Eileen’s Society Party

My ex girlfriend Eileen was having a society party and James, Natasha,
Drunken Paulie and I never missed one of those. Natasha put together
her usual outfit – something black, something old, something new, and
eyes painted like a Fellini reject. Her daywear had acquired a new
addition in the last couple of weeks – a purple ribbon tied in her
hair. She says it’s for “the souls lost in the Ardennes,” but there’s
no telling with Nat. James pulled out his best 1970’s vampire garb, and
I put on whatever crap was at the bottom of my clothes hamper because
the day I dress up for a party hosted by an ex girlfriend is the day
you can fuck me in the ass.

We had to pick up Drunken Paulie, tearing down Wisconsin Avenue
with little time to spare. He was waiting outside his apartment
building in high-water jeans and a button down work shirt that made him
look g-g-g-gay to the b-b-b-bone. I screeched to a stop in the right
lane and screamed past Natasha, “Paulie!!”

He had fallen backwards into a pile of trash and was staring at the
sky, but he responded to the sound of my voice, pulled himself up and
lurched drunkenly in the direction of my car, then he attempted to
climb through the sunroof.

“Mother of God!” Natasha barked, opening the door and stepping out.

Paulie fell to the hood with a nasty ping, then pushed past Natasha and
sat down in the passenger seat. He sighed heavily and ripped a bottle
of scotch from some hidden compartment in his ultra-tight jeans.

There was an awkward moment of silence while he drank deeply.

“Well?” Natasha put her little hands on her little hips, cocking her head so it was nearly on her shoulder.

Paulie handed her the whiskey bottle, but she only grabbed it and threw
it to the sidewalk, unphased as it shattered near her feet.

“Let the girl in!” James shouted from the backseat.

Paulie moved the seat up and pressed himself against the dashboard. He
turned his face to Natasha and, whatever his expression, it didn’t make
her happy because she got that look in her eyes and that weird little
twitch at the left side of her mouth. Still, she climbed into the
backseat with James and I adjusted my mirror so I wouldn’t have to look
upon the face of Kali for the entire trip to Eileen’s silly townhouse.

Eileen had bought this place in Northeast DC in a neighborhood that, in
my youth, was known for gangs of boys who would run up to you and cut
your balls off and stick them in your mouth, then ask you for change.
Now, the cruel hand of gentrification meant mousy girls like Eileen
could move in and buy fresh tomatoes at the corner. It was disgusting,
mainly because the nut-cutting madmen had moved out to my neighborhood
in the suburbs. But they and I had an understanding, so it wasn’t an
inconvenience. It just did a doozy on the property values.

I parked my car about eight million blocks away because DC sucks ass
and I led my troupe of misfits up to Eileen’s front steps. There was a
brief moment where I felt like I was part of the opening scene of Reservoir Dogs,
except Paulie was slamming into trashcans and falling down, Natasha was
seething and James was singing some Sinatra tune in a voice louder than
any creature on Earth was capable of matching. He was okay, too. Still,
though, on the last leg to the townhouse, he started on ‘It Was a Very
Good Year,’ and I suppressed the desire to drive a pencil into his eye.

“This it?” James asked after we arrived, all of us standing and looking up at Eileen’s front door.

“It is.”

Natasha pushed past us, whipping out her double disk set of Blondie’s
greatest hits, “Let’s rip them to shreds, boys.” I was glad to see that
she had recovered from the Paulie incident.

I knocked on the door while Natasha sang ‘Rip Her to Shreds’ under her
breath. I’m sure I’ve mentioned that there was no love lost between
Natasha and Eileen. Haven’t I?

Eileen opened the door and her eyes instantly narrowed when she saw
Natasha at my side. Nat, in reply, smiled smugly and shook her head
with her whispered song. Yeah, you know her, miss groupie supreme. I
stepped away from the two women as one would a basket of angry
wolverines.

“Glad you made it Nacho,” Eileen said, never taking her eyes off of
Natasha, “I don’t recall – ” She stepped back when she saw James and
Paulie behind me. “No, no, no,” her desperate smile and nervous laugh
were strangely pleasing.

“Sorry, brought the gang,” I said.

Eileen was weighing possibilities, no doubt a whole galaxy of possibilities. “You’re not here to ruin my party, are you?”

“Of course not,” I replied a little too quickly.

