The next day my head ached. I felt like crap. Fighting with Nik always made me feel like crap. I hadn't been myself, I'd just woken up from one hell of a nightmare, and I was panicking – which resulted in some things that I really should not have said. Nik shook me so hard my skull nearly cracked the headboard. Then he left – without answers. That was to my credit.
But serving drinks did not help the guilt.
It did not help the urge.
"I'll be back," I said fast, and left my station at the bar – running to the bathroom. Yeah, that didn't look comical or anything. And to be honest, I had no idea what I planned on doing there – there wasn't much to break in a bathroom, except for the mirror, of course, but that I didn't want to have to lie about more damn cuts brought back from work.
I reached the bathroom. It was a dingy, crappy little room with a half-dead, blinking light bulb. And in the corner of the room there was a rat.
It looked at me. It blinked shiny black eyes, and that was enough. In half a second I had it clamped in both hands. At that moment I was so much faster than Niko (and believe me, that is too damn fast), but I couldn't think about that right now. I felt like an alcoholic finally bringing the glorified bottle to his lips. This was enough. This was it. I was finally, finally satisfying the hunger.
It was only afterward that the nausea hit me, as I gazed down in disbelief at the limp, broken, mutilated animal, torn apart by my fingers.