She was beautiful.

Chocolate locks piled high on her shoulders: dark and voluptuous. The large curls made soft pillows whenever she turned her head—a striking contrast to fair, rose-tinted cheeks that sparkled in sunlight. And the eyes—deep brown eyes—their breathtaking cruelty; no one could refuse their wordless demands. She wasn't human. She couldn't be human. No creature could ever be this unearthly. And yet, she could walk, speak, laugh, flirt, touch, kiss... and she could do them better than everyone.

Victoria

We had lived on the same street as kids, Victoria and I. In 3rd grade I crashed my bike into her mailbox. I had a bloody lip and a big bruise on my forehead. She helped me, gave me ice for my lip and band-aids for the scrapes. I remember feeling like she could handle anything. Like she was the adult, and I was the kid. I remember thinking it was the nicest thing anyone had ever done for me. From that day forward we were always together. Went to the same school. We rode the same bus. I remember we used to sit at the front together, giggling at whatever made ten-year-old girls giggle. She had one of those infectious laughs, you know? Once we got going, we couldn't stop. We'd laugh until our cheek muscles were sore and our ribs ached. No one laughed like her. No one.

I remember V was always boy-crazy, even as young kids. Her bedroom walls were covered with posters of pop stars and teen actors. I remember looking at them, feeling like they were alive. They stared at me as if I were an unwelcome visitor. So stupid, to feel intimidated by a poster, but I did. I was intimidated by her, too. She always knew what to do, how to dress, who to like, always in control—a few steps ahead of every conversation, knowing exactly what to say and when to say it. She knew what everyone was listening to, or what everyone was about to listen to. Everything came easy for her. Like, life had to keep up with her.

At 16 she started sitting at the back of the bus with the other kids. I didn't move. The transition must have been gradual but the memory of it is immediate: one day she was with me and the next she wasn't.

I guess—I think I'm ugly. My hair doesn't cascade down my shoulders and it doesn't burn cinnamon-chocolate in the sunlight. It sits flat and dull against my freckled, uneven skin. My eyes do little to help this whole situation. They try to be green but fail into a muddy gray sort of thing. I am shy. I'm not the life of the party. The other kids maybe think I'm strange—they don't talk to me. They live their fairy-tale lives and I'm not in them. The plexi-glass bus window twists my reflection. It shows the real me: Awkward. Wrong. Alone. V is giggling, somewhere in the back of the bus, but not with me.

"...you're too needy.Please, just leave me alone,"

"But you're my best friend.My only friend—"

"I can't be your only friend, not anymore."

My cheeks still flush when I think about that first day of senior year, when I think about her words. I was so desperate, back then. I despised the fact that she made me desperate. Two years away at college created distance, but I still carried her around. She was my permanent shadow. The routine of school helped; I reveled in the distraction of books, assignments, lectures, papers—it became my little oasis. I even feel normal in this place. I have friends. I laugh. I flirt. I touch. I kiss... Here, I am safe. Here, I can forget the plexi-glass and giggles.

Halloween was when my twisted reflection came back to haunt me.

I was at one of those college costume parties: kids, booze, drugs, sex—I never went to these parties in high school. I remember hearing stories though, the next day, of how wasted so-and-so got and how what's-his-name jumped off the roof into the pool. Some of them were about Victoria—I hated those stories the most. The boys she'd kissed or the boys she's done other things with. I remember imagining myself as her: beautiful and perfect, surrounded by people who wanted just to be near me. She was always somehow the center of everything. But things were different now. I was no longer imagining myself at parties—I was invited.

It was fall quarter of college, my second year. I remember my costume. I was a fairy, pixie thing. My wings were green, punctuating the mass of black and red and orange. Little wisps of organza barely passing for a dress hugged my waist, covering little of my thighs. A thick layer of make-up hid the uneven skin and a box of dye transformed my lifeless hair into cherry molasses. I passed for pretty, I think. And in my new little world, I think I was.

Until I heard her.

