Chapter 1, Page 5

It's page 5, last of the provided sample, and we’re off to an auspicious start. “Where was I? Oh yes!” Silly forgetful Zero, before your grammar melt down you were talking about forcing yourself to date women, despite having an obvious disinterest in doing so. Which I assume was going to lead us back to your relationship with Meri, you know, the reason we’re all here.

However, the Zero decides that was not where he was and now we’re back to the Zero’s childhood. “As a kid I modeled how my parents acted until my teachers at school kept giving me timeout in the captain’s chair.” Well, you’ve described only one parent- but he’s been something of a monster, right? I can imagine how screaming at other children on the playground to fetch you more Bourbon might not go over too hot.

So the Zero gets the “chair” a lot; apparently this is his catholic school’s punishment in which the naughty child must, “stand in a corner, squat like you were sitting on an imaginary chair with your arms straight out and stand like that until you either fell over, faked a fall to get out of it, or until the kitchen timer went off.” I work out quite a bit; this sounds something like a wall squat. Other than that I have no frame of reference for this type of punishment. Google didn’t seem to know what this is talking about either; I found very few instances of it that were similar. One was in an African parenting blog about creative punishments and the other was in a blog entitled, “Stuff Korean Moms Like,” (apparently, punishment). So this must not be all that common in the United States.

What? You didn't think English nerds work out?

The Zero says he was in trouble quite frequently, but it’s not what you think. “I was never in trouble for running my mouth off in class. Or pulling pigtails. I always got in trouble because I wouldn’t rat out my friends.” This dude had been a boy scout since birth, and he would really like you to remember that. Seriously, has there been a page yet where he hasn’t viewed himself as a chivalrous asshole? He goes on to elucidate, however, and that’s when it becomes pretty obvious that he’s just a blameless hero in his own mind. He just got into trouble because his friends did things to “involve” him, “Making me pass notes, making me sneeze loud so they could make a weird noise to distract the class at the same time. It was always something.” Alright, how does someone make you sneeze? Did they toss some pepper at you? Do you mean they said, ‘Hey dude, sneeze,’ and you faked a loud one at their behest? Because if it’s the latter, you’re pretty much the main perpetrator- you deserve to be punished, it was your choice and your damn action. Once again, the Zero has no sense of personal accountability, ever.

He speculates he had to take the wrap for his friends because, “I was a good 6 inches taller than anyone else my little brown-haired head was always the one the teacher focused on.” Oh good, we haven’t been treated to any special snowflake narcissism in at least half a page, I was beginning to miss it. I’m 6’ tall, and I guess we do stand out in a line up- but I’ve never been in a line up, so I couldn’t tell you from experience.

Once the Zero is implicated for his wrong doing, for mysterious reasons he just can’t figure out beyond his being tall, he refuses to name any of his accomplices, “Instead of wasting time finding out who really did the bad things I would get punished for not giving up any names.” Bro. You passed the note. You sneezed. You did the bad things pal, it’s all you. His friends love him for abiding by Stop Snitchin’ mentality and it gives him, “mad street cred for this.”

 Playground gangsta yo

He muses, “Loyalty is a must as a kid to keep your friends.” Loyalty is a must as a kid. Interesting distinction. You see, as a child his skills as a sociopath weren’t yet finely developed; he had to do annoying things like take a fall and be loyal. As an adult he’s figured out that there are so many alternatives to tedious loyalty in order to keep people in his life coming back for more. Why be loyal when mind games and manipulation will suffice.

Out of nowhere we get, “I honestly believe my parents should have never gotten married.” Kay. No idea how this came up. He prayed that they would get divorced and prayed, on several occasions, that his father wouldn’t come home. “I am ashamed of admitting that but I wanted him gone.” Understandable, it seems like you had a pretty crappy home life and a complicated relationship with a man you were afraid of; yet, desperate to please. Go ahead, let it all out and continue to explore this topic- we are your captive audience.

