Chapter 3
When we finally broke apart, Camillus hugged me tight, his voice tinged with desire. "Baby, I can smell your sweet blood."
"Don't try to sweet-talk me. You kept this from me for so long. How are you going to make it up to me?" I teased.
His face flushed, and he fidgeted as he pulled a velvet box about the size of his palm from his pocket.
When he opened it, there was a crimson gemstone inside. The way it caught the light made it glow with a dark, mysterious shine, just as blood turned to crystal.
"Is that a ruby?" I asked.
"No, it's a Bloodcore." He took out the gem and held it up near my tongue. "It's harder than silver, but it won't burn me, and... It really suits you."
"Are you going to turn this into a tongue piercing for me?"
He nodded, the tips of his ears going red. "I've had it ready for a while, but I couldn't bring myself to give it to you. Because giving it to you would basically be admitting I'm not human."
I opened my mouth so he could size it up, mumbling with my tongue sticking out, "So what are you waiting for? Go get it made already."
His eyes sparkled, like a fledgling vampire granted a single drop of live blood, and he ran off to hit up his jeweler.
Three days later, the Bloodcore tongue piercing was ready. As soon as I put it in, he kissed me, long, slow, as if he had finally been permitted to taste what he'd been starving for.
After his secret was out, Camillus went back to being his clingy, possessive self, letting his guard down more and more around me.
He'd sleep all day, tag along to my classes at night, and head to work in the early hours. His schedule was like a cat's.
Wait, scratch that. He was basically a bat.
I asked, "Don't vampires usually sleep in coffins?"
Camillus was sipping from a blood bag and nearly choked. "Who told you that?"
"That's what they always show in movies."
"That's so medieval. We don't sleep in coffins anymore. It's asking for trouble."
"So, what do you sleep on?"
"Just a regular mattress, bought it at IKEA."
I cracked up.
He went on, "And these days, we don't bite humans for blood anymore. It's gross. No vampire knows if the human we targeted has any infectious diseases or not.
"Buying blood bags from the hospital is way better. They're pasteurized, you can pick your flavor, and it's clean and safe. It's way easier than hunting for food the old-fashioned way."
"There are different flavors?"
"Yeah, A-type is a bit sweet, B-type is tangy, O-type is the most balanced, and AB-type is pretty mild."
"Are you talking about wine or blood here?"
"Blood and wine actually have a lot in common. Both have iron pasteurized, both have tannins—"
"Wait, blood has tannins too?"
"I'm kidding."
One day, my curiosity got the better of me, and I kept bugging him to let me experience what it was like to be bitten. He told me that vampires didn't feed on live humans anymore.
It was not hygienic and was treated as uncivilized. No vampire wanted to be infected by virous blood just for a feast. Food safety was a big deal, even for vampires.
I didn't care. I wanted to know what it was like to have a vampire drink from me.
He couldn't say no to me, so he gently bit my arm.
It didn't hurt at all, so light, lighter than a mosquito bite.
He made a face and smacked his lips. "Way too sweet."
"Sweet?" I echoed.
"You eat too many sweets. Your blood sugar's high, so your blood tastes sweet." He wiped his mouth and started nagging, "For the next month, cut back on the sugar and get some exercise. I'll keep an eye on you."
I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
Then a weird thought hit me. "So, if high-blood-sugar blood is like a sweet little drink for vampires, then wouldn't high-blood-fat blood be like pudding? And a blood clot. Would that be vampires' jelly?"
Camillus buried his face in his hands. "Please, I'm begging you, stop."
"What? What's up?"
"You're giving me some seriously traumatic flashbacks."
"What kind of flashbacks?"