Then I realised that eagle's are slightly better

This is the first part of a series of Short Stories called ‘Hi, have you met me?’. It is a comical horror (think Joss Whedon but british) and I’m writing it on the fly from memory so apologies if there’s any grammatical/spelling errors/it’s just terrible… I’m just covering my back here. 

Waking Up (Part One)

‘People say it’s a strange sensation to die… I say it’s stranger to wake up afterwards. A feeling like all of the veins in your body beginning to catch fire. Your skin burning and stinging as you’re thrown violently back into being. I can say one thing… it bloody hurts. It’s my own fault really. A man of my background shouldn’t have been in Cheapside in the first place; but after Catherine called off our engagement I figured any mangey harlot walking the streets was better than sitting in an empty house with only the servants to keep me entertained. 

It was walking down those cobbled streets, between the choleric peasants and factory workers trudging drowsily back to their hovels, in amongst the drunkards and the gamblers, that I saw her.  A vision, like an angel of darkness walking amongst the swine.

Moments later she ducked into a dark alley, as lithe and quick as a cat, but in that flickering instant I swear I could hear her call to me. A sweet low sirens song, urging me to come and find her.  I could not resist, instantly I took chase and followed her down the same dark alley… but she was nowhere to be seen.

A chill came upon me and suddenly I no longer felt like the predator… something was watching me in the shadows. Slowly I moved further into the alley, a rustle, quickly I searched for the source but saw nothing. A few steps forward when suddenly a huge seagull flew up and over me causing me to shriek in a most undignified manner. Laughing it off, I decided not to venture any further lest I walk into the grasp of some cut purses, the beautiful woman would have to be surrendered to the night.

I turned back. The women. The ravenous beauty I searched for. Taken aback I stood silently as she studied me. 

“Not from around here are you, Sir?” she drawled at me with a Cheapside lilt that I found immediately unappealing. Trying to stifle my look of displeasure “No. I believe I’ve wandered desperately out of my way…” I replied. “I should probably be making my way back now.” I added as she began walking around me disconcertingly. “You didn’t come here to find some company then?” she purred rhetorically. “Maybe in a bad humour” I returned, although I could feel myself becoming entranced by her. Once again she stood before me, a fragile beam of light now illuminating her face.  Her skin was pale like that of a lady but there was something rough about her.  There was a darkness in her brown eyes, like a sadness built over a millennia, those eyes that seemed far older than her years, looking into me.

Her breathing was deep and frantic, which I at first mistook for arousal… I must admit I felt flattered until I noticed the  quick flicker of her tongue across her moist red lips.

This was not lust… it was hunger.

What happened next is hard to explain. Her form moved towards me at the speed of a bat whipping out of the rafters. And then just pain… but not just from where she had bitten me. Pain all through my body my body weakened as hers became stronger. I could feel myself slipping down and down until the whole world went black…

People say it’s a strange sensation to die… I say, they don’t have the faintest idea.’