Journal Entry – April 26th, 2010
Unc.. err, Robin… does these journal things, so I thought I would, too. Well, alright, it was kind of his idea and all, but I thought it sounded like a cool idea, so I’m running with it. The life of a vampire, from the start onward. He said he often wishes he would have started journaling back during his first days, and it made me think… some day when I’m a century or two or four, will I wish I had written all this shit down?
The future me’ll probably wince at my language like Robin does.
Anyway, so that’s what I’m doing. The past few days have been a little nuts, so this is the first time I’m actually opening my laptop up since I woke. That was on the 21st, by the way. And the day I died was on the 16th. I suck with dates, so I’m writing this down for the future me. To tell you the truth, I’ve barely noticed the last five days. It seems like I open my eyes and want to claw at something for blood. I officially wake up after I eat, because that’s when the haze clears, and Victor’s always there, with whatever he brought me to eat. I get up, shower, and have been working on arranging my room here, which took a god-awful long time, let me tell you.
Not because of my speed, because shit… I can book. Seriously, I move freakishly fast now. Dad tells me he doesn’t move this quickly, so I’m guessing this is something I inherited from Victor. (Does Delilah move this fast, too? Hmm… I’ll have to ask her.) No, it’s because of everything else. When I get into the shower, everything hits me at once. The different way the water feels. Even watching it fall from the shower head, like little liquid crystals. Sometimes, I wish I had the power to stop the droplets of water and stare at ‘em for a while. Maybe I could use my telekinesis for that.
I don’t know. But I force myself out of the shower after a few minutes and get dressed. My first full night at Victor and Dad’s house (I guess mine too for a while), I seriously spent an hour staring at my clothing as I put it away. The different colors. Well, I guess they’re the same colors, but you see them differently now. They’re more vibrant. That’s really a good summary of everything in the world… It’s more vibrant when you look at it.
You hear more. You smell more. I still have trouble talking about the taste of blood without my fangs wanting to come down, but it’s fucking better than a perfectly-grilled slab of filet mignon. You don’t just drink the blood, your head gets so wrapped up in it, it’s euphoric. It’s more than eating, but I haven’t figured out how to describe it… other than nothing short of a religious experience. There are other things to it, but even typing about it is getting my teeth on edge, so I’m going to switch tracks.
Anyway… so waking the first time. Wow. Seriously, it was a mind fuck and a half because it took me a few minutes to figure out why Victor was in my head telling me to wake up. He was the first person I saw when I opened my eyes. (Has actually been the first person I’ve seen every night. See my note above about him being there with something for me to eat. Every night, though. Huh… just truly realized that. But anyway… ) I remember looking at him, knowing it was him but wondering why the hell he looked so… different. I saw Dad and thought the same thing, then I remember…
Someone mentioned fangs and I suddenly got so fucking hungry, I looked at Victor like he was that steak I just talked about. He helped me to a stand and I started staring at his neck. I have no idea how I stopped myself from biting him, except to say Dad was pretty Johnny-on-the-spot about bringing in the mortal I first bit. I can’t even remember if they were a man or a woman, but I think it was a woman, because I held ‘em up pretty effortlessly while I was drinking from them. (Of course, it could just be that I’m stronger. I remember that being part of the deal and it has been a lot easier to lift things.) I don’t know, that whole thing is a haze. I just remember Dad carrying away the body and me realizing the blood on my shirt came from them.
I still don’t know what to make out of the whole killing thing, to be honest. I feel like I should be guilty about murdering somebody for their blood, but I’m not. Pretty strange, isn’t it? Maybe the fact that I’ve already killed has made a difference. I slayed a few vampires with the Order and Lydia and I sent Wallace Alexander packing to the hereafter. Granted, Lydia had the death blow, but I watched the entire thing and didn’t care that another person was dying. Did that desensitize me? I don’t know, but I’ve killed my meals every night now and the only time it made me uneasy was earlier this evening, when Victor brought me two. He kept ‘em both glamored, then wanted me to try and glamor the second one myself to see how I did.
Needless to say, I failed miserably. They started freaking out and I begged Victor to glamor ‘em again so they wouldn’t be freaking out any more. We’re planning on going hunting tomorrow evening, so tonight was supposed to be my first trial run with dealing with a human and still having some of my senses. Up until then, any time I heard something with a pulse, I wanted to stick my teeth in them in the worst way possible. I fed from the scared one once they were glamored again, but I really hope nobody starts freaking out tomorrow night.
