#sinfulsoldier

I had walked the streets for an hour or so, my long legs taking the snow-wet pavement in stride. The whole city was lit up for the holidays, but the streets were full of dirty slush, and the cold sank into my bones.

Humph. Holidays. Bah humbug. If it weren’t for all the decorations, I’d never have known Christmas was so near at hand. I had nothing to celebrate, and every holly jolly song rang hollow in my ears. “I’ll be home for Christmas.” Yeah...fuck you, Perry Como. Just fuck you.

When I was human, Christmas had been a religious festival, a simple and small affair designed to make the worshipper feel humbled by God’s mercy. Now, however, the United States had turned the holiday into a commercial extravaganza, and every television show was designed to make people feel a nostalgia for “the good old days” at home with the family. That was a feeling I knew I’d never experience, and it set my teeth on edge.

Earlier in the evening, people were still rushing about getting last minute gifts, but as the evening stretched on during this, the darkest night of the year, the traffic thinned, leaving the streets to the lonely, the drunk, the depressed...the ones like me who had no reason to wish anyone a merry anything. All I...all any of us wanted was to find forgetfulness and a place where no one expected us to ho-ho-ho.

It was hard not to let the open maw of despair swallow me whole and leave nothing but hollow bones behind.

As for emptiness, I had that in abundance. Not just in an emotional way, but literally. Physically.

I realized I hadn’t had so much as a drop of blood since Damon left. It hadn’t occurred to me, but as I stood there outside of CBGB, watching the taxis hurry by along the Bowery, I suddenly felt the ache of hunger so fiercely I clutched my stomach, and my eye teeth slid down, cutting into my bottom lip. I desperately needed to feed, and I knew I didn’t have the luxury of patiently hunting down the perfect victim. Three days without drugs, booze, sex, or drugs. This wasn’t going to be pretty, and I was pretty sure I’d be filled with regret afterward, but I was too far gone to let my conscience stop me from finding what I needed. Someone was going to have their last Christmas, and it was going to be me who delivered them to their maker.

The inside of the bar was dark, and though the crowd was thinner than usual, I recognized some of the regulars. Damon had been coming here for years, tapping the veins of the youthful patrons and then wiping their memories of the event. It was convenient snacking, but it wasn’t going to slake the thirst I felt.

I remembered the stories Damon had told me of his brother Stefan. Of how he’d been a ripper, leaving bodies arranged with an artful and macabre flair for the dramatic. That wasn’t my style. I hadn’t committed a proper ritualized killing in a very long time. Oh, sure, Damon and I had killed. Even done it for sport. But the art of it...I’d given that up. Being with him had rendered my need for serial murder unnecessary. Whether or not Damon knew I had abandoned my murderous ticks, I couldn’t say. I hadn’t drawn his attention to it for fear he might ridicule me or take it as a sign of a softening in me. I wasn’t ready to be soft with Damon. The two of us together had edges that could slice a man in half. He had admired my savagery once, and I hated to change for fear he would find me boring.

The Police had been on the rise all year, making several appearances, not just here, but worldwide. Initially, I had found the fact that they heralded from England reason to filled with hate, but Damon had told me to shut up and listen. Had said their lyrics would appeal to my poetic soul. He’d been right, of course. Damon knew me. Their songs spoke to me, and as a result, I was willing to forgive and ignore their nationality. They were here, playing one more night before they left for Europe. Each song was one I had heard a thousand times before, but there was still something about them that resonated with me, and I found myself caught up as the first song of the set began.

“Once that you've decided on a killing

First you make a stone of your heart And if you find that your hands are still willing Then you can turn a murder into art…”

Ironic, really, those lyrics. Almost as if they’d seen right through to the center of me and knew why I was there, the monster lurking among his prey.

I couldn’t belly up to the bar. I’d promised, and though I begrudged that promise, I intended to stick to it all the same.

That’s why instead, I stepped out on the dance floor, letting the swarms of die hard music lovers, stinking of cheap beer and marijuana, surround me. The neon lights flashed, and I moved with them in a kinetic way, letting my inhibitions slip away and becoming one with the music.

