nosleep

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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/ursaM4xima on 2024-10-31 19:39:23+00:00.

Jenna Swanson told me that my "sexy vampire" costume was trashy, but I could hear her screaming even from where I'm sitting in the living room, so like, who's laughing now?

Well, I mean, actually none of us. Or at least, none of my classmates are. I'm smiling and nodding like a maniac, which is, I assume, why I'm the only one still alive. Everyone else that was originally at this party is either dead, or dying, and I'm not fully sure that the people who showed up are...alive, in the strictest sense of the word?

So I'm just sitting, pretending to sip on what I think might be an IV pack, plastering on my best customer service smile and trying to make a sound when everyone else laughs at the jokes the guy in the cape keeps making.

I'm not a monster, I just want to say that. I didn't choose this. And I tried, I really tried, to get out, or to call someone, or anything. I didn't just leave everyone to their fate.

But I can't do it. I'm stuck in this house, just like they are. The only difference between me and the rest of the kids here is that I'm not 100% sure I'm going to die.

The living room is slowly emptying out, but it's still pretty crowded. The house isn't actually that big. But it was big enough - and abandoned enough - for some of the popular kids to plan a rager big enough for everyone in my high school. That probably sounds like a lot of people, but there aren't that many students. Or there weren't. I guess there are even fewer now. Just me and whichever nerds figured they'd sit this one out and get ahead on their AP studying or whatever the shit they thought they were going to do instead of going to a Halloween party with actual liquor.

God, I wish I was at home right now.

It's a huge relief when Cape Guy tells another ~hilarious story and I can tilt my head back like I'm laughing, but actually pinch my nose. I've already had one nosebleed tonight, and I really don't want to be bleeding around these folks.

Although, I think the first nosebleed might have been what saved me?

I'm not...good with stress, honestly. And I guess I'm not usually very good with parties. It's not like I have a whole lot of experience with them. The diner pays better for late shifts, and my parents are pretty strict otherwise. And like, sure, it would be nice to be invited from time to time, but like...whatever. Everyone in my grade knew about this one, so I didn't need an invitation, and I figured I'd cancel one stupid shift and try being a normal teenager for one night of my life. That's going great, obviously.

Anyway, I get nosebleeds. It's embarrassing, and it sucks living in a town small enough that everyone remembers all the worst times it happened in middle school. These days, if I feel it coming on, I just sneak off and deal with it. Take a minute to sit in a closet or whatever, calm myself down, and then come back, hopefully without using up half a box of kleenex first.

The party music was a little overwhelming, honestly, and the drinks smelled like paint thinner, and it was all just a lot. So I just stepped away, for a minute. Or ten. Or thirty. When the shit hit the fan downstairs, I was in the furthest, darkest, moldiest room I could find, hoping that it was gross enough that no one would try to come in and have sex because of the smell. Most of the other rooms were already "occupied". Between the bass and the scream-singing and the extremely questionable wailing from the other bedrooms, I couldn't tell you when the second wave of guests arrived.

I hadn't really clocked a change in the shouting when I heard someone heavy thud up the stairs and try to kick down the door of one of the other bedrooms. There was a splintering sound, and I guess they got their foot stuck in the door? The couple that was in there started shouting and screaming, but the person didn't say anything to them, just hopped around, trying to get their foot out of the door, I guess. Then they ran further into and across the room, and I heard the shattering of glass.

What was left of the glass in the window of my room exploded inward as a huge guy crashed through it. He hit the floor pretty hard, on top of all the shards of glass and everything. He just lay there for a moment, confused, stunned maybe. It was kind of like those birds that fly into the window and just sit around, all spacey, until either they fly away or they run out of luck and get eaten by a cat.

I crawled over toward him, trying not to touch any of the broken glass. His neck was cut up pretty badly, and I tried to remember the first aid training I'd taken so that I could charge more for babysitting. This hadn't been on the course, somehow. My nose had started gushing, but I figured he was already so bloody that he didn't really have room to criticize. So I bent down to check if I could hear him breathing, hoping he wasn't dead.

"Naughty," said, apparently, Morticia Addams from the doorway.

I turned and gaped. Shit, we were all in so much trouble. That was a bona fide adult, and we were a bunch of asshole teenagers drinking underage in a certified fire hazard. The guy next to me definitely needed to go to the hospital, and I probably looked as if I was involved in whatever stupid shit he'd been trying to do when he...jumped through a second-story window? My parents would ground me until I went to college. Wait, was this going to impact my college applications?

It's funny, you know? That was a few hours ago. I still remember the flavor of that panic, and thinking that only getting into my backup college was the worst thing in the world that could happen to me.

This beautiful, ethereal grownup slunk across the disgusting, slightly squishy carpet to kneel across from me, on the other side of the linebacker-type. Her eyeliner was inhumanly perfect. She looked at me, and I sheepishly tried to wipe away the blood that was running down my chin.

"No respect for seniority," she said, shaking her head. "Well, I think you're finished with the real thing for tonight, dear. Please try to behave better next time."

And then she bent and sunk her teeth into his neck.

The fight went out of him almost immediately. Between the blow to the head and the rapid blood loss, maybe he didn't even really understand what was happening. Like, he definitely made a noise that will feature in all of my nightmares (if I live long enough to have nightmares), but it was pretty quick, all in all? Over before I could process what was happening.

We left him there, pale and still and cold. I touched the window before I followed her - she told me to follow her, and there's something about their voices that makes it super hard not to listen - and there's no sky. There's nothing out there, just a weird gray static. It hurt my eyes to look at it too long, and I couldn't get out into it anyway. So in the end, I followed her.

I don't know how many vampires are here. Maybe two dozen? Enough that they didn't pay too much attention to me. The Morticia-looking one shoved the IV bag of blood into my hand and told me that because I'd started without everyone, I had to wait on the couch until the others had "made their selections". All around us, the rest of my school is still standing, drooling, their eyes glassy, waiting for someone to lead them away to die. They all seem to snap out of the weird trance just before it happens. Maybe that's more fun for the vampires? Maybe they just like the screaming?

It feels late, now, but I don't know how long I've been here. Hours, I'm sure. I offered to grab everyone some more blood packs from the kitchen while we waited, and I tried the kitchen door while I was there - but it's still the same static, and when I try to run out into it, I just wind up in another doorway in the house. There's an old sun room with the glass all broken, but whenever I try to go in there, I find myself in the same doorway, just facing the opposite direction. I tried to call someone, anyone, but my phone won't connect to a network. There's no way out.

So in the end, I just brought some more blood packs from the big insulated bag that they'd left in the kitchen. They have one of those heating packs in there, to keep everything warm, I guess. I handed them out to everyone else on the couches like a pro, experiencing the only flash of gratitude I've ever felt towards my worst diner customers, because despite it all, my apology-smile stayed on.

They're all pretty tipsy at this point. They've gone through everyone else, and I think the alcohol in the blood they're drinking is finally getting to them.

Everyone else has left the living room to go "feed", and I've moved back into the kitchen. I've been typing this out on my phone so that it looks as if I have something to do. I think the vampires know that's what I'm doing, but they just think I'm a loser at a party. I don't mind being a loser, but I don't want to be food. I'm keeping the blood coming, but we're down to the last few packs, and I don't know what will happen when it runs out.

I'm so scared, and I don't know what to do.