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Soda’s hair had begun to fade over the past few days.
Admittedly, Emizel had been a bit too distracted to notice or say anything about it. A lot was going on at the moment and trying to work through the major disruptions in his life was difficult, to say the least. Emizel’s entire life seemed like it had gotten uprooted in the span of one night a few days ago. And Soda only knew half of what Emizel told him.
So maybe Emizel had been so caught up in his own problems that he hadn’t had the time to notice his best friend. A part of him felt guilty about that. But there wasn’t a lot that Emizel could do when he was focused on saving his own skin and bumbling through finding the person who did this to him while figuring out how things were supposed to work now.
Not being able to go out in the sun definitely made it hard for Emizel to keep up with Soda as well. By the time he powered through the exhaustion of trying to navigate the day (before ultimately giving up and hiding in either his room or the Demon’s hideout), Soda was probably back home or asleep. And Emizel didn’t want to bother him in the middle of the night. Especially when the hunger was at its worst.
That first night after Emizel woke up in an unknown alleyway somewhere on the outskirts of Los Angeles was probably the last time that Emizel had spent a good amount of time with Soda. After waking up, Emizel, in his confusion, had ended up at Soda’s apartment covered in blood and disoriented.
For what was presented to him, Soda handled the situation surprisingly well, a lot better than Emizel would have expected. A lot better than Emizel would have been able to deal with himself.
But after that, in the few days following Emizel had been too busy “hunting” and getting adjusted to his new body to figure out where Soda was or what was going on.
The realization that Soda’s hair dye was fading didn’t even cross Emizel’s mind until he walked into the bathroom at the Demon’s hideout pretty early in the late afternoon a few days later. Soda was, surprisingly, already in the bathroom standing in front of the sink with a bowl of red paste, some already staining the counter.
Emizel felt himself inhale, the air getting caught in his throat as he instinctively yanked himself back through the doorway, almost completely out of the bathroom from accidentally walking in on someone. He clenched his jaw and felt his sharpened teeth grind against each other, fitting together unevenly and crooked.
Soda looked up like a deer in the headlights, staring at Emizel with a bit of fear and surprise in his expression. His hands immediately stilled around the stick that he was using to mix the dye.
They both froze. Neither of them spoke.
The tension was thick enough to bite through.
Emizel’s eyes trailed from the bowl of red hair dye to Soda’s head. He felt like he didn’t recognize Soda in the dim yellow light of the grimy bathroom. Soda looked like a stranger.
He was wearing his glasses for once, the round frames perched on the bridge of his nose and just beginning to slide down, the light reflecting off the lenses. Instead of his normal furred hoodie, Soda had switched it out for an old ratted black tank top that surprisingly didn’t show the million different colors from past hair dye accidents.
His freckles were more pronounced across the bridge of his nose, probably from the past few days of being out in the sun when he wasn’t hanging around the hideout (something that Emizel could no longer indulge in. He wondered if his freckles would fade eventually).
That thought made Emizel squirm with discomfort.
As he observed the situation around him, only now did Emizel notice that the bright fiery red of Soda’s hair had slowly shifted into a deep shade of red auburn practically right under Emizel’s nose. The shaved sides of his head were starting to grow out as well and definitely needed a touch-up but it would be fine for another week or so. But the dye had almost completely faded, leaving Soda with darkened roots and only a slightly reddish brown color.
Emizel almost wished that he had noticed sooner. Maybe he wished that he had noticed before everything went down so they could have had one last normal moment together. Maybe he wished that Soda had come up to him and asked for help like he always did (although Emizel had no idea when that opportunity would have come up with how spotty his appearances had been).
He suddenly longed for normalcy that he knew he would never get back.
Emizel clenched his jaw so tight he could feel his fangs grinding.
“Oh, s-sorry man, I can go somewhere else if you need to take a piss or something,” Soda broke the silence first, chuckling awkwardly and shifting his weight so that he was facing Emizel with his shoulders pulled back. He was so much taller than Emizel. It made Emizel feel small to tilt his head back just to meet him in the eyes. So instead, he looked away.
