Crimson

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Saida did everything she could think of to keep me occupied and to make me feel... Anything. We watched a variety of different movies, everything from comedies, to sad dramas, to horror. Though I quickly noticed that she avoided putting anything on that contained romance.

She took me out to shop for clothes. Had me try on a lot of things and tried on a ton herself. The clothes she tried was all more ridiculous and uglier than the previous one in an attempt to make me laugh.

She even tried to tempt me with food. Buying and making all of my favorite things. But all of it tasted bland to me.

I was empty, numb, broken, and I couldn't see anything changing that.

I got a lot of time to think as sleep kept alluding me, though I always tried to not think because the conclusions I slowly drew made it all feel even worse.

Breaking the bond, should have made it easy to be away from Lamech, easy to move on. But it didn't. I wanted to go back to him, hug him and just be by his side. And the more I thought, the fewer reasons I found to stay mad at him.

He had ignored me in the beginning and he had called me weak and said he didn't want to be mated with me. Although that was stupid behavior, with what Alair had told me, it became easy to forgive him for it. It had been idiotic of him, but it had all been because of some dumb plan to protect me. And in the end, he had been caring and kind and loving.

Though too overprotective to the point of disregarding what I wanted. But as annoying as that was, it was something that I could sit down and talk to him about. Something that we could solve and right after having woken up after having been hurt hadn't been the best time for it. I hadn't realized how badly hurt I actually had been then, because I had really felt alright when I had woken up. But the doctor had told me later and it really had sounded like I had been on the brink of death. If it had been the other way around, if Lamech had almost died... I knew I wouldn't have acted reasonable.

And the bimbo. There could be a million reasonable explanations for why she had been in his room and he had said she had been the one trying to force things. That he had drunk her blood before he had met me, but never since, and I would be a hypocrite if I judged him for having drunk her blood before knowing me. It wasn't exactly like I was a virgin.

The hardest one to forgive was that he had bit me against my will, but even that I could feel myself forgiving him for. Hadn't he stopped almost immediately? Hadn't he apologized and really looked like he had meant it? It had been wrong of him to do it, but as I could understand now, he really hadn't been himself during that argument. We all could do crazy things when we were upset, I was myself a master at it. What really was important was that he knew it had been wrong and didn't do it again.

Alair had called me impulsive during that last conversation I had with him. Had I been far too impulsive in rejecting Lamech?

I sat at the living room table, drank from a cup of chamomile tea. That had become what I drunk almost exclusively. It made me sad to do it as it reminded me of Lamech. But I also couldn't stop myself from making more as soon as I had finished the previous batch.

"What do you say about going and seeing a musical tomorrow?" Saida asked and sat down opposite me at the table. "I've heard that the new production of Jesus Christ Superstar is really good."

I didn't answer her, for I didn't care. Instead I just raised the cup and took another sip.

"Chamomile tea again? You never used to drink this much tea before. Doesn't it get boring? Is it really that good?" she asked in a jokingly manner but her words pierced my heart.

"Chamomile tea, thunder, and freshly baked bread," I said and stood up.

Night had fallen and I walked to the front door. I went out every night and jumped from roof top to roof top, but no adrenaline came with it anymore. It had simply become just something to do to occupy the long hours of the night.

"That's what he smells like to me," I told her as I left the apartment.

I walked up the stairs and to the door in our apartment building that led outside and onto the roof. There I breathed in the fresh air and felt saddened over that the sky was clear. They had promised rain in the paper, I had wished it would come with thunder.

I walked to one of the ends of the roof and then took off at a sprint. I jumped from roof to roof, over ten of them until I came to a stop, feeling as if I had put enough distance between myself and the admission I had made to Saida.

I sat down and hugged my knees to my body. I had no idea what I even wanted anymore, or what I could do. Because the truth was that I wanted to return to Lamech and repair our broken bond. But would he be willing to? As I had told Aideen what felt like another life-time ago, breaking a bond was easier than mending one.

But I knew I couldn't keep going as I was. It wasn't only that I slowly faded away, but I also didn't fit into the coven anymore nor did I want to. I had stayed because it had seemed like an easy option and there had never been a reason as to why not. They did provide for me and they had never harmed me in any way. But I couldn't stay after having had my eyes opened to how wrong so much of what they did was, and I definitely couldn't assist them in doing those wrongs as I had used to.

Something needed to change, but I didn't know how to go about that change.

As I sat there lost in my thoughts, sounds that I was all too used with reached me. Pleading and a muffled scream of pain.