“She looks like she don’t know better,” Nat was singing.

“I have office people here,” Eileen looked over her shoulder with wide eyes.

“I have office people here,” Natasha said in a mocking voice.

“Cool it, Nat.” I put a hand on Eileen’s arm, “we’re not going to do anything bad.”

Natasha sighed and pushed past Eileen, “Out of the way, tall girl!”

“Please don’t let anything insane happen,” Eileen whispered as she let the rest of us in.

I kissed her lightly, “Darling, I haven’t done anything crazy for years.”

In the narrow foyer, Paulie fell down in a tangled mess with a flimsy
little table. I flinched as a bowl of peppermint candies shattered on
the floor. I tried to hold Eileen’s gaze, but that old trick didn’t
work anymore.

I must say, the first hour did go well. There was a moment when Natasha
downed about seven shots of Grey Goose and hugged the stereo like it
was a dog, playing ‘Poet’s Problem’ over and over. I always loved that
song, so it was no bother, but it sure got Eileen in a snit.
Fortunately, Nat’s easy to keep in line if you give her control of the
stereo. (Another secret is to give her a basket of glitter pens and
construction paper. She’ll bite her tongue and mindlessly draw swirls
and flowers deep into the night.)

The trouble began when the Last Guest arrived. It was around eleven and
one of Eileen’s friends opened the door. We all turned, Blondie filling
the air, booze filling our heads, when a man stepped into the living
room as if he were in his own personal movie. There was something about
him that was simply beautiful. Like the basic ingredients of beauty –
sugar, spice and everything nice. I think James even licked his lips
before I shook him violently.

The Last Guest ran long fingers through a tussle of brown hair, turning
a glowing face towards us as Eileen burst from the ranks of the party
and fluttered around him like a suicidal moth making a final run on the
U.S.S. Hot Toddy. Despite the music, there was a hushed silence in the
room. Natasha appeared beside me and grabbed my arm. I looked down at
her. Her eyes were wide, her face more pale than usual.

“What’s up, Nat?”

“It’s happening…again.” She hissed.

“What is?’

Her jaw dropped open and she began to shudder, “I’m going boy-crazy.”
Then she peeled herself from my arm and went to flutter around the Last
Guest.

James leaned close to my ear, “There’s only a few thousand years
standing between us now and drinking wine from that guy’s skull.”

I looked at him for a long moment, then we shook our heads and turned
away. Still, though, I had picked up the cheese knife just in case. A
few thousand years equals about half a bottle of vodka in my world, and
I’d long since zoomed past the mark.

“Nice party.” James said after the last of the women had fluttered to the Last Guest.

“I hate my fucking life.”

“Oh, come on, Natasha eats guys like that for breakfast. You have
nothing to worry about.” He put a hand on my shoulder, “You’ll always
have Nat.”

“I hate my fucking life.” I said again, chopping at the cheese with the knife until white chunks were flying around us.

Midnight; the finest hour. James and I had set out to track down
Drunken Paulie, who had vomited a strange and repellant mixture of
cheese, cereal and blood on all of the coats in Eileen’s bedroom. We
found him in the closet and I went to turn him on his side while James
conducted an impromptu search for Eileen’s panties, stuffing whatever
he found in his pockets with frenetic movements.

Paulie made it to the bathroom in one piece and we slammed into a few of Eileen’s office mates outside the door.

“Who’s the latest guest?” I said, sounding like Natasha whenever she looked at a picture of one of my old girlfriends.

“Martin,” one of the guests answered, “Accounting.”

“Martin Accounting. Strange name.”

“No, it’s…” The guy trailed off. I was still holding the cheese knife
while James, hovering feverishly behind me, held a pair of navy blue
panties to his mouth and nose. Eileen’s co-worker looked contemplative.

His waterhead buddy was more adventurous. “I’m Jack, this is – ”

“That’s fucking great, thank you.” I pushed past them with James in
tow. We hovered over the booze table and I poured a glass of Bacardi
for each of us. “Martin Accounting,” I hissed, slugging the drink.

“Are you getting worked up?” James asked.

“Fucking hell,” I snarled, pouring another glass of rum.

A wide, malevolent smile spread slowly across James’ face, “You are
getting worked up.” He breathed reverently. “Beautiful. Do you want me
to find some matches?”

