Emily was sleeping when I arrived, but not well. I could hear her making little noises like she was having a bad dream. Her father was awake. He used the bathroom, stopping and starting like in an ad about prostate health. Then he climbed the stairs and peeked in on Emily. She woke up but pretended to still be asleep.

When her dad was gone, I pulled an Emily and tossed a tiny rock at her window. I heard her rouse in her bed and mutter to herself about how much she hated me. Then she got up and zipped on a jacket. I met her at the front door.

“Thanks,” I whispered as she let me in.

“Don't thank me,” she whispered back. “Don't say anything. I'm trying to pretend none of this is happening.”

I, on the other hand, was trying to convince myself it was happening. Emily Harding in her PJs, sneaking me in in the middle of the night. I'd seen her bedroom once before. I'd tried hiding in it, the day I'd bitten her. It was pink and leopard print. Her dressers and bookshelves were covered with the bouquets she must have received from all her friends while she was in the hospital. And on one wall there was a huge poster of a blond cowboy with his shirt unbuttoned and his thumbs in his jean pockets. What the hell.

“Here we are,” Emily said.

“Uh-huh.”

“I'm going back to bed. You can sleep on the floor or whatever.”

She turned off her bedroom light before taking off her jacket, as though that meant I wouldn't be able to see her do it. Then she got into bed. I stood there in the “dark” for a minute, assessing myself. I wasn't tired. Or maybe I was tired, but my anxiety about Sidney had me amped up. I finally sat in the floor next to Emily's bed and let my head rest against the wall near her headboard. I exhaled, long and slow, and tried to ignore my hands trembling in my lap.

Sidney. How I missed her. She'd been so generous to give me her blood when I needed it, like a sexy, nerdy saint. I shouldn't think about her, but her face kept coming back to my mind. Her intuitive gray eyes and her dangerous grin that could laugh at almost anything. I remembered her scent, so warm and strangely nurturing. I would have happily drowned in it.

But I couldn't have her again. She wanted her freedom and I would honor that. I could fight this addiction to her, now that I understood that there was something to fight. I would not go to her. Even if my phone rang right now and she begged me to come to her, I would not. I would keep control.

I took my phone out of my pocket and looked at my recent calls. The call to the Totalitarian She-Beast was right at the top, the little phone icon taunting. It would be so easy to redial and hear her voice again. I longed to know what she was doing. How she was feeling. Did she still need me as much as I needed her?

I could tell by the way Emily was breathing that she wasn't asleep. She rolled onto her back and let out an annoyed sigh.

“What's wrong?” I said.

“I hope you understand,” she said, “this doesn't mean anything.”

“What doesn't?”

“Me letting you stay here. It doesn't mean I like you or anything.”

For God's sake. This again. How many times did she have to repeat that she didn't like me? And I would have loved to let it go, but the more times she said it the more it did start to hurt my feelings.

I said, “Maybe this is hard for you to believe, but I don't like you either.”

She smiled like she didn't quite believe me. “Okay.”

“What? I don't.”

“Please, Nathaniel. There's a reason you came to me on Saturday.”

“I came to you because you were the closest beating heart.”

“Really?”

“Why is that so hard to believe?”

She pulled her blankets up higher, under her chin. “I don't know. You know what guys say about me.”

No, I didn't. At least, I didn't know what the guys she hung around with said about her. The guys I knew could never have her and so tried to pretend she didn't exist.

I said, “I've heard guys say you're hot, but that's about it.”

“Oh.”

Thinking the conversation was over, I exhaled and let my head rest against the corner of Emily's mattress. I wanted to try sleeping a little, but I was afraid if I slept I would lose all my focus and wake up a slave to instinct. That's what happened with Emily. I couldn't risk it happening again.

“So you don't think I'm hot?” said Emily.

I opened my eyes and looked at her.

“What?” I said.

“You said your friends think I'm hot. But apparently, you don't.”

What was this, entrapment? I said, “No one would be dumb enough to think you're not hot.”

“So you do think I'm hot.”

“I guess.”

“But you don't like me,” she said, as though I'd committed a sin of some sort.

“No offense. I just don't think you're my type.”

“Your type?” She lay there, blinking like a drive copying new files. Suddenly, she shoved the blankets down and sat up in bed. “So, you're telling me that if I threw myself at you and was like, oh baby, I have to have you, you'd turn me down? Because I'm not your type?”

