The Vanishing Vampire Read Free Page B

“Are you going to stay in bed all day?”
    When I spoke, the words exploded through my head with the force of a hurricane. “I’ll be up soon.”
    No more now, please . Even my thoughts roared.
    Her steps slammed away.
    And another timeless hour passed. And I gained more control of my senses.
    I was hungry.
    But I was afraid to get up.
    Another hour passed. I had shut off more sensations than I ever knew existed. I was in control—sort of. It was a slippery control that threatened to fly from my grasp at any moment.
    I had become something other than what I was.
    But I had won the first battle.
    And boy, was I hungry.
    I didn’t know what had happened. I was still too busy fighting the waves, holding off the sights and sounds and smells.
    But I had made it through what had to be the worst of it.
    Then, as I stepped from bed, I learned the real meaning of pain.

 
    Six
    FEEL THE BURN
    I left my bed and stepped into the light of day. The light felt hot against my flesh. I could bear it, but it felt the way dripping candle wax feels—not hot enough to hurt, but hot enough to make me flinch. Then my foot landed inside the bright square of sunlight on my floor, and my body filled with the pain of an unending fire. I yanked my leg back and fell to the bed. I looked at my foot. The flesh had already started to smoke and blister, blacken and crackle.
    Then it healed. As quickly as it had burned, it mended, like a movie running in reverse.
    That was when I realized what I had become. My mind would not accept the truth all at once, but I knew there was no other explanation. I fought against the waves of sensations as the pain of the direct sunlight slowly faded.
    â€œAre you getting up today?” Mom called from below.
    â€œI don’t feel good.” I pushed the curtain closed and got back in bed. As the words left my lips, I tried to grab them and stop them from reaching Mom’s ears. This was another of those magic chants. This was the spell of parental action. I had set in motion Mom-the-Nurse, one of the most powerful types of adult wizards.
    She was up the stairs in an instant, thermometer in one hand, medicine in the other. “Open,” she said, jabbing the thermometer toward my head.
    I hesitated. Did I have fangs?
    She jammed the thermometer into my mouth, then placed her hand against my forehead. “You feel chilled,” she said. She hopped from the side of the bed. “It’s too dark in here.” She reached for the curtains.
    â€œOoob right!” I shouted around the thermometer.
    She paused, her fingers gripping the curtain.
    I pulled out the thermometer. “Too bright.”
    Mom smiled, but she was obviously adding this symptom to the list and running through a collection of conditions in a way Norman would have approved. “Well, you just stay in bed today, and I’ll get you some nice hot soup. We’ll have you feeling better in no time.”
    â€œThanks.” I looked at the thermometer as Mom left the room. The mercury hadn’t moved. My body seemed to be the same temperature as the air. I wondered again whether I had fangs. There was only one way to tell.
    I crossed the floor, opened my closet door, and looked at the mirror there. Like an idiot, I stared and moved from side to side, then glanced around. It took a minute to sink in. I had no reflection. I wasn’t in the mirror. Then my reflection flickered back. For a moment, it was solid; then it became transparent.
    I heard Mom take a bowl from the cabinet. I switched on the lamp by my bed, flinching a bit from the sudden light, and held the thermometer near the bulb until the temperature rose to ninety-nine degrees. Then I put the thermometer back in my mouth.
    Mom had a steaming bowl of soup on a tray. I never could figure out how she did stuff like that so quickly. “Here, this should pump a bit of life back in your veins.” She took the thermometer, looked at it,