My heart stopped, and then skipped—the taste of "Witch's Brew" souring my tongue. I remember the twisting anxiety in my stomach as I turned to face the laughter I knew so well. Her white, feathered wings swayed as they moved, bodies in tandem, to the beat of the throbbing dance floor. Wisps of chocolate and cinnamon brushed his cheek as he moved across her face. She bit her lower lip in rehearsed pleasure. His hands slid down and rough lips nipped her throat where giggles floated up like bubbles in champagne. I could only stare. I was frozen. I could feel my pathetic wings beginning to tremble—heat licking up my body.

"Who's the Angel?"

Startled, I turned to see Jared standing next to me. I met him the first week of classes. We kissed. We fucked. I remember that look in his face just before sex—you know, that hunger. It was nothing to the expression that whipped across his face as he watched her. I'd seen that look before. I'd seen it everyday in high school. The obsession. Jared never looked at me that way. I never made his eyes burn. I just stood there, watching Victoria's thrall. Jared was dressed as a mad scientist—lab coat and chemical gloves. In his safety goggles I saw a sad, twisted green pixie reflected back. Plexi-glass.Giggles.It was back. I was sitting on the yellow bus, looking at my reflection: Awkward. Wrong. Alone.

"Victoria. Her name is Victoria."

Weeks passed and my world changed. She had transferred here from another school—Jared informed me—and was promptly the topic of conversation in my small circle of friends. She had them transfixed, distracted. I felt myself changing, closing up. Everyday I spoke less and less. I tried to stay rooted in this little world I'd built for myself but high school had followed me. It had found my oasis and was sucking it dry.

A tiny sliver of me, the pretty pixie on Halloween, tried to think beyond high school. What if she's different, now?Everyone changes.Everyone grows up.The small piece of my existence that I'd found at college fought to stay alive. It fought for me. It was braver than I was. I replayed my last conversation with Victoria. She doesn't care about me anymore.But the pixie had to know. The pixie had to find out. The pixie was the one who walked up to her one day after class.

"Victoria? It's me. Surprise." I squeezed my text book against my chest hearing the sound of my own voice. It was shrill and uneven. My skin turned cold as her gaze washed me over. My insides tightened, twisting. A brief flicker of recognition danced across her face before it was smothered by feigned ignorance.

"I'm sorry—" she smiled, "who are you?"

Awkward. Wrong. Alone.

I was mute. Frozen. I screamed for words, but the world gave me silence. She stood there watching me as a coiled arm slithered across her waist. Another snake. Rough lips found her neck, whispering in her ear, oblivious to my stupor. The corners of her mouth tightened in reaction to his touch, but her eyes never left my face. They bored into my existence with a lethal dose of disinterest, but I knew she knew me. We beheld each other, locked in eternity, until the snake pulled her down the hall. She laughed as he hissed into chocolate locks and I felt the air leave me, the pixie crushed in the wake of her giggle.

Sex. Alcohol. Drugs. And more sex. These were my new distractions. The only ones that actually worked. My oasis was gone—stolen. Who I had become was gone, and I was ugly, again. The molasses cherry had begun to fade revealing the lifeless color underneath. My color. Slipping. Slipping. The months. My grades. My friends. It was all slipping. They thought I was being irrational, my friends did. They called me a martyr, that I was choosing to be mad. Maybe they were right, but it didn't change anything. Their words just bounced off me—unaffecting, good advice. The past came back, and it still didn't want me. I thought about the person who I'd become these two years at college. The girl who could be pretty. The girl who had friends. The girl who went to parties. It was all a facade. I had run away—that was all. Nothing had really changed. The girl I'd deluded myself into thinking I'd become was just a mirage, a distorted reflection.

Time lost meaning as I lost myself in Dixie cups and rolling paper. The nights were a toxic mess and the days were merely the moments in between. I had a new circle of friends who wanted to escape like I did. We didn't care about ourselves or each other. We worked hard to obtain the absence of feeling: plants, fungus, paper, powder—whatever brought us closer to whatever.

I remember it being very late and very dark that particular night.

I remember the smells and the sounds. I remember we were everywhere. Someone decided to go swimming. I remember following the crowd—wasted on this new distraction. Halloween was in a week, and I needed as many distractions as possible. There were five or six of us. Some of them were kissing each other and some of them kissing me. Did it matter? The boy was everywhere. I watched him move from one part of my body to the other. It was all very slow—delayed: the kissing, the groping, the screaming. The screaming? He was screaming in my ear as a woman I didn't recognize stood behind him kissing his neck. She looked up, staring at me as I watched. The thin dark lines dripping from her mouth matched the color of her eyes: Red.

