Macrina Wang

It’s not a crime to like parties. I know this. But after all of the pretty sucky things that have happened to me during and after parties, you’d think I would stop liking them so much. I have been vomited on and I have vomited. I have watched a drunk 10th grader pee down the side of his father’s car. I was once at a party where a bunch of assholes were dancing in the upstairs living room and the floor caved in onto the kitchen and a girl named Jessica was crushed by the plaster and dancers and she died.

But I still go to parties, because parties are usually fun, and in Chillicothe, Ohio, fun is in short supply. I’m pretty good about what I do at parties. I don’t drink to the point where I black out, only to the point where I vomit. I don’t hook up with guys I haven’t spoken to before, and so if there’s a guy I like at a party and I don’t know him, I make sure to speak to him before I hook up with him. Usually, I’ll ask him his name and then we start making out, but sometimes it’s just “hi.” It’s enough, though. And most of all, I stick close to my girlfriends so that nothing too terrible will ever happen.

As you can see, I’m cautious. But sometimes cautious people do break their rules and they drink so much that they can’t remember anything about the previous night. This means that they also don’t know if they broke any of their other rules because they can’t remember if they hooked up with anyone or whether their girlfriends were anywhere nearby. Actually all I sort of remember is that everyone was shaped like erasers and kind of waddling around. I don’t know, everything’s fuzzy.

This is all to say that I blacked out at a party. It was just one time. But I did. I woke up the next day in my own bed with no memory of the previous night. Someone had driven me home, according to my mom. My mother is very understanding and does not mind me going to parties because she never went to parties as a kid, and I think she’s in awe of me. The next morning after a wild night she’ll pass me a Vitaminwater for my hangover and then prod me for details, nodding with her eyes wide open, looking just like our rescue pug, Edgar. And then my father will stumble downstairs and yell at me for staying out so late and being a disappointment, and my mom will then yell at him, and then he’ll yell at my mom and then I go to school.

Anyway, after the night I drank too much and blacked out, I woke up in my own bed. I was a little nervous about not knowing what had happened, mainly because I had been planning to hook up with Thomas which was a three-years-in-the-making hook up. I had been preparing for it with well-timed eyebrow raises in every single class Thomas and I shared since the first day of high school. Now, a junior, I had gone to this party — which was thrown by Arvin, an excellent guy — ready to finally seal the deal with Thomas, who I haven’t mentioned has killer biceps and a slight lisp, both of which are kind of my thing.

But I had blacked out, which meant I couldn’t remember how amazing our hook up had been, or really, if we had hooked up at all. So as soon as I got to school — with a killer hangover, I should mention, slightly lessened by my mom giving me Gatorade with breakfast — I asked Lisa about what had happened. Lisa has been my best friend since last year. Before that Sarah was my best friend but she got demoted to third-best friend because she dated an ex. It’s a long story and not materially important to what I’m about to tell you but at any rate, I talked to Lisa.

I didn’t want Lisa to know that I had blacked out. I have a reputation as the responsible member of our friend group, since I’m the only one who usually only vomits and doesn’t black out. So I framed my question carefully. 

“Hey, Lisa,” I said. “Wasn’t Thomas so cute last night?”

“Yeah, girl,” she said. “But did you see Armand? I’ve never seen a muscle shirt actually work before. I was like, totally into him.” She looked around, even though the hallway was pretty empty, and said, “he wasn’t a great kisser but he was good at everything else.”

“Wow,” I said. “Good for you. But back to Thomas for a second, didn’t we look great together?”

“Yeah!” Lisa said. “Did you hook up?”

“Didn’t we?”

Lisa smiled and looked confused. I had the feeling that my long-awaited hook up with Thomas hadn’t actually occurred. Well, I thought, back to the suggestive eyebrow raising. Maybe I would even throw in a wink or a smirk. We would hook up the next time Arvin threw a party, and I would only get drunk enough to make my memories of the night great to think about afterward, instead of deleting them from my brain entirely.

“Hey, I took some great pictures last night,” Lisa said, pulling out her phone. “Megan was so wasted. Wanna see?”

“Hell yes,” I said. Neither of us liked Megan. I did feel kind of like a hypocrite, since I was also completely wasted last night, but it was really only that one time, and Megan was a bad person, so I couldn’t feel sorry for her.

Lisa scrolled through her photos of the previous night. Once Lisa reached a certain level of drunk during a party she would start taking photos. All of the photos were taken with ill-timed flash and artsy angles, though I think the angles had to do more with Lisa being very drunk while taking the photos than with aesthetic choices.

