town, penniless, it makes sense to latch onto the first person who is nice to you. But that’s not the feeling between us. It’s greater, more irrepressible than that. It’s why she was able to find me. She just followed her desire, the universe’s most flawless divining rod.

And I can’t blame her for being so bold. I have looked on this from both sides, and, no matter what your point of view, it’s a perfect, and undeniable, attraction.

I have made no demands of her, but every time I turn around, she is there making an offering. Every time I touch her, she melts into my hands, begging the touch to go further than I am ready to take it. The anticipation is far too sweet to let it come to an end.

The look in her eyes, the need, it’s a beautiful thing to witness. I am glad that I can give her this, the key to her own desire, the awareness of what she wants. Too many women have these decisions made for them.

If I were stronger, I would leave her where she lay. She’s safer there, out alone in the night, with a door between us. But I’m not strong, at least not now. I feel weak, the kind of weakness I can’t fight on my own. She must be feeling weak too, because she came back.

And then there’s the desire. Let’s not forget that. But, of course, desire is a big part of weakness and weakness a big part of desire. I am not one to put too much energy into fighting my wants. I’m no Buddha.

When I open the door, she will lift her head to look at me. She is only pretending to sleep, but too anxious to be able to do it in earnest.

Is it really worth it for her, to sleep outside my door, to put such soft flesh down on such hard concrete?

If I leave her, she will be sporting all kinds of bruises by morning. Letting her come in, it’s for her own good. And for mine.

The last thing I need is to see the marks of her blood just beneath the surface.

I feel her need. It comes through the wall in waves. She found me again. But then - I knew she would. If you stay in the same place for long enough, it doesn’t take any kind of supernatural senses to be tracked.

She doesn’t have to be invited in. Not that it matters, because she isn’t knocking. I’m the one who is desperate to open the door. I discovered some time ago that human beings have more than sustenance to offer me.

But to let her in is to let in more than just her. It also invites in a few things I yearn to remember and too many things I long to forget. Every girl like her reminds me of every girl like her. There have been so many. In the past, I have killed her a thousand times. It wasn’t long enough ago to vow that I will never do it again.