Vampires Today

Once, there was a year where every romance had fangs. It was hard to open up a novel without a vampire bearing down on a young, virgin neck. Soon, they were on the television. Later, the sidewalks. Teenagers. They owned us with their hackneyed plots. Platinum fleur-de-lis emblazoned on their jeans. How do they wash them? I asked.They don’t, my friend said.It’s part of what keeps them so dark and stiff. An entire generation has arrived dark and stiff. Unlike my pliable, light, pubescent years. I grew up reading Little House on the Prairie. Sweet, blind Mary stole my heart. Turn the page. Oklahoma. Wild mustangs. Malaria. And Pa. Talk about a hero. Now they have boys so angry they transform into wild, shirtless dogs. They are maniacs, these fans. They beg their mothers to drive them to the theater where they burst into dollars and popcorn in their seats. They want the car tossed off their withering girl bodies. Lured from their couches, they are eager to be taken from their lives and placed directly in the vampire’s mouth. Younger and younger.Cha-ching. Is there nothing anyone can do?