Foreword:
Health class was right – abstinence is the way to go. Trust me boys and girls, you may think sex sounds awesome and romantic, but there are even worse things you can catch than crabs…try vampirism. Yep, I finally gave up my v-card at 18 years old (much longer than most people I know) and I became a freaking vampire. Confused about how sex can cause vampirism? I’ll start at the beginning…
Chapter 1:
College in the big city. After countless hours studying, volunteering for honors society credits, and late night shifts at Pizza Hut, my life is finally beginning. Many of my friends went to Big Ten universities or other schools in the middle of nowhere, but I have always wanted to live in Chicago. Every time my family took the Metra to the windy city for Michigan Avenue shopping or a Cubs game, I felt as though this was where I belonged. The fast paced life, the diversity and the beautiful architecture called to me more than cornfields and frat parties ever would. And now I have finally arrived. I have been attending DePaul University for a month and life could not be better. Especially now that I have met the hottest guy I’ve ever seen.
“Dorian Gray, right?”
I looked up from the statistics book I was slogging my way through at a homey Wicker Park coffee shop and gasped. This guy was beyond gorgeous. I took in the dark tousled hair that fell to the nape of his neck and his emerald questioning eyes. I was momentarily speechless.
“Uh, sorry?” I said after an awkward moment of silence passed between us.
“Your phone cover, that quote is from Dorian Gray, isn’t it?” the gorgeous man towering over my small table asked, amused.
I noticed he had what sounded like an Irish or British accent, which now made him ten times hotter. I looked down at my phone, which was incased with green plastic that displayed the silver words “The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it”. I felt my pale skin burn red as I answered “Oh yes, it’s my favorite book”.
“Why is that?” he questioned, leaning his jean clad hip against the rickety table. The dark denim fit his body perfectly, not too tight like the hipsters that over ran the neighborhood, but still fitted, very European if you will. My eyes hungrily roamed over the rest of him, taking in his svelte but muscled chest and arms under a black cotton V-neck. Dark stubble graced his chin and led up to his perfect sculpted cheekbones and then I was back to those striking emerald eyes. Warmth shot tingling through me and ended with splash in my stomach, rippling to the very center of my body.
Only then did I remember that he asked me a question and was waiting for a response, the amused smirk still planted on those lovely lips. I tore my eyes away from his and tried to recall what he had asked. Dorian Gray!
“I, um, well….no one has ever asked me that before….” I responded as I let out a nervous chuckle and averted my eyes from his, focusing instead on the coffee counter behind him, hoping I would be able to think more clearly if this sex god was no longer in my direct eye line. “I guess I’m intrigued by the idea of immortality …it is both so romantic and yet so tragic”.
His shining eyes narrowed and he looked at me intensely, taking me in. It was as if he was look right into my very soul. I shivered involuntarily and looked away again. He must love the effect he has on women.
“Tragic more likely. It was Dorian and company’s obsession with youth and beauty that led to their demise”, he pondered, flipping a piece of silky hair away from his eye with a graceful flick of his long neck.
“Well yes, I guess you could say that is the moral of story. Though I would think Wilde would also want us to appreciate beauty. He was after all a big supporter of Aestheticism and living life decadently,” my voice wavered and I grabbed my cold coffee and sipped it nervously to distance myself from the intense energy he was emitting.
“Great point. Which begs the question…have you yielded to temptation lately?” his Irish/British accent lilting as he teased the question out of his perfect lips.
I choked on my sip, dropping my paper cup across onto the floor in the process. The brown liquid splashed at our feet and I reached down to pick it up just as he bent down to do the same. Our hands made it to the fallen cup at the same moment and his long, manly fingers fell over my own bitten down, purple nailed ones. An electric current ran through my body, shocking me so intensely I let out at a high pitched squeak. His emerald eyes widened as he pulled his hand away and I could tell he felt it too. We stayed there; me leaning over my knees in my chair, my black cardigan clad arm stretched out grasping the cup, him squatting down next to me, his hand still reaching midway between the cup and his lithe body. My stormy grey eyes held his green ones, the electricity still alive in the air between us. Heat coursed through my body, bringing out something primal in me. I could have jumped him right there on the dirt ridden, scuffed linoleum.
A graying, wet mop slopped down next my hand, breaking me out of my hypnosis. “No worries guys, I got this” a lazy voice sounded, coming from the barista who had shuffled his way over. He soaked up the spilled coffee with his dirty mop, along with any electricity still left between me and this beautiful man. I sat back up with a jerk, placing the coffee cup back on the scratched surface of my study table. I stole a glance at the accented stranger to my right and found him still crouched to the floor, staring intently at me.
