1356


John was thirteen hundred and fifty-six years old. And no, he was nothing special. He was not resurrected by a mad scientist. He didn’t hide any portraits up in the attic that kept him young. And he was most definitely not a vampire even though his family would try to make you believe otherwise. In fact, he was all of the contrary. He was the most average of old men out there.

He had a bad back that gave him a constant pain. His knees hurt if he walked too much. And he had a severe case of the grumps, as anyone younger than him said, which pretty much included every single person in the family.

No, his age was all thanks to the marvels of medical technology, which included the cocktail of pills, the little bots inside his cells, and the medical bills.

Most people were like him, as death was more of a choice nowadays, well except like with cousin Mark Villanueva, who thought it would be a good idea to ride a motorcycle off the roof of the house into the swimming pool. Things didn’t end up well for either him, the pool, or the dog that saw it all happen. Even to this day, the family pays a spiritual healer for the 589-year-old dog, and apparently, he’s still not feeling very well.

But as with a fish that’s been left out on the counter-top a little too long, people were growing a little upset. They wanted John to die already.

When he walked by the swimming pool, Samantha—the youngest at 256 years old, would try to scare him into falling in and drowning because she’d hear that John had never learned to swim. But just as John was resolute in avoiding water deeper than a few feet throughout his life, he was resolute in not being scared. It usually ended with John taking revenge a few hours later by sharing pictures from when Sabrina was a child on social media. Oh, she hated that, and she thought it was worse than death.

Now, the family wasn’t actually violent. They were just a little passive aggressive. For example, if John took a little too long in the shower, his eldest great granddaughter would shout, “did you finally die?”

The truth was that John got a kick from it. Well, originally it just made him a bit angry, barely enough to break a few things around the house. Nothing to bad. Now though, he had started to get a kick of it. In a way, living had become like his revenge. So the family would be passive aggressive about him dying? Well, he’d be passive aggressive about living.

When he walked by Martha, he’d always make sure to say something like, “Your nightmare is still alive and kicking” or “I’m gonna die after you just to spite you, you dumb B****.”

Ah, but it was all just in good sport. He only really just wanted a few of them dead so that he could watch TV in silence, but he would not deal with murder. Nah, usually people chose to die at around one thousand or so, mostly because of the microaggressions in the house.

Oh, and he also really wanted Leila, his first wife to call it a day already. It seemed that she was content making sure he knew that she was happy and doing it every night with her young 800-year-old husband. John hoped she’d choke on it one night and come up on the news the day after.

Other than that, life was pretty good, and John had no intention of letting it go. It was just too darn fun when your life makes other’s miserable. And he was not going to let the others bring him life. Besides, cousin Mark had three kids left and they were just as smart as their dad, so John couldn’t wait to see how those three would go.