For a few days, I was living in your house, being fed and my injuries were tended to… Again, why? What was this reasoning? But you seemed happy… And even though the tragic death that was upon my father, I couldn’t be entirely sad either, was it bad not to be? For the few days, I eager for your return home… Home… Was it right for me to call this place that? Or was it you that made me have this feeling? Even through all these questions, one thing I knew for sure was that I wanted you to be happy.
For as long as she could possibly remember in her many decades of life, things had never really gone as planned for Yeoreum. Ups and downs, a consistent pattern of inconsistency. However, the truth was, that’s just what it was like to be immortal. Still, as sharp as her fangs were, her connection to human emotions was strong. If someone would need help, she was quick to lend a hand... It’s just who she was. She was a nurse before she was a vampire, after all.
The year was 2006, the age of cringe colored eye shadows and flared jeans. Truthfully, the modern lifestyle was never something Yeoreum was able to keep up with. In times her eyes weren’t trained consuming romantic literature she was content to be outdoors, in the world, like tonight. The snow falling slowly from the sky as she walked across the bridge over the Han River suggested that the air tonight was unforgiving cold. In moments like these, she was often cruelly reminded of just how human she wasn’t, snowflakes were cluttering by her feet on the ground and yet not a single shiver threatened to creep up her spine due to the weather.
Once lost in her thoughts, the sounds of metal scrapping against the road would brutally rip her away from her own mind. The car tumbled over and over again, her unbeating heart threatened to... well... you got the point. There was no way anybody within the vehicle which violently tumbled over the side of the bridge in a fit of rage could have possibly survived. More death... How much more could she watch before her immortality made her begin to hate herself... How could you consider yourself blessed to live forever when it came packaged with an eternity to watch lives end and graves being filled.
She stood still like a statue, the road deserted as if she was the only person left alive in this world. As if the time where all life finally ceased to exist had come. And then she saw him, or well... smelled him. In the middle of the road just twenty feet away he was there, lifeless, limp, and not to mention a child. Without even thinking her feet finally moved on their own, her nurse’s intuition kicking into high gear as she immediately began to go into full fledged war nurse mode. Coherent? No. Pulse? Struggling. Breathing? Shallow. Blood loss? Significant.
Yeoreum could easily have given him her blood to heal his wounds almost instantly, but it was a very well known fact that any person practically drained of blood before being fed the blood of a vampire would wake up as one of her own. He was so young, so small. How could she take away his right to a human life when he’d hardly had the chance to enjoy the things being mortal had to offer? Warmth, sweets, the sunlight, freedom, and not to mention... children.
In a rush, she would end up carrying him back to her apartment as quickly as possible, using her inhuman speed. Never once had she been so relieved to have fed on a human before, as it left her able to tend to the wounds of the boy without turning into a monster. Following that tragic night, she spent days watching over him like it was her morale mission to keep him safe. In a way, it brought her happiness, if she could grant him life- maybe it would make being what she was a little bit easier to cope with for now. His name was Park Sooha, and he was bright, stubborn, and a fighter for sure. Yet there was an endearing sense of gratitude and loyalty in his eyes whenever he looked at her, though there was some curiosity in there as well. From what she saw, he was possibly the closest feeling to warmth and humanity she’d felt her own heartbeat. Yeoreum was entirely certain, if they’d met when he was older, he would have been the type of person who would not need to be compelled to see the humanity in her. Maybe he didn’t even need that now. Somehow, things just happened to feel right.
But just as the roller coaster went up, it had to go back down. He wasn’t safe with her, if Jinyoung discovered she had housed a child behind her back... The thought only brought shudders to her spine. And thus she would take him to the orphanage once he was recovered enough, reluctantly, but selflessly. The words she wanted to say to him so desperately would echo in her head >You’ll be safer here<. But instead, the only words she spoke out loud were that of compulsion. “Be a good kid. Don’t waste time thinking or searching for someone like me, you’ll miss out on too much. If we meet again, it’ll be a pleasant surprise that way.”
Something felt like it hadn’t clicked, like her compulsion hadn’t taken root, then again... he was a child so maybe things worked differently that way- who knew. For a vampire, she was nothing but a child herself, still learning and still coping. That day she left him there she would spend not longer than a moment feeling guilty before inflicting her compulsion onto her own self, knowing she was too feeble and weak to actually go on knowing she’d left him behind. Yeoreum was the type to check up on those she saved, taking it personally. She saved him, she was responsible for him, she played god and therefore his future was up to her. Right? Wrong. He deserved a life, and she couldn’t be selfish enough to possibly risk that.
Forget him, he’s safer where he is, without you. You did well, you did what was right. If you see him again, you’ll remember for sure. Until then...
You’re a vampire. Humans have no place in your world.
