Claude just shook his head at me when I told him of my encounter.

"You're going to get yourself killed," he said.

"Since when has that ever stopped me? Besides, you'd never let me stay dead."

"Yeah, we really gotta talk about that. And by talk, I mean me yelling and you listening."

"Yell away. I'm ready. But can you really stay mad at this face?"

I made my most pathetic face.

"Oh, I can definitely stay mad at any face you give. Especially that one. But seriously dude: things have changed. We are so far out of the realm of normal that it's not funny. You're really going to get yourself killed if you're not careful."

"Dude, I'm a vampire. I don't stay dead."

"Yeah, but what happens if it's another vampire doing the killing? A vampire like Harry?"

"Let's burn that bridge when we're on it," I said, with a grin that didn't completely fool Claude or even myself.

***

The sign we eventually came up with was subtle.

"REAL BLOODSUCKERS INSIDE!" was printed in bold red lettering on the front of the sign. It was as subversive and as juvenile as possible, and it was perfect. Unfortunately, it may have been a little too perfect and on the nose.

About twenty minutes after I got there, there had been a bit of a murmur in the crowd as if someone famous had shown up. If you've ever been to one of the bigger film festivals like we have every year with the Toronto International Film Festival, then you get familiar with that kind of murmur. It's different in tone and intensity and makes you want to turn and see who it is if only to get a quick selfie as that famous person sprints by behind you.

This time it wasn't anybody really famous, at least that I knew. It was a group of rich vampire dude-bros, and they were as cocky as hell, and they were looking for a fight. Specifically, they were looking for a fight with me.

There were about five of them, all skinny, pale and white in that classic vampire fashion as if they were auditioning to be the next great literary vampire. The crowd may have just seen some of the richest and most fashionable young adults in the city, famous simply for being young, rich and stupid, but I could tell that they were vampires. The eyes were a dead giveaway of course, but it was more in the way they walked, that swagger that said that they owned the city and more than anything, that they owned you.

Four of the five broke off from the group and headed across the street towards me. I just watched with that deer caught in the headlight look on my face, trying hard not to react. Harry had practically given me permission to be here, so this couldn't really be happening, right? Just in case, I quickly ran through the list of things I could have done that would have pissed off Harry, then when I realized that would take too long, I instead tried to figure out if someone had seen me while I was doing the thing that I should not have been doing.

Not that I'm admitting to anything of course...

"Hey Bob, you suck!" One of the frat boys hissed as he and his four buddies circled around me.

"Why don't you kill yourself you retard?" Another one hissed.

"Everybody hates you," the one with too much hair-gel whispered, and he had a definite kind of Lester-the-Molester look to him.

"Shouldn't you kids be in school," I responded. "Where are your hall passes?"

I noticed a couple of people in the line recording on their cell phones and shook my head. Kids in high school had better insults than these guys, and I had been out of high school for a very long time. They should have gone straight to emasculating me instead. So much more effective at any age.

"Seriously Bob, nobody wants you here."

"Yeah man, you're way too poor. Just go the fuck home."

"You will never be one of us. Ever."

I noticed the fifth guy who had held back across the street. He looked kind of familiar, classically handsome in a punchable kind of way. He had hair that could only be described as lustrous and that at least seemed familiar. I just couldn't put a name to the face as punchable as it looked. The way he was staring a hole through me, with that level of smirk said that he definitely knew me and I had definitely pissed him off.

Something about the way nobody had actually punched me yet suddenly clicked home and I grinned at the morons circling me, playing the intimidation game to the best of their limited abilities. Apparently, a grin was the last thing they had expected, and I was prepared for one of them to finally punch me if it wasn't for one thing.

"You guys can't actually touch me, can you?"

They faltered and looked uncertainly at each other. Lester-the-Molester rallied.

"Oh, we can do more than touch you. In fact, we're going to fuck you up—"

"Then hit me!"

