Hello again everyone! I was very glad and grateful to see that some lovely folks already decided to fave and follow this little project of mine. I really do appreciate it and it keeps me motivated to keep writing. Don't be afraid to leave a review, I love hearing from people! I hope you enjoy this chapter.

chapter two - necessities

"Ich liebe dich," Bastien told me once again, carefully moving my hair from my face.

"Ich liebe dich," I repeated.

The smile on my face was soft, but at the same time one of the strongest and most meaningful that had ever graced my face. Things were different with Bastien, as stereotypical as that sounded. With him, there wasn't the same pressure that there was with Samuel and Elisabeth. Did Samuel allow me to hunt as I pleased? Yes, though he discouraged it. He hated himself enough for feeding off of humans. It was clear based on his endless attempts to become a vegetarian.

But Bastien….Bastien encouraged me to hunt. He, like me, believed that it was natural. We were supposed to feed off of humans. Not animals. And he hunted with me. Hunting with him, feeding with him, sharing the experience with him was all an a sort of hyper-erotic experience that usually culminated in some heavy sex when we arrived back to our penthouse. If we could wait until we were in private in the penthouse, that is.

"Your German is still terrible," Bastien laughed.

"As is your hair right now," I chuckled, messing with his mid-brown locks playfully.

"Low blow," he grinned.

I kissed him again, tasting the remnants of the human we'd devoured on his tongue. Hands in my hair, he pulled my face away from his, smiling up at me. His smile was perfect. It probably would've been perfect even if he hadn't been a vampire. I straddled his hips and set my hands on his chest, which was just as cold as I was and just as stony.

"Don't tell me you're ready for a second round," he said with a raised brow. "You've already worn me out enough for one night."

"Don't worry about it," I assured him. "That was a favor to you."

He rolled his eyes. "As if."

I laughed and patted his chest. I gave him one last kiss before hopping off the bed, which we'd more or less destroyed a few dozen times over. With a skip and a hop, I was out on our little balcony, overlooking the twinkling lights of Berlin. It reminded me of New York, but at the same time, it was so different. Parts of it were so old, and parts of it were so new and bland, having been built up by the GDR. Still, the city had a voice of its own, one that truly drew me in. Perhaps part of that was because it was where Bastien was. I'd follow him anywhere.

"Berlin's so beautiful," I said, feeling Bastien coming up behind me.

He set his hands atop mine on the railing, his front pressed into my back. He had hastily put some underwear on and I had hastily slipped into the nearest t-shirt of mine I could find that covered my ass. He leaned forward, pressing a deep kiss into the crook of my neck.

"Nicht so schön wie du," he murmured. "Not as beautiful as you."

"Don't be cheesy like that," I replied.

He laughed. We watched the city together. Until a certain human scent caught our noses. It was a man, a middle aged man crossing the street towards our building. He took good care of himself, I could tell. I could smell it in his blood, as well as by seeing his impressive physique. He was talking on the phone. It was a business call.

"Are you in the mood for dessert, darling?" Bastien asked me, peering down.

I smirked. "Immer."

"You know, you're really never going to use this in life," I told Nevaeh. "Especially in the digital age."

She looked up at me, narrowing her bluish eyes. "Mrs. Hanscomb still wants me to learn it. And I have to learn it to get an A."

I grinned. "Yeah, I know. Just sayin'."

Nevaeh smiled at me. She was missing one of her front teeth, which made her look even cuter than she already was. She was blessed with good looks, though I thought most biracial kids were. She had her biological mother's blue eyes, which were so much like Elisabeth and I's when we were humans. She had her biological father's tight, dark curls which she wore in braids adorned with blue beads to accentuate her eyes. And she had perfect, clear, deep olive-toned skin with a cute little button nose.

I watched Nevaeh's pencil come to a full halt on the page. She was doing long division, something I remember thinking was stupid when I was her age. The question 4 divided by 472 had stumped her.

"Need help?" I asked.

"No," she replied stubbornly. Sometimes I could've sworn we were biologically related with how stubborn she was.

"Think about it," I prompted her. I gave her a good minute on her own, but she hadn't come to any conclusions. "Break the 72 down. What's 4 times 10?"

"40," Nevaeh answered without missing a beat.

"Good. And what's 72 minus 40?"

"32."

"And how many times does 4 go into 32?"

"Eight."

"Exactly. Eight plus ten?"

"Eighteen."

"And four divided by four is….?"

"One."

"Right. Altogether it's….?"

"One hundred and eighteen," Nevaeh said triumphantly.

"See?" I said, patting her warm, blood filled shoulder. "You've got it."

"Thanks, Lindsay," Nevaeh smiled.

"No problem," I assured her.

I let her go back to doing her own work until she got stumped again. I leaned back in my chair. It was one of the new ones Elisabeth had gotten, all leather and rounded. Not at all the kind of dining chair I would've chosen, but I suppose it fit the new modern aesthetic of the penthouse.

In watching Nevaeh, I couldn't help but to think of her fate. At eighteen, she'd become like me. Frozen forever. Thirsty forever. Alive forever. I didn't want her to be like that. I wanted her to be an nine-year-old little human girl forever. Innocent and sweet, with dashes of stubbornness and spunk and a hint of attitude that I liked in a girl. She was perfect the way she was. I didn't want her to turn ten, let alone become a vampire on her eighteenth birthday.

