While the family slept, all the little vampires fed.
The laptop, whose battery no longer held its charge, sipped wall current. No less greedy were the phones and tablets plugged into sockets and quietly slurping. The microwave and stove tolled the hours in digital numbers, as did cable boxes. Modems and routers hummed, their readouts showing they, too, were feasting well, as spelled out by blue or green diodes glowing in their dark corners. Flat-screen TVs were off in every room, though not really, according to their little tell-tales, red like blood.
And then the electricity bill arrived—the horror!