“Now if you have a taste for this experience If you're flushed with your very first success Then you must try a twosome or a threesome You'll find your conscience bothers you much less

Because murder is like anything you take to It's a habit-forming need for more and more You can bump off every member of your family And anybody else you find a bore…”

The heat in the room rose as all those bodies moved en masse, and I closed my eyes, singing along with the chorus, the words speaking the truth only I knew. It was my confession, though no one else would realize my sardonic intent as I crooned the lyrics in a sort of mesmeric haze, lost in the moment. The drums echoed the heartbeats of a hundred potential victims, and I let it move through me, arms waving over my head with abandon.

“Because it's murder by numbers, one, two, three It's as easy to learn as your ABC Murder by numbers, one, two, three It's as easy to learn as your A, B, C, D, E”

Repeating the words again and again, emotion ringing in every line, I kept dancing until I felt a tap on my shoulder, gentle but insistent. The guitar was still strumming as I turned, the words still on my tongue, and I found myself face to face with the one person I’d desperately hoped to avoid.

My dealer. Mitch.

He was looking at me as though I was his Christmas gift come true. Tonight must have been slow for him, and he was hoping meeting up with me would make up for sales he thought he’d lost.

For once, I wasn’t looking for what he had on offer, but as he began trying to make small talk, he made the mistake of asking after Damon, and the question ran through me with a jolt of pain worse than any gunshot wound I’d ever suffered. In that moment, I knew what was going to happen.

“He’s out of town,” I said, allowing him to see the briefest glimpse of sadness before leaning in as though whispering conspiratorially. “I’m looking for a little something. Maybe you can help me out.”

“Yeah sure, man. Of course. You know I’ve always got what you need.”

His supercilious smile nearly made me growl, though I’m sure he couldn’t have heard me over the din in the place. It was all I could do to keep the monster in me caged. Resisting the urge to bury my fist in the center of his smug face and splatter brain matter over the dance floor, I smiled back. Only his greed kept him from recognizing the deadly intent in my expression.

“Not here,” I said. “In private. I’ve got something special to give you. For old times sake.”

“Christmas present?” he asked, and he laughed as though he’d made the funniest joke of the year.

“Something like that,” I replied, turning on the charm and giving him the same smoldering look I’d used with a thousand other meaningless one night stands before I’d met Damon. Lip curled in a crooked smile, I stepped a half step closer and palmed the front of his jeans, never taking my eyes off his.

Hook. Line. Sinker.

I saw his expression change from one of startled disbelief to a flame of a lust he’d never have admitted out loud. He licked his lips, and a bead of sweat broke out on his forehead as he nodded in acknowledgement, and even over the music I could hear his breath catch.

“A-alternate payment, maybe?” There was a nervous squeak in his voice, his eyes open wide in anticipation.

“Sure. You could call it that,” I said, grinning and reaching to put an arm over his shoulder as though we were best buddies.

That was how he let me lead him away to one of the private VIP booths. The curtains closed around us, hiding us from view, and I dropped down onto the couch, my fingers tugging at his shirt to pull him close into a kiss.

It was the last thing I wanted, but seduction would let me get closer than any other approach, and goddammit I needed to slake my thirst with this asshole’s blood.

He leaned into me and kissed me back, his hand fumbling awkwardly with my collar. My fangs cut his tongue, and he pulled back with surprise, staring in confusion.

“You’re fine,” I said, catching his gaze and exerting my influence on his mind. “You want me to suck your cock, don’t you? You can admit it. Everyone does. Even women. They wish they had one so I could drop to my knees and suck it.”

Panting, he nodded.

My gaze turned to steel, the smile becoming something much more sinister as I commanded. “Drop your pants. Now.”

I doubt he’d ever moved so fast in his life. In seconds, his jeans were down around his ankles.

With a dark laugh that became something of a growl, I rose to my feet again, still gripping the front of his shirt, and in one fluid motion I turned and shoved him down onto the couch where I’d just been sitting.

