Chapter 4

• My alarm went off right next to my ear when I was in a deep sleep. The angry electronic sirens beat on my poor eardrums, so I quickly pulled my hand out from under the quilt and hit the snooze button. Sleepily, I turned over in bed and pulled my quilt around me tight. Slowly, hazy memories of last night started to come back to me, and then they started to become disturbingly clear. I thought about that man, who was my husband.
• I suddenly sat up in bed because I felt restless.
• I didn't remember walking back from the graveyard or taking off Laura's long dress. I do not even remember getting into bed! But I could still hear that voice and see those lips.
• My heart beat fast, which I didn't like.
• I tried to pull myself together while shaking my head. My brain tried to make sense of the strange things I remembered from last night. Maybe I drank too much, maybe I was on drugs, maybe I hit my head really hard on the way home from the party, or maybe this was the start of a mental breakdown.
• I sighed and leaned back against my pillows, wishing I could figure out what had happened last night. I knew that different drugs and even stress could make a person start to see things, but deep down I knew the man from last night was real, even though my head told me it was impossible.
• Could there really be vampires?
• When I opened my eyes, I looked at the ceiling and thought about whether or not I really wanted my mystery vampire to be real. If he was real, he would have turned me into a vampire when he bit me last night. So, if I were a vampire, I would probably burn in the sun, flinch at the sight of a crucifix, or turn away from the smell of garlic.
• This gave me some ideas about what to look into. So I got out of bed and got ready for the first test to see if Mia was a vampire.
• I went over to my closed curtains and opened them just a little bit, letting in just a little bit of light. A little bit of light came into my room through the curtain. I stood in the room's shadows and cautiously waved my hand through the ray of light, but nothing happened. My simple hand was easy to move through the light.
• So I guess that meant I wasn't a vampire, but I wasn't sure for sure. As a teen, the only thing I really knew about vampires was what I saw in bad, trashy horror movies. So maybe vampires could stay alive in the sun, which would make me a vampire... or maybe I was just going crazy.
• I fell down on my bed and couldn't figure out what the hell was wrong with me.
• "I'm going crazy," I said to myself in a low voice.
• 'Mia...'
• "What's going on?" I said sitting up.
• Suddenly, my bedroom dorm door was slammed in a panicked way. The voice of Laura Taylor yelled, "Hayden! Is anyone there!?"
• When I opened the door, I saw Laura still dressed up for Halloween. She smelled awful, and I know that sounds bad, but Laura smelled like cigarettes, vodka, puke, and sweat. I took a step back into my bedroom as my stomach roiled.
• Laura's eyes filled with tears, "You skank! Did that make you laugh! I sent the whole football team to look for you in that graveyard." She yelled at me out of anger.
• "Laura, what are you saying?" I answered.
• "When the church bells rang at midnight, the guys who were guarding the cemetery gates heard you screaming. They thought someone was killing you or something!" "I thought someone had killed you!" Laura cried.
• I was surprised to see that Laura was really upset, because I didn't think she could be honest in any way.
• She yelled, "Where the hell did you go, Hayden?"
• "I'm not sure?" I told the truth.
• I didn't know what was going on with me last night. Last night was all I could remember, and all I could remember was being turned into a vampire. How could I even begin to explain that to Laura? Oh, and Laura, it turns out that the Prince of Darkness is a real person, and he showed up last night and made me marry him in a strange ceremony with a zombie bishop.
• "I hate you Hayden. Before, I just felt sorry for you because you were the nerd nobody liked, but now I officially fucking hate you "Laura spit as she ran down the hallway.
• I stood in the doorway and watched as Laura slammed the door behind her as she left my dorm. When I went back to my room, I closed the door. What did I do wrong last night? Was I vampire?
• I passed the light test, but what about garlic and crucifixes?
• I ran over to my desk, where my jewelry box was sitting. When I opened the box, I found a silver crucifix that my Aunt had given me for my 18th birthday. I stared at the cross, hoping to feel something horrible that would make me turn away, but nothing happened.
• Then I left my room and went to the kitchen that everyone used. I knew there were no garlic bulbs in the kitchen, but there was always a lot of garlic bread. I took a stick of garlic bread out of the freezer and put it in the microwave. I took the bread out of the microwave once it was done and ate a piece.
• It was very tasty.
• I leaned against the kitchen counter and groaned.
• So far, everything I've looked into has shown that I'm not a vampire. I guess this meant that the crazy Victorian sociologists had finally gotten to me after all these years. Their hard-to-understand ideas and confusing writing drove me crazy. I had given up, and now I dreamed about hot vampires.
• I ate the rest of the garlic bread and decided that I still had to go to class, even if I was going crazy. I poured myself a glass of water when I was thirsty and went back to my dorm room. As I walked by the room of my neighbor, her door opened. I smelled something I had never smelled before.
• "Mia, thank God you're up! I cut myself on my craft blade," my friend Becca said as she held out her hand. She spoke.
• I felt like my throat was on fire. I looked at her hurt hand and watched the red liquid leak through the white bandage she had wrapped around it.
• Becca said, "The cut isn't that bad, but I need some gauze from the kitchen because I don't want to risk bleeding all over the carpet."
• "Sure, I can get you some gauze," I said without thinking.
• "Thanks Mia, you're such a star!" She chattered.
• I quickly turned around and ran back to the kitchen, where I took the first aid kit out of the cabinet under the sink. I was trying to think about Becca and how she was hurt, but my throat was getting dry and my jaw was starting to hurt. I went back up the hallway and gave Becca the first aid kit.
• "Thanks, Mia," she said with a smile. "By the way, I really like how real your teeth look."
• "What?" I said in a whisper, finding it hard to swallow.
• Becca said as she shut the door, "The fangs are so cool."
• "No, no, no..." I shook my head.
• I ran down the hallway and into my door room and bathroom. I turned on the light and looked in the mirror of the bathroom. Where my canine teeth used to be, I was shocked to see two sharp fangs.
• "Last night did not happen. I am not a vampire, "I told my thoughts.
• Then I heard his voice in my head.
• "At last, you're awake!"