Letters

Dear Oskar,

I didn't think I could say this to you, so I'm writing you this letter. I have been so happy having you with me. I've never really been happy before. I'm so afraid that it will end, and I don't want it to ever end. I was thinking that if you became like me, we could be together as long as we wanted. Forever.

I'm sorry. I know I shouldn't ask this. It's not fair. Maybe I should just tear this letter up. I write that, but I know I won't. I'm just so afraid of being alone again. I know I can probably find someone else to help. I've had many helpers before. But that still didn't keep me from being alone. Now that I have you with me, I feel like I don't need a helper. I'd rather have a friend, and you are the only true friend that I have ever had.

But you are going to grow up some day. Even before then, you will become an older kid - a teenager, I guess. Teenagers don't like to hang around with kids who are 12. Teenagers want to be with real girls, and do crazy things to have fun, and get ready to be grown up. I can't really help you with any of those things. When you're a teenager you will want someone else. I guess when that happens, you should go. I will hate it, but it will be the right thing. It will especially be the right thing for you. You will have to do it. If that happens, you should know that you have already given me something to last forever. I will always be happy when I remember our time together. But I don't want it to happen.

I don't know how to tell you what it's like to be me. You shouldn't want to be like me. It's horrible for me to even ask you. You are the last one that I should ever want to become infected. Please, please don't be mad at me for being so selfish. Just think about it. You don't even have to say anything if you don't want to. If you want to do it, say, "Yes." If you don't say anything I will know that means NO.

I won't be mad if you don't want to. I won't be mad if someday you want to leave. I feel like every night with you is a gift. I just don't want it to ever end.

Your Eli

†

Dear Eli,

I read your letter. I knew that some day you would ask me. Sometimes I wonder if I am slowing you down. Are you in danger because of me? I wonder if you would be safer if I weren't here, or if I could keep you safe if I were like you. I would rather die than have anything happen to you because of me. Sometimes I think that maybe if I became like you, you would be safer.

Also I don't know what will happen when I get older and it bugs me. Maybe you won't like me anymore when I grow up. If I could stay the same age as you then we could be together forever. That would be great. But I don't think I could be like you. I saw what you did to the man who found us in your apartment, and I saw what you did to Conny and Martin and Jimmy. I know that those are the kinds of things that you have to do to live. You can do those things because you are strong. I don't mean that living on blood makes you strong. I mean that you have to be strong to live on blood.

For a while I thought that you were making me strong, too. I stood up to Conny, and I even hit him with a stick. I thought that when I cut my hand for you it showed that I was strong, but it was really just stupid. When you left I was so sad. I didn't know what I was going to do, but I still thought that you had made me strong. Then at the pool when Conny showed up with his brother Jimmy all of a sudden I wasn't strong any more. I was weak again. I had always been weak. I was just pretending to be strong because I could tell that you were strong.

I want to be together with you forever, but I am scared that I am too weak to do what you do. I don't think that I could ever do it. I want more than anything to be with you forever. I think that I would do anything to stay with you but I'm afraid that if I actually had to I wouldn't be able to kill someone for their blood. I can't decide. I don't know whether to say yes or no. I guess that's one more way that I'm weak. I'm too weak to do what you do, but I'm also too weak to live without you. You are the one who is strong, so I need you to decide for me. So that is why I am writing you this letter.

You can be strong for me again. I'm going to go to sleep before you wake up. After you read this, you decide what to do and then come find me in the next room. If you decide to do it, even if I'm only pretending to be asleep, please don't talk to me - just do it. I hope it won't hurt too much. If you decide that I'm not strong enough, that's OK too. I promise that I'll still love you just as much and I'll stay with you as long as you want me to. As long as I can. I know that you could never make the wrong choice for me.

Love,
Oskar

†

Oskar awoke with a start, which in itself was strange. In the past six months he had woken up each day in a different place more often than not, but he had gotten used to that almost immediately. Being free of Blackeberg was like being shown wings that he had never known were there. Someone had snatched the heavy coat from his back and his wings had spread and lifted his feet from the ground. Now he didn't care where he went. Just so long as it wasn't Blackeberg and so long as Eli was there. He now saw the world as divided into two places: the one that was Blackeberg and the one that was not. He was happy to be with Eli anywhere in the one that was not. Now every time he woke up, his eyes opened on different part of the world that was not Blackeberg and he was comforted. He thought it was strange that he had fit himself into this gypsy life so easily. Strange that waking up to different was so easy. But waking up with a start was stranger still.