“No—No it’s okay,” Emizel stepped back, placing his hand on the edge of the doorframe. He opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to think of something to say. He hadn’t seen Soda since he had stumbled into his apartment a few days ago bloody and incoherent. They hadn’t spoken.
It used to be so easy to talk to Soda, he was his best friend. He could just open his mouth and the words would just come out, even the ones that always seemed to get stuck in the back of his throat before he could say it. Soda had always been kind, soft, and reassuring, his presence alone enough to calm Emizel’s nerves.
But now Emizel had a hard time reading him. He couldn’t tell if the look on his face was fear or uncertainty. He couldn’t tell if the way he pulled his shoulders back was to push Emizel away or to invite him closer.
He had no idea what to say to Soda.
The words were stuck. Emizel made a few aborted sounds from the back of his throat, hands clenched into fists at his sides but then stopped before the syllables could ever form into something coherent.
Soda stared at him, Emizel tried to pretend like that didn’t bother him. His heart felt like it was pounding in his chest although he knew that to be impossible. He was dead, well, he was supposed to be dead.
“Uhm,” Soda prompted awkwardly, shifting his weight from foot to foot, the bowl of hair dye still in his hands.
What had Emizel gone to the bathroom for in the first place? He didn’t need to pee.
Soda probably wanted him to leave, that would be the reasonable thing to do. He was just about to dye his hair and likely didn’t want Emizel interrupting him. Not after things had seemed so awkward between them lately. It was like they had some sort of falling out without the massive fight that was supposed to come before it.
Instead of excusing himself and running off to hide in some other corner of the basement, Emizel very intelligently blurted, through the choke of his stutter: “Your hair is fa—fading.” Emizel was sure that if his body still could, his face would be burning from embarrassment.
Soda stared at him for a few seconds to process what Emizel had just said, and then he blinked, looked away, and laughed half heartedly. He used his elbow to push up his glasses when they began to fall down.
“Uh, yeah,” Soda agreed, absently mixing the red dye. Emizel tried not to stare, the sight reminding him all too much of the twisting feeling in the pit of his stomach that he had been doing his best to ignore all day. “That’s why I’m redying it.”
Emizel felt painfully awkward. He didn’t remember the last time he had ever felt this weird around someone, let alone Soda, his best friend. He was supposed to be better than this, more eloquent, more easily spoken. He was supposed to be chill.
“Do—Do you want help?” He cursed himself, his tongue, and his new teeth that didn’t quite fit which made talking even more difficult than it already was.
Soda sniffed once and rolled his shoulders back in a loose gesture, “Sure, as long as you don’t mess up this time.” He laughed at his own joke, Emizel barely smiled, remembering all too well all the times he had screwed up helping Soda dye his hair. But that was all part of the fun, wasn’t it? Crappy hair dye in their equally as shoddy punk gang?
At least, that used to be part of the fun. Emizel didn’t really know where he stood as part of that anymore.
All the prowling at night, sleeping or hiding and moping during the day, it left him so isolated from the rest of the gang. He hadn’t meant to be isolating himself, but what else could he do? The others either went home or were asleep when Emizel could go out, and not many people wanted to go out looking for unprovoked fights in the middle of the night.
He had barely spoken to anyone, barely spoken to Soda. It had been one hunt after another, hunger after hunger after hunger, or sleeping when he wasn’t out searching.
That didn’t leave a lot of room to fit his old normal life back into the mix.
“Are you gonna just stand there or…?” Soda interrupted his train of thought, chewing on the inside of his mouth while he pretended to smile at Emizel.
“Right, uhm,” Emizel stumbled over his words, stepping into the bathroom and slamming the door behind him, locking it this time where Soda had failed in the first place. His chest felt tight, and when he moved, he found that his hands were shaking.
They had done this dance before. They had done this many times before actually. Squished together in a cramped bathroom, stained with years of mildew and various substances, dye, alcohol, and blood. Soda took a seat on the closed toilet lid, the creaking hinges squealing in protest under his weight and passed off the hair dye as easily as if it were a can of, well, soda.
Emizel took the bowl in his hands, trying not to chew on the inside of his mouth because now his teeth would puncture the skin so easily he wouldn’t even feel it until blood was running down his chin. He absently stirred the hair dye, pushing the stick around in the red muck.
