Richelle Mead owns the VA and Bloodlines series.

So who's seen the Vampire Academy movie? I thought it was great. So much better than all of the adaptions that have come out recently (maybe with the exception of Catching Fire). But I'm so disappointed by everyone's reactions to it. Or, actually, lack of reaction to it. So many fans of the books are saying they don't want to see the movie because of the ads. What happened to having faith? I went and saw the suck fest that was The Host (which is my favorite book of ever btw) and City of Bones which was actually worse then The Host turned out to be, so I know seeing a good book turned into a sucky movie is just the worst, but come on! VA was actually really impressive. Okay okay. I'll shut up now, I know I'm ranting.

Anyway. Hope you enjoy this strange, strange—maybe a little depressing and out if character—chapter. What can I say? I'm in a mood right now and I just got this image of Sydney, still functioning, but completely wrecked and I thought, "what if?"

The cold wind whipped the back door of the bar open as I stepped out into the alley behind the building. I finished typing out my text and put my phone away before pulling a match out of my pocket. I shook a cigarette out of the pack I'd borrowed off one of the regulars.

The cold seeped through my jacket, but I didn't care. I needed a smoke more than I needed warmth. I could feel my hands shaking already, and it wasn't from the chill in the air.

"Hey," a voice echoed off the brick walls surrounding me. "What are you doing out here? It's like twenty degrees out!"

I finished lighting my cigarette before bothering to turn in the voice's direction. When I did I nearly rolled my eyes. It was one of guys from the band that played at the bar tonight. He'd been looking at me all night. Well, looking at parts of me all night, anyway.

I took another drag of the cigarette before blowing the smoke off to my left, the direction the wind was going. "And?" I asked, giving him an indifferent shrug.

"I just thought..." he started, sounding more unsure then he did a second ago. Good. Maybe he'd go away. "You've got to be cold."

I lifted the cigarette up between two fingers. "I'm fine." Then I put the filter to my lips.

"Those things will kill you, you know," he added helpfully. He was trying to smile, but it was pretty cold out and his teeth were starting to chatter.

He was right, of course. Cigarettes were very unhealthy and if I continued to smoke them would most likely lead to a highly unpleasant and wretchedly slow death. But still, I took another puff. I didn't particularly like this brand, but I was all out of my clove ones.

I gestured back toward the van where his band mates were putting their equipment away. "Why aren't you helping them?"

He tried for another smile. "Because I'm talking to you."

Ugh. I actually performed the eye roll this time.

"You're the bartender, right?"

"No, I just like to pour drinks for people so the owner let's me." He smiled like that was just the cutest thing he'd ever heard.

"You're a piece of work, huh? That's fine," he added at my raised eyebrow. "I like a challenge."

I sighed deeply and took one last puff before flicking the cigarette out on the bricks behind me. "Trust me, okay. You don't want to get to know me," I told him. "You don't want anything to do with the mess that is my life."

Finally the flirtatious vibes he was sending out faded and he cocked his head to the side. "Why not?"

Why not? Oh, if I could only count the reasons. I started with the beginning.

"I used to be affiliated with a group who's dedicated themselves to protecting the secrets of an ancient race of vampires known as the Moroi." Band Guy only raised his eyebrows an infinitesimal amount so I went on. "After I fell in love with one of the vampires, my father, out of the goodness of his heart, had me carted off to be punished. Humans and vampires are not supposed to interact, you see."

Band Guy raised a hand and said, "But I thought you said you were protecting them?"

"Protecting the secret of their existence," I explained, sort of impressed he was going with me on this. "It's a long story, but basically the group I worked for hates and fears vampires more than anything, even though they work with them. Anyway," I went on, "I fell in love, got myself kidnapped by my dad, and shipped off to be tortured and brainwashed. Don't remember much after that."

"Uh huh," Band Guy said skeptically. Yup. That was more like it.

I could feel my hand starting to quake again so I withdrew another cigarette. "Don't believe me? Don't worry. I wouldn't either. I almost don't, except that I still have the scars. Mental and physical, if you're wondering. The physical ones aren't so bad, but," I lifted my shaking hand, "the mental ones are a real bitch."

Band Guy looked at a loss. His wide brown eyes were narrowed like he was scrutinizing me. Probably waiting for me to pull a butter knife out of my back pocket and jab it at his eye. I knew how crazy I sounded.

"My boyfriend, the vampire," I kept talking, pausing only to take a drag of the cigarette. "He found me, eventually, but it was too late. I was broken beyond repair by that point. I remember waking up and being warm for the first time in months, wrapped in a fuzzy blanket. I was happy, you know?" Another puff. "It was so nice. But then I saw his face."

