Kissed By the Devil

The splinter bathed in a mixture of blood and champagne when it cut me on the cheek. Probably, it is worth putting less effort, clinking a bottle with a friend. – And then what? – Yes, I turned him down, of course, – the last word was half swallowed by a belch, after which Celeste, in mock embarrassment, gasped and covered her mouth with her palm. She worked in a cafeteria not far from our apartment, and her shift neighbor with enviable persistence endured refusals and continued to ask her out. – Commendable self-confidence for a man with such an appearance. The unreasonably sensational phrase "the main thing is the soul" is bullshit, it's some freak who found an excuse for himself. – Yeah, – but she didn't hear me anymore, leaning on her hand with heavy eyelids and funny snoring. I rested my chin wearily on my palms, squinting against the light, which suddenly became too bright. Migraine throbbing jolts attacked the temples – lately she has become a regular guest in my head. A group of teenagers at the far end of the room were noisily celebrating someone's birthday, their loud voices were the last straw for my sensitive brain: – Shut the fuck up, – my eyeballs were filled with blood when I crashed into the birthday boy with the speed of a meteor, pinning him against the wall and being dangerously close to using my fangs. God knows, I usually didn't touch the children, but sometimes I wanted to smash their skulls into the passage to the next room. – Calm down, – a low voice made its way through the tenacious tentacles of acute pain, but it was not enough to force me to free myself from a sudden attack of aggression. My forearm pulled back with an unpleasant weight when someone's palm pressed it insistently, roughly throwing my hand back. I turned around with a wild look, expecting to stumble upon a too bravehearted brat, but stopped in confusion. There was nothing to indicate an opponent of child abuse, except for the thick energy hanging in the air. Her distinctive scent resonated in my nostrils with instant recognition: this was how the aura of crackling electricity accompanying each immortal was felt. – Celeste! her thoughts seemed to turn into an ambulance, but the panicked sound of the siren was replaced by her name. "They don't need her," I muttered incessantly as we made our way back to her place. "They don't need her. With a determined intention to take our carcasses away from this "corner of tranquility", I deftly shouldered her, accustomed to an almost daily ritual. It was easier to convince myself that in this way I was repaying the girl for a free shelter than to admit that her presence had become a tangible part of my life. Attachments are overrated – they bring nothing but pain. Especially with people whose bodies are so fragile and short-lived compared to the endless but shitty existence of immortals. A saving breath of freshness slightly dispelled the fog in my head and depressing thoughts, reinforced by the stale air of the underground bar. The eye-cutting neon sign read "Eden": that's what caught my attention in the first place. Do you want to get a regular customer? Include an element of the supernatural in the title. For a victim of advertising like me, it works flawlessly. – Phew, – my head was spinning as I crossed the couple of blocks separating the bar from our apartment with a burning ass. With a victory cry, I slammed the door on the lock from the inside, turned on the light and threw my neighbor on the bed not too gently. That asshole didn't even move. The indignation that was gaining momentum in my soul was extinguished by the relative order that reigned in the room, which was an obvious sign of Celeste's hand. The evidence of my stay here was everything that stood out from a decent picture: a warehouse of things on the back of a chair, ready to compete with the Egyptian pyramid in height, and a leaky sock, huddled in a corner since the Battle of Kulikovo (oh, yes, we study human history), and patiently waiting for its journey straight into the trash can. His wandering gaze caught on a small bookcase full of works by classics, modern science fiction writers and romantics. Memories of cozy evenings that we often spent in silence, preferring the fictional world to conversations, made me smile a little. At such hours, the only bridge connecting our souls who had flown away in search of adventures was a teapot, which rightfully took its place in the center of the coffee table and was alternately used until the first light dawns in the windows and plunges us into a doze. No matter how rotten life may seem, there is nothing that the company of a good book and a cup of tea cannot fix. At least, that's what I thought before the catastrophe, which forced my views on the world to be shaken, and my values to lose their meaning. Some problems are as tenacious as cancer: medicines have not yet been invented to solve them. A sensitive inhuman ear caught a barely audible vibration that instantly alerted me. I didn't share the number with anyone except Celeste and colleagues, who are unlikely to be eager to communicate with my friendly person on a single day off. The display, not for the first time forgotten on the laundry basket, lit up with a notification from the bookstore. Relaxing, I returned the phone to its place, putting my palms in the sink. Turning the red handle to the maximum, I shoved them under the burning jet, knowing that I would not feel pain. A furious blow on the faucet did not make the water hotter, no matter how much I would like it. His exhausted gaze glanced briefly at his reflection in the mirror, remembering what it was like to see yourself. Hate. Those almost black eyes, in intensity of color inferior only to the hair that descends over the shoulders in a messy curly mop. Pale plump lips, an echo of the former ideal girl who could bring angels to their knees with just a smile. Pressing the incisor hard on the tender skin, I tore them into blood. Not ready to endure this torture for a second longer, I turned away from the painfully familiar features. And froze. I've always had problems with the speed of the thought process, but this time I could even swear that it smelled fried, the gears in my head worked so hard: – On the laundry basket, – I repeated stupidly. "And I decided to find you by your phone location." The words echoed in my ears, each breath was given with difficulty, as if glass was hammering into my lungs. But I didn't rush into the room to get to the truth. Probably because inwardly I already knew what was waiting for me. – I'm sorry, – later I was tormented for a long time by the question whether the tremor in Celeste's voice was reality or my wishful thinking. Painfully. I still had time to feel this before consciousness broke off.