Flash Fiction Friday: The Hunger

Today's Flash Fiction Friday is: The Hunger

Lord Vlad hated this era.  Once he was called "Lord" by the servants, soldiers, and serfs of his little kingdom in what is now someplace in Romania.  He ruled over all he could see or conquer.

But then he met her.  She was a maid, beautiful by the standards 500 years ago.  His attempted seduction of her had an outcome he did not expect as the pain grasped his neck and wouldn't release him.  And hasn't released him, for 500 long years.

And now he was a vampire, living in the Twenty-first Century, and just another man with a social security number and living off the interest from his 500 year old investments.  But money did not interest him other than it was needed in this era to keep a place for his coffin.

And tonight, he had the hunger.  Worse than ever before.  He skulked through the darkness, avoiding streetlights and brightly lit storefronts. He was dressed in a black suit with a blood red tie.  Clothes in this era are so unfashionable, he thought.  And wearing armor was completely passe.

But tonight he would feed, late into the night, satisfying the need, the want, the desire that only one thing could satiate.

A young girl, couldn't be more than 20, was walking down the street.  He could smell her, smell her warm flesh.  The blood she held would be warm and salty and would keep him alive another decade.

He smiled as he walked past.  She whispered, "Creep" and kept walking.

No one respected him anymore, he growled to himself.

Then he saw his goal.  Glancing at his watch (one of the many technological marvels of this age that he really couldn't appreciate still longing for a time past), he knew it was not too late.  It was summer, the sun did not go down early and this late at night was his only chance.

Stealthily he approached his goal.  Unfortunately, it, too was well-lit with those damnable electric lights.  He so much preferred the flicker of a candle but that, too, was a relic from the past denied him.

The door opened easily despite the late hour.  He quickly walked forward, squinting against the bright florescents overhead.

The girl smiled at him and he smiled back.  Yes!  This was it.  This would feed his hunger.  The hunger that started at sunset when he arose from his coffin and could only be satiated by this.

"Welcome to Taco Bell," she said.  "May I take your order?"