Isabella wasn’t distraught right away. In fact, she was just surprised, and a tad accepting. She inspected her left arm, twisting and turning it to see the subtle difference in skin tone now. It was slightly paler, not a noticeable change, but overall, she looked like a porcelain doll now. With her dark brown hair and blue eyes, Isabella looked positively unreal now. It was slightly disconcerting.

Looking in the mirror, she touched her reflection’s face, wondering how something like what she had gone through could have changed her so much, both inside and out. Not only did Isabella have an unnatural air about her now that she’d had the disease, but she also had a whole new side to her. A side that would have been unimaginable to her only a week before.

Amor sanguis, the disease that had made her into this unnatural person. It attacked the blood cells and weakened the red blood cell count as well as the iron in a person’s body, resulting in an extreme form of anemia. It got to a point where the person affected died, or at least showed the symptoms of a deceased. However, Amor sanguis brought you back. As something else, no less.

It changed the way the person looked and felt, making them into a predator. There were permanent side effects to the disease; thanks to the low iron and blood cell count, the person affected craved blood. Thus, the name evolved into a slang term: the vampire disease.

In all ways, Isabella was now a vampire, or something close to it. Though when the disease had first struck, doctors managed to find a way to help ease the ache for blood. The form came in iron supplements. The supplements could hold off aches and longing for blood, but the catch was to take them twice a day, as if the person was severely anemic. Which, in a way, they were.

Isabella now reached her pale, delicate fingers out to a bottle on her dresser; her iron supplements. She fished around for one in the white capped bottle, only to find to her distress, there were none left.

She needed one now and she knew it. She had tried to withstand the pain filled pangs that came to her for as long as she could -a mere day- but to no avail. Isabella was losing grip on her control and knew the disease was still there doing this to her. Amor sanguis coursed through her veins, making sure she stayed infected and different; making sure she could never be the girl she was before.

Putting her head in her hands to try to block out her own bloodthirsty thoughts and all the heightened senses that came with the disease, Isabella thought of before.

Before had been beautiful, though she hadn’t known it until after. Isabella had, of course, known about the vampire disease, but never thought she would get it. It was a fantasy, not reality. Though she had witnessed one painful change of someone else’s, the odds of getting the disease never sunk in until it was too late.

Before had been full of life, even through, what she saw now, were dulled senses. The sounds had been joyful and alive. The scenes had held vibrancy and youth. Now all Isabella had was darkness and difference. Though she looked a radiant beauty, Isabelle couldn’t help thinking of herself as death reincarnate.

But now wasn’t the time to start resenting who she was; it was time to figure out how she could get her hands on more iron supplements. She knew she wouldn’t last much longer without one; her resolve was crumbling like a stone wall through the ages.

Isabella moaned as her stomach contorted in pain and she fell to the floor. She barely noticed as a pair of hands dragged her across her bedroom floor and then picked her up and settled her on her bed. She writhed as the hands held her down, finally becoming aware of someone else in the room besides her.

Opening her eyes in desperation as her natural survival instincts kicked in, she found herself looking into a pair of forest green eyes. Her body stopped moving for a second as she recognized Vincent, a fellow victim who had turned years ago and was her guide to this life she was trying to adjust to now.

“Isabella,” he whispered, looking down at her, perhaps in sympathy or maybe pity.

However, new Isabella wasn’t distracted long as she folded in on herself, squeezing her eyes shut, too. And then a strange thing happened. Isabella could feel her pulse slowing as well as the world around her. Her hearing had extended and she felt she could feel the cool breeze from outside caressing her skin.

She slowly opened her eyes as her senses heightened and then her pair of cornflower eyes latched onto the neck directly in her vision. She knew what she was doing as she bared her new fangs at Vincent, she knew what she was doing as her eyes took on a deathly red color, and she definitely knew what she was doing as she leaned forward towards Vincent, impossibly fast.

And then she was pushed down. Isabella’s new predatory instincts had kicked in. She kicked out and pushed at the vampire holding her down, but to no avail.

The struggling was making her blood pangs come back with a vengeance, making her go still. Vincent’s hands hesitantly pulled away from where he had been holding her down and then he crouched down next to her.

“You need to open your eyes and get control of this.” He watched as she wearily opened one blue eye to look at him, much like a suspicious cat would. He gritted his teeth as her eye fluttered closed again, resulting in him shaking her, maybe a tad too hard.

This time she responded, but with a raspy growl as if she had choked on something and still hadn’t recovered.

“Isabella, open your mouth.” She weakly protested at his words until Vincent pried open her mouth, and then gently dropped two red tablets into her mouth.

A few minutes later and she could sit up again, rubbing her eyes drowsily like she would if she had just woken up from a good night’s rest

She lowered eyes, humiliated, but looked up when Vincent touched her shoulder.

“You need to learn there is no going back to before.” He ran a hand through his messy brown hair before continuing, “And of course, I’ll be here to help. After all I’m supposed to be your mentor in all of this.” He laughed, a short sound, and then stopped his pacing to look at her again.

They stared at each other for a few seconds before Vincent awkwardly patted her head and went to the window.
“I know I can’t go back, but for a second there, I thought…” Isabella trailed off as she tried to catch Vincent’s green eyes gaze. However, she found her window open and a slight breeze blowing the cornflower blue curtains apart.