The tiles were cold and the water was warm. It was a dichotomy in temperature that did nothing to soothe Peter’s nerves. They provided only a distraction, harsh and yet useless. Peter himself felt cold. Never did he feel any change in temperature to his own skin. Maybe he would, if he fed from live victims. But he avoided ever reaching the kind of hunger that might cause him to lose control. He fed at the same time every night, without fail, from a thick Styrofoam cup – blood that was not cold, but nor was it warm. It was a sickly room temperature. It was hardly satisfying, for lukewarm blood to be the only thing one could eat for the rest of eternity. Maybe it was one of the things that lurked at the back of his mind; one of the things that contributed, in the end, to the nervous breakdowns.
It wasn’t something that Peter noticed, nor did he complain about it. It was a fact of life, and if there was one thing that Peter accepted, it was fact.
Except when fact happened to overwhelm him. It was a fact that one of his employees had been attacked, and was now dead. It was a fact that Peter had tried to save him, and had failed. It was a fact that blood was his arch nemesis, his mortal enemy. The facts were hard to swallow. They were poison, and they left him a shuddering mess in the corner of the bathtub. He needed to expunge, somehow. Some kind of antidote, maybe.
If he were clearer of mind he’d have lurched away from Keara. But it didn’t even register, that any of this could be inappropriate. Some latent instinct had his body tensing at her touch, as if it knew that this could in some roundabout way put him in danger. But Keara professed herself to be his mother. She was his sire, and she was unreasonably old. Irrationally old. There was intimacy, but not the kind of intimacy that Peter sought with Jersey.
It took him a while, but he loosened up. Under Keara’s ministrations, he soon stopped counting. His fingers still shook as he reached out for the soap; a plain kind of soap with the usual, ordinary soapy smell. He breathed in and out, to fill his lungs with the scent of the soap, the strong sharp tang of it – pulled the humid air into his lungs, which did not need it. He wanted to be rid of the smell of blood, which seemed to linger in his lungs. He wanted to get rid of the memory. His hands were only slightly more study as he scrubbed at his hands, the soap lathering and bubbling, turning pink as blood dislodged from beneath his fingernails.
And he continued to scrub, his hands turning red with the pressure of it.
It wasn’t something that Peter noticed, nor did he complain about it. It was a fact of life, and if there was one thing that Peter accepted, it was fact.
Except when fact happened to overwhelm him. It was a fact that one of his employees had been attacked, and was now dead. It was a fact that Peter had tried to save him, and had failed. It was a fact that blood was his arch nemesis, his mortal enemy. The facts were hard to swallow. They were poison, and they left him a shuddering mess in the corner of the bathtub. He needed to expunge, somehow. Some kind of antidote, maybe.
If he were clearer of mind he’d have lurched away from Keara. But it didn’t even register, that any of this could be inappropriate. Some latent instinct had his body tensing at her touch, as if it knew that this could in some roundabout way put him in danger. But Keara professed herself to be his mother. She was his sire, and she was unreasonably old. Irrationally old. There was intimacy, but not the kind of intimacy that Peter sought with Jersey.
It took him a while, but he loosened up. Under Keara’s ministrations, he soon stopped counting. His fingers still shook as he reached out for the soap; a plain kind of soap with the usual, ordinary soapy smell. He breathed in and out, to fill his lungs with the scent of the soap, the strong sharp tang of it – pulled the humid air into his lungs, which did not need it. He wanted to be rid of the smell of blood, which seemed to linger in his lungs. He wanted to get rid of the memory. His hands were only slightly more study as he scrubbed at his hands, the soap lathering and bubbling, turning pink as blood dislodged from beneath his fingernails.
And he continued to scrub, his hands turning red with the pressure of it.
