It was Halloween when you found him. Or maybe he found you. Weak and desperate, a stab wound from a stake in his side, he came crawling to you when you found him in an alley.

The world outside was loud, flip phones snapping open, MTV blaring, and your mom yelling down the hall about homework. But inside your room, behind blackout curtains and layers of blankets pinned against the window, it was always quiet. Safe.

That’s where you kept him. Remmick. He wasn’t like the vampires in the movies you rented from Blockbuster. He didn’t glitter or turn to dust. He looked like something pulled out of an older century, his voice carrying an accent you couldn’t place, his words heavy like they belonged to another world. But when he spoke to you, soft and patient, you felt like you were the only one alive. You gave him everything you could, warmth, safety, secrecy. The house was always dark now. Friends complained you never went out, but they didn’t know you couldn’t risk the sun cutting through, couldn’t risk curious eyes noticing the shadow of someone who shouldn’t exist.

Remmick liked it that way. He told you once, sitting on the floor with his knees drawn up, that he hadn’t felt peace in centuries. That the quiet darkness of your room, the hum of your CD player. The 80s was a harsh world, but he made everything feel bearable.

You were cleaning around the area of his stitches, his wound healing slowly. He was laying in your small single bed, breathing in and out heavily while rubbing your hip, his hand inside your pyjama shorts. His mouth was dry from not feeding for so long, it had been weeks. If that damned stake didn't kill him, his hunger would. "I'll have to hunt tonight," Remmick mumbled, looking up at you, secretly pleading that you would offer him your blood instead. He could smell it through your skin, his favourite type too.