The sky was bright blue, and the air was freezing cold, I remembered that clearly. What I couldn’t remember was why it was my job to check up on him. I was clenching my jaw so tightly I felt a headache forming as I recalled that phone call. He was frantic, barely able to get a full sentence out. He dropped his phone once or twice. Dr. Chase tried her hardest to calm him down, but it proved futile. And then she gave me a piece of paper with an address on it and pushed me onto the sidewalk. It was abundantly clear I wasn’t welcome back until I checked on him, and she would know if I was lying.

I made my way to his apartment, tripping on the uneven concrete a few times, scraping up the palms of my hands. I wiped as much grit out of the cuts as I walked. When I knocked on his door, I didn’t expect him to open it within a second or two. He pulled me into his apartment before I could get a word out and threw me against his door as he closed it. His blue eyes were glazed and unfocused as he stared at me, nose twitching ever so slightly. I felt like prey; shaking, I tried to slide my hand to the doorknob so I could escape.

He grabbed my wrist, and I whimpered in fright. He bared his teeth, showcasing two sets of razor sharp fangs. I shut my eyes tight, frozen with fear. I couldn’t even relish in the twisted triumph of being right that Malachai was a vampire, more concerned with what he was going to do to me. I felt his breath against my neck, then his tongue before I finally felt his teeth sink into my skin. It came with it a little pinprick of pain, the pain only worsening when his lower fangs broke the skin. All my discomfort dissipated when he started to suck, his tongue darting against my neck. It started to…feel good, coupled with a soft scent of honeysuckle that seemed to resonate off him, I was relaxing. Maybe even becoming aroused by him sucking my blood.

It didn’t seem like he could get his fill, he kept suckling as my knees gave out, my skin burning where his hands helped me to the floor. I opened my eyes briefly to see spots, to have the room spin around me. I had no strength to try and push him away, or even try to demand he stop. He bit down harder, I felt I was falling to the side, the darkness only getting darker.

I felt his bite turn into kisses, trailing down my neck and over my shirt. It tickled when the fabric pressed against my skin by his warm mouth. He stopped over my crotch, unzipping my jeans and pressing his tongue through the fly. His tongue moistened—I had a view of his ceiling. I felt ashamed and embarrassed that I wanted to continue that dream, maybe even make it a reality. I dug the heels of my palms into my eyes, pulling them back to find band-aids over the scrapes. I felt my neck, my fingers grazing a gauze pad soaked in blood. I would’ve laughed at the madness if I didn’t catch sight of Malachai.

I sat up on his couch, watching him bring his hands from his ears to protect the head he tucked against his chest and knees. He was muttering something, a prayer, a mantra, I couldn’t quite tell. He was rocking back and forth, obviously upset and distraught about something. He fell to his side, curling further into himself, and I could finally hear what it was he was murmuring: “I’ll be a good boy.” I saw an empty and open prescription bottle on the floor, I made it my mission to see what it was he had taken. I didn’t so much as stand up from my seat on his couch than fall awkwardly to the floor from the blood loss. I crawled over to the bottle, reading the drug name first before noticing the refill date. I glanced over at him, weighing the decision to leave while I still had the chance, or to try to calm him down. On one hand he was a vampire who attacked me, drained me of blood in a way I…didn’t fully hate…on the other he was a patient at my internship I was supposed to check up on.

Even if he had wanted to take his anti-anxiety medication, it had been empty for almost a month now. That was assuming he was taking it when he was supposed to. I screwed the lid back on the bottle and made my way to him. He flinched further into himself when I placed my hand on his arm; I realized he was sobbing. “Malachai, it’s-it’s August,” I said softly. “Do you remember who I am? Do you know where you are?” He didn’t answer me or made any sort of acknowledgement I’d spoken. I placed my hand in his soft hair, a few beads of blood dripped down my neck. “You’re a good boy, Malachai,” I said, stroking his hair. He started to loosen his tensed muscles the more I said it, eventually placing his head in my lap. I stopped once he fell asleep.

I grabbed a pillow off his couch and switched my lap with it, hoping I didn’t wake him. I rummaged around his bathroom as quietly as I could to find a first aid kit to change my gauze with. I caught sight of it in the mirror, the once white cotton was soaked deep red in my blood. I felt woozy just staring at it. I wasn’t prepared for what was under the bandage when I removed it, though. It was cut jagged, a piece of my flesh ripped clean from my body. I wasn’t sure if I were imaging that I could see my muscles contracting with every breath, or if it was really happening. I covered the hole with a new piece of gauze, wrapping it tightly with bandages, repeating the process until no red seeped through. I did a quick sweep of his medications, finding an empty prescription bottle for an anti-depressant with a refill date two months ago. The only thing he still had something in was a mood stabilizer with a handful of pills left.

