Babies were getting born, people were waking up, teenage girls were talking on the phone, men were in the pubs drinking beer. It was 2am on a Thursday and Abigail climbed into bed, grateful that it was the holidays.

The party had been exhilarating, she’d had such a blast with her boyfriend. She grinned to herself as she ran over some scenes in her mind: him holding her tight in her arms as they braved the battlefield of a water-bomb fight, her throwing handfuls of crisps at him for daring to spray her with a violently shaken fizzy drink, them kissing out on the moonlit porch.

She yawned hugely, and sank into oblivion.

Sheila felt blissful as she reached out for her ice-cold grape juice. The sun was shining, a breeze was blowing, she was lying partially under an umbrella on a huge, comfy towel, with her juice and laptop beside her. She knew she looked great in her new blue bikini, with her bronze skin, long slender legs and curvaceous figure. And there were so many hunks around! Already she’d received appraising looks from two gorgeous males. She absorbed the glances as her skin took in the sun’s vitamin D. She fluffed her hair around her, reveling in the sight of dark blue highlights in her straight brown hair. She pouted into it and shifted one leg felinely over the other. She wondered how many guys had noticed.

Her laptop beeped; an orange light flashed at the catch. Lazily a well-toned arm stretched for it.

Phantom Menace says: Hey, beautiful.

She smiled – her favourite cousin had opened an MSN window with her. Dear Eric, a whole continent away from her, with a time difference of fourteen hours between them.

Hey, she typed, what’re you doing up so late?

Eric grinned, sitting at the computer with muffins and coffee beside him. Surprisingly he wasn’t tired at all. Probably the effect of staying up till 4am ever since the holidays began.

Phantom Menace says: C’mon, it’s the hols! Just got back from a party.

Phantom Menace says: God I’m starving. Now I’m bingeing on muffins lol.

xxSHEILA; says: Tsk. 2am. You’re gonna get fat.

Phantom Menace says: do I care. They’re MUFFINS!!!

xxSHEILA; says: Yeah I get the point :D I’ve been trying my hand at baking lately. Going to buy more ingredients tmr and have a baking spree at Lish’s house on Sunday.

Phantom Menace says: betcha that when you drop them, there’ll be a meteor-like hole in the ground

xxSHEILA; says: HEY!! hmph. gotten insulted

xxSHEILA; says: I shall fly one over and make you eat it

Phantom Menace says: WOW MUFFINS ME WANNA EAT THEM!

xxSHEILA; says: Yea you can be my food-taster (and be poisoned first)

Phantom Menace says: BITES INTO MUFFINS

Phantom Menace says: TEETH FALL OUT

xxSHEILA; says: haha

Phantom Menace says: MUFFINS DROP ONTO GROUND

Phantom Menace says: AND BOOM, THE WHOLE HOUSE EXPLODES INTO NOTHING BUT DUST

Phantom Menace says: boom boom bom

Phantom Menace says: boom

xxSHEILA; says: hmph

xxSHEILA; says: Fine I ain’t gonna give you any. I’ll keep all the lovely yummy muffins to MESELF.

Phantom Menace says: sob

Phantom Menace says: i want muffins!

Phantom Menace says: MUFFINS!

Phantom Menace says: rush

Phantom Menace says: AHHH

Phantom Menace says: it’s a mirage

Phantom Menace says: sob

xxSHEILA; says: dies laughing

xxSHEILA; says: greeeeeeeeedy

Phantom Menace says: boohoo

His pale skin gleamed in the moonlight as he stepped across her window-sill. Vampires were said to have teleportation powers; that was nonsense of course, they just had the ability to run much faster than humans. He felt proud that he’d managed to reach her house in less than ten seconds, considering she stayed thirty kilometers away from him. If only he could share his newest achievement with someone.

She looked so sweet as she slept. One arm lay across her body, reaching to the other’s elbow; the other arm was curved so that its fingers nestled in the hollow between her collar bones. She always slept like this; it wasn’t the first time he’d come to watch her as she slept.

She moved in her sleep, mumbling something. She giggled, held her hands out to cup someone’s face, and kissed him.

“Eric,” she whispered distinctly in the darkness.

An intense surge of jealousy coursed through him. One bite and it could be over, she would be his. The same thought had occurred to him each time he came, but he always fought the temptation; what if she hated him forever for it? He did not want to live unloved for another hundred years…

He reached gently for her face. Abigail, sweet…

Suddenly, her eyes opened. His hand froze, inches away from her cheek. For a split second he scanned her face, horrified.

Recognition flashed into her eyes.

He leapt to the window in one swift lunge. The curtains stirred as though caressed by a night breeze.

And he was out, running, running, running to God-knew-where.

Abigail woke suddenly, with the tense, sticky feeling of the calm before the storm. She opened her eyes to see what time it was.

Her heart missed a beat as she saw a guy close beside her, his hand stretching toward her face. His face stood out in the dark; it was so pale it looked ghostly. But what was worse was the expression on his face… like a sexually-crazed maniac. And the face looked familiar… Eric? No. Edward.

As soon as the name leapt to her mind, the face was gone. She couldn’t imagine what had happened. She threw her blanket aside and sat up sharply in her bed, the blood rushing to her head. It looked normal… and empty. The poster of lion cubs hung on her wardrobe door, the glow-in-the-dark stars twinkled at her from her ceiling, her wearily-discarded jeans and shirt were still huddled in a heap beside her writing table.

She shivered. She picked up her phone and called Eric. It was three; she knew he wouldn’t be asleep yet. She needed him to hold her in his arms and reassure her that everything was fine.

Eric’s handphone vibrated against his tabletop, causing ripples like frowns on the surface of the coffee. Hastily before anyone could get woken by the noise, he answered.

“Hello?”

“Eric, it’s Abby here.”

“Oh hey, sweet. Still not asleep yet after the exertions of the party?”

“I was. Eric, could you come over? I… just had a bad dream. My parents flew to Minnesota yesterday, no one’s in the house and I -”

He could tell she was getting into a nervous wreck. He could get there with his bike; she lived only three blocks away. “Calm down, Abby, I”ll be right there. Get yourself into the kitchen and make something hot, you’ll feel better. I’ll be there, okay? Ten minutes at your porch. Don’t worry.”

He told Sheila he had to go, and she accepted it cheerfully without question. Bless her, sometimes she was really rather a dear. He closed the window and shut down his computer.

Sheila closed the wacky conversation, smiling to herself. She took a swig of her grape juice again and resumed her inspection of the males around the beach.

Not five minutes later, a guy walked up to her. He was fair, really fair. So, no tanned complexion but were his eyes stunning. She wondered if he wore contacts; they were the deepest chrome she had ever seen. He looked like he was going to eat her. Sheila enjoyed the attention.

He sat down beside her on the sand and held out his hand. “Hey,” he said. “I’m Edward.”