Lester-the-Molester raised his fist and lunged at me—

I'd like to say I didn't flinch, but I'd be a goddamn liar. Of course I flinched. Even though I knew he was only faking me out and that his fist would stop inches from my face, there was still the reality of a fucking fist flying through the air heading directly for my nose, and my body knew it was going to hurt. It's hard telling the body not to react, that it's all a big ruse when the body knows from past experience what kind of pain and indignities I've invited. So of course I flinched; you would have flinched too.

I grinned through my still unbroken teeth.

"Tell my friend across the street that this is all pointless. None of you can touch me, and you still don't scare me."

We both turned to look at the dude with the punchable face (what the hell was his name anyway?), and he just glared at me even more. I turned back to Lester-the-Molester.

"Can you at least tell me what his name is? I'm thinking Lawrence? Adolphus? Fuck-face?"

Lester-the-Molester never answered me. He just flipped the bird, and then he and the other three vampires walked away from me, keeping up their bravado as if they had succeeded in showing me who was boss, but I could see their heart wasn't in it. Lester-the-Molester whispered something to my nameless nemesis, and I waved cheerily when he glared directly at me.

If I had thought he had been giving me the death glare before, I was definitely wrong. He gave me two middle fingers there was some incoherent swearing in what might have been Italian, as he and his vampire crew made their way back to the club. With all of the noise on the street, it was kind of hard to hear, but I think it was mainly swearing.

A brunette who looked almost exactly like a popular movie star except for her pale blue vampire eyes, was watching me from inside her Maserati, which had pulled up in front of the club at some point in the last few minutes.

"I like your sign," she said. "Way to stick it to the man. Ironic though since you're one of us."

"They didn't seem to appreciate it," I said, and I could already feel the adrenaline ebbing away from me, my hands shaking and my stomach muscles clenching and unclenching, glad they hadn't been punched.

"Do you even know their names?" the movie-star vampire asked and I thought deeply.

"To tell you the truth, I can't even remember where I'm supposed to know these guys from but whatcha gonna do, right?"

"And yet they know exactly who you are." She winked at me. "Keep it real Bob."

"Wait, so you don't think I'm that bad?"

"I never said that. You're a terrible vampire. But is that such a bad thing?"

She left and no. I never saw her again because this isn't that kind of story where Bob goes off and dates some glamorous vampire, and all of the stuff you and I both wish would happen.

No, this is the other kind of story.

"'Real Bloodsuckers Inside'?" This was a leggy brunette who had wandered over from the line. She seemed genuinely concerned that someone was outside with a sign. "What is that even supposed to mean?"

I jerked a finger at the sign. "Says exactly what I mean," I said smugly, and put my fingers to my lips. "Shh! I'm not allowed to say more than that, but beware and heed my warning!"

"You're weird," the girl said and gave me an odd look. She hurried back across the street to join her friends in the long line of people who were just dying to get into the club. They were more like lambs to the slaughter than they would have liked. The slaughter was of course metaphorical.

In a large city, the murder of a single person, or the disappearance of a lot of well-off white kids would raise a huge stink. So while they may have been marching into the largest and most well-funded lair of vampires in the city, nobody was getting killed, everybody was just having fun, and if they had a hazy recollection of just how the night had gone, you could always blame it on the booze and the drugs man. HTDK was known for some killer parties, and the less you can remember, then the more fun was had, right?

Damn skippy.

I continued my protest that night, but the encounter with those vampires had left me more shaken that I would like to admit.

Later that night, I chucked the sign into an open dumpster in an alley and just left it, wondering not for the first time if it was really worth it.

Oh, don't look at me like that, all sad and puppy-faced. It was not the first time I'd ever dumped a sign and had self-doubt about my purpose in life. It's kind of a weekly thing by this point.

But it was the first time I actually asked myself the serious question: Where were the other vampires out in the city who were just like me? And more importantly, how the hell would I even find them?

######### AUTHOR'S NOTE: #############

Question of the Day: would you try to make it on your own or would doing a club or a gang of vampires be any help? Sound off in the comments!

The book is now AVAILABLE in Hardcover, Paperback and Ebooks. It's going to live here free on Wattpad, but if you love the story and want to support your awesome author (me), grab a copy from one of the lovely retailers below. Who knows: maybe it can become a bestseller with the help of you lovely WattPadders

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