Page 45 of To Save a Vampire
“Glad you could finally join me,” he says with a smirk.
I nudge my shoulder into his, the only revenge that feels safe at this steep of an incline. Once my heart rate finds a sense of normalcy—as normal as it might ever be with Asher Xavier sitting next to me—my eyes start to trail the horizon.
The sky is so clear. The stars appear brighter up here. Life feels brighter up here. The night sky drifts on for miles and miles. We traveled all of that. I passed each mile just to come to this spot, on this roof, with him.
I inhale the clouds, seemingly just within my reach. I feel light and free, right where I’m supposed to be in my life. Finally.
Maybe it wasn’t just him I saved by running away from all we left behind…
“Why didn’t you just heal my palm when we first met?” I ask, trying to fill the silence.
He shifts in his spot, his head angled down slightly. “Hybrids tend to lie low because humans have a tendency to use us,” he says, giving me a side glance.
I bite my lip as a strange question threatens to slip over my lips.
“How do you know I won’t use you now? With the union,” I finally say, but I can’t look at him when I speak. What if he doesn’t trust me like I do him?
He leans a little closer to me, his chest brushing my shoulder. The warmth of his body is an ember burning against me and I just want to lean closer and closer into that dangerous heat. “Because I know what being used feels like and this isn’t it,” he whispers in my ear. “Not by a long shot.”
He pulls away from me too soon, his arms leaning against his knees. I can still feel his breath against my neck. His strange words echoing through my mind.
Why him? Why did society decide his dwindling race would be the oppressed? Of all the diminishing cultures in our world, both mortals and monsters, why did they choose to brutalize and abuse his? The war against the vampires has destroyed the divide between our own people. Our heritage, skin tone and religion is no longer the focus of animosity. But there will always be someone to hate …
My heart falls to pieces in my chest. His pain—the pain he never shows—seeps into me. A sharp ache splinters through my chest, but I take a deep breath to ease it away.
We’re quiet for a few minutes. Both of us tracing the stars. Everything feels so monumental with him. With us. Like we’ve been through hell and the smallest mistake will send us spiraling right back into it. Everyone’s waiting for us to figure ourselves out when I can’t even figure myself out. I’m not capable of deciding my future and his.
“I used to hang out up here with Micah.”
I still, looking at him. His silhouette is outlined by the moon as he sits high in the night sky, an archangel watching over the mortals.
“He was my only friend. The friends I met in the woods were not friends my grandparents wanted for me, not the friends humans like very much.” He looks at me for a moment, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “Not that they wanted me contacting Micah either, really.”
He takes a breath before leaning back on the roof, the metal groaning under his weight as he lies down. He places his arms behind his head like a pillow. I join him, my back leaning onto the cool metal.
“When I was younger, your mother used to check up on me.”
I turn my head to him, surprised by his words. His gaze still assesses the stars. My mother never told me that. Another secret among many.
“Every couple of years she’d come, like she felt responsible for thepikeshe delivered in the dead of night in an underground house to a family who didn’t understand him. She’d do her little mortal checkup, see how I was progressing. It seemed to settle my grandma’s worries.”
Something in his voice has changed. He’s not the careless, confident hybrid he portrays. There’s pain and sadness in his words.
“I didn’t grow like a normal boy. I didn’t go through normal growing pains as other children did. I never got sick or had scraped knees. When I was ten, I fell from this roof.” He looks at me with a hint of a smile on his lips, but it’s gone in an instant. “I didn’t tell anyone … There was nothing to tell, really. No bruises, no broken bones, just another reminder that I was different from the other kids.” His eyes drift over the sky.
“So, Charlotte checked in on me and my grandparents. She studied me like she does the others imprisoned in Compound 186.” He says the numbers like they’re heavy for him to speak. “I was her secret project.” He pauses, his eyes narrowing. I hang on his every word. “I hated her.” The confession comes out quiet, but he quickly regains his voice.
“I was everyone’s secret. Kept from the only brother I had. They were afraid I’d be caught. I understood that, but it didn’t stop me from looking for him. We were friends the moment we met. I was the hybrid reflection of himself. I amazed him with my abilities, and he amazed me with his lack of hate for what I am. A decade passed, and our short interactions were the only thing I looked forward to. As much time as we spent together, I’m surprised I didn’t cause us trouble sooner.” His words trail off quietly.
My heart sinks so low in my chest it might never come back up.
He looks at me out of the corner of his eye, his dark lashes lining the sadness in his eyes. I want to comfort the friend I’ve grown so close to, I want to remind him that I am his friend. I reach my hand out to his, my fingers drifting into his with ease. His face still holds the tragic memory. Asher will always hold these memories, but right now, I’ll hold them with him.
“When I was caught and taken to the compound, I had no idea who you were to Micah. Just another human who despised me for what I am.” My heart sinks because he’s right in a way, and I can’t correct him. His words aren’t angry, just factual. “But what fate knew and I didn’t was that my brother spent all his short life excelling at academics, just like you. Struggling to accept politics, but desperate to help his community, just like you. All so he could be matched with the beautiful, quiet girl that glared at me through the window of Compound 186. All so he could die just before your union. All so I could meet that beautiful girl, the daughter of the woman I loathed. All so she could remind me of what my brother taught me all my life.”
My chest rises and falls as the warm air fills my heavy lungs. My eyes are wide, taking in every vulnerable part of him. Every part of me is alive with turning, conflicting emotions.
“He taught me that not all humans are bad. A few have clean hearts. Souls that, even under the shadows of life, still shine within.”