I drew back. She glared down at me.

“That's a totally different thing you're talking about,” I said. “Anyway, can we not have this conversation right now? It's distracting.”

“I thought you wanted to be distracted.”

She didn't understand. Talking wasn't distracting me from Sid, it was distracting from all the effort I was putting into not getting up and going after Sid.

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“So, you'd do it?” she said.

I groaned and let my head fall back against the wall.

“If you were insisting on it,” I said, “I'm sure I could suffer through.”

“So you're saying you think I'm hot, and you wouldn't mind hooking up with me, but you don't like me and don't want me to be your girlfriend.”

“Right.”

“You're a jerk.”

“I'm not a jerk. I'm a guy.”

“So all guys think that way?”

“Yes.”

Too blunt. It was too blunt, and I knew it. But I didn't have the mental fortitude to be diplomatic.

Emily went quiet. Which was a relief at first, until I started to realize that I might have broken something. Like she'd been living a world where bare-chested blond cowboys were always perfect gentlemen and I'd just told her that world wasn't real. But what was I supposed to do? I didn't know how to talk to girls at all, let alone about this kind of stuff.

Finally, though, Emily said something.

“So how do you know if a guy actually likes you? You know. Likes you, and not just your boobs.”

“Oh god.”

“It's a real question.”

“If he's talking about---about that to you, that's probably not a good sign.”

“Oh.”

She sounded sad, and I thought I could feel her fantasy world break even more. Fumbling, I said, “I think Brick likes you. I mean, the real you.”

“Nah, Brick and I are just friends.”

“Are you sure? I was here when he found you, and he sounded pretty panicked. Like he forgot he was supposed to be a badass for a minute.”

She pinched her bottom lip into a cute little shape while she was thinking, like a taco shell. Then, suddenly, the thoughtful look left her face.

“Wait,” she said. “What do you mean, you were here?”

I winced. “I was hiding. Brick was between me and the front door.”

“You were still here and you didn't call the police?”

“I left my stupid phone at home.”

“That's so irresponsible!”

“Well, I'm sorry!” I caught myself getting too loud and lowered my voice. “Next time I go on a mindless blood rampage I'll make sure I keep my phone on me.”

She shook her head. But then, like a miracle, she smiled.

I was surprised by how satisfying it was to see that smile. Like, on a metaphysical level. As though now that she was bonded to me it was my responsibility to keep her happy. And maybe it was. Sounded like a fair trade for parasitically stealing her blood.

She laid back down and scooted under her covers. “You're not really a jerk, Nathaniel. I think you're a nice guy.”

I saw a chance and I took it. I said, “It's Nate.”

“What?”

“Nate.”

“But all the teachers call you Nathaniel.”

“Yeah. So does my mommy.”

“Nate,” she said, testing out the name. Then she smiled again. “Okay.”

After that, she was able to go to sleep. I guess she needed to hash it all out before she could comfortably sleep with me sitting right there.

But now I was alone with my thoughts. And, pretty quickly, I realized how wrong I'd been about the conversation. I did need to be distracted. Because, without it, my thoughts were really starting to have their way with me.

My fingers had traveled Sidney's skin as I searched out a vein, and they remembered every minute detail. Tiny hairs and freckles. Softness. Intoxicating, radiant warmth. My teeth could still feel the resistance of her skin. My mouth remembered her pulse, so steady and fearless even while I fed from her. But I wanted to feel more. My fingers wanted to know more. My mouth wanted to feel her pulse stronger, in her throat. My teeth wanted to bury themselves there, to draw the wine from her veins so I could drink and drink until I was drunk with satisfaction.

Time passed. Maybe even hours. It's hard to tell because I don't experience the normal passage of time when I'm missing someone. I took in a deep breath, and then let it out, and then another deep breath, and my muscles started to tense and I realized that I was preparing to do something. Jump up. Run for it. I reached out blindly, found Emily's hand beside her pillow. The contact startled her awake, but when she realized who it was she relaxed and let me hold her hand.

Emily's being was like a second frequency, and touching her turned the volume up enough that it helped drown out the frequency of Sid. But too much time had passed. Sidney was miles away and it still felt like she was broadcasting directly into my brain. Calling to me. I had to go to her.

“Are you listening? Nate.” Emily shook my hand.

“Huh?”

