Oh What Fun-Malinowska

Oh, What Fun

Persie Malinowska

Mina never means for it to happen – does her best to prevent it from happening – but there are times in her life when becoming a gigantic hairy, drooling, wide-mawed Beast is the only logical outcome.

She feels the creep of the monster beneath her skin now, standing upon the cheery welcome mat of her childhood home.

“Breathe,” Skip reminds her. “We stay for a few hours, then we don’t see them for a few months.”

“Oh yeah,” Mina replies with a laugh. “It’ll be that easy.” Her debt of absence is paid for in snide comments and tight smiles. There’s never a need to make a scene, they remind her, as if she’s the one to set the stage.

Skip lays a hand on her shoulder and gives it a quick squeeze. Those strong fingers have never flinched away from the tough skin and coarse fur, but Mina prays that she has enough restraint that Skip doesn’t have to this time.

She stares down the door and the holiday decorations that adorn its perfectly white paint. The faded red of the bow with its gold trimmings looks almost drab up close, slightly wrinkled and with a musty smell even the winter air couldn’t freeze away. Mina brushes the fabric with something like tenderness before pulling away and knocking.

Inside, she can hear her family’s indistinct speech. Her pulse quickens. They’re not arguing yet, that’s a good sign, probably.

The time between rapping her knuckles on the door and her mother opening said door feels like the shortest eternity on record.

“You made it! I thought you had maybe forgotten about us,” Ann says, as if Mina had given any indication that she and Skip wouldn’t come for the holidays. As if the toll of her absence didn’t come with a weightier punishment than her presence did. At least, that’s what the pros and cons list seemed to indicate. “Well, c’mon in then. Oh, it’s a good thing you didn’t bring any food, we probably have enough as it is already.” She waves them in, her hand moving about in the air.

Skip gives her what’s probably meant to be an encouraging smile.

Mina tries to reciprocate, knowing that today is likely just as, if not more, stressful for her partner.

Ann lets everyone know that Mina and Skip are finally here, the holiday can start now!

Yippee.

Mina’s father is asleep in the armchair, a book open face down on his chest. She watches the worn softcover rise and fall with ease. Her father is gifted in falling asleep anywhere at any time, so it’s hard to ascertain how long he’s been in that position. Just about as hard as it is to imagine him volunteering to help out in the kitchen. Hopefully Ann and Seth skipped that argument – or already had it before Skip and Mina arrived.

Sean stands in the living room, talking animatedly with his wife while their two kids are running around the house, playing with their toys.

Opened presents already, Mina thinks.

Skip squeezes her arm. Another smile, a silent promise of their own celebration when they get back home.

“Hey,” she greets, pulling out a chair for Skip and settling into her usual seat. “Merry Christmas.”

Sean watches her and Skip. “We missed you guys at Thanksgiving, you know? Mom made her stuffing.”

“Mom always makes her stuffing; what are you talking about?” she says, laughing it off. “And besides, we have to visit Skip’s family, too, you know? Mom and Dad can’t have all the holidays.”

“Okay, well, you can visit their family when you guys get married. When are you popping the question anyway?” Sean smiles a little. “Or wait, is that actually your job, Skip? I don’t know how things work between you two.”

In her chest, Mina feels the rumble of The Beast, already stirring. She digs her still unclawed fingers into the meat of her thighs, hoping to quell the creature’s lust for blood.

Skip, bless them, simply shrugs. “We’ll know when the time is right. Besides, maybe we’ll be like those ultra gay couples that propose at the same time. Wouldn’t that be romantic?”

The ring that Mina has been carrying around in her purse seems to grow heavier, threatening to tip her chair backwards. Obviously, she’s not going to propose to her partner today at Christmas. Not when her family is bound to ask question after question, ignoring the answers that Mina has given them time and again.

It won’t matter how many clarifications have been made, the family have decided to remain mystified, finding a hobby in othering Skip and Mina when they aren’t in the same room.

No, that will be for themselves, when the time is right. Probably right after Skip does actually propose, though Mina hasn’t been able to sniff out an engagement ring no matter how many times she goes through Skip’s sock drawer or their secret weed stash. Either Skip is amazing at hiding things – and they are – or they just aren’t ready to pop the question.

