Ah! The wretched afternoon again.
I don't like it. Why do I have to suffer when the entire world is moving just fine?
I hate it.
The sun, the sunlight. And everything sunny.
It's been more than a thousand years that I have been roaming around.
Yeah... I am a-thousand-and-a-nine years old vampire roaming around in this world... Ohm is the name. I have no way to die. And so, I survive on blood.
I try to coexist. I feed on the blood of the almost dead, except for the ones who are suffering from any blood-ailing diseases. Not that it can give me the disease. But how do I explain?
When I was a human, my mom taught me to eat fresh foods. So, I have a habit of discarding the rotten ones.
Unlike how they portray it in movies, I can sleep just fine. I can eat normal food too. It doesn't get stored anywhere, but I can put on a show.
The only thing that resembles what they show is the forbidden sunlight. My skin doesn't glisten in sunlight. It will burn and leave me empty on that part. I have a hollow part in my body, like a hole in my right thigh, which I hide well with the jeans or shorts I wear.
When I was a newly turned vampire, I was lost and curious. So, by mistake, I walked out and got burned.
I immediately retracted, and I was saved. But that hollow is unreal. And it reminds me time and again that I am not human. I am not... normal in terms of everyone around me.
I know a few others who are like me. Like dogs, we have territories. We do not cross our lines. And so we do not crowd.
There is an unsaid rule too. We are not allowed to convert others just like that. Only those who do not die after we consume their blood automatically become one of us. They are sent to dungeons and tied up for the time they accept the fact and agree to coexist with humans and others of our kind.
That dungeon is dark and smelly. It smells of blood and tears. So, any new vampire, when released, first runs towards the sun despite being warned.
I did the same. And I suffered the same too. A few who do not realise it in those fractions of seconds even die on the stop and turn to ash like they never existed.
It's like their entire existence is gone in a second by only this sunlight.
So, I hate it. Like all of our kinds, I too hate it. Or rather, I used to hate it until I saw him.
He struggles the same way I do.
Never in my existence have I seen a human trying to avoid sunlight like he does.
Initially, it intrigued me. So instead of my thirst craving for his blood, my curiosity craved an understanding of his actions.
It's been a month of seeing him hop on the slabs of shadow to walk forward and reach his destination when the sun is over his head. He carries an umbrella for a few days. And the other days when he is late, he usually rushes.
I see him wince when, by chance, he gets into the sun.
A smile forms on my face, which has stopped moving for any expression in the past thousand years. Even my features are frozen in place because I hardly smile, cry, or even flinch.
Nothing... Nothing affects me at all but him.
Unknown to myself, I am following him daily from his house to his office.
Then from his office to his house.
On the way, he stops at convenience stores at times. Then, on weekends, he sometimes won't leave the house, and sometimes he will go to a nearby bakery and have croissants.
He likes black coffee with baklawa on a few days. He eats instant meals mostly, and sometimes he orders takeout.
So far, his sleeping posture and the posture in which he sits to play games on his laptop are all wrong. He snores lightly and sometimes drools.
I spend my nights by his bedside. Because... I am curious.
There is something he does that is similar to mine. And it is not similar to any other human.
Before any other of my kind gets to know it, and before any other of my kind becomes curious, I want to know the reason.
The days were longer before because I had been living a long time. But now each day seems like a minute.
These days, I am always following this person who avoids sunlight.
But something changed today. At the café. When...
"Excuse me?"
I sucked in my breath, which I do not even need to take in the first place, but we are so used to pretending to be humans that it comes as a habit.
I turned to look at a black pair of eyes, which I had seen before but never met with mine.
"Can you please let me share this table with you?" He asked.
I have been interacting with humans as smoothly as possible. In actuality, my mere presence charms the majority of them. But for the first time in a thousand years, I am nervously nodding, unable to open my mouth to simply say yes.
He smiled, showing his dimples. I knew they were there. But I never saw them this prominent before.
"Thanks." He chirped, dragging the opposite chair to place his bag besides it on the ground and picking up the menu from the table. "It's rare to see this place so crowded." He mumbled.
At some point, I could calm myself a bit, but the problem was that he was unaware of the pink tint on his cheek.
For a vampire, this is dangerous. One cannot love my food enough to keep looking at it.
I dragged my chair back and walked out of the café as fast as I could.
Strangely, how long had I waited for this very instance? I wanted to know him. Ask him about the sunlight. But all I could do was struggle to contain myself.
I don't have a heart. Technically, I cannot have one, right? Then why is there a pain in my chest?
I avoided going to the same bedside for a few nights. I avoided following him or even going to the locations where he could pass.
However, strangely, after a month, I saw him again. Unable to contain myself on a rainy day, I rushed to the market near his house and saw him walking out of the same café.