I bit my thumb, pulled my phone out and called Dr. Chase’s cellphone. “August, is he alright?” She asked, not even a hello.

I gripped the edge of his bathroom sink to keep me standing. “Um, Dr. Chase, I think I need to go to an emergency room,” I said. “Can-can you help me with that?”

“What happened, August?” I heard her gathering her things. “Is it serious? Can you still walk?”

I opened the door to Malachai’s apartment, stepping out into the hall. “I can walk, but if-if I pass out again, my blood type is A positive.”

“‘Again’?” Dr. Chase shouted into the speaker. “What do you mean ‘again’?”

“I’ll tell you later.” I focused on taking the stairs slowly, hoping I didn’t fall. “Please meet me halfway with your car.” I hung up on her, feeling a little bad but the wound kept flashing in my head. The pain was starting to seep its way into my focus. I swore the smell of honeysuckle stuck to my clothes.

It was dizzyingly bright when I stepped onto the sidewalk. I walked with a small stagger, my frozen hands shoved deep into my jacket pockets. I kept my eye out for Dr. Chase’s car as I followed the route back to her office. It took a moment or two for me to register she was calling my name from her car. I sat in the passenger seat, rubbing my hands on my pants. “August, did he attack you?” She asked as she started driving. “Are you sure you’re alright mentally?”

My hands started shaking and I rubbed them on my pants faster to get them to stop. The band-aids started to peel from my palms. “I was right.” I shut my eyes against a migraine forming. “He’s…He’s…He’s a v-v-vampire.” I forced my hands into fists, remembering the feeling of his fangs in me. He was a monster, a thing that…that hunted humans, and I…think I might’ve been slightly aroused when he had fed from me. I looked at the half torn off band-aids on my palms. If I hadn’t scraped my hands, he might not have bitten with so much haste.

Dr. Chase was speaking but I had a hard time focusing through the growing migraine and my own thoughts. Even behind closed eyes the world was spinning once more. I didn’t need to open my eyes to know the gauzes were soaked through with my blood and would start dripping down my neck again. I tried to hang onto consciousness, at least until I was in the emergency room, but it was a losing battle. I hadn't noticed if Malachai had nicked my jugular; I was starting to think he did by the amount of blood I felt leaking down my skin.

His glasses were resting on top of his pink hair, giving me an unobstructed view of his bright blue eyes. They seemed to sparkle when they caught the light. I was mesmerized by them, he could do whatever he wanted with me if he kept staring at me. His hands roamed over my torso, my skin burning wherever his fingers touched. The sweet scent of honeysuckle filled the air, I wanted to sink into him, to coat myself in his smell. It almost felt like a taunt when I opened my eyes, Dr. Chase filling out forms beside me.

My neck didn’t hurt, my migraine was long gone. The world seemed more bright, bubbly, a little round around the edges. There was an IV filled with red stabbed in the crook of my arm. Two more filled with clear liquids were stuck to the back of my hand. My eyes wouldn’t focus on the words of the wristband. The light streaked as I glanced around the room, reflecting off the pulled curtains in a harsh way. I stared at the palms of my hands, at the new band-aids there before bringing a hand to my neck. The bandages and gauze I’d wrapped around myself were gone, replaced with some sort of covering.

Dr. Chase finally looked up from her paperwork, her nose, eyes, mouth all slipping off her face. “August?” Her mouth didn’t move as she spoke. “How are you feeling?" I took my hand away from my neck; I felt like I was swallowing my tongue. “They said you might be a little out of it.” She scooted closer to me, placed her hand near where her mouth should’ve been. “If anyone asks,” she lowered her voice, “you’re my nephew. Call me Auntie Abby while we’re here.”

I got my tongue firmly back in my mouth, blinking until her eyes were back on her face. “What…what…did you—”

“A dog attacked you,” she said. “Rest up, August. Once I finish this paperwork we can go.” I stared at my hands while Dr. Chase continued working on the forms. Eventually, she disappeared, face trailing on the floor, only to return with someone without a face. They spoke gibberish to me as they removed the tubes leading into my veins. Dr. Chase helped me into her car, “Do you want me to take you back to your dorm?” She placed a brown bag on my lap. “Or do you want to stay with me for a few days?”

“I…” I closed my eyes to think. With the state of my dreams recently, I’d feel mortified if Dr. Chase found out about them. I also didn’t want to be a bother to her, she was already doing so much for me. “I’d…” I saw how blurry the world was, how weird I felt in my body. “Can…I stay…with you?”

“Of course,” she turned the ignition, “let’s go grab some of your stuff first.”