What was different? Or rather; why was different startling now? He knew exactly where he was: In the basement of some sailor's house. They had found this house a few days after Eli had written him that letter. She had said that they needed to find a place where they could stay for perhaps a few weeks. Oskar didn't understand why, but he had to admit that she was the expert about living this life of movement. He hadn't been about to question her.

They had been moving through the port city of Malmö. Oskar had figured that there should be a lot of sailors who lived in the area, and that - at least if they were single - their houses would sit empty while they spent weeks at sea. It was easy enough to find a newspaper listing of ships and their dates of departure. Helpfully, it had also listed the names of any officers who were Swedish. The officers were the ones likely to be able to afford something more than an apartment, and Oskar was looking for a house. Once Oskar had a list of addresses gleaned from the phone book, he had given it to Eli. She had disappeared with it, and then in a few hours she reappeared.

"This one. No one has been there since the ship left, and it has a basement. It's sort of hidden from the other houses by some trees. I couldn't go in, but I did make sure that the front door is unlocked."

The address had been that of the second mate on a Liberian ship whose name Oskar couldn't pronounce. He didn't know where Liberia was and he didn't know why the ship had been in Sweden. All he cared about was that it went back to Liberia and stayed there for a good, long time. For a couple of weeks at least. The address was in Åkarp, which he had a vague impression was somewhere north of Malmö.

Thinking aloud, Oskar had said, "Why don't you just go back there tonight and I'll take a cab over there tomorrow?"

"Because I can't go in, silly. No one has invited me. Do you think I can hide in the mailbox all day?"

So instead they had decided Eli would sleep in the trunk and Oskar would arrange somehow to get it over to the house. When Oskar arrived at the house in a cab the next day, he had no trouble getting in. The taxi driver had helped Oskar unload three boxes and a large travel trunk from the back of the cab. As they were lifting the trunk out, the man had asked why no one had come out to greet him. Oskar had said that his dad was inside and probably asleep. When Oskar had picked up the first box and carried it into the house through the unlocked front door, the cabby had just shrugged.

Oskar had come back outside and said in a low voice, "Can you help me take the trunk just inside? We'll have to be quiet so we don't wake up my dad."

The cabbie had helped Oskar carefully wrestle the trunk into the small front hallway. Then Oskar had paid him and he had left. It had been easy.

Oskar had just sat on the floor next to the trunk and read until nightfall, when heard Eli stir inside the trunk. Then he had opened it and they had spent that first night carefully exploring the house, before finally getting settled into the basement. The house itself seemed to be filled with the ghosts of furniture. Most items were covered with pieces of cloth like sheets. Oskar and Eli agreed that this was good sign for a couple of reasons: it meant the owner planned on being away for a long while, and it also meant that there was no cleaning woman to come around in the mean time.

If the living area of the house was filled with ghosts, the basement was like a skeleton to Oskar. Bare floor joists ran across the ceiling like the rib cage of some ancient dinosaur. Oskar could imagine some enterprising carpenter nailing planks across the tops of the ribs to make the house. The basement was filled with things the dinosaur had eaten. A bicycle, boxes of non-descript items like clothes and books, gardening tools, an old bird cage. These things were stacked along the walls of the already narrow basement, leaving a clear corridor down the center from the oil furnace at one end to almost the foot of the stairs at the other.

Strangely, the dinosaur had had a light fixture that hung over the base of the stairs. It was as if none of the things the dinosaur had eaten could stand the light, since there was a clearing underneath it where the floor was clear from wall to wall. Since Eli could stand the light and Oskar needed it, this was where they had set up a little camp; Oskar with his sleeping bag and Eli with her trunk. After the hassle that he and Eli had had bringing the trunk down the stairs, which took a 90∞ turn about halfway down, Oskar was happy to not have to take it any farther. The basement had no windows, so it was really the only safe place to have a light on at night anyway. The only downside to the basement for Oskar was that it had a musty "basement" smell. All basements smelled oily and dusty, with a touch of mildew. In this basment the smells were almost a physical presence, perhaps because there were no windows for the wind to leak through.

Now Oskar was slowly waking up in this basement, and something was strange about it. Did it have something to do with Eli's letter? In the days since she had given it to him, Oskar had read and re-read her letter many times. Then yesterday he had responded to Eli's letter with a one of his own … The letter! That was it! He had gone to sleep early because of the letter! Eli! Where are you?

