I awoke one morning with a very peculiar headache. This wasn’t your general headache however, and the thing that set it apart from other headaches was the fact that the throbbing pain seemed to intensify from all sides of my cortex. You see, I have so many different types of headaches that I have become an experienced headacheist. In fact, I’ve been thinking about going to college so I can get a PHD in the science of headacheism. There are thousands of different types of headaches, there’s the ‘whisky-headache’, there is the ‘I-don’t-want-to-have-sex-tonight-I-have-a-headache’ headache, there’s the ‘dehydration headache’, there’s the ‘I-slept-too-much(or-not-enough)’ headache, there’s ‘I-need-my-morning-cup-of-coffee’ headache, and then there’s the ‘I-feel-incredibly-ill’ headache. I’ve experienced (almost) all of these headaches. Generally a headache generates pain in the center of your forehead, behind your eyes, or on the sides of your head. This pain, as aforementioned came from all sides –even the back side of my brain.
The pain didn’t start without a cause; of course it was an unknown cause. However, there had to be a cause for the cause of my headache. Using all the essential survival skills I’ve learned from many hours spent watching James Bond movies, I knew where to begin. I’d have to analyze everything I did the previous day. Of course, I couldn’t do anything while I was still lying in my bed writhing in pain from the constant intensifying pressure building up on all sides of my head.
Careful not to disturb the explosion in my brain, I sat upright and gently rubbed my eyes. It was bright outside. I made a mental note to write down the extreme amount of daylight at this time of day. I glanced at my alarm clock and suddenly all the answers hit me at once with such force that I almost fell out of my bed. It was exactly noon. “Well that explains the daylight.” I muttered to myself miserably, realizing that my James Bond dreams were now irrelevant.
I swung my legs over to the floor and raced to the window at a speed that would put a herd of turtles walking through a cloud of peanut butter to shame. I quickly drew the curtains closed, causing every speck of light in the room to disappear. I smiled gleefully at the thought of conquering the daylight with my quick thinking.
I stumbled through the blackness of my room as my eyes began to adjust to the darkness. As my eyes adjusted, so did my headache. It was as if the darkness had some sort of healing aliment which cured the common-yet-uncommon-for-the-pain-was-too-great-for-this-to-be-considered-normal headache. “Almost like aspirin!” I shouted.
After the headache subsided there was another feeling that began to overcome me. It was thirst. My throat was practically burning with the need. I quickly flew open my bedroom door and began to trek down to the kitchen.
Along the way there were many curtains that were carelessly left open, allowing my true enemy, daylight, to enter. I of course, outsmarted them by drawing them closed.
After several seconds of daylight battles, I reached the kitchen. I swung open the refrigerator and glanced inside the giant machine.
In the fridge, there were many bottles of red liquid which had the appearance of red kool-aid. I grabbed one and greedily drank from the bottle until I found my needs met.
I glanced toward the kitchen counter and saw something that threw me into a violent state of shock. I saw my true arch enemy. Now I know what you’re thinking, “Didn’t you say that curtains were your enemy approximately three paragraphs ago?” Yes, I did mention that however, if you were asking that question it is obvious that the differences between an ‘enemy’ and an ‘arch enemy’ are far too complex for your small human mind.
Garlic: it was a small bowl of garlic. Something that the average person wouldn’t think twice of –I knew better. Garlic was one of the most intelligent organisms on this planet and it knew how to kill and destroy. My race was dwindling down to nothing and this was all because of Garlic. Granted, Garlic wasn’t in this business alone, it had accomplices. It worked with other diabolical things such as undrawn curtains, churches, fire, and angry mobs of humans seeking revenge.
I stood my ground prepared for the worst. If Garlic made a move on me, I’d be dead for sure. Minutes passed, and soon it was twelve-thirty. During this intense stand-down I took the time to fully study Garlic. It’s not often that a thing like me gets to look at Garlic so closely. The peculiar thing was that Garlic wasn’t in one huge misshapen form like it usually is. The skin was missing and it was broken up into shapes that were almost like cloves. It was then that I put some pieces together. Garlic was dead! Rejoice! I smiled, unable to control myself. I had been in such a state of fear and it was over absolutely nothing! Now this led me to my next thought. Why was Garlic here in the first place?
I turned toward the living room and glanced in the direction of the couch. There was a woman sitting on the couch watching Oprah, completely oblivious to my existence.
A smile crept over my face as I instantaneously fell into hunter mode. This woman was some sort of evil being. She knew that I had broken into her home, desperate for shelter from the rising sun. So she booby-trapped the entire house hoping to frighten me. She came into my bedchamber and opened the curtains attempting to turn me into a pile of dust. It was a flawed plan of course, because only direct sunlight will have that affect on me. She placed Garlic on the counter hoping to paralyze me with fear, yet she didn’t think about my incredible intellect. But that didn’t explain the kool-aid-like liquid.
If she had meant to destroy me, why would she have placed something that would give me power in the fridge?
I crept toward her, careful not to alert her to my presence. Once I was behind her, I reached toward her. I soon learned that this was a mistake -she expected me.
“That red liquid you drank was actually just kool-aid.” She said as if she’d just read my mind. “And yes, I just read your mind.”
I stood there feeling dumbfounded and irrelevant. How can this woman read my mind? Did she know who I was? Was she intending on ending my prolonged life?
“How...?” I began to ask her, unsure how to phrase my multiple questions.
“Because, I’m meant to kill you.” She said as she turned to face me. Her eyes were glazed with a look of destruction they almost appeared red, but I knew that was impossible, she was a human, and there is no way the color of a humans eyes could be red. That’s simply impossible and absurd.
Regardless, she lunged toward me with all her strength and with none of her intelligence. I quickly grabbed her and tossed her to the side as if she was made of nothing more than cardboard. I hovered above her, baring my fangs: ready to kill.
I stared down at her frail body. Something in it felt familiar, as if I had at one point seen this woman before. Impossible, I’m ten-thousand years old, there’s no way I could have met her before. The woman stood suddenly, with a wooden stake in her hand. “Don’t make me do it, I don’t want to do it!” She said sounding hysterical. I glared at her, “then let me drink your BLOOOOOD!” I said doing my best to emphasize the ‘OOOOO’ in order to achieve a theatrical effect. The woman responded, “absolutely not. That’s not part of the game.”
Game? What game? This woman was toying with my mind. Saying random things in order to confuse me. I made my move, lunging toward her like an angry bat. I tackled her and knocked the wooden death-machine out of her hand with ease. “It’s either you, or me. And I’ll be damned if it’s me.” I said as I laughed mentally at my little pun. I’m a Vampire, so I’m already eternally damned! LOL!
I opened my fanged mouth and bit the woman on the neck, draining her of all her sweet kool-aid-like liquids. They tasted copper-like with just a hint of cherry flavor. It oozed all around my mouth, and some of it even dribbled on my chin. This was the life.
It was just then that I noticed some fancy flashing lights in the distance. They were playing this strange music. And before I knew it, a gang of fat white men were surrounding me with guns pointed. “Drop the woman and no one gets hurt!” he called to me. I stood and did as I was told.
Turns out, I wasn’t a vampire after all. Even worse, apparently that woman I killed was my mother. Well, on the bright side, at least I don’t have to worry about cleaning my room anymore.