“Sit there, Mitch. You’re going to get what’s coming to you. Don’t move. Don’t scream. Don’t speak. In fact, I don’t want to hear a sound from you. Just shut up and take it.” I could have taken away his fear before I bared my fangs. I could have made certain he didn’t feel the pain of what I was doing to him. But I didn’t. I wanted him to feel all of it.

Because of him, I’d been high more times than I could count. That was part of why Damon had left. I didn’t have any respite from the pain of that, and therefore, I didn’t have any mercy on Mitch either.

My favorite sweet spot to drink from wasn’t the neck. No. I prefered something much more salacious. Tapping the vein high on the inner thigh, especially when a man’s cock was hard...there was nothing better than that.

I dropped to my knees in front of him, guaranteeing that anyone who chanced to peek a head behind the curtains would step right out again, assuming they’d walked in on us en flagrante delicto, in an amorous moment. Nothing could be further from the truth for either of us. No sexual pleasure would be derived from the experience either for him or for me, but I wanted to be absolutely sure we were undisturbed.

My lips curled up and I could see the horror in his eyes as realization hit. He knew in that moment he wasn’t going to get what he’d expected, and the terror in his look gave me a thrill. I clasped his cock in my hand, knowing he couldn’t help the reaction my touch would cause. More blood rushing south. Just like I liked it.

One more malicious laugh, and then I snarled, “Goodbye, Mitch,” before I tore into the vein at his groin, blood spurting into my mouth like a fountain, making me moan with delight.

He did as I’d commanded. Sat silent and still as I drained him dry. I heard the moment his heart gave a flutter and died.

I let go of him then and sat back on my haunches to look at my handiwork.

He was so still and pale, he looked almost as though he were sleeping. Yet the way he was sitting was clearly lascivious and lurid, the bite mark high and intimate on his thigh, pants at his ankles. The monster in me reveled in leaving him just like that for someone to find. Let them explain that to the cops.

Reaching into his jacket pocket, I pulled out his wallet and snagged the cash there. Nearly three hundred and fifty dollars. “You won’t mind if I take this, will you, Mitch? Hmm? For old time’s sake. Merry Christmas.”

With that, I stood, tossed the empty wallet into his lap and wiped my lips with my pocket handkerchief.

The music swelled outside the curtains, and I left him there in that darkened corner, making my way back out of the bar onto the street. Only when I was back in the apartment did I realize I’d left behind his stash of drugs. Maybe old habits could change after all. 

Tossing my jacket onto a chair, I sat down at the kitchen table, resisting the urge to crack open a beer. The place was so empty and cold. I’d forgotten to turn on the heat in spite of the winter chill and snow outside. But having been inside the warmth of the bar had reminded me what I was missing.

Damn you, Damon. Damn you all to hell.

Except I didn’t want that at all. I missed him more than ever.

Now that I’d satisfied my hunger, I had the strength to truly feel the loss of him. I wanted so badly to call him. There was no point, though. I didn’t even know if he’d be in, anyway. Yet sitting there alone was a torture.

There was so much I wanted to say to him. Needed to say.

Dammit. He should be here. All I wanted was to bury my head on his chest and hold him close. We didn’t even have to fuck. I just wanted the intimacy we shared. The quiet acceptance that went unspoken between us. Or at least it had.

I clenched my jaw, muttering curses under my breath. My vision swam, and I swiped at my eyes impatiently with the back of my hand.

Sniffing, I cursed again, then got that notebook again, scrawling off another letter with anguish and sadness overwhelming me, and as a result my words were far more raw than I’d have ever let myself reveal.

“Dear Damon,

Come home to me. I need you. I miss you. Dammit, it’s Christmas. Wherever you are, come back. I’m dangerous without you.

I’ve followed your request to the letter. I haven’t given in to my addictions. God, I wanted to, but I didn’t. I’ve even made sure my easy access has been cut off for good.