I felt delayed panic as pain ripped at my neck. I tried to move my arms but they were pinned to my sides. Rings of iron encircled my wrists. I froze as the swell of pain broke through my body. I listened to myself scream—it was thick and heavy in the air. The woman dropped the boy, her look curious as faceless lips tore my neck. Then a change, her expression blooming into a look I knew well: that burning. I felt, more than heard, her growl as she lunged toward the creature at my neck. The lips released me and I fell on top of the boy who had kissed me before he had screamed and turned cold. I watched the thirsty creatures tear themselves apart until flames filled my vision.

And then, it hurt.

I knew before my eyes opened that they were red. I knew before I inhaled that I would not need to. I knew before I looked in a mirror that I was different. This was a new distraction—a new escape. And it burned.

I was trembling as the inferno raged in my throat. Every piece of me was seared, charred. I couldn't remember how to move, how to think. I was silent. I was stone. I tried to remember my place in the world but time could melt now. Moments pushed against each other and then spread themselves thin. I fought to anchor my being somewhere—anywhere—but I couldn't win and the radiant flame was too hot. I stopped. The pain rejoicing as my will withdrew. I barely understood the small sound floating over my pyre:

"...result of the newborn frenzy."

Frenzy?

"...needs to feed. I'm taking her, Laurent."

Feed?

"...will not be responsible for her. Do what you like, James. Just see to her thirst before..."

Thirst? Thirst.

My body exploded at the sound of the word, everything springing to life. I knew this word without knowing. It all made sense—the fire, the stone, the cold. It all distilled into this basic understanding of my reason for being: thirst. I stood there trembling as I looked into the faces of the two men. Their eyes held the same color of the woman from before. Blood.I felt anger, confusion, and panic roll through my body. They raised their hands defensively, watching the emotions burn across my face.

"We're not going to hurt you. You need to feed. We can help." The blonde man's head turned sideways as he spoke. His nearly translucent skin wrapped tight across his body: each muscle threatened to tear through with the slightest movement. I watched him take me in. I felt his gaze pierce my being—he wanted it. He wanted me. I knew the expression well. I had seen it a hundred times. Only now, it was different. I was no longer a spectator—I was the spectacle. I felt a pull to run. Escape.His gaze ravaged my body; it made me feel sick. Run.I felt my insides twist as he walked toward me.

"Careful, James. She is new," sang a smooth, melodious voice. My eyes darted to the other man. His eyes glowed a beautiful, brilliant crimson against dark skin. He looked anxious. Wary.

The one he called James ignored his warning, moving closer—his eyes never leaving mine. He slithered. I felt liquid fire gurgle in the back of my throat as he reached out to touch my face. His fingers slowly slipped down my cheek landing on the contours of my collar bone. I screamed for my body to pull away from the creature, but I couldn't move. I was dead. Red eyes followed his touch as it fell down the middle of my chest, to my stomach, then resting on my hip. He bolted, quickly ensnaring my arm.

My body reacted as I pulled away with extraordinary ease; I was stronger. I was running. Escape.No, it was much different from running. I was hovering. Floating. Street lamps blurred into a single line of yellow in the dark. Escape. I could feel the creature behind. I could... smell him. It filled my body with acid, fueling my legs. Fear. Panic. Anger. I felt all these. I could smell them. Taste them. See them. Hear them. Sounds of the night whipped around me as I flew. I heard so many voices. Different from the two behind me and yet familiar. Human. They were swirling around my head, kissing my earlobes. One voice lifted above the rest. A laugh. A giggle. Stop.I inhaled the scent that followed, something overwhelming my mouth as a new level of pain filled my throat.

"Victoria," I whispered. I knew nothing else. The world was a smoldering pile of ember and ash. There was nothing but that voice, that scent in the chaos of this new nightmare. I followed the sweet sound; what else was there?

