"Monster Night" by Brian James Freeman
Cemetery Dance's A Halloween Short Story ebook series
Readers unfamiliar with "Monster Night" by Brian James Freeman may prefer to read these notes only after reading the story.
Regardless of seasonal tie-ins, coming-of-age horror stories demand adult baddies, even if they also splurge on supernatural baddie clichés, too.
Brian James Freeman's everyday adult monster: mom's boyfriend.
Last year, she had been a little happier because she found a new friend named David, but that didn’t last long and he didn’t come around anymore.
Jonathon thought maybe they had a fight. He hoped it wasn’t about him.
His mother hadn’t liked how David came to the house so late at night sometimes. David would smell funny and talk too loud and Jonathon’s mother would say, “Don’t wake Jonathon,” because she didn’t realize Jonathon was already awake from the noise.
Jonathon also knew that his mother didn’t like some of the things David told him.
For example, David had been the one who told Jonathon about the Pumpkin Eater.
The Pumpkin Eater wasn’t someone who ate pumpkins, as the name might suggest, but was instead a giant living pumpkin who ate little boys.
In their sleep.
There's a purely mundane but destructively selfish and childish monstrousness about David. Jonathan's mom tight-rope walks through what she hopes is the relationship's end as Halloween approaches.
"Monster Night" rises above we-are-the-monsters cliches. The climax is perfectly articulated and viscerally satisfying. Just desserts are meted. Jonathan and mom are permitted enough agency and desperate guile to serve up their enemy for the delectation of the night's true king of monsters.
Jay