Now that I’m sober, all those feelings I repressed are rushing in on me, though. I’m such a fucking mess, Damon….”

My hand paused, pen in hand, and I stared down at the page. I was on the verge of admitting the depth of my feeling for him, but as I sat there I realized the futility of such a confession. He knew I still harbored feelings for Jasper. I’d told him as much long ago. What I felt for Damon wasn’t the same as that kind of emotion. It wasn’t the love at first sight sort of thing. But still, it was love, and deep nonetheless. My love for Damon was something I couldn’t lie about to myself, but using that word to describe my need for him was an exercise in futility. How many times had he told me he couldn’t love? Not anymore. I’d seen the picture he still carried of Antonio, and it was obvious that I was never going to mean that much to Damon. Still...no. I had to cut off that little voice of hope at the root. Letting myself want what I couldn’t have...well...that was Jasper all over again, wasn’t it?

I was also filled with the urge to confess what I’d done to Mitch. There was a time when he and I would have laughed at the poetic justice of the way I’d left his corpse. But now I wasn’t sure he’d see the humor in it. Truth be told, my guilty conscience was already starting to eat at me in spite of all my bravado and certainty that Mitch had earned that death. Conscience. I hadn’t missed feeling that. What kind of sick monster feels pity for an asshole like that?

I sighed, then began writing again, cutting my words short in order to keep myself from saying things I knew I shouldn’t.

“Just come home. I need your body next to mine. I miss your scent and the sound of your voice and the way you touch me in the dark. I miss your smile and those blue eyes of yours. I miss the way your hair falls across your pillow. I even miss that goddamned new British invasion music of yours. Come home, and I will never complain about it again.

Come home before New Years. I want someone to kiss at midnight.

Yours,

G.”

I tore the pages from my notebook and folded them carefully, then stuffed the letter inside a Christmas card I’d bought when I’d thought he was going to be here. I still had his gift tucked away in my rucksack, and if...when he came home, I’d give it to him.

@SinfulLibertine had only been gone for a couple of days, but it felt much longer.

I missed him terribly, not just because of the way he held me in the dark, but because of his smile, his laugh, and the way I had just been starting to feel true warmth from him after being at his side for so long. Perhaps it had been there before and the haze of drugs and booze had kept me from noticing, but I had finally let myself start feeling hopeful about a future for the two of us. I had started thinking that perhaps this was something more than a convenient way for each of us to stave off the loneliness that haunted us both.

And then he’d left. Just like that. Told me he needed space. That he wanted me to get sober while he was gone, though he was vague on the specifics of just how and when he’d be back. “I’ll see you when I get home,” he’d said.

/Home/.

That word was meaningless to me. It floated through my mind,  groundless and empty, rolling like a tumbleweed on the breeze as he said it aloud. I realized that “home” was not a place that existed for me. There was him, and then there was nothing. Just me, drifting without roots of any kind. I’d let him be my anchor. I’d bound myself to him and let him give my life gravity. I’d never used the word love. He wouldn’t have wanted it or been able to reciprocate it. He’d told me his emotions were firmly switched off, and I’d accepted that as a condition of our relationship, not expecting it was even possible to hope for more. That was the price for him to shut out his pain. I understood that too. I wasn’t worth him turning them back on just so he could love me when it would also mean he had to relive and confront the anguish of his past. My shattered self was a poor trade for his peace of mind. For me, it was enough that he not only permitted but invited my presence. It wasn’t romance, but I’d long since accepted that I was never going to have that. This with him was as close to love as I was ever going to deserve, and so I was grateful for the measure of happiness being with him brought me. I was even able to forget, sometimes, how damaged I really was.

His leaving ripped that anchor away, and I was already feeling restless and jittery. My dreams were dark and left me waking in a panic to a cold and empty bed, with no one to calm the storm that was always raging  in my mind.

He’d told me to ask Miha to stay with me, but I didn’t want her to see me this broken. Talking to Damon about my flashbacks and fears hadn’t bothered me. He’d been a soldier too, and he and I had been tortured in similar ways. We understood one another in ways that didn’t require words to explain.

