How Long Is Forever

Chapter 6: Human...In Feelings

The warmth of a gentle touch against my face awoke me, showing me Luna in front of me. She sat next to my once unconscious body as the both of us were on her living room floor.

“Luna,” I called out to her as my sight spun around the room for a moment, verifying that I was indeed in her dorm. “How did I end up here?”

Worried in the face, Luna immediately answered. “You were actually in front of my door unconscious. Someone knocked and when I answered the door, only you were there.”

The thought instantly hit me; the vampires brought me here. The image of me being carried over here by a vampire enraged me on the inside, even if no one saw.

“Are you okay?” Luna continued to worry. “Who did this to you?”

“I'm alright,” I told her as I sat up at a normal paste, quickly feeling the pain in my ribs.

The pain was hardcore enough for me to grab my rib, as if that would stop the pain.

“Don't sit up so fast,” She told me. “Your ribs appear to be fractured.”

The pain from my sore and beat up body was causing me to sweat, even though I

could clearly feel the A/C was on.

I noticed my shirt was off, with bandages around my stomach and chest.

“Thanks for taking care of me,” I assumed, not wanting to give the vamps credit for patching me up as well.

“Anytime,” Luna proved me right. “Let's just hope that this doesn't become a hobby.”

Luna's troubled look didn't go away. Sitting next to me in what appeared to be pajama shorts and a plain T-shirt, Luna wouldn't drop the subject.

“Ryan, who did this to you?”

Knowing she wouldn't let me out her apartment without me telling her, I sighed before replying.

“It was a vampire.”

“A vampire? What were they doing on this side of the campus?”

My sudden silence told her that I was in fact on their side of the academy. Her worried face then turned to a face of disappointment. I felt like a kid all over again.

“N...Now Luna, let me explain,”I stuttered. “I just wanted answers about-”

“You let the school solve the case on your mother Ryan! Don't play detective like that; they could have killed you!”

Her outburst startled me, causing more pain to my wounded body as I jerked. Her

tone than calmed down as her hands hovered above my chest area.

“I'm so sorry Ryan,” She changed her tune. “I just want you to be careful. Obey the

school's rules; they're there for a reason. The school will handle the disappearance of your mother.”

“When Luna?” I grunted. “I've been here for three months and I have not been given any leads or information on my mother's status.”

“Things take time Ryan. There are plenty of people at this academy who are going through a similar problem,” Luna stated, her words shifting into a lower tone as she got closer to the end of her statement.

The emotion of inner depression alerted me. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to catch on that Luna was going through a similar case of pain.

“Luna, what happened to you? Why are you attending this academy?” I couldn’t help but ask.

Luna didn’t answer right away, sitting in place stuck as if she was trying to convince herself to tell me.

“Maybe another time,” I added on, respecting her silence.

“No,” She shot back with her hand in the air. “I’ll tell you. Better now than never.” She sighed before continuing. “Before I came here, I had a little brother. His name was Marty. I was responsible for keeping tabs on him. One night my mother was cooking, and she realized she had to go to the grocery store for an ingredient she

was missing. I think it was some sort of seasoning if I recall. So she asked me to watch my brother and the food.” Luna paused for a brief second before exhaling again, signaling that she was getting closer to the downfall of the memory she was telling. “I was studying and watching the food at the same time. So I didn’t notice...I didn’t notice...that my little brother went outside. To this day, I still don’t know why he went outside. Eventually I heard him scream. It was a scream that stuck to my soul, like he was dying or something. To my surprise, he was. By the time I followed the scream to his whereabouts, his voice had gone silent. The front door was open, and my little brother rested a cold nap, on our doorsteps. The bloodsucker didn’t even have the courtesy to let him turn. His neck was broke.”

Tears flooded her cheek, with sniffles guiding my ears to the sadness that dwelled on her heart. I couldn’t help but pull her into my arms. Her head now against my chest, the tears that she struggled to overcome, began to moisturize my bandages.

With no words, only tears, I did what she couldn’t seem to do as I rubbed my hands up and down her upper back. I spoke.

“It wasn’t your fault,” I attempted to speak in a calm voice over her crying.

“Tell that to my mom,” She spoke in between her outburst of tears. “She was a wreck afterwards. She...she...she couldn’t even take care of me, let alone herself after that night. She gave me up for adoption four months after that. If it wasn’t for the academy, who knows where I’d be,” Her tears began to calm down, clearing her voice up a little better as she leaned out of my chest, wiping any evidence of crying with her fingers. I helped as well. “I turned eighteen the same month the academy found me. And that was that.”

With a few sniffles coming and going, the room went silent for a moment as I thought of what to say next. The truth was...what could I say? I didn’t know any resolution for anything that had happened to people like Luna and myself. All the humans in this school were placed here due to their bad experience with vampires, just to force us to face our trauma and then embrace them as fellow civilians. What a load of crap.

Not thinking too far into it, I said what I felt. “This sucks,” I spoke. “Here we are trapped on a campus with our worst nightmares turned into reality. I wish...I wish I could change that. I wish I could save people. I wish I could have been there...for you. For my mother. For your brother. You three didn’t deserve anything that happened to you. If you hadn’t heard it before, I wanna be the first to tell you...that I’m sorry. And what happened to your brother...will never happen to you.”

“How do you know?” Luna questioned me. “How can you be so sure of what you said? What makes you think that any of these vampires won’t get out of line and attempt to go after the rest of us? We’re lambs in a slaughterhouse basically.”

Grabbing her chin, I gently lifted her face towards mine, making sure we made direct eye contact when I answered her. I wanted her to know how serious I was. That we were no longer kids. That this time I wouldn’t back out on her. That I no longer had a mother who moved me away from her, so she didn’t have anything to worry about.

“Because I’m going to be the one wolf that challenges the workers in this s*******r house. I’m going to s*******r them, before they can do the same to me. Or anyone else that I care about.”

My hand didn’t move from her face. And Luna didn’t show any sign of restraint as silence stepped in between us, with time passing as we remained in place.

Locked into each other’s eyes, we were slowly drifting into different feelings. Well, at least that’s how I felt. But for some strange reason, I could tell she felt the same. I could tell that she believed in me. That she could see I cared, holding my head up with regrets, keeping my dreams in the sky.

Luna’s path slowly closed into mine as I slowly leaned in to her. I couldn’t explain it, but I wanted her. I wanted her lips. Feelings that were now burning with hunger, compared to what I felt for her when we were kids. I secretly wanted her back then as well. But this time, the fire in my heart had evolved into an inferno in my chest. This time...our lips would be more polite to each other.