When he had gone to bed it had been like the night before Christmas for Oskar. He had wanted to fall right to sleep, to hasten the arrival of the next night. He soon found however that he was too excited to sleep. Too many thoughts had been bouncing around in his head. Some were happy and others scared him terribly, and he really couldn't tell which were which. Finally he had decided that he would never fall asleep. He had been busy planning in his mind how to pretend that he was asleep when he had finally drifted off.

While he was awakening his thoughts had ranged lazily over the events of the previous days, but now as he came fully awake his mind focused on the present moment with an almost painful intensity. His eyes searched the room but in the dim light he saw nothing. He snaked his arm out from inside his sleeping bag and squinted at his wristwatch. 3:11. Eli must have woken up by now. Maybe she had gone out. But … had she bitten him? Shouldn't he be able to see in the dark? How quickly did it work? Or maybe she hadn't.

He was about to sit up when he noticed a dim silhouette against the concrete wall opposite him. Now he could see Eli standing there, watching him. Had she been there the whole time? Oskar knew that she moved more silently than a cat. He had become accustomed to her appearing beside him with no warning. So accustomed in fact that he expected to see her any time he glanced around, and was disappointed if she was not there.

Oskar sat up and waved his arm around, groping for the string that he knew was hanging somewhere above him. At another time he might have spared an amused thought for how silly he must look to Eli. She could, of course, see him flailing around as plain as day. No amusing thoughts came now though. Now his thoughts were filled with dread and excitement, warring with each other for control of his emotions. What had Eli decided? He was afraid that she had decided to do it, and he would become like her. He was afraid that she had decided not to do it, and he couldn't be with her forever. As his hand found the string leading to the bare bulb on the ceiling, for a moment he couldn't bring himself to pull it. Then he thought, Don't be so weak, Oskar, and gave it a sharp tug.

Light filled the basement and after a moment Oskar could see Eli clearly. She was standing there watching him with the usual impassive look on her beautiful face, with eyes that seemed to come from a million miles away. What was not so usual was that the lower half of her face was completely covered with blood, just beginning to clot and dry. It was not uncommon to find a dark, crusty smudge at the corner of her mouth, or on her chin or her nose. Oskar would usually reach over and clean it away, chiding her with mock severity about keeping her face clean. In fact lately it had turned into a game between them. Oskar suspected that she was always leaving some blood on her face just to play this game with him.

For Oskar the game had a deeper meaning that he was just barely aware of. The blood was proof of the darkest aspect of Eli's true nature worn upon her face. By making a game out of wiping it away, Oskar was acknowledging what she was and he was also signaling his acceptance of it as part of her. Although he wasn't consciously aware of it, on some level Oskar sensed the symbolism of this game. The game was very important to him and he found it satisfying without understanding why. The part of him that understood the game was now squirming in terror at the sight of the mask of blood on her face. That part knew that the acceptance was going to be tested far beyond any imagining.

This time however it wasn't part of the game. There was too much. This had gone far beyond a game. She did it! While I was asleep! Oskar felt his throat for a wound but could find nothing. His hands were clean when held them up to examine them.

"No Oskar, I didn't do anything to you."

As Oskar scrambled out of his sleeping bag and stood up he noticed that the front of her tee shirt was also covered with blood. If not his blood, then … .

"I already went out and found someone. I wanted to make sure that I wasn't hungry."

Oskar didn't know whether to be disappointed or relieved. "Then you decided not to … ."

"No, I decided that you have to decide."

This was worse. Oskar thought that if he was capable of deciding, he would have done it already. He hated that he couldn't make up his mind. It was big decision, sure - bigger than most people ever have to make their entire lives - but still … . He had certainly had enough time to think it over. Plus now Eli had asked. He thought he couldn't refuse her anything. But this - this wasn't just anything. He was worried that Eli would take it as a judgment if he didn't want to be like her. He was worried about what it said about him if didn't immediately agree to do it. But he was scared. Anybody would be scared about doing something like this.

"But I can't. I don't know what the right thing is. I can't make myself choose."

"Yes, you can, but first you have to know exactly what I did tonight."

He could already see what she had done tonight. Except for that one time in her apartment, he was never around when it happened. That memory would never pass from his mind. He would always be fully aware that it did happen. Even if he might have forgotten, their little game would be a constant reminder. He didn't like to think about it, and when he did he felt guilty. He didn't care who she killed. It was more important that she go on living. He knew that it wasn't right to feel that way, but he didn't care. However that didn't mean that he wanted to talk about it - especially not when he could literally see it on her face, on her shirt.

"I know what you did tonight."

"No you don't, Oskar. Not really."

Eli stepped close to Oskar. "You would be choosing what I did tonight for the rest of your life." Then she leaned forward and kissed him.

