1. Goodbyes

Thursday, August 20th
Waxing Gibbous Moon (Six Nights to Full Moon)

I never thought I’d get into college being what I was. Of course, the acceptance board didn’t know what I was. How could they? They thought I was just like any other student. I paid my tuition just like any of the other students; I even got a partial scholarship. I registered for classes, got a dorm room, bought my textbooks, and prepared to finally leave my parents, even if I’d be back home the next summer. I would enjoy my fleeting freedom until then.

After lugging countless heavy boxes and living essentials through crowded hallways and up several flights of stairs, after all the sweat and unpacking and frustration, and after realizing that I had a whole lot less space than I thought I had, at the end of the day, I knew that I would be blissfully alone, away from the people that I’d tried so hard for so many years to love and hate at the same time.

My father closed the door of what was to be my home and cubicle of a room for the next two semesters. This wasn't a good sign. Closed-door sessions meant serious business.

My mother was sitting on my still-naked bed trying not to cry, her dyed-blond hair showing brown roots as she ducked her head, wiping away tears and hoping my dad and I wouldn’t see. I ignored it as always. She did the same thing every time I went to a slumber party or any other venture as I was growing up. She should have had at least one more child. The nest was empty too soon, too fast for her liking. If she had her way, I would never leave home. She tried to get me to go to a community college for at least my first two years of school so I could be close-by and still live at home, but I wanted to go to the university, and a scholarship was not something to walk away from, even if it was partial. My family didn’t have the funds to pass up free money.

He looked at me sternly with his light hazel eyes and put his hands on my shoulders. His brown hair had darkened over the years, and now it was lightening again, but not to a lighter brown. It was salt-and-pepper gray now, getting grayer every time I looked at him. By the time I came home after the school year ended, it would probably be completely gray. His mustache was also starting to gray. I had often wondered if he would stop wearing a mustache after it went full gray, but I just couldn’t imagine my dad without that hairy caterpillar on his face. He’d been mustachioed all my life.

“Now Selene, you know your mother and I love you very much,” Uh oh, the ‘we love you’ line, the most serious way for parents to begin a speech, “We only want the best for you,” I cringed inwardly. “Please, you must be careful, we want you to try and have as normal of a college experience as possible. You have to watch yourself, who you talk to, who you go out with, when you go out, and what you tell people. We aren’t gong to be here to help you clean up your messes and give you advice. We’re not going to be here to hold you back. You need to keep track of things.”

I nodded; it was all the same stuff I had heard before. He always gave me a speech every time I went off without him, even if for only a few hours.

“We don’t want to hear or read about any attacks or investigations or anything else suspicious,” My mother chimed in, fresh tears creeping down her cheeks. She brushed the frayed, blonde tips away from her face, where they were sticking to the wet spots tracking lines through her once-immaculate makeup.

“That won’t happen, that was when I was new at this. I have better control now.”

She patted my hand as an old woman would and smiled, closed-lipped and cautious. I could see lines of age in her face. She looked older than I had ever remembered, tired and stressed. Her green eyes that I had always thought beautiful were bloodshot and shining. “Just don’t…eat anyone,” She tried to make a joke but ended up crying more. I didn’t think she had much faith in me.

I smiled and assured them for the hundredth time that I wouldn’t. I opened the door and led them back down to the car. As they drove away, my mother in the passenger seat of our old van, still trying to hold back sobs, I realized one important thing.

I was finally free.

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A/N: I present to you: the first chapter of Bitten! To get it started, I'm going to post two chapters per week for the first few weeks. The first several chapters are shorter than Becoming's chapters, so that's another reason I'm posting two per week. Expect another chapter on Thursday, along with the newest chapter of Becoming. This chapter sort of serves as an introductory chapter, almost a prologue of sorts.

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