Under The Stars

The whole world knew about me, but at the same time, no one knew about me. I had thousands of articles printed about me, thousands of news channels talking of me, and thousands of signs that warned people of a dangerous, unidentified vampire that was me.

But no one truly knew who I was.

So what if I drank blood? So what if I could hypnotise and manipulate and kill? So what if I was a demonically possessed corpse that never made it to the other world? I was sick and tired of hiding, of running, of pretending to be something I was not, just because I was in the wrong world, surrounded by the wrong beings. After all, we were all under the same stars.

It was a quiet night when I roamed the roads of California, looking for something to drink. I spotted a few horses a mile away, not as sufficient as human blood, but it would have to do.

I sank my teeth into their unsuspecting necks and drank as the life slowly drained from their flailing bodies.

I could just imagine the articles the next day. Unidentified vampire strikes again! They would get my face wrong; they always did. I was often drawn as a skinny, long-faced, growling vampire with short dark hair. Wrong, I wouldn’t call myself skinny, and my face was quite round, thank you very much. I never growled. Why would I growl? I wasn’t a wolf. And my black hair is long, luscious, curly, and gorgeous; I was not humble about it.

Humans were quite stupid.

Afterward, I washed my face in a watering trough and walked miles until I reached a forest in the middle of nowhere. I lay against a tree and fell asleep, the sun shining in my face.

***

A human awoke me. A male, because humans had genders, with curly brown hair and an obnoxious amount of freckles. But the most prominent thing about him was the two thin scars across his face, one cutting through his eyebrow and the other on his left cheek.

“Are you okay?” the human asked.

I stood, not wanting to be looked down upon. “I’m fine.” He looks delicious.

He cleared his throat, glancing around at the forest around me. “Why are you here?”

“I have nowhere else to go,” I answered simply, hoping it would suffice.

He stared at me, taking in my patched clothing, and pointed a thumb behind him. “You can come to mine, I have a spare room, you can stay there until you have somewhere to go.”

I observed him, tilting my head to get a better look. He was kind, that much I could tell. But would he still be so forthcoming if he knew the blood that coated my existence? Would he still be so hospitable if he knew what I was? No, definitely not. But the trees were uncomfortable.

I mustered my best non-threatening smile. “Yes, please.”.

He led me out of the forest, making conversation as he did so.

“My name is Luke, but everyone calls me Loops, and I prefer Loops anyway. Luke is such a common name.” He walked with a hand in his pocket and a tilt in his gait. “What’s your name?”

I didn’t have a name, but I always loved stars. If there was one thing I liked about humans, it was that they could spin engrossing stories from little shiny dots in the sky. “Canis,” I replied. Sometimes I felt like the Teumassin fox, always running away from something, or maybe I could even be Laelaps, except I didn’t know what I would be chasing.

Loops raised a bushy eyebrow, the one with a scar going through it. “Like Canis Major?”

I smiled. This human was alright. “Yes.”

***

The next few weeks, I stayed with Loops. He taught me so many new things. Like, how to play Poker, the sufficient amount of shampoo to use weekly, and that David Bowie’s favourite food was a Shepherd’s Pie.

There were sacrifices I had to make. Like, changing my nocturnal habits and eating the revolting human food only to hide in the bathroom and puke it all up.

I was getting hungry and growing desperate. It was a feeling that a human could never understand, the all-consuming famine that a vampire could feel.

People all over California were looking for me, but I was growing creative. I would kill a cat, or a rabbit, or a simple bird, then throw their corpses into the lake. But it wasn’t enough.

I tried to ignore it, but the feeling was too large. I began seeing red when I looked at Loops, sensing the veins full of juicy blood beneath his skin. I had to stop myself too many times from digging my fangs into his skin.

I needed to leave, to hide somewhere, and hitch a ride to Nevada. That was what I had always done; I never stayed. So why was it so hard to leave?

At first, I took it as my own hesitation. Maybe I was scared, or perhaps I simply enjoyed having a comfortable bed.

Until a dark Tuesday evening, when Loops and I sat side-by-side on his sofa, listening to Queen’s album A Night at the Opera on the record player. I decided I liked music a lot.

He nursed a cup of tea. “I’m glad I met you, Canis.”

I raised an eyebrow, something I had learnt from him. “Really?”

Loops sighed. “Yeah. Things weren’t going… well for me.”

“What do you mean?”

He took a sip of his tea, even though I knew it was boiling. His eyes were glazed over. “My mother died, not long before I found you in the woods. It was just me in this tiny house in the middle of California. I was just rotting here, alone. Until you came along.”

I stared at him, counting the freckles on his cheeks. “How about your dad?”

Loops flinched. “No. He’s a… horrible person.”

I wondered if that had anything to do with the scars on his face. “Do you have any friends?”

He shook his head. “They’re too far away.”

I nodded, not sure how to respond.

Then I realised, I wasn’t hesitant to leave because I was scared, or because of the comfortable bed. But because I didn’t want to abandon Loops. How could I possibly go on without him? How could I possibly start anew without thinking of him daily? It would be torture.

