It wasn't even ten when I felt the first vampire in the living room downstairs. Jessica felt it too and from where she sat at her desk behind me, growled. "That's Lira for ya." I simply shrugged the comment off and looked back at the painting I had been working on, and hoped I could use to get out of the bash.
I had been up most of the day. I had gone back to the old woman's shop and gotten a few more canvases. She asked relatively civil questions and I would answer them to the best I could without compromising her sanity. I had gotten five more easels and was now on my second painting since returning.
The first one had been a simple painting of Risika's face with her tiger stripped hair behind her. Her black eyes glowing on her pale face, and the slight smirk daring you to ask her what she wanted from you. Jessica had demanded that I make a copy and let her keep it. I laughed and told her to buy me a larger easel and I would paint her bigger. She liked that idea.
The painting I was working on no was just a simple figure. Painted on a white background. The girl had unusual black tipped hair that traveled down the length of her body. The white dress she was now wearing was hiked up around her knees with her hand pulling it away form her body like she was dancing. Her blue eyes a live but at the same time I had somehow, even in with the first coat only on, made them seem tragic. She was beautiful, dusty tan skin, light lips that were all smiles right now.
I push my hair behind my ears again and put both of my hands on my knees. I look at her again and sigh. Jessica looks at me and smirks. "You know, you're almost as much of a work-a-holic as I am now." I look at her and smirk.
"Except I actually take breaks." Jessica sighs and after looking at the easel for a minute stands up. She walks over and stands behind me. I look at her and then follow her eyes to the painting.
"Who is she?" I shrug.
"I don't know." She looks at me quizzically.
"Really?" I nod. She shakes her head. "The way you were so quite for that three hours there, I though you were paining you best friend. I shake my head.
"I don't really have any friends. Out side the undead." She nods.
"Know the feeling." She was looking at the painting again. I don't look up as a pair of boots stops at the door. I knew it was Aubrey and I knew that there were a growing number of people downstairs. Jessica looks at him though and shakes her head looking at the painting again. Aubrey sighs and walks into the room. He stands next to Jessica and looks where she was looking. He doesn't say anything for a second.
"You know, you're supposed to be down stair right now," his voice was bothered and slightly tired. He looks at me and then the painting. Jessica sighs and shakes her head.
"I don't wanna." I could tell that Aubrey was now glaring at her by the way Jessica took a step to her right. She drops her shoulder and walks toward the door. Aubrey follows her but stops before shutting the door.
"Nice job," he winks slightly and walks out of the room. He had seen the other paintings I had done, seeing as I just left them exposed leaning against the bookshelves.
I sigh again and pick up my brush to paint more but put it back on my knee. She was perfect as she was. And I didn't know my skills well enough yet to think that there was anything else I could do to make her more life like. I sit back on the stool and look at her some more. I put my brush down and moving the stool move to sit on the table like I always did.
I was getting better with every painting. This was the best so far. But it still wasn't far from my painting of Christopher and Nikolas. I close my eyes for a second and mentally search the downstairs. He was here. Changing his energy a little so he didn't stick out too much. All of them had only a small difference from him to her or to the guy across the room. But I could feel Nikolas through all of them. Nissa and Christopher wouldn't, or rather weren't here. There was only one thing wrong with his energy. It was heading for the stairs.
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It wasn't long. He knew exactly where I was and he knew I knew where he was. As the door opened, my eyes were closed and my picture of this white goddess was in my head, her thick white skirt twirling around her as she twirled in the middle of a large tree lined field.
He laughs a little. "Who would have thought it would have been this easy." I smirk and open my eyes slowly. He seemed slightly impressed with the power there.
"Obviously not you." He smirks wider. Still thankfully he hadn't noticed the paintings leaned against the bookshelves. He shakes his head slowly.
"Well, Sarah there you are correct." I wasn't going to tell him my new name. "I never thought we would find you. I figured a person of your mind would have the mind to go further away." I smirk.
"There as no need," I say standing from the table and walking over to the easel. I pick up the white maiden and after covering it with a sheet place it in the line with the others. Only then did he see them. The first Dominique's inner person. The picture of himself and his brother, back to back. The lone one of Nissa. The duet of Jessica and Aubrey. Risika's face in a world of her hair. And now the off place one of this maiden in white. "I have all I need here." I pick up a clean canvas and carry it to the easel. He looks down the line and then at me where I sat in front of it.
"You will never cease to amaze me, will you?" I look at him. As he asked the complex question, there was a softness in his voice that I had only ever heard him use on Christopher. I shake my head and look at the white expanse.
"I have never tried to amaze you, Nikolas," I look at him with a smirk now, "It just works out that way." He smirks back and walks over to the line. He looks at the one of the white maiden. He tilts his head and looks at it.
"Who is she?" I shake my head.
"I don't know," I say truthfully. He looks at me and smiles.
"Yes you do, because I know her." He looks at her again and smiles even softer. With him standing in relative proximity to the girl I knew her without a second look. She used to call herself Kristin. I smirk.
"I would have never placed her," I say with a chuckle. He nods.
"She went back," I look at him again, "With her family." I nod.
"I wish we all could. She has it pretty damn good," Nikolas laughs a little.