Miha knew about my darkness, but I hadn’t been willing or able to rip myself open to show her the reasons why. I couldn’t help feeling weak in admitting what had happened. Captured and tortured by humans...that was still a source of shame for me. Damon didn’t judge me for being unable to prevent it, and while I knew Miha would tell me the same, I couldn’t bear to see pity in her eyes. Couldn’t bear to have her feel sorry for me. It was one thing to know I was an addict, a killer, an asshole even. But to have her think me a coward or see me as weak was something I refused to even contemplate.

I could put on a front for her for a while. But in order to do so, I would need to dull my emotions, and that meant giving in to my addictions. I’d made Damon a promise to sober up. More than that, it was an unspoken condition of his return. How could I face him if I’d broken faith with him? I could bear having everyone else see me as a failure and a wreck, but not him. To see him look on me with disappointment and see me the way everyone else did...or (worse still) see me the way I saw myself...no. I couldn’t stand that.

That’s why for the first few days, I’d resolved to go cold turkey and suffer through withdrawal on my own.

I knew where he’d gone, of course. He hadn’t left me completely in the dark on that score. But I didn’t want to call him or, worse yet, follow and let him see how weak willed I was without him there to keep me whole. And I didn’t want to explain just how much I really needed him. Loved him. How his absence broke my heart and made me feel unworthy.

I wasn’t just withdrawing from the drugs, though. In fact, that was the least of my troubles. The truth was, I was hopelessly addicted to Damon. Desperately so. And for that, there was no cure.

His words assuring me of his return ran on a loop in my mind, and I found myself muttering to myself as I sat huddled in the bathtub alone, hugging my knees to my chest, “He’ll be back. It won’t be long. He’ll be back.”

At first, I’d had trouble even contemplating leaving our apartment. I was so afraid that if I walked out that door, even for a moment, I might miss him. That he might come back and find me gone and leave again, this time for good. I knew this was paranoia speaking. Knowing a thing, doesn’t change the way you feel, though, and I just couldn’t shake my delusions, and as time stretched on, things seemed more and more bleak.

What if he realized what a fucked up mess I was and decided I wasn’t worth the hassle?

What if he found someone else...someone less complicated?

What if something happened to him out there? The world couldn’t be trusted, and nothing was guaranteed?

And what if all this had been a beautiful lie to cover the fact he was breaking up with me? A clever lie to keep me from following as he left me for good? After all, I didn’t deserve him anyway. I’d felt as though our time together was doomed from the first, predetermined to fail like every other relationship I’d ever had. What if it was finally just time to recognize that the inevitable conclusion had arrived while I was too blind to see it coming? These thoughts tormented me, tore at my psyche, ravaged through my veins even as I trembled and sweated through my withdrawal.

By day three, I was no longer paranoid. I was angry.

I loved him, and he didn’t give a shit about me. If he had, how could he have left? I needed him, goddammit. I needed him, and he’d abandoned me, just like everyone else. I’d counted on him to be different. Clung to him and let him see my need. Yet knowing what it would do to me, he’d gone all the same.

In an effort to hold onto my sanity, I took out a notebook and began writing a letter to him, pouring my heart out on the page in a way it would never be possible for me to speak aloud.

“Dear Damon,

I get it. I’m a fuck up. Tell me something I don’t know. It’s not new. I was like this before we were together, and I’ll still be that way long after you’ve left my sorry ass.

Fuck you, though, Mister Perfect. You are just as messed up as I am. I just have to live in it. Every goddamned day, I’m drowning in how fucked up I am. I don’t have the luxury of not caring. Of not feeling every single failure for the last two hundred years again and again like a series of stabs.

You try dealing with that for a fucking day and see if you don’t end up just like me.

You can stand there in judgment. Maybe I deserve it too. But I never claimed to be anything other than what I am. And while I am admittedly a mess, I’m an honest one, and I’m coping the best way I know how.