Can’t live the fantasy of two people proposing to each other if one isn’t ready to pop the question.

No matter, Mina can wait. She has all the time in the world and the patience to go with it. After all, who else could stomach Sean’s deliberate confusion about what kind of ring they would get one another?

The hair on Mina’s arm grows thicker. She pulls down the sleeve of her sweater.

“It’s boiling hot in here, kid, you okay?” Seth asks as he sits at the head of the table.

“Yup!” Mina agrees easily. “You rereading Frankenstein again? What, you couldn’t do it around Halloween?”

“I read it then, too, just felt like reading it again.”

“That thing is gonna fall apart if you read it again.”

“I have another copy around here, somewhere.”

“I’m sure.”

Seth redirects his attention to Skip. “Hey, kid. How you doing? Everything okay down at the office?”

Skip and Seth get into a mostly genial conversation, allowing Mina to let the small talk wash over her. She looks around the house she was lucky enough to grow up in and remembers it feeling small, somehow.

Now that she’s allegedly grown up a bit, she knows that it’s too small.

“Mina!” Her mom calls from the kitchen. “Can you come and help me, please?”

Unfortunately, she’s not preoccupied and can find no reason to say no, so reluctantly gets up to do whatever it is her mother needs.

The task put to her is to gather all the tiny plates the family used for appetizers and to wash them.

“Clean as you go, right? Or, you should know that. Do you do the cleaning or is that Skip? I should ask her. Oh, sorry – them.” Ann nods to herself, as if proud of her open-mindedness. “Maybe Skip should be in here helping? Or … Hm. You know what, Skip is a guest. Clean the plates and put them away for the next celebration. You’re coming for your dad’s birthday, right? No reason to miss out on that one, but if Skip has to work that’s okay.”

Mina’s jaw aches as canines threaten to crowd her mouth, fighting for space with the conversation she’s already had with Ann several times.

“You remember Denise, right? Oh, you remember Denise. She’s Elaine’s cousin. Anyway, Denise’s son, Brian, has this job I think you’d be perfect for, and there’s an opening—”

“I have a job, Mom.”

“Honey, there’s no money in non-profit work. It’s literally in the name. Non-profit. Just hear me out, okay? This could be a really good opportunity for your career.”

She lets her mom rattle off the amazing opportunity of working alongside whoever the hell Brian is and focuses on the water running over the fancy plates. That and the special stuffing. It really is good enough to brave whatever unique and tired bullshit the family comes up with.

Ann monologues about her last few weeks, not expecting more of an answer than the obligatory mhms, no ways, and that’s crazys. Such behavior used to drive her crazy – it still does – but Mina has chosen to view it as an opportunity not to say anything to make it worse.

Occasionally, the one-sided conversation does not lead to more reciprocal dialogue, which works out in everyone’s favor.

What a Christmas miracle that would be were this such an event.

Fingers and claws crossed.

At the dinner table, with all the excellent food around them and the delicious scents wafting in cartoonishly tempting ways, Mina thinks that perhaps this year will be one without incident.

And then, as Mina reaches for a second helping of stuffing, Ann says, “Are you sure you want more, honey?”

“Ann—”

“No, c’mon Seth, she’s had plenty. Unless …” Ann gasps dramatically, making the entire family jump. “Are you eating for two?”

In her peripheral vision, she can see Skip checking in on her, but Mina can do nothing to reassure them, not when her fingernails begin to harden and grow longer.

“No, Mom. I’m not eating for two.”

This garners a theatrical sigh. “You know, Mina, if you’re interested in having children, you really should have them soon. You’re getting older, you know, and your brother—”

All at once, The Beast comes crashing forth. In a clothes-tearing, wood-breaking, chandelier-shattering dramatic type entrance.

Mina wishes it were more of an out of body experience, rather than the closed-in claustrophobia she feels in her bones.

Ann rolls her eyes and sighs, gesturing with her arms in the usual What did I do now? fashion she does after saying the most rage-inducing vitriol known to man.

Sean looks away while Amber rubs a soothing hand along his back.

Seth gets up from the table and announces he needs a smoke.