"I guess she does, doesn't she?" I look at him again and lightly bite my lip. He looks up at me and smirks softly. "You know you have a place there, with us, don't you?" I look at him, not really answering. After a few seconds I look back at the blank canvas.
"I don't know where I belong anymore." He cringes a little, mentally mind you, his face staying completely null.
"Well, then I guess I'll have to make you see, won't I?" I look at him and lift an eyebrow slightly.
"What?" He walks over to me and taking my hand stands me up and walks me out of the room. He pulls me slightly out the door and down the stairs. As we enter the tangle of living and dead people, blood-bonded and otherwise, I was once again, just as the few times I had been to a bash before, felt out of place.
"You're aren't so different anymore," He says in my mind as if reading my thoughts. He leads me through the gaggle of feeding vampires and to where Jessica and Aubrey were sitting in the kitchen at the table, well Jessica was sitting on the table and Aubrey was next to her. Risika was in the doorway on the other side of the room and as Nikolas pushed me through, I was aware of the others that were watching me.
There were two girls on the other side of the door that were looking at me. I could see Nikolas' marks on their arms. Then another one walks up next to them and I could see the small K carved into her shoulder. I mentally smirk and walk into the room like nothing was out of the ordinary. Jessica smiles at me.
"Didn't think you would come out." I smirk and her and shrug walking over to the fridge and getting out Aubrey's iced bottle of vodka. He looks at me and shakes his head and I take a drink.
"I like it," I say in a childish voice and nod toward the bottle. I walk out of the door and in to the room Nikolas had pushed me from. He looks at the bottle and I hand it to him walking back in the room and over to Risika, Faster than she could stop me I steal the pack of cigarettes from her pocket and her lighter. I take a cancer stick and light it handing the two things back to her and taking a drag of the single lit cigarette. I walk back out of the room and take the bottle form Nikolas without batting an eyelash.
He laughs and follows me out the front door. He sits down next to me on the porch swing and smiles looking at me as I alternate between drinking and taking drags. He smiles and shakes his head. "Are you sure you still need to stay here?" I look at him and shrug.
"Where would I need to go?" I take another drag. "I have all I need here." He nods.
"But, trust me on this, there are things there than need you." I look at him and take a drink, quickly after taking a prolonged drag.
"How is the slugger?" He smiles and nods.
"He's been worse, but, at the same time, he's been better. At least he feeds normally again." I smirk.
"Saw that," I say nodding toward the house. He looks at me and smirks.
"You're still amazing me Sarah."
"Cera," I say, "I changed my name. I'm not a Vida anymore. And I'm not the same Sarah." He nods.
"That's quite apparent." He was now looking at the cigarette and vodka. "You aren't the same Sarah Vida. So Cera, what would you do? Will you stay here and keep getting whacked out or will you come back soon?" I smile.
"I'll be back. I only need a little more time." Nikolas seemed to be thinking it over and smiles after looking at the moon and stars.
"Yes, it would seem you do." It was a while that we sat there in the comfortable silence. Both of us looking at the moon high in the sky. The only sound was the night and the gentle exhale I made while letting the smoke out and the even gentler sloshing of the vodka as I drank it, and every now and then, Nikolas.
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It was a few more days on that before I was willing and able to risk walking in the sun. I would walk to the park about four in the afternoon and sit under one of the dense trees. I would watch and sketch the teens as they skated and walked round. The elderly, as they played chess on the south side. The businessmen as they took their late lunch with their cell phones and laptops on the north side not to far from the firms and cubicles.
There were several people in the area that I took an interest in after only a short time. One was a boy who looked like he was in his later-teens but that still hung around the thirteen and fourteen-year-olds. He had bushy brown hair that as he wore the black helmet clung to his cheeks and ears. There were pads on his elbows and knees though he managed to make them look fitting. The low black vans were untied and hung off his keels as he walked. He was of average height and lanky. I had to have drawn his face five times. He wasn't anything special, just an interesting person to look at.
The other was a woman who was lying on a bench on between the skate-park and the south end. She was wearing tighter pink pants with a hunter shirt. Her brown hair, she held in her head above her head. Her eyes were squinted as she read the white pages in the harsh dying sun. There were older Reeboks on her feet, the tops of her socks just visible over the tops. Her hunter shirt matched the bench she sat on so well, at the distance I was at, I couldn't tell the difference. But when she sat and leaned over her book, you were in clear sight of her cleavage over the end of her shirt. Again there was nothing special about her, I just found her interesting.
By the time Jessica came to get me to hunt, the sun was gone and the park, all but deserted. I liked listening to the life here. But I still was more than ready to go.
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Like cold glass on my back the rain cut through my shirt. I looked down on the blackened ground, asphalt. The water making it look, reflectable in the security light from the side entrance to the bar. The thin black shirt and the black jean pants, my pale skin was a strong contrast to it. Then there was the little noticeable fact that my usually perky blond hair was sticking to my head my eyes closed. And if you were close enough, you might have been able to smell the tint on blood on my breath. In the rain though, you could see the crimson tears as they traveled down my cheeks.
Maybe, even after all of this, I'm just not cut out to be a vampire. I made to fit the mold of a witch and the two molds are to different, the transition would kill even the strongest witch. And I wasn't even one of the strongest.