Although he would die if ever forced to admit it, Oskar really liked it whenever Eli kissed him. He knew she wasn't really his girlfriend - could never be his girlfriend. Even though he had asked her to be, he still wasn't sure what a girlfriend was. He had heard older boys talk about their girlfriends; how they took them to a movie, or made them mad by talking to another girl, or dumped them, or made out with them. Some of these things he understood, some he thought he might understand, and some out-stripped his twelve year old imagination entirely. However he understood that none of these things really applied to Eli. He knew that she wasn't really a girl - not even a vampire girl.

Still, it was nice when she kissed him. Sometimes when she kissed him he saw things, like she was playing a film in his mind. He knew that she was showing him her memories. Although he wanted to know whatever Eli would share with him, some of the things he had seen were horrible beyond description. He didn't understand how she was not crushed under the weight of such memories. On those times when Eli kissed him like that, it was like drifting off to sleep and having a dream of falling, then jerking back suddenly awake. Oskar jerked back awake and …

†

He was on a street in a city. Not a retail district like downtown. There were no stores; just big, drab buildings. Warehouses he supposed. Over in Malmö - down by the docks. He could smell the sea. It was strangely deserted. There were no people on the street; no cars, no trucks. He could hear traffic, people talking, doors opening and closing, but even though these things sounded close, everywhere he looked was completely empty. Where was everybody? He listened more closely and found that although the sounds he could hear were very clear, they were also not coming from nearby. Then he realized: it was night time. Even though he could see everything as if it were daytime, somehow he knew that it was dark.

However there was one sound that was closer; two blocks over and one block down. How can I know that so precisely? It was someone talking. He moved quickly to the next intersection between the warehouses and then a block over. It happened so quickly that Oskar thought, It must be a dream. Eli must be skipping over some parts. She can't really move this fast, can she? There he paused again, listening. Someone was talking - no muttering - in an unbroken cadence of slurred words that he couldn't make out. On the next street over almost all the way down to the end of the block. It sounded like the person was up against the wall of the building on the near side of the street.

He crept over to the next street and peered around the corner of the building. Sure enough, exactly where he had expected, there was a figure dressed in many layers of torn, shabby clothes, slumped against the wall. A bum. Oskar realized that all this time he had been hungry. Ravenously hungry. He felt as though someone had taken a length of coarse twine and threaded it through every vein in his body. That twine was his hunger, being pulled back and forth, scratching and scoring every inch of his insides. And what he hungered for was just down the block, slumped helplessly against the wall.

The next thing that Oskar knew, he was scaling the side of building. He wanted to see how she was doing it but her eyes were fixed above on the edge of the roof. This is pretty cool, he thought as he topped the edge. Then he stood and began to make his way silently across the roof towards … the blood. He somehow knew when to stop. He knew without looking over the edge that the person was directly below, but he looked over the edge anyway.

Beneath him was a man whose age he couldn't guess. All he could tell was: old. No, not even that - just not young. The man was staring dazedly across the street with unseeing eyes, muttering continuously to himself. Somehow, Oskar knew that no matter what happened here this man would neither know nor care. He could smell the man's blood, and something else. The man was dead drunk. Oskar knew that if he fed on this man, he would be drunk, too. That was dangerous, but he felt too hungry to pass up on the blood. He stood there just looking down. He supposed that Eli was trying to decide what to do. As he stood a moment longer he heard footsteps coming.

Around the corner at the near end of the block came a man smoking a cigarette. He was about 20, wearing a leather jacket and boots. A few steps past the corner, the man noticed the drunk and immediately angled across the street towards him. The young man came up next to the drunk and stood there for a moment looking down at him, unknowingly mimicking Oskar (Eli?) on the roof above him. Then he threw down his cigarette, ground it out with the heel of his boot, and said, "OK, old man. Let's see whatcha got." The drunk, still oblivious, just lay there mumbling as the young man rolled him back and forth going through his layers of clothing.

Then the young man stood and gave the drunk a savage kick, saying, "You're good for nothing, aren't you?" With that he spun on his heel and start walking back across the street. At his second step, Oskar felt himself springing off the roof as a low, guttural growl came from somewhere. He felt a moment of terror that was strictly his own as he fell through the air. As the man's third step took him off the curb and into the street, Oskar felt himself land on his back and drive him down onto the street. His forearm landed across the man's shoulder while his knees drove into the man's kidneys. Oskar felt his right hand comb into the man's hair at the back of the head and then make a fist, pulling the scalp tight against his knuckles. As the man was still falling Oskar felt his left hand snake under the man's left arm, around the man's chest and grab his other wrist. As his grip on his wrist tightened, his forearm was drawn tightly against the line of the man's jaw, pinning him to the man's back while at the same time savagely wrenching the man's head to the side, baring his throat. The man landed on his hands and knees, and then, because his head was being twisted around, he rolled onto his right shoulder. This just made it easier for Oskar to bring his mouth up the man's neck.

