As Deandra stared at the clock with wide eyes waiting for 4:59 p.m. to become 5:00 p.m., she couldn’t wait to leave work. She had not one strand of her hair out of place, and her makeup was applied with perfection. As she hurried out of her office in a sexy outfit, she left an aroma of roses behind her after just spraying perfume. However, a hot date was not waiting for her, but rather a victim unbeknownst of her intentions. She was not rushing out of work for pleasure, but for need. She was off to her “hunt,” looking for her prey.

The hunt was a ritual that Deandra needed to do every five years, and her time had come again, on the eve of her 40th birthday. Ideally, she would find her prey tonight, and everything would be finished before she turned 40 because thereafter she would only have 30 days left to save herself.

As Deandra sat in that dark pub in London looking around for her potential prey, she was left with her thoughts, and she sadly thought of how the hunt began 160 years ago. The sentiment had almost caused a tear to run down her cheek, but then she caught herself. She needed to stay calm and collected, and by this time she was a professional at what she did, but every now and then, her emotions would overcome her.

Deandra was born in 1825 to a family of witches. She always knew she was different and special. She felt comfortable with her family and her coven, but obviously, she needed to be an actress from birth to survive, as did all the other witches in her family and coven. They had to learn to act as everyone else, only using their powers as needed and not to draw attention to themselves for fear of being burned alive.

Accordingly, Deandra married and had a son. She loved her husband and son very much, and although she maintained a relationship with her family, she strayed from the coven, ignoring and not using her powers. She was happy with her life until she turned 40.

On her 40th birthday, Deandra began experiencing horrible migraine headaches. She went to the doctor, and he did not have good news for her. He told her that she had an inoperable, malignant tumor, and she had only 30 days to live, and unfortunately, she would suffer terribly until she died as the pain would only worsen.

Although Deandra had suppressed her powers since her marriage, she immediately thought to reinstate them in hope of somehow saving herself from her miserable fate. She did not know what to do, so she reached out to one person she could trust to ask and who would have the answer–her mother.

To Deandra’s delight, her mother told her there was a way for her to survive this. Deandra was overjoyed and asked what she needed to do. She would do anything to survive this. Her mother, with a melancholic expression, told her that what she had to do would not be easy, but if she wanted to live, she needed to do it. To survive this diagnosis, she would need to turn back time, since her fate was inevitable, and that every time she turned 40, she would receive the same diagnosis and only have 30 days to live thereafter. To turn back time, she would need to have sexual intercourse with a man, kill him, and eat his heart. After that, she would experience continuous vomiting for a few hours, followed by sleep, and when she woke up, she would be five years younger again. Life and time for everyone else would have stayed in the present, but she physically would be five years younger, looking and feeling the way she did at 35.

This was a lot for Deandra to accept. She would have to do things she never did before nor wanted to do or be: a murderer, a cheater, and a cannibal. But the alternative was to die a miserable and painful death and never see the people she loved most again.

Deandra thought a lot about it after she returned home. Even if she hid the truth from her husband and her son, who did not know anything about her or her family being witches, how would she explain how she was not aging? How would she explain how she looked 35 years old for the rest of her life? What would the doctor say when she continued to live and look younger? Everyone in the town knew him, and he knew of her diagnosis. That was the point where it all became clear to her what needed to be done.

Then the next morning when her husband and son returned from their hunting trip, they asked Deandra what the doctor said when she saw him. She responded that she was diagnosed with a rare aging disorder which makes people age in reverse. Her husband and son were perplexed, but since they didn’t really know much about science, which she knew, they just believed what she said and thought she was fortunate. They then told her how they could already see the effects of it and were amazed. She embraced her family and told them to get cleaned up since she was preparing supper. After they went upstairs, she did everything she could to compose herself and forget the night before how she seduced the doctor, leading him to become her first victim.

The first kill was the hardest, and one Deandra would never forget, even all this time later, 160 years to be exact. As she was planning to leave the pub, a boisterous young man entered the bar, seemingly drunk, and smiled at her. She thought, “here we go again.” They had some drinks together, talked, and went back to her place, but things didn’t go as planned.

His name was Lawrence, and Deandra had liked him very much. They went back to her apartment, and he made her laugh, like she hadn’t laughed in years. She knew she couldn’t ever kill him or hurt him in any way. Although she was having fun just hanging out with him, she had to cut the night short and not let anything further happen so that neither one of them would become attached. It was very difficult for Deandra to be in a serious relationship because of the hunt. Lawrence was surprised that she was ending the night early because they connected so well, but he understood. He just figured maybe she was more reserved than she appeared to be. Before he left, he asked for her number, and against her better judgment, she gave it to him. It was hard for her to accept not seeing him again.

Lawrence persistently courted Deandra until she accepted his advances, and once she did, they were inseparable, and despite that she felt ill (which she hid from Lawrence), she was happier than had she had been in a long time because she was in love. Lawrence’s love for her helped her overcome her fear of dying. She had no interest in doing the hunt anymore, so she stopped looking for prey.

One day, Lawrence came by Deandra’s house unannounced and found her on the floor passed out. He quickly brought her to the hospital, where she was admitted and underwent a procedure.

Lawrence waited there all night until Deandra finally woke up. When she woke up, she didn’t know where she was and had no recollection of what happened. Lawrence ran over to her and hugged and kissed her. The doctor came in to deliver the news. He explained how she had a small aneurysm, but it was safely removed, and she would just need to recover for about four to six weeks.

Deandra then realized that within all the years she had done the hunt, it had never once occurred to her that maybe medical improvements had been made for her condition since 1865. She felt foolish and guilty for the lives needlessly taken, but there was nothing she could do about it now, except feel fortunate that the hunt was over.