“Aedin, we are leaving!” a detached voice yelled, causing the stranger to stand back up quicker than I have ever seen anyone move before. He sensually pushed his tousled chocolate locks back away from his forehead, almost causing me to faint right there at the table, and glanced at the exit as the door jingled shut.
“I’ve got to go. I will see you again” his self-assured voice made it a statement, not a question. Before I could even muster up an idea for a response, he was out the door.
“He’s like Batman. But with James Bond’s accent” a deep male voice said in awe. I glanced over at the hipster barista, holding the mop in his hand, his mouth agape as he stared at the exit.
“You ain’t just whistling Dixie…”.
**********
My mind was replaying my interaction with Mr. Gorgeous for the 20th time as I pushed through the ringing coffee shop door and into the crisp October evening. Speeding bikers raced down the lanes of Milwaukee Avenue, enjoying the last month of decent biking weather before the brutal Chicago winter kicked in. I started making my way to my tiny Wicker Park apartment, dodging other students and young professionals as they waited for a concert to begin outside the Double Door or smoked outside the multitude of bars that littered the street. Everyone would already be locked up in their homes in my sleepy suburban town, but, at 10pm on a Wednesday, my neighborhood is only just beginning its night.
The El rumbled overhead like a roller coaster as I pushed my way through the crowd exiting the Damen Blue Line station. The pungent smell of tacos wafted over from the popular restaurant across the street. God, I loved this city.
Aedin.
That was the only detail I knew about my fellow Dorian Gray fan. That and he made me feel things I never felt before. Truth be told, I’ve never had a boyfriend. I told my friends this was because I was too busy studying so that I could receive a scholarship that would allow me to afford city tuition and living prices, but it was honestly because I’ve never been interested in any guy I have met. I first wondered if I was gay, but that idea was shot down when I saw Chris Evans come out of a machine shirtless and buff in that Captain America movie. I am attracted to the opposite sex, it is just that every time I have been pursued, I have never felt any desire. When I kissed John Zimmer in the 10th grade at a party, I felt the same desire I would feel kissing my hand. I said yes to double dates in hopes that someone would soon give me the spark you see in the movies, but it never happened. I have been holding out hope that college would be different.
I turned the lock open to my off campus apartment and could already hear Marilyn Manson screaming through the door. I found a random roommate on a housing website and was excited to find someone else who wanted to live in Wicker Park, which was much more my scene than the usual Lincoln Park or Wrigleyville. Her name was Annabelle and she lived in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin and was also an incoming freshman at DePaul. Her roommate backed out on her last minute, so she was desperate to find someone to share her garden apartment. I was more than happy to fill the void and stupidly decided that after a couple emails, and no in person meeting, to sign the lease. Little did I know that Annabelle was not pleasant or a prairie girl, but a throwback 90’s goth. I didn’t even know they still existed, let alone in rural Wisconsin. But they do and she is quite alright with living up to the stereotype.
I pushed off my faux leather ankle boots and took in our living room. Annabelle had the music blaring and her back turned to me. She was a walking ad for Hot Topic in dark fishnet stockings, clunky platform mary janes, and a ripped black concert t-shirt. She turned her overly lined eyes to me as I shut the door and went back to furiously typing on what looked like a message board for something that required a Chiller font for its title
“Hey” I said brightly while she pointedly ignored me, her fingers clacking away. I sighed, wishing she would give me a little effort in return. If we are going to live together for the rest of the year, we could at least attempt a little rapport. I’m not asking for friendship, but some conversation when we are both in the same room would be nice.
I walked down the hallway to my broom closet of a bedroom and plopped my heavy statistics book and purse down onto my white wicker dresser. There is no way I can think of statistics any more tonight.
After changing into my pajamas, I fell down into my bed, letting dreamy, and admittedly sexual, thoughts of Aedin creep back into my mind. The electricity that I felt when our hands touched was like nothing I have ever experienced. And judging by the look on his face when it happened, he felt the same way.
Though maybe I am just overreacting, as he is insanely good looking. I am sure he made women, and men if the barista was any indication, feel this way all the time. That was probably why he asked random awkward girls in coffee shops about their phone cover; to watch them squirm as he spewed random innuendos before leaving them in a pile of their own drool (and spilled coffee).
He said he would see me again.
But how could he know that. He doesn’t even know my name.
Does he expect me to be in that coffee shop again? Perhaps I should study there every night…
“Ugh, I’m starting to sound desperate. Or obsessive” I groaned to myself. I pulled my big blue Ikea comforter over my body and rolled over, closing my eyes. I dreamed of him the rest of night, his green eyes seeing into my every atom. Those long, experienced fingers running over every inch of my skin while Nine Inch Nails seeped through my walls.
I want to fuck you like an animal…