Chapter Three

Fangs Among Fangs

Apparently, the vampire band, Death Reign, was actually extremely good. According to Kyler, they're really into gore, death, and sex songs about vampires and blood. She likes the song 'Blood Of Eternity'. But she said every emo kid in town and the towns surrounding Merit, Missouri was suppose to be coming to the Soundstage, so it was absolutely vital that we went to the local concert of the beginning of summer. Can't say "of the summer" because it is just a local concert.

And so, the last four days of school flew past, and on the last Friday of being a Junior, I was satisfied with having to leave to go to the doctor because Ms. Genny raised my blood pressure high enough that before I could stop and breathe, my nose started dripping blood like it was trying to drain the pain of my headache out of my brain. It didn't exactly do that, but it did make me pass out and I got the rest of the day off. Plus, according to Kyler, the look on Ms. Genny's face when Kyler felt obliged to burst into the room at lunch and accuse her of nearly killing me (which wasn't even true because nosebleeds are bad but not deathly) was priceless. And my dad decided to talk to the principal about Ms. Genny, stating that she was told from the beginning of my problems and clearly ignored them without care. To cover that up, she paid for my doctor visit.

So it was saturday, and I was sitting on my couch in the living room with my dad, waiting for Kyler to come pick me up. My dad never really had a problem with me hanging out with the people I hang out with because he noticed that though I stayed around them so much, I didn't seem to have the ability to be influenced by them. I was clearly keeping orange as my favorite color, but for tonight, I had painting my nails black. That's as close to emo as I'll get, sorry. So I was planning on going to see Death Reign in dark jeans, a red shirt, and my skater shoes... still keeping just my regular ammount of eyeliner and my massive ammounts of jewelry on my being. Meanwhile, I'll be surrounded by a sea of black, with an assorted colored heads of hair, such as neon purple and pinks and blacks and greens. Along with all these mouths that held plastic or dentured vampire fangs. Some may have even went as far as to use a nail filer on their canines. Still, music is music, and what you look like when you're listening to it doesn't change how good it sounds.

"Remember, no alcohol or drugs. It'll mess up your system in a heartbeat," Dad repeated to me as I watched the movie 'We Are Marshall'. Dad loves football, and even though I'm more of a runner, I liked the movie anyways. It was sad, but everyone was learning to move on. I didn't mind watching movies like these.

I looked at him. "Yeah, I know. I haven't touched alcohol in my life, and drugs are for druggies," I assured him.

"Make sure you just go to the Concert and come right back home," he said.

"I will. I never lie about where I'm going unless necessary, dad," I joked yet told the truth. I smiled widely.

"And if you come home pregnant, I'll kill every little freak boy in the state," Dad threatened.

"I'm a lesbian, dad," I lied. It got him off my case, but I think the posters of guys in my room gave that away anyways. It was worth a try. Before dad could say anything about that, headlights flashed through the window, and I got up. "I'll see you after the concert." And I opened the door to the honking of Kyler, who would want to get there early of course.

"And don't talk to strangers," Dad called after me desperately.

I opened the front passenger side door and called back, "Love ya!" That brought about a bunch of 'Awww', 'Hail loves her daddy', and ect. I got into the car to see that Kyler had brought along four people from our section, including Pheonix and Kyler's sister, Mandy... whom we couldn't come up with a better nickname to replace hers. Unless she preferred to be called Man.

"Shut up, you dorks," I snapped in a kidding tone. And we all waved my dad goodbye as Kyler drove out of the trailor park. The ride to the concert was loud. Everyone felt obliged to talk, laugh, and yell loudly. Plus, the radio was on a metal station on full blast. And so we had four people in the back who were moving around, yelling out the window, and you had Kyler, who was laughing and practically hopping with excitement. I leaned my head against the window and listened to the music that I could hear. And during my thought process, I was interrupted by someone poking the back of my head. I turned around in the darkness to look at Pheonix, who was yelling something and holding out plastic vampire teeth. Apparently he had brought a whole set to pass out to whoever wanted them. I shook my head no, though. I'm fine with my real teeth. But Kyler took it and everyone in the car was soon human vampires, hissing at each other, except for me. A misfit among misfits.

We arrived at the Soundstage, and Kyler pulled up to the front of the building. "You guys go ahead. Me and Hail are gonna go to BloodScore for a bit," Kyler yelled over the noise. The back seat was emptied the next minute, and Kyler parked the car. Normally, I'd be confused, but I know that BloodScore is merely located right next to the Soundstage. It was a store made specifically for people like Kyler and the crowd we hang out with. It was like Hot Topic, except less were made around this world.

I followed Kyler over to the BloodScore building, but we spotted a sno cone stand just outside it. I laughed at the obscenity of it, but I had to drag Kyler over so I could buy a red sno cone. Then we continued over towards the shop, while I was in joy for having a tastey cherry sno cone.

