We'd begun to disperse from the amphitheater. For the seventh consecutive year, we preyed on the living. A base act which I'm never eager to expound upon.

It was the usual routine: a man, woman, and a couple children. Anger. Bargaining. Crying. Shrieking. Thrashing. The warmth transferring from their bodies to ours.

I'm not proud of it. I never have been. It's just our way of "life". Everyone had their own reasons. The majority were just too hungry to resist.

I'm not sure any of us feared death. At one point or another, each of us had attempted suicide.

Nothing worked.

Amanda and Josh "killed" me and the rest of the town. But my consciousness never wavered. Even when I melted to a pool at their feet, I was always aware. I knew, somehow, I'd be back.

It took just one day.

"Ray!" It was Karen who called out my name. Through the shambling corpses, she weaved to catch up to me.

"Hey! That was a good yield, huh? Don't you feel refreshed?" The corner of her mouth caught my eye. There, a solitary, almost luminescent crimson drop of blood clung. Contrasted with her innocent, beaming face, my stomach rolled.

"Karen." I hissed in disgust. "Your mouth." Her expression was one of confusion, then remorse. She hastily scrubbed it away with her forearm.

"Sorry," she whispered sheepishly. "I forgot how much this bothers you."

"It doesn't bother you?"

"Well," she considered it a moment. "I mean. We're not killing them. They get to join our community. Right? I mean, it's like one life to the next... Right?" Her tone was cheerful, but it was a shell. Beneath it, I could sense the hollow lack of conviction. Karen had a habit of putting optimistic spins on everything. Initially, a charming quality. As the years passed, however, I grew tired. Of her, this town, its inhabitants, and everything else.

""Life"". I echoed, narrowing my stare.

"Ray." Karen sulked. "How are we supposed to live with ourselves if we think of ourselves as... murderers...?" She lowered her head. As she had a penchant for sugar coating the cold truth of reality, she also had a habit of making me feel guilty. For all of her faults, Karen and I were practically inseparable. It pained me to see her distraught.

"I'm sorry." I muttered, still agitated.

I'm so sorry, Amanda

"I worry about you, Ray. You've always been kind of distant. But you seem like you're, I don't know..." She paused. Either she was uncertain or reluctant to continue. "Like you're drifting away. You've been like this since-"

"You know what I said." I barked at her, annoyed she nearly violated our agreement. Years ago, I made it clear never to mention Amanda by name. Somehow, it made me feel sick. The dead weight of my stomach flittered when attention was called to her. I felt joyful and alive and depressed and anxious all in one blow.

There was another obvious shift in mood after my verbal lashing. Karen withdrew further into herself, and the reason grew more and more obvious with the passing years. She and I had gotten close, especially in the few most recent years. I knew she had feelings for me. And I'd be lying if I said I didn't share the sentiment. To some extent.

But it felt wrong. From the moment Karen confessed, my mind was inundated with what Amanda's life must be like. I wanted to know where she was. Who she was with. Where she was going to school. When, exactly, her birthday was. I know that I don't belong here. As much as it pained me to think it, the last thing I wanted was to be stuck with Karen. Forever frozen in this photograph of a town. With the shells of citizens and our hollow, meaningless lives.

Amanda was life. I wanted her because she was a change. And the worst part was, even if I escaped this town, even if I could make her love me, I'd always be a child. And I'd never get over her rejecting me that night. I hated being undead, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, yet the thought of her resistance maddened me.

I could stop all of it if I simply found and slaughtered her. It was my only solution. Nothing else could be done. Nothing could be repaired. I needed to do it while she's still young. While she's still close to the physical form I remember and despise. Close to a form I grew to love.

As to what I'd do beyond her demise was unknown. It didn't matter. I had a purpose beyond this stagnant cesspool. Beyond Karen and her foolish proclamations of love. I wouldn't be tethered to her or anyone else who toiled away uselessly here.

There had to be more.

"I wish you weren't so guarded, Ray." Her voice was a low and broken whisper. In confidence, I revealed my repulsive secret to her. She knew of my feelings for Amanda. And my strong reactions to her mention, or lack thereof, was always an indication.

It pained Karen's still, petrified heart.

"I'm sorry. Again." I sighed. "But you know how that makes me feel."

"Because you love her?" She had another habit. This one, however, was far uglier. Any time I rejected her, or even made vague allusions to Amanda, her jealousy was palpable. She'd turn Amanda against me like a blade.