Distantly, Mina hears Skip telling Ann that that was uncalled for, but they’re still able to control their own voice, their own temperament.

How embarrassing it must be for them to see Mina like this; to see the dark fur, the elongated teeth, the thick foam that collects at her jaw as she roars in fury.

The Beast will not be negotiated with, getting up from the remnants of the chair that no longer fits the monstrous body. It stalks into the living room, the one she grew up in, and howls at the ceiling.

Cracks form in the windowpane.

“Oh, for goodness sake, Mina, the neighbors will hear you. Can’t you just for once behave? Your brother’s able to have a civil conversation, why do you have to be so difficult? Why can’t you grow up?”

Of course Sean is able to have a civil conversation – he’s accustomed to the taste of his tongue as he bites down on the offending muscle.

But despite the scripts she’s written in her head, all the perfect comebacks and the logic that might assuage a person more willing to listen, all Mina The Beast can do is roar until the fancy plates and champagne flutes rattle.

“Must you do this every time?” Ann does not yell, just gets up from the table and stalks into the living room. She’s shorter than Mina – even when Mina doesn’t fill a living room with rippling muscles – but takes up more space when she places her hands on her hips. “You’re tearing this family apart with these antics. It’s past time you learned to control yourself so that the rest of us can have a pleasant holiday, don’t you think? All this because I asked a simple question! Fine, then. I won’t ask you any questions if that will make you happy. Honestly, Mina. Honestly, you’re—”

“Leaving,” Skip announces. “We’re leaving. Thank you for the meal, Ann, you really know how to put Christmas together.”

The mere mention of leaving relieves some of the pressure The Beast puts on her body. Mina grows smaller and lighter as she watches Skip gather their things, giving Ann no room to argue any further.

The sidewalk is freezing but the cold winter air brings her back to herself. There are slippers on her feet. They’re shaped like teddy bears but protect her from the worst of the frost for now.

It’s likely not a good sign that she can’t remember the rest of the interaction, but she’s happy to repress a few memories if it means she won’t have to picture when and where the blanket now draped around her shoulders came from.

“I’m sorry,” she mutters, exhausted and humiliated by the scene she left behind. “I’m just …” She closes her eyes, hoping to forget the rest of the evening along with the last half hour or so. Maybe if she rammed her head into the nearest building? Is that how amnesia works? Or maybe it’s not too late to ask Santa for a draught of forgetfulness. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Skip reassures. “I already know what your mom is like.”

“I don’t care what my mom said, I’m sorry you had to see me like—” Her eyes well up with tears, which is just the cherry on top. “I hate it when you see me like that.”

“So, maybe next time we skip Christmas. Maybe we don’t go back at all.”

“I … I can’t do that,” Mina argues. She’s never even made a pros and cons list about forgoing family gatherings altogether. “It’d break her heart.”

“Yeah, well, it breaks my heart to see her speak to you that way. To see no one else say anything.”

Mina sniffles.

“Besides. Your mom’s a monster. I wouldn’t mind not seeing her again – her stuffing comes from a box, did you know that?”

It’s enough to pull a genuine laugh out of her. “That is not true. And do not let her hear you say that!”

“Well, she won’t if we don’t go back!” Mina laughs again, and Skip presses on. “And maybe, by not seeing her for a little bit, we’ll see the big furry friend of ours a little less often, too.”

“Sorry.”

“Not sorry. Just … Don’t say sorry, okay? I’m here for you, even when you’re a gigantic hairy, drooling, wide-mawed Beast. I love you.”

The love isn’t enough to convince The Beast to leave Mina permanently, but there’s an odd sense of inner relief that originates from it.

Quietly, Mina apologizes to The Beast.

They can work on cohabitating now that they finally have the space to do so.

Persie Malinowska is a thirty-something wannabe clown who spends much of her time imagining improbable scenarios and occasionally writing them down. She’s lived in five different countries spanning three continents and plans to continue drawing inspiration from each place that welcomes her in. “Oh, What Fun” is her first published work.

Without in any way limiting the authors’ and publisher’s exclusive rights, any unauthorised use of any part of this story to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited.

This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, events, locations or general circumstances is entirely coincidental and/or used in a fictitious manner.