Bloodrush and Tea

Mitchell literally couldn't get his key in the lock. He fumbled and struggled and pushed until finally the door opened for him; Annie stood in the entrance, holding the kettle in one hand and flashing different colours and pulsing and Mitchell's head ached to see it.

'Are you all right?' asked Annie.

Mitchell stumbled through the doorway, escaping the dawn light. He had blood in the creases of his hands and under his chin; he could feel it as thought it were crawling on his skin.

'Oh my god,' Annie said. He thought he heard her drop the kettle. Everything around him shimmered in too-bright colours. Annie was the worst of it all, leaping in and out of perspective, blurred and dark and bright and sharp in an instant. And she smelt strongly, strangely, as well: like ozone.

He put his hands over his eyes, smelled the blood on them – and the darkness burst into colours behind his eyelids.

'Oh god,' he vaguely heard himself mumble. 'Oh god.'

He needed a shower. He needed to go pass out somewhere.

'What shall I do? What shall I do?' Annie was saying. 'You've got blood all on you.'

'I'll be fine-' he said. He forced himself upright, searching in his pockets for his sunglasses, but he must have left them behind.

'I'm going to call George,' said Annie.

'I'll be all right.' Mitchell motioned at her not to, but he wasn't sure if she saw him. He cast his eyes around and found: the stairs. There would be a shower. And a bed. He began to climb.

'I don't think you should-'

'For god's sake Annie, I'll be fine!' he shouted, thumping the wall with a fist that burst into pins and needles. Annie stared, shocked, smallened.

Mitchell climbed the stairs in an unsteady, heavy tread, someone else's blood rushing in his veins.

***

He woke up, clean and naked and in his own bed, with dim memories of the most painful shower ever. His damp skin scratched on the sheets; his whole body felt alive, coursing with power, aching with rawness.

From downstairs, a rather squeaky voice called his name. It was George.

When Mitchell got to the top of the stairs, trousered, he could hear them talking:

'He had blood all over him, on his mouth…'

'What did he say?'

'He just shouted. His eyes were all – I didn't know what to do.'

They stopped when Mitchell began to climb down.

'Mitchell.' George cleared his throat. 'Annie called and said you came in all… What's been happening?'

Annie eyes were downcast and still. She still flickered in Mitchell's vision like a guttering candle, though the colours of the room had died down to a low-level buzz as though there were hundreds of flies just out of earshot.

Mitchell gave his head a shake. 'It's nothing,' he said, smiling, shrugging, rubbing at his still-wet hair with a towel and walking towards the kitchen. 'Seriously, I was just feeling a bit off.'

'No, no,' said George, adjusting his glasses and following Mitchell into the kitchen. 'No, I've seen you like this before.'

'Like what?'

Annie watched them from the doorway.

'I know what's happened. We both know what's happened,' said George. 'You've, you've, you've… you've done something stupid.'

'Who broke the kettle?' asked Mitchell, picking it up. 'It's all dented. And how was Nina, by the way?'

'Stop changing the subject.' George looked mournfully at him. He half-sighed, half-choked. 'You've killed someone, haven't you?'

There was a pause. Mitchell heard Annie's intake of breath and felt violently annoyed with her – so stupid, why would a ghost need to breathe?

George put his forehead in his hand.

'Just… why, Mitchell? Why? And, oh god, who? Was it someone we knew? Oh please let it not be someone we knew.'

Mitchell hurled the kettle at the lino floor; it bounced and hit the table legs with a clatter. 'Look. I lost control, okay? For god's sake. She wasn't… It wasn't…'

Annie said, 'She?'

Mitchell looked at her, half hidden behind the doorjamb; she bounced in and out of his sight. 'I never meant it to happen – look, I'm rushing, can we have this conversation later?'