We looked through the photos and even though I had blacked out, I felt that I understood the sort of party it had been, because I had seen photos like these a million times before. Trevor humping a door. Megan, absolutely smashed, passed out on the carpet with half a tit out. One blurry photo obviously taken while Lisa was in the middle of hooking up with Armand. Me making out in a bedroom with someone. Another shot of Megan, throwing up into a garbage can on the front lawn.

“Hey,” I said. “Go back to that one of me.”

“Oh, this one?” She scrolled back to it. “Yeah, you two were really going at it.”

She had taken it through a crack in the door leading to what looked like a spare bedroom in Arvin’s house. Actually, Arvin’s house was so great for parties because it had so many spare bedrooms.

I was on the bed, with a guy who was sort of hard to tell apart from the darkness of the room.

“Is that Thomas?” Lisa asked.

“Can you make it bigger?” I asked. She magnified the photo. 

“Turn up the brightness,” I told her. She turned up the brightness.

In the photo, I was making out with what can only be described as a large, furry monster. 

In a teasing tone of voice, Lisa said, “Oh my god, you were so adventurous last night! Is that a literal monster? I didn’t know you were into monsters.”

“I have no memory of this,” I said.

“Bro, there was a monster at our party?” Lisa said. “That’s crazy.”

“Yeah,” I said, sweating.

I had made out with a monster? I had never done that before. Actually, I had never even seen a monster before, ever, except for imagining a squid-like monster under my bed when I was a kid. But actually that monster was just a squid, not really a monster. And the monster in Lisa’s photo had been big and hairy, and I was pretty sure it had horns.

So I went to talk to Arvin about it after school. Arvin’s house was about a 20-minute bike ride away. On the way to his house I had to pass the cemetery, which is always kind of awkward because Jessica’s pretty new grave is right at the front of it by the gate, and it makes me remember how I was the one who asked her to go get me a beer from the kitchen, right before she was fatally crushed. But her death wasn’t really my fault or anything. My mom told me to make sure I wouldn’t blame myself and so I don’t.

I knew Arvin would be at home because he always did the same thing everyday after school: sit in the driveway next to his house on a folding chair, blast 80s music from a speaker and smoke weed. I don’t know what Arvin’s parents did for a living, but I got the feeling that they were basically never home. 

Arvin’s weed was especially skunky and I wasn’t a huge fan of the smell, but I would still hang out with him after school when I had nothing to do. This is mainly because Arvin’s parties were so great, and I wanted to make sure I was invited.

He nodded at me as I left my bike at the curb and approached his folding chair. “How’s it hanging?” he asked.

“I’m good,” I said. “Killer party last night.”

“Thanks, dude,” he said. “Somebody absolutely trashed the bathtub, though. Do you know who did that?”

“How do you trash a bathtub?” I asked.

“They emptied out all of the bottles under the bathroom sink into the tub,” he said. “Now it’s all pink? And the drain is making weird noises. I dunno. I gotta fix it. But my parents get home a few days from now, so it’s cool.”

“Cool,” I said. “So, listen. Lisa and I were looking through some photos from last night—”

“Love Lisa.”

“Right, and we found one where … was there a monster at your party last night?”

“Oh yeah,” Arvin said. “That was Steve.”

“Oh,” I said.

“Yeah, Steve’s this monster who lives in the woods behind my house.” He nodded at the trees behind him. “Right there. He’s pretty chill.”

I looked at the woods. They were normal suburban woods. It wasn’t dark yet.

“Do you think Steve’s in the woods right now?” I asked.

“Well, duh,” Arvin said. “You think he’d be at a supermarket or something?”

I laughed because I wanted to stay in Arvin’s good graces, but really I had no clue what monsters did. Sure I had never seen a monster at a supermarket, but I had also thought until a few hours ago that there weren’t any monsters living in Chillicothe.

“I’ll see you around, man,” I said to Arvin, high-fiving him and then walking past him toward the woods.

It didn’t take me very long to find the monster. Only about 60 feet into the woods, I came across a sort of teepee in front of a tall evergreen. The teepee was made of red leaves and long, thin sticks, strung together artistically with twine. I walked around the teepee until I found an opening. Steve was sitting inside, looking at his phone.

“Hey,” I said. “Steve?”

He looked up and said, “what up?” Slowly, he came out of the teepee, unfurling his long limbs.

