The Monster

by Shen, L. J.

  The Monster

  Copyright © 2021 by L.J. Shen

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without prior consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial use permitted by copyright law.

  Resemblance to actual persons and things living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental.

  Title Page

  Copyright

  About This Book

  Dedication

  Playlist

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  Stay connected

  Also by L.J. Shen

  Pretty Reckless Excerpt

  Prologue

  “Maybe we were never meant for each other. But that night at the carnival, when you showed me who you were, I figured out who I wanted to be.”

  The most important thing I’d ever read was scribbled on the door of a portable restroom, engraved into plastic at a carnival on the outskirts of Boston.

  Lust lingers, love stays.

  Lust is impatient, love waits.

  Lust burns, love warms.

  Lust destroys, but love? Love kills.

  Maybe it was always my destiny to fall in love with a monster.

  When other kids stayed awake at night fearing the pointy-toothed beast hiding in their closet, I longed to see mine.

  I wanted to feed it, domesticate it, understand it.

  Sam and I were only allowed to love each other in the dark.

  Once our story unfolded, and the truth came to light, I was the one to cut the cord.

  My name is Aisling Fitzpatrick, and I have a confession to make.

  Sam Brennan is not the only monster in this story.

  To monsters everywhere, and to sword-yielding Pang and Jan. Thank you for storming into my life.

  “You Are in Love with a Psycho”—Kasabian

  “Rock & Roll Queen”—The Subways

  “I’m Not in Love”—Kelsey Lu

  “Good Girls Bad Boys”—Falling in Reverse

  “Wow”—Zara Larsson

  “Listen Up”—The Gossip

  “The End of the World”—Skeeter Davis

  “What would an ocean be without a monster lurking in the dark? It would be like sleep without dreams.”

  —Werner Herzog

  Age 9

  This is the last time you ever cry in your life, shithead.

  That was the only thing that went through my head when the woman who gave birth to me punched the doorbell five times in a row, clutching the back of my shirt like she was disposing of some punk who’d TP’d her house on her neighbor’s doorstep.

  The door to Uncle Troy’s penthouse swung open. She shoved me past the threshold.

  “Here. All yours. You win.”

  I flung myself into the arms of Aunt Sparrow, who staggered backward, pulling me to her chest in a protective hug.

  Sparrow and Troy Brennan weren’t really my aunt and uncle, but I spent a lot of time with them—and by ‘a lot’, I mean still not enough.

  Cat, AKA the woman who birthed me, was giving me away. She’d made up her mind tonight when she’d passed by me, on her way to her bedroom.

  “Why are you so small? Pam’s kid is your age, and he is, like, huge.”

  “Because you never fucking feed me.” I flung my joystick to the side, giving her stink eye.

  “You’re, like, ten or eleven, Samuel! Make yourself a sandwich.”

  I was a nine-year-old and a malnourished one at that. But she was right. I should make myself a sandwich. I would if we had the ingredients for it. There weren’t even condiments in our house, only drug paraphernalia and enough booze to fill the Charles River.

  Not that Cat cared. She was blind with rage because I stole her cocaine and sold it to some wiseguys down the street then used the money to buy four McMeals and a Nerf gun, when she left me unattended tonight.

  Grandma Maria was the one who did the heavy lifting when it came to raising me. She lived with us, working two jobs to support us. Catalina was in the background, like a piece of furniture. There, but not really. We lived under the same roof, but she moved out whenever her boyfriends were whipped enough to let her stay with them. She went to rehab centers, and dated married men, and somehow had money to buy expensive bags and shoes. Kids at school kept telling me their dads said Cat knew the curve of every mattress at our local Motel 6, and even though I wasn’t sure what it meant, I was sure it wasn’t good.

  I once eavesdropped on Uncle Troy telling her, “He is not the fucking Hamptons, Cat. You can’t visit him periodically, when the weather allows it.”

  Catalina had told him to shut his trap. That I was the worst mistake she had ever made while she was high.

  That day, I got expelled. Beat the shit out of Neil DeMarco for saying his dad and mom were getting a divorce because of my mom.

  “Your mom’s a slut, and now I have to move to a smaller house! I hate you!”

  I’d given him a different reason to hate me by the time I was done with him, one he would always remember because it changed his face.

  When Cat picked me up, she’d yelled at me that she’d fuck up my face like I’d done to Neil, but I wasn’t worth breaking her new nails over. I’d barely heard her. Everything inside my head was swollen from the fight and from thoughts that made my head hurt.

  But I knew she’d be too cheap to take me to Urgent Care, so I didn’t complain.

  “All ours?” Aunt Sparrow narrowed her green eyes at Catalina. “What are you talking about? Today is not our day with Sam.”

  Aunt Sparrow had red hair and freckles and a body like a scarecrow, all bones and skin. She wasn’t as pretty as Catalina, but I still loved her more.

  Cat rolled her eyes, kicking the duffel bag with my stuff. It hit Uncle Troy’s shins.