George was rubbing his face all over. 'No, we cannot,' he said, with that peculiar way of pronouncing all the consonants that Mitchell usually liked, only right now was more irritating than he could have thought possible. 'Once again, once again, Mitchell, you've put the whole household in danger! Because you can't control yourself, always thinking with your, your teeth-'

'Easy for you to say,' snapped Mitchell. He felt a pounding in his chest; the bloodrush was full of rage. 'Just because you've found some outlet for your frustrations, you think everything's that simple, well it's not.'

'Did you…?' George swallowed, shaking his head. 'Did you, did you… make her into…'

'I killed her.'

'I can't believe this.' George stared at him. 'You're just… You've just murdered someone and-'

'Can we have this conversation another time or I swear I will tear your fucking head off so help me god,' shouted Mitchell, starting forward at the other man, the anger rising in him like a flood.

George leapt backwards with a yelp. 'Don't you dare!'

Mitchell shoved the table off balance. He might have attacked George too if the door hadn't slammed suddenly, distracting him.

George spun on the spot. 'What was that?'

It wasn't a trick of his eyes this time: Annie had left the house.

***

For Annie, it was betrayal, as simple as that. She couldn't have said in what way she was betrayed, but it was betrayal she felt as she hugged her cardy to herself and stomped through the city's streets. She had a vague notion of where she was heading, a notion she had been following since Mitchell had admitted not turning his victim into a vampire.

She had been this way, record-hunting, with Gilbert just the other week: she remembered the police station's cold dark windows. Gilbert had hated the police for fairly arbitrary reasons, she knew, but she now thought of the man who had seen her in the street, that time after Tully attacked her. His eyes. His smile.

Inside the police station, nobody seemed to be able see her. She wasn't sure she was even in the right place, but she waited, absently crumbling Nice biscuits into piles and listening. Listening until she heard something that sounded right, that sounded like 'girl' and 'murder' and 'neck'.

The afternoon was a long one. Annie rode in a police car. She stood outside a hotel where there was a body. She watched some parents get some bad news.

She couldn't hate Mitchell for what he'd done. But she wanted to.

***

'I've just seen everything you should have seen.'

Mitchell woke up on top of the covers, dazed.

Annie was almost solid now, sitting at the end of the bed, though she glowed unnaturally. The room was dim with evening.

Annie was holding a cup of tea and staring at the floor.

'What?' he asked. He sat up.

'I saw her on the stretcher. Under a blanket.' Annie's hands on the cup shook a little. 'And I saw her mum and dad.' She looked up at him. 'They're so nice. They garden for a living. Isn't that wonderful? Just mess around with plants all day long.'

'I know,' said Mitchell. 'She told me.'

'Her mum went and sat on the lawn with her face on the ground and cried. And her dad didn't say anything. He just listened.'

Mitchell watched his memories like a broken spool of film; the hotel lobby, the blood on the bed, the girl's face lit up with neon lights. He flung himself off the bed, startling Annie from her seat.

'I am what I am, Annie,' he said, yanking a t-shirt over his shoulders. 'I'm a vampire, vampires kill people. If they don't do it, they die. I try so hard, so hard. But I am what I am.'

'And I am what I am,' said Annie. She was beginning to cry. 'And you know what? She isn't. I looked for her. She's not a ghost. She isn't stuck around on this earth waiting for god knows what. She was killed by a vampire and that's not grounds enough to find resolution, when I, when I…'

Mitchell slammed his wardrobe door. 'Owen is a man,' he said. 'Owen is a mortal, normal man. He didn't have to even bother trying to be a good person, but he wasn't. He didn't have to even fight it, he just went ahead and did it. And you have no idea how angry that makes me, Annie.'

Annie held herself resolute for a second, then put the coffee cup down on the bedside table.

'It started off in here,' she said quietly. 'He shouted at me. Shoved those pants into my face.'

She walked past him to the door, pointed out into the hall. 'He gabbed me there. And there – that's where he grabbed my hair.'

Mitchell put a hand out to her. 'Annie…'

She shrugged him off, her voice rising as she moved into the hall. 'And here's where I pushed him – and I was so sorry, I was so guilty. And here – '

She stopped at the top of the stairs, looking down into the dark living room. ' – here's where he pushed me.'