His stomach rumbled. Emizel ignored it like he had been ignoring it all day.
Soda turned his back to Emizel and suddenly it felt so much easier to breathe now that he wasn’t being inspected by those deep brown eyes. Emizel began their practiced ritual, applying some of the hair dye to the short, frizzy hair at the back of Soda’s neck, using his fingers to smooth it in properly.
They sat in silence in a place in which there would normally be all kinds of noise. Emizel didn’t know what to say, he didn’t know if he could even say whatever words he wanted to convey. He was already shaking. And Soda didn’t seem to be in a very talkative mood anyway.
He just sat there on the toilet, fiddling with the hem of his shirt and staring straight ahead, allowing Emizel to move his head in any direction, staining both their skin red.
The dye was cold on his already freezing fingers, and thick with a paste-like texture that always grossed Emizel out a little bit. The only relief was the smell, a sweet, fruity combination of conditioner and dye. It filled the room until it was the only thing that Emizel could smell, hiding Soda’s scent from his overly sensitive nose.
Soda’s hair was damaged and frizzy, dry when Emizel slathered it with dye. He knew that at one point, Soda had curls similar to his own, although it had taken quite the beating after bleaching and dying it so many times. Occasionally he had a few tight ringlets near his hairline, or he would get a cowlick in the shape of a healthy curl, but it was mostly frizz. Soda never seemed to mind anyway.
Emizel ran his clawed fingers through Soda’s hair, easily sliding through the strands he had already covered, and catching on patches of dry frizz. Soda didn’t so much as flinch at the sudden tug, nor did he jokingly snap at Emizel to be a bit more gentle before he pulled all his hair out.
The silence was deafening.
Emizel continued up the back of Soda’s head, lathering his hair in dye, working as gently as he could although his hands were shaking. They had been shaking a lot lately, no matter what he did. Emizel swallowed thickly and slid his tongue over his lips.
In the background, the old air conditioning of the building finally kicked on, rattling the air ducts with an aggressive sort of sound. It groaned softly and filled the room with a comfortable droning noise, hopefully drowning out the sound of Emizel’s uneven breathing when he forgot to breathe when his body no longer sent the automatic signals.
Somewhere, one of the Demon’s members shouted something and there came a distant muffled crash followed by peals of laughter. Outside, a car laid on the horn, and someone yelled a few distant profanities. Footsteps from upstairs rattled the floor above them. Someone was making out in the room near the bathroom.
Emizel didn’t know if Soda heard any of it.
He just continued to apply the red goop to Soda’s hair, working his way up from the nape of his neck to the top of his head. He scooped small portions of dye into his hand from the bowl, massaging it into his hair.
With the palm of his hand, Emizel smoothed Soda’s bangs away from his forehead, picking them up limply in his fingers and slathering them with hair dye. He did his best to apply it as evenly as possible to the rest of Soda’s head, running his fingers through his hair to smooth out the tangles and really comb it through his frizzy curls.
He ran the sides of his hands over his hairline, trying to wipe away the excess dye before it could really stain Soda’s skin, although the damage had already been done by the time Emizel got to it. He still did his best anyway, making sure all of Soda’s hair was covered before he finally pulled away.
His hands looked like he had just murdered someone, a sight that he was beginning to get used to by now. Emizel took a few steps away from Soda and swallowed thickly, doing his best not to stare at the places where the dye had dripped down the side of Soda’s neck, staining the tender skin above his collar.
“Finished?” Soda asked the first word that he had spoken to Emizel since they started.
“Yeah,” Emizel mumbled, already turning away to wash his hands in the dirty sink. The soap was empty so he had to make do with scrubbing his palms raw with cold water. He couldn’t feel his fingers.
Out of the corner of his eye, Emizel saw Soda pull out his phone and set a timer, although Emizel couldn’t see for how long. Probably an hour. Maybe less.
“Thanks,” Soda said, wiping his forehead with the palm of his hand, pulling his hand away to see the red smeared on his fingers.
