Tess met me at the door, dressed in overalls and covered in grime. Apparently the water redistribution system needed some cleaning.

"I believe I met one of your old friends at school today." I said, hanging my pack and keys on a hook in the doorway.

"Hmm. Lawrence, I presume?" She said, removing her rubber gloves.

"If Lawrence has jet black hair, with the exception of some white in the front, then yeah. Him."

She sighed heavily.

"He’s a teacher at my school. He helped me today." I said plopping down at the kitchen counter.

Tess followed me, her eyes furrowed in concern.

"Your eyes are black." Before I could move to make my own, she was preparing a drink for me.

"Maybe you should just stay home...." She said quietly.

"Did you-..?"

"-No. But it was close. You didn’t say it would be like that."

"Could I have?" Tess said, turning the knob on the crockpot to low.

I paused, thinking. She was right, there was no way she could have described the level of need I would have.

"No."

"Well, you’re away. You should keep your distance from now on. You’re not mature enough to handle it."

I sighed heavily. "Sometimes, I think you forget, the child is the shell."

"Well, you forget I’m still well your elder." Tess, said planting her hands at her hips.

"You still have much to learn, young one." She stroked my hair, making it stand up in all directions.

"Will I feel different tomorrow?"

"The desire will still be there, though it will be suppressible, unlike today. But our supply isn’t endless. I think you need to hunt." She said handing me the warm cup.

"I know."

I hate television. Reading books and observing nature, including people are what I enjoy. These things are infinitely more interesting to my heightened senses.

We don’t sleep.

I do ‘rest’, laying prone for a time, with my mind restlessly traveling places I’ve been and have yet to go. ...But never sleep.

****

The next morning when I got to school, I saw Will in the parking lot...His footsteps angled in my direction and I tensed, waiting for that inevitable crushing wave of tension to press upon me.

He thankfully stopped a few paces outside of my personal space, instinctively keeping his distance.

"Hi, Ibis. You feeling better?" he said, his head tipped to the side to better meet my lowered eyes on my short frame.

"Yes. I am. Thanks." I offered a smile, but still, I felt it. It grated like starving man’s hunger pangs.

I did my best to hide it from my expression.

"Good... Listen." he said, following me into the school.

"My sister, she likes to bag on me. I don’t go through girls like toilet paper. I’m not a dick or anything..."

I laughed. "She never said that."

He went red. "Oh."

"Well. Just so you know."

"Okay." I said.

"Hey, Ibis!" Clara spotted me in the hall.

"I’ve got to go."

He nodded, and opened his mouth to say more. But he waved instead, and headed the opposite direction down the hall. "See you around, Ibis."

We reached our adjacent lockers and unloaded our books.

"How are you feeling, today?" She asked, her eyes filled with genuine concern.

"I’m fine...I think I ate something bad, yesterday."

"Oh, I know how that can be. I had this bagel once, that was just a little bit harder than usual, you know? I just thought it was stale, but oh, my GOD it had my stomach bubbling like boiled water!"

I laughed.

"So, my brother seems interested in you...As do a LOT of the boys." she said, closing her locker, an eyebrow raised.

"Just watch out, for Will..." She leaned in and whispered. "He goes through girls like toilet paper."

I laughed the hardest I had, in awhile at that.

****

At lunch this time, Will stayed at his table. I noticed a leggy chestnut-haired girl with pale green eyes, draping her arms over his shoulders possessively.

"You see what I mean?" Clara asked.

I hadn’t known, I was being so obvious.

"Of course she does." Nelli, finished. "We dated back when I was freshman. Asshole cheated on me with the bitch hanging on him now, so I dumped him. But he was a good kisser."

"With those lips, how could he not be?" Gail said smirking.

"Gawd! I really don’t want to be hearing these things about my brother, okay?!" Clara said shaking in mock disgust.

"Sorry, Clar’."

Kirk sat down at the table and made a big show of kissing and feeling up on Clara in greeting.

"Hey, babe."

"Jesus! Kirk not so much in public, okay?"

He was doing it for my benefit of course, a show of what he could do. I hoped Clara would see past his mask soon and dump him.

