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She drinks. She drinks until she's filled. She drinks until it's nauseating. She drinks until it spills from her mouth, until it pours out of the holes poked into her heart. She drinks until even her sister raises a brow from where she's lounging on her loveseat. She drinks, and drinks, and drinks until she can no longer. And still drinks, yet she is not satisfied.
Love is greed.
And, right now, the only thing she wants, the only person she loves, she cannot have.
So she drinks.
"Still thirsty?" her sister drawls, sipping from her cup, when Carmilla's drink pools on her parquet.
Carmilla feels sticky and sick. Red fills her mouth, heavy like honey. She's made a mess: her face is tinted crimson from her nose down to her throat. She can't bring herself to care.
She pouts. "No." She smudges the red on her cheeks (it blurs messily higher up until it passes her ears) and laps at her fingers the way a cat washes its pelt.
"Oh, honey," Matska murmurs, a gentle smile on her lips when she deposits her cup on a nearby tea table.
She can be so gentle when she tries. Carmilla thinks gentleness will be the end of her.
"Don't pity me."
She rolls her eyes. "What else am I to do? You look miserable, like a sad, wet cat."
Carmilla lays on the floor, away from the puddle of red, but close enough for her fingers to touch the still warm liquid. "Kill me instead."
"Wouldn't that be me pitying you?"
Carmilla grunts, rolling away from Mattie. She uses her fingertips to draw slippery shapes on the wood, the hard floor digging into her forehead and her shoulder. She hears Matska heave a sigh before she gets up and joins Carmilla, crouching at her sides. Carmilla focuses on the texture of the wood as Mattie strokes a lock away from her face.
"Is this about that Laura girl again?"
She flinches like she's been slapped.
"You're better than that, Carmilla. You're better than her. You're a vampire." The more she talks, the worse Carmilla feels. She needs her to stop, needs it to stop. "You are centuries old, you have the strength of a hundred men and the beauty of a goddess. When will you cease your childish whining?"
But how can any of this be childish? When it feels as though she's been made alive just to have her beating heart ripped out of her chest a second time. When it feels as though even the air is stripping her skin, layer by layer, only leaving her bare flesh to be touched. When it feels as though she's been gutted, leaving the hollow husk of her body to mirror the gaping hole in her soul. How can the most excruciating pain be considered childish?
"You have eternity in front of you, darling. She'll be dead in a minute or so. Don't let her ruin this for you."
It's too late for that. Nothing will ever compare to being with her. Everything is ruined, without her.
"Eternity bores me," Carmilla laments, glancing up into her sister's eyes, looking for anything to make sense of herself. Answers, reassurance, love... But all she finds are black holes staring right back at her.
Matska hums, sullying her palm cherry when she rests it on her cheek. "Maybe you're doing it wrong."
Carmilla frowns, licking the front of her teeth while Mattie straightens up to refill her cup.
"Is there a way to do it right?"
With her back turned towards her, Carmilla can't see the way Mattie's face contorts and scrunches in an exasperated air. She doesn't wait for an answer. She knows it won't be the one she's looking for. So she gets up and walks to the dress hanger, a little wobbly on her legs, letting her hands coat her sister's costly-looking fur red before her fingers smear on her leather jacket.
Matska looks back as she's slipping it on, an annoyed look crossing her face before she suspires at the sight of her leaving.
"Mircalla, stay. I'm sure the spare bedroom is more comfortable than going back."
But Carmilla has no intention of letting anyone be merciful to her. She is her own martyr. She will suffer for her devotion. It's the only way she knows. So she leaves.
She doesn’t remember getting home. She remembers dripping crimson on hardwood and the vexed look on her sister's face when the door’s hinges squeaked. She remembers basking in the moonlight and seeing red. Now, she's standing on the front porch, blood still coating the half of her face heavily. The blood on her fingers is starting to clump and coagulate.
A shower would be good, but she doesn’t think any amount of scalding water would be able to cleanse her of her filth regardless. Her hands are always stained red, no matter how hard she scrubs at them.
She leaves a trail of bloody footprints behind her wherever she walks.
Tonight isn't any different.
The door lock gives under her fingers like butter. The sound is a little more grating. She doesn't bother watching where she's going. She bumps into the furniture as she stomps her way to the living room.