"Your boyfriend's?" he asked and I nodded.

"I didn't remember him. All I saw was this face that I associated with pain and torment and death. I started screaming and hid under a desk." Another long puff which I blew into the wind. "I'm not proud of my reaction. Turns out the people who tortured me, they got me pretty good. They convinced my subconscious that the only guy I ever loved, who'd never hurt me in any way, was going to murder me. I don't remember much about that night that isn't complete terror, but I do remember him crying. He cried because of how messed up I was."

Band Guy let out an impatient noise and I pulled my eyes from the invisible spot I'd been staring at to see him looking annoyed.

"There are plenty other girls I could hook up with tonight," he said. "If you're not interested, you could have just said so. You don't have to make me think you're psychotic."

"Oh." I smiled and took another drag, deciding not to mention the fact that I'd already told him no and he hadn't listened. "Well, then no. Not interested."

He turned back to the van and huffed in this forlorn way that made me laugh. Whatever girl went home with him tonight had more problems than I did.

I saw him laugh about me with his friends, no doubt telling them I was a psycho so he'd turned me down, but I calmly finished my second cigarette, ignoring them. I needed it now more than ever. While I didn't exactly never talk about my past, talking about it had mixed effects on me so I didn't do it often.

That night, in the motel when Adrian saved me and I'd run from him, my mind cracked somehow. I hadn't been able to look at him since without having a full blown panic attack. Which really sucked because I loved him just as much as the day I'd been kidnapped. It was the worst thing I could think of, which was probably why the Alchemists had embedded the fear in my head.

They loved to torture, and being in love with someone you've been programmed to fear is the ultimate torture technique. Adrian and I had tried for awhile. He'd stayed away, only coming to see me for short periods of time so I could "adjust". Except there was no adjusting. I'd been reprogrammed. My mind wasn't my own anymore. It was working with the Alchemists to keep me away from Adrian. And there was no fixing it, at least none that we'd thought of yet.

So I'd left. Adrian wasn't happy, I wasn't happy, but we both knew it was no use trying the same thing over and over again. Adrian and his beautifully chiseled face and green eyes were lost to me. And so was the Sydney of old. that might have been worse than anything. That I wasn't me anymore, and I'm not just talking about having to use a fake name. The Alchemists had shattered my psyche pretty good.

But it wasn't all bad, I guess. I'd started college and was currently studying art history. Adrian had offered to pay for school and an apartment for me, but I couldn't accept it. Not when I couldn't even look at him. I was alright with email and texts though, so we could stay in contact. But even that sporadic communication left me panicky. It was the reason I'd started shaking. The reason I'd started smoking. Which was so ironic because Adrian had quit because of me and I'd started because of him.

Someone had seen my hand shaking one day after I'd just finished texting Adrian and they'd offered me a cigarette to take the edge off. It had, so I'd gone out and bought a pack myself. Cloves, of course, since the smell reminded me of someone. Not a healthy habit, but I couldn't stop texting him and nothing else worked to stop my shakes. Believe me, I'd tried.

"Taylor!" My boss's voice drifted out from the partially closed back door, calling the fake name I was starting to associate this life with. "Breaks over. We need you at the bar."

I finished off the butt and flicked it to the ground to stomp it out, before heading back inside. In order to have some semblance of autonomy I took a job waiting tables at the local pub which was a favorite of college kids in this area. Soon the owner had bumped me up to bartender, once he saw what a natural I was at mixing and measuring. It came with a nice raise so I'd taken it. Now I didn't have to depend on Adrian to pay my rent, though he'd since managed to weasel his way into paying for my classes at the college. At least he wasn't sending me checks for spending money anymore.

I spent the rest of my shift pouring and mixing and semi-flirting with most of the men who ordered drinks from me. Tips were better if you flirted a little, but not too much. Drunk guys tend to get grabby when you flirt too much. Not that my watered down flirting techniques stopped one of the guy's from approaching me when I was leaving to go home.

"Hey, sweetheart," he called out as he jumped off his stool and followed me to the door. His brown hair was cropped short and made his forehead look bigger then it really was. But he had incredible blue eyes that I couldn't seem to stop looking at. He'd been sitting at the bar for the past hour and I'd found myself staring more than once. "You going home?" he drawled.

"Yeah," I told him, shrugging on my jacket and then flipping my hair out from under the collar. "My shift's over."

"Mind if I join you?"

His blue eyes narrowed to a ridiculous looking leer, but they were still attractive. He was attractive, despite the too big forehead. And unlike Band Guy outside, this guy wasn't obnoxious when he hit on me. Blunt, maybe. But that didn't bother me. After a minute's worth of studying him, I shrugged.

