TWO MONSTERS
(Excerpts)
There was an old man who regularly hung around a bar called Le Vieux Village (« The Old Village ») in Boucherville. He was always dressed the same way: blue jeans and a red-and-black plaid lumberjack shirt. He reeked of a mixture of urine, sweat, and stale booze. Children were afraid of him. Women found him repulsive. Most of the men, however, were rather amused by him and would often buy him a drink just to hear him rant and spew obscenities.
The man was known as Beau-Blanc.
Not long before Le Vieux Village was demolished, a man sat down there to hear what the village madman had to say. Without alcohol. He wanted to know what story lay behind such a marginal figure. And you know what? He was not disappointed by what he heard.
A few weeks after that unusual conversation, the bar closed and was torn down to make way for a pharmacy. And Beau-Blanc, you ask? He passed away not long after “his” bar had closed. I suppose one simply could not exist without the other…
(…)
The phone had just rung. It was late at night—or early in the morning, depending on how you looked at it. Four-thirty in the morning. Monster 1 answered, his voice rough and hoarse, having still been in the arms of Morpheus only seconds earlier.
— Dad?
The voice on the other end of the line hovered somewhere between worry and apprehension.
— Sweetheart, is that you?
Monster 1 was fully awake now.
— I’m freaking out, Dad.
— Where are you?
— You know what? I don’t even know.