Victor said he and Dad’ll be watching just in case anything happens.
Anyway, back to my first night.
So, after changing my shirt and splashing water on my face, I looked in the mirror and saw myself for the first time. God I’m pale. And breathing still feels funny. We only need to breathe to talk, not to live, but you feel it in your chest that you’re kind of just storing air and tossing it back out the way it came, oxygen and all. My heart doesn’t beat any longer and I never knew how trippy that would be. When you’re human, you take for granted that the ticker’s functioning properly, but when it stops, you walk around wondering if there’s something missing. Are humans subconsciously aware of their pulses? I can’t remember noticing it any other time, except when I was exerting myself and it was beating harder. Even at rest now, though, everything inside my body is quiet and I’m aware of it.
The fangs, though. Ha. I remember looking in that mirror and seeing them for the first time. That’s fucking surreal in an epic way. I still feel stupid for cutting my thumb on them the first night and saying, “Holy shit, I’m a vampire,” but that was my reaction to actually seeing them. Holy shit. I’m a vampire. It hasn’t gotten old, though. Every time I shower, while I’m drying off, I stop and look at myself in the mirror and grin. I even let ‘em slip down once to get the full effect. But doing that started making me hungry again, and I forced them to slip back up.
There’s a whole lot of other things, too. When I’m around Delilah, I get hypnotized by the way she looks and smells. Our first kiss… my fangs slid down there, too, and when she kissed me again, I cut her lip and tasted her blood. Holy shit, what that does to you when you’re a vamp. In front of my Dad, my sister, Victor, and Robin, I wanted to fuck her blind. Even when you’re feeding, you start getting a little turned on, although for right now, I’m still just focusing on their pulses and their blood. And then, there’s the night. Wow. Just being outside, you feel the air around you and wonder if you were born to be a vampire. Like it’s not just Victor’s blood which made me what I am now, it’s the stars and the darkness, and the moon in the sky. Lydia brought me outside and every night since then, I’ve at least stolen a few minutes out in Victor’s back yard.
Late at night when the human neighbors are all asleep, mind you.
But those have been my nights. Waking, feeding, talking a little to Victor and Dad. Getting settled. Getting wrapped up in everything. I’ve been through Victor and Dad’s house a few dozen times studying everything. (Victor has an epic sound system by the way.) I haven’t tried to pick up my guitar yet, although now I wonder what that sounds like with my vampire hearing. Victor doesn’t have a television, but the entire world is HD through these eyes. I, at once, want to thank Victor every night for giving this to me and, at the same time, wish I could mute a few things about the world because it doesn’t hit you in layers. It hits you all at once and forces you to sort everything out.
I still don’t know what to think about a lot of things. Victor included. I’ve always respected him and appreciated what he means to my Dad, but every time I’m talking to him now, there’s something different. Something more. My maker. I guess that summarizes it? I have no idea, but I feel connected to him in a much different way now that I’m his child. I want to make him proud and make him glad he turned me. Otherwise, I’m at a loss for words to explain how I look at him.
Well, dawn is approaching and that’s another strange quirk. I can feel dawn approaching, almost like a warning bell for me to get my shit together and prepare to fall asleep. I’m dead to the world during the day, which sucks, but at night… man, at night, it’s worth the several hours I need to sleep to arrive at the few hours where I get to play around in this new playground. It’s dizzying and unnerving and wonderful and terrible and amazing and bigger than I could have ever imagined. I just hope I can figure out who I am now, because I know I’m something different. I’m just not sure what yet.
Well, besides being a vampire.
Peace,
John Michael Dawes
P.S. – Lyd mentioned something to me on the first night about me talking to Victor when I have any problems. I kind of planned on that, but when she added the struggles Dad went through, it freaked me out a little. I’m a vampire and a seer. I don’t know how those two things are supposed to mesh with each other, but I sure as hell hope I never have a Flynn complex.
Had the thought that maybe Dad being part of the other bloodline didn’t help? Dark magic and shit? I don’t know. Haven’t been focusing a whole lot on my seer abilities the past few days except to prove I still have ‘em. Maybe I’ll figure out how this all works better when everything else stops being so dizzying.
