Gabriel Jeroschewitz, October 8th, 2026, dedicated and inspired by Bram Stoker and at least 50 B-grade Dracula movies that I have seen. And to all dentists and vampires everywhere.
He didn’t see ceiling tiles; instead, he saw sugar-coated gargoyles.
The vampire’s fangs ached with an appetite no longer strictly about blood, but memory. For a hundred years he had drunk the sweet, metallic blood of diabetics—Type I with their sharp, artificial-tasting blood, or the thick, slow molasses of Type II. One sip and the world around him would be a memory of the sickly-sweet decline that was the disease. Angels wept in the stratosphere. Souls too plump and lethargic to go to heaven, tainted by high-fructose despair. The sugar-free gladiators of the Vatican, the phantoms of a long-gone time, seemed now as if a fever dream. Their lean muscles forgotten under the layers of modern overindulgence. On Tuesday last week, he had met Sartre in the corner of a coffee shop, filled with existential anguish over a cool drink. Sartre muttered, “Hell is other people… and their HbA1c levels.” Nietzsche sat drinking his third green smoothie and lamented the death of the Übermensch to a candy bar. Even Jesus himself wept at the gates of the Vatican, remembering lions and roasted flesh, now replaced with the weak and ineffective jaws of a populace gumming Tootsie Rolls.
Now he was here. Inside the immaculate minty purgatory of Dr. Finch’s dental office, a vampire’s favorite, as the office provided a constant supply of low-sugar donors—receptionists who skipped dessert and hygienists who flossed. Today, however, there were no donors. Instead, the new dental assistant sat nervously on the vinyl chair, fidgeting with her black latex gloves with almost religious concentration.
Elara. The name tag said it, but the vampire knew her. She was the exception. Her skin was not only pale, but had a translucent glow to it, as if moonlight had been caught in porcelain. Her hair was blonde and tucked neatly into a severe, practical bun. Her face had high cheekbones and a trace of a smile. In this context, that smile could make the dead return from the grave, but only if they weren’t already drowning in sugar. Elara carried an air of discipline and energy, a sharp contrast to the syrupy fugue that dominated the city. The vampire idly adjusted his bib as he sat. Inhaling. Not the common fog of sugar and despair, yet something different—crisper, cleaner, like fresh mountain air after the rain or the first bite of a green apple before sugar takes over. Iron-rich. A hint of the diet angels once attempted to live by. A hundred years of sugar and yet he felt… revelatory.
He extended his fangs without thought. A sharp prickle on his gums. Finally. Not the thick, unsatisfying sludge of the modern world, but the real thing—the essential, life-giving liquid that had sustained his kind before the Great Saccharine Flood. This was not hunger exactly but a sort of intense, almost painful longing. A hundred years of starvation focusing in on the throbbing throb of her neck above her uniform. Not just a need for sustenance but also an urge for clarity. A need for the strength of his ancient self to return. Not the lethargy that followed a diabetic’s feast, but strength instead. Unbidden, his eyes roamed past the sharp line of her jaw and down to the slightly raised breast below her light blue scrubs. A long-suppressed feeling arose inside him. A fierce and insistent heat that had not affected him since the time when blood was blood and not sugar. His body starved for the true purpose it was intended for.
Elara bent over him, and the smell of pure purity wrapped him. Her blonde hair tickled his shoulder and bore a hint of mint and something not quite sugared—perhaps almond? Her gloved hand held steady while adjusting the dental instrument. The vampire’s eyes narrowed. He did not see a dental assistant but a vessel. The world merged into the sound of her carotid artery, the promise of iron-rich warmth, and the memory of strength. The pain in his fangs from the effort to keep them sheathed. The part of him that had survived on sugar-free diet soda and hopelessness for a hundred years desperately ached for release. Just a taste. Just to remember what it was like prior to the world turning into sugar.
His mouth opened in a silent snarl as the ancient predator in him rose. “Almost done, Mr. Hemlock,” Elara stated cheerfully and professionally, completely ignorant of the storm she had caused. She flashed that smile that could bring the dead back from the grave, and it was completely, devastatingly sincere. No fear was in her eyes; instead, there was focused professionalism. She was doing her job, focused on plaque and prophylaxis, and not on the ancient hunger that lay in that chair before her. She grabbed the suction tube.
Everything broke. The vision of pure blood was broken. What remained was the familiar, sickly-sweet decline of the modern world. Even Elara bore a hint of the now-common sugar soup they all swam in. The vampire felt disgust hit him, sharp and bitter. Of course. Even she, the paragon of paleness, was affected by the age. The vampire slumped back as the sudden absence of his nearly lost purpose left him empty and shaky with frustrated longing. His fangs withdrew with a slight throb, and the heat between his legs receded into a rather embarrassing sort of pain. A sign of how far he had fallen and how deep the sugar rot had taken hold.
While Elara continued to chatter cheerfully about the importance of flossing, his eyes drifted up to the ceiling. He didn’t see ceiling tiles; instead, he saw the sugar-coated gargoyles of Mr. and Mrs. Death’s new factory downtown. Monuments to confectionery in which the dead now sucked on sugar lozenges instead of the blood they once drank. He saw the dwarves and elves in the factory break room working their jaws over Tootsie Rolls. He felt Sartre’s presence in the corner as he cringed into his non-existent espresso and lamented about bad faith and candy wrappers. Somewhere in the stratosphere an angel sighed. Another soul too sweet for heaven.
He returned Elara’s smile—a rictus that bore no relation to her life-giving smile. “Perfect,” he rasped. The word tasted like smoke and sadness. “Just… perfect.” As she handed him his rinse cup, he caught a glimpse of himself in the darkened window. An object starved for blood that was no longer present in adequate amounts. His body betrayed him with desires as obsolete and useless as a sugar-free gladiator in a world full of suckers. The real evil here was not the thirst in his fangs but the world that had infected even the purest taste of the neck with a hint of failure. He stood up, and the taste of minty mouthwash suddenly seemed the most honest thing in the room.