  “Don’t pretend like you haven’t been gunning for this all along. You take him on your family vacations, he has a room here, and you go to all his soccer games. You’d breastfeed him if you had any tits, which sadly, you don’t.” Catalina swiped her eyes along Sparrow’s body. “You always wanted him. He’ll complete your boring little family, with your boring little daughter. Well, it’s your lucky day, because the asshole is officially yours.”

  I swallowed hard and glared straight ahead at the flat screen TV behind Sparrow’s shoulder. Their living room was a mess. The good kind of mess. Toys strewn everywhere, pink fluffy blankets, and a purple, glittery toddler scooter. Brave was playing on the screen. It was Sailor’s favorite movie. She was probably asleep.

  She had a bedtime. Rules. A routine.

  Sailor was Troy and Sparrow’s two-year-old. I loved her like a sister. Whenever she feared a monster was hiding under her bed and I was there, she’d slip out of her toddler bed and pad into my room and slide under my blanket, clutching me like I was a teddy bear.

  “Keep me thafe, Sammy.”

  “Always, Sail.”

  “Not in front
of the kid.” Troy stepped toward Cat, putting space between her and me. My stomach growled, reminding me I hadn’t eaten since those McMeals I’d shoved down my throat.

  “Sam, can you give us a minute?” Sparrow ran her fingers through my dusty hair. “I got you that Ghost of Tsushima video game, like you asked. Grab a snack and play while we finish up here.”

  I took some beef jerky—Uncle Troy told me protein would help me grow taller—and disappeared into the hallway, rounding the corner but not getting into my room. I’d had my own room here since I was in first grade. Grandma Maria said it was because Troy and Sparrow lived in a good school district, and we needed their zip code to register, but even after I got expelled from my first school, I still came here often.

  My “real” house was in a bad neighborhood in Southie, where tennis shoes littered every power line, and even if you didn’t pick fights, you’d sure as hell need to finish them in order to survive.

  Eavesdropping, I heard Troy growl, “What the fuck?” from the doorway. I liked how he said the word ‘fuck.’ The sound of it gave me whiplash, and the skin on my arms turned all funny. “Maria has barely been gone for three weeks, and you’re already pulling shady shit.”

  Grandma Maria passed away in her sleep less than a month ago. I was the one who’d found her. Cat had been out all night, “working.” I’d held Grams and cried until I couldn’t open my eyes anymore. When Cat finally got home, with whiskey breath and smudged makeup, she told me it was all my fault.

  That Grams was too tired of my bullshit and decided to bail.

  “Can’t blame her for kickin’ the bucket, kid. I’d do the same if I could!”

  I packed my duffel bag that same morning and hid it under my bed.

  I’d known Cat wasn’t going to keep me.

  “First of all, watch your mouth. I’m still grieving. I lost my mother unexpectedly, you know,” Catalina huffed.

  “Tough shit. Sam never had his mother to begin with.” Troy’s voice made the walls rattle, even when he spoke calmly.

  “The boy is untamable. Dumb as a brick and as aggressive as a stray dog. Me sticking around ain’t gonna help. It’s only a matter of time before he lands in juvie,” my mother spat. “He’s a monster.”

  That was her nickname for me. Monster.

  The Monster did this.

  The Monster did that.

  “Look, I don’t care what you and your perfect little wife think. It’s just too much responsibility. I’m out. I can’t send him to therapy and shit like that. I’m not made out of money.” Catalina stubbed her heel on the floor. I heard her rummaging through her Chanel bag for her cigarettes. She wasn’t gonna find them. I smoked half the pack in the backyard while she was getting high in her bedroom. The rest were in my bag.

  “If money is an issue—” Sparrow started.

  “Bitch, please,” Cat cut into her words viciously, spluttering. “Keep your money. And I hope you are not dumb enough to think you’re better than me, with all the help you’re getting from your husband and harem of nannies and tutors. Sam’s the spawn of the Devil. I can’t do this alone.”

  “You’re not doing this alone,” Troy ground out. “We have shared custody of him, idiot.”

  Fire blazed in my chest. I didn’t know Sparrow and Troy had legal custody over me. I didn’t know what it meant, but it sounded important.

  “Either you take him or I drop him off at an orphanage,” Cat yawned.

  In a way, I was relieved. I always knew once Grams died, Catalina would get rid of me. I spent the last few weeks worrying she’d set the house on fire with me in it to get insurance money or something. At least I was still alive.

  I knew my mother didn’t love me. She never looked at me. When she did, she told me I reminded her of him.

  “Same Edward Cullen hair. Same dead, gray eyes.”

  Him was my late father, Brock Greystone. Before he died, he was employed by Troy Brennan. Brock Greystone was weak and pathetic and a weasel. A rat. Everyone said so. Grams, Cat, Troy.

  My worst nightmare was becoming like him, which was why Catalina always told me I was so much like him.

  Then there was Uncle Troy. I knew he was a bad man, but he was an honorable one, too.

  The wiseguys down my block said he had blood on his hands.

  That he threatened, tortured, and killed people.