I saw her, pushed against the back of a house. There were familiar sounds coming from inside. A party. It tinged the air: vomit and sex. The music beat the atmosphere and I could feel the bodies move back and forth in it. Her breath was coalescing into soft clouds; each one coming quickly after the other disappeared. She was an Angel, just as she had been a year ago. Snowflakes dusted the wings that had been thrown at her feet. A soft fur shawl hung on her bare shoulders. I could see every goose bump on her thigh as it was furiously massaged by the boy in front her. That familiar, rehearsed smile danced on her perfect face that sent those giggles into the air. My vision was red.

I watched her smile melt into confusion as I moved behind the man undoing his belt. Her lips moved to speak but froze as the man was ripped from her. He landed somewhere behind me—his head splitting against a street lamp. I heard every fissure as they made small canals across his cranium. I felt the pull of his blood—it made me ache—but it was not enough to tear me away from the fragile creature before me. I'd felt her eyes on me before: dark, knowing, confident. They could hold me like no others could. They could consume me like no others could. Now they were wide and filled with panic. They would dart from me to the dead man bleeding on the street lamp—fear locking her limbs. I hated her. And I wanted her.

"Who are you?" I'd heard her ask the same question, but this was different. The voice from before was crushed velvet, not this ragged and frightened whimper. I felt a smile that wasn't mine creep up my lips. It blossomed into a mixture of pure joy and terrible sadness. I shuddered at the combination, new and terrifying, sweeping through my body. The frenzy. The thirst. She started to run as the emotions enveloped me, but I was faster. My fingers snatched her wrist, her scream covered by the deafening house music. I could sense the creature James watching me, but he made no move to get closer. I could feel his smile. Victoria was clawing at my hand now—her ugly, beautiful face contorted in fear. I laughed.

"It's me. Surprise." I listened as the words slipped off my tongue—my voice was smooth, like liquid. I clocked the flicker of recognition but feigned ignorance didn't follow. She saw me. She had always seen me. But this time, she couldn't turn away. I felt her renewed attempts at escape as fear, guilt, and pain, played all over her—my grip was iron. An instinct I can only define as divine took over as I felt tiny, erratic heart beats pumping in her wrist. It was too much.

I bent down and kissed her neck like I'd seen it kissed by so many before. Her skin was hot and smooth; it was the sweetest thing I'd ever touched. She smelled like I imagined. It made me homesick for a place I never knew. When her blood hit my tongue hysteria took me. I was everywhere: her shoulders, her wrists, her chest, her lips. Her lips. I felt myself shake as sobs escaped my body. They didn't come with tears—just empty, involuntary shudders. I moved furiously across her face with a sense of urgency, kissing and hurting, as her arms weakened. Her eyes rolled into her head. Her last breath swirled in my mouth as her heart stopped. It was euphoria, my second death that night.

I let go and her lifeless body slipped to the ground. Still. Cold. I was free. I was full. I was empty. The first hints of morning sun illuminated her skin, accentuating the scatter of my half-moon kiss across her body. Her fur shawl was lying at her feet. It was white and remained untouched by the chaos. I picked it up, absently, and laid it across my shoulders. I looked up into the window and froze at the reflection looking back at me.

She was beautiful.

Ember locks piled high on her shoulders: bright and voluptuous. The large curls made soft pillows whenever she turned her head—a striking contrast to her albescent cheek that sparkled in the sunlight. And the eyes—her eyes—their breathtaking cruelty; no one could refuse their wordless demands. She wasn't human. She couldn't be human. No creature could ever be this unearthly. And yet, she could walk, speak, laugh, flirt, touch, kiss... and she could do them better than everyone.

I stood there, transfixed by the image in the glass as a coiled arm slithered across my waist. The blonde terror tightened his grip as he looked in the window. He hissed into my scorching locks, "Who are you?"

I shuddered as his hand traced the bumps of my spine. I was his, no matter how many times I escaped. He would always find me. I looked at the couple staring back at me in the glass. I had seen them before. I'd seen them at high school. I'd seen them at parties kissing and laughing and touching. They were beautiful. They were everything I wanted. They were everything I hated. The fur fluttered in the breeze filling my head with her scent, disgusting and divine.

And something locked.

I looked into the glass and smiled that rehearsed smile I'd seen so many times before. A small giggle escaped my lips as I spoke:

"Victoria. My name is Victoria."