"Hello, Miss Jefferson?" An annoyed voice asked as I answered my phone. I could almost hear the long day she was having in her voice, but I choose to be polite on my part.
"Yes, this is she." I answered, doing my best to smile at this woman's poor attempt at conversation.
"I am from Fitzgerald Hospital and your friends, Dan Howell and Phil Lester have been in an accident." I felt everything slow to a stop as I processed these words. "Now, I am not allowed to release an information about their condition." She barreled on for fear of being interrupted. "But I think you should come down here soon." The slightest hint of humanity was in her voice as she gave me this advice.
"Of course," I squeaked as I grabbed my coat and keys and rushed out the door. "However, can you tell me how you got me as a contact?" I asked as I ran down the street towards the hospital. It was easier than taking the bus, anyways.
"You were the last person they contacted that was in the general area." She informed me. Of course I had been texting them all day, telling them how to navigate the big city while I was in class.
"Thank you, I will be there as soon as I can." I breathed then hung up the phone. I felt quick as lighting as I rounded another corner.
The hospital was like any other. Patients moaning, heart monitors beeping, children wailing and as always that too clean hospital smell, enveloping it all. I rushed to the nearest front desk.
"Dan Howell and Phil Lester, please." I inquired breathlessly.
"One moment please." The lady in white smiled from behind the tall desk. I looked at a man being wheeled to the ER on a gurney, his leg bandaged but blood was soaking through it too quickly. I snapped my attention back to the secretary. "Mr. Howell and Mr. Lester are on floor three, room 360." She smiled then pointed to the elevator but I took the stairs next to it. It was quicker and I had a fear of elevators for a very long time.
Taking the stairs two at a time, I made it up to floor three before the elevator passed floor two. I rushed to room 360 and gasped at what I saw just from the doorway.
Phil and Dan were mangled.
That was what I saw.
Phil had a neck brace on along with bruises all over his face, an arm in a sling, and he was hooked up to an oxygen machine. Dan had it worse though. He had one leg hoisted up into a better healing position, his head wrapped up in what looked like a bloody turban, his face looked swollen, not to mention the switches that went from his temple to his cheek, he was not only on oxygen but a blood bag was dripping slowly into his arm as well. I tried not to look at the blood bag too much as I stood between their beds. A grandmotherly nurse came in and looked from me to the internet cult leaders misshapen bodies.
"It's a shame what happened to them." She looked over their charts.
"What did happen to them?" I asked, unsure if I even wanted the answer.
"They were hit by a bus, full speed. Guess they just didn't wait long enough at that cross walk." She tutted slightly. I was about to open up a can of excuse me, extra saucy, when Dan's heart monitor went to that dreaded, ceaseless line. The nurse sprang to live. "No, you're not quitting on me!" She roared as she grabbed the defibrillator hanging on the wall.
"Help! Someone come and help!" I ran out into the hall crying like a lost animal. Other white wearing people rushed into the room. After a lifetime of hearing "CLEAR!" and the shocks jolting Dan's body, the grandmotherly nurse came out first and looked defeated.
"I'm so sorry dear, we did everything we could for them." My heart leaped in my throat.
"Them?" I gulped as the doctors and nurses shuffled out of the room, the excitement now over and done with.
"During Mr. Howell's episode, Mr. Lester began to act up as well. When Mr. Howell left, Mr. Lester was already halfway gone. I'm so sorry, my dear." She reached, grabbed my hand, patted it then moved up the hall for the next patient.
I was breathless, shocked, froze, numb, angry, hollow and devastated all at the same time. My body managed to get into the room, wander to the only chair in the room and collapse next to Dan's bed. Only one nurse was with me in the silent room now, and she paid me no mind as she went about her work. I reached for Dan's hand and it felt cold and wrong so I let it go. I wept at this devastating loss for the whole time it took for her to prep the bodies for the morgue. Finally, just as she was about to call another person to wheel them out, I grasped her arm.
"Can you please give me a minute, alone?" I asked, tears still streaming down my face. She was about to say no, "I'm so-" but something changed her mind. I saw it in her eyes at this snap decision. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt anything for you to say your last goodbyes." She said then she walked out the door with her head cocked to the side, her eyes unblinking as if in a trance. She closed the door behind herself and locked it for good measure. Once I knew I was completely alone, I wiped my eyes and looked down at the bodies again. They almost looked peaceful, if not for their dismantled appearance.
"Normally, I wouldn't do this." I confided to the corpses as I drew the blinds closed and walked back over to the bodies. "But, you two are anything but normal." I decided to do Dan first because he had dead first.
I looked at the door again making sure it was locked before I lowered my face to his pale neck. I opened my mouth widely and felt my fangs with my teeth, just to make sure they were there. I first kissed the spot where I was going to make my mark, took a deep breathe, opened wide then bit down.
My fangs pierced his flesh quickly and quietly, then that familiar rush of hunger came as the cool blood touched my lips. I pulled away faster than I would have normally because my hunger for Dan's blood was stronger than I was expecting.
He was O, a favored type among vampires. It being the universal blood donor, it's so hard to find because we aren't the only ones longing for it. I looked at my mark as saw the wound sucking up my venom and healing itself with ease.
"Good, that's what I like to see." I whispered to myself. I then drew my attention to Phil. I did the same thing to Phil as I did with Dan. Kissed where it was going to be, breathed in, opened wide and bit. I felt that same surge as I did from Dan.
Phil too was an O blood type. I couldn't tell if either were positive or negative because I was not use to such a rich blood type. I pulled away more slowly this time, just to make sure I did it right. Even though it nearly killed me not to suck. Phil's wound sucked up my venom quicker than Dan's, I noted. I wiped my mouth on a nearby tissue as the door unlocked and tough looking men came in.
"Sorry miss," One snarled. "No private viewings tonight." They then took Dan and Phil off without another word and pushed me down into the chair, to make sure I was out of the way.
I didn't make a fuss or complain, I did what I needed to do.
And that, for right now, was the best thing to do.