The rest of the table asked how I was doing. I was tired of it, but I was patient. It was a human thing to do. Nelli angled the conversation towards eating disorder symptoms, hoping I’d slip up and reveal something.

I’ve been at this too long to do that. I’m small, yes, but I don’t look unhealthy. In fact, quite the opposite. I suspect part of her wanted me to reveal a secret so she could cop it for herself.

****

At the end of the day, I slipped into my Jeep and cruised out onto the stretching road. The shadows in the valley were long. I enjoyed watching the tiny desert creatures scamper just on the edges of the road; mostly scorpions, lizards, and small insects.

My cellphone buzzed. I reached down and pressed the speaker button.

"Tess?"

"Yes. I just wanted you to know we’re having a guest over tonight, from your school. You know Mr. Redbourne."

"Sure." I said, though I was not in the mood for guests.

"How was your day?"

"Routine."

"Good. I think I may have a job at the local library. I’ll know tomorrow."

"I’m glad. You’d been wanting to get back to that. It’ll be nice quiet work."

"Yes. I’m hopeful..."

I could feel what she’d wanted to ask.

"-It wasn’t as bad today. I can handle it." I said.

"-Now."

"I’m hunting tonight."

"As you should. Hurry home."

-click-

Same old Tess. Direct.

****

As I stepped through the threshold, I noted the other smell. Mr. Redbourne was there.

I hung up my things and walked into the living room. They sat across from each other.

"Come join us."

"I’m Lawrence." He said, shaking my hand.

He looked much more at ease. His tinted glasses were gone.

The eyes they’d concealed were very strange. One was the inky black of hunger. The other a pale gold. His face was sharply angular. His attractiveness was hard, chiseled like from out of white flint.

"An old injury." He explained, noting my curious look.

"I’ve heard a lot about you."

"I’m sure." I said crossing my arms, my eyes flitting over to Tess, her chin length pale blond hair, better styled than usual.

"You’re from Florida?"

"Little Tree. Near the Everglades. Yes."

"Seminole?"

"--And black."

Very interested in my background. And rudely intrusive.

"You healed well."

"Yes. So, Tess says..." I said, finally sitting down in a nearby chair.

"I wouldn’t have survived. I don’t really remember it."

"It’s just that we’re usually perpetually the state we were in during the change."

"This is your gift."

"Tess, has said this."

"What’s yours?" I said, trying to get the focus off myself, for once.

"I see their thoughts, clearly...Not a terribly comfortable gift." He said, shifting his eyes to his folded hands briefly.

"I’ve known Tess here for about a century, though not this one, obviously."

She forced a smile.

"It happens that way, sometimes."

So, he’d wanted to see the girl, who could’ve been his had he stayed with Tess.

I wondered why they separated.

"I just wanted you to know that you have an ally in the school. If you need a hand, dealing with anything... The boy..."

I didn’t like where this conversation was going. He had been talking with Tess about him. I’m sure revealing his thoughts about me.

"I know he intrigues you. I just don’t think it would be wise to be as friendly as you’ve been to him. For the reason you already know, among others."

"Jesus. This is getting tiresome. I look like a child, but I’m not one. And you Lawrence, are a stranger to me. You have no say."

"As far as we’re concerned..." Tess interjected.

"-We who care and have lived longer, it would make sense to exercise more caution than you have been."

"And that’s why I’m hunting tonight...but to limit myself, when I don’t have to? I might as well have been left back in that fire. I need to live, Tess."

Tess clenched her jaw, minutely.

"It was nice speaking with you Mr. Redbourne." I said, slipping back into my role as student.

"I’ll see you on Monday."

****

I waited until the a.m to slip out. I went out into the night often, even with the synthetic blood, but I had forgotten the exhilaration, the thrill of truly hunting down prey.

It had been easy for me, a neat little game, with a sating reward in the end.

I stalked through mountains, sometimes speeding along so fast I was scarcely a breeze along the hard sand.

I was following the trail of solitary male cougar, who was stalking prey of his own.

****

Will and Hannah walked quietly in the night, whispering initmately. The kids had sneaked out to the mountains to watch the stars and sunrise.

