The Lonely Vampire

This is a story about how I don’t want to write a story. I hate English class. I can’t wait for next period, Spanish. But I suppose that I have to type something, because Mrs. Lakewood is watching me, even though I sat at the furthest computer in the media center, as far away from everybody else as possible. That’s how I usually do things, anyway, far away from other people. I’m different, you see. I’m a teenage vampire.

Nah, I’m kidding. I’m just kind of a loser. I guess that’s bound to happen when you’re 17 and your parents still won’t let you stay out past 8 pm. Not that anyone would invite me to hang out anyway. It would be pretty cool if I were a vampire, though. Sucking out people’s blood, staying up all night to fly around as a bat. Avoiding garlic. Actually, if I have to be typing anyway, vampires would be a pretty neat subject to write about. Ok, story time:

The Lonely Vampire

All right, pretty lame title, I know. But here it goes:

There was once a vampire named Dave. Don’t laugh. Vampires were once humans too, with boring parents giving them boring names. They can’t all be named Count Dracula.

Dave lived in Michigan. He was born and raised there; in fact, he still lived two miles south of the hospital where he was welcomed into the world. Unfortunately for Dave, his job coordinating large scale exports of lumber for a luxury flooring company included a bit of travel, sometimes to exotic places, like when he went to Transylvania last year to check out a particularly rare breed of oak. That’s right, that one’s not a myth.

Long story short, now Dave is the only vampire in Seven Trees, Michigan -- as far as he knows, anyway. Fortunately for Dave, however, his job dealing almost exclusively with vendors overseas allowed him to work at night. This was good for two reasons: one, sun made him break out in a horrific rash. Two, Dave never was much of a people person anyway.

Except for one person. The romantic interest of this story. Her name was Eleanor. The old fashioned name suited her. She was born in the wrong time period – elegant, reserved, yet unendingly sweet, just friendly (and curvy) enough for all of the men in the office to fawn all over her. Including Dave. If Dave had been more outgoing, he might have even had a chance. She also worked nights, and the two of them were often virtually alone together in the wing of the enormous office complex where both of their offices sat.

Now, you might be wondering why Dave had a job at all. It’s not like he needed money to buy groceries, as vampires don’t have functional digestive systems. And he still lived with his parents, so he wasn’t paying any rent. But that was the reason he still pretended to function like a normal human being. His parents would be heartbroken if he just up and left and accepted his new life. And although he hated himself for it, he depended on their love just as much, even if they did refuse to let him get a driver’s license and force him to wear dorky leather New Balances to school and never once let him see a movie in the theaters.

Anyway, I’m getting sidetracked here. Dave felt as though his only chance of a happier immortal life was to find another vampire to relate with. Sounds simple right? Not so much. It had been a year since his transition, and despite countless Internet searches for “vampire covens American Midwest,” he had yet to find anything aside from gothic teenagers desperate to feel special.

As you may have guessed by now, and as Dave was slowly realizing, the easiest way to make vampire friends would be to make new vampires. As you may have also guessed, Eleanor was at the top of his list. Although a little voice in his head told him that it would be wrong, she wouldn’t be happy, he couldn’t stop thinking about the time in the office kitchen when she helped him clean up after one of the IT guys tripped him. Or the time when he forgot to study for the Spanish quiz and she slyly slid her completed paper closer to him with a little smile as he was still struggling with the first answer.

So he started formulating a plan. Now Dave was no idiot, mind you. He took his time. Almost an entire school year. He would propose his plan to her as gently as possible. And if Eleanor wasn’t on board, he would do it anyway. She would get over it. After all, they were going to spend the rest of eternity together.

Dave crafted a beautifully written note on gorgeous embossed stationary he stole from his mother’s vanity. He explained all the benefits of vampire life – immortality, never worrying about normal human problems, and he had to admit, the lingering sense of superiority he felt over the mortals was pretty fun too. He was going to pass this note to her in 5th period Spanish and see what happened from there.

Like I said, Dave was no idiot. He had seen the news stories about what happens when somebody proposes eternal life to someone else, and the plan doesn’t work out. Lifelong jail sentences, being universally hated by the entire country. But that didn’t really bother him. Nothing could be worse then how he felt now. And besides, he really did believe that Eleanor felt the spark between them, too.

And if anybody stood in his way, they were going to go down. He didn’t have any qualms about that.

And the clock was ticking closer and closer to 1:45 and the bell was about to ring and he could feel the weight of the special transitioning tools he took from his dad’s safe and put in his backpack comforting his nerves.

And when he looked around the media center he felt a little bit of that vampire superiority, because nobody knew what was about to happen. Not even Dave.