“Don’t mention it,” Emizel responded, still staring down at the red dye swirling in the bottom of the sink as he rinsed it from under his nails. His body ached and his stomach growled.
Emizel turned the water off and barely dried his hands off on a towel and was about to leave but his body wouldn’t move him from the spot he was in.
Soda spoke first, “Are we going to talk about the other night?”
The other night. The whole dying and showing up at Soda’s place panicked and covered in blood. Emizel had never really gotten the chance to explain, had he? He hadn’t seen Soda very much, if at all since, although he would never admit to avoiding him.
“Wh—what do you want to talk about?” Emizel asked, hoping his voice sounded steady even though he felt like the entire world was off-kilter.
Soda stared at Emizel as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing, “You showed up covered in blood!” It was almost funny because, at the moment, Soda looked very much like the one covered in blood.
“Yeah,” Emizel swallowed and shifted his weight from foot to foot, subtly moving toward the door.
“You’re not going to explain why?” He seemed annoyed, of course, he would be annoyed. Emizel wasn’t giving him answers, Emizel didn’t really know what kind of answers he could give him. “You show up freaked out and covered in blood, I calm you down and then you leave before I even can see if you’re injured.”
Soda shook his head slightly, parts of his soaked bangs falling in front of his face, “And then you don’t talk to me for three days, you’re never around, no one has seen you and you don’t even respond to my texts.” His cheeks had darkened to a hot shade of red, his hands flailing in an attempt to convey to Emizel how frustrated he was.
And what could Emizel say that wouldn’t sound crazy? What could he say that would make sense? What could he say that could possibly explain the entire realm of changes that had been going on in Emizel’s life.
Emizel bit down on his tongue and tasted stale blood.
“I died,” Emizel blurted.
Well, he sounded crazy. Soda was going to hate him.
Soda didn’t look amused, “Are you going to tell me that a ghost just did my hair?”
“No—I…” Emizel fumbled to fix his mistake, “I think I died and… and… I came back. And…” He didn’t know what to say, what he should say? What could he possibly say to get everything to go back to normal?
Taking pity on him, Soda said nothing, his anger fizzling out into nothing but sadness. He let Emizel take his time to get his words out.
Emizel was never good with poetics. “I—I think I’m some kind of monster now.”
The silence that followed was heavy enough to crush a building.
“Like… Like a zombie? Or a vampire?” Soda asked, his expression conveying his disbelief.
“Yes!” Emizel blurted because that sounded right, that made sense, maybe Soda was just humoring him but he had gotten it on the nose, “That—That weird guy who was there… He… He did something and now I’m…” Emizel trailed off, and shrank away, the excitement of figuring it out giving way to the horror of knowing. What the hell was he?
“A vampire?” Soda finished for him, his face going pale.
“Something like that…” Emizel muttered, leaning heavily against the sink. He could see the sun setting from the grainy, dirty bathroom window. His stomach growled.
“God…” Soda reached up like he was about to run his fingers through his hair but the moment his fingers touched the hair dye he stopped, pulled his hand away, and turned his head away from Emizel. He took his glasses off instead and scrubbed at his eyes.
Emizel said nothing, his hands shook.
“Why didn’t you say something? Why didn’t you tell me then?” Soda asked, pulling his hands away from his face and squinting at Emizel, his glasses still in his lap.
“I-I don’t know,” Emizel shook his head, “I was freaked out… I didn’t know what to do…”
“What about these last three days when you’ve been pretty much M.I.A.?”
“I’ve been… hunting…” The word tasted sour in his mouth when he said it out loud even though it was nothing but the truth. And the truth of what he was supposed to be doing right now as well. “And… sleeping… I guess… I’ve—I’ve been exhausted.” Awake all night, a few hours of sleep at dawn, and then awake again just to hide from the sun falling in and out of restless sleep with dreams of blood and gore.
“I don’t understand why you didn’t just tell me,” Soda seemed hurt.
“I don’t know,” Emizel admitted because he didn’t know why he hadn’t just gone to Soda in the first place. His best friend, his closest companion, the person he trusted with every single part of his life. The past few days had been exhausting and terrifying in their own way, Emizel was just trying to keep it together.