Here’s my description of Steve. He was seven feet tall, with foot-long horns that shot up from his head like an impala. I’m only five foot five, and the height difference was pretty hot. His body was covered all over with thick, short, brown hair, his face was long and expressive and his ears had tufts at the tips. His arms hung down to his knees and his fingers ended in long, black claws. He was wearing Levis but no shirt, and I could see that under the fur he was very heavily muscled, with an eight-pack and meaty biceps, which as you know is totally my thing. So even though he was a monster, I felt justified in hooking up with him because he was sexy.

“Do you remember me?” I asked Steve. “From last night?”

“Oh, yeah,” Steve said. He bent down and squinted in my face. “Sorry, what’s your name?” Probably because of the massive fangs protruding from behind his bottom lip, Steve had a slight lisp. This guy checked all my boxes.

“I’m Celia,” I said. “We hooked up?”

“Right, right,” Steve said. “How are you, Celia?”

“I’m good,” I said. “Listen, Steve, did we have sex last night? Everything in my memory is a little fuzzy.”

“Yeah, we did,” he said, scratching his arm with a claw. “You were great.”

“Thanks,” I said.

It was a little awkward. I knew what I wanted to ask but it was hard to get the words out now that I had this sexy, somewhat frightening, behemoth in front of me.

“You used a condom, right?” I asked him.

“Yeah,” he said. “I always use protection. I mean, it’s kind of hard with condoms, because of my…” He looked down at his pants and then back to me with an expression that said, “You know how it is.”

I certainly did not know how it is. I had a sinking feeling that my blacking out the previous night had cost me memories of interacting with the most interesting penis I was ever likely to find.

“I like your place,” I told him.

“Thanks,” he said. “My mom gave me the sticks but I built the rest of it.”

“Cool,” I said. 

He seemed open to me asking more questions so I asked him, “Just wondering … what do you eat?”

“Rabbits.”

“But you don’t have a fire,” I said.

“No,” he said.

“But you have a phone,” I said.

“Yeah,” he said, a little defensive. “How are these things related?”

“Oh,” I said. “Um, do you have Insta?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Follow me?” I followed him.

The conversation sort of died out.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you whenever Arvin throws another party,” Steve said.

“Sounds good,” I said. “Hey, why have I never seen you at any other party in the neighborhood?”

“The ceilings aren’t tall enough for me usually,” Steve said.

“That sucks,” I said. “Well, see you around.”

“Yup.”

I left the woods.

Steve was definitely a major hottie, but after chatting with him for a few days over Instagram I felt that we hadn’t really struck up a connection. I figured that if I ever saw him at another one of Arvin’s parties I might hook up with him again, but for now I was back to getting with regular humans and not monsters.

After I met Steve, I had a few pretty shitty months. Second semester junior year was a bitch and I always felt like I was failing my classes, even though I actually had C+s in all of them. I was stressed out, and so tired that I fell asleep in class all the time. Gym was the pits. I’m great in bed, just ask Steve, and I like to bike, but I’m pretty terrible at all other athletic activities. On top of that, third-best friend Sarah dated another of my exes and we had a massive blowup in front of the entire school during an anti-smoking presentation in the auditorium. Everyone saw it because we were sitting in the first row and I had to stand up to get a good angle for slapping her.

Meanwhile, my rescue pug Edgar kicked the bucket when he fell down the stairs, which just sucked because he was finally starting to get a following on the Instagram account I had made for him. And worst of all, I finally managed to hook up with Thomas and it turned out to be 100 percent not at all worth all those years of effort I had put in to make it happen. Thomas may have killer biceps but he also has clammy hands and a tendency to shove his tongue down your throat as far as it can go. And I had to pee the whole time we were hooking up.

But then, a few weeks before the end of the semester, I got really nauseated during math class. I went to the bathroom and promptly vomited straight into the sink. There were a few freshmen in there who caught it all on video but that’s not important.

So it seemed I was pregnant, which did explain why I had missed my last two periods.

As I rode my bike to CVS after school to buy a pregnancy test, it occurred to me that it was exactly three months after I had hooked up with Steve. 

Buying the pregnancy test was awkward as hell, so in an act of defiance I threw in a box of condoms and some lube just for the hell of it and stared the cashier down.

Half an hour later, two little assholian lines were looking up at me from the plastic stick. I could hear the lines whispering, “Celia, you fucking idiot, you got a monster fetus inside of you.” I wondered what had happened with the condom Steve had used. Maybe his wacky monster penis had torn it somehow, or maybe it had come off. Either way, he was most likely having a grand old time in the woods somewhere while I was the one stuck with a pregnancy I didn’t want and a really embarrassing CVS experience.