"Carmilla?” Laura’s drowsy voice travels to her from the other room. “Could you be any louder?"
She stumbles and topples a candelabra over. She hears a small groan and soft footsteps coming her way. Lights blind her momentarily and she hisses slightly, eyes squinting.
"It's two in the morning, what are you even doing?"
She turns towards Laura, who’s half hidden by yellow tape, and tugs at the sleeves of her jacket until it slides off her arms. Laura cocks her head, frown deepening the crinkle between her brows.
"Is that blood? Why are you covered—” She closes her eyes, hugging herself closely. “Why do you think, Laura?” Her voice has a mocking lilt. “Your ex is a vampire."
Carmilla doesn’t say anything. She sways to the couch and lets herself drop on it. It sighs just as Laura does.
"Are you going to— She's not going to clean up."
She watches as Laura turns on her heels and leaves. She thinks that might be the end of it, that she’ll leave Carmilla alone, but a few seconds later she comes back, a towel in her hand and a bucket in the other.
Laura crosses her own boundaries— the caution tapes— to get to her.
There is something to be said about love and self-sacrifice. Carmilla doesn't think now is the time to say it.
She sits beside her. The cotton of her pajama pants brushes against the bare skin of Carmilla’s knee. Laura doesn’t berate her as she dips the cloth in the bucket. She doesn’t scold her when she wrings the towel free of the ice cold water. She doesn’t speak at all.
She just uses the cloth to wipe at her face. Carmilla lets her.
Some time passes as Laura erases the night’s evidence from her pelt and Carmilla only watches her. Laura puts on a brave face when she’s in front of the camera, but Carmilla knows better. She looks so tired.
"Why are you doing this?"
Laura’s eyes flit from the cloth to her eyes. She busies herself by soaking the towel in water again before bringing it back to Carmilla’s face.
"I'm only doing this so Perry won't freak out tomorrow at the sight of the very expensive blood -stained carpet."
That's not the answer she's looking for, so she asks again.
"Why are you doing this?"
Laura sighs.
"It's fine. It's just for tonight.” She stops wiping, trapping her bottom lip momentarily. “We can go back to hating each other tomorrow."
Carmilla hums. Laura resumes. There is too much care, too much tenderness, for there to leave any place for hatred.
"I don't hate you,” she mumbles after a while. Her words are not quite intelligible enough for Laura to pick up.
"What?"
"I could never hate you. I fear I will love you forever."
Laura’s breath hitches. Her shoulders tense. She looks up at Carmilla, eyes pleading for something Carmilla’s not sure she wants to figure out.
"You're being incredibly unfair, Carm."
"You know what's unfair?"
She sighs, her hand falling away from Carmilla's face. "Let me guess: 'life'?"
Carmilla's head lolls to the side and she reaches for Laura's blood-stained hand, prying the soaked cloth from her fist and letting it fall on the carpet with a plop. "Yes." Laura rolls her eyes. Carmilla holds her hand, smearing clot across her knuckles.
"I will outlive you, Laura," she whispers, her voice quivering around the syllables of her name. Though it’s no secret, it would feel too cruel to say any louder. She hears the uptick of her heart through the roaring of the room looming over them. Laura's eyes meet hers again, shiny and miserable.
Carmilla takes a deep breath, sucking in oxygen like it'll save her somehow. "I fear I will love you forever," she repeats. Her eyes sting and, when she blinks, red spills down her cheeks in heavy, syrupy drops. "And I will stay rotting too slowly for us to ever meet again."
A sob escapes Laura's lips, wet and desperate. "Carmilla..." It's uttered like a prayer. Like a plea. But there will be no gods to answer their sorrows tonight. It is only the two of them. Besides, when have the gods ever disrupted tragedy?
“I thought vampires didn’t cry,” Laura chuckles, words strangled by the tears she tries so badly to force down. A small, melancholic smile trembles on her lips when her thumb wipes at the blood pooling under Carmilla’s eye. Carmilla leans into her touch, mirroring her smile.
“Must've drank too much.” Must be her love for Laura spilling out of her, her god-like immortal body still too small and weak to hold all of it. Any of it.