We all have demons. You. Me. Everyone. We all have regrets and pain and heartache and suffering. Anyone who says otherwise is a fucking liar.

So judge me if you want for the way I’m dealing. I can’t stop you. But you need to know that the only thing that’s keeping me from sliding into the abyss and giving up on life was you.

I’m not saying that as a guilt trip. I know you’re not capable of feeling guilt anymore. You can turn that off like everything else.

I’m simply stating the truth. If I hadn’t found you, I’d have found a way to die. I was desperate for it. For any kind of relief. Even if that relief was complete oblivion.

I need you, you asshole. I need you, and you left like I was nothing. I’m a broken man, and you goddamn know it. You’re the only one I can admit that to without feeling shame attached to the confession. We make a beautiful mess together, you and me. We aren’t perfect. I know that. I never asked for that. But I’m only one side of that fuckedupness. Your mess and my mess, they fit, you know? Don’t you see that?

I’m not asking for love or even emotion. I’m just stating facts.

I’m going to tell you your life, and you don’t have to like it. In fact, I know you won’t.

You’re a fucked up asshole, Damon Salvatore. You hurt people. You can be cruel and heartless. You have so much anger in you, and you lash out at anyone who gets too close to you. You’ve been badly hurt. You’ve lost sight of what it means to truly be happy or to love.

I’m all those things and more. I’m a gambler and a killer and a thief. I’m a coward and I’m weak and I am sometimes endlessly sad for reasons I can’t even express. I am passionate, but often in very dark ways. And I am a fucked up asshole too.

That’s the truth about you and me.

But I’m still here, waiting for you in spite of that. Even because of that.

There is something gorgeous and perfect in our brokenness. I think even you can admit that. It’s not just in the way we fuck or the dark desires that drive us. We understand each other in a way most people never find. You have seen me at my worst, and I’m not afraid to admit every part of who I am to you. And Damon, I’m the only one who knows both your darkness and light and doesn’t ask you to change or be anything other than yourself. A broken wreck. But you’re my broken wreck, just like I’m yours. What we have is real, even if you don’t feel the emotional side of it. I will feel it for you.

When you’re done with your high horse and ready to come back to earth, I’ll be here waiting.

Yours,

G.”

I read over the words ten times, trying to decide if it was worth sending, second guessing myself, but then my impulsive side took over. “Fuck it,” I muttered, reaching for an envelope, and before I could talk myself out of sending it, I walked down to the mailbox on our corner and sent it off to where I knew he’d be staying.

As soon as the letter dropped, I wished I could take it back. It was too raw and angry, and I feared I’d cut too close with what I’d said.

“Fuck it,” I said again with a shrug, lighting a cigarette. It was the only addiction besides coffee I was allowing myself. I had to have something to stave off my cravings. Blowing smoke into the evening sky, I turned, gazing back at the main entrance to the apartment, but I couldn’t face going back to those four walls that had begun to feel as though they were closing in around me. I needed to get out of there and feel anything but his absence and the pain that went along with it.

A moment of deliberation, and then I turned and walked in the opposite direction, heading for the distraction of the night. I didn’t know where I was going. I didn’t really care. I /couldn’t/ care. I was drowning in my emotions again. How could I help it? He’d taken away everything I used to cope.

Me and the needle, we were best friends. Had been since I returned from World War I.

I’d been introduced much earlier, however, by Doc Holliday who had used morphine as a way to kill the pain of consumption. I’d tried to convince him to let me turn him, but he wouldn’t go for it. He was one of the few humans to whom I revealed the truth about myself, and after his death, the only things I’d kept as souvenirs of our time together were his pack of cards and his stash of morphine. From that point on, whenever I felt overwhelmed with pain, I fell back on it like a crutch.

Morphine was the way I’d blunted the shell shock of the first World War. Then in Chicago I’d tried heroin, and it had helped me dull the guilt that threatened to overtake me. It made me forget, dulled my emotions, let me walk through my days without any of the guilt and shame that plagued me. And it let me dull the ache I felt each time I thought of Jasper Whitlock, now married to Alice Cullen.