"What the Hell? Hey, I'm sorry old man. Get off …" the man shouted, sounding angry and surprised. He must have thought the drunk had come after him. Oskar could hear and feel the man's heartbeat as it quickened in anger, or maybe fear, or maybe both. He felt his mouth open and bite down hard on the man's exposed neck. It was like biting through the skin of a sausage or a grape. At first his teeth dug into it and the skin stretched and resisted. Then when his teeth broke through the skin gave way suddenly, only instead of being soft on the inside it was chewy and tough, like raw steak. At the bite the man's tone changed. It now sounded shrill, with a hint of desperation.

"Hey! Damn it! Ow!"

The heartbeat filled Oskar's ears as he pulled his head back, ripping flesh loose from the man's neck with his teeth. Then he opened his mouth and bit again, this time deeper and in a slightly different place. Now he felt his mouth fill with something warm and thick. It gushed into his mouth in spurts, each in sync with the heartbeat that was racing out of control. Of course, Oskar had tasted blood before, but that was never more than a drop or two on the tip of his tongue. He had never realized how having more than that in his mouth could be so disgusting. As the coppery taste filled his mouth in rapid little gushes he became aware of an intense feeling of pleasure and satisfaction. He didn't know how, but he knew the feeling was connected to the taste of the blood. He began sucking and swallowing the blood as fast as he could. Gush, gush, gush. While he had thought it was cool to climb buildings and see in the dark, this was just gross. Worse than gross. This was something that no person was supposed to do.

"Get off me!" The man had reached up with his free arm and grabbed a handful of hair. He tried to pull Oskar's head away from the gash on his neck, but Oskar could feel that the man was no match for his strength. The man wasn't forming words now. His incoherent screams echoed back and forth along the street. He rolled onto his back and Oskar felt himself pinned to the street beneath him, but still his mouth sucked away. Gush, gush, gush. The man began pushing with his heels on the asphalt, trying to somehow scrape Oskar from his back. This new position just gave Oskar the opportunity to wrap his legs around the man's torso, and hook his feet together. Oskar felt his legs begin to squeeze like a vice. The man's screaming stopped abruptly as his organs were forced up into his lungs, almost completely collapsing them. Then Oskar heard and felt a sickening crunch as his legs broke the man's lower ribs. The man's body gave a sharp jerk and then went limp. And still Oskar sucked and sucked at the warm flow that was not only passing down his throat but also now running down and drenching the front of his shirt. Finally the flow was beginning to slow and the beating in his ears was losing strength. Gush … gush … gush … .

Gush.

When the beat fell silent, the flow of blood finally stopped. Oskar pushed the man's body off of him and stood up. His fist was still knotted in the hair at the crown of the man's head. He looked over at the drunk, who was still in the same position, still staring, still mumbling. Oskar saw his other hand reach down and grasp the man's chin. Then quickly his hands swapped positions, spinning the head 180 degrees and yielding a crunch even more sickening than the last one. Then, still holding onto the head, Oskar dragged the body across the curb and propped it against the wall next to the drunk.

Why? Then Oskar realized: To make it look like the drunk had somehow done this. Eli was covering her tracks. An instant later he was blocks away, running incredibly fast. He would have thought this was cool, too, but he felt like nothing was ever going to be cool again. Then the street faded out …

†

As Eli released him, he staggered backward and sat down hard on his bedding. Eli followed and quickly kneeled in front of him.

"I'm sorry. Are you alright?"

"Am I … ? Umm, yeah." Oskar was having a hard time pulling himself back to right here, right now. The smell of the sea was gone, replaced by the oppressive dank smell of … what? He slowly came to realize that he was back in the basement, but it was no longer the inside of a dinosaur skeleton. He was in a strange basement, in a strange house, in a strange city, surrounded by the random artifacts of some sailor's life. "That was tonight?"

"Yes. But it could have been any other night. This is how I live."

Of course Oskar had known that Eli was dangerous. He had known how Eli got blood, but knowing something and feeling it were two different things. Oskar had been surviving on that difference. He loved her so much that it had been easy for him to not feel these things were true. He now realized that he didn't want to feel them. Even just knowing them was almost too much. As Eli gazed intently into his eyes, Oskar remembered the taste of the blood, how the warmth had flowed down his throat, and he felt as though he would throw up.

