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Sunlight. It streamed over the land and covered the garden, stretching its fingers over the small cabin-like house in the middle of the suburbs. The golden fingers slipped through the closed shutters, over the couch, and began flicking at my nose.

I woke up with a thunderous sneeze that catapulted me to the floor, and found myself struggling with an oddly-confining jacket under the redwood table. After a moment of sleep-deprived panic, I won the confrontation and peeked around at the clock pressed against the wall.

Shoot. It was a bit past feeding time.

I wormed my way to a standing position, left the villainous outerwear to sulk on the floor until tomorrow morning, and made my way out to the garden.

The green plants celebrated the sun, and I joined them for a moment. It was warm on my skin as I stood, breathing in the morning air before going about my day. The bell peppers were finally ready, the tomatoes juicy red, and the ears of corn seemed to wave like volunteers for harvest.

Gathering them into small bundles, I brought them into the kitchen to rest and went out for a second round. Going straight to the back of my garden, I took a moment to talk to my beanstalks, admired them for their growth and thanked them for their contribution. Then I knelt and began to dig them up by the roots.

Escorting the bundles back into my kitchen -- and trying to ignore the giant dirty boot prints smearing dark mud across the linoleum tile -- I set to stripping the roots from each beanstalk, cleaning all my products, and getting them ready for both farmer’s markets I was to attend later in the day. Hunger began to set in as I worked, so I grabbed a couple of spare roots I kept in the freezer and began to chow down.

Ugh, the taste wasn’t exactly what I wanted. Metallic yet smooth, with a tiny bit of sweetness as an aftertaste. I needed something to drown it with. Another trip to the fridge produced a large cup full of green chalky liquid, and I downed it in just a few gulps. Sweet, sweet chlorophyll.

The smooth taste was welcome after the metallic hemoglobin, and it went down easily thanks to the coconut water mixed in. The pairing of chlorophyll and coconut water was a great substitute for blood.

Oh, right. I’ve been living with it so long, I often forget not everyone knows about us.

Hi. The name’s Trevor. I’m a chlorophyre which, at its core, is a ‘vampire’ that lives on chlorophyll instead of hemoglobin. I used to be a vampire, but ever since I found out there were other, healthier ways of living, I decided to take a more natural approach to life.

I finished cleaning the greens, packaged them in little baskets, and stacked them in brown paper bags which then made it into my Hybrid car. I took the few veggies and beans to my stall out at the local farmers market and set up shop.

The humans were nice, as usual. A good number of lookie-loos, a handful of loyal buyers, and I even managed to convince one or two new faces to buy a basket of beans. It was a long day, made even longer with the knowledge I had committed to this booth for the next two days as well.

I may have technically been a member of the ‘un-dead’ but that didn’t mean I enjoyed derelict houses or used familiars to do my work for me. The weekends at the farmer’s market helped pay my bills.

When time was up, I began cleaning my booth and storing things away while my neighbors did the same. We swapped stories about harvesting, soil prep, and the latest news on governmental damage in relation to agriculture and the environment. We traded farewells, knowing we’d see each other the next morning, packed the last of our unsold wares into our cars and drove off.

I made sure my veggies were safely stored away at home before going about my day; buying new seeds, working home-made compost into my soil, looking up the latest in natural pesticides. I couldn’t take too long, as I only had a few hours between markets. My second booth was scheduled to be set up right after sundown, and by the time I finished my daily chores, the sun was starting to drop below the horizon. I had to hurry.

I gathered up all the leaves and stalks of my plants and worked them, getting out all the chlorophyll I could manage and dividing the results between green-tinted eight ounce glass bottles.

Then I removed the fresh root clusters from the fridge and bundled them, the fraying hemp rope scratching at my fingers. The cabinets above the sink held generous supplies of coconut water, which I removed and mixed with half of the chlorophyll bottles. Gotta create a good example of each product, after all.

The last step was to make sure all my pamphlets were in order, each one printed on eco-friendly paper with biodegradable ink. They contained information regarding a plant-based alternative to blood, and explained it in more detail than I could manage in the short time I was at my booth. It was definitely better than it sounded, but most vampires wouldn’t understand why green was better if it wasn’t explained properly.

I had my work cut out for me, to be sure, but I deeply believed in chlorophyrism and wanted to get the word out to as many as I could.

Packing up my nightly wares, I got back in my Hybrid and took off for the Night-Market, a farmer’s market for nocturnal-based creatures. Parking in my regular spot, I gathered my things and began down the secret forest trail leading to the bridge where the market was held. Apparently, even under the cover of darkness, our gatherings must be veiled in secrecy and subterfuge.

I set up shop like normal, putting out my pamphlets and products and ignoring the jokes at my expense. I’d been doing this long enough to know responding in kind got me nowhere. The other vendors knew my product and knew where I stood on the matter, and so long as they didn’t upturn my booth or break my stuff, I wouldn’t burn their coffins in the middle of the day.

Instead of sinking to their level, I waved to the werewolf across the bridge selling distilled Wolfsbane pills. Apparently she had managed to figure out a formula able to reverse the werewolf curse for a limited time. I’d never seen it work in person, but she had plenty of regulars. The she-wolf must have been doing something right.

The market opened. Night-creatures began to pour in from all sides. Blood-suckers bought packets from the vampire vendors. The she-wolf’s regulars padded in, panting for her antidote. There were bottled nightmares, brain samples, animal parts, and a couple of the booths even sold ‘deals’. I was never quite sure what ‘deals’ were sold, but I didn’t try to find out.