He’d changed his name for her to Jasper Hale and become her perfect doll of a husband. It made me sick every time I thought of him. I had fallen in love with him long since, and knowing he didn’t or couldn’t let himself feel the same was a pain I couldn’t seem to get over, no matter how many years it had been. She loved him, I knew that, but she loved the man she thought she could turn him into, not the man he was. I loved him with all his flaws, but I couldn’t say it to him. I wanted him to be happy. I loved him enough to walk away and never tell him why. Carlisle had asked me to join their coven, and I didn’t dare explain why I refused. Just seeing them together...it reminded me of how alone I was, and I couldn’t bear to watch it or to listen to the way she spoke to him, treating him as though he were an unruly child she had to constantly give instruction to. Jasper was no child, and I found myself biting my tongue to keep from telling her so. Biting it until it bled.

Easier to stay away, numb the ache, and try to stop caring.

I’d gone to war a second time to get away from him, and found myself in a Nazi torture camp, the object of experimentation. I escaped with a lot of luck, but when I’d come back to the States afterward, it had been difficult for me to return to anything like a normal life. Then there was Korea, and finally Vietnam, and when I’d returned from that place I’d vowed it would be my last war for this country I had helped bring into being.

Whatever you call it - “Soldier’s Heart,” “Shell Shock,” “Battle Fatigue,” or “Post Traumatic Stress Disorder” - it’s all the same thing, and I had been dealing with it since the Revolutionary War. Vietnam, however, was the worst of all, and I had come back feeling that everything was meaningless. What use was it to care about anyone or to feel any sort of remorse or guilt for killing indiscriminately? People died every day in horrible ways. Humans had invented ways of setting fire to the very air so people burned even as they ran in fear. No one was innocent. Anyone could become a monster. I felt justified in letting my vampire instincts take over, and I used heroin as a way to release the last of my inhibitions in that regard.

The torment for me was that there was always this small voice deep within me that harbored a conscience, and I couldn’t turn it off, no matter how I tried to numb it. I could distract myself with drugs, with sex, with blood...but all the while it was still there in the background, reminding me that my actions weren’t human, weren’t sane, weren’t anything other than evil. And I couldn’t stop hating myself, nor could I stop wishing that my life had turned out differently.

I knew, though, that not all vampires were the same. I had heard of some who could turn their emotions off completely, and I craved the kind of absolution that would bring. If I could only have that, I thought, I wouldn’t need the drugs anymore. If I could just stop feeling, I wouldn’t feel guilt or remorse, and I could rid myself of the love I felt that was unrequited. No more pain or heartache.

To keep my feelings under control, I made killing a ritual, trying to establish order in my chaotic mind. Dealing death as a way of turning the randomness of life into something with meaning and calculated logic. I made a game of it, choosing my victims from a crowd by use of an old counting rhyme my brothers had taught me when I was just a child.

“Wire, briar, limber, lock.

Three geese in a flock.

One flew east.

One flew west.

One flew over the cuckoo’s nest.

Out you old dirty dish rag, you.”

I told myself it was simply that their number came up. It seemed as good a reason as any for them to die. After all, death itself can be even more capricious. I gave it a pattern, fitting each killing into a pattern. I collected small items from each killing as a memento, starting first with a piece of jewelry or item the victim carried, placing each token into a little leather pouch I carried around my neck like a totem. Eventually, I began collecting teeth and fingernails, and I wasn’t satisfied until I had completed a “set.” In dark moments when the strain of my emotions became overwhelming, I would fan them out on a tabletop or even count them in my pocket, mumbling under my breath. Two-by-two, rows of canines, molars, incisors, followed by fingernails spread out to recreate the hands that had scrabbled against my chest and tried to scratch and push me away. If I had uneven groupings, I felt incomplete. It was the only thing I had complete control over.

So much guilt. Every time I thought I could do without the drugs, I was overwhelmed with it. I didn’t want it. All I wanted was to be free of it finally. After all, I hadn’t asked to be this thing.