"How do you do it? It tastes so gross."

"No Oskar, it tastes good. Better than anything you have ever tasted - at least when you are like me. But it doesn't really matter how it tastes. I have to have it."

And Oskar thought, Just like I have to have you. At the same time he couldn't rid his memory of the revolting feeling of the man's skin giving way between his teeth. The sound of bones breaking still rang clearly in his head. Could he really choose that? If it was for Eli, why shouldn't he choose it, no matter how bad it was? Could anything be worse than being without Eli?

The silence drew out as Oskar's mind reeled from one unhappy thought to another. Eli's gaze was still fastened on Oskar's eyes and held them like magnet. Despite the blood covering her face, despite his immediate and sickening knowledge of how it got there, that gaze still wrapped him in a warm feeling of comfort. Just as Oskar was coming to the thought: What wouldn't be worth looking into these eyes?, Eli spoke.

"Remember the first time we were in a basement together? You wanted us to mix."

This was a welcome change of topic. Oskar chuckled and said, "Yeah. Boy was that a dumb idea. Umm... I mean - it sure didn't turn out like I thought."

For the first time since he had awoke he saw Eli's expression change. One corner of her mouth turned up as her gaze drifted from his and she remembered, "No, you really didn't have a clue then, did you?"

Then Eli's expression turned serious as her eyes came back to his, "You said in your letter that you can't be strong. That's not true. You're not mean, you're not cruel, but that's not the same as being weak."

This didn't sound right to Oskar. He knew that cruelty didn't mean strength, but he didn't feel strong. "But I'm not strong - not like you."

"Yes you are, whether you know it or not. You are strong enough to decide for yourself. You decided to run away with me, didn't you?"

Oskar had to admit that was true - sort of. It was probably more truthful to say that the choice had made itself. He could have stayed in Blackeberg in misery and been faced with explaining three dead boys, or he could have run away with the only person in the world that mattered to him. It had not exactly been a coin toss. "Yeah, but this is different."

"That's right. This is different because if you choose to do it there is no turning back."

"No, that's not what I meant."

"But it is what I mean. Oskar, the choice was taken away from me. I could never take it away from you. Even though you know what I did tonight, you don't really know what it means to be infected like me."

What more could there be to know? Wasn't what he saw just now bad enough? "It means that I can always be with you."

"Yes, you will have me, but you will lose everything else."

To Oskar, this was a strange thing to say. If he had ever had anything else to lose, it had been lost long before he met Eli. When he thought of Blackeberg he felt no pangs of loss. He felt nothing at all, except perhaps some guilt at how his mom must feel. She had always said that if anything happened to him, she couldn't go on. Now something had happened to him, but he knew it was something wonderful. And although he couldn't articulate it to himself in these terms, he knew he shouldn't carry the responsibility for his mom's happiness. No, he had really not left anything behind. "Eli, I don't have anything else but you."

"Yes you do, Oskar. You have a choice. You could choose to go back to your family tomorrow."

"I have nothing to go back to. I already chose you." Eli never seemed to believe this when he said it. Oskar sensed that a part of her was fragile; that she thought she didn't deserve anything good. He was ready to say this as many times as it took.

Eli was silent for a moment. She took a breath as if to say something, but remained silent. Then after a long moment, she did speak, "You also have a life where you don't have to kill."

Oskar let his breath out in a "whoosh!" There it is, he thought. That's the price for being with Eli forever. That's why she showed me. Oskar thought that he couldn't blame Eli for being worried that he could never kill anyone. He was worried about it himself - especially after what she had just shown him.

"Oskar, if I had the choice now, I would choose that none of it had ever happened; that I had never been infected."

"But then we would never have met," Oskar protested. How could she want that?

"That's right. I would have died long ago."

"And Jimmy would have killed me."

"Maybe."

"And that would be okay with you?" Oskar's voice had taken on an accusing tone, but he didn't care.

"Oskar, there are worse things than being killed. I don't have to kill people to get their blood. I kill them afterwards because I don't want to leave them infected. For most people, being dead is better than being infected."

"Then why don't you kill yourself?" Once the words had left Oskar's mouth and filled his ears, he regretted them. Before he had said them he thought it was a logical question. Now that he had actually heard the words they sounded like a terrible thing to say. Was he asking her to kill herself? Would she think that?

