TWENTY FIVE

Thursday.

I got the shit kicked out of me last night and I don't know why, but I'm back at the hospital.

"Well, well, well. Look at what the cat dragged back in." Bella drops her cigarette to the sidewalk and grinds the smoldering butt under her toe, again with the lip licking. Again with the tormenting. "My little pep talk must have worked."

Masen is taking a piss in the alley and I have 24 seconds to get rid of her.

"I'm not here for you."

"Sure." She slips me a smile that is part sweet and part caustic, burning around the edges. As she flounces away Masen appears from the alley with a laugh under his breath, still tucking himself into his pants. He's been wearing the same jacket for days now. Red leather, roughed up enough that it looks like it's been put through a meat grinder.

"That girl likes you," he says, watching her disappear through the doors.

"No she fucking doesn't," I huff.

"This is gonna be fun." Masen rubs his hands together like we're going to an amusement park and he's planning which roller coaster to attack first. Which thrill he's going to stay away from. Which addiction he's going to ride over and over and over again until he's sick with dizzy exhilaration. I know that he'll fixate on Bella. She's the thrill that hoists you high in the air then drops you face first into the concrete on a broken bungee cord.

"You have to stay out here," I tell him.

"Why?" He looks put out, pissed off that I'm once again telling him what to do. "You really do like that girl."

"It's not about her."

He doesn't believe me.

I leave him sitting on the front steps and wander into the basement trying not to look suspicious. Trying to to cover bruises. Trying not to move my tongue too much. The hole in it still hasn't healed and I've eaten for days is my own blood. Bella just chain smokes and twists her hair with her fingers. Eye fucks me while Jane sobs over her own hair, which has started falling out. Jane looks like the skeleton of Dakota Fanning if you put her in a dress and too much lipstick. Walking around the party smiling extra pretty at everyone to disguise her slow crumble.

I glare at Jane so I won't glare at Bella.

Bella usually loiters around the coffee bar and scowls at anyone who comes near her during the one-on-ones. I make a break for her when she invites me with a tempting finger. She whirls out the door and I almost follow, but Emmett grabs me.

Presses me into his tits and starts to cry into my hair.

TWENTY SIX

Emmett cries forever. I don't come home until midnight.

Bella's dress is crumpled like a broken bird on the staircase.

She probably tripped over Masen on her way out of the hospital so I spend most of that night listening to them fuck each other down the hallway. I delete Masen. Insert myself. Drift off with my face in her pussy, sleepless dreams of eating her out. Dig my face into my pillow and wake up to my sheets stained with blood from my broken open nose.

It's the first time I've slept in a month.

TWENTY SEVEN

Out of the thirty guys at fight club, I tap Masen.

I regret it for a week.

I'm so fucking angry, it makes me stupid. I'm so sick of listening to him yell her name when he fucks her, it blinds me. The single night of sleep slaps a flimsy band aid over a big, black hole and makes me think I'm stronger than I actually am.

I don't even land a hit.

He almost kills me.

Puts a fresh hole in my tongue. Leaves my bloody wet faceprint on the asphalt. I can taste my spinal fluid burning the back of my tongue as he digs my face into the parking lot. He gives me one last pound to the back of the head before he gets off me and stalks off through the silent crowd.

It's the first time since our initial fight that he's actually participated.

TWENTY EIGHT

It takes four days for my bruises to bleed yellow and for Masen to show back up again.

I knock on his bedroom door and he answers it naked.

His dick is huge. Big the way improbable porn is big. It's standing straight up and staring at me, wet and dripping from the tip. I looked over Masen's shoulder and Bella is moaning into the mattress with her ass in the air.

Handprints and bite marks all over her.

Her eyes meet mine for a split second before Masen is laughing with the nearly manic one he saves for fight club.

"Care to join, Edward?"

"No," I huff and pull my eyes off Bella splayed out in his sheets. I've been listening to him plow into her for hours now. "Can you try to keep it down? Jesuschrist," I mutter.

"I don't fuck quietly. Neither does she. You should know that."

Masen slams the door in my face and I press my ear to wood, listening to them finish louder than they ever have before. Watching through the keyhole as Masen crawls back onto the bed and sinks his face into Bella's splayed pussy. Wincing through her scream when she cums around his tongue. He licks her clean before he thrusts his dick up into her, telling her that her asshole is the tightest he's ever felt. His fist grips her hair, yanking her harshly to her knees as she moans again. He whispers filth into her ear and rubs her clit as roughly as he thrusts. Her nails scrape four long ragged gashes up the length of his thigh that heal immediately and I shoot my load against the door.

I leave that shit where it lands and go to fight club alone.

There's a first time for everything.

TWENTY NINE

I go to the parking lot without Masen and beat the fuck out of some kid. An angel face with blonde hair and blue eyes. The Texas state flag tattooed across his shoulders.

