A part of me longed to sink my fangs into his dark, tanned neck. Would it taste like suntan lotion? I wondered absentmindedly as I gnawed on my pencil. Most girls were attracted to his chocolate brown eyes or his wavy dark hair. His smaile was charmingly crooked and his ears were lopsided in a way that a lot of girls found endearing.

Pure and simple, Jeremy Rodriguez was the most sought-after guy in school. Even by my pale, gawky vampire self.

I couldn’t bite him, I knew that. He would almost certainly die if I did. But I still wondered what it would feel like to bring my lips to his warm neck, only three inches away in the desk in front of me. Open my mouth, and bite all the way to the gums… My pencil snapped.

Someone giggled behind me and I twisted around in my seat to see Danny Pearson’s grimy face two inches from my own. Danny Pearson was the most acne-infested 18-year-old on the planet and the only guy who giggled at a higher pitch than a girl. Any girl I knew anyway. He was also the only guy whose blood I didn’t fantasize about drinking; somehow, I was sure that it would taste like pus.

“Need a new pencil?” Danny giggled again, his eyes flicking over to my desk where the gnarled remains of my pencil lay.

“No thank you,” I whispered back, starting to turn back to face the chalk board. Just then though, I felt dry lips at my ear and Danny Pearson’s scratchy voice whispered words that made my already dead heart freeze, “I know your secret.”