"I..." Eli looked down and away. Then suddenly her eyes snapped back to Oskar's and she exploded, "Because it's not fair!" Suddenly she was on her feet, standing over him shouting, "My life was stolen from me! My family - everything gone! Now I can't even remember them! Even my memories were stolen. I have nothing; no life. How can I have a death without a life? I will never take death when I wasn't allowed a life! When I haven't lived. When I have nothing!" Eli took a breath as the slight echo of her shouts died against the concrete walls.

Then her voice softened. "I have nothing but you, Oskar. I just want you to know that I wouldn't choose this if it was my choice."

As Oskar looked up into her face, he felt that he would do anything to make it right for Eli - anything but give her up. "I know it's not fair. If you have nothing but me, then I want you to have me forever. It's just that..."

"It's just that no one would want to be like me."

Oskar looked away from her eyes. He couldn't look into them as he nodded in agreement. He didn't want to be like her. "I just don't want to ever be apart from you. If I'm all that you have … I can't let the last thing be taken away from you."

Eli sighed. This was something new: Oskar had never heard her sigh before. She sat on the ground in front of him and crossed her ankles in front of her. As she wrapped her arms around her knees she said, "Oskar, anything can be taken away. Haven't you figured that out yet?"

Well, that was probably true. And on top of that, the things that you wanted to get rid of the most would always be the last things taken. That was the way it worked - unless you did something about it. And what Oskar wanted to get rid of was his fear of growing up. He was afraid of growing into a teenager and becoming girl-crazy, because that would be for real girls. He was afraid of growing into a man who wanted a wife and a family, because that would require a real woman. He was afraid of just being no longer a twelve year old. He didn't want to be someone who didn't want to do twelve year old things, because it was the twelve year old things that made Eli happy. All the things that little boys can't wait to get older to do, these were the things that Oskar feared. He wanted to rid himself of the fear by making sure these things never happened. Rather than let these things take Eli from him, Oskar thought he would instead take them away from himself.

"But we can at least try to keep the things we want. It's not just for you. It's for me, too. I hate the idea of growing up. What if I grow up and don't want to be with you anymore?"

"What if you do? If that's what you want then you should do it. It's not like you owe me anything. I know that."

Now it was Oskar's turn to shout, "But that's NOT what I want!"

"Then you have decided?"

Oskar's thoughts screeched to a halt. Well, wasn't that what he was saying? He tried to say, "Yes," but his jaw was clamped tight. He just couldn't. He had decided what he wanted, but he could not bring himself to choose it.

"You know Oskar, I've been thinking a lot about us being together. I … I don't know for sure that if you became like me that we could be together."

What? Was she just saying that to make sure he said no? But she had asked him if he wanted to. Why would she be making things up to talk him out of it now? Was she just trying to make it easy for him to chicken out? Oskar searched her face for some clue about what she meant, but with Eli it was usually impossible to read her thoughts on her face. All that he could see was that she would not meet his gaze. "What do you mean? Why not?"

"Since I wrote you that letter asking if you … well, you know …" She glanced back into his eyes but quickly looked away again. "I have been doing a lot of thinking. I have been imagining what it could be like if you were like me. I remembered something that I hadn't thought about in a long time …"

Eli's gaze drifted over Oskar's shoulder and took on a far away look. "Since I became what I am, I have only ever met one other person like me. I was real curious to talk to her, but I didn't want to stay around her for long. Maybe it was just because I didn't like her, but maybe also it was because people like me just can't be around each other."

Oskar leaned forward and put his hands on Eli's shoulders. He held them there in silence, until eventually Eli looked back into his face. "Eli, I will always want to be with you. Nothing can change that."

"Oskar, I believe that you would want to. I would want that, too. But it could be that we just … can't. Like the way that I can't stand sunlight, or the way that cats don't like me, or the way that I have to be invited in. Maybe it's like the way two tigers can't share the same jungle. I wonder if I'm just fooling myself. Maybe I don't kill people to save them from being infected. Maybe I just don't want to share the … the hunting. Like the infection inside me just doesn't want anyone else like me around."

Now her face, although it didn't outwardly change, took on a sharp look. Razor sharp. It was like looking down the edge of a finely honed sword. "Don't you understand that the worst thing would be for you to become like me and then you had to go away? That would be worse than you just leaving now. It would be worse than you dying. It would even be worse than me killing you. It would take everything away from both of us. It would leave us both with nothing!"

Eli reached over next to Oskar and rummaged around in his bedding for a moment. When she pulled her hand back out, Oskar saw that she held his knife. Then she stood up and looked down at him expectantly. Oskar was unsure what to do, so he stood up as well.