He had been so focused on figuring things out on his own that he hadn’t even thought of Soda. It had been one thing after the next, pain, hunger, and panic, emotions that he didn’t fully understand, and sensations he definitely didn’t enjoy. He had been busy, he had been distracted. He was just trying to get through things on his own.
“Man I thought you were mad at me,” Soda admitted with a painful-sounding laugh, finally putting his glasses back on. “I thought I did something and you were pissed at me.”
“No… No…” Emizel shook his head, running his fingers through his hair and trying to figure out how he had gotten into this entire mess and managed to screw it up this badly. “I’m not… I’ve just been… busy…”
“Becoming a vampire,” Soda wasn’t going to let it go.
“Right.”
“Without telling your best friend.”
“I didn’t know what to say.” Emizel had never been very good with words.
Emizel shifted his weight from foot to foot, the hunger was starting to get difficult to ignore. He watched the setting sun through the small window in the bathroom and realized the longer he stayed here, the less time he would have outside of the hideout when he could actually explore.
He slid his tongue over his lips, wishing that all of this was easier. That this conversation didn’t have to happen. That his world hadn’t gotten flipped upside down. That he could just go back to dying Soda’s hair like normal and talking about stupid stuff.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there,” Soda finally said after a few moments of silence, shocking Emizel.
“No, it wasn’t your fault,” Emizel was quick to redirect. Soda had been there, Soda had left, and then Emizel died. But it wasn’t Soda’s fault. It wasn’t his fault and it never would have been Soda’s fault. Because if it wasn’t Emizel, it would’ve been him. Or worse, Soda could have died and wouldn’t come back, not like Emizel. He would’ve been gone and then Emizel would have to live the rest of his life without him.
It was better this way. Emizel was dead, but then he wasn’t. And Soda was still alive, and the worst he had to worry about was the color of his hair fading, rather than the color fading from his skin.
“I was there… I could’ve done something,” Soda shook his head slowly, letting his hands fall limply to his lap.
“You could’ve died,” Emizel admitted, fear in his voice.
“You did.”
“I’m fine now,” Emizel insisted, spreading his hands in a loose gesture, unsure where he was going with that.
“Then I could’ve done something these last few days when you’ve been scared and not knowing what to do. I should’ve been there!” Soda exclaimed, shaking his head in disbelief before turning away from Emizel. He took his glasses off again and scrubbed at his face.
“I should’ve told you earlier,” Emizel said, not knowing if that was fully the truth or not. There’s a lot of things he should have done. There’s a lot of things he still probably should do. He didn’t know if it was a good idea to bring Soda into this mess. He didn’t want Soda to get hurt. He would die a second time over just to keep Soda safe. Maybe telling him about what happened wasn’t the best idea.
“I wish you would’ve.” Soda sniffled and put his glasses back on.
“I’m telling you now, though,” Emizel tried, pushing his shoulders up and then letting them fall in some sort of shrug.
“Yeah…” Soda mumbled, still looking dejected.
They lapsed into silence. Neither of them looked at each other.
Then Soda’s phone timer went off, the loud chime echoing in the bathroom, causing both of them to flinch hard. Soda fumbled to turn it off, nearly dropping his phone in the process. The alarm stopped, and neither of them moved for a few moments.
“I should probably wash this off,” Soda mumbled, still staring at his phone.
“Do you want help?” Emizel asked.
“No I… I think I got it from here.” Slowly, Soda began to stand up, already moving toward the small dirty shower in the bathroom. He put his phone back down on the counter, frowning to himself.
Emizel’s stomach growled. It was finally dark enough for him to go outside without fear of getting burnt. He was so hungry.
“I should… I should go…” Emizel started to back up to the door, fumbling for the lock.
“Talk later?” Soda asked hopefully, briefly turning back to look at Emizel with a soft, searching smile.
“Sure,” Emizel agreed easily, doing his best to smile, although his fangs were too big for his mouth. Then he turned away and left the bathroom, shutting the door behind him.
He was hungry, night had just fallen, and it was time for him to go out and see who or what he could find. Another night trying to find the guy that did this to him, and another night trying to find something to eat.