So I did what any self-respecting pregnant 17-year-old would do. I went to Lisa’s house and cried my way through two boxes of tissues. Lisa had no advice for me other than that if I decided to go through with it, she had a long list of baby names that she had been pulling from minor characters on her favorite ABC Family shows. This didn’t make me feel any better so I went home to my mom and cried my way through another two boxes of tissues.

For once in my life, my mom was actually angry with me, instead of being in awe, probably because she’d had a kid before so she knew all about it and it didn’t seem like anything special. But when she learned that the father was Steve she said, “I’ve never been with a monster,” and then went back to being in awe and asked me a million questions about what Steve was like.

Finally she asked me if I wanted to have an abortion. The answer was undoubtedly “yes.” I wasn’t ready to have a kid. If I had a kid I wouldn’t have time to do anything I liked to do, like going to parties, and I probably couldn’t go to college, where the parties were supposed to be even better than in high school. I didn’t have a job or any money saved up to support a baby. And although I was sure I could teach a baby all kinds of great selfie poses and how to ride a bike and how to do a keg stand, I didn’t think, when it really came down to it, that I would make a very good mother.

On top of everything, I wasn’t really sure what kind of baby I would hypothetically be giving birth to. Would it be a weird hybrid of monster and human? I thought it would probably grow up to be super hot, the way mixed-race people are so much hotter than normal people. And as much as I wanted to contribute to the Earth’s pool of hot people, I still really didn’t want to have a kid, especially a monster-y kid.

When my dad got home, my mom and I told him everything and he yelled at me for getting pregnant and being a disappointment, and then my mom yelled at him, and then he yelled at my mom and then I got on the phone with Planned Parenthood.

I live in Ohio so, of course, it was a whole thing. I had to fill out a bunch of forms and do a screening and our insurance didn’t cover it so it was really a bitch. It took a week just to set up a final date for the procedure. I spent every night on the phone with Lisa, crying and complaining, but all that venting made me feel better about how stupid I had been.

I didn’t tell Steve, either about the pregnancy or the abortion. It seemed to me that, considering he had meant to use birth control and he lived alone in the woods, he wasn’t really interested in being a father. We weren’t dating; we hadn’t even texted in like a month. And really, in the end, it was my decision, as the pregnant person, how much information I gave to anyone, if I gave it at all. I thought it was probably better if only a few people knew, and after I had had the abortion I could quietly go back to my normal life, although I was probably going to have to start taking the pill so that I wouldn’t have to rely on just condoms anymore. And also, maybe, I would have to stop having sex with monsters. But they were so hot! But their penises couldn’t handle condoms! But so hot! It was going to be a tough decision.

The morning of the procedure, my mom, Lisa and I all sat together in my dining room sipping iced tea and talking about literally anything other than babies. They had both agreed to come with me to the appointment because I was nervous. My dad was at work. 

I took deep breaths and mentally prepared myself. It wasn’t that I was anxious about getting rid of my baby — that I was sure about. I was actually really scared about undergoing surgery. I had only had surgery once the previous year when I had got my wisdom teeth out, and that wasn’t bad at all because they had given me Vicodin and it was the shit. But this surgery was going to involve a doctor having their hands inside my vagina and I was super not into that.

It was time to go. We went into the front hallway to put on our shoes, and my mom was double checking that we had all the right forms, when there was a loud knock at the door. I opened it.

It was Steve. He was panting, as though he had run there. Behind me I could hear my mother gasp as she got her first glimpse of him. He was too tall to come inside without ducking, so he just stood awkwardly outside the doorway.

“Steve,” I said. “What’s up?”

“Hey, so, listen,” he said. “Arvin told me that you’re pregnant because of me, and that, um, that you want to have an abortion.”

“Who told Arvin?” I asked him.

“Sorry, that was me,” Lisa said, quietly.

I made a mental note to demote Lisa to second-best friend once I had the time.

I sighed. “Yeah,” I said to Steve. “We’re actually just about to leave to go get the procedure done.”

“Celia,” Steve said, “I’ve thought about it a lot, and I want to raise the baby with you.”

“Well, the thing is I’m having an abortion,” I said.

“I think I would make a good father,” he said. “I’m willing to take on the responsibility.”

“Steve,” I said, “I’m having an abortion.”