The pain in the chest that had subsided last month rose again. I gulped and strolled with an umbrella towards him, who was walking happily in the rain. But as I reached midway, the rain stopped, and suddenly there was sunlight.
I saw him running to the nearest shelter.
This time, my curiosity rose to its peak. He was walking like it was nothing while it was raining cats and dogs. And just when the sunlight blessed the city after the dark day, his gloomy face made me curious yet again.
So instead, I did not close the umbrella and walked to him.
"Excuse me." I spoke. The voice came out hoarse because I hardly speak. But he looked up brightly while he brushed his wet hair. "Can you tell me what time it is?" My phone seems to have run out of battery."
He looked at me for a second longer before smiling wide. "It's still seven hours to go before you come and sit besides my bed."
I gaped at him, unable to form words. He smiled at me and walked a step closer, holding my umbrella. "Can you give me a lift in your umbrella?" He asked with a smile. Our faces are so close that I had to again suck in my breath and stop breathing before I pounced on him. The smell of blood will expose me in broad daylight.
He did not wait for my answer; instead, he held the umbrella in such a way that our hands were almost touching and started walking in the direction of his house.
I was speculating about what was happening. Even if I can't sleep, I don't need to. And I never dream. Then what is happening? This cannot be real.
"I never thought you would come and talk to me." He turned and smiled at me.
I still did not speak.
"But I am glad you did. What are you, by the way?"
I paused. He almost stepped out of the umbrella but walked back in immediately. "Shit, I could have... What are you doing? Walk!" He said.
"What do you know about me?" I finally asked.
He grinned. "You followed me daily a month ago. And that you even entered my room from the window and sat at my bedside watching me."
"And you don't think I am a serial killer?"
"You are a stalker, for sure. But if you wanted to kill me, you would have killed me sooner. And the way you climb the apartment wall and get into my room is not human. And that's why I am asking you, What are you? A ghost?" He started pulling the umbrella and walking, making me walk along.
"I am Ohm." I said.
"I am Nanon." He smiled. "But I am not asking your name. Though that was the next question in line."
"What do you think?" I asked as we reached his apartment building.
He got out of the umbrella. "Ummm... If I go by the movies and books... maybe a vampire?"
I closed the umbrella and smiled. "And what if your guess is true?"
"Then you grant me a wish in return for guessing correctly." He said.
I gaped at him, unable to process what to say next.
"C'mon in. Today, spend time in my house with me instead of sneaking in." He walked in, leaving me perplexed.
Because he did not stop, I followed him into his apartment. For the first time through the door.
"What would you like to drink? Tea, coffee, beer, soda, or blood?" He grinned.
I pressed my lips together and sat on a stool. I never thought he could be this weird.
"Did you hit your head somewhere?" I asked.
"No, I just missed you." He said it plainly, but a bit seriously, looking into my eyes.
I gulped. He sipped some water and kept looking at me.
When we both did not say a word for a while, he walked up to me. "You stopped following me. I was so curious." He said that and took out packets of ramen from the shelf. "Do you eat?" He asked casually.
I was losing my patience. A thousand-and-a-nine-year-old vampire is losing patience with this guy. Unbelievable. "Are you insane? What are you?" This time, I asked.
He turned to me and smiled his dimpled smile. "Guess?"
I rolled my eyes. From the sound of his beating heart and the scent of his blood that is rushing through his veins and making me itch, he can be nobody else but a human.
I shook my head and walked to the other side of the room to distract myself. I heard him giggle behind me, and the smell of ramen filled the room. "You sure like to play a lot of video games." I commented.
"I do." He said it plainly.
"And you seem to have something with the sunlight?" I asked now, turning to him while he poured his ramen into a bowl.
"Ah that! You noticed?" He grinned and kept the pan in the sink. "I have a sunlight allergy. You can say it's forbidden for me."
I froze in place. My eyes landed on the picture of a teen boy on the wall behind Nanon.
"Aaarrrggghhhhh!!!" I yelled and yelled in pain as the shackles around me did not allow me to move.
From afar, I saw a boy walking towards me.
I hissed. My throat ached with the smell of blood hitting me.
"Who are you?" The boy asked in the dark. I could only see his silhouette.
"Arrgh... Aahh..." I tried to free myself, but I could do nothing and wince in pain. I wanted to pounce on him, but I guess that is why these shackles are around me. I recently converted into a vampire. And I cannot control my thirst.
The boy walked forward, and slowly his face became visible. He was a teenage boy with small dimples and a bright face.
He looked at me, and I kept hissing at him. Strange was the part that he wasn't afraid of me. Instead, he kept looking at me with eyes that seemed amused.
"You are beautiful." He said it and smiled.