Martin Accounting sat down with Eileen giggling like a goddamned six
year old on his lap. Natasha was sitting on her legs and gazing
wondrously at his face while a bevy of other girls swirled around him
like autumn leaves. It was at the 2:41 mark of the four minute ten
second version of ‘Heart of Glass’ (a moment I knew well) when a dull
rage settled in my heart and I threw the empty rum bottle across the
room. It exploded against the wall and I looked around, momentarily
unsure of what had happened, until James leaned close, his face still
broken in a joker’s smile, “That was you,” he whispered.

Fuck. Total regression. I knew it must happen some day but not now, not like this…

Eileen looked at me in broken-hearted horror, but Natasha was immune to
such things. She took advantage of the frozen moment to reach out and
touch Martin Accounting’s face, her black nails raking across his cheek
with enough force to draw blood. He shouted out and jerked to his feet,
holding a hand to his cheek, and looked down at her.

James muttered something along the lines of ‘uh-oh’ but I was trying to hold Eileen’s gaze again.

Natasha had this terrible, hungry vampire look on her face. She clawed
out like a zombie, reaching for him, her eyes locked on his face, her
mouth gaping. “Pretty…boy…” she hissed.

“Both Natasha and Nacho are tripping out!” James shouted excitedly, as if letting a radio audience in on the events.

Then Paulie burst out of the bathroom with a box of tampons and, after
that, things went bad. We ducked down as Paulie leapt onto the food
table, screaming maniacally in Spanish about cotton Satan and the death
of chastity, then he started throwing tampons at the guests, causing a
mass panic. I started to roll under the table, but James caught me as
the table, and everything on it, including Paulie, came crashing to the
floor with such force I heard the window casements shaking over the
blaring music.

When Blondie’s ‘One Way or Another’ started, the party guests were
scrambling in ice and food, Eileen was reaching for me with what I
hoped wasn’t a knife, James was laughing himself sick, I was stuffing a
bottle of Scotch into my pants and Natasha had Martin Accounting pinned
to the floor, tearing at his shirt.

James grabbed me and I slid along the floor, hitting the wall with my
head. He half-dragged, half-carried me through a door into darkness.

“We’ve lost Natasha!” I shouted.

“She’s a fallen hero, Nach, we gotta run!” James replied. We were
clutching each other close, nose to nose, when one of the guests yanked
open the door. James had taken me to a closet. It seemed that everyone
at the party had clustered at the door, hungry for revenge. Some of
them were smeared with food and many of the girls were crying. Someone
pulled the plug on the stereo and a deafening silence washed over us. I
could hear knuckles cracking, the menfolk shuffling towards us, Paulie
screaming through what must have been a gag and Natasha’s harpy-like
screeching. She’d been captured, too, by the sound of it. James and I
turned slowly to look at all of them, then James leaned forward and
grabbed the doorknob.

“Do you mind? We’re having a meeting here.” He pulled the closet shut.

“We’re in a fucking closet!” I screamed in his face, “There’s no way out!”

“Punch through the walls, Nach! Hurry!” He shoved me into the coats and I began flailing against the drywall.

“This is all your fault, bitch!” I screamed back at him.

“My fault? I’m not the one who went out with a girl who got kicked in the head by a donkey!” James shouted.

This time Eileen ripped open the closet door. “Okay,” she barked, “This
is the last straw, you childish motherfuckers! Collect Wednesday Addams
and that goddamn Spaniard and get out of my house before I bring the
cops down on you!”

I think that was the first time I had heard Eileen curse. James and I
sidestepped out of the closet and he went for Drunken Paulie who,
indeed, had been gagged and restrained. I went over to Natasha, who was
rocking back and forth, hugging her legs to her chest and staring into
middle space. She was mumbling a mantra and, as I drew near, I could
just make it out: “…boys, pretty, boys, pretty, boys…”

I thought briefly about slapping her, but my fear of her right hook was
so deeply ingrained I gently touched her shoulder with a broom handle
instead.

“Come on Wednesday,” I said, “We gotta go.”

“Pretty boys!” Natasha screamed. Then, as if she had startled herself
awake, she cast desperate, confused glances around at the party guests
and the mess we had created. She allowed me to lead her out of the
house and it took about three hours and several beers before she
finally threw that right hook.