by Collins, Tim
Grandpa? Really? Do I get a say in this?
I hope so-called ‘Grandpa’ will be fetching his own blood supplies rather than tucking into ours. I need all the blood I can drink at my age, and I barely get enough as it is.
* We had a bit of trouble earlier this year with a vampire Dad transformed and abandoned in his wilder days. He’s probably still feeling guilty about this and wants to go out of his way to help the vampires he’s created. Which is all well and good as long as he doesn’t neglect the most important vampire he’s created - me!
MONDAY 12TH SEPTEMBER
3PM
I sat in the library with Chloe at lunchtime. It’s quite a romantic place for us because it’s where I seduced her and claimed her heart earlier this year (after a couple of false starts).
I got annoyed when I saw she was reading a vampire romance novel called Touch of the Forbidden Prince, which is part of a series called Dark Temptations.
Dark Temptations? We’re a race of vicious blood-drinkers, not a selection of plain chocolates. Why she feels the need to indulge in that far-fetched nonsense when she’s got the real thing right here I have no idea.
She looked rather distracted, so I assumed she was worrying about the prospect of losing me one day. But when I asked what she was thinking, it turned out she was obsessing about becoming a vampire yet again. Give it a rest!
I told her she must never mention the topic of transformation inside the school grounds again. I said this was to protect my identity, but the truth is I’m just bored to tears by the subject. It’s not like I don’t hear enough guff about coffins and eternity at home.
10PM
I went to the park with Chloe after school, as I wasn’t in much of a hurry to return to our crowded house. We had a cuddle on a bench and I really wanted to drink her blood, but I couldn’t in case someone walked past. Needless to say, I was really thirsty by the time I got home, so imagine my dismay when I saw there was no blood left in the fridge!
Tellingly, Grandpa was sitting next to an empty flask, with a trickle of blood dried to his chin. Thanks for saving me some, you selfish oaf.
Out of interest, what am I supposed to do? I can’t attack anyone here in town without revealing myself as a vampire, so it looks like I’m just going to have to wait until Mum and Dad fetch some new blood tomorrow. I told Dad that Grandpa should only be allowed to access the blood in the fridge after all the main family members have fed, but he said it wouldn’t make him feel very welcome if we introduced that rule. But how does he think I feel when I have to go thirsty all night?
In the meantime I shall try to take my mind off my thirst by watching Don’t Look in the Attic, a DVD that Craig from school has lent me.
2AM
My movie plan didn’t work very well. The film was really gory, and featured explicit shots of blood spurting from severed limbs, so it was a bit like a human trying to stave off their appetite by watching a cookery show.
TUESDAY 13TH SEPTEMBER
3PM
Jason showed everyone his new iPhone in Maths this morning, and all the silly humans were fawning over it. It didn’t impress me. I’ve got so used to new technology coming and going that these trivial gadgets no longer excite me. It only seems like a moment ago that a boy called Brian Palmer brought a Walkman into school and you’d have thought he had a working time machine from the excitement it caused.
I don’t understand why Jason even needs a phone. It’s not like he’s got anything intelligent to say. He looks like he should communicate through smoke signals rather than text messages.
7PM
Craig was reading a book about horror in English today and he said that my mum looked like the Bride of Frankenstein. I thought he was disrespecting my family so I went over to give him a deadarm, but when he showed me the picture I had to admit it did look a bit like Mum. It wasn’t much of an insult really. If anything, Frankenstein’s Monster was punching above his weight there.
When I got home, I found that Mum and Dad had harvested some lovely flasks of type AB+. It was very sweet and obviously taken from someone with high blood-sugar levels. Whoever it came from should probably go and see a doctor if they recover.
To make sure I don’t miss out on my share of this lovely claret tomorrow, I’ve written my name on one of the flasks in permanent marker.
I’m feeling much stronger after my blood feast, which is just as well as I fully intend to dish out a humiliating defeat to Jason in PE tomorrow to make up for his disgraceful behaviour last week.
11PM
I just asked Dad if he’d buy me an iPhone and he said no. He said he couldn’t understand what was so good about them, which is hardly surprising as he doesn’t understand what’s good about any mobile phones. He still thinks they’re called ‘radiotelephones’ for a start.
It’s completely unacceptable. He lets smelly old duffers help themselves to our blood, yet when it comes to buying his only son a decent phone, he’s not interested. It’s not like he hasn’t got the money. He’s got loads stashed around the house, and he’s been hoarding some of it for so long it’s become obsolete. Perhaps I should take a bag of gold doubloons down to Phones 4U and see if they’ll swap them for an iPhone with a twelve-month contract.
WEDNESDAY 14TH SEPTEMBER
1PM
I just got told off by Mr Morris for snogging Chloe. He said that heavy petting was against school rules and if he caught us again we’d both be in detention.
If being in love is a crime, then lock me up and throw away the key. I’d be able to escape using my vampire strength, so it wouldn’t be much of a punishment, but that’s not the point.
