“Gideon! Gideon, help me!”

                “Where are you, Elizabeth?” I shouted, unable to find her in a darkness so complete even my vampiric senses couldn't penetrate it. Somewhere far off I heard Rosalyn sobbing, every terrified shriek of “Daddy!” putting a sharp, cold stab of fear in my chest. Groping blindly in the pitch black, my hand brushed against a candlestick, and when the flame alighted, before me was a horrifying sight: my wife and daughter lying at my feet, swarmed with rats from head to toe. Little Rosalyn screamed, and Elizabeth reached out with a bloody, bitten hand.

                “Elizabeth!” I awoke yelling her name, my arms still trying to catch hold of someone who was no longer there. I had been dreaming of my long-dead wife and daughter for almost a month now and they were always in horrible pain, crying out for me to save them. I still wonder what spared me from the plague that took my family.

                I sat up and put my head in my trembling hands, my breath coming in labored gasps, forehead damp with a cold sweat. When I placed my bare feet on the hardwood floor, I felt a small draft coming down the hallway and heard traffic sounds from the outside. “Open front door,” I thought to myself. “Strange.”

                “Hello?”

                There was someone in my house.

                “Hello?” A distinctly female voice called out again, and I heard the clip of her shoes as she stepped inside the doorway. Curious, I decided to investigate my intruder and slowly made my way down the unlit hall to the kitchen. When I rounded the corner, I was surprised by the exquisite creature before me. She was wearing a tight red dress that left little to the imagination, and her black stilettos showed off her shapely long legs. Her blonde hair hung free down her back and a few stray tendrils framed her large blue eyes and cherub mouth. She was a woman who possessed a natural beauty that was only made lovelier by her carefully painted on makeup. A humid nighttime breeze blew in and carried her scent to me, and it was beginning to rouse my appetite as I watched her from the shadows.

                “What do you want?” I asked, flipping the switch for the overhead light, and she jumped, putting her hand over her heart.

                “I... didn’t realize you were there, you startled me,” she stammered, looking embarrassed, but then she began to smile as she ogled me. “Wow, she said you were cute, but her description doesn't do you justice.”

                “Who sent you?” I watched a bead of sweat come off her cheek, run over the vein in her throat, and down into her considerable cleavage.

                “Oh, I'm a present from Meegan. She told me you can be a little shy, but with a face like that, you shouldn't be. And that accent of yours is adorable.”

                Meegan. I was stunned. A name I hadn't heard in years.     

                “I'm here because your friend is worried about you. Says you hardly leave the house anymore.” She smiled coyly. “I'm just here to keep you company.” She shut the door behind her and began to walk across the kitchen. I was so flustered by this whole event that before I knew it she was right in front of me, so close that I could feel the warmth of her flesh. The perfume she was wearing reminded me of something long ago, stirring forgotten things in the back of my mind.

                “Uh...I... don’t think... I can do this,” I stuttered, surprised my voice was even working, my heart resuming its jackhammer pace. I sat down on the metal stool near the island in the middle of my kitchen, attempting to find my bearings.

         “Then kiss me and find out.” She leaned in to where her mouth was a mere millimeter from my own. I felt my willpower giving out the nearer she came, the baser, darker part of myself beginning to take control. I knew that I should make her leave, but it had been years since I had tasted human blood, and desire rarely overlaps with reason.