Carlos was born in 2020, on a Friday morning in March. He didn’t count his actual day of birth as his birthday, but the day he had been turned.
At the age of thirty, he was attacked while walking down the street, in the middle of the night. He should have been more careful. The Empire had just invaded, and the streets were now dangerous.
Thugs beat him up, and stole his wallet, after stabbing him in the arm and stomach. Carlos put up a fight, and if he didn’t, he would have escaped unscathed.
As he bled out in the gutter, on a warm summer night, an angel came to save him.
However, he was accompanied by his rude wife.
"Why must you have such a weak spot for these meat suits," Nymphadora asked.
She stood over Carlos, so weak, that he could only turn his head to look up at her. She was a beautiful woman, with long black hair, brown skin, and dark red eyes. Her eyebrows were arched, looking as if she was always asking a question.
She wore a green summer dress, and her husband, Santos, stood next to her, wearing only pants, his feet filthy and his hands covered in blood.
"I kinda feel sorry for the guy. All these weirdos that can make shit explode with their minds showed up, and this guy, he probably couldn’t fight back," Santos said.
"You can eat him if you want. Put him out of his misery. I don’t want him," Nymphadora said. "He looks used."
Carlos passed out as the last thing he saw was Santos kneeling over him.
Carlos awoke inside a small house. He was in someone’s bed, still wearing his bloody clothes. He inspected his body, and all his wounds were gone. Carlos wasn’t sure if it was a dream because he was inside someone else’s house, but he was sure the pain was very real.
Carlos perked up, and suddenly, he knew a friend was approaching.
His new best friend.
Carlos was so giddy, thinking of all the fun things they would do together. Santos opened the door and sighed, used to the same face on all his newborn children, that their dad was home, and today is so wonderful, I can’t wait to see you again.
"Do I know you," Carlos asked.
"Nah. I mean, kind of now. You’re going to be fine."
Santos sat on the bed next to him, now, much cleaner. He wore a green striped shirt but kept the same bloody pants on. He stared into Carlos’s eyes and tried to listen. Carlos averted his gaze, but Santos grabbed his face and smashed his cheeks.
He turned his head, so he had no choice but to look at him, and once he did, everything was different. The world was slightly skewed, but now everything was aligned, and Carlos wondered how he had lived his life never knowing.
"Can I stay here for a while," Carlos asked. "Everything seems so much better here."
"You’ve been awake for two minutes," Santos replied.
"Yes. Everything is so much better now."
Santos rolled his eyes, grunted a yes, and went off to find his wife and listen to her stream of complaints. He sat at the dining room table, wondering why they kept one if they never ate real food, and listened to his wife talk about being an irresponsible parent.
"You have so many children! So many! Most of them aren’t mine either!"
"Yeah, duh, why would they all be yours?"
"Santos. Cheating is wrong. I’ve been faithful this entire time, " Nymphadora said.
"I get tired of drinking the same blood type sometimes. Think of it like that."
Nymphadora gave Santos a swift smack on the back of his head, and Carlos could feel her anger in the next room over. He could hear the complaints of all his siblings, wishing their parents would stop fighting, and a few whispers saying, nice to meet you, Carlos.
Carlos smiled softly in the wide bed, with many soft pillows and sheets, and he would never be alone again.
It had been a year since Carlos had joined his new family. He didn’t live with the others, so unlike the rest of them, he wasn’t as detached from humanity, their monstrosity feeding off each other, spiraling deeper into madness.
He stayed with Santos, in the small cottage Carlos had awoken, in the middle of an evergreen forest. Sometimes Santos’ oldest living children, Dante and Kato would come to visit. Their mother, Nymphadora stopped coming.
She and Santos had another huge fight. They would fight, break up, and come back to each other, some seventy-odd years later, never truly apart. It was easier than getting a divorce and then re-married, hundreds of times.
When Carlos first met Kato and Dante, he was jealous of how close they were. They were twins, and no one could break their bond. They loved each other as no other could.
Too much.
Way too much.
The longer Carlos was away from the others, inside Santos’s house, the more he realized what they were doing, and the more disgusted he became. He was no longer jealous.
The twins didn’t care.
No one else in the family cared. What were morals to monsters? Morals were for those who were to be judged one day, and they were all certain there was no reason to try and be good. They would live forever if they were careful, and even if they died, there was no chance at salvation for blood drinkers and heathens.
The only person who seemed to be disgusted by Kato and Dante was Santos. He was the only one not caught up in the family’s strange obsession with each other. Every time they came to visit, and every time they left, he told them that he loved them, but he hated what they did.
"Why do you let them visit," Carlos asked him one day.
Carlos was sitting on the couch, reading, wrapped in a blue and white checkered blanket. All Carlos did was read now that he had the time. There were so many books he had to drop because he had more important things to do. Now, there would always be time.
"I can stop them any time I want," Santos said. "But it wouldn’t be their choice. You all love me, no matter what I do or say, no matter what I force you to do. "
"Yes," Carlos grinned. "Why would we not love you?"
"Loving family should not be the default. I want you to love me because you like me, not because we’re related."
His words sunk deep into Carlos’s soul and he understood.
"I choose to follow Christ. It’s a choice, I see what you mean. A good choice. Maybe if-"
Santos rolled his eyes and tuned out Carlos’ daily diatribe about repenting. It was impossible for Santos to ever repent, and even if he wanted to, there was no acceptance. He had committed the only sin that God would never forgive, and that was leaving.
