I stare at him. Did he just make a joke? Max gives a slight smile but his eyes don’t leave mine.

I have so many questions, and I want to ask them but I can’t, not sounding like this. I close my eyes and try to calm down. When I look back at my hands they are the right colour. A check on my teeth reveals my normal human pegs.

“What have you done to me?” I whisper.

Max sighs and looks away. “I had to.”

“Had to?” I repeat.

Even Colin looks away. “I’m hungry,” he says.

I step back, there is no way that I’m going to be anyone’s dinner.

“No, Bitsy,” Max says. “We don’t need blood. We still eat and drink normally.”

“But I had teeth,” I say, gesturing to my mouth.

“Yes, but only when you’re worried or angry. The rest of the time you’ll…

Around me there is light everywhere and it hurts. I think I’m screaming, but I can’t hear anything. I can feel hands holding me down and the roughness of concrete on my back. I can also hear laughter and a soft thumping noise. Everything seems too loud and the light is hurting my eyes.

“I think she is coming round,” a voice says and I can tell it is Colin, although he sounds as if he is yelling in my ear instead of talking normally.

The light is gone and I can see his concerned face looking at me.

“What?” I ask and then I remember what they did. “How could you” I cry and crawl backwards away from them.

Max had been holding my legs but now he puts his hands up, palms out, as if letting me know he was harmless. Except I know the truth.

“You turned…

Kate has recently completed her Masters in Creative Writing. She is currently working on her third short story anthology and had had a number of short stories accepted in magazines and ebook anthologies, such as ‘The Lampeter Review’ and the What the Dickens’ anthology ‘Busker’.

 She has kindly agreed to be interviewed about her  writing.

What are you working on at the moment?

I am currently working on a set of stories for a horror collection that will be published by Raging Aardvark Press on the 31^st October 2014. ‘Shadows Close’ is an illustrated volume of 13 stories. Set down one road during one week in October 1983, it shows just how a closed door can hide the evils of the world. Horror is on our doorstep, even if we don’t see it.

What was your initial motivation or prompt to write this story?

The concept for the story…