Please note that Cari isn't always angsty. But this was a dramatic change in her life and she does have previously existing problems to deal with. Also-good news: Chassidy does stay out of the situation with Demyx. And I've always felt that Zexion should be the very curious type.
Chapter 11: Adding Frustration
Cari growled silently as she sat down on her bed. This wasn't how she wanted things to go at all. Things were going to get too complicated. And she didn't like that very much. Her life had already become complicated enough—more so than it needed to be. Because in truth, she'd only ever wanted a normal life. Well, normal to her standards. But now that was out of her reach. The chance for a normal life had been abandoned when she became a vampire. And now she'd been hurdled into a life she had even less control over.
Scooting back against the wall, she drew in her legs and loosely wrapped her arms around them. She rested her forehead on her knees and sighed. She felt tears begin to form in her eyes.
Today was hardly what she considered good. How could it be? Demyx had been attacked. And Larxene, who Cari wasn't sure what to truly think of, had shown up, making her day even more stressful. Now, besides finding whoever had created the issue involving Demyx, she had to keep Larxene under control at least some. If she'd had any good luck before, it seemed to have just run out.
She wanted so badly to scream. But she didn't. Or rather, she really just couldn't. Not if she wanted to keep people from worrying. She didn't like others worrying about her. And it wasn't like she could just be honest about it and say that she wasn't fine. She preferred not to bother anyone else with her problems. She'd rather keep it to herself, considering everyone had something wrong in their life.
And right now, she was far from fine. Her emotions were in utter turmoil. She couldn't stand it. While she knew she'd be this way, she couldn't stop it. She couldn't help feeling sad. Feeling empty, hurting inside, being angry—hating herself.
She hated herself now. She hated herself for all the mistakes she made. For being reckless. Doing stupid things. Almost getting herself killed. And for hurting her friends. She couldn't forgive herself. Others would have said it was alright, and were she standing in their shoes, she'd say the same. Forgiving others was always easier than forgiving herself.
She blinked and tears began rolling down her cheeks and staining her glasses. This wasn't how she wanted things at all. She didn't want to be a vampire. But she hadn't wanted to just die and leave her loved ones sad. That would have hurt even worse.
She hated that she had to drink blood. Or at least, drink it as often as she did. It wasn't that she hated blood. It was delicious. And essential to her health. It was just, she was concerned about others. She didn't want to hurt anyone by drinking their blood, and she couldn't go on just animal blood.
It made her feel horrible. Loving the taste of blood so much. She'd never had something so delicious before. But she hated it, too. It made her feel like a monster. Well, technically, she was a monster. But she felt even more like one.
Why did vampires have to be attracted to blood so easily? It was tempting even thinking about it, let alone being around it. An open wound, if only bleeding a bit, smelled sweeter than honey to her. How tempting it was had already been proven twice in one day.
When Demyx had been attacked, she'd smelled the blood all the way in the cafeteria. Even at such a distance, it was tempting her slightly. And then finding Demyx, it was even harder to resist. Truthfully, she'd barely kept herself restrained by reminding herself that he was already hurt.
And when she'd come home, and Vexen had cut his finger, she'd hurried to heal it. Sure he'd had a reason. He was worried about her. But still, that was no call for doing that. Vexen may know some things about vampires, but he had no idea how tempting the smell of blood was to them. She found it shocking how he could have done something so reckless. So not him.
Cari grabbed her mp3 player and put the head phones on, the kind that had that looked like a headband and connected the ear pieces. She didn't like the ear buds, because she went through them like candy almost. She figured they weren't really made to last long. And she didn't much care for the headphones with the band that wrapped around the back of her head, either. But that was mostly because she found it tedious to almost constantly pull her hair out from under it.
Just as she turned her music on, she heard her cell phone go off, playing yet another favorite song as her ringtone, which was currently now starting one of the few Japanese songs she had courtesy of Yuki. She put the mp3 player in her pocket and grabbed the phone and looked at the caller ID. She definitely didn't recognize the number. She pulled back one of the ear pieces and tucked it behind her ear, something she did commonly, and went ahead and answered anyway.
"Hello, Cari," she heard a feminine voice chime.
"Hello," she said, as calmly as she could. Though it wasn't easy, seeing as how her voice was broken, she managed. "May I ask who's calling?"
"Don't tell me you forgot the sound of my voice!" the person said, sounding overdramatically offended. "It's me, you know, your best friend."
Cari blinked a few times. The voice was familiar, and the overdramatic tone was unmistakable. She almost smacked her forehead. "Don't tell me," she said, cheering up significantly. "Chassidy, right?"
"Of course," said Chassidy. "Who else could it be?"
Cari pictured her golden haired friend with that feral grin plastered on her face. Highly doubtful she'd changed any.
"So how'd you manage to get my cell number?" asked Cari. She could only imagine how she got it. "I thought you lost the phone numbers after your last move."
"How'd you know I lost the numbers", Chassidy asked, laughing a nervously, something she wasn't known for doing much in the past.
"Just a guess", Cari said, now herself grinning. It was so like her to lose something.
"I'm not that predictable, am I?" asked Chassidy.
Cari laughed. "Sometimes you are", she said. "I can totally see you losing yet another phone number. It's not that hard."
"You've turned into a real smartass since you moved," Chassidy grumbled. "Be nice, or I'll have you mucking out stalls when I take over the world."
Cari laughed again. Chassidy hadn't changed at all. Still that same smart-alecky attitude. And that same 'take over the world' joke. One that she now thought of as simply amusing and nothing else. Hardly taken seriously as she had when her friend first told her.
