A/n: Sorry about the long wait everyone. This summer's been very busy and I've been trying to write as often as I can. Please enjoy this next chapter of Smoke.

PS: THANK YOU ALL OF MY REVIEWERS! I love you guys! Honestly, you make writing more fun. ^^

I took a deep breath and opened my eyes, sitting abruptly in bed. The small amount of light that was in the room suddenly disappeared, and small red dots filled my vision quickly, a wave of nausea hitting me square in my abdomen.

I groped beside me for the lamp light that always rested there, and finally felt the cool metal against my palm. Yanking the chain, the room suddenly filled with a sharp white, blinding me even farther.

After blinking a few times to regain the vision I had lost, I frantically looked around me, pulling the blankets tighter and closer to my body for some sort of delusional protection. Who knows why in a time of distress some think that mere cotton sheets could save your life or even make the monsters go away.

But there were no monsters in my room. In fact, the door was shut and locked, just the way I had left it before I went to sleep. The only thing left unprotected was the open window, but no one could ever dream of getting in there, unless they could fly.

They could…fly.

My glasses instantly found their way into my hands and I put them on hurriedly, not wanting to stay behind a natural curtain of fuzzy visualization. The room, now bright and in clear view, looked smaller, cozier, less haunting.

My tenseness relaxed, the swollen heartbeat calmed to its normal beating, my hands released their tight grip on my childhood sheets.

Maybe the fact that I could now see, this delusional sense that everyone possesses. A wave of serenity filled the air, and I slid back down the wooden bed frame behind me, covering myself with the sheet.

It was only a dream, only a dim-witted dream.

I saw the blood on my pillowcase the next morning.

It was covered, soaked through and dried, but my neck was much worse.

There were two holes and smaller, fainter teeth marks around them, making a half-crescent around the large vein. Blood had streamed down, making its way around and between my breasts, then making one full stream to fill the small cavern of my bellybutton, only to stop right before the small blonde hairs of my womanhood.

As soon as I had seen, stripping off the small white nightgown I wore, I threw myself into the shower, eagerly scrubbing, rubbing, even tearing skin.

It had to come off, it had to.

My head jerked and hit the side of the shower suddenly, and I reeled back, blinking slowly. It hadn't hurt; I felt nothing from it. But something else crawled up the inside of my abdomen, a small fire that found it's way up… up to my throat, and I cried out, screaming like I had never heard myself do before.

Bloodlust. Fangs protruded from my canines, making me scream more, for the pain was almost unbearable.

I reached out… my hand stretched towards the ceiling… I didn't know what was happening to me, this fire in my fangs and the pounding pulse that throbbed in my head…

I wretched myself upwards, opening my eyes wide and gasped for a deep gulp of air.