"Why do you do this Carlito," Santos asked.
He laid down on the blue couch, and groaned, listening to more cheers in his head from his children about how he was fine just the way he is.
"I miss church," Carlos admitted.
He started to cry, and he was ashamed. Carlos hadn’t returned to the church since the day Santos had turned him. He missed the parishioners, and the other priests he worked with. He missed leading the children’s choir and he loved how every 3rd Thursday of the month they would have a different charity event.
He knew that last week was bingo because he still visited the church’s website daily.
"I can never go back...I can’t."
Blood trickled out of his eyes and onto the couch, and Santos sat up, not fazed by his tears. Each of his children had to give up something they loved once they were turned, and Carlos was not an exception to the rule.
"I hate you," Carlos sobbed. "You allow my siblings to be sexual deviants, and you’ve cursed us all. I hate that-"
Santos hugged him, and Carlos cried harder, hating that he was being so kind, hating that he was being consoled by a man who looked younger than him.
"I have never been so happy to hear someone tell me that they hate me," Santos laughed.
He wiped away Carlos’ tears and Carlos was embarrassed. He pushed him away, and Santos laughed, loving that for the first time, someone other than Nymphadora was arguing with him.
"Why do you hate me," Santos asked.
"You took Heaven away from me. I can’t even go to church."
Santos let out a loud and short laugh that sounded like a bark, and Carlos was insulted. He gripped the blanket and had to listen to the others as they told him how selfish he was.
"You can do whatever you want," Santos told him.
With those six words, Santos had unwittingly freed Carlos from his spell. Carlos had to do whatever he said. When he told Carlos, that loving family should be a choice, Carlos could form his own opinion about Santos as well.
Carlos looked around the room, scared that he didn’t know what to do. Everything was back to how it used to be. He missed when everything was fine, nothing was wrong.
He was eighteen again, realizing that there were so many possibilities.
He just didn’t know where to begin.
It had been ninety years since the Empire had colonized Earth, and they were still there, refusing to leave, a tick sucking the blood out of an unsuspecting squirrel.
Carlos had returned to the Church fifty years ago, when he, like all of Santos’ children, could suddenly walk in the daylight. He wanted to choose his own life, to choose how to spend the rest of eternity.
After many years of traveling, of trying all the things life had to offer, he knew what his purpose was.
Carlos believed that his being turned was another test given to him by God. That he still had a duty after he took his vows to spread the word, and that he should minimize the amount of human suffering, helping those in need.
He opened his small church, in a very bad neighborhood. It was filthy, the streets filled with trash, and gangs of street children roamed around, abandoned by their parents. They were all little halflings or astrals.
No one wanted a cursed child.
Carlos would hold a Birthday Feast every Christmas for the children who didn’t have birthdays. He opened a food pantry and had Wednesday suppers so they could have at least one good meal a week.
He did not forget his family as well.
Carlos and a few others set up a small network. Not everyone liked being turned, and they didn’t want to hurt people. Most of Carlos’ siblings mocked him, but Carlos didn’t care. He didn’t need to kill people for blood.
There were willing donors and friends. There were blood drives the church held every few months, and sometimes, a few pints might go missing now and then.
Carlos was happy to spend eternity helping those reach what he could never have. He was sometimes sad, that his humanity was stolen from him without his consent, but after twenty years, Carlos had forgiven Santos.
Santos still lurked around the area, up to mischief as usual.
This time, he was pretending to be a different kind of human.
A gang leader.
Carlos tried not to roll his eyes every time his father came up with a new game to play every decade or so and tried to remind himself that everyone had their own separate lives.
One night, long after the parishioners had left Carlos’ church, his father came in. Santos was wild-eyed and panicking, holding a small child that was weak and malnourished. His skin was pallid and grey, and even though it was cold, in the middle of December, the child was sweating.
Santos walked down the blue-carpeted aisle, past the wooden pews, and towards Carlos. Carlos knew he was there before he arrived. He had heard the calls of his siblings and had gotten everything prepared.
George was there, and he was more than willing to help with his medical training.
The young boy was placed in the back of the church, in the guest room, they had for those who didn’t have a safe place to go some nights. George, Carlos, and Santos took care of him, and once his temperature was stabilized, George turned to look at his father, jealousy in his blood, skin, and eyes.
"What does this meat suit have that I don’t," George cried.
"Georgie, stop being jealous. You’re jealous of everyone, and it’s gross," Santos said.
"It’s not fair," George cried.
A 400-year-old man was throwing a tantrum, and Santos tried to remember what he had said to Carlos to make him, not strange, but he never found out what he had done. He told George to have his tantrum in the bathroom, and George left, crying about always being replaced by new ones.
"I don’t mean to be rude, father, but he is right. What is so special about this child?"
Most were quiet, except for the oldest. There were about 37 of them, three of them being Nymphadora, Kato, and Dante. They told him that the young boy resembled Santos’s child.
One of the very few he had before he was cursed.
Carlos couldn’t see it. The boy looked nothing like Santos, with his blonde hair and blue eyes. Carlos was sure that Santos was projecting his feelings about his dead son and worried that he would turn a small boy, forever stuck at eight years old.
"I won’t do that," Santos said.
Carlos jerked up from his chair, and he tried to make himself busy, citing he needed to go do something in the next room. He walked down the narrow wooden hallway, but it didn’t matter how far he went.
Santos was still in his head.
I want him to choose to love me, just like you, Carlito.
Santos kept his word.