“You're starting to scare me. I don't know what to do.”

“Help,” I gasped.

“Help you how?”

“Skin. Blood. Heartbeat.” It was nothing. A list of things I was fixated on. But Emily slipped out onto the floor beside me and pulled off her sweater. Underneath it was a tank top. She grabbed me and pulled my head into her chest.

“Look, it's a heartbeat. Right here. Just---oh, god, I can't believe I'm doing this. Just listen to it. Can you hear it?”

Of course, I could. It pounded against my face like those mesmerizing African drum beats, the kind that guide you into the spirit realm while you're drinking ayahuasca. Her scent rose up from her skin, carried on the heat from the fire inside her chest. I wrapped my arms around her and my fingers clung to her back. My hands were like claws. I wanted to dig my way into her body and live beside her beating heart.

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“It's okay,” she said. She had her arms around my head and she patted me awkwardly. “It's going to be okay. Do you want to bite me or something?”

I forced out a no. No more.

“But wouldn't it be better if it was me than if it was Sid---”

No more!

“Alright. Shhh. Okay. That's fine.”

I reached blindly for the phone in my pocket while I continued to cling to Emily with my other arm. I called Sidney's cell. Emily said, very seriously, “What are you doing?”

“I need to talk to her.”

“No, you don't.”

“Yes. I have to hear her voice. Make sure she's okay.”

“She's fine, Nate. She doesn't want to talk to you. Leave her alone.”

But by this time the phone was on the fifth ring and I knew something was wrong.

“She's not answering,” I said. Then I heard hissing and realized I was breathing through my teeth.

“Because she doesn't want to talk to you.”

No. That wasn't true. Sid needed me, too. She wouldn't ignore a call from me. I dialed her again, and when it went to voice mail I cursed and slammed the phone down onto the carpet.

“You have to relax,” said Emily. “You knew this was coming, remember? You knew it was going to be hard. But Sidney doesn't want to see you---”

No.

“You told her you were going to leave her alone. You have to do what you said.”

“I didn't know it was going to be like this. I didn't know how much pain she'd be in.”

Emily was all logic. Cool, infuriating, completely irrational logic. “You don't know she's in pain. She's not here. She's protecting herself. She's okay. You can't see her so you don't know.”

“No!”

“Okay, shh.”

“I have to see her. I have to know.”

“Nate,” she said, in a voice she probably used on her little sister. “No.”

A sobbing sound came out of me and I wrapped myself around her. I buried my face in her neck but there was only one person I wanted to feed from. Emily petted my head and shushed me, rocking, soothing, telling me everything was going to be okay but I sobbed again because I knew she was lying. Her heart was racing because she was afraid. She couldn't stop me. I couldn't stop myself. I didn't even want to anymore.

“Nate,” she whispered. She was starting to panic. “Please don't bite Sidney.”

I touched her face, her hair, trying to make her understand.

“I have to,” I said.

“That's a lie. Nobody has to do anything they don't want to do.”

I ignored this and pulled away from her. “Someone's got Sid and they won't let her answer the phone.” I could see it all in my head. She was trapped. A prisoner. And with each moment that passed, the life was leeching out of her body.

“What? That's crazy!”

“It's not crazy. She would have come to me by now if she could.”

“But---”

I had to help Sidney. No one else could. I got to my feet and walked to Emily's window. I slid it open while she watched me from the floor.

“What are you doing? You're not leaving.”

“I'll be back later with Sid.”

“You're going out the window? I don't have a tree like you do!”

I'd rejected this window once for that very reason. But I'd learned a few things since then. I climbed up onto the sill and breathed in deeply. The cold air was soothing and it called to me. It promised to bring me the intoxicating scent of Sidney Cross if only I would come a little closer.

Emily was on her feet. Headed my way. “Don't!”

I shoved away from the window. For a brief moment I was in the crystal cold air, and then my feet were buried in damp grass. The muscles in my legs tensed and took the impact for my knees, and I straightened with no pain. Why would there be pain? The dark, the dew---they were part of me. I belonged in the night.

Above me, Emily stared out from her window. Tears glittered on her cheeks like stars.

“I'll be back,” I said again. Back to dry the tears. Back with Sidney. Then we can all be together.

“Nate, please. You can't!”

And then I was running toward the only place I wanted to be, as fast as I could because Sid couldn't wait. I had to find her.

I had to save her.