"Ceci, just listen to Papa. Stay away from those creatures OK?"
The little girl with red-brown hairs nodded with a dejected frown on her face.
"Yes, Papa." Came the reply from her chime like voice. She then looked at the tall, handsome and strongly built man kneeled in front of her. "But can Papa tell me why? I have seen them on the TV, they are just like us. They have normal jobs, normal families - well, as normal as it can get - and they look just like us."
Her Papa let out a sigh.
"Ceci, Pumpkin, they might be all of those but they don't eat like us. They kill in order to survive."
"But Papa! So do we!" The little girl was now throwing a tantrum. She just didn't understand why her Papa, and especially her Mama warned her to stay away from the people of the night. Her Papa fixed her floral sundress and then patted her head. This caused the little girl to wear a gigantic pout with crossed arms. He then took her small oval face in his comparatively gigantic, calloused hands and stared hard in her blue hazel eyes that matched his. He then used one hand to pinch her small nose and the other to put away the pout from her full heart shaped lips.
"Celicia, those creatures are called vampires for a reason. They feed on blood. Human blood. Do you want them to feed from you?"
The little girl hurriedly shook her head. Fear visible in her eyes.
"Good. Now let's go pick some flowers while we're here to give your Mama more time to finish decorating your birthday cake."
A bright smile spread across her face.
***
10 years later
"Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday dear Ceci! Happy birthday to you!..."
The crowd of friends and family was gathered around the girl in front of a rectangular birthday cake with 16 candles on it.
"Ceci! Happy birthday! I can't believe it has been 16 years since you were on this Earth!" A brown haired beauty came running with outstretched hands with a small box in her right.
"Auri! I'm so glad you could make it! I was worried you wouldn't get to finish your project on time." Two beauties hugged each other.
"And miss my best friend's sweet 16? Never!" Auriela pulled away fixed her straight platinum blonde hair and took a good look at her friend. Trying to find a difference in her appearance since she was now sixteen.
"Gosh Auri! Don't look at me so deeply I might think you're checking me out." Ceci said this with an eyeroll and both girls ended up laughing.
"In your dreams I am! Anyways here. I got you a little something." Auriela then gave Celicia the small blue box with a white ribbon.
"Thanks Auri, you didn't need to. But I'm glad you did! I'll open it now. I'm so excited!" Rapidly untying the bow she saw a teardrop shaped pendant on a silver chain. Behind it a picture was shown of the both of them laughing at the camera. "Auriela Williams, how long did you take to save to buy me a diamond teardrop necklace with a picture of us at the back?"
Auriela gave a shrug. "Well I would say my whole year of savings. It's no big deal, it's not that expensive."
Tears came to Celicia's eyes but they didn't fall on her rosy cheeks. She grabbed her friend and hugged her tightly not wanting to let go.
"Thank you."
*Later that year*
"Mother, has father returned yet? He's usually here by seven. It's now eight. What if something happened to him?" Celicia had her long red-brown hair in a high messy bun with a worried look on her beautiful oval face. She was looking at her mother that had the same color hair as her in a Bob cut. One leg was on the arm of the recliner while the other on the wooden floor. She had on a yellow tshirt and a green and yellow plaid pyjama pants. A vodka bottle was in her right hand while her left was trying to rub the headache away from her heart shaped face.
"Celicia, I don't know what's wrong right now. Just stop talking. When he comes, he comes. I just hope nothing too drastic is happening."
Ceci let out a sigh and went up to her room.
Later that night she heard a commotion downstairs. She went to check it out. What she saw was something she would never forget.
Her mother had a knife in her hand, stabbing at the beast that was biting on her neck. She was trying to use the remainder of her strength to defend the remainder of her life. Celicia was traumatized, she was frozen on the stairs. A scream wouldn't even leave her mouth afraid to gain the attention of the beast.
She finally saw it slump on her mother. She regained her motor skills and ran the remainder of the way down the stairs. She helped her mother to take him off of her. The monster dropped on it's back but she paid it no mind, running to catch her mother that was now falling to her knees. She hurriedly went to the kitchen to turn on the lights and got some clean table towels to wrap around her mother's neck as well as a glass of water, but on her way back she saw the face of the attacker. This froze her in her tracks. The towels fell from her hands and the water glass crashed to the floor disturbing the silence of the night and splashed water on both her and her mother.
"Mom... why... why does he look like my Dad?"