In that instant, for a moment, the pain in me subsided. Who in their right mind would find a shackled, bloodthirsty vampire beautiful?
"Out of all the ones they brought here, you are the most beautiful." He said.
"YOU CAME AGAIN?" The voice from behind the darkness surrounded the space.
There must be something wrong with me. I was worried for the boy all of a sudden. The voice was that of the vampire who turned me into one.
"Sorry." The boy instead answered very normally. "I know I shouldn't have come. But he was pretty loud." He pointed at me and smiled. "Don't let this beautiful creature be in so much pain, uncle."
I was shocked. He is calling him uncle?
"HE IS NOT MY REAL NEPHEW. BUT AN ORPHAN WHO WORKS IN THAT HOSPITAL INFORMS ME ABOUT THE ONES WHO ARE HAVING A HARD TIME SURVIVING AS WELL AS DYING. LIKE HOW YOU WERE WHEN YOU WERE SUFFERING FROM INFLUENZA." The so-called uncle answered my question without being asked.
In the last two years, I could finally forget about my pain and stop screaming. Instead, I was sitting normally and watching the boy.
"GO BACK, KID. THIS PLACE IS NOT FOR YOU." He said this to the boy.
"I AM NOT A KID!" The boy said he was pouting.
For some reason, I couldn't take my eyes off him.
The boy turned to me and smiled, showing me his dimples. "When you are okay, would you like to go on a ramen date with me?" He asked, leaving me dumbfounded.
"THAT'S IT. OUT YOU GO." The uncle vampire picked him up with an arm and walked him away. It was only after he left that I started feeling the thirst and pain again.
I looked at the photo for a long time before I saw Nanon smiling at me. He winked and smiled. "Would you like to go on a ramen date with me?" He asked.
I gulped and gaped.
I was stunned.
"You..." I couldn't form words.
But he realized. He shook his head and kept a lid on the bowl before getting up and walking to me. "This is my fourth life after I met you." He said.
I blinked.
"I don't know why God did this to me, but I remembered you all my life. But I couldn't find you. The day I saw you for the first time, I knew that my prayers were finally answered."
"H-how?" I was unable to move.
He held my hand, pulled me to a stool, and made me sit. He smiled at me, holding my face in his palms. "I asked God before every life to give me a way to find you. But maybe I did not realize the potential he gave me. So, before this life, I asked him to give you a way to reach me instead. And guess what? He made me allergic to the sun! Amazing, no?"
I kept looking at him, unable to process anything. This is all unreal. I tried pinching myself, but my hollow body did not have an effect.
"You can't believe anything, right? So let me help you feel like this is real."
Before I could understand anything, a pair of lips held mine. I paused like a rock. I did not know what was going on. The only close proximity I have with humans is while I am drinking their blood. But this... It's like my body is feeling some new sensations.
All my body parts are behaving differently.
It's like warmth has graced me from head to toe.
He nibbled on my lips lightly, and his warm, wet tongue brushed past me and made its way into my mouth. Before I knew it, I closed my eyes and kissed him back.
It was like somebody gave me my life back. The life of a 22-year-old boy who, before suffering from influenza, was as healthy as a horse Who was excited about experiencing youth and love. And who, unknown to himself, was in love with the teen boy who helped him reduce the pain his body was in, even if it was just for a few minutes.
As we broke apart, Nanon wrapped his hands around my shoulders and smiled at me. This is so unfair. I know I love him, and I feel he loves me enough to ask God to let me meet him, the God for whom I am an evil that shouldn't actually exist. If he allowed Nanon to find me, then I might have done something good with my life.
But he is so ready for this moment, and I am not. I am feeling giddy like a teenager.
Nanon chuckled. "I felt like this and looked exactly like you when I first saw you. I am glad that after 5 lifetimes, I could see you showing me the same face."
Suddenly, my thirst has been overcome. Years of practice or whatever, but I am able to control myself. In fact, I don't want to harm Nanon in any way. Instead, I want to protect him.
Nanon pulled my cheeks when I kept looking at him, speechless, talking to myself endlessly. "Hey, would you like to go on a ramen date with me now?" He pointed at the bowl behind him.
I chuckled. after a thousand years. Not just a smile, but laughter. Nanon laughed along and quickly placed a kiss on my lips again before turning to his bowl, keeping two pairs of chopsticks besides it. "Hurry up. We have a whole life to talk. But these will turn soggy in the next 2 minutes."
I looked at him drawing curtains on the window as the sunlight was starting to fall in the kitchen area.
Thanks to the forbidden sunlight, I, a thousand-and-a-nine-year-old vampire, found a new meaning to life... and love. Even the hollow in my body seems to have filled with the warmth of the boy who just waited five lifetimes for this ramen date with me.