I didn't empathize with humans much. I hadn't even empathized with humans when I was one. But having Nevaeh in my life had taught me otherwise. She showed me the good in humans, or human children, to be exact. I saw her take her first steps, heard her say her first word (which was "Linny," as she was trying to say my name), watched her incredible joy when she successfully mastered the potty and how proud she was when she finally got the training wheels taken off her pink bike with streamers on the handles.

As innocent and sweet and perfect as Nevaeh was, I knew that would change as she got older. The older you got, the more you let the world rot you. It was a lesson I learned quickly, having to grow up faster than a lot of other children. I knew she wouldn't remain like this forever, as much as I wished she could, trapped in the amber of the moment, as Vonnegut would say. Because the world got to people. I saw it. I lived it. I killed people who lived it every week or so.

"Fried chicken, southern style, made just for Miss Nevaeh Grace," said Anna, entering the dining room from the kitchen. "With green beans, mashed potatoes and gravy."

"Thank you," Nevaeh said graciously. Elisabeth had really nailed etiquette into the kid's mind.

"Not a problem," Anna assured her with that unfairly beautiful smile of hers. "How's the homework coming?"

"Almost done," Nevaeh said. She was rushing to scribble down the last answer. "Done!"

"Good job, sweetie," Anna said. She took a seat across from us, crossing her legs in her bohemian chic skirt. "Tell me how school was."

"Good," Nevaeh said. She dug right into her food. I didn't blame her. Anna's cooking was amazing, well, at least it smelled and looked amazing. "We had art class today."

"That's right, it's Monday, isn't it?" Anna replied. "What kinda art projects did you do?"

With a slight eye roll, Nevaeh answered, "We're gonna paint different monuments from New York, but we're not allowed to use the actual colors….like, if I wanted to paint the Empire State Building, I'd have to make it bright pink. And no one in my class but me seemed to get what that meant."

"Cause you're a genius," came Jesse's voice. "Especially when it comes to your art."

"I know," Nevaeh replied playfully.

Looking to me, Jesse asked, "Aren't you supposed to be leaving?"

I narrowed my eyes. "No."

Anna sensed the tension between the two of us and suggested, "Why don't you two step into the other room?"

It was a good suggestion, one that neither of us refuted. We both stood and walked down the hall into the library, where we stood at odds with each other. Which was weird, because Jesse and I had always gotten along.

Jesse was the kind of guy, or vampire, who didn't let things get him down. He didn't get on my case about my human-based diet, despite the fact that he'd been a vegetarian since he was turned back in 1933. He always made me laugh, which often was quite the accomplishment due to my near constant gloom and doom. He didn't confront me about things the way Samuel and Elisabeth did, but I suppose that was because he was my adopted big brother rather than my adopted parents like they were. I liked and got along with Anna too, but we just weren't as close as Jesse and I were.

"I don't know why you're being stubborn about this," Jesse said.

He, like Anna and Samuel, was of African American descent, but his skin was lighter, closer to Nevaeh's tone. Elisabeth had turned him because of this. She said he looked like what her child with Samuel should've looked like - middle-dark skin and light eyes that were now golden from having fed recently.

"Because I don't need to be protected like a delicate flower," I retorted. "I can fend for myself, y'know."

Jesse rolled his eyes. "Yeah, we've seen how you fend for yourself against Bastien. Berlin worked out real well for you last time, Lindsay."

"I don't love him anymore," I said. It sounded like I was trying to convince myself more than anything, which didn't help my case at all.

"It doesn't matter," Jesse said. "If he gets within sight of you, he can shock you and before you know it you're chained in a basement in Berlin with him."

"You're wrong," I said. "I won't be that easily manipulated by him."

"He's not alone," Jesse informed me. "He's gathered others."

"How do you know?" I asked.

"I know," Jesse said. That didn't really answer the question. "Rachel and Oliver ran into them during their anniversary trip to Spain….Bastien didn't say anything, nor did they really speak, but Rachel sensed that -"

"Rachel's been wrong," I interjected.

Rachel and Oliver were vampire friends of ours who lived in the city as well. Rachel, like most vampires, had a gift. Samuel could control minds, Jesse was a super fighter, Elisabeth had telekinetic abilities, Anna could hypnotize her victims and Rachel had the ability to sense danger coming to her friends. She'd been right before, uncannily right. But she'd also been wrong. Dead wrong.

"And she's been right," Jesse reminded me. "Either way, we don't want to take risks with you, Lindsay. We all love you too much to let him take you."

"He won't take me," I said.

"We don't want to take the chance," Jesse said. "We don't know who he has coming."

"The Volturi won't let him get away with anything."

"The Volturi don't know, and won't know unless it's too late," Jesse said. "You and I both know that."

Neither of us said anything for a minute. We let the tension do the talking until Jesse couldn't keep his mouth shut anymore.

"If you won't go for yourself or for us, go for Nevaeh," Jesse said, passing me on his way out. "She loves you."