na's

s, I was already getting un

didn't know these two. I had never seen them before today even though at the same time, it still felt like I had seen them before now. And yet they

have been enough

a huff of relief to buy myself a second to

my right

et you go,

it was just certain. The kind of certainty that didn't nee

ed. "Ex

be about that, he added quietly ... like it was the most natural t

re my

e middle of my chest

at

same breath. I looked at him properly for the first time. And that was when I noticed it ... the shift h

ay that human eyes simply did not. His jaw tightened slightly, and when his lips parted, I saw his teeth. It was not the normal teeth. It w

caught in

real. This i

rational explanation I reached for dissolved the second I touched

d my voice, the on

eck, so deliberate it almost felt clinical. And then a small, sharp sting. I swallowed an invi

lo

blo

into something cooler, yet at the same time, something that didn't feel entirely human, and he 'inhale

se guys are defi

calm, which probably said some

ue. Bright, cold and endless which felt like looking at deep water from above and not being able to see the bottom. His teeth, when I caught a glimpse of the

ok directly a

ave been. Every sane, self-preserving instinct I possessed was telling me that this was the moment to scream, to bolt, to do

sion and the racing heartbeat which seemed quiet, stubborn and impossible to

on't hu

now why I

elieved

y chin, turning my face gently but firmly toward him the moment I tried to loo

wn. My knees weren't exactly giving out, but they weren't being cooperative either, and I must have swayed slig

d already

y knew my body b

happeni

k from my neck slowly, exposing the skin there. Not rough and not urgent either. It was l

to be gentle," the

ecide which one o

mething I didn't have a perfect word for yet, moving through me like a current that started at both sides simultaneously a

ent still at t

ey felt

e breath and in the

e bond

from whatever this was before it went any further. But the truth was that my body had stopped consulting me somewhere betwee

neck. Both of them

ey mar

sn't a scream. It w

t as quickly as it came. Then it was replaced by that same warm, consuming c

ng in a school corridor, between beings that seemed like a werewolf and a vampire, having just

quiet, traitor part of m