A Self Made Monster by Steven Vivian Read Free Book Online

said. He knew of no Tracy.
    “I’m not sure if I know Tracy,” Jimmy lied. He also knew of no Tracy. “Whatever. I’ll play it cool.”
    “Yeah, don’t let on you know. Let her come out and, you know, confide in you.”
    “I’ll play it right.”
    Jimmy played it wrong. When Ellen did not come to the frat party at nine, as she usually did, Jimmy started drinking heavily. Ellen arrived at eleven, a striking, olive-skinned girl in a red and blue winter coat.
    “I’ll take your coat,” Jimmy offered, but the offer sounded like a drunk’s threat.
    “I’ll keep it.” She pushed by and joined a group of friends.
    Working his way through the crowd, fending off elbows, biceps, and beer cups, Jimmy approached Ellen.
    “Get you a beer?” he demanded.
    She frowned at his glazed eyes and unashamed leer. “I’ve got one.” She held up her cup.
    “Well so have I!” Jimmy snorted.
    “Looks like you’ve had one too many.”
    Jimmy noted the foam on her mustache. Her mustache, he thought, is thicker than mine and I’ve been trying to grow one for six weeks. He wiped at his upper lip, wondering if he too was foamed.
    Ellen was self-conscious enough about her mustache. Her free hand darted at her upper lip as if fending off a bee. Now her mustache was two-tone: black on the left half, white on the right.
    Jimmy had turned away, revolted by the foamy mustache, when he felt beer running down his head and back.
    He cursed her. She laughed at him.
    Jimmy’s rage was instantaneous. He wondered how he could have hoped to spool her: that mustache!
    “You bearded slut,” Jimmy growled at Ellen. “Suck on this.” He tossed his beer into her face, and he cackled at her shock: brown wide eyes, mouth contorted into a howl, foam fading into liquid that dripped onto her tomato red blouse.
    “And you suck on this,” a voice behind him countered.
    Jimmy turned to see a large fist rocket down at him. He tried to duck, but only fell drunkenly into the punch. Ellen not only was still engaged; her boyfriend Francis had just entered through the back door. Seeing his bride to be, he had waved and navigated through the crowd. As he moved to embrace her, he accidentally spilled his beer on the head of a short person. And even as Francis apologized, the short person threw beer into his fiancé’s face.
    Don’s attention was wandering. He played idly with his empty beer can, staring into space. He was remembering how funny Jimmy looked after Ellen’s boyfriend had flattened him: Jimmy on his back, surrounded by feet and legs that must have looked large and long to such a little drunk guy.
    Jimmy told Don about the disappearing maintenance man.
    “A disappearing maintenance man?” Don asked. He had been only half-listening.
    “That’s right. Last night. Looks like he got nabbed.”
    Don was skeptical. He wondered if Jimmy had learned of his deception about Ellen. Was the little creep planning revenge? “Do you think there’s anything to it?”
    Jimmy cracked his fifth can of beer. “Seems that way. But I guess even a dweeb like Edward Know It All would make up a story just to impress Holly Dish.”
    Don settled deeper into the battered chair, rested his feet on the fraying ottoman. “Who’s she?”
    “You know, Holly.” Jimmy carved two breasts in the air with his hands.
    Don acted nonplused.
    “C’mon. Holly. Big jugs.”
    “Oh yeah. A bit on the thick side, though,” he teased.
    “That’s crap! You’d kill to spool her deep dish tits.”
    “She’s solid, all right,” Don admitted. “She belongs on one of those swimsuit magazine covers, with a bikini string up between her cheeks.”
    “You’d kill to spool her deep dish tits!” Jimmy repeated, vicious.
    Booze did not flatter Jimmy; it reminded him he was short, cynical, and manipulative. He responded to these realizations by standing over people (when possible) and becoming more cynical and manipulative. “I’ll be spoolin’ her and she’ll be eating jelly