I press him into the concrete hard enough to shatter his cheek and dip-dye his baby blues in blood. Pull his arms back and dig my knee into his spine, feeling the bones grind underneath me. Slam him into the parking lot, trying to indent the concrete with his pretty, pretty face.

I want to destroy something beautiful.

I let them pull me off him only when he's good and damaged.

THIRTY

Bella flounces into the kitchen, too pale and too lively for my taste. Her hair is snarled and her lips are swollen. There is a chain of bite marks around her neck. Costume jewelry punctures made by Masen's teeth.

"Good morning," she purrs at me and pours a cup of coffee. I glare at her behind her back and stab my cereal with my spoon. Her dress is pale pink taffeta and wilted tulle, stained and coming apart at the hem. Masen probably found it in some dumpster somewhere. It looks like the last dregs of someone's cliched prom night.

"Your dress should be burned."

She scowls at me. "Your mood swings give me whiplash."

"Sounds like you were thoroughly fucked last night," I grumble around my spoon, her moaning still echoing through the big empty rooms of my brain. Yes Masen. Fuck me Masen. Harder Masen. She probably smoked while she sat on top of him, flicking ashes off the bed and grinding away with practiced ease like she'd been doing it since grade school.

"You would know." Bella hisses and storms out the door, taking our last un-chipped coffee mug with her. She's probably accusing me of leering from the doorway last night. Staring at the dead jellyfish condoms in the toilet this morning long before I flushed them. The shitty, sweating palm of my hand. Hating myself for picturing her mouth around me instead of my fingers.

It felt so real, I was half tempted to ask her if we'd done it before.

THIRTY ONE

Masen appears the moment Bella is gone.

"Why isn't she dying?" I ask.

Masen eyes me carefully. "I hold back my venom."

"You can do that?"

"When I want to. Which isn't often."

I hate that fucking bitch. Without Masen, she would be nothing. Without her, Masen wouldn't be so fucking ruthless at fight club. He'd nearly killed me last Thursday and the hole in my tongue just wasn't going away.

"That girl is something else, Edward. You've got some fucked up friends."

"She's not my friend. She's your toy," I spit. "I thought it would be me but I guess I need a pussy and a pair of tits for that position."

"What the fuck are you talking about?" Masen snaps at me, flashing fangs.

"I should have been the first!" I yell. "After everything I've gone through? All of this!" I wave my hand in front of my broken face and growl at him. "You almost kill me, but you don't even try to bite me. She gives you a few fast fucks and you've got your teeth all over her. What the fuck, Masen?"

Masen unleashes his monster and I see all of his teeth.

Every single one.

THIRTY TWO

Masen grabs my hand and pins it to the table between us. He leans over and licks the back of it and it burns like hell is supposed to burn. Right through my skin and into my blood. Through my blood and into my bones. Volcanic pain. A hiss of smoke in the air as my skin starts to bubble.

I try not to think of chemical burns. Try not to think of searing flesh.

I am not here.

"Don't do that Edward. Come back to the pain. This is the greatest moment of your life, the beginning. Everything up until now has been meaningless," Masen hisses into my ear.

I am in Brazil.

On some tiny island surrounded by water. Sweet, clean, fresh water and there is so much of it, endless, but not enough to mask the smell of my skin starting to sizzle. Masen's lick is branding itself into the back of my hand, venom scorching my flesh. An entire forest fire, concentrated into an inch of space.

"The pain is the only thing that you have now." Masen grips me tighter when I try to pull away. I have cool blue water. "It is the only thing that proves you are actually alive." I have clean, cool air. "The pain is your salvation."

I am in Brazil and the breeze smells like salt.

"Look at it!" Masen demands. Yells. I try, but my eyes don't work. I'm crying down my neck, the collar of my shirt gone damp. "You can cry, but your tears will only make it worse."

I can smell myself, sweating, pissing. Barbequing.

I am not in Brazil.

"Can you feel it? The pain?" Masen asks.

I am not in the ocean.

"Yes," I moan.

I am being burned alive.

"Good, because one day, you won't be able to feel it anymore. You won't be able to feel anything anymore, so you better fucking appreciate it now." Masen leans over my charred hand and takes a solid whiff off the charcoal steam rising off my flesh. He splashes the last of a bottle of whiskey over it and the fire is gone. There's a swollen swipe of skin, purple at the edges, puckering the back of my hand.

"You're such an asshole," I gasp, still burning in pain. "You have no idea how bad that hurt."

Masen smiles slowly and holds up his hand, baring the back of it with its own puckered scar.

"You wanted it, you got it. You're one step closer to becoming a vampire."

THIRTY THREE

Angelface isn't so angelic anymore, thanks to me.

His lips are twisted off to the side, face misshapen where the bones didn't fuse back together just right. He comes back the next week and the stitches haven't even had time to set, still pulling at his skin to hold it all together, a jagged black line from his hairline to his chin.

Cheeks so swollen he can barely see. Nose so big he can barely breathe.

He taps Masen for a fight and I wonder if I damaged his brain.

