Lilliana Roseblood POV
'Ahhh! What is wrong with me!'
It was the morning after Soren had come over to her dorm, and Lilliana was walking towards class F, clutching her head in shame.
The reason she was so embarrassed?
Last night, when Soren had left her dorm, she had noticed that the bowl was still half full, and because she was full, she had decided to store the blood for future use… and that future use ended up being today's breakfast.
It wasn't just that, either; there was another problem.
'Why can't I stop thinking about it?'
Every time her thoughts wandered, they always ended up at the same place: her sitting on Soren's lap, biting into his neck.
She couldn't forget the euphoria she felt as she drank his blood; it was unlike anything she had ever had before.
Granted, the blood she had drunk was only ever livestock blood, but that didn't change anything for her.
It was so delicious that, even though she had tried drinking her regular bloodpacks that morning, she ended up spitting it out and rinsing her mouth with water; for some reason, her regular meals now tasted awful in comparison.
'What is happening to me..'
She covered her face in embarrassment.
'Why was my heart racing?'
She didn't understand.
She knew she wasn't in love; after all, that wouldn't make sense.
Up until now, her ideal type had always been an older, fairly masculine man, so Soren didn't fit the bill at all, which led to her current confusion.
His appearance was so misleading that a large subset of students thought he was a girl, and his voice didn't help the matter either.
If his voice were even slightly masculine, then it would be easy to deny the rumours, but no, his voice was also androgynous, making the misunderstandings even more rampant.
In fact, even Lilliana had been confused more than once as to whether Soren was a girl or a boy, but she was too afraid to bring it up in case it offended him.
Her head hurt as she tried to figure out why she was reacting so strongly to the androgynous boy.
It was then that she had finally reached the door to class F.
She reached out and opened it only to almost immediately slam the door back shut before crouching down.
'I'm going to go insane.'
The moment she opened the door, she happened to see Soren, more specifically, his appearance.
'What are you doing, Ren?'
Usually, Soren would have his hair in a low ponytail that sat over his shoulder, or if not that, he would just leave his hair loose, but today, for some inexplicable reason, he had decided to wear it up in a proper ponytail.
Ordinarily, this wouldn't have been a problem for someone as professional as Lilliana, but her senses were still heightened from the previous night's bloodsucking.
"Hooo…"
She let out a deep breath to regain her composure before opening the classroom door, trying her best to avoid looking in Soren's direction.
There were a few people who looked at her strangely due to her slamming the door earlier, but nevertheless, everyone still settled down and sat, waiting for Lilliana to speak.
She kept her head down, avoiding eye contact with all the students, and followed her usual routine of taking roll call.
While reviewing the list, she made a mistake.
"Re-Soren Arden."
She had almost called him Ren instead, which made her want to cry.
She desperately wanted to bury her head in her hands and escape, but she couldn't, leaving her to reluctantly continue with her homeroom session as usual.
Because of her attitude this morning, a rumour began to spread that Lilliana Roseblood was on her period.
••✦ ♡ ✦•••
Once lunch arrived, Lilliana, as usual, asked Soren to have lunch together; this time, however, it was because she had something she needed to discuss.
She had also made sure to ask if he could keep Amelia from coming, to which Soren readily agreed, surprising Lilliana.
As they sat down together to eat lunch, she noticed that the distance between them was a lot smaller than usual, so much so that it caught her off guard.
'When did we get this close?'
Even stranger, however, was the fact that she felt reluctant to move from her position.
She tried to ignore the situation when a soft, androgynous voice called her name.
"Lily? Are you sick?"
She wanted to say yes and run away, but she was fully aware that the answer would only worry the boy sitting next to her, so she just shook her head and continued eating.
There was a problem, though.
Due to them eating lunch, Lilliana was constantly being reminded of last night, which led to her frequently glancing at Soren's neck. It didn't help that, unlike usual, his neck was also on full display.
Then she noticed something.
Two small dots on his neck.
The moment she saw those, she froze.
'Oh my god!' She was screaming internally.
'He's just going around showing them off so casually, is he insane? Doesn't he know?'
Part of her felt embarrassed by the blatant display, while another part wanted to strangle him.
It was too much for poor little Lily.
She had long since reached her limit.
SLAM!
She slammed the desk as she stood up and turned to Soren.
Soren looked at her with a face full of confusion while Lilliana was desperately trying to figure out what to say.
"Can…"
"What's wrong, Lily?"
Shudder
Her body shivered in response to him calling her nickname, but she ignored it and pressed on.
"Can you cover up…?"
"...?"
"Can you please cover your neck?"
Soren sat there for a few moments in silence as if trying to piece things together, then his expression changed as if he had figured everything out.
A grin crept onto his face as he opened his mouth to speak.
"What's wrong, Lily? Are you hungry?"
Lilliana balled her hands into a fist and gripped hard in an attempt to calm herself down.
"Hmm? Didn't I tell you that you could just ask?"
Swoosh
Lilliana jumped at Soren, holding him by the shoulders.
She looked at him with tears in her eyes.
"Please… cover your neck… It's driving me insane..!"
Soren was so surprised by her actions that he lost all the momentum he had, moving his hands to his hair and untying it.
"Is that okay?"
"Thank you…" She whispered.
Soren looked at her anxiously.
"Hey.. I'm sorry…"
He had only been intending to tease her playfully, and if she wanted, he really would have let her drink some of his blood, but he had unintentionally made her upset.
"No, it's fine.. It's my fault, I should've warned you… I didn't know it would be this bad either. To tell you the truth, I've never sucked blood directly before, maybe that's why I'm being so weird…"
Soren just nodded as Lilliana continued.
"This morning I tried to drink my regular packs, but for some reason they tasted different, gross even, I ended up having to rinse my mouth out and… drink the blood you left last night… ughhh! What have you done to me?"
"Sorry, I wasn't intending for any of this to happen. I was just trying to help, you seemed like you wanted some, so I thought I'd offer… if that's really the case, I know I said it somewhat jokingly, but please feel free to ask whenever you need blood, Lily."
He looked at her with a guilty expression, making it impossible for Lilliana to stay upset.
She didn't refuse his offer; she knew how awful her life would be without blood, she had already seen proof of that through her brother, and she was terrified of such a thing ever happening to her.
"I usually drink blood a couple of times per day, but… if it's from you, I should be fine for a few days per week."
"Are you sure? I don't mind letting you every day… Although twice might be too much."
Lilliana waved her hands and tried to re-explain her point in more detail.
"No, no. What I meant was that your blood lasts a couple of days, unlike livestock blood. The only reason I'd had more this morning was out of habit, of course, as with anyone eating daily is healthier, but I don't want to be a burden, so I'll just stick to a few times per week and see how it goes."
Then Soren smiled once again, his familiar gentle smile making Lilliana's heart rate quicken.
"Sure, if that's what you want to do, I have no problem, but you'd better remember our promise, Lily."
In response, Lilliana smiled wryly.
"Yeah, yeah, I know, Ren. Thank you."
With everything sorted, they both turned their attention back to their meals and ate in silence.
Apart from the occasional glance at Soren's neck or shudder when he spoke, Lilliana had finally managed to calm down.
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