Be More Chill by Ned Vizzini Read Free Book Online

Mom?”
    “Yes, Jeremy.” She doesn’t look up from her work.
    “There’s actually a, ah, Halloween Dance tonight as part of school, so I’m going.”
    “Really?” Mom asks, looking up. And just as her
really
is ending, Dad slips through the curtain into the dining room, shirtless. He’s eating a giant hot dog in a
too-small bun. “Really?” he says.
    “Yeah!” I look back and forth between Dad and Mom. I had expected, challenges.
    “That’s wonderful!” Mom gets up and hugs me. “Who are you going with?”
    “Yeah, what’s up?” Dad asks. “Does she have, you know…” Dad pantomimes breasts with his hands and hot dog.
    “Stop it!” Mom snaps. “That is
not
appropriate.”
    “You’d be surprised, son,” Dad says. “So many divorces that I handle stem from breasts. They’re incredibly important. Make sure that the girl—”
    “There isn’t a girl,” I declare.
    Silence from Mom.
    “Hmm,” Dad chews. “Are you gay?”
    “Stop it!” Mom shrieks, scrambling toward Dad. He skitters out. “Your father,” she says, returning to her seat at the stacks of paper. “Sometimes I really
don’t know. So, in any case—”
    “I’m not gay. Don’t worry.”
    “I’m not,” Mom smiles. “It would be fine if you were, really. We’re good parents. But you’re going to a dance?”
    “Yeah.”
    “That’s great. Do you need money?”
    “Sure.” I had no idea they’d give me money for this. I suppose I should be more social more often.
    “Here,” Mom presses bills into my hands that I’ll count later. “Go to the dance—do you need a ride? Oh wait, I’m sure you wouldn’t want one from us.
Take a car service!”
    “Yeah, I already called one.”
    “Well that’s great! Remember, don’t ever touch my car, Jeremy. But have fun at the dance! You’ll do fine.”
    “Yeah, for sure!” Dad says from the living room, eating his hot dog on the Bowflex. “Dance with girls!”
    “Thanks, Dad.” I walk out to the porch and wait for the car service. When it comes, I stroll down the lawn dressed entirely in black, mask over the top of my head, not on. I get in
the car and try to negotiate the wannabe-strawberry air-freshener smell.
    “Where you goin’?” the driver asks.
    “Elks Club Lodge, Lefferts Road by the Friendly’s.”
    “T’anks.” We slide down my street, take a turn past school and the field, which somehow has two fireflies in it, spinning in a lazy DNA spiral, this late in the year. I try my
mask on.
    “Oooh, tha’s cool,” the driver says.
    “Yeah?”
    “Yeah. You look like a l’il hooligan.”
    Hooligan? Hooligan doesn’t sound particularly dangerous or interesting. We ride in silence the rest of the way. I plan the night’s events: if Christine is there with Jake, I’ll
pay a girl some of this money Mom gave me to distract Jake while I talk with Christine about how I feel about her (good plan). Then I’ll take off my mask and she’ll see who I am and
she’ll be like—
    “We here,” the driver says. I pay him and step out.
    The Elks Club Lodge has a snaking line in front of it nine trees long, comprised of kids dressed as pro wrestlers, kids dressed as members of Slipknot, kids dressed as Fidel Castro and Bill
Clinton with Phillies in their masked mouths, kids dressed as giant condoms and Viagra pills. The line surprises me. I step to the back with my mask down.
    “What’s this for?” I ask the guy in front of me.
    “Tickets, yo,” he says over his shoulder, making a lip-smacking noise. He’s dressed as some sort of small tree. “You need tickets for the dance.”
    Oh crap, it’s Rich. His whole face is green, so I couldn’t tell at first. I’d better be quiet so he doesn’t figure out who I am and torment me. I keep the mask on and it
gets atrocious and spitty inside, but I think the anonymity is worth it. The line shuffles toward the door and I finally get in after giving money to a guy who looks like a walrus.
    The Elks Club Lodge