I didn’t admit this side of myself to anyone. I kept it well hidden, in some ways even from myself. I never stayed anywhere too long, and I never stayed sober if I could help it.

One night full of desperation, I broke down and called Carlisle from a pay phone in Jackson, Mississippi. I don’t know what I thought it would accomplish. I was sure he would judge me nearly as harshly as I did myself. He could tell there was a tension in my voice, and said as much.

“Carlisle, it’s me. Garrett Llewellyn. Do you...do you have a moment? I...I need someone to talk to.”

The rain was falling hard in the parking lot as I stood in the phone booth outside a bar I couldn’t even remember the name of. A body lay in the trunk of my car alongside a shovel, and I knew I was going to have to dispose of it, but the drugs were wearing off, and I was starting to feel that creeping guilt again that threatened to drown me completely. I was out of control, and I knew it, and I was grasping at straws for help.

“Garrett?” he said, his voice sounding tinny over the wire. “Where are you? Are you alright?”

A bitter laugh escaped my lips. Alright. Was I? I was fairly certain I would never be alright again.

I ran a hand through my wet hair, pushing it back from my forehead to stop it dripping in my eyes. “I can’t...I can’t do this, Carlisle. I can’t live like this anymore. I’m in so much pain. I need the pain to stop. Please...help me. I need it to stop.”

“Garrett, where are you? You can always come here. You know that.”

I could hear the concern in his voice, but the moment he offered to take me in, I pictured that face I’d tried so hard to forget.

“I can’t.” I shook my head, laughing maniacally at the thought. God knows I couldn’t be there with...them. “I just...remember you told me once about the vampires who could just stop feeling things? You said they could turn their emotions off.”

“Yes, but...Garrett…”

Cutting him off, I smacked the door of the telephone booth with the flat of my hand, breaking out one of the panes of glass. “Tell me how. I need to know how.”

“Garrett, that isn’t something I can do. You don’t want that.”

Pieces of broken glass had sliced into my palm, but I ignored the pain, shaking my hand so small droplets of blood splattered the inside of the booth. “Don’t tell me what I want. You know someone who can help me. Give me a name, Carlisle. You owe me that, goddamnit.”

I heard him sigh, and I could almost picture that furrowed brow of his as he decided what to do. At last, he murmured a name softly, whispering as though he was afraid he’d be overheard. “I knew a vampire named Damon Salvatore once. He was able to do it. I met him in New York. But Garrett, you don’t have to do that. You can come here. I’ll help you. We’ll help you.”

The kindness in his voice made me choke back tears, and I shook my head. “I’ll make do. Thanks.”

And with that, I hung up the phone, swiping my face with the back of my sleeve. I had a name. That was enough. I would find him, even if it took me a year.

From that night on, Damon Salvatore became my obsession. I searched all of New York and found only whispers, an apartment on the East Side, a bartender who knew his name in a club called CBGBs, and that led me clear across the country to Los Angeles where I heard he had part interest in a hotel.

That hotel was run by a vampire named Elizabeth, it turned out, and for some reason, she took a shine to me. “Those eyes, darling,” she said, touching my cheek with a white gloved hand, “could break a thousand hearts.”

I’d laughed at that, but she inspired my confidence, and somehow I ended up confessing myself to her in spite of everything. When I’d told her who I was looking for and why, she’d smiled indulgently, then gave me a room and said she’d contact him. In the meantime, she said, I could have whatever I needed, and that meant drugs and blood...lots of it.

i couldn’t use aussie slang to save my life tbh, i’m probably actually the least australian, australian there is. i really don’t know whether to take that in a dirty way or not, the struggle is real

g’day is that what us australians say? idk how to be my nationality help. [ i am literally the most awkward person ever so don’t even mention it xo ]

takealapx replied to your post:sinfulsoldier replied to your post: + guilty…. ...

#also guilty

i was going to attempt to make some cool response with some aussie slang but i just got really confused

guilty….