  Nobody messed with Troy. Nobody kicked him out of the house or yelled at him or told him he was their worst mistake. And he had that thing about him, like … like he was made out of marble. Sometimes I looked at his chest and was surprised to see it moved.

  I wanted to be him so much that when I thought about it my bones began to hurt.

  His existence just seemed louder than anyone else’s.

  Whenever Uncle Troy disappeared in the middle of the night, he always came back bruised and disheveled. He’d bring dunks and ignore the fact he smelled of gunpowder and blood. He would tell us bad jokes at the table while we ate, and to make sure Sailor wasn’t scared anymore, he’d tell her he saw the monster family that lived in her closet move out.

  One time he bled all over a donut, and Sailor had eaten it because she thought it was Christmas frosting. Aunt Sparrow was close to nuclear explosion. She’d chased him around the kitchen with a broomstick while Sail and I giggled, swatting it about and actually catching his ear twice. When she finally caught him (only because he let her), he captured both her wrists and lowered her to the floor and kissed her hard on the mouth. I thought I saw some tongue, too, but then she swatted his chest and giggled.

  Everyone was so happy and laughed so much, Sailor had an accident, and she never had accidents anymore.

  But then I’d felt my chest tighten because I knew they’d send me back to Cat later that afternoon. It reminded me I wasn’t really a part of their family.

  It was the only good moment I had. I’d play it over and over, lying in my bed, every time I heard Cat’s bedsprings whine under the weight of a stranger.

  “We’ll take him,” Sparrow announced coldly. “Off you go. We’ll send you the paperwork as soon as our lawyer drafts the documents.”

  My chest filled with something warm just then. Something I’d never felt before. I couldn’t stop it. It felt good. Hope? Opportunity? I couldn’t put a name on it.

  “Red,” Troy breathed his wife’s nickname.

  And just like that, my insides turned cold again. He didn’t want to adopt me. Why would he? They already had one perfect daughter. Sailor was cute and funny and normal. She didn’t get into fights, hadn’t been expelled three times, and definitely hadn’t broken six bones in her body doing dangerous shit because pain reminded her she was still alive.

  I wasn’t an idiot. I knew where I was headed—the streets. Kids like me didn’t get adopted. They got into trouble.

  “No,” Sparrow snapped at him. “I’ve made up my mind.”

  Nobody spoke for a moment. I got really scared. I wanted to shake Cat and tell her how much I hated her. That she should’ve died instead of Grandma Maria. That she deserved to die. With all her drugs and boyfriends and rehab trips.

  I never told anyone how she used to give me shots of rum to make me sleep. Whenever Troy or Sparrow paid us surprise visits, she’d rub white powder on my gums to wake me up. She’d curse under her breath, threatening to burn me if I didn’t wake up.

  I was seven when I realized I was an addict.

  If I didn’t get the white powder daily, I shook and sweated and screamed into my pillow until I ran out of energy and passed out.

  I was eight when I kicked the habit.

  I’d just refused to let her give me rum or powder. Went crazy every time she came near me with that stuff. Once, I bit Cat’s arm so bad a part of her skin stayed in my mouth, salty and metallic and hard against my teeth.

  She never tried again after that.

  “You’re fucking lucky my wife is stubborn as hell,” Troy hissed. “We’ll take Sam, but there will be stipulations—and
many of them.”

  “Shocker,” Cat bit out. “Let’s hear them.”

  “You’ll hand him over and sign all the legal paperwork, no negotiations and without asking for a penny.”

  “Done,” Cat cackled humorlessly.

  “You’ll fuck off from Boston. Move far away. And when I say far, Catalina, I mean somewhere he can’t see you. Where the memory of his deadbeat mother doesn’t burn hot. Another planet is preferable, but since we can’t risk aliens meeting you and thinking we’re all cunts, two states away minimum is my requirement. And if you ever come back—which I sincerely recommend against—you’ll go through me if you wanna see him. You walk away from him now, you lose all your motherly privileges. If I catch you messing with this kid, my kid…” he paused for emphasis “…I will give you the slow, painful death you’ve been begging for almost a decade, and I will make you watch your own death in the mirror, you vain waste of oxygen.”

  I believed him.

  I knew she did, too.

  “You’ll never see me again.” Cat’s voice rattled, like her throat was full of coins. “He is rotten to the core, Troy. That’s why you love him. You see yourself in him. His darkness calls to you.”

  That was when I turned into a pillar of salt. Or at least that’s how it felt. I was afraid if someone touched me, I would shatter.

  I could be like Troy.

  I had darkness. And violence. And all the things that made him great.

  I had the same hunger and disdain for the world and heart that was just that—a heart—with nothing much inside it.

  I could turn a corner.

  I could be something else.

  I could be something, period.

  That was a possibility I’d never considered before.

  Cat left not long after. Then Troy and Sparrow talked. I heard Troy pour himself a drink. They discussed lawyers and what to tell Sailor. Sparrow suggested they send me to a Montessori school, whatever the heck that was. I tiptoed my way to bed, too tired to care about my own future. My knees knocked together, and I felt the beef jerky crawling up my throat. I made a pit stop in the bathroom and puked my guts out.