Free I Love You, Beth Cooper by Larry Doyle

between his erection and judgment. Rich slid the frozen waffles across the counter. Denis lowered them out of sight.
    â€œYou might’ve scratched your cornea,” Beth said. “Maybe you should go to the hospital.”
    â€œOh,” said Denis, who had been thinking the same thing, “Let’s not spoil the party.”
    â€œWhat party?” Cammy wanted to know.
    Denis’s tendency to answer sarcastic questions sincerely was short-circuited when he realized he was still gripping the bottle of:
    â€œChampagne!”
    â€œ La bebida de los gods!” Rich yelled in support. He grabbed a stack of the Krazy Kritter Dixie cups and attempted to set up five in a row. This took a few tries.
    â€œDelicious champagne,” Denis said, buying Rich time.
    â€œDelicioso,” Rich agreed. He finally accomplished five upright cups, and stepped back with a hand flourish, as if he had just done a magic trick.
    Denis filled the first cup. The second cup started strong but quickly faded to a dribble. Denis considered filling the remaining three cups with squeezings from his rugby shirt, but took the high road.
    â€œEven things up a little…”
    Denis poured from the first cup into the final three, then some from the fourth cup into the second cup, and then a little bit more from the first into the third, producing five Dixie cups with approximately no champagne in them.
    He distributed the cups, making sure to give Beth the one with Ally, the pretty giraffe, on it.
    Treece squinted suspiciously. “Why’d I get the hippo?”
    â€œIt’s all good fat,” Cammy said.
    â€œThat’s racist,” Treece jabbed at Cammy.
    â€œIt’s not race- ist,” Cammy mocked.
    â€œIt’s fattist.”
    â€œ You said you were fat. Two minutes ago. And every two minutes before that.”
    â€œI was owning it.”
    Beth sighed. “You’re not fat, Treece.”
    â€œI have fat,” Treece said.
    â€œEverybody has fat.”
    â€œNot everybody,” Cammy said.
    â€œA toast!” Denis yelled.
    Usually when one proposes a toast, one has a toast to propose. This was one of the details Denis had neglected based on its infinitesimal probability of coming up. And yet, here he was, toasting Beth Cooper with a paper cup of champagne. He improvised.
    â€œTo the future!”
    Rich had his friend’s back. “To the future—and beyond!”
    â€œGo future!” Cammy exclaimed with a tiny swing of her fist, suggesting less than complete sincerity.
    â€œ Go, future!” Treece exclaimed with the same tiny swing, signaling true enthusiasm.
    â€œThe future,” Beth simply said.
    The girls micro-chugged their champagne splashes. Rich sipped his urbanely. Denis, who had left his own cup empty, made a show of guzzling it.
    Treece crushed her cup and looked for someplace to shove it. She noticed something sticking out of Rich’s shirt pocket.
    â€œParty balloons!” she squealed, extracting the unfolding ribbon of ignominy.
    â€œUm.” Rich raised a finger. “Those aren’t—”
    â€œI know what they are,” Treece said, tearing a foil pouch open with her teeth. She popped the condom into her mouth, breathed in deeply, and blew out a ribbed rubber bubble.
    Beth turned to Denis, amused but also a little disappointed.
    â€œWhat exactly,” she wondered, “did you have planned for this evening?”
    â€œOh,” Denis said, sort of maybe pointing toward the contraceptive Treece was inflating. “Those are my dad’s.”
    Treece stopped blowing. “Your dad’s not hiding in a closet or something? I hate that.”
    Beth then said with polite finality:
    â€œWell, this was fun.”
    Treece tied off the party balloon and flicked it at Rich.
    HIS LIFE HAD CHANGED, in some potentially tragic but no doubt important way, and Denis didn’t want it to end.
    â€œNot yet,” he said.