It was a normal Wednesday.  I opened my eyes and attempted to stretch away the kink in my back, created by sleeping in one position on my broken, lopsided love seat.  I lit up the half cigarette that sat atop an empty beer can that I had used for an ashtray the night before and glanced at the clock.  3:34pm.  I wasn't used to waking up that early, but I had things to do, so I decided against going back to sleep.  Maybe I could get a nap later.  Besides, I didn't have to work that day because I didn't have a job.

A warm, unopened beer sat beside my Playstation handle, a gift to my morning self from the night before.  Silently, I thanked me and opened it, and then unpaused the basketball game that had been in progress for the last 10 hours of "real life" time.  Looks like Dick Bonercock had the ball.  I was playing the Undisclosed Racists versus the Los Angeles Lakers.  There were three minutes left on the clock.

I picked up my cellphone, closed my eyes, and counted down.

"Four... three... two... one..."

She loves my COCK!  Loooooves my cock!  Looooooves my cock!

I opened the phone, interrupting the ringtone and put it to my ear.

"I told you, Jansen, I'M NOT SELLING MY FARM," I yelled into it.

"Hey.  You dressed," asked David.

"Yeah.  I just got up.  Working on my first smoke.  I should be fully awake in a few."

"Ok.  I'm about three blocks down.  I'll be there in about two minutes."

"Just let yourself in.  Door's unlocked."

"And you're dressed, right?"

"Yeah, I said I'm dressed already."

"Ok.  See you in a minute."

Wong hung up.  I paused the game, stripped down to my boxers, and took a swig of my warm Milwaukee's Best.  One minute later, the front door opened, and David Wong stepped into my apartment.

"There's a beer in the fridge," I called out as he walked through my kitchen, stepping over empty beer boxes and something that might have once been pizza.

"No thanks," he replied.  "I've got a huge headache."

"I didn't mean for you.  I'm almost empty," I said, holding up my can, eyes still locked on the screen.  I dunked over Lakers' center Andrew Bynum and yelled, "BOOYAH, BITCH!  PUT IT ON YOUR CEREAL!"

"Did you just tell Andrew Bynum to pu-"

"Yes, I did.  Put it right on your damn cereal, whore."

"That doesn't even make any-"

"Put it on.  Like dunk berries.  Like berries made out of dunk."

David sighed and scooted a new beer into the crowd of empty cans on my coffee table.

"We need to take a trip downtown in a bit.  I got a call this morni- holy shit, 989 to nothing?"

"Yeah," I nodded to the screen.  "They lost both Bryant and Fisher in the first quarter from foul-outs.  And I replaced their entire bench with Jo Jo English with his stats and height turned down to the lowest setting."

"So you got almost a thousand points with the fouls turned on?"

"Yeah," I replied, and quickly realized what David was hinting at.  Normally, we play the game with the fouls turned off.  That way, when the opposing team throws the ball inbounds, we can intentionally foul the receiving player, beating him to the ground without us receiving a penalty.  Then, we just pick up the ball that he dropped and dunk, repeating the process until we beat the game by usually 800 points or so.  We had never broken a thousand before.

"You're on the sauce, aren't you?"  It was an accusation.

"Well, not now.  I took a little last night because I wanted to break 1000."

"John, you can't be doing that.  You know how dangerous that is."

"I didn't even take a whole one.  I just licked the residue off of the inside of the canister.  It's mostly worn off now.  I'm just down to predicting phone calls and hearing the screams of old Civil War guys.  By the way, you'll be getting a call from Shelly tonight around ten, asking you to fix her computer.  It breaks while she's cybering with a dude from Canada."

"Yeah, I know.  I saw that about two years ago.  I've been preparing for it ever since.  Remind me to pick up a graphics card later."

I stole the ball from Jo Jo English and popped a three pointer.  As the ball arched through the air and hit nothing but net, both of us shouted in unison, "Awwwwww... BUSINESS!"

"So what's goin' on uptown?  Is the dead thong guy out?"

"No, Drake called me this morning and told me about a new one that's hanging out around third street at the old hardware store.  He's pretty sure it's a prank, but his big thing is that if it is just the neighborhood kids being stupid, he doesn't want them doing it in that building.  Doesn't want anyone getting hurt in there."

"Alright.  Let me finish this up and I'll- GODDAMNIT!"

While David had me distracted with his stupid story, Bynum threw up a desperation shot from half court and made it.  I threw an empty beer can at my TV screen and turned off the Playstation in disgust.

Ten minutes later...

The hardware store Dave mentioned was not a functional place of business.  It was an abandoned building that had long since collapsed from age.  Actually, most of the downtown area was abandoned buildings that had long since collapsed from age.  They just called that one the hardware store because it had once been that back in the 1940s.  People in Undisclosed don't like to just let shit die.

We opened a couple cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon and stepped to the entrance.

"What the fuck is that," I asked.

"It... it's a..."

"It's a tarp," interrupted Drake from behind us.  "Kids have been screwin' around inside the buildings for a couple of days, and I'm startin' to get pissed.  I'm tired of runnin' 'em off.  One of 'em is gonna get hurt and their parents are gonna sue the city."

I looked back at the store entrance.  It was a tarp alright.  It was halfassed hung from the ceiling in the rough shape of what stupid people considered to be ghost-like.  A cartoonish scowl was crudely painted across the top - like it was put there by a drunken third-grader with Down Syndrome.  With the paint brush clenched between his ass cheeks.

"So," David said, "if this was put up by neighborhood kids, why are you calling us?"

"Well," Drake started.  "Well, it... it kind of... um... farted."

Dave stared blankly at Drake for about twenty seconds without saying a word.  I chugged the rest of my beer and threw the empty can at what I had mentally named "Stupidmonster."  We all watched as it arched gracefully through the air towards its target.  And just before the can reached its impact point, something caught my attention.

Stupidmonster's eyes moved.

Its frown deepened as it watched the incoming can.  Its teeth gritted in warped cartoon anger.  Tiny little black feet shifted from under the tarp, and I was certain that I'd made a huge mistake.

The can bounced off of the creature with a barely audible *whop*.  And then it farted again.

We all stood there for a good five minutes, waiting for something - anything - to happen.  It blinked a couple of times, but other than that, it just hung there, frowning.

"Well, that's fairly retarded," Dave said.

I killed off my second beer and flung another can at it.

Drake yelled, "Stop that!"

"This is how we conduct all of our investigations," explained Wong.  "If he hasn't eaten you after the fourth or fifth beer can, he's harmless."

I said, "I'm gonna go pee on it."

"Right," Dave added, "I'll go get a marker so I can give it bigger eyebrows and a beard.  You stickin' around, Drake?"

Drake sighed, got back into his patrol car, and drove away without a word.

David and I stayed and threw beer cans at Stupidmonster for a couple of hours, pausing every once in a while to urinate on it and curse at it.  It never moved.  Just kind of hovered there, frowning and occasionally blinking.

Around nine, I said, "Well, it's obviously not hurting anything."

"Yeah.  Seems harmless enough."

"You should probably get going.  Computer store closes at ten."

"Yeah.  I need to shower, too, before I go over there.  You need a ride back?"

"No," I said, "I'm probably gonna just hang out here for a while and see if he does anything else.  Just keep your cell on."

Dave nodded as he walked back to his car.

"She likes it when you suck her neck right behind her left ear," I advised.

Dave stopped and sighed.  Then, he opened the trunk and pulled out a beer.

"Probably best if I stick around with you and make sure this thing doesn't flip out."

"Ok."

"What'd you name it?"

"Stupidmonster."

"Yeah, that's what I've been calling it, too."