Nope, we’re done. That was it. Onto another topic. We’re now at the Zero’s first love interest- a comely lass named Lisa, his, “first everything.” Lisa is a go-getter who doesn’t believe in wasting time or mincing words, “She told me on the first day of freshman year that I was going to be her boyfriend.” He agrees to this but doesn’t know what it means and ignores her for the rest of the week. Bro, she wants to sex you bro. This guy really could have used a sex education class- the idea that two people could want each other in a sexual capacity just isn’t on his radar at all.

Lisa- visual approximation

One Friday, Lisa lets the Zero know that he really needs to pull some weight in their relationship and take her on a date already. Our young business tycoon didn’t have a cent to his name though and he, “… doubted my mom would give me $10 to go anywhere.” Okay, what happened to those fabulously wealthy uncles that were spending money like it was going out of style? Couldn’t they make it rain on their favorite nephew? No? Kay. Anyhow, it’s not Lisa’s problem and she tells him so and declares she’ll meet him at 6 at the old Dairy Queen.

The Zero never says how he scrounged up the cash, which you think would be sort of relevant since he spent so much time on the idea, but whatever. Did your mom end up giving it to you? That would have been nice of her; been nice of you to give an ounce of character development to the poor woman. She did birth you, I think she’s earned it. Geezes.

Zero's Mom- visual approximation

The Dairy Queen date gives rise to a stunning “off and on” 15 year relationship between the Zero and the Lisa. Even more stunning, the Zero says, “There was one other girl in between Lisa and Meri, I won’t talk about her.” One. One other girl besides Lisa and Meri. So, unless he’s simply not counting one night stands or something- he’s had a sexual relationship with only 3 people. Using slate.com’s sexual history calculator- that puts him in the bottom 20^th percentile for number of partners for his age and gender. Definitely well below average; pretty unusual.

He credits Lisa with showing him, "how to be in a relationship." We'll just have to guess at what she-who-must-not-be-named taught him during their relationship since he refuses to talk about her; personally I am dying to know. You'll talk about overly attached Lisa and a trashy romance with a reality star but not this chick? That must have been a total train wreck; really, why isn't that this book. Fuck Meri, this isn't going anywhere, tell me all about the she-beast who feasted on your tears. Anyhow, Meri showed him, "how to nurture and build a relationship," because that just didn't come up in a staggering 15 year relationship... 

"And the sex with Meri was amazing."

Oh God, I pictured it 

 

 And don't worry, if that sentence wasn't enough to rev your engines, "I will get more in detail about our sex life in a few more chapters." Once I feel a little less nauseous I will definitely be there with bells on.

 "Lisa and I got along very well because she understood being Catholic." I'm starting to think the theme of this book is, you can't understand me unless you're Catholic. Seriously, are Catholics a mythic breed of human? Am I missing something? "She didn’t pressure me into anything," like sex, huge relief right? And though little Lisa didn't pressure him, she did just micro-manage every aspect of the Zero's life, "She told me what to do, where to be, and who to talk to." The Zero gave into her demands because her smile was so darn cute and, "It made me happy to make her happy."  

He ends the page by dropping the advice, "By the way, don’t be like that in relationships. It eventually makes you resentful. I know that now." He's the thing though- you shouldn't live to make someone else happy and ignore your own needs in a relationship, sure, but if it's genuinely making you happy to see her happy then that's not going to breed resentment. Do you think there was a point where Mother Teresa, just to throw out a Catholic reference for ya, was like 'You know, fuck these sick, poor people, what have they done for me lately?' Going to go out on a limb and say no. When you try to fake that you're that sort of person though- that's what causes resentment. And don't worry Zero, you've fully established you're not such a person.

 
Closing Thoughts:

This page was so much less of a bummer to review! We've still seen only fleeting glimpses of his relationship with Meri though, but hey, at least he's promised more gory details. I, for one, cannot wait for though. Seeing as how this is the final page of the preview those, I guess I'll be holding my breath until my pre-order rolls in. Might want to send me those funeral wreaths now.

 -Kate