Mitchell caught her. He wasn't sure what danger she could have come to from a second, posthumous fall, but he caught her lightly anyway, pulling her gently back.

'Oh, Annie…'

'Why did you do it?' she asked, turning between his arms. Her rush-enhanced ozone-scent was still strong.

Mitchell shook his head. 'After Lauren and I… It's been too long.' He hesitated. 'Could you forgive me?'

Annie stepped away. 'Your tea's getting cold.'

'You made me tea?'

'I bought a new kettle.' Annie said, before vanishing down the stairs.

***

It was three days of slipping in and out of consciousness and nausea before the rush stopped and the guilt set in. Cups of tea appeared periodically beside his bed but other than that the other occupants of the house kept a wide berth.

Mitchell was glad of it. Any excuse to get out of bed and his need might have gotten too strong. As the alien blood left his system, his body cried out for more – he held on through the sweats and the shudders. It was a waiting game. It had been too long since he last fed, and now he was reaping the punishment.

'I see you've finally decided to grace us with your presence,' said George, looking up fro a newspaper, when Mitchell finally made it down the stairs.

He shot George a look and sat heavily on the sofa beside him.

'I called in sick at work for you,' said George. 'If only to keep up appearances. I told them you'd got the flu, not the vampire equivalent of a massive hangover.'

'Thanks.' Mitchell leant forward, began fiddling with a bowl of potpourri on the coffee table. 'How's Nina?'

'Quite well, if you must know. We went to that new café they have on the high street.'

'She still cross at you for bailing on her?'

'We've resolved that issue, actually.'

There was a long silence. George's newspaper rustled. Mitchell looked around. 'Where's Annie?'

George looked uncomfortable. 'She went out.'

'She went out? She hardy ever goes out!'

Putting down his newspaper and adopting a severe expression, George said, 'She went to the funeral.'

Mitchell met his eyes for some seconds. 'Right.' He stood up. 'I need a cigarette… When will she be back?'

George shrugged, taking up the paper again. 'Who knows. Soon?'

Half way out of the front door Mitchell turned. 'Look, George. I'm sorry. I know I can't fix it, but I am sorry.'

George shook his paper out and cleared his throat. 'You're letting in a draught.'

***

Annie turned up while he was smoking his fifth cigarette.

'Are you feeing better?' she asked.

Mitchell watched her; she looked as real as the pavement, the houses, or Mrs Finchley up the road doing her gardening.

'Much better,' he said. 'Thanks for all the tea.'

She nodded distractedly, her arms tight around her chest.

'George told me where you were,' said Mitchell. She nodded again. He said, 'Are you still angry with me?'

'Not with you. Not with you.' She stamped her feet and shuddered. 'They made you like this. And they lied. They covered I all up, I saw them, the doctors, the police. They said it was an accident. They said… And her mum and dad, they just believed them. Believed everything they said!'

Mitchell put his arms around her. It was always strange to hug her – it was like hugging a light, cold balloon, as if you couldn't feel her until you squeezed her.

'I'm sorry,' he said. 'I'm sorry.'

She stepped out of his arms, smiled a tight, small smile.

He said, 'George is so grumpy for someone who's experiencing the most glorious sex of his life.'

Annie blushed. 'He's worried about you.'

Mitchell laughed. 'It's his girlfriend I'd be worried about.'

'Anyway, how do you know it's so… glorious?'

Mitchell gently poked the air where her nose should have been. 'Vampire sense of smell. Not as good as a werewolf's but still pretty excellent.'

Annie wrinkled her nose and raised her eyebrows. 'You can't smell that, though? No way. Really? No!'

Annie stepped through the closed front door, in that uncomfortably incorporeal way she had; Mitchell watched, his cigarette burnt down to the filter.

Annie opened the door with a slight flounce, and said, 'Are you coming in, or what?'

Smiling, he stubbed out the cigarette and stepped through the doorway.

The End