“Who are you?” I asked softly and quietly, like I was talking to a child not a boy that looked like he was at least ten years older than I.

All he did was whimper and back away on all fours, his fingers digging into the ground. I stepped closer to him, moving slowly, like how you move when you are approaching a wild animal. But that is what this man, the beautiful, angelic man , seemed to be.

"I won't hurt you," I whispered, despite our being alone. "Heck, I don't think I could, even if I wanted to," I said, throwing up my hands.

“You couldn’t.” came a quiet reply in a voice deep and rich.

“What?” I asked exited I had extracted a few sombor words from his beautiful mouth. But he simply shivered and shuffled away again. He was backed against a tree now. Again I moved forward like the idiot girl in every horror movie. Now he stood up slowly his muscles coiled, ready to leap off into the night at any moment. I stepped up to him until I could feel his ragged breath on my face.

“Your taller than I expected.” I murmured deciding that a quiet voice was the best approach. But he was tall. He must have been six feet at least, and every inch of him was pressing against the tree and he was holding his breath now.

“What are you, and what should I call you?” I asked this though I had a hunch. I wasn’t an idiot, I had read Dracula! The white skin, fangs. I wouldn’t have believed it if I wasn’t the one it was happening to.

“Nathan.” The word was like a song in itself but passed through his lips like a breath.

“I like that. I’m Christine.” I said staring at his eyes. They were amazingly blue, but not the piercing blue, or gold, or even black, the kind everyone talks about in books. A soft, cool color. It was then I realized, he was still holding his breath.

“You don’t have to be scarred of me.” He seemed to relax a bit at my statement.

“Will you tell?” He asked his eyes and voice thick with worry. The way the question was phrased he sounded like a little boy that had done some thing he wasn’t allowed to do.

“No I wont tell anyone.” Now his muscles un-coiled and he let out a long breath, like snow on my face.

He reached out and touched my cheek with his hand, letting his fingers trail along my cheekbone and explore my lips. The other hand ran through my thick crazy curls. Then the hand left my hair and laid over my heart.

“Amazing.” He breathed.

“I don’t know about that. .” I mumbled blushing and lowering my head. His other snowy-white hand cupped my chin and tilted it up and in the rush of the moment I stood up on tiptoe and covered his mouth with my own tiny pink one. For a moment he pushed his lips back harder and then pulled away, his eyes wide and body slipping back down on the ground.

“I’m sorry I shouldn’t have done that.” I gasped not wanting him to slip back into his shell so easily. Nathan shivered, his eyes wide and slightly misty.

“Not one for talking much are you?” I asked a smile pulling on the corners of my mouth. He shook his matted black hair and drew his legs up to his chest.

And so we sat, and I felt myself slowly falling asleep. The last words I heard Nathan whisper were:

“Beautiful.” And I fell asleep with a smile on my face, my head resting on his pale shoulder.