‘99% of all UV rays, you say?’ Vlad asked nervously, looking up at the feature window his hosts had pointed out to him, and the beams of sunlight stabbing through.
‘Yeah, isn’t that neat?’ giggled the wife – he’d already forgotten her name. She seemed sweet though, if a little simple. Her husband on the other hand…
‘I could, like, totally sunbathe here and not burn — just tan!’
Her husband had questionable intelligence, Vlad knew that for sure.
He smiled politely and excused himself to use the bathroom. As soon as the couple left (prattling on about how… sick the waves were going to be?), he made a detour for the floor-to-ceiling frosted windows that lined the hallway.
He approached cautiously – this wouldn’t be the first time he’d been burned by tinted glass that claimed to stop the sun from getting in.
He stuck his toe out tentatively, then whipped it back. Nothing; no smoke, no ash, no bursting into flames. Even through his many, many layers of sunblock, he usually felt something. How had they managed to get such impressive frosted window tinting? In all of his too-many years of life, Vlad had never seen anything like it.
‘Find it okay?’ he heard a call from down the hallway. Vlad ignored them, pulling out his phone and punching in a number.
‘Yo, boss,’ came the raspy answer.
‘Shut up and listen,’ Vlad cut them off. He was too busy replacing his assistants to ever learn their names, and this one had made less of an impression than usual.
‘I need you to do something for me.’
‘Anything, boss,’ it said.
‘I need you to find someone… special.’
A chuckle came down the phone line. ‘What are you thinking, boss?’
‘I need you to find me the best commercial window tinting company in Melbourne. Do you understand?’
There was a pause on the other end of the phone.
‘Uh…’
Vlad was suddenly interrupted by the husband, appearing at the end of the hallway.
‘Dinner?’ the man asked.
With a grin, Vlad hung up the phone.