Twilight Inspires Real-Life Vampire Scare?

Apparently a whole bunch of grade school kids hopped up on Stephanie Meyer novels have been running around spreading rumors of vampirism in the sleepy town of Lake Stevens, Washington. According to Everett, Washington's Daily Herald, it all started last Friday, when a seventh grade girl met up with a fifth grade girl in a wooded park near Mount Pilchuk Elementary School.

And this is where the story diverges. The girl claims to have only hugged the boy. Yet the boy's friends ran back to the school claiming that she had actually bitten the boy on the forehead. First red flag: what self-respecting vampire would bite someone there? Unless that vampire happened to be a wrestling fan who had watched one too many Ric Flair matches...

Anyway, the whole thing spiraled out of control as the boys' story of being bitten in the woods expanded over the next few days to full scale reports of vampires in Lake Stevens, and of other boys being bitten all over their faces and having to be rescued from the woods. None of that stuff, however, seems to have any basis in reality.

Obviously, the hot speculation among parents and administrators is that Twilight is to blame. The book series and movie are quite popular with the tween students, and also remember that Twilight itself does take place in the dreary state of Washington, so it's not much of a stretch. Since it was a little girl allegedly doing the biting, I prefer to imagine the rumors were inspired by Let the Right One In. That's just infinitely cooler.

While local police were contacted, the boy's parents did not pursue anything, and so the issue was dropped pretty quickly. Since then, school officials have been busy sending home letters assuring parents that their kids are not in danger of falling prey to a pint-sized nosferatu.

So bottom line, some kids start telling tales out of school (literally), made up some stupid crap, rumors spread out of control, and a whole town gets up in arms. Someone needs to tell these hicks that that's how the Salem witch trials got started.

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