Hello everyone,
Today I wanted to begin sharing a story I wrote for fun a while ago. It made me smile reading it again, I hope you enjoy it as well!
New Age Vampire:
PART 1
He stared out over the expanse of his backyard. This century was weird.
He watched as happy people in their suburb homes went about their daily lives. Taking their kids to school, going to work and the retired people simply sitting on the porch enjoying life.
If only.
He sighed as he stared at his old house cracked and broken from decades of use. The neighbors thought he had died earlier that year and the house was set up on the market to be sold again.
“I don’t want to dye my hair AGAIN.” He sighed in frustration.
He hated dying his hair. It only happened once every thirty years but that was enough for him. As time went on it seemed to fly by faster and faster and before he knew it he had to “die” and…well…dye…yet again.
“I think it’s time I changed houses.” He mused quietly, looking at the bright and happy neighborhood surrounding his dark Victorian house.
“Why am I so mopey?” He wondered. It had been a recurrent thought to him since posts had begun circling the internet talking about how people should write about vampires that are not “cliché” and mopey. For the most part, people still believed vampires to be a mythological creature and thought anyone who claimed to be one or know one was crazy. He preferred it that way, he didn’t want humans to understand the existence of vampires. An idea shared by almost every vampire he knew.
He looked around his house again. “I guess anyone who lived in a dump like this would feel depressed. It’s so dark and depressing and it’s not like I have a pet to keep me occupied.” He mused further.
“That’s it! I’m moving.” The sentence shocked him. He had lived in this house his whole life. There was a local legend surrounding it, that only people who looked like the previous owner would buy it because he kept ‘dying’ and coming back.
Other vampires in other parts of the world were more open with their condition and some communities even accepted them. But he didn’t want to bother with the publicity and possibility of having to slaughter a whole town just because they got scared.
But it was time to move. This old house was in such a state of disrepair after centuries of use, it didn’t matter that he kept replacing parts of it through the years. The house had just about had it and so had he.
“I guess I should go live somewhere nice and sunny. Somewhere that’s not so shaded.” He was worried though, because the sun hurt his skin and caused burns unless he put on a special lotion.
Vampires had made technological advancements too…
He just hated the feel of lotion on his skin. A trait shared with a few humans he had met. So he stayed inside his dark house to avoid the sun, but it really wasn’t good for his mental health to be in the dark all the time. After all… his brain used to be human and still chemically functioned as such.
“I guess I need to buy more…” He grumbled, texting his friend who sold some.
He looked at his boxes and nodded one more time to himself for finality, it was time to move. He started up his laptop, logged onto his neighbors unsecured server and began house hunting.
It was hard in the beginning. His first instinct was to search for older Victorian style houses that looked like what he was used too. He had to keep reminding himself that he had to get away from that and start anew.
He searched farther and farther away, one to two to three towns over until he got to the beach a few states away. Only condos, apartments and small family homes were being sold here.
He heaved a heavy sigh and leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling at a particular mark on the ceiling from when he was younger and tried to feed for one of the first times with live food. He cringed a bit. The man had squirmed quite a lot and it made a huge mess. His thoughts went back to his life in that house. Everyone he had used to know had moved away for the same reason give or take that he was thinking of moving now. If he moved, they might tear it down for good. No human in their right mind would think about buying the house.
If he moved, there was probably no going back. But that’s just what he needed.
He looked back at his screen and chuckled at the listing. It was a condo meant for a small family. It had three bedrooms and two baths and was beachfront property. He never needed to spend much money so he had accrued more than enough money over the years to pay for the ‘prime housing’ as the humans called it.
“What kind of vampire am I?” He asked himself, laughing again at the absurdity of the situation. It would be something totally new to him, but he did need a change and everything he knew about how the mind worked pointed to the conclusion he had come too.
“Eh…what the heck.” He opened the message system and sent a letter to the agent that he was interested. He stopped when it came time to put his name. What would he go by this time?
He sat staring at the screen for what felt like an hour at that little blinking line to type before finally typing,
“Ivan”
He blinked in surprise at his new name. He had been going by Vladimir for the past thirty-five years. Ivan was still formal but was definitely younger sounding and more up to date with the current traditions happening this century. He liked it.
He got a message back within a few hours and the lady offered to let him look at the house the very next day. He agreed and put some clothes in his car before taking off. His house was on a freeze from the bank since he had no living relatives marked for his last persona and his stuff would be safe for about another month until he absolutely had to get it out.
He drove the ten hours to the house and was there a few hours before he had to be. He spent the time freshening up, putting on lotion and then taking a stroll around what could potentially become his new domain.
He liked it. Everything was bright and happy and other than a few bad places that he could sense had cropped up, it was safe. He walked around the area of beach that his condo sat on and determined it was…pleasant. The only worry he had was monsoon season and other weather-related issues, but it really wouldn’t be a problem for him to move. It’s not like he actually relied on the house the way most humans did. He just didn’t want to go through the trouble of trying to find another house sooner than he had too.
He had always picked a span of thirty to thirty-five years to live somewhere because his looks passed for any age from twenty- three to thirty-five if he had kept good condition of his skin. Not telling people his age at all allowed speculation that could buy him an extra decade or two before it would start seeming suspicious.
He sat on a bench outside of his possible new condo and waited for the realtor to show up. When she did she seemed surprised to be greeting him rather than a younger type who would fit the condo better…but was on her best manners anyways and did her job.
“Why is there so much light?” he asked, looking around the well-lit white interior of the condo with a pained expression on his face.
The realtor looked a little shocked, “Because it’s a condo, sir.” was the reply.
He told her he would need to think about it and promised to get back in touch with her within two days before she was scheduled to meet with a young couple about the condo.
Walking around the boardwalk that night he noticed a smaller house that was more isolated from the beach. He wondered about maybe checking out that house instead, but then decided against it and immediately texted her saying he would take the condo.
He had never understood why people had to live in little boxes attached to one another, but he figured now was his chance to find out.
“Let’s face it…” he said to himself, “you are dying on the inside. Time for a change.”
He got his boxes moved in with the help of a uhaul within a week and was unpacking his boxes when he first met his neighbors.
End of PART 1
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E. Lexi Abbott 