Even though I think he won't, Masen agrees. It's quick and dirty, literally. Over before it's begun. Nothing but the sad, flat packing sound of Angelface getting more than he can take. The snap of stitches and the splitting rupture of teeth. Masen lifts him upright and throws him against the side of car while Angelface laughs and laughs and laughs through his beating.

"You crazy motherfucker!" Angelface howls, spitting blood. "You really are just as nuts as they say."

Masen's bloodshot eyes pool red, redder than I've ever seen them before. An ocean of blood. He pulls back his lips and bites.

Hard.

Ripping away a chunk of flesh from the boy's neck.

Angelface goes limp and the crowd around me stiffens. Masen drops the boy at his feet, his face dripping blood and his fangs on full display, hissing at the the men around him like a cornered animal. He wipes his sleeve across his face, smearing the blood across his jaw.

"What's the first rule of fight club?" Masen asks us and I can feel everyone around me shuffling their feet, mumbling the answer. "That's right. You don't fucking talk about it. Any of it. Ever." He bares his fangs again. "Or I'll kill you."

Someone in the crowd behind me mutters a hail mary.

Behind Masen, Angelface is pulling himself to his feet. His neck wound is lazily pumping blood, slowing to a trickle and his skin is hardening around the wound right before our eyes. Blue eyes floating in a crimson flood. Color draining down his neck until it's just pale skin and fiery red scars. He puts a hand to his mouth and growls in pain, but it isn't from his smashed up face. We all watch in fascination as he pulls his hand away.

A fresh set of fangs where his canines used to be.

Masen grabs him by the shirt collar and gives us one last deathly cold stare before hauling the reborn Angelface away.

"See you next week boys."

THIRTY FOUR

Masen is in the bathtub, which has seen better days. Someone must have tried to cook meth in here and everything went horribly wrong. It might explain the smell and the bathtub barely holds water. The enamel is burnt to a heavy grain sandpaper grit.

When your ass is made of stone, I guess things like that don't bother you.

I sit on the toilet and start to clean the blood off myself. I got tapped after Masen left and I did alright, but I certainly didn't win.

"If you could fight anyone in the world, who would you fight?" I ask him. I don't want to talk about what happened anyway. I have no idea where Angelface is, but I'm pretty sure he's somewhere close.

"Hemingway," he says.

"Ernest?"

"Who else? His piece, Hadley, she wanted to fuck me. He was not happy about it." Masen isn't cleaning anything, just sitting in the warm water with his skin steaming. There's still a bunch of dried blood caked around his mouth.

"When was this?"

"Mid nineteen twenties, I think. They divorced a couple of years later. Christ, that woman was beautiful. . ." He sounds nearly indulgent before he looks at me. "Who would you fight?"

"I'd fight Bella." I reach into my mouth and touch a tooth which promptly falls into my lap, gooey with blood and the still-writhing tentacles of tendons.

"That's fucked up, man. I think she'd beat the shit out of you."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." I pick the tooth up and contemplate shoving it back into place, but set it on the sink instead. "That girl is bat shit crazy."

"She's bat shit and crazy. About you."

"She doesn't like me." I shake my head, still prodding at my jaw. There are four teeth loose on the bottom and three on the top. They wiggle in their sockets, bolts of fiery pain through my jaw.

I couldn't kiss anyone right now, even if I wanted to.

THIRTY FIVE

I go to work with a hole in my tongue that just won't stop bleeding, lacing my teeth with red. I can swallow a gallon of blood before I start to feel sick. I know this, because I've done it. I write epic diatribes instead of punching numbers and make copies of them while I prod the bruised bones of my face. No one talks to me anymore and I wear a mask of raccoon eyes to keep them away.

Masen does nothing but fuck Bella and show up to fight club.

THIRTY SIX

Angelface reappears at fight club in new form.

He's still got those fangs and all of his color has drained away, even from the angry red scars that rip across his torn-up face. He looks like he's been put through the same meat grinder as Masen's jacket. The whites of his eyes are swimming in blood as though his head has been squeezed too hard.

He taps Masen.

Which has got to the stupidest thing he's ever done, other than tapping Masen the first time.

"No," Masen shakes his head.

"Fuck you, you cowardly shit! You did this to me." Angelface rips off his shirt and lunges at Masen, power housing him into a car. The whole thing skids sideways in a squealing grind of rubber. He tries to get at Masen's neck with those freshly sprung fangs.

"You owe me this," Angelface yowls against his skin. "You turned me into a monster!"

Masen bows momentarily under the weight of the furious, resurrected boy, growling as he finally slams Angelface into the ground. Cratering him through the concrete and crushed stones. Smashing the boy through the surface and leaning into the hole to set his fangs into the kid for a second time.

A chunk of Angelface's cheek comes away, his mouth now gaping twice as big. Masen spits out the remnants. It clatters to the asphalt and skitters loudly before it comes to rest.

"I gave you a gift, you ungrateful little shit," he snarls.