"Why are we going here," I asked Kyler. Usually we went after a concert to look at what new things they had. Though the only thing I liked looking at were the jewelry and shoes. But otherwise I didn't have a point in coming to this place.

"i want to get some different makeup real quick so I can look like a real vampire before the concert," Kyler explained, "You want to get some stuff? We could make you look like one, too." Kyler was always itching to know what I would be like as a goth/punk girl.

"Maybe on Halloween," I replied humorously. And we entered the slightly darkened shop. It was actually a good, decent size. They had all types of things here. Makeup, clothes, jewelry, music; the works. There was some sort of lights that would blink like it would be at a club, along with colored lights. It made the place more disturbing than with regular Wal-Mart lights. And you could hear the loud rock music clearly. At the entrance were a couple of cash registers, with employees that seemed to have no other uniform requirement besides black, metallic clothes. And one guy had a green mohawk with a bunch of peircings on his face that was connected by chains. Kyler had to comment on how awesome he looked before heading over towards the makeup section.

The place was swarming with people. It seemed that the store was perfect in it's chosen state. There were always rock concerts going on, and people could come here to see what they were selling. And today people were dressed as vampires for Death Reign, searching for cool clothes and fake blood and fangs. Every person I passed seemed to be messing with their plastic vampire teeth. And the flourescent lights in the store made them glow. Kyler felt obliged to hiss at everyone, who was glad to hiss right back. But I could tell the teeth were fake because the flourescent light showed the trace of the dark shadows of their real teeth underneath. I started smiling at some point, amused by the abstract ideas of every person's appearance. But Kyler wouldn't let me get lost in the amusement, for she kept a hold of my wrist so that I'd stay caught up with her.

We turned into the isle of makeup that both brightened and darkened the left side of the isle. This was because there was an assortment of dark, depressing makeup, followed by rainbows of colored makeup. On the right side of the isle were all kinds of hair dyes and gel. Kyler started sifting through the makeup, so I backed up more towards the dyes.

"Are you sure you don't want anything," Kyler asked, "You'll look a bit out of place at this if you don't."

I shrugged, "And since when has that ever changed my mind?" Kyler started back to picking some red and black eyeliner. She started looking at the eyeshadow. My lips were cold from the sno cone, but I still took another bite. By now my lips and tongue were blood red, so maybe that would satisfy Kyler enough. I smirked.

Suddenly, I was pushed forward when someone just plowed past me without announcing themselves. My sno cone dropped to the floor, spilling the red liquid ice to the floor like blood. Kyler turned around and bursted out laughing at my mishap, but instead of looking down at my sno cone, I had turned my head to look at the stupid asshole who had pushed passed me without so much as an 'excuse me'. I've hanged around plenty of these types of people to know that just because they look different didn't mean they didn't have manners. And I saw the guy still walking off as though he hadn't done a thing. From behind he just looked like a tall guy with bleached blonde hair. And he must have sensed me glaring at him because he slowed down a bit.

It was as if time started to slow down. He turned his head to the right slowly in mid-step, and a peircing blue eye glared at me from the corner of his eye. Then my glance went to his mouth as he growled threateningly, baring his teeth momentarily. And then he turned a corner and was gone. Time went back to normal, and Kyler was laughing at my spilled sno cone. I frowned.

"Did you see that," I asked Kyler in wonder.

She laughed harder, "Yeah.. you... aha... he pushed you... and you... dropped... ahaha... your coney... ha... who's gonna pick that up?" And she cackled. I didn't quite see what was so funny about that.

"No, did you see that guy," I asked, shaking my head and looking back at the sno cone.

"Oh, yeah. You're right. He was a complete hottie. But if he wasn't, I would've kicked his nice ass for you," Kyler responded. She seemed to be getting ahold of herself, and she bent over and grabbed the cone of the sno cone. But the sno was forever lost to me. Not that I was worried about that.

"Nooooo," I sighed in exasperation, "Did you see his teeth? He had fangs."

Kyler snorted, "So do I. So does she." She pointed at a random girl in the isle. "We all do. Death Reign, remember?" She paused. "Oh, God. Are you having an episode? Was it the sno cone? I knew you shouldn't have eaten that. Think of all the sugar... want me to call 911?"

I shook my head. "No. I--" I gave up. "Nevermind. I'm going to go look at the jewelry. You can go ahead to the concert if you want."

Kyler smirk slyly, "You're going to go look for that guy, aren't you?"

"No."

"Yeah, whatever. I'll be where I'm always at in the concert. If you can't find me, we'll meet at the car after the concert, all right," Kyler said. "Hope you find your lover boy. But just so you know..." She got closer, "I don't think he seemed that interested in you." I shoved her back playfully.

