It was him, Kyle. He was right there, all grown up, tall and handsome. I could recognize him anywhere. That expression on his face, it was hard to decipher. He just stood there staring into the distance for a while. My heart was lurching around and the anxiety was taking its toll on me. Seeing him just froze me in place not knowing what to do with myself.

‘I didn’t know you still came here.’

His voice was different obviously, deeper, but very neutral. Even his heartbeat was surprising undetectable, there were no sudden movements, I really had nothing to go off of. I couldn’t predict his mood even if I tried. I wanted to know what he was thinking without having to ask but here I was, completely dumbfounded.

I hadn’t seen him in ten years and now he was right here. What was I even supposed to say to him? Where would I even begin?

‘It hasn’t been the same for a while,’ I finally replied.

We used to play there because it was quiet and hidden from everything. The sound of the rushing water, the birds and other critters made it pretty hard for the adults to hear us and so we could get into whatever mischief we wanted, swim in the murky water, wander off and rarely catch any trouble.

Now you could completely see into the distance. It was as if the forest had been stripped naked and of course no one on that other side could see as far off as we vampires could but it didn’t feel the same. It was one more thing in my life that had changed, something else that was completely out of my control, it was part of the reason why I didn’t come back here. It reminded me of the bad parts of the chain of events that took place ten years back.

‘I can’t believe they did this.’

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‘Yeah well, time changes a lot of things I guess,’ I replied.

‘It’s good to see you again, Jeff.’

I couldn’t help the smile that curled up on my lips. He started walking towards the water, his woody fragrance wafting off behind him, as if it was leaving a trail for me to follow. He was so calm as he crouched down to grab a smooth stone or two, carefully sifting through the sand.

I couldn’t really believed that he was thrilled to see me. Surely that wasn’t the case, right? Was I supposed to just trust this? Plus the way he said it, he was still so unreadable.

‘Really?’ I asked.

He did not turn around but instead continued with what he was doing.

‘Are you not happy to see me? I mean, it’s been ten years,’ he said.

‘Its just that, what happened before all of you left—’

‘Again, it’s been ten years. I’d already forgotten about that,’ he interrupted.

All this time I’d been holding on to the dark uncomfortable feeling that he would hate me, but here he was being all nonchalant about it, hurling stones at the water like he didn’t have a care in the world.

‘Really? Are you sure?’ I asked again.

‘Yeah. It’s starting to sound like you want me to be upset.’

He grabbed a couple more stones and sent them bouncing swiftly on top of the water into the far night. He did it so effortlessly yet he seemed so invested in it at the same time, but the vampire strength always made it seem like cheating.

‘I’m sorry, its just that—’

‘Jeff, you don’t have to say anything. It happened ages ago, we were little kids. It was just a stupid, unfortunate, random thing. Let’s just, I don’t know, howl at the moon like we used to. Come on,’ he said, gesturing me to join him.

It felt surreal, like we were going back, like the night was our time machine and all we had to do was step into it, embrace it with open arms. The smooth moon glow right there close to the water, it made him look like a sculpture, like he was some beautiful bronze relic lifted out of a museum.

The smile on his face was heart-warming, more warped on one side than the other, just like it had always been. He had his arms stretched out towards the murky water, eyes closed and all like he was reaching out to something and was waiting for a response. There was something about this whole picture that just seemed so perfect, like it was all meant to happen like this, as if the night would reach back to us, so I followed suit and reached out too. I was a little bit scared that I would open my eyes and he would be gone and this moment would not be real, that he would not be real, but a mere hallucination I’d just conjured up.

‘Do you feel that?’ I asked.

‘Strange, but oddly satisfying. It’s like the moon is licking our arms, giving us a taste of its glow,’ he replied.

Before I could say anything else, he broke off into the loudest howl I’d ever heard.