Will’s flatbed truck was to be their camp-down spot. Truthfully, his reputation was more about luck than anything else. He was a handsome boy and so he got a lot of attention. He didn’t purposely try to be with lots of girls. In fact he’d never moved beyond third-base.

He dated a lot, sure, but he wasn’t malicious. In fact Hannah had schemed to get him to kiss her, with Nelli watching.

In her fury, she’d made herself the bad guy and Hannah the victim who needed comforting. She’d used that to become Will’s new girlfriend.

They both lay on their backs while in the deep quiet black of Mew Mexico, the only sound being the breeze and the distant howling of a coyote.

Will nestled Hannah in his arms as they gazed up at the multitude of stars, sparkling like tiny crystals spilled on black velvet.

"You sure you don’t want to do anything else tonight?" Hannah asked leaning her chin on his chest, her hands wandering down to his belt.

"No, I’m sorry Hannah, I’m not just feeling it tonight. I just want to be with you like this and look at the stars. Okay?"

She huffed.

"Sure." she said, sarcastically.

"Let’s just watch the stars."

This wasn’t working out at all the way she had hoped. Hannah had been fast. Will would be the fifth notch on her belt at sixteen. For a small town, like Shadow, that was like sleeping with half of the school.

He felt like a traitor. His body was with his girlfriend, but his mind was with Ibis, the strange, beautiful, new girl who seemed to be repelled by him.

****

I had inadvertently driven the creature into the path of two humans...ones I knew. The girl and Will.

I crouched silently behind a boulder and listened.

The creature reared up, a slow threatening growl welling up from the bottom of it’s throat.

I could see Will and the girl sit up.

"Shit! Did you hear that?" she said.

He put his hand up to silence her.

He panned the perimeter, his eyes raking across my own, for the briefest of moments. He stopped for a second, probably catching the iridescent shine...but he moved on when the growling started up again in another direction...closer this time.

The cougar was dangerously hungry.

"Oh, God!"

She said and began to try to scramble up out of the flatbed...

Will tried to make her freeze, but she punched him in the shoulder and yanked back too hard. She flipped over the side and cracked her head on the hard ground.

She’d knocked herself out.

Will hopped down to her side, but the threatening rumbling was much closer... He looked up and saw the creature staring at them, it’s teeth bared.

I moved, before I could think better of it. Quicker than a blink, I snatched up the cougar and carried it behind some faraway brush...Far enough away that he couldn’t reach me, nor I him.

He couldn’t have seen me. It was too dark and I was too quick. I drained it quickly, sating my body but draining the cougar’s body had only wet my appetite.

I still wanted Will’s blood.

****

It was there and then it was gone. Will sat over Hannah shaking and confused. The cougar had literally disappeared.

There was something else out there. He had seen another creature’s eyes, he was certain of it.

He got up and picked up Hannah. He pushed her into the passenger-side of his truck and closed the door.

And then he sped off, his mind racing, still panicked.

He was driving stupidly.

He looked back, wondering if the other creature were behind him and lost control, swerving and running headlong into a large ditch. He cracked his head on the steering wheel and knocked himself out.

****

"Shit." I thought. "He’s unconscious and injured. He’s bleeding."

The smell of it filled every part of me...I was drowning in it.

My feet carried me towards him before I could think against it.

When I got to the truck, I could see the blood on his forehead.

I purposely avoided him. I lifted Hannah out first. She had no injuries, aside from the large knot on the back of her head.

And then I looked at Will. His arm was fractured. And there was a small cut on his brow.

I dragged him out, as well.

And then, I just couldn’t help it...

I wiped a finger across his forehead, picking up his blood there.

I stuck it into my mouth sucking with relish my eyes closed. Looking down at him, I knew it would only take a slight movement to finish him and his girlfriend. That would be the end of my problem. It would be easy and beyond satisfying.

My body wanted it. I was still, unable to decide which mind to follow. Desire or will. A few more seconds and the decision would be made for me.

He stirred, his eyes half-opening.

I moved quickly from his reach and view.

Before I knew it, I was home again, taste of him still in my mouth.

I hoped he thought I was a dream.