The online dating profile had been a cheap shot at forever, but what could she say? She was looking for love, and maybe she was looking in all the wrong places, but she'd already checked the right ones, she thought, and those had all proven empty. She had answered all the website's personality questions and even paid twenty dollars for three months, and had moved on to clicking through her matches. They were boring, boring, too old, kind of cute, too young, and boring but she needed someway to pass the time before her first date in months.
They hadn't met online, actually, which gave her a little extra hope about this one. She'd left her purse in a restaurant and he just so happened to be seated right where she left it, graciously returning it to her flustered person before inviting her to sit down for tea before she left. She'd been in a rush, so couldn't stay, but had scribbled down her number on a napkin for him before she hurried out the door. The rest, she hoped, was history.
Finally, she closed her laptop and began to leave, grabbing the very purse that would bring her and the new love of her life together. She began her stroll down to the café at the end of the block—they even lived on the same block!—enjoying the view of the setting six o'clock sky. She looked down at her phone to see a friendly, "I'm here when you are!" text, and smiled to herself. She could see the café, and with a spring in her step, someone grabbed her from the alley a street from her destination. And the rest, like she'd hoped, was history.
She was on fire. From the inside out, she was burning. She had lost track of time, but it must have been an eternity since the blood had curdled in her veins. She was screaming, she knew she was screaming but she couldn't stop. Every once in awhile a cool hand seemed to touch her face, but whoever that hand belonged to had done this to her, so she hated that hand, no matter what reprieve its cold temperature granted. She could feel her heart beating, too fast, too fast, too fast. She didn't know what was going on but she must have been dying—there was no surviving these flames. So she prayed for the pain to end, for the flames to stop spreading, and finally to die. But as her heart finally stopped, she knew death hadn't come. She compartmentalized immediately, tucked away the uncertain sweetness that had been the pinnacle of her humanity, putting anger and ferocity in its place.
Her eyes snapped open. She sat up. She surprised herself as she snarled, an inhuman sound that struck fear into her cold heart, though she wouldn't show it. Across the room, she saw her: a small brunette whose old eyes didn't match her youthful face.
She snarled again, and the brunette put her hands up.
"It's okay," she said, "I know you don't understand right now—"
"What I understand," she hissed back, "is that whatever just happened to me happened because of you."
The girl across the room looked embarrassed for a second before her face hardened into a more bland expression.
"Well, yes, but this had to happen."
"Had to happen?" She was perplexed. There was no way all that burning was necessary. There was no way that was natural. There was no way she should be alive that second without blood pumping through her veins.
"Had to happen," the other girl confirmed. "You're in the future, but this is the only way how."
She didn't know what the girl was talking about. What way? What had even happened to her? As confusion and fear began to creep into her mind, she let out another sharp snarl, "What happened?"
"You're one of us now—a vampire. You'll get used to it."
What she wouldn't get used to was the solemn look in the back of the other girl's eyes. But right then, that didn't matter. What mattered was that the young girl against the wall was looking at her watch, mumbling a quick, "Anyways, we need to go," as she moved forward to grab her counterpart by the wrist.
She snatched her wrist back, and the other girl put her hands up once more.
"Whatever. Just follow me."
And she really had no other place to go just then, so as the spritely youth bounded toward the door, she made the choice to follow.
"Who are you?" She asked on a whim as they exited the room together and started down a flight of stairs. For a second the girl perked up, spinning to offer a hand as she chirped, "It's nice to meet you! I'm Alice."