Amelia Salvatore

It's A Cruel World

I liked my own company. I liked it a lot. In fact, it was probably safe to say that I liked myself more than I liked most people. Everyone tended to annoy me. It was exactly this reason that I was by myself tonight.

I was in a classy little cocktail bar, sitting at a table on the balcony that looked over the city of Seattle. It was a place I'd grown to like. Seattle had been my stomping grounds for a while a couple of decades ago. I had history here. 

It had nearly been three months since I'd left Mystic Falls, and I was happy to say that I'd avoided contact with any of the people there. I knew I'd promised Stefan that I'd call, but I'd give it a year, at least. 

The bar was fairly busy, as it was a Friday night. Instead of bothering myself with the ongoings of the people around me, I ignored all of them, continuing to sip the glass of wine I had in front of me. I watched the city lights, my thoughts elsewhere.

Apparently my night was doomed to be interrupted, because someone was actually stupid enough to watch me from across the other side of the room and think that I wouldn't notice. They were doing a remarkably terrible job, as they'd failed to realise that there was a mirror on the wall from which I could clearly see them.

He was a man in his twenties with a boring face and an unfortunate nose. He looked vaguely familiar somehow. Whoever he was, he wasn't game enough to confront me, which made me dislike him even more.

With a sigh, I finished my wine and stood to leave, ignoring the man as his eyes trailed after me. He wasn't human, that was for sure. A vampire, most likely, and a bad one at that. He followed me out of the building and walked into the same alley that I had just seconds previously, only to find that I had disappeared.

The man looked around, confused, before I appeared out of nowhere and pinned him to the wall by his throat, squeezing tightly to cut off his airways.

"You have exactly thirty seconds to tell me why you're following me before I rip your heart out," I warned, my voice pleasant and calm.

 "H-he sent me!" the man gasped, clutching desperately at my hands.

"Who?" I pressed, narrowing my eyes.

"Jack," he answered, fear evident in his eyes. "He told me to follow you."

"Why?" I demanded.

"I don't know," he said. 

"Mmm... Not good enough," I replied boredly as I squeezed his throat tighter.

"I swear, I don't!" he cried desperately, his voice slightly distorted from my hold. "Please. I-I think he's just being cautious!"

I relaxed my hold a little and tilted my head.

"Cautious," I repeated.

"Y-yeah," the man nodded. "I mean, after what happened last time you were in Seattle."

"And how do you know what happened last time I was here?"

The man frowned. "I, uh, was here. Wait, don't you remember me?"

"Should I?" I asked, arching an eyebrow, almost amused by the fact that he thought he was important enough to be worth remembering.

"Um, my name's Liam Peterson?" he said, making it sound like a question. "You, uh, turned me into a vampire like, thirty years ago?"

Realisation hit me.

"Oh. Right. Now I remember. You were the annoying one," I mused. I squinted at him. "Didn't I kill you?"