"Yeah, right," Cari said, still laughing a bit. She rolled her eyes. "Like that could happen in a million years."
"It could!" Chassidy snapped back, sounding overdramatically frantic. "You don't know that it couldn't!"
"Whoa, calm down," Cari laughed. "Besides, I think I actually have a better chance of that then you now." This was going to be quite enjoyable to mess with Chassidy. So long as she didn't slip out her secret, anyway.
"Oh, really?" Chassidy asked skeptically.
"Yeah, really," Cari came back with, her tone now slightly mocking.
"Oh, really?" Chassidy stretched out her words even more. "What makes you think you could take over the world and not me?"
Cari chuckled musingly. "Because," she taunted.
"Because why," Chassidy asked, apparently almost laughing.
"Just because," Cari taunted again.
"Tell me," Chassidy demanded now.
Cari laughed. "I'm kidding," she said. "I'd never do that. I was just messing with you. So calm down."
"That was mean," Chassidy said, probably pouting.
"Where do you think I got it?" Cari retorted.
"Yeah, yeah," Chassidy grumbled. "Smartass."
Cari shook her head. "Now, back to my earlier question," she said. "How'd you get my number?"
Chassidy seemed to pause, obviously calming down a bit. "Yuffie told me, of course," she said. "I found her number just the other day and called her."
"And then you questioned her for mine," said Cari.
"Yeah, pretty much," said Chassidy.
"And she snapped at you," said Cari.
"Yup," Chassidy quipped.
"Figures," said Cari. She laughed, picturing her raven haired cousin giving Chassidy the riot act through the phone. And Chassidy squinting her eyes closed and holding the phone about two inches away from her ear as Yuffie yelled. And of course, her brother, Zack, trying to calm her down. "She has a few anger issues."
"Yeah, well I guess it runs in the family, then," said Chassidy.
Cari jerked at that statement. "Hey!" she snapped angrily.
"See what I mean?" said Chassidy. Cari could picture a smug grin on her face. "Runs in the family."
Cari rolled her eyes. "So, anyway. How have you been lately?"
"Good," said Chassidy. "We're getting packed up again."
"You're moving again?" Cari asked, surprised. "But you just moved last year. What happened now?"
"Dad was offered a good job, so now we're moving," said Chassidy.
"How soon are you moving?" asked Cari.
"Thursday," said Chassidy. "Most of our stuff is already packed up."
"Really," said Cari. "So that's how you found Yuffie's number. Ok. So where are you moving to?"
"Take a guess," said Chassidy, who sounded like she was trying to hold back laughter.
"By any chance, is it Twilight Town?" asked Cari. She would not be at all surprised if it were. It was as if fate was working to make her life even more complicated than it needed to be.
"Yup," said Chassidy. "I'll be going to the same school as you again. Lucky, huh?"
Cari rolled her eyes a bit, and, as enthusiastically as she could, gave a, "Yeah." "That is lucky. How soon will you be enrolled at the high school?" She sighed inwardly, though. Lucky, indeed.
"Already am," said Chassidy. "So I'll be starting at the end of the week."
"Ok, that's good," said Cari.
But she mentally groaned. While she loved her friend dearly, this was only going to add another complication to things. And it was highly doubtful that they could get the current issue dealt with before Chassidy got there.
"When I get there, you've got to introduce me to your friends," said Chassidy.
Cari smiled. "No problem," she said. "We'll show you around when you get settled in."
"Can't wait," Chassidy chirped. "Well, I'd better go. I had to beg my parents to let me call you. They wanted to make it a surprise."
"Yeah, ok," said Cari. "Bye. See you soon."
Cari closed the phone and set it down on her bed, groaning. Things were not going to get any easier now. And of course, Chassidy had to be just as adventurous as her. Now she'd not only have to worry about her friends who were already here, but now she'd have to worry about Chassidy, too. Why couldn't her life just be simple anymore?
Trying to relax, she pulled the ear piece back over her ear. She laid down on her bed, pulling her mp3 player back out. It was still playing Still Doll, but she didn't want to listen to it now. So she flipped through them for a while, and finally found a good song to hopefully cheer herself up.
Zexion sighed as he got up from the chair at his desk and went over to sit down on his bed. He looked out the window on the other side of his room. For some reason, he couldn't help but think something was going on. Something seemed to be wrong—or at least different. He had no clue what it really was. But he felt like it had something to do with Cari. And it wasn't just that they were now dating.
He couldn't explain it, but there was something different about her besides her improved athletic abilities. Whatever was different was a complete mystery to him. And he was driving himself crazy trying to figure it out. Something about her changed over the summer. Maybe it was just his imagination, though. Or maybe it wasn't. If it wasn't, there was obviously something Cari wasn't telling him about herself.
But he couldn't possibly imagine what she wouldn't tell him. It was a ridiculous thought. And if she did hide something, it couldn't be that important, could it? Well, maybe it could. But she wouldn't, right? He'd been thoroughly honest with her since they started talking. And until she'd returned from camp, he was under the impression she'd been the same.
He honestly didn't know. But ever since she'd come back from camp, there was a huge difference. No, even before that, there was a difference. The day right after their first date, she was different. It was probably because she was just happy, though. That seemed to be the only thing he could think of.
But something seemed to be missing—some piece of the puzzle that he knew he'd seen, but couldn't think where or when. It was like a blip in his memory, like a mystery within the mystery. His memory was impeccable. What could he have forgotten? And why? It was frustrating him. He couldn't stand not knowing something important. But he was going to find out. Some way and somehow, he was going to solve that little mystery. He just needed to know what was going on.
To Be Continued