I’d just been told that my father was a vampire. It was a lot to take in, so I stumbled back, taking a seat in the auto shop. The owner, who I now realised must be a vampire too, came and sat beside me.
“You seriously didn’t see this coming?” the man said. “The lack of actual photos of his family, the bats in your castle, the picture of the graveyard, the time he sent you to Transylvania, the coffin that he slept in?”
I shook my head. “Never occurred to me. So I am his real son? I’m not adopted? Did he ever actually work as a mechanic near Hawthorn?”
“Of course not. You’re a half-vampire. Although he did work here before I turned him into a vampire. Now that you’re here, I can give you your true reward. Your father wanted me, Jim the Vampire, to turn you into one of our kind as well.”
Looking up, I stared into those deep, hypnotic eyes. “What about the billions of dollars he left behind?”
Jim the Vampire laughed. “Do you really care about that, when I am offering you immortality?”
“Yes. Absolutely,” I answered.
“Oh, well the money is stored underground, at a Brunswick auto shop. We use it to hide all our money while providing car repairs in the Hawthorn area from here. Once your father was turned into a vampire, he used his hypnotic stare to become a very successful businessman. Of course, you could just use your own vampiric abilities to do the same.”
I shrugged. “I’d rather not. So, are all the mechanics I’ve seen over the last week vampires?”
“Indeed they are, although that wasn’t always the case. Almost all mechanics in Victoria are vampires, but in other states, they aren’t. However, your father wanted to give the gift of immortality to all the mechanics he worked for, so it has spread quite a bit across Australia.”
Jim the Vampire stood, heading toward the door. “Now, we’d best get to that other auto shop. Your father left a letter there that he wanted you to read before your transformation.”
And so I left with Jim, off to claim my inheritance and become a vampire.
– William Hunter Jr.