“Bizarrely morose…” Amazon Review

An excerpt from the short story

 BILL’s BECOMING

By Patrick C. Greene

Bill Travers looked with bitter eyes at his reflection. Since puberty, that time when humans learn to care about such things, Bill had been painfully aware that he was ugly.

His oft-inspected reflection offered no differing opinion, ever. Even in the soft light of the lamp on the bathroom counter, there was little reason for hope.

His face, like his physique, was pear shaped, with jowls that drooped around his neck. His brow was thick and pronounced, hooding his beady, unremarkable eyes and forming a trifurcated, bulgy wrinkle over the bridge of his flat nose. His short, thick neck dropped straight to narrow shoulders. His thick-jointed legs appeared too short for his oval torso. Now that he was hitting his mid-thirties, a potbelly was starting to take shape, and his dark brown and oily…