Page 110 of Vampires of Eden

Wait… what?

That’s not how that goes.

I laugh.

“I don’t know what the hell you’re laughing about, but just lie down, please? You can open your eyes.” He helps me onto the bed and once I feel it underneath me, I fall back, still laughing at my internal dialog. When my head hits the pillow, I open my alighted irises.

Daniel stands over me at the edge of the bed. He’s tall and his inky black hair is pulled back in a loose ponytail. He almost never wears it loose. It’s always braided or confined in some kind of bun atop his head—or at the nape of his neck… never at the side though. That might be cute? Or interesting? He has enough hair to do buns on both sides, like Princess Leia.

“Are you alright, Rabbit?”

Focusing, I look up at him. In the dim lamp light, he looks like a dark angel with ethereal eyes. Or maybe a striking and dangerous devil.

“Mostly,” I say, smiling. God, I like him so much. “Do you know why Raph started calling me that?”

He sits down on the edge of the bed and near my waist. This makes me happy. “I do not. Please tell me?”

“Right after they’d hired him as my manservant, he was observing me with a tutor. I don’t remember it, but I guess the tutor was teaching me about all different kinds of animals and asked which one I would want to be. I told her that I wanted to be a rabbit. Raph said when she asked me why, I said, ‘Because everyone likes rabbits.’”

Resting back more comfortably, I chuckle. “That probably speaks directly to a deep personal failing on my part.”

“Did you know that a rabbit’s vision covers almost three-hundred-and-sixty degrees?” Daniel asks, his head tilted in curiosity. “But their only blind spot is that they can’t see what’s directly in front of them?”

The air stills as I take that in. I turn my head against the pillow to avoid his gaze. “Sooo, another uncanny similarity and personal failing?”

“No, that’s not what I mean,” he says quietly. I turn my head to look back at him. He’s wearing that soft expression that I love. “You don’t have to hide your eyes around Leoni.”

I shake my head against the pillow, which makes Daniel spin. Bad, bad idea. “It’s inappropriate.”

“It’s not. There aren’t any strict rules here.”

“I know…” I’m distracted because the silky, wavy length of his ponytail rests over his shoulder and I… I want to touch it. It’s so close. I lift my hand and meet his eyes. “Can I?”

“Can you what?”

I move my hand closer so he knows what I’m talking about, but I don’t dare make contact. “Touch… Is it okay?”

His irises shift. The tender expression rested in his sharp features transitions into something darker. Something I can’t read. Nervous, I pull my hand back.

“Yes,” he says.

Nothing more.

This is awkward and I’ll definitely hate myself in the morning. It’s stone quiet as I reach and carefully scoop the length of his hair into my palm. It’s heavy, just like I had imagined. Cool to touch and silky. Pushing my luck, I shift my hand so that I can entwine it between my fingers. It’s messy but graceful in the way that it falls. Elegant in its imperfection. Like him.

“You’re not a ‘spider-vampire,’ or half-dead,” I tell him. “You say that about yourself all the time, Danny. But ‘disagree.’ You’re not like that at all.”

The words spill out easily, in a way that they typically can’t. It’s like a road block has been removed from my chest and throat. A concrete barrier has dissolved and now the traffic of my words and feelings can flow freely.

Daniel leans down closer and my nature celebrates this. My heart races and because of his angle, his hair bunches in my fist. I can’t take my eyes off of him.

“Then what am I like, Alexander?” he asks, his gaze unwavering.

“You’re alive. To me, you’re… complex. Like a sonata with multiple movements. Your essence is like a nocturne—a melody that floats between mezzo forte and pianissimo. Rhapsody on a moonlit night.”

It feels nerdy of me to express how I feel in terms of music, but it’s the language we share. We have many languages, but this one in particular? He gifted it to me. I didn’t know the piano nor classical music well until him. My love for it is rooted in him because he planted the first seed.

Daniel hovers inches above my face and the heft of his ponytail rests within my fist and fingers.