Siren Suicides (Second Edition)

Chapter 6. Brights' Boat

I tense and kick, leaping into the air with inhuman speed, shrieking mid-jump to scare and arrest my target. But the second my head pierces the lake's surface, noise, smells, light, all hit me with unexpected intensity and I promptly shut up. The sky is too bright, the air is too warm. Raindrops are too sharp, and the sounds are too many. There is screeching, talking, whirring, honking. I cross my arms over my face for protection. With my eyes closed, scared to see who it is I'm about to kill, I hang midair for a split second, and fall. I land within inches of someone warm.

It's a he—I don't know how I know, I simply do. As if done waiting for an opportune moment, the melody of his soul hits me full force, a beautiful harmony broken up by a hinge of pain. I can taste emotions in its vibrations. Surprise. Fear. Awe? Is this how it's supposed to be, some kind of killer admiration?

Perched like a bird, and holding the sides of the rowboat for balance, the first few verses of "We Can't Be Apart" by my favorite band, Siren Suicides, rings from my lips. I don't know how I decided to sing exactly this, but I always listen to it when I miss Hunter; it makes me ache and feel comfortable at the same time.

"There you are,

Without me you cry.

I surround you,

Love me or I die..."

I feel human warmth roll over me in waves of breath; it makes me hungry. All logic squandered, my new primitive side drives to push for more, but something is blocked. There is no flow. I don't know what flow there is supposed to be, but the process seems to have gone wrong. Whoever it is I decided to feed on is trying to say something. I don't want to hear it or I'll lose control.

"I adore you.

See me or I fly.

I dream of you.

Dream with me, don't lie..."

His soul reverberates to my rhythm, tunes in and morphs into a submissive harmony. I imagine it happening. I imagine bending it, telling it to shed its host, pulse to my beat, slink inside of me. I imagine the warmth filling my chest, unclenching an agony of hunger, replacing my void with fresh soul. What's really happening is...nothing. Nothing happens. Something is wrong, I'm doing something wrong. Still, perhaps out of sheer stubbornness, the siren in me urges me to keep trying.

"Can you hold my hand,

Can you hold my heart?

Can you hold my soul,

I can't be apart..."

A warm hand touches mine and I choke on the last note, nearly shrieking, hunger piercing me with a jolt. I open my eyes. Light sears my retinas with excruciating clarity. Visions filter through a kaleidoscope of colors and shapes. I blink through tears. My song dies.

"Hunter?"

Because it's Hunter's hand that's touching mine, Hunter's face that's blinking inches away from mine, Hunter's breath that warms me. I'm both horrified and ecstatic to see him.

"Fuck! I thought you were some random guy, I almost killed you," I say.

Hunter grins his crooked smile, with that familiar dimple in his right cheek. He looks nonchalant, as if we just met up on the Aurora Bridge and decided to go for a boat ride to observe rain from the open lake on a cloudy Monday morning. A fancy new way to skip school.