“Why?” he said.

“Because I’m 17!” I said, throwing up my hands in exasperation. “I don’t want to give birth. And we only had a one night stand that I didn’t even remember afterward because I was so fucking drunk. You didn’t even remember my name the next day!”

“Celia, language,” my mom said.

“Sorry,” I said. “Just go away, Steve, will you?”

“No,” he said. I thought it was pretty ballsy of him.

“No?” I said.

“Here’s the thing,” Steve said. “From the moment I met you I could tell that you have, like, a really strong womb.”

“Excuse me?”

“So I’m a monster, right? There aren’t that many of us. We’re kind of endangered, I guess? And my mom always told me that if I came across a girl who smelled like she had a strong womb, I should get that girl to bear my child. And Celia you have a womb that’s like, I don’t know, made of iron or something. So please have the baby. You wouldn’t have to do any of the work. You wouldn’t even have to raise it. I could raise it. The hardest thing about it would be that monster babies do get their full-sized horns in the womb, but after that I would do everything so it wouldn’t be a big deal at all. Please don’t have an abortion, Celia.”

This was a lot of information to take in.

“What does my womb smell like?” Lisa asked behind me.

“Uh, it’s pretty weak,” Steve said.

“Aw,” she said.

“Hold the fuck up,” I said. “Steve. Did you actually use a condom, or did you lie about that because you were trying to get me pregnant from the start?”

“What? No,” he said. “Why would you think that?”

“Because of literally everything you just told me,” I said.

“Okay,” he said. “You got me. But here’s the thing, you have to have the baby. Either you call off the abortion or I guess I have to  hold you prisoner in the woods or something until you give birth.”

“What the fuck?” I said. “You’re crazy!”

“Are you calling off the abortion?” he asked me.

“No!” I said.

His lips curled back in a sort of wolf-like snarl, which actually would have been really sexy if he hadn’t been bending down as though to grab me with his claws.

“No, you don’t!” my mother said. I whipped around. While Steve and I had been talking, it seemed like she had gotten all of the guns out of the hall closet. Now she had my dad’s Browning hunting rifle aimed straight at Steve.

“Step away from my daughter,” my mom said. I had never seen her so badass before.

Steve snarled again and backed out of the doorway but he didn’t leave.

My mom passed me and Lisa each one of the handguns, all the while keeping her rifle trained on Steve.

“Get out of here, Steve,” I said.

“I’m not leaving until you agree to have the baby,” he said.

“I swear to god, I will shoot you in the face,” I said. I turned the safety off and raised the gun at him menacingly.

He gave me one last snarl, I guess trying to retain some dignity, and then scrambled off the porch. I looked out of the doorway to watch him fleeing down the road.

“Holy shit,” Lisa said. “Did you see him snarl? That was so hot.”

“What are we going to do if he comes after us again?” I asked my mom.

“We’ll take the guns with us,” she said. “Turn your safety on, Celia.” She looked down at her watch and said, “Oh no, we’re late. All right, ladies, let’s get in the car.”

We went out to the driveway with our guns up in defensive positions and packed ourselves into the car. My mom was driving, I was in the passenger seat and Lisa was in the backseat with the guns. Lisa and I looked around as my mom pulled out of the driveway, but there was no sign of Steve. I thought maybe he had gone back to his woods, but I couldn’t be sure.

We began the drive to Columbus in tight silence, all of us nervously looking out the windows for signs of Steve. There wasn’t much traffic on the highway, so we had a clear view of everything around us. My mom put on Light FM which reduced the tension a little. In some ways, this new Steve development was great because I wasn’t nervous about the abortion at all anymore since I was so angry. Who was Steve to say what I should do with my body? Not to mention he had purposefully impregnated me. I was probably the angriest I had ever been, other than the time that my at-one-time-best-friend Jeanine had switched out my ketchup with hot sauce in the middle school cafeteria just to make me look bad in front of my crush, Cody Atkinson. Yeah, I was definitely madder that time, but I was still pretty angry at Steve and my anger burned away all of my fear about a doctor sticking things in my vagina.

Suddenly Lisa said, “Hey, isn’t that Steve?”

The left side of the highway was bordered by woods and that was where she was looking. We all craned our necks, and sure enough, there was the asshole, running on all fours along the edge of the woods, following the car.

“Step on it, Mom,” I yelled, and pretty soon we were doing a hot 80 miles per hour, the wind roaring through the open windows. Still Steve kept pace with us. He was inhumanly fast but he was a monster.

“Lisa, can you get a good shot at him?” my mom yelled.

Lisa braced her elbow on the car door and fired. Her bullet went right into a passing tree, not even in line with Steve at all.

“Shoot,” Lisa said.

“Lean back, Mom,” I said, taking off my seatbelt and getting the rifle from the backseat. I leaned across my mom and took aim. I’ve always been a good shot. The only thing my father and I do together is yell at each other after I come home wasted from a party and go to shooting ranges together to practice.

I tracked Steve’s path as he weaved in and out of trees, waiting for the right moment, until a big oak forced Steve to expose himself outside the protection of the woods and I took my shot. I wasn’t sure exactly where I had hit him but he howled and collapsed to the ground. He disappeared from view as our car raced forward.

“I got him!” I said.

“Great work,” my mom said. “Now, put your seatbelt back on.”

“You’re amazing, Celia,” Lisa said, but it didn’t change my mind about demoting her.

I wasn’t sure if I had killed Steve or just maimed him, but goddammit I was willing to do it again if it meant I could get my abortion. I clutched the rifle to my chest as our car raced toward Columbus.

As we entered Columbus, we kept looking around for Steve, since it was possible I hadn’t killed him, or not managed to maim him enough to keep him from following us.

“All right, this is it,” my mom said as we parked next to the Columbus Planned Parenthood. “We’re five minutes late. Let’s hustle. Oh, and bring the guns, just in case,” she said.

There was a security guard standing outside the front door.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he said. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“We are late for our appointment!” my mom said.

“I’m getting an abortion,” I said.

“We’re being chased by the monster that got her pregnant,” Lisa said.

“I don’t care who’s chasing you,” the guard said. “You can’t come in here with guns.” He was reaching for his own gun.

Suddenly my mother was pointing her rifle in his face. “My daughter needs her abortion now!” she screamed.

“Mom, you’re so cool,” I said.

“Put down the gun, lady,” the security guard said.

“Let us in!” my mom said, poking him with the barrel of her rifle to make him move aside. She kept the rifle pointed at him and waved us into the Planned Parenthood.

The waiting room was empty but the receptionist at the desk had heard the commotion outside. As Lisa and I entered she squeaked, “I’ve called the police! Don’t come any closer!”

“But I’m here for an abortion,” I said.

“Don’t hurt me!” the receptionist said.

“Let go of me!” my mom said. 

I turned back and found that the security guard had somehow managed to pin my mom to the ground just outside the door. 

“My daughter needs an abortion!” she said.

“Shut up!” the security guard said.

“Everybody calm the fuck down!” I screamed.

The receptionist began to cry.

Then suddenly there was a brown blur leaping over the security guard and my mom, and Steve hurtled into the room. He was bleeding profusely from his right thigh. He growled at me, circling me on all fours. I have to admit it was really sexy. It didn’t change that Steve was an asshole, though.

Lisa had backed herself into the corner of the room, terrified, and incidentally demoted herself to fourth-best friend.

“You shot me in the leg,” Steve said.

“You threatened to kidnap me, you fucking weirdo,” I said. “How did you even get here with that leg?”

“I work out,” he said. God, he was so hot. “That’s not important. Celia. Bear. My. Child.”

“No,” I said.

He snarled and kept circling me.

“I’m going to kill you,” I told him.

“What the heck is going on?” the receptionist said, sobbing.

“Celia!” my mom shouted from beneath the security guard.

I could hear police sirens in the distance.

“You’re such a bitch!” Steve said. He let out a howl, and then, before I could blink, he had launched himself at me, claws out.

And suddenly it was bam, bam, bam, bam, bam as I shot Steve over and over again. His blood spattered all over me and his body jerked and twisted until he finally crumpled in a heap on the floor, looking kind of like a really gross rug.

I turned to face a horrified doctor who had just emerged from an examination room.

“Hey,” I said. “I’m here for my 3 o’clock.”

Anyway, so of course it had to be a whole thing where Lisa, my mom and I had to answer a bunch of questions at the police station, but it turned out fine because shooting a monster who attacks you because he wants you to have his kid is actually considered self defense. And then I got my abortion.

Steve ended up buried a few graves down from Jessica in the cemetery, which made it even more awkward every time I had to ride by.

Even after everything, it’s not like I don’t go to parties anymore, because I do. I go to all the parties. And I still vomit. But I make sure to never, ever drink until I black out. 

I have hooked up with one monster since, but it wasn’t an issue.