Chapter 7

Mantel wasn't afraid to walk up beside her.

He knelt down, his knees pressing into the soft and wet soil that was slowly engulfing her body. Ren watched, unsure where he should stand, unsure what to do with his hands, and unsure if he should be doing anything at all.

Mantel seemed to know what he was doing and Ren had no idea why he was still there. A part of him felt as if he should be questioning everything Mantel was doing. He was confident, unlike Ren, that it frightened Ren more than what had been done to the girl. He could understand murder in a sense but confidence in this situation was alien.

Mantel didn't touch her. His eyes roamed over her body, taking in the large gash at her neck, and the bruises along her arms.

Ren couldn't look at her anymore. He was looking everywhere but at her. The forest was spinning, tilting back and forth, and he couldn't concentrate.

"We should call the police," he said. He wasn't sure if Mantel even heard him.

"We can't." Mantel stood and crossed the distance between them. "They're vampire marks."

Ren nodded. He didn't understand why they couldn't. "Then that's more reason to call."

"Listen to what I'm saying. If we call them and they find us with her, they'll convict us of her murder." Mantel looked back at her body. Ren looked on reflex.

His stomach churned.

"What then?" He was shaking. "We can't leave her here."

Mantel was right. No matter how Ren tried to look at the situation, he knew Mantel was right. Montis was small. Vampires were scarce. Though he wanted to believe the truth would save him, no one cared about the truth when it came to a vampire.

One more gone was good enough.

Mantel moved back to her body and before Ren could say a thing, Mantel grabbed her arms and started pulling her toward a muddy area.

"What the fuck are you doing!" Ren ran, not thinking, and pushed him back from her.

Mantel pushed him back. The blood on his hands smeared Ren's shirt and skin. Her blood is on him.

He turned around and puked his stomach empty. There was nothing there, but he gagged until he was seeing black.

He's crazy. He's out of his mind.

Ren feels his hands on his shoulders. He wants to move, to get away from his touch, but he's weak. His vision is hazy and he's still reeling from the episode. There's comfort, one that's fucked up, in Mantel's embrace and while Ren hated it, he's grateful Mantel doesn't just let him fall.

"We'll bury the body. They won't find her if we do."

"You can't make me," Ren gasped out. "I'm not going to do it."

Mantel's grip tightened around him. He won't let Ren fall, but he won't let go of him either. His voice is clear and next to Ren's ear. "I can't risk you telling."

The break in his voice is pathetic. Ren closed his eyes, shaking though he doesn't feel cold.

Everything about this is fucked up. He shouldn't have even been out in the forest. He should have fought harder against the buzzing. But he couldn't change what had happened already.

Mantel had this figured out. He had a plan and Ren didn't.

Mantel let him go and grabbed the girl's arms once again. Ren stood there, blank-faced, staring at the leaves and dirt covered in his saliva.

It was a memory he wasn't going to forget. The rising feeling of the buzzing, the ache in his stomach and throat, the glow of Mantel's red eyes, and the magnetic pull Ren felt toward Mantel.

He made his choice.

He grabbed the dead girl's legs.

They had nothing to dig the ground with except their hands.

Mantel was the first to sink his fingers into the soft dirt and toss a handful into a somewhat neat pile. Ren watched from the other side of the girl's body, crouched with his hands clenching his knees.

Mantel looked at him from where he was kneeling, red eyes burning into Ren's emotionless face. From where Ren crouched, the moonlight beamed down like a torch onto Mantel's face. His skin was porcelain.

The longer Ren saw Mantel beside her, the more he looked like a bloodthirsty vampire. Ren shouldn't think of him that way, not when he was half-vampire. The situation had him fumbling about what he should be more worried about.

Her body, Mantel's eyes. All things combined was making it hard for him to keep it together. He just didn't know what he was doing anymore.

He unclenched his fists. Slowly, he worked his hands into the dirt, scooping and scraping through it like it wasn't the start of someone's grave.

He tried not to think about it. In his head, he dreamed up a different scene. He wasn't digging to bury the dead. He was digging to plant.

He wasn't a garden person. He wasn't any type of person except for the kind that followed rules when it was best for him. Other times, he was selling illegal synthetic blood to druggies and sneaking under his mom's nose. That was the kind of person he was. A nobody.

But he pretended there was a purpose for his actions. Once he was done with this hole, he'd plant a tree that would exist for hundreds of years, long after he was gone.

Mantel is faster than Ren is. He's locked in this stupor while Mantel didn't look like he cared about anything else besides digging that fucking hole. Mantel's eyes stare into the ground, his hands cooping and tossing. Ren didn't even notice the tears falling down his face until they start to burn.

He wiped them with the back of his hand. It only made it worse.