"Oskar, you know as much as a normal person could what it's like to be me. You know what it could mean to us. Is this what you want now that you know? Only you can choose."

Eli held the handle of the knife in her right hand and with her left she pulled the leather scabbard away to expose the blade. She dropped the scabbard and held her empty hand palm up at her waist. Then she placed the edge of the blade on her open palm and without any hesitation drew it across from one side to the other. She glanced at her palm and let her hand drop lightly to her side as she held the knife out to Oskar, handle first.

Oskar looked from the knife to her face, and then back to the knife. He saw a hand reach out, wrap itself around the handle, and then take it from her grasp. He hadn't meant to take it. He hadn't even thought about taking it, but now it was in his hand. He didn't know what to do, so he thought he would test the knife's sharpness against his fingernail to buy some time. As he held the blade up he noticed that it was perfectly clean. Spotless. He looked suspiciously down at her hand. Sure enough there was a dark red line drawn across it. Blood was oozing from it, forming trails that curled down around her two middle fingers.

Oskar's mind flashed back to the time when his past self had foolishly wanted to mix with Eli. He had cut his hand deeply - just as deeply as Eli had cut her's just now - and he could vividly recall how the blood had filled his palm, overflowed between his fingers, and dripped to the ground. What he saw now was different. As he watched, the trails of Eli's blood reached her fingertips, first one and then the other, and both stopped. Drops of blood formed on each fingertip but refused to fall. They got a little fatter, but instead of forming larger drops that would fall, the edges of the drops actually grew up the sides of her fingers. Her blood had a will of its own; it would not leave her of its own accord. Then she held her hand out to Oskar and the drops moved to hang from her knuckles, but still refused to fall.

"Take my hand Oskar. Whether you cut yours first or not is up to you. If your skin isn't cut, you won't get infected."

"But, won't the blood make you … dangerous?"

"I'm not hungry - I just ate. There won't be any danger. But either way, whether you cut your hand or not, I want you to take my hand. I will always want you to take my hand."

Oskar didn't know where to look. His mind went blank. He couldn't force any thought to form. He continued to stare at the blood that was wrapping itself around her hand like a glove. He knew that he was faced with a choice that was either horrible or wonderful, and he didn't know which way was which. He started to look up into her eyes, but then forced his gaze to the blade. He knew what his decision would be if he looked into those eyes. He couldn't let those eyes make this choice for him.

Then Oskar steeled himself and met her gaze. He thought to himself, I can't ever be afraid to see these eyes. I'm taking this knife and cutting out any part of me that would keep me from you. He pressed the edge of the blade to his palm and curled his fingers around it. Then before he could think about it he clenched his fist around the blade and pulled the knife from his hand. The stinging pain from the cut sang in his palm. Oskar winced but the thought that came to his mind gave him power, This time I decide what gets taken from me, and I decide what I get to keep. Never dropping his gaze from Eli's, Oskar reached out and took her hand.

Oskar saw tears forming in the corners of Eli's eyes. He couldn't tell whether she was happy or sad. The first tears spilled over and Oskar's eyes followed their paths down her cheek and into the blood there, finding their way to the edge of her jaw. It was then that he noticed her jaw was quivering. He stepped forward and with his free arm drew her tight against him, trapping their clasped hands between them. She returned the embrace with her free arm and buried her head in his shoulder as she started to silently sob.

Oskar quietly held her, and as sob after sob shook them both, he felt triumphant. He imagined that he could feel the infection moving into the cut in his hand and finding its way into his veins. It was chasing through him seeking out and cutting the chains that would have bound him to a future that he did not want - a future without Eli. Now, for the first time in his life, he was choosing what would happen to him. His choice was Eli.

Eventually Eli's sobs subsided and she raised her head to look at him, her face wet and shiny from her tears. Much of the wet blood was gone - just some dried clots on her chin and at the corners of her mouth. Oskar resisted the urge to wipe them away. This was no time for games. Their noses were almost touching. For a moment they just looked into each others eyes, trading breaths. Then Eli gave Oskar one quick light kiss and said, "Oskar, I still don't think you know everything that you're giving up, but I promise I'll do whatever I can to make sure that you're not sorry."

"Eli, there's nothing that would make me sorry except losing you."

Now Eli turned serious, business-like. "You are starting a new life. I have to teach you how to keep it. I think it will take few days for you to … change. After that, you know what has to happen."

"What?"

"I already showed you. You will hunt."

Oskar swallowed hard. He still had a price to pay for his choice.

He and many, many others.