<\/p>\n
My ex girlfriend Eileen was having a society party and James, Natasha,
\nDrunken Paulie and I never missed one of those. Natasha put together
\nher usual outfit – something black, something old, something new, and
\neyes painted like a Fellini reject. Her daywear had acquired a new
\naddition in the last couple of weeks – a purple ribbon tied in her
\nhair. She says it’s for “the souls lost in the Ardennes,” but there’s
\nno telling with Nat. James pulled out his best 1970’s vampire garb, and
\nI put on whatever crap was at the bottom of my clothes hamper because
\nthe day I dress up for a party hosted by an ex girlfriend is the day
\nyou can fuck me in the ass.<\/p>\n
We had to pick up Drunken Paulie, tearing down Wisconsin Avenue
\nwith little time to spare. He was waiting outside his apartment
\nbuilding in high-water jeans and a button down work shirt that made him
\nlook g-g-g-gay to the b-b-b-bone. I screeched to a stop in the right
\nlane and screamed past Natasha, “Paulie!!”<\/p>\n
He had fallen backwards into a pile of trash and was staring at the
\nsky, but he responded to the sound of my voice, pulled himself up and
\nlurched drunkenly in the direction of my car, then he attempted to
\nclimb through the sunroof.<\/p>\n
“Mother of God!” Natasha barked, opening the door and stepping out.<\/p>\n
Paulie fell to the hood with a nasty ping, then pushed past Natasha and
\nsat down in the passenger seat. He sighed heavily and ripped a bottle
\nof scotch from some hidden compartment in his ultra-tight jeans.<\/p>\n
There was an awkward moment of silence while he drank deeply.<\/p>\n
“Well?” Natasha put her little hands on her little hips, cocking her head so it was nearly on her shoulder.<\/p>\n
Paulie handed her the whiskey bottle, but she only grabbed it and threw
\nit to the sidewalk, unphased as it shattered near her feet.<\/p>\n
“Let the girl in!” James shouted from the backseat.<\/p>\n
Paulie moved the seat up and pressed himself against the dashboard. He
\nturned his face to Natasha and, whatever his expression, it didn’t make
\nher happy because she got that look in her eyes and that weird little
\ntwitch at the left side of her mouth. Still, she climbed into the
\nbackseat with James and I adjusted my mirror so I wouldn’t have to look
\nupon the face of Kali for the entire trip to Eileen’s silly townhouse.<\/p>\n
Eileen had bought this place in Northeast DC in a neighborhood that, in
\nmy youth, was known for gangs of boys who would run up to you and cut
\nyour balls off and stick them in your mouth, then ask you for change.
\nNow, the cruel hand of gentrification meant mousy girls like Eileen
\ncould move in and buy fresh tomatoes at the corner. It was disgusting,
\nmainly because the nut-cutting madmen had moved out to my neighborhood
\nin the suburbs. But they and I had an understanding, so it wasn’t an
\ninconvenience. It just did a doozy on the property values.<\/p>\n
I parked my car about eight million blocks away because DC sucks ass “This it?” James asked after we arrived, all of us standing and looking up at Eileen’s front door.<\/p>\n “It is.”<\/p>\n Natasha pushed past us, whipping out her double disