With a Voice that is Often Still Confused But is Becoming Ever Louder and Clearer

by J. R. Hamantaschen

  Soon Enough This Will Essentially Be a True Story

  It was the easiest thing to do, so she did it.

  Click, and she was entered into another Goodreads giveaway. She’d entered about ten giveaways in the last couple of minutes, just entering with nothing more than a click, to win whatever seemed even marginally interesting: meaning something dark, something weird, something bizarre. Click. Click. Click. If anyone ever wrote a biography about her, they’d have to come up with different words for “click.”

  Here was a Penguin re-issue of some Edgar Allen Poe Stories, stories that were available for free online and that she already owned, but she didn’t see any harm in entering the giveaway, anyway. It was just a click away. Click.

  Give me Convenience or Give Me Death, the band the Dead Kennedys had named their compilation of rarities, their dig at 1980’s consumer culture. That album was released back in 1985, years and years before she was even born.

  What had they been satirizing, mail-order catalogs? What was that in a world where she canvassed a digital aggregator for free books — free books provided by authors so eager for readers that they even paid their own shipping costs — while simultaneously pirating four albums off SoulSeek and skimming through her friends’ online pictures of food shots and exaggerated expressions.

  Give me Convenience or Give me Death, indeed.

  She checked her Goodreads tally. She’d entered about fifteen giveaways, thought, well, this is enough empty-minded clicking for one day, and logged off.

  It was about 2:30 p.m. on an unassuming school day. Karen was home alone in her room, had been for approximately an hour. Ahh, the perks of being a high school senior. If you couldn’t set yourself up with an easy-peasy schedule, they should demote you back to freshman.

  So much free time, yet her room, still so messy. Maybe she’d spend her afternoon conquering “Heap Mountain,” as she and her mother dubbed the lump of clothes, accessories, books and accumulated detritus that gathered around her bed. Her mother would be pleasantly surprised and impressed, and that would be her strongest reason for doing it. But still, she didn’t. No reason why not. She should, she wanted to, but she didn’t.

  Her rickety old phone buzzed. She checked the text.

  Yo Yo Bee-yotch, swingin’ by. It was Rose, her best friend and hetero-life partner. Karen was impressed that Rose had bothered to spell out Bee-yotch, put in the little hyphen and everything. That’s the type of care and dedication that makes someone a best friend.

  Coolio, in the lair, astride Heap Mountain. Stop in, she texted back.

  Good thing she didn’t get started on cleaning up her room, she would have been interrupted anyway, she fake-thought. Getting to work on stabilizing Heap Mountain remained the insurmountable task. That’s because Heap Mountain never updated – it was always the same. Maybe if cleaning incorporated clicking.

  She went on Songza for a dour-but-upbeat music mix, and on came “Crawl” by the Alkaline Trio. She bobbed along, keeping rhythm.

  She uploaded her just-finished Goodreads review. It’d been almost 48 hours since her last update. She was in the top 20 in the United States on Goodreads for her prolific and well-”liked” reviews (literally: the algorithm that ranked reviewers depended on how many people clicked “like” on her reviews). (“Yeah, top twenty reviewer. At twentieth,” she imagined Rose saying, something she’d probably said in the past. “Still the top twentieth,” she imagined shooting back, gleefully).

  She was damn impressed with herself. Top twenty for the United States was an achievement. There was a lot of competition; America created the online marketplace for attempts at attention-getting. If she were in Latvia or something, she’d certainly be taking the number one spot.

  Hobbies were getting more and more niche. Posting online reviews on Goodreads was hers. She posted the review and closed the website, with the full knowledge that she’d be back online in about ten minutes (or one minute, who was she kidding) to see how many likes, tweets and comments she’d amassed.

  “Crawl” played again. She set it on repeat. She was like that, she loved hearing the same thing, refreshing the same pages, whatever controls the circuitry of satisfaction and pleasures, well, that was what got her off.

  Fifteen minutes, five refreshes, eleven individual comments, fourteen likes, and two profile picture changes later, Rose arrived.

  “‘Can’t believe how strange it is to be anything at allll,’” Karen sung along with Neutral Milk Hotel, another repeat favorite, as Rose came into the room.

  “Hola, hola.” Rose came to Karen’s house to-and-fro and as she pleased, essentially another family member. “Damn, still good ole Clutter Island in here, I see. You didn’t lie.”

  “Yup, and still can’t get Leonardo DiCaprio to sign on.”

  “Well, in his defense, you’re no Scorcese.”

  “Not yet.”

  Rose leaned in and looked at Karen’s Goodreads page. “Raped by the Raptor,” she read the title of the book Karen had just reviewed off Karen’s computer screen. “Sounds like another Karen-approved classic.”

  “Actually, it’s ‘Raped by the Reptar.’ Learn to read, beo-otch. It’s Rugrats fan fiction porn. Rugrats is this old kids’ cartoon.”

  “Jesus Lord, you keep sinking lower and lower, don’t you? Damn, Karen, you never cease.”

  “Don’t hate the player.”

  Karen pointed her cursor over a comment that a fan had just left in the last minute or so and read the comment aloud: “You sexy goth librarian you, you never cease to amaze us.” She turned to Rose. “See, my fans agree with you. I never cease to amaze. And my fans are legion.”

  Rose laughed. “That’s awesome. Great minds think alike. Serendipity, it must be.” Karen replied to the comment, noting her friend Rose had just said the same thing, and clicked ‘like’ on her own comment.

  Karen liked being called a sexy goth librarian. Goth librarian was not exactly the look she went for, but was somewhere in the wheelhouse. She didn’t see herself as sexy: she instead focused on the fifteen pounds or so she felt she could afford to lose, if only clicking was exercise and cookies and ice cream didn’t taste so damn good. She had natural dark hair, which she kept pulled back; well-curated outfits of dark colors, tight-fitting enough to suggest the chesty body underneath, which she knowingly accentuated with pendants or necklaces to lead the eyes to the fun parts. Her current profile picture was appropriately gothic and decked out for Fall, the lower part of her face covered by red-and-orange crumpled leaves she held up for the camera, only her arch, sharp eyes and angular lashes visible. And the picture showed off one of the best things about living in Rhode Island: damn good Fall foliage.

  She received a new message on Goodreads.

  Mhmm why you hiding behind those leaves lol, you’re too pretty for that. Maybe put the leaves between the boobs though, that may work better for Fall lol. Groan. On a good week, half of the comments she received were sexualized come-ons, always replete with the ‘what-me?’ LOLs, as if dropping a LOL or JK in a comment completely nullified sexual obnoxiousness. The same guy — profile picture showed an avuncular older man with well-styled white hair — had left a couple comments before, some of them substantive and constructive. She only responded to those worthwhile comments. Eh. She didn’t want to ignore him and lose a follower, but still, eh. She oscillated about how to respond.

  Two more messages popped up.

  The first message was from the same avuncular older man. An apology of sorts. LOL sorry I didn’t mean any offense, just ignore that, I’m an idiot sometimes.

  Whew, problem solved. No prob :) she replied.

  The second message.....

  “OH SHEET,” she bellowed.

  She won a Goodreads lottery, which meant she’d get a free physical copy of the book she “bid” on. She usually only read physical books if she won them; with
her reading interests, the books were usually free or, at most, 99 cents for a Kindle copy. Not many authors or publishing companies would bother to physically produce copies of the gems in her collection, which included such classics as Mounted by the Monster, the related but far more offensive Mounted by My Masta; I, WhoreBot; Vampire Fuck-Fest, The Only Crosses We Respect Are the Ones That Go Inside Us; and that beguiling story of star-crossed lovers, The Maiden and the Deer Gods.

  She actually did read some respectable fiction, non-fiction and the like, but those reviews took longer to prepare, and the Goodreads metrics prized quantity. She absentmindedly ended up becoming the ascendant genre erotica reviewer on Goodreads. She was listed as a favorite reviewer on the “MonsterErotica Chat Group,” and every related review had a guaranteed fan base of at least 500 pairs of eyeballs. The competition was always nipping at her heels, churning out reviews that were barely more than click-bait gifs and look-at-me meta-hipsterism. The genre she was reviewing, of course, was largely fatuous trash, but she made an effort to separate the wheat from the chaff. I mean, there’s something to be said about trash done right.

  She read up on the book she’d won. The Ardent Aardvark Who Fucks The World, and Other Stories, by the Obviously Pseudonymed KatMandu. That was the whole title, which included the author’s name for whatever reason. And literally, that was the author’s nom de plume: Obviously Pseudonymed KatMandu. The author’s profile picture was of a grey-and-white tabby cat wearing wide-framed wire glasses, donning a Photoshopped, squiggly-black line of a smirk.

  She read the book’s description:

  A serial killer who only targets the most deserving victims: people who don’t turn off their phones in movie theaters. An unloved Aardvark who, frustrated that his species is unknown to the wider world, becomes whatever he imagines himself to be. A tree who rapes a shrub: only to become America’s Sweetheart. Ellen Page’s boobs that were digitally created for that video game gains sentience and haunts her dreams - with sexy results. Plus, Katy Perry and Taylor Swift dyking it out and blowing a bunch of dudes while Ashton Kutcher gets set on fire.

  All this and more, finally in one place.

  For the first time, after much demand, KatMandu’s surviving stories have been collected in one anthology.

  Not strictly Monster Erotica, but the type of wallowing genre so-bad-it’s-great Kindle-bred trash that should make for a decent review. And, she had to give credit where it was due, this guy (well, maybe not a guy, but let’s play the odds here....) took the time to self-publish the book in a physical format. That boded … not well, but at least meant something. Perhaps this author put a little more tender love-and-care into his creations.

  “Oh man, this one’s a winner,” Rose leaned in, her long neck and limbs crowding out Karen’s view of the screen.

  “You just like it because it’s written by a cat.” Karen pointed to the profile picture. Rose was lithe and cat-like, naturally dark-haired and with soulful green eyes, and many a Halloween she’d donned black tights and black-stub earrings and gone as a cat, a good I’m-pretending-to-be-lazy-but-this-only-works-because-I-can-sorta-pull-it-off costume. “Mreow,” Karen play-scratched at Rose. Rose hissed back, impressively. She’d had practice.

  Goodreads provided the participating author with the addresses of the contest-winners. The author would send out the physical copies, and then verify electronically that the copies had been sent.

  Within 5 minutes, Goodreads sent her another automated message:

  “Congratulations! We are happy to let you know that [Obviously Pseudonymed KatMandu] has sent out your contest copy! Happy Reading! You are encouraged to write a review, but it is not mandatory.”

  Damn, this Kat was an eager beaver.

  Another email arrived.

  Subject line: Straight from the Kat’s Mouth.

  Karen! Thanks for submitting to my contest. And even better, thanks for winning! You are a review rockstar, even if you didn’t win I would have sent you a copy anyway!

  I knew you had it in you! Holy Meowzers, you live in Rhode Island, too. I hope you love the book and we can drink Del’s and ‘Setts and I can eat your clam errr we can eat clams together! Hope you like it, it’s my life’s work! I sent it out via Amazon Prime.

  And remember.....MEOW!

  She responded kindly and enthusiastically, ignoring the clam comment (par for the course) and electronically high-fiving him on his love of Del’s and asking him where he lived in “Lil Rhody.” She sent him the usual disclaimer — that she had a bunch of other books on the reading queue, so a review may not be forthcoming anytime in the near future — but she would definitely make sure to get to his book in due time and post an honest review.

  “Hahah, oh man, what have you gotten yourself into?” Rose asked as they got ready for the night.

  “Just another day in the life.”

  >< >< ><

  They were going over to Justin’s house. In shocking-yet-related news, Justin’s parents were out of town. This was going to be a low-key affair, a couple of friends over, drinking whatever cheap and/or tasty alcohol they could procure, probably end up streaming a movie and pigging-out on fast food. She and Justin had a little on-again/off-again thing going. They’d been friends since Junior High, and undoubtedly, as she joked, allowing Justin to put his penis in her mouth on a few choice occasions only heightened the bonds of their friendship.

  He was sweet, and she suspected he was a little infatuated with her; since guys are obsessed with their dicks, she reasoned, Justin may feel weirdly indebted to her, or maybe he just would have felt that way toward any girl who helped him satisfy that most incessant, perennial craving. But she liked that he was too shy or sweet (or both) to ever make any moves on his own. She was in control. He was so understanding, sweet and … is grateful the right word? Maybe, but she liked it. She liked having his penis in her mouth, and she liked when he satisfied her, too. She straight-up liked it and wasn’t afraid to say so.

  And God bless Rose, her wing-woman. If Karen could take an informal poll at school, she imagined most people would think Rose was the more sexually active of the two, probably because Rose just looked more sexual — taller, leaner, more svelte of face and form. But in fact, they’d be wro-ong; Rose had the sense of humor of a sailor but the chasteness of a school chaperone. The most salacious thing she’d ever had in her mouth was a chili cheese dog.

  Funny, you can’t win: too much sexuality, and you’re a slut; too little, and you’re a cock-tease. Rose had been burned by guys who dated her a bit and then cast her off after she’d do nothing more than kiss and feel. Maybe they thought she didn’t like them, maybe their pride had been hurt, who knows. Karen and Rose talked about this at length — they’d talked about everything at length, and Rose had no moral or religious objections to sex (“and, appropriately, no morals or religion whatsoever,” she’d once quipped), but just didn’t have the desire to get embroiled in sexual high school politics and never found a guy worth the risk. Poor Rose, she was actually eager to experiment, to know and give pleasure, but these local scrubs weren’t fitting the bill.

  Someday.

  >< >< ><

  After they’d gotten ready (which meant looking a bit more sex-ified than usual, but without doing anything that brought obvious attention to their efforts), they made their way downstairs.

  “You want food? We got pizza left over from last night,” Joan, Karen’s mother, offered as they were making their way downstairs. The one set of stairs in the house ended across from the entrance to the kitchen; in other words, when you went down the stairs, the kitchen would be directly before you. You had to turn a left from the bottom of the stairs and turn the corner to head out toward the front door. If Joan needed to talk to Karen, she made sure to be centrally-located in the kitchen. Whether Karen was coming-or-going to her room upstairs, she had to walk past the kitchen.

  “Is
that my Karen wearing perfume?” Joan asked as she opened the refrigerator. “It smells like…flowers! You smell like flowers! Not gravestones—” (at this Rose doubled-over with laughter) — “or something weird, but flowers!”

  “No, it isn’t perfume. Mom, you know if that day ever comes, you will be the first to know. And by the way, if you know of a gravestone perfume, then I don’t need to tell you what I want for Christmas this year.”

  “You’re not?” Her mom came over and sniffed at her neck and hair while Rose laughed. “You smell nice, though.”

  “Must be all the patchouli I bathe in.”

  “Must be,” she said as she whipped Karen playfully with a dish rag.

  “Ahh, assaulted by my own mother! Rose, you’re a witness!”

  “Oh shush you,” Joan continued, emptying out the fruit drawer. “Are you sure you don’t want to bring a fruit or anything? You didn’t eat yet! Eat something good, at least. Or you two could not go out at all, it might rain tonight, you know?”

  “Eat something good, like pizza?” Karen asked rhetorically.

  “If I was your daughter, I’d love to stay at home and eat pizza,” Rose brown-nosed.

  “Oh, I know that, Rose. They must have switched you two at birth.”

  Karen played at exasperation. “She hits me and then wishes she had a different daughter. This is what I live with.”

  “Oh boo hoo, call me when you come back. Be safe. Don’t drink and drive, ok Rose, you promise me? And even if you do drink, call me, I can pick you up.”

  “No drinking and driving, got that?” Karen told Rose. “She didn’t say anything about doing crack and driving though. Loophole!”

  “Oh look at you, future lawyer over there,” they heard Joan as they made their way out toward the door.

  “Haha, yeah, right. The closest I’ll get to being a lawyer is suing your ass if you try and kick me out of the house!”