But why? Why did I feel so attached to Loops? I had spent my entire life running.

Why can’t I run away from him?

***

It was midnight, and we lay on our backs on the grass outside his home, staring up at the night sky and its constellations.

“My mum and I ran away from my dad when I was thirteen,” Loops said, breaking the comfortable silence. “He was an abusive bigot.”

I looked at him, at his freckles that were scattered like stars, and at the scar on his left cheek. “Did he give you your scars?”

Loops winced, then nodded.

I turned back to the sky, anger blurring my vision. Oh, how I would’ve loved to taste his father’s blood.

“I have scars too,” I whispered so quietly I was afraid he hadn’t heard me.

“Really?”

I lifted my shirt, the burn marks around my torso on full display. Though Loops probably couldn’t see them clearly, because he didn’t have night vision.

He swallowed. “How did you get them?”

“Most of them were accidents, some were friction burns. All from running away,” I explained.

Loops hummed, and then he was placing something cold and metal into my hand. I looked down to see a star-shaped pendant resting on my palm.

“It’s a gift,” he said.

I stared down at it as if it had offended me. A gift? No one had ever gifted me anything. It was perfect. “Thank you.”

The stars smiled down at us.

***

In simple words, killing animals was killing me. What made it even worse was that Loops was the only human within miles.

I would disappear for hours daily, drinking the blood from every animal I see. But it wasn’t enough. No, I’d never be able to derive enough nourishment from them. My hunger was a real, tangible thing.

I needed a human.

There was a steady breeze blowing through the trees, and an arbitrary path of dead animals trailed behind me.

The moon was high in the sky, barely visible through the trees. It reminded me of the night we shared a few days ago, where we showed each other our scars. It felt like a distant memory.

What I wouldn’t give to feel like that again. Now all I could feel was starvation.

Loops would be wondering where I was; I couldn’t let him worry. I couldn’t let him feel alone again. But I was a vampire. I was a monster. Why did I care so much?

I knelt at a lake, the one where I drowned all the animal corpses, washing the blood off my hands and mouth.

This simply wasn’t right. I couldn’t care so much about a human, no, that wasn’t right at all. My adoration for him was holding me back, breaking the pattern I had been following for years. I had to stop feeling like this; it was too much.

I walked back to Loops’ home.

The only way to stop this hunger and all this humane emotion was to eradicate it.

***

It was so quiet that I could hear Loops’ faint snores when I stood outside his door, a muffled inhale and exhale of air.

The breaths that oxygenated his blood.

The thought was enough for my hunger to make me push open his door, which was always slightly ajar, a habit he had gained during my stay in his house. Not because he’d want to hear my footsteps if I came and decided to suck his blood, but because he wanted to be able to hear me pacing the halls when I couldn’t fall asleep, so he could join me. It was sweet.

His blood would be sweet, too.

I stared at his sleeping body. Loops was a lump underneath the blanket, his fluffy brown hair sticking out at the top.

He looked so peaceful.

No, I couldn’t do this.

I wouldn’t let my hunger ruin another life. Especially not his, he was too important. He, with his fluffy hair and lovely scars. I had to leave. I had known it all along in the back of my mind, but now was the time. This wasn’t going to last anyway. I had gone too far.

I knew what I had to do: run off to another state, hiding for eternity. This constant cycle of my life, that Loops broke. I wished I hadn’t stayed with him for so long, because he taught me what it was like to live, to have someone who cared, even if it was only for a few weeks. But it was enough. I couldn't repeat the cycle.

I had to end this.

Loops’ snores followed me out of his room.

I wrote a letter and left.

***

It was humbling, drowning in the same river I dumped all those corpses.

The water around me was blood. I drank, and drank, and drank. Until I couldn’t anymore.

The last thing I felt was hunger. The last thing I thought of was Loops.

***

Loops,

Something urgent has happened, and I have to leave on a whim. I'm very sorry, please forgive me. Don’t come looking for me, you’ll never find me.

The few weeks I spent with you were the happiest in my existence. Your life will continue, and you’ll find new people, I promise.

I know I’m in no position to make requests, but please think of me when you look at the stars. I will never forget you, and I like the idea that you won’t either.

-Canis

***

Loops awoke the next morning. Ever since Canis came, he had been able to wake up at a decent time and be productive with his day in a way he hadn’t since his mother died.

He yawned, rubbing his eyes.

With eagerness, Loops shot out of bed. Bacon and eggs with a blueberry muffin, he decided. It was Canis’ favourite breakfast, and today he felt determined to please. There was nothing he liked more than Canis’ smile.

Bleary-eyed, he walked into his kitchen and flicked on the light, his retinas burning.

Loops saw the letter when he was reaching for eggs.

He read it. He read it again. And again.

He ran to Canis’ room. The duvet was untouched, and the room was empty.

But on the bedside stand was a star pendant.

Loops clutched onto it and sobbed until he felt as if he was drowning in his own tears.