There was so much pain and anguish in Alexandre's eyes, that I was stunned for a moment and didn't answer. His look of worry grew and he became tense.
"I feel I have wronged you!" He moaned and I held up a hand, shaking my head.
"I can't tell you what I would have chosen had you asked me what I wanted while I was dying. But I will NEVER regret the chance at a new life you have given me. Perhaps this is how it was always supposed to be. Maybe I had to lose my life to find the will to live it, I don't know." I said with a shrug "But please, never, ever apologize for saving me. You're the only person in my life that ever did." My reply was somber and I watched Alexandre's face dance through relief, pity and then and expression I couldn't identify. Was it determination?
"Now that I know a little of your past, I apologize and will try to remember myself around you. I can't make promises, it has been a long time since I had company in this house, and I find it both disturbing and fascinating in ways I never could have imagined. But I will try my hardest to keep my temper in check to keep from scaring you badly again as I did today. You must also promise me one thing." He held up a finger and I looked at him dubiously.
"What's that?" I asked with suspicion.
"You must try to work with me on this. Remember for me, I have made you a promise: unless you become a danger to yourself or others, I will never harm you intentionally out of anger nor any strong emotion. I am not your father, nor your mother, I will not neglect nor mistreat you, but I am also not perfect, so we will have to improve ourselves together. Agreed?" Alexandre stared hard into my eyes and I relaxed, nodding my agreement.
"Good. Now, get some rest, you must be tired. I've left you a snack." He tucked the quilt around me again as I leaned back against the pillows.
"Not my mother huh?" I retorted. Alexandre sighed with exasperation, but I could see the corners of his mouth turn up into a slight smile as he left the room. Interesting note: vampires still cry real tears. I closed my swollen eyelids and let myself drift to sleep.
Sometime later I woke to the sound of the 'nurse' saying "There it is..." and I grabbed at my arm quickly, trying to snatch out a needle that was no longer there. My heart racing, I sat up and decided it was not going to be possible to sleep anymore, so I drifted down to the library with a glass of the donor blood Alexandre had left me. I stuck a straw in the glass, one of the few things I made a special request for from Alexandre, since it still kind of gave me the creeps to drink the blood from a glass or bag without sort of distancing myself from it a bit. He thought I was being ridiculous but allowed me the peculiarity.
I perused the shelves while quietly slurping away. I picked up an older Reader's Digest with a collection of shortened stories in it, and curled up in the chair by the fireplace that I now considered 'mine'. The first story was an old murder mystery that easily drew me in. I heard a knock at the door leading to the front foyer and looked up to see Alexandre, who walked in when he noticed he had my attention.
"Well that was polite of you-not going to pop up on me suddenly anymore?" I taunted.
"You get a pass for a few days, at least until I feel you have returned to normal. I will still try to keep my promise about my temper, but you really must start using your heightened senses to their potential, and I believe we're going to have to start some regular exercises to encourage that. How do you even find the blood you need?" Alexandre waved a hand in the air dismissing the question "That's not why I came here. I actually came here to offer you my story, since you have shared yours." I tilted my head.
"Let me guess-born to European aristocracy, led a happy and wealthy life full of fancy parties, horseback riding and an arranged marriage. Tragically fell in love with some strange foreign beauty who drained you of blood and left you for dead, making it impossible for you to ever trust again." I replied.
"Yes, however did you know?" Alexandre answered with a shocked expression.
"What, really?" I asked also shocked.
"No." He replied with disdain. "Now, shall I tell it, or would you care to guess again?" I saw a glimmer of a smile in his eyes.
"Oh my gods-you're teasing me! Am I rubbing off on you?!" I exclaimed incredulously.
"Perish the thought, now hush." Alexandre settled into the chair on the other side of the little round table across from me.
"Obviously, you've been reading too many fantasy stories. No, my origins started in France, at least that part you had correct. But I was born to a very low-class family. We had to scrape and scramble much as you have to survive. By the 1920s plague had ravaged most of Europe. Medical care wasn't so much of thing then, and it wasn't very...reliable. Being from a poor family made things even more difficult. The best way to protect the family from infection, was to force the infected party-me-out of the home. We didn't have as much knowledge about germs and contagion then as we do now. I wandered around the streets until I was too weak to continue. At that point, I was found by a rather hungry fellow, that was having a harder time finding a...living...meal...with all the deaths, infection, and people trying to stay isolated inside their homes. I'd like to say he drank from me to save me, but it was entirely selfishly motivated. Unfortunately, in my weakened state, already gravely ill and on the edge of death, the virus had all it needed to conquer my immune system, and it did. Rapidly."
"After waking up to my new life, I spent some time travelling and trying to figure out who, and what, I now was. You see, my sire had simply abandoned me. He was probably too mad with hunger to realize he had turned me at all, in all honesty. Eventually, it occurred to me that, as a vampire, I required very little in the way of upkeep. I started taking odd jobs, and since I didn't have to spend my earnings on food or light or heat, I could save almost everything I made to spend on...other amenities. Oh, I'll admit, for several years I greedily spent money on the best lodging and clothing and fine things that I could afford that I had never been able to have before. Eventually, I wised up and opened a bank account or two. Bought a stock or bond here or there. Invested. Finally accrued enough to purchase property. I had plenty of time to wait on my finances to mature, and in the meantime I could continue to earn more wages, and I did. When I cashed in some of the investments I had made early on, I invested again, and repeated the process. Eventually I immigrated here, and at the time, transferring some of my wealth into US currency increased it quite nicely. By now I have a tidy some in several bank accounts that enable me to live off of interest alone, but I continue to invest and choose to play it safe, you never know what the future holds, and besides, now I have you to worry about too."
"And so, here we are today. I have quite a bit of money that is barely being used, so I enjoy pampering you, and will enjoy it even more now that I know you come from a similar financial background. Has my story satisfied your curiosity?" Alexandre finished with the question.
"Most of it... You said you'd been alone for a long time, I'm sensing there's more story there...did you have company before? Wait! You said the 20s! OMG! Are you YOUNGER than me?!?" I shrieked.
"Technically I'm much older, and remember, people in my time grew up more quickly and died much earlier, but yes, if you must count it exactly, I was infected in my early 20s, which makes my human body younger than yours at the time of its transformation." Alexandre answered.