A couple of curious vampires stopped by my booth. “What’s up with this?” one of them asked while sucking on a sample packet. “Is this a joke?”

The other one leaned in and whispered, “Vampire-hippie. Walk away slowly.”

“It’s nothing like that,” I said with a forced smile, sliding one of the pamphlets across to them. “Vampirism has its place in the world, I guess, but have you ever wondered if there was a better way?”

One of them looked like she couldn’t care less, but the other peered at the pamphlet and seemed to be listening.

“I mean, sure: drinking the blood of others has sustained us for a good long while. I’m not saying it hasn’t. But the world was...different back then. Less chemicals in the blood, less preservatives in the food.”

I gestured towards the shrinking blood sample, which was now leaking in the corner. “Do you know how much more monoxide is in human blood these days thanks to burning gasoline and oil, as opposed to 100 years ago?”

The packet-drinker shrugged. “Nope. But if that’s true, why not just drink animal blood?”

“They’re inhaling the same air, for one thing,” I stated. “But if we all switched to drinking animals, do you know how badly that would impact the environment? It would take years to breed enough animals for them to be a sustainable alternative for all of our kind...not to mention there’d be competition from all sides.”

In answer to the sarcastically-quirked eyebrow, I gestured around to a few of the other booths. “Vampires aren’t the only ones that feed on animals.”

The one reading the pamphlet finally spoke up. “So how is this any different? What’s the catch?”

“Ah, that’s the best thing,” I said, holding up a small glass bottle. “There is no catch. Drinking from plants instead of people is a much more sustainable alternative; you can grow your own food, so you don’t have to worry about things like cameras and cell phones tracking your movements. There’s more than enough soil to use, either out in a garden or in a potted plant, and you don’t have to worry about soil erosion so long as you rotate and feed the plants properly. And best of all, you know exactly what’s going into your food: because you’re putting it there.”

I gestured to the ever-shrinking blood packet. “Do you have any idea what kind of life your food was living? How much blood-poisoning might have happened?” I looked back to the other one. “Using plants, you don’t ever have to worry about it again.”

The two glanced at each other. The blood-sucker shrugged her shoulders. “It’s not like I’d catch any of their diseases. Plus, this sounds like a lot more work.”

But the other one had picked up a bottle and was looking it over. “It’s not any more work than hunting down human prey in this digital age,” I said. “Plus, the switch is easier than ever with our root bundles.”

The blood-sucker was looking away, her packet nearly empty. She was clearly debating if she wanted to go back to the vendor a few booths down and purchase a couple packs for the fridge. But the other one looked up at me. “Root bundles?”

I nodded. “Did you know that the legume plant has nodules that produce the exact same substance as blood?” She peered at the bundle of roots, fingering one of the small gnarled ends. I could see she was interested, but unsure what her companion would say. I nudged her a little more and told her that the movement I was a part of had a small online presence. If she wanted to give me her general whereabouts or territory, I could have a representative stop by and give her more information.

She shrugged and wasn’t sure, so I suggested she take my card and come back the next night to take another look at the nodules. I offered her a small sample root bundle as compensation for her listening ear, and as a little something to snack on when she had the time.

She seemed grateful for the offer and accepted, slipping the small bundle into her coat along with my card before spinning around to join her companion. They loudly mocked the chlorophyre movement as they left, and I later spied the two buying a generous supply of packets from the vampire two booths down.

I didn’t mind. I may not have gotten a chance to tell them about the side-effects, how drinking chlorophyll was like drinking a natural sunscreen, how it converted sunlight into energy like the plants, but that was something I saved for customers showing a genuine interest. Vampires generally don’t believe that part of the deal, and I can’t blame them.

The first chlorophyre I saw was met with equal cynicism, and I didn’t believe the movement until I tried it for myself. Anyway, it isn’t easy to make the switch from ‘acceptable’ to healthy, especially when clan pressure is involved.

Said pressure is one of the reasons I now lived on my own.

A few more vampires came over during the night. A few more mocked my products openly or over their shoulders. Another couple passed by and stopped, familiar faces that wanted to purchase another bundle and learn more about growing their own. We talked while I gathered their order, and I found out that they prowled an alley a couple streets down from where I lived. With a smile, I offered them to stay at my place for a bit. They could learn more about growing their own food, and my house was definitely safer than the streets.

Soon the sun was on its way up, and all the booths were dismantled. I packed up what I had left and headed to my Hybrid, wondering if that couple had made their way to my house yet. I wondered if the two vampiresses from earlier would come back. I loved talking to an open mind, something startling hard to find in the underworld.

I got behind the wheel and drove, wondering once again what the she-wolf’s Wolfbane pills actually did for werewolves, or why they’d take an antidote in the first place.

I got back home and brought everything inside. I grabbed from my personal stash of chlorophyll, drinking it down as I laid out on the couch and enjoyed the slight tinge of rum added to the mix. It may not have had the same effect on me as it once did, but the flavor was still a nice addition. I stared at the ceiling, the full moon making silver tracks through the darkness, and contemplated the night.

There was still some gardening I could do, but there was also online marketing to work on, a seminar on Essential Oils to watch, and more information to gather for the book I was planning on self-publishing later this year.

One of the added benefits to being a healthy chlorophyre meant working in the day and the night, as my body no longer required sleep to function. I stared at the ceiling, sipped my drink, and wondered which of my projects to work on next.