Blood and dirt was smeared over his face.

Hours passed since they started digging. Ren could feel the sun before it broke above the mountain. There wasn't a lot of time left for him to make it home if they didn't finish this now.

Lucky enough, they finished the hole with barely any room for the body. They hoist her up and place her in. The motions are robotic.

Ren tossed dirt on her without thinking. Each scoop and toss cut a little deep in him. He doesn't see her face anymore, not like he had before he was forced to bury her. She's not a person, not anything that is part of this world anymore.

He wanted to get out there. He didn't want to think about this anymore.

The last of the dirt-covered her face. Mantel brushed her eyes closed before the dirt touched them and shut her mouth. Watching him made Ren feel ill.

The kind gesture he made doesn't match his face and while Ren is out of his mind, too tired to function, he does know how to feel about him.

He made him sick. His red eyes and pale skin. Everything about him made him want to wash his skin raw. And the revulsion made him want to close himself in his room. His hate made him dislike himself more than he already did.

Mantel does the finishing touches. The unsettled ground doesn't look natural and he fixed it by spreading branches and leaves around. He's done most of the work before they started to dig. The place he'd picked was by a bush and a large tree. Most of the ground is covered by them and gave cover for the grave.

And then it's done. The sun is minutes away from rising and Ren's out of time.

They don't speak. Mantel doesn't have to for Ren to know he'll come for him if he did tell. Ren isn't planning to. His DNA was all over her and like Mantel said, vampires were few in this town. They'd either come for Ren or the Mantels.

He turned, his eyes looking down the path that led back home.

Mantel is already walking in the opposite direction.

The walk is a cold one and nothing he thinks about changes it. He's focused on the leaves, the cool air fanning his face, and what he'd do when he arrived home. Sleep-deprived, he was a ghost walking through the forest and it was only going to get worse.

He had school. He made a promise to himself to go.

It was only for this week.

He's there, standing at the front door. He entered and noticed he hadn't locked it.

Like the idiot he was, he left his mom alone in an unlocked house sleeping. Fucking idiot.

The stairs flashed under his feet but because he's walking fast. His eyes closed and opened. Black and then light. The sun had reached the horizon. His bed appeared and he started to climb into it.

"Ren?" There was a knock at his door. "Are you awake? It's seven o'clock."

He pulled his leg out from underneath the covers.

Right. No time to sleep.

***

The entire morning was a haze for him.

He brushed his teeth, changed his clothes, and tried to pretend like he'd slept at all the night before. His mom doesn't notice and he knows it's not because she isn't observant. If it had been any other day, she would have seen the black circles under his eyes and the glossy look on his face.

Something was on her mind and he was too out of it to think much about it.

"Love you," she said and then kissed his cheek. "I'll see you after work."

Their farewell hadn't changed since he started school. He wondered if it was a formality or hope that made her say it. Maybe she thought she wouldn't see him one day.

It's too much for him to think about it in his current state. He was having trouble just keeping his knees from buckling beneath him.

She was gone before he knew it. Out the door.

He's glad she's away from him.

The minute her car disappears from the driveway, he fell to the couch, his face in his hands. The sobs are quiet, but they're violent. They punch through him and he can't control them. He doesn't have time to cry like he wants to. He doesn't have time to collect his thoughts or begin to unravel the mess he'd stumbled in.

He stared at his hands.

Blood was on them.

It had been washed away, but he could see it. Even if Mantel was the only one that knew, it didn't make him feel better. He knew about it and that was the worst of it all. He could lie to his mom, he could lie to the police, but he couldn't lie to himself.

There, in a place he couldn't quite call home anymore, he felt like the killer everyone had been making him out to be his entire life. The tears dried before he removed his hands. There was a decision to be made, but he didn't want to think about anything. School. That was what he was going to focus on. He would deal with all the rest when he had to.

The walk to school couldn't have been colder. He saw shadows that weren't there, things that wee only a figment of his mind. Last night had pushed him across a boundary he never thought he would cross. After he met Mantel, one of who knew how many, Ren was confused as to what he could do now.

Nothing had really changed in his life, nothing he could see so far. He had a huge secret now, one that if it ever got out could end his life and his mom's.

The plan was the same as always. He would graduate, get a job at the Mines, and send money back home. It was what he owed her after causing her so much trouble and after what he'd done.

After what he'd chosen to do, he couldn't ever let it affect her. He knew the kind of things people thought about her. They felt sorry for her, somehow sympathetic that she had to raise a demon. They thought she was too nice to abort him.

He thought so as well.

It was what he kept coming back to thinking about. Even as he had murder on his mind and Mantel's face flashing in his head every few seconds, he thought about if the world would have been better off without him.