Winter's Nights: Eternity

Amy awoke in the evening on Alix’s bed. She could feel him, and Merry, and every other vampire. She knew that vampires had invaded and destroyed the facility, and she was glad. She also knew that besides Alix and herself, only Susan still had her memories of the facility and the project, since Jonas had transformed her into a vampire.

Amy was glad. Although she didn't know her very well, she had always liked Susan, and she seemed like a very kind and friendly woman.

Jonas had also erased all of Josie's memories of the project before sending her home unscathed. She would return to work the next day to find that her office was burnt down and that she had to go find another job. She would never mention any government work on her resume, since, as far as she was concerned, she had never liked working for the state department and really couldn't care less about frog and toad populations in the greater D.C. area.

Amy finally understood what Merry had meant about it being eternity not immortality. Immortality meant never dying, but being a vampire was so much more. Being a vampire meant living many lives and having many memories of many ages. It meant being eternal.

Alix had been sleeping on the couch, but when he felt Amy wake up he did too. He entered the room slowly, afraid that Amy would be mad at him and not doubting for a moment that she deserved to be mad. Amy saw him and smiled. She wasn’t angry with him anymore. He had helped Merry give her this gift. She was grateful to him. And Merry had been right, she did still love him, and he did still love her.

“I’m sorry…” he started to say, but she cut him off.

“Don’t be. I understand why you did everything that you did. And this was Merry’s idea, not yours. Besides, you have an eternity to make it up to me.” She smiled.

Alix grinned back. He sat down beside her on the bed. Amy sat up and they kissed.

“I do have a question,” Amy admitted.

“Of course you do,” Alix answered, smiling.

“Your link...”

Alix understood. A vampire's link connected from where they were bitten to where their sire was bitten, but Merry hadn't bitten Alix.

“Merry bit me once before,” Alix explained. He touched the side of his neck as he offered Merry's memories of the car accident that she helped him recover from. “I have no memory of it, and she sealed the link as soon as she had healed me. I have belonged to Merry almost my entire life, and my link extends from where she first bit me.”

“And if she hadn't bitten you?”

Alix put his hand over his heart.

“It would have been here, the source of blood,” he explained.

Amy put her hand on his thigh suggestively as she said, “Well it's good to know that it's not your...”

“Ha! You wish!” Alix interceded playfully, grinning at her.

They kissed again.

The world came back to Susan slowly. She didn't open her eyes at first, she simply absorbed the room with her other senses. The smells and faint sounds, the feel of the soft bedding, the extra sense that told her that it was after sunset... Still not opening her eyes, she reached her arm around underneath her back and ran her fingertips across where her scar had been. She smiled when she found that it was gone. Just as Jonas had promised, she was healed.

Susan opened her eyes and looked up at Jonas. He was sitting beside her, just where he had been the last time she'd seen him, smiling back at her.

“How do you feel?” he asked.

“Like I could leap over tall buildings,” she replied.

He smiled wider. He leaned closer to her and she wrapper her arms around him to kiss his lips. At last they pulled apart.

“Let's go play outside,” Jonas suggested, rising from the bed.

Susan smiled and nodded. She rose from the bed, her every movement effortless, and took his outstretched hand. Together they leapt from the balcony and made the city their playground.

Alix gently removed the top drawer from his dresser and brought it over to where Amy was still lying in the bed. He set the drawer down on top of the blankets, then crawled back underneath them as Amy sat up, curious. Alix watched as she gently sifted through the contents of the drawer, astonished at the things that Alix had saved from earlier in their relationship. She recognized the ring box that had once contained the silver and sapphire ring he had given her. She opened it and was pleased to find the ring inside.

Alix took the ring box from Amy and carefully removed the ring. He gently took her hand and slipped the ring on the third finger of her left hand. Once it was in place he looked up at Amy, his expression asking if his actions were alright. Amy smiled at him, making him smile back. They both looked down at the ring, then back at each other, before kissing.

Amy and Alix arrived at The Red Rock. They walked past the line, hand in hand, and nodded to the bouncers. They immediately opened the doors and the couple made their way through the crowd, feeling the music flow through and around them. Soon they would get used to their new, enhanced senses, but for now, everything they experienced was as if it was for the first time.

Alix and Amy passed people that neither of them had ever met before, yet they knew who they were, including one young man with graying hair that Amy recognized as one of Merry’s werewolf friends. They smiled at them as they passed and continued toward the semi-circular booths at the back.

Merry was waiting for them. She was wrapped in Davide’s arms and the look on her face said that she never wanted to be anywhere else. Alix and Amy sat down beside them and cuddled up together also. None of them spoke – there was no need – anything that they needed to say could be said without words. But there was nothing to say. This was it, everything that they ever needed to do: just be. Eternity.