Read Online Just Kill Me by Adam Selzer - Free Book Online Page B

to impress Zoey with big-city name-dropping. She lives in some small town in Arizona.
    â€œHow’s Zoey?” asks Cyn, reading over my shoulder.
    â€œOkay, I guess,” I say.
    â€œStill no picture?”
    I shake my head.
    â€œI’m gonna set you up with a friend of mine,” says Cyn.
    â€œNo thanks.”
    â€œSeriously. I’ll have her come on the tour. She’s about your age. Big into ghosts. And you can see what she looks like and be sure she’s not twelve and all.”
    I lean back in the chair. “The reason Zoey won’t send a picture is an anxiety disorder. What kind of asshole would I be if I broke things off because of her mental health?”
    â€œYou’re not being unreasonable. There are safety issues. Not to mention physical ones.”
    I shrug. “I can deal.”
    â€œHave you ever at least kissed anyone in person?”
    I don’t answer for a second, then say, “I almost kissed the girl who played the other old lady in Arsenic and Old Lace, but she got freaked out when I tried.”
    â€œNot into girls?”
    â€œI thought she was.”
    â€œWere you both still dressed as old ladies at the time?”
    I pause, then nod. Cyn can’t help but chuckle. I don’t blame her. I chuckle too.
    I was still sort of reeling from that particular misadventure when I first starting e-mailing back and forth with Zoey. If I hadn’t had Zoey, I’d probably still be seeing that girl’s heavilymade-up face looking horrified every time I closed my eyes.
    â€œYou don’t have to die a virgin for someone who won’t even meet up with you,” says Cyn.
    â€œI don’t feel like I am one.”
    â€œJust from cybersex?”
    I shrug. “I think it counts. Virginity’s a social construct anyway.”
    I sort of wish I really thought that more than I do.
    And I do at least want to kiss someone. Soon.
    Maybe I can be in another play where I get to kiss a costar.
    We watch a few students stumble their way through stand-up routines, then Rick comes up and absolutely blows the others off the stage with a routine about an uncle of his whose hobby was buying new insurance plans.
    â€œSeriously, folks,” he says. “Every time I see the guy, he’s got some new policy that he’s all amped up about. He’ll show up to Thanksgiving and be like, ‘All I got to do is pay ten bucks a month, and they’ll give me fifty grand if I lose one lousy limb!’ Then at Christmas he’ll have some new plan that costs fifteen bucks a month, but they’ll give him half a million for a severed arm. I learned long division by him making me figure out how many months he’d have to pay before he lost money by losing a leg!”
    He milks certain words perfectly, wringing all the laughs he can out of them. The class roars with laughter.
    â€œSee?” Cyn whispers. “Star.”
    She’s right. Rick is head and shoulders above everyone else we’ve seen in the class.
    â€œI’m totally serious,” he goes on. “One day Uncle Carlos is going to be a very rich man. With no arms and no legs. We can hang him on the wall and call him Art. Throw him in front of the door, call him Matt.”
    It’s a third-grade joke, but even the teacher is cracking up.
    â€œOr toss him in the pool, and BOOM! Bob’s your uncle!”
    Now the class explodes.
    Cyn has heard the routine a million times, but she smiles proudly when the class laughs. “That’s my crazy bathroom,” she whispers.
    Between the teacher’s notes and what Rick tells me on the way home, I can see that it’s all in the delivery. It isn’t just that the things he’s saying are funny (they only sort of are ), it’s how he says them. Waiting until just the right second, when the laughter from one joke is just dying down, to throw out the next line. One change in word choice can make or break a