"Don't do this to me. Karen."

"She's out in the real world, Ray. With people who sleep, eat, and live with purpose. We're here. And you're the only thing that makes me care about staying alive. You helped me-"

"Don't say it." She'd mentioned it to me before, and I didn't want to hear it again. Not when she was in one of her moods. Because she always twisted it.

"You made me feel better about killing." The corner of her lip- where a small red stain was now- curled just barely. "Now, I gladly consume blood. It fills the void. It makes me warm. And it's something we share."

"That's our bond? The blood of the living?"

"Forget about her. Please." She was getting closer to me. I could smell the copper on her breath. Overwhelming and foul. The inner lining of her mouth was coated with the thick, shimmering liquid.

She was savoring it.

I turned away from her and drew in a fresh breath of air. I didn't need to breathe, but I needed to clear my head of that scent.

"We're just corpses." I spat at her, low and bitter. "This isn't life, and I won't continue to live this way. Not forever." What I imagined to be Amanda's life now played itself out in my head. I saw her in school. I saw she was taller than I am now. I could see her scraping her knee. Fresh blood. I could see the warm, pink blotches in her cheeks. Approaching a boy her age. A crush. I could see a rich, fulfilling future laid out before her. Children. Marriage. A husband. A wedding. And I was there. Always behind her. A photograph of a boy she wouldn't look at anymore. Frozen in time. Frozen in her past.

And Karen was beside me.

"You can't die. None of us can." She rested her freshly-warmed hand on my shoulder. I instinctively shrugged away.

"You can't die, Ray. And neither can I. But she-"

"Don't." I snatched her wrist. "Just stop talking." I could see thin scarlet lines forming on her lower eyelids. She was close to tears now. And all the damned could cry was the blood of our victims. Another trait which disgusted me. I took a step back, simultaneously releasing her wrist.

"You have to get used to this, Ray. There's no other way to live. And you told me that." It was true, I had. And though it was only a handful of years ago, it felt like a lifetime. Karen was barely able to live with herself for the first year or two. She refused to eat for nearly two years. I comforted her for much of that time. We bonded. We discussed our aspirations, back when this somehow seemed temporary. I convinced her all would be well. We drank together. We laughed with bloodstained teeth. We hugged in the cold, dead light of the moon. We laid in the cemetery and went cold with the ground around us at night. We looked at the stars and played head games with the humans who would come along annually.

That was life, for a while.

Life.

"I can't live like this." My throat stressed the word so hard it went hoarse. "Karen, I'm losing my mind. It's only been seven years." I advanced toward her, closing the gap between us once more. "It's been seven years and I'm already losing my grip. I'm already forgetting how to be human. I'm forgetting how to be undead. I'm forgetting everything. Every day is listless and grey. It all runs together and I'm losing time. I'm losing time and somehow it doesn't matter." I seized her shoulders. My hands were long, sinewy talons.

"You're becoming something I don't even recognize. Everyone else is the same way. I look in the mirror and I'm what I've always remembered. But I don't see anything there anymore. Do you understand me? How do I live another seven years? Another seventy?"

"Ray..." Her eyes widened. A solitary red line cut her cheek. I could sense her anguish. And a fear equally as palpable. Somehow, I knew this was only the first time she was considering the consequences of unending existence. In the entire town, I'm not sure anyone had the thoughts I did.

"Do you get it now? If nothing else, do you understand?"

"Ray, please. Stop." Her voice was uneven. I could feel her muscles slacken and shake in my grip. "We have to make it work somehow. We can't die."

We can't die we can't die we can't die

Like an ouroboros

Swallowing its tail

Without fail

She says to me:

We can't die

"Don't say that to me. Not Amanda, not immortality... Nothing." She took the lapels of my coat into each hand and bunched them up. It was purely a psychological reaction, but she was still quivering.

"Please, just calm down. You're really, really scaring me. We don't have to talk about any of it. Let's just go back to your house." The suggestion seemed to ease her trembling. "And just watch something stupid on TV."

My hands slid down her arms, lingering on the elbows before dropping to my sides. Her evasiveness only worsened my despondency. But I was losing the will to fight it. I didn't have enough strength left to raise her to the surface. She was drowning with everyone else. And she seemed convinced I should drown too.

"Yeah."