"Why not."

He smirked in a way that was just a little too familiar and I had to look away.

"Baby, you just made the best decision of your life," he purred into my ear and I pushed him off.

"Sure I did," I told him skeptically, but I led him to my car and less then ten minutes later he was standing in my living room.

"Nice place," he said, but he wasn't looking around the apartment. His blue eyes were locked onto mine. "I bet the bedroom's even better."

"You're not wrong," I laughed.

I'm not sure how much time had passed, but my blue-eyed Casanova was lying next to me in bed, all sweaty and panting.

"Tired?" I asked, innocently. I was on my side, blankets draped around my waist.

He opened one blue eye to peak at me then draped his arm over his face. "Exhausted. You know how to wear a guy out."

I spun around to lie on my back, staring at the ceiling for a little while. He never made a move to get up, just laid there, breathing steadily with his eyes closed. Those blue eyes, unlike anything I'd seen before. I'd never seen eyes that blue before.

I gave him a sideways glance and breathed the words of a poem I liked. Thinking of poetry after sex had kind of become a habit for me.

"Should e'er unhappy love my bosom pain, From cruel parents, or relentless fair; O let me think it is not quite in vain..."

"To sigh out sonnets to the midnight air," he finished for me. He dropped his arm to the mattress beside him and opened those unusual blue eyes for me to see. "Keats," he said slowly. "We studied him last semester."

I let out a breath I'd been holding and closed my eyes. Of course a college student would know a Keats poem. The mattress dipped and his lips were on my shoulder, but I just rolled away. He didn't let that stop him though. His arms came around my waist, pulling the blankets up around us.

"Mind if I stay the night?" he whispered, pulling me close.

"Only if you'll go to sleep," I smiled. "I have class in the morning."

He didn't say anything else, just cuddled up against me. I drifted off like that, with a stranger's arms wrapped around me, his cheek resting against mine.

When I woke up the next morning and stretched I wasn't expecting him to still be there and he wasn't. Of course he wasn't. Why would he be? But when my hand brushed the small, crinkly piece of paper on the pillow I grinned, despite the tremor that ran down my spine.

Carefully, like I was touching some sort of ancient artifact, I unfolded the small paper and took in everything about it. The words etched across it, the shape and flow of the letters, even the pattern it had been folded in. This was my treasure after last night. The only thing I depended on after going home with a guy. The only thing I was looking for. Well, maybe not the only thing, but it was the only part that made the rest mean something to me.

The familiar script scrawled on the paper caused my hands to tremble, but I brushed my fingertips over the words anyway.

Sage,

It's not in vain. I promise.

Love,
Adrian

Ironically enough it was the doubt that did it. The doubt that let me hang on to the only bit if hope I had left. As long as I had some doubt, I couldn't see past whatever charms Adrian used to disguise himself. Going home with random strangers who may or may not be my boyfriend was certainly not a healthy way to deal with my issues, but I hadn't chosen wrong yet, so I kept playing along even though the game was twisted.

The thought of Adrian being in my bed, lying next to me all night, even disguised as someone else, still caused panic to seep into my veins, but it wasn't as bad as it used to be. That gave me hope, even as I grabbed the pack of clove cigarettes Adrian had left beside the bed before he left this morning, and lit up. The familiar act soothed my nerves and calmed the panic which was building like a pressure in my chest, ready to explode.

This game of our's had come from desperation. He'd come into the bar one night when I was waitressing, disguised as a redheaded poetry enthusiast. I didn't know his plan to seduce me and then leave a note the next morning, but I did have my suspicions when he began reciting a few familiar poems to me. I don't know what I'd been thinking. Maybe it was just blind hope. It wasn't like I could ever purposefully go home with someone who wasn't Adrian. I still loved him, desperately. And I think that's why I'd done it. I was so desperate for that redhead to be Adrian that I took him home. And, even though the note in the morning sent me into racks of terror, I still felt this overwhelming relief that we could be together. It didn't matter that I couldn't look at him or even really talk to him. Just knowing he was there with me, loving me despite my issues and inconveniences, made me feel stronger.

So yeah. Our situation was messed up, my life was messed up. The only way I could get close to my boyfriend was to let him trick me into thinking he was someone else. But I refused to let go of the hope that I felt every time I woke up to one of those notes. The hope that said this wouldn't last forever. The hope that promised a time when I could roll over and see those blazing green eyes I loved so much staring back at me.

Until then I took another puff of my cigarette and brushed my fingers against the paper in my hand. Hoping for a time when I wouldn't need either.