"See ya," Kyler said, and grabbed her pack of makeup before heading off to the cash register. I hesitated, but started walking in the direction the guy had headed. When I saw his teeth, I didn't see the dark shadow of the real ones underneath. Then again, it was a side snarl so that could've blocked it. Plus, I have visual problems anyways because of my problems. So I wasn't "following" him because I thought he was cute or a vampire, I just thought he was kind of interesting. Something about him drew me to him. Maybe it was that he clearly was bugged about something. And who knows, maybe he's my inner demon. Also, I wasn't following him per say... I was merely walking around the store with a small hope of maybe... maybe catching one more glance at him. He was actually pretty cute. From what I saw.

It looked as though I wasn't going to be catching a glance or anything from that guy again. I walked around for a while, and soon people were started to file out of the store for the concert. If I didn't start leaving, I would probably miss some of it myself. And that would tick Kyler off if I found her late. The only reason why I wouldn't find her is if she moved, but if she didn't, then she'd want to know why I wasn't there for so long. Plus, it was just some guy. There was no need to be so bugged about some...

At the guy's clothing, he appeared directly in front of me. I was startled enough to where my heart jumped and ached with the startlement. He was indeed quite tall, though I'm sure I would've been taller if it wasn't for my JRA (arthritis). And now I was nervous because he looked as though he knew I had been looking for him. He was abnormally pale, which was normal for emos and goths. He must be one because he had a dark black 'HIM' shirt and his converse shoes were half covered by his thickly chained tripp pants. He had snake bites just like Kyler, but otherwise no jewelry was on his attire. His peircing blue eyes glared at me, but he smirked, showing no fangs at all. See, either I have visual problems or he took them out.

I was once again startled when he grabbed my right hand and pulled it in front of him. It was as in hand holding, but more like how the guy dancers at balls greet the women; where he held my fingers and had the back of my hand faced up. I pulled my hand back a bit... or tried, but it didn't budge from his stone cold hand.

"Can I ask you something," he asked in a dark voice. Something about the smirk on his face and the look in his eyes was starting to make my heart rate rise even more than it already was.

"Sh-sure," I stuttered, hoping he would let go of my hand so I could run embarrassingly away. At this point I was wishing Kyler was here. She could actually help me seeing as I'm a wimp. And now the store was just about empty because of the concert.

But instead of asking anything, he lifted my hand to his lips. I felt the fear being replaced with a slight tingle of embarrassment at being afraid. And he opened his mouth, flashing the fangs that hadn't been there just before, and bit down on my hand opposite of my thumb. I opened my mouth at the sudden pain, scrunching my eyebrow together in startlement, but no sound came out. Instead, the world faltered for a second, and I felt a sudden wave of exhaustion flow through my body as it rebounded with a draining wave. I still had my mouth opened, trying to get a sound out as he kept my hand to his mouth. I couldn't even move to try to hit him or anything. Instead, I just started to feel my legs give out, and started sinking to the floor. As I went down, he followed me until he ultimately had to let go of my hand. I felt a tongue ring as well as he licked the wound before grabbing me. The world was pulsing and twirling as he dragged me over to the racks of pants. He propped me up to sit to the left of him, his arm around my waist to hold me up. I leaned my head against his shoulder weakly, not because I wanted to but because I couldn't hold it up anymore. And he grabbed my wrist.

He twisted my right hand around to where it was palm up, and raised my wrist to his lips and I felt another jolt of pain as he bit the side of my wrist just below my hand. A small whine came out with an exhale of air, but that was about all I could get out. The rock music overhead was a roar of constant noise at this point, and I thought I saw someone walking by, but we looked like a simple couple by now. All they could see was me leaning against my boyfriend as he kiss my wrist. And soon it was as if I was going through a constant dizzy spell that never stopped for a break. My heart flutter, taking away my breath, and repeated. This stopped the guy... the real vampire from continuing, and he once again licked the second wound before lowered my hand from his mouth. Apparently he was finished. My heart continued fluttering, causing black spots to invade my sight. It was my blood pressure. Usually it's just an occasional flutter, but a constant one was begging my asthma to start in.

He picked me up bridal style, and my head hanged back as though I lost all control of any muscle. My heart struggled until my asthma started straining my airway, and soon the dark, spotted, twirling, abstract world was flashing from view to blackness to rage to blackness to rage again. It was as if I was going insane. And at some point, I felt the breeze of the outside world on my cheek. I closed my eyes to the insane blur of the world, wheezing for air. I was going to die. There was no way I was going to live through this. Too many problems.

Suddenly, there was solid ground under me again. I kept my eyes closed, and stopped breathing. It was too hard to struggle for air. I was leaned against something solid; a wall. And my numb hands were laying dead like against hard, rocky cement. After a moment, I wasn't being bothered anymore. I opened my eyes, welcoming the swirling world to my vision. The sudden twist of the world caused me to roll my head around. But I struggled in air and tried to focus. I could hear screaming, but it was more of a pleasure type of scream. I was leaning against the wall of the Soundstage. Nobody would be out here for hours, though, and I would be dead by then. Who knows? Maybe I'm already dead.

I give up.