Chap 1, Sipping life from bottles

I opened my eyes and sat up. My forehead was full of cold sweat and I was breathing faster than normal. Nightmares, my dreams were full of them. I rested my head in my hands, whispered a line of words, words that made me more comfortable. I lifted my head and looked around my room, my little dorm in the big school I had the good fortune to go to. I smiled, to wake up there was the best thing I new. I slipped out of bed and started the hunt for clothes, a much harder task than I could have guessed. I finally chose a pair och black jeans and a light blue t-shirt. Then I brushed my long black hair and I was ready to go. I opened my dorm's door and headed down to breakfast. Outside it was as dark as my black hair, since my school was on a vampire schedule we slept during the human day and went to school during the human night. I was in fact a vampire, or a moroi as we were called, and the school I went to was called St Vladimirs Academy and it was a school for vampires and guardians. Guardians, or dhampires as they're called, are needed to protect moroi, especially from evil creatures called strigoi. Strigoi are undead vampires who love the taste of moroi. So there the guardians were trained to protect us and we just got normal education, except the fact that we learned magic in school, which isn't very normal. Every moroi have one of the five elements, earth, water, fire, air or spirit. Spirit is a very unexplored area in magic since only a few people have that element, it was very uncommon. I had spirit, together with two other at my school, Vasilisa Dragomir and Adrian Ivashkov. Technically Adrian didn't go to the school, he'd already finished school but since Vasilisa, or Lissa, and I hadn't he had to stay at the school so we could explore spirit more. I had to admit, I had a little crush on Adrian, but who hadn't? He was this older boy who always was really drunk and charming, who can say no to that? I couldn't. But Adrian didn't like me in the same way, he was deeply in love with Rosemarie, or Rose, Hathaway. But she didn't notice, she was too busy being in love with one of her instructors.

As I was thinking about him someone showed up behind me, put their hands over my eyes so I couldn't see. I sighed.
"Let go Adrian, I know it's you." I said and tried to get lose.
He let go and I turned around. I was right, it was Adrian. He smiled one of his famous smiles, the smile that I fell for every time. I was so stupid.
"Wanna grab some brakfast, Drizzle?" he asked.
"Sure. But stop calling me Drizzle." I said as we started to walk.
"But you smell like Drizzle." he pointed out.
"Yes, but Drizzle smells like rain and my name is Rainy. So why not just use my real name?"
"Pfft, Drizzle is nicer." he said and weaved it away like a fly.
I shook my head but let it go. As we walked down he kept on taking about som party he'd been to. He might sound like someone that only get drunk for fun and screw around all the time, which was kind of true. But there was more than that. Spirit drives you crazy and alcohol numbs the sadness and craziness. I, too, drank sometimes to numb all the feelings. When Adrian didn't have some big party to go to we sometimes drank together. Mostly because Adrian had some better stuff, but also so we didn't get so lonely. The best thing with Adrian was that he understod me, I could give him one look and he knew exactly what I was going to say and how I felt, and I understod him too.

As we got to the cafeteria everyone we used to sit with was already there, so we took our food and walk to their table.
"Hey guys." Adrian said and sat down beside Lissa.
I sat down on the opposite side beside Rose.
"Hi, we just talked about how excited we are for the field practice." Rose explained.
"Already?" I asked. "It's still a couple of months left."
"Yeah, maybe you should finish kindergarten before you get excited about collage." Adrian added.
I expected some mean joke from Rose but she ignored us.
"Anyways, how are you guys?" Lissa asked me and Adrian to break the silence.
"Fine." we both said at the same time.
Our eyes met and I could feel how everyone looked at us, wondering if it really was fine. I could tell that he, just like me, had lied. I tried to read his eyes.
What happened?, his eyes said.
Shitty night, I answered. You?
Same, wanna talk?, he asked.
Sure, your place after school.
He nodded and the others started to talk about something new. I didn't quite know how we did this. It probably was spirit, but Lissa couldn't do it. But if you think about it, Lissa could do lots of other things that I couldn't, like heal things.

"Class starts." Lissa finally said. "Coming Rainy?"
I nodded and stod up.
"See you later." Rose said as she and Eddie stod up to go to their class.
Lissa and I started walking towards our class.
"So.." Lissa started when we gotten a couple of feet away from the others. "How are you doing? And don't say fine."
"Why? You think I lied?" I asked.
"No, I know you lied. You have to be blind not to see that in your eyes."
"Noted." I mumbled.
"Really." she said and walk up in front of me and took my hands. "I want to be here for you, even though I don't know how to talk in your mind. Don't you trust me?"
I looked in her beautiful jade green eyes, this whole trust thing meant a lot to her.
"Of course I trust you. I'm sorry, I just had a bad night. Spirit I guess." I said.
She nodded and did something that seemed like she wanted to read me, but she couldn't.
"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked carefully.
"I don't know what to say." I said simply.
This was in fact true. When ever me and Adrian said we should talk it ended with us drinking because we never found the right words. We both knew what the other one felt like, but we didn't know what to do or say. So instead we joked around and drank, a weak attempt to feel better. I assume that Lissa didn't know what to say either since she hugged me and said nothing more.

After a day of constantly having Lissa's eyes on me I was happy when the last class finally ended. I was free, for a couple of hours at least. When I'd taken my books I went straight to Adrian's. I knocked at his door, four times, no uneven numbers. After around ten minutes he finally opened the door.
"Drizzle." he said as a greeting. "Sorry it took so long, just got of the phone."
"No problem." I said.
I stepped inside and got hit by the smell och alcohol of some sort. That phone call was probably hard on him, judging by the smell and his eyes.
"Who called?" I asked.
"Dad.." he said shortly and I could tell that he didn't want to talk about it.
I threw my bag in the corner, I didn't really care if anything broke, nothing expect Adrian and alcohol mattered. Adrian closed the door behind me and started walking towards his liquor cabinet where he poured up two glasses of the first thing he saw.
"So, how was your day?" he asked me and gave me one of the glasses.
"It was okay, I guess. But the depression is driving me mad." I sighed. "But this will probably help, whatever it is."
I studied the drink. Me and Adrian had this thing when we took of the labels of the bottles, so we didn't know what we drank. You could smell it, of course, but we tried not to, what would be the fun of that?
"It sure will." he agreed.
He sat down beside me and looked into my eyes. My eyes, my ice blue eyes was the only part I actually like of myself. They were beautiful, the really were. And Adrian seemed to agree since he couldn't let go. I had to break the connection, so I did. I looked down to my drink and took a sip. It was stronger than I expected and I coughed.
"Take it easy Drizzle." Adrian said and laughed.

Two bottles later we were both a pretty dizzy and didn't really know what we did.
"So, what's your secret Drizzle?" Adrian asked.
"Secret?" I asked, confused.
"We both know that you're hiding something, Drizzle. Don't try to fool me. A person can't simply be this perfect, only I can."
"What could this secret be?" I asked.
"Hmmmm like.." he looked like he had no clue, the question was apparently not very thought throw. "Like a puppy, a crush, a secret ambition, a cat or maybe a unicorn."
"You're so basic Adrian. A cat? A unicorn? Hell no, I have a cat-unicorn.. Like a unicat och a caticorn." I said and took another sip. "And I also am the queen of Rivendell."
"Cool." he said and spaced out, probably to Rivendell.
"But yes, I do have a secret ambition." I said and set my drink down on the table.
"What is it?" Adrian asked, back on earth.
Instead of saying anything I leaned forward and kissed him. Yes, I was drunk. Otherwise I would never have dared to do that. But it was worth it because he returned it. Drunk or sober, Adrian was a good kisser.