Chapter Text
The nighttime landscape of trees and houses streak by in Juliette’s blurred, peripheral vision as she drives. In a distant part of her mind she registers that this is dangerous; driving while weeping. There’s no other word for what she’s doing now. Crying shamelessly and openly as she drives; fat tears rolling down her neck and splashing onto her bare legs. Shuddering sobs wrack her body. Her hands tremble on the steering wheel and the sound of her sobs reverberates through the car. She is weeping.
How could this happen?? She doesn’t even understand. Theo… a vampire. Turned by… her? But how? It’s nothing she’d ever even considered. Her heart sinks. She should have known! Her own father is technically half Made. So her mother would have had to turn him. But no one ever talked about it. She doesn’t even know how it works. And anything they may have said would have slipped in one of Juliette’s ears and out the other as she daydreamed about pretty girls, texted with Ben. Any bits of vampire wisdom her family may have tried to impart would have been drowned out by the happy, soft Pop music dancing through her earbuds. She’s always tried to ignore what she is. To tune it out at all costs. What her family is. And anything having to do with how it all works. Now it is really coming back to bite her in the ass. She swerves sharply to avoid oncoming headlights and wipes tears away with one hand, squinting to see the road.
Juliette’s chest is tightening progressively as she struggles to breathe. God, she needs… God she needs… she needs… something. Someone. Calliope. She needs and she wants. She wants, she wants, she wants . Calliope. Calliope . Her heart is trembling with the confusion and pain and fear of it. Calliope doesn’t want her. Not now. Cal’s words echo in her mind. Monster. Monster. Monster . It’s her greatest fear: that she’s unlovable because of what she is… Unforgivable. A fresh sob shudders through her as Cal’s words jumble together leaving only a feeling behind. Hate. Cal wants to kill her. How could she go from “Forever” to hate so quickly? Was their connection a lie? Was this hate always waiting just under the surface of their love? She should have known. Should have known when Cal saw her kill. Saw her feed. There was no coming back from that. Monster . But then they’d made love. Touched each other inside and out. They’d been stronger than ever. Juliette feels sick as memories of Cal’s soft, strong body shaking inside her arms flow over her unbidden. Of her own body twitching around Cal’s fingers, wet and wanting.
A horn blares and Juliette swerves, nearly missing headlights on one side and a small copse of trees on the other. She’s unknowingly driven away from the city. Out of the neighborhoods and into a more rural, boggy area with curving roads and clumps of trees on either side of the road that shoot up through the muddy ground. There are no street lights. She is gasping for breath now. Hyperventilating. Stupid, when she doesn’t even actually need oxygen to live. “Residual humanity,” her mother would say.
The car seems to be rumbling over uneven terrain. Shit. The road, where is the road? Suddenly the headlights illuminate trees ahead. Juliette tries to turn, craning her neck as she frantically searches for the road. But the car’s tires snag on something and the car lurches sideways into a large tree with a resounding crunch. She cries out as her body is thrown to the side and then stopped short by her seatbelt.
The car lurches to a stop and grows quiet… even more so as Juliette struggles with clumsy fingers to turn off the ignition. Then she fumbles with her seatbelt; getting it off and pushing open the door. Her feet step down into squishy mud. Luckily it was the passenger side that hit the trees and she is able to climb out without issue. Sniffling, she makes her way around the car, shoes squelching with each step. The damage is not as bad as she feared but she can immediately see what caused the wreck. The front passenger tire is completely flat- probably punctured on her brief off-road journey into these trees. She hiccups another sob and squeezes her eyes tightly shut in frustration before squelching back around to dig her phone out of the cupholder. Her parents are gonna be furious. And, let’s be honest, she’s already on thin ice with them. Maybe she could call Ben.
But… there’s no signal. She sighs a long, exhausted, defeated sigh. And begins to walk.
Juliette’s arms wrap tightly around herself as she puts one heavy foot in front of the other and tries to block the image of Theo’s poor, confused face from her mind. The cacophony of bugs and birds singing their nighttime chorus absolutely fills the humid air to bursting. A reminder that life goes on even while her own personal world is collapsing. After only a couple minutes headlights light the road and a shiny, dark car slows to a roll beside her. The window slides down. Inside is a well dressed white man older than Elinor and younger than her parents. He wears a crisp button down shirt with the sleeves rolled up and top button undone. He smiles ruefully with a concern that feels ever so slightly off. His elbow props itself up on the window ledge with casual confidence.
“You okay?” he asks, slowing the car to a complete stop.
Juliette regards him. The meaning of his words take a little extra time to filter through her grief-addled brain. She swallows. The man seems to register her tear stained face and puffy eyes and his brow wrinkles. The locks click open.
“It’s not safe for you to be walking alone this late at night. Can I give you a ride?”
Juliette’s nerves prickle. The side of her that has spent her whole life living as a human registers the inherent risk for a young woman getting into a car with a strange man late at night. But the vampire side of her… the monster side rises up from her typically dormant state reminding her that she, herself, is nothing to be trifled with.
Monster, monster, monster.
She swallows down a lump in her throat and croaks out, “Yeah… thanks.”
_______________________
End Notes:
Thanks for reading! If you are here from the Cazzie fandom I'm glad you're with me again and hope you will say hello!
I HAVE NO ONE PROOFREADING so please please if you see grammatical errors let me know what and where they are.