I’m off to PE now. I like to get changed before everyone else so they don’t see how pale my skin is. Also, we’re doing badminton this afternoon and I want to make sure I get Jason as my partner. I know he’s got brute strength, but I doubt he’ll be any good at a sport that requires skill and dexterity.
8PM
I turned up at the changing room ten minutes early, only to find that Jason was already there. I’m not surprised he also wanted to get changed early. His back is so hairy I thought for a minute that I’d wandered into the Neanderthal wing of the Natural History Museum by mistake. He wouldn’t have to bother wearing a shirt at all if it didn’t look so repulsive.
I managed to partner up with him for badminton, but sadly he was pretty good at that, too. I was planning to hold my powers back and let a few shots hit the net, but he was playing so well that I couldn’t bring myself to do so. Plus, everyone else was focusing on their own games, so I didn’t think it would matter if I went for it.
It turned out that neither of us missed the shuttlecock at all, and we made a single rally last the entire lesson. It was only when Mr Moss blew the whistle and told us to pack up that it became apparent that one of us would have to lose on purpose. I saw determination in Jason’s eyes, and it was clear that he would rather play all night than miss a shot, so I held my racket up and let the shuttlecock fly past to show him he hadn’t really beaten me. That didn’t stop him holding his arms in the air and whooping in a ludicrous manner, of course.
Fine, have your little moment in the sun. I don’t care. I’m happy to let you shallow little humans have your victories. At the end of the day, I’m the one who gets to live for ever and bite the necks of hot girls, so I’m the real winner, whatever happens in PE lessons.
THURSDAY 15TH SEPTEMBER
11AM
There’s a bug going round school and almost everyone is off sick. I notice that the tough gang have all taken ill at the same time. Last time that happened they were spotted dropping Mini Cheddars on to the heads of bald men from the balcony above the shopping precinct. Jason seems fine, though. I expect viruses are so repulsed by the hair on his back that they stay well away.
Obviously as a vampire I’m immune to disease because of my healing powers. I could pull a sickie if I wanted, but when you’ve been up all night unlocking all the tracks on
Gran Turismo, you rather welcome the change of environment.
6PM
Despite my warnings about getting hooked on such nonsense, Chloe has now moved on to the second book in the Dark Temptations series, which is called Lure of the Deadly Immortal. Perhaps this is why she brought up the topic of transformation again as we walked home this afternoon.
When I told Dad I had a human girlfriend back in May, he gave me an ancient leaflet warning she’d get obsessed with the idea of transformation. At the time, I thought it was just prejudiced old nonsense, but now I see it was true. Oh, weak human race! Why can’t you enjoy the privilege of consorting with our kind without lusting after our shadowy domain?
Chloe kept pushing me for technical details of how I’d go about transforming her, so I gave in and explained. I said I’d have to drink her blood again, but this time keep on going much longer, and then cut open one of my veins and let my blood flow into hers until it revived her. Then, after a couple of days in bed, she’d be a blood-drinking immortal and never have to bother with her weekly food shop again.
I immediately began to regret using us as the example in this hypothetical scenario, because she replied, ‘Yes! Let’s do it, Nigel! I want to turn into a vampire!’
I have to say I was shocked by her audacity. I knew this request would come eventually, but I had no idea it would be so soon or so brazen. I mumbled something about how transformation is a big step and you should wait a long time before making the commitment, before pretending I had some important homework to do and darting off home.
I really don’t know what to do now. I suppose I should talk to Dad, but I’m afraid he’ll forbid me from ever seeing Chloe again.
FRIDAY 16TH SEPTEMBER
6PM
In English this morning Mr Byrne told us we had to choose a novel to talk about next week. One of the books on the list was Dracula, and I realized that I hadn’t read it for eight decades, so I thought I’d give it a go. Better keep my copy hidden from Chloe, though. She’ll only use it as another excuse to go on about transformation.
This afternoon we had an art lesson where we were supposed to paint bowls of fruit. Jason ignored these instructions and drew a dead body with loads of blood coming out of it instead. Everyone thought it was really cool and daring, but I didn’t think much of his art skills. I tried to do a gory painting of my own, but it was so good I made myself thirsty and had to sneak into the supply cupboard to drink some blood from my flask.
I was really thirsty again by the time I got home, so I was dismayed to see Grandpa tucking into the flask with my name on! Can the old fool even read? I had to make do with the clotted dregs, which were hardly sufficient. When he left the room, I asked Mum why Grandpa can’t harvest his own blood, and she said that it’s hard for him to go out and hunt because he’s old and frail.
He doesn’t look very frail to me. The other day I saw him lift up a huge metal filing cabinet in Dad’s study with just one hand because his bus pass had fallen underneath it.
11PM
Chloe came round to visit this evening. She finds it too cold here because we never have the heating on, and Dad goes mental if anyone messes with the thermostat. I would use this as an excuse for a cuddle, but Mum has now introduced a stupid rule where we have to keep the door to my room open whenever she’s round. It’s because she thinks I’ll be drinking Chloe’s blood all the time, which isn’t even true. If I wanted to drink her blood, I’d do it in her house when her parents are away. I wouldn’t do it here with my immature sister barging in and destroying the mood. She even burst in and did a crude blood-drinking mime on her Tenderheart Care Bear today, and I had to get Mum to tell her to stop.
