I am a vampire. And if you are going to banish me from your presence with garlic as I try to drink your blood and convert you into an immortal angel of the unholy dominion, you better be mincing that garlic by hand.

Blood-sucking demons have standards, too. We notice, as our skin starts to blister and our insides begin to boil, if you substituted with garlic powder, frozen cubes, or, hell forbid, a jar of pre-minced blasphemy. 

Look, it’s not easy being a vampire these days. Drinking human blood is more frowned upon than ever. Bats are the poster child for rabies. And the Millennial obsession with gentle parenting has eradicated any social acceptance of biting your friends on the neck. While we may not agree on all things, and you will inevitably hunt me down with a gauntlet of icons blessed by the local village priest to avoid your bloodline being cursed for an eternity and exiled to an abandoned castle that only experiences constant thunderstorms, the least you could do is make sure the garlic is freshly minced. 

Now I know what you’re asking — Mr. Dracula, isn’t garlic poisonus for vampires? First off, Mr. Dracula was my father. Not like my biological father, but my vampire father. As in he’s the one who hypnotized me to invite him into my home, bit me on the neck, and transformed me into this terrible beast. Where was my real father to protect me when all of this happened? Good question. Who knows. I never met him. Mom says he’s not worth the thought and that she always loved me more than two parents ever could. But I can’t ignore the hurt in her eyes when she looks upon my face and sees his likeness, even amid my grotesque, ever-paling skin and sharpening cuspids. What? No, I’m not crying. These are tears caused by garlic searing my eyeballs.

Oh, right. Garlic. Sure, it’s poisonous. But if you’re going to be lit afire from the inside out and have all things impure burned out of you by a root vegetable, wouldn’t you want it to be the freshest, most pungent form of said root vegetable?

The minute you slice, grate, or cut garlic, the flavor starts to change. The bitter and assertive presence that cooks us alive begins to fade into a reflection of its true self. This is coming from a guy who can’t even see his reflection. It’d be like me biting two holes in someone’s neck, letting them empty out into a cup, then coming back for it months later. Yeah, I’m still going to drink it. But I won’t like it.