What We Once Were

Was it the sprawling maple tree she sat under, her captivating physique, or those mesmerizing eyes that drew me into my oblivion. I may never know the answer to that question. What I do know is that by closing my eyes for what I had hoped would be the kiss of a lifetime unexpectedly transformed me into the monster I am today.

Her fangs were sharp and potentially deadly, but my corpse was not what she required. What she lusted for was a companion to share her dark world with. I became her partner in blood. What she had turned me into was not who the original me started life as. It’s amazing how something as simple as a kiss can transmute a person from an easygoing fun-loving person that everyone enjoys being around into a monster that is feared and loathed.

There is still a warm passionate person that everyone loved to be around locked deep inside me. I know he’s in there just longing to be set free. I just need to find the key to free my true self from this unnatural life of bondage. Unfortunately, that key is the most precious of all her possessions and she guards it with all the ferocity of a mother lion. Without me she would be stranded, alone in a world where her only companions would be solitude, bloodshed, and the hatred others feel towards her.

She tells me that her life was once very similar to my former life. Love and kindness were something she took pride in sharing with all those around her. The world was fresh, clean, and so was she. Animals and humans alike longed for her companionship and she gave it willingly. All she asked for in return was to be treated as an equal in all things. Was this too much to ask for? Apparently, the higher powers thought it was.

She was ridiculed and belittled for standing up for what she knew was right, even if it went against the teachings of her male counterparts. They punished her for her transgressions and eventually banished her from the home she had helped build for herself, her mate, and their future children. She was treated with scorn and unjustly expelled. Now forced to survive in the barbaric world of the outside, she became a wanderer of strange and mysterious places.

As she roamed from place to place she honed her skills in the dark arts. As time moved on, only one person had more power than her and she knew no matter how proficient she became, the underworld would never belong to anyone but him, but she had the power to rule the mortals that dwelled on the surface.

Centuries drifted past and she discovered that no matter how powerful she became, the thing she needed most was companionship. Not someone who would need to be replaced every fifty or so years, but someone that, like her, would last for eternity, a soul mate. I was selected to fill that position. All that was required of me was to be her loyal servant and drink the blood of the living to maintain my youth.

She was beautiful, intelligent, and fascinating, but I’ve never been able to love her the way she needs me to. How am I to love someone that only cares for me the way a human cares for a pet. I am much more than what she commands me to be and it’s time to demonstrate my worth. Whatever happens today, win or lose, I will have reclaimed my humanity back from the woman that was once Adam’s original bride, Lillith.