SATURDAY 17TH SEPTEMBER
When I was down at the shopping precinct today, I spotted Jason with his family. Let’s just say it’s not hard to see where he gets his looks from! He was with his mum, dad and little sister, and they were looking through the shoes in the bargain bin outside JJB Sports like troglodytes inspecting rocks.
Everyone in Jason’s family is tall and stocky like him, and they all have the same bushy eyebrows, even his mum and sister. I was really hoping Jason would buy some cut-price trainers so I could mock him in PE. Pikey Darren from school once bought a pair of trainers with just two stripes on them and tried to add a third stripe with Tipp-Ex to make them look like Adidas, but it fooled no one.
Jason and his family soon gave up on the cheap shoes and sat down on a bench. Then rather than going to Starbucks and getting coffees, Jason’s dad went into the supermarket and bought them each a tin of corned beef, and they scooped the meat out with their fingers.
It was so disgusting. I know I always find the sight of humans feeding pretty rank, but I bet the sight of Jason and family wolfing down bargain meat would have looked gruesome to even the skuzziest human.
SUNDAY 18TH SEPTEMBER
Today my sister embarrassed us all by asking Dad where vampires come from. Although she’s been a vampire as long as me, she was only ten human years old when she turned, so she’s too young to be told the facts of death.
My parents usually try and brush aside such questions by saying that when a mummy and daddy vampire love each other very much a bat delivers a vampire child, but this time Grandpa stepped in.
He said that great and powerful gods once ruled over the earth, and humans worshipped them and made sacrifices to them. One of these gods wanted to meet his subjects, so he decided to become human for a day. However, he fell in love with a woman, and chose to stay in human form so he could be with her. He let some of his spirit pass into her body and in doing so created a race that had the strength and beauty of the gods, but could pass as human, and this race became known as vampires. To this day, the spirit of the old god enters those selected as worthy to join the race. This supposedly explains why we still need the sacrifice of human blood to survive and why the symbols of newer religions like Christianity cause us distress.
Obviously, I’m old enough to know this is just a myth invented to cover up the gory truth, but I have to say I found Grandpa’s speech compelling. It certainly did the trick with my sister, who said she felt proud to have been chosen by the ancient spirit, and I’m sure I saw Mum wiping a tear out of the corner of her eye.
MONDAY 19TH SEPTEMBER
12PM
I was late for school this morning because I had to wait for Grandpa to finish in the bathroom. While I’m sure he has to look his best for a day of lounging around and stealing blood supplies, some of us have actually got lives to be getting on with. I told him to leave the bathroom free between 7.30am and 8.30am in future, to give me enough time to floss my teeth, but he took no notice.
When you’re late for school, you’re supposed to write an excuse on a form and give it to a teacher. I couldn’t bring myself to write ‘old man who’s pretending to be my grandparent hogged the bathroom so I couldn’t floss my fangs’, so I wrote ‘bus delayed’ instead. Not that it stopped me from getting detention.
6PM
Jason’s phone ran out of battery today, so he couldn’t use it as a calculator in Maths. I offered to lend him mine, which can draw graphs and has loads of extra buttons you don’t need until A level. You should have seen his face! He looked like he didn’t know whether to use it to add up the angles of a triangle or fashion it into a primitive spear. Maybe I should try and find him an abacus next time.
I’m sure Jason’s only in the same set as me for Maths because he’s new. As soon as he has to do a test Mr Wilson will realize he’s stupid and put him down to the bottom set, and I won’t have to listen to him adding up.
11PM
I started Dracula this evening. I have to say I’m enjoying reading it again, although the language and technology are much more old-fashioned now. Count Dracula himself is a very cool character, and seems to be having a wonderful time. I wish I could live in a decaying castle with loads of sexy vampire chicks at my beck and call! If any real vampire acted as irresponsibly as him, t
hey’d get a stake through their frilly shirt in minutes.
Later on, my sister started playing her awful teen pop really loudly, which ruined the novel’s spooky Victorian atmosphere, so I grabbed a flask of blood and came down here to the graveyard to read it.
I have to say that I find graveyards at night very peaceful places. I suppose it must be part of my culture. At any rate, I’m having a relaxing time away from the stress of noisy families and high-maintenance girlfriends.
3AM
This Van Helsing guy is an idiot.
TUESDAY 20TH SEPTEMBER
Today I took Chloe’s advice and signed up for the school talent contest so I can showcase my amazing backflips. I know I’m sort of breaking Dad’s rules about displaying vampire powers, but last year I saw a boy on a TV talent show doing backflips as part of his act and nobody walloped a stake in him.
I have chosen to perform to a track called ‘I Like to Move It’ by Reel 2 Real featuring The Mad Stuntman, and I spent tonight timing my jumps to it. I looked pretty cool (if I do say so myself) and I’m sure to win. At any rate, I’m bound to be better than Jason, who’s signed up to give a display of football skills, which I’m sure will be utterly fascinating to anyone with an IQ of single figures.
