The Vampire's Reflection Read Online Free PDF

professor. “I’m out of here.”
    He hocked a wad of spit at the broken Jindrich before collecting his bag and laptop and storming out of the room. The door slammed behind him.
    That was exactly what happened when you’ve been bullied too much, he thought. Those morons, they had it coming. He sucked in a deep breath of air as realization slowly set in on what he’d just done. “Holy crap.” He hurried down the corridor, his heart pounding in his ears, stirring and speech echoing from the room—probably the professor trying to help the slimy behemoth out of his entrapment. Their low voices weren’t distinct enough for him to catch what they were saying, but a little voice in the back of Nikolai’s mind urged him to leave the university faster. He was sure, at any moment, police were going to be called. Stupid move, he scolded to himself. Stupid freaking move.
    Nikolai quickened his pace, racing down the stark and lifeless hallways and out the wooden doors into the mid-day sunlight, his entire life flashing before his eyes. That was the first time he’d ever used his abilities in front of anyone. What had he done? His own parents didn’t even know he possessed this strangeness. He could feel his pulse build in his throat, almost choking him, as he replayed over and over again in his mind the thing he had just done. That was the real reason he would never fit in anywhere. The reason why he would always be the outcast.
    Quickly, he bulleted out of the university commons and into the crowded city streets. Stopping in between the shadows of a clothing store and a bustling bakery, he bent to yank his tattered North Face sweatshirt out of his bag and pulled it over his head and down around his waist. Slinging his bag onto his shoulder, he pulled the hood up over his damaged face and continued on to his dank studio apartment on the other side of town.
    Tears stung in the corners of his eyes. He wished he could just be dead before the day was over. Looking down at his fingertips, he imagined he could actually see the impossible energy that buzzed just underneath his skin. He remembered the first time he’d ever revealed his secrets to anyone. It was the day when he and his family were moving to Kojakovice, leaving all of his friends and relatives to live four hours away, and that was only if you took the train. His father commissioned him to help load the car. A skinny, ten-year-old, Nikolai started to tantrum with the protest of not wanting to leave. His very best friend had come over that day to say good-bye. When his father demanded that he begin loading his wooden toy chest into the car, and disappeared back inside the house, Nikolai slammed his fists onto the lid of the chest and watched zillions of wooden splinters fly up around him, as though his meager hit held the same weight as an exploding bomb. The wood hung like raindrops in the air for the brief seconds that Nikolai’s wondrous gaze held them there.
    “What have you done, Nikolai?” His friend whispered in utter fear of him—as if Nikolai were some sort of devil.
    When Nikolai’s focus shifted to his friend’s shocked face, the wooden shards plummeted to the ground, the final evidence that the toy chest ever existed.
    Nikolai grabbed hold of his friend’s shoulders and begged, “Please! You’ve got to help me cover this up! My parents can’t know what just happened. They’d never understand!”
    “Nikolai, they are going to find out anyway! How long have you kept this secret?”
    “No!” Nikolai blanched. “You have to promise you won’t tell! My dad—he already thinks I’m a freak.” Tears welled in his eyes.
    His friend only stared at him with the shimmering promise of his own tears in his wide, frightened eyes. “Okay. I swear it.”
    With that, the two quickly spat simultaneously on the palms of their hands and shook on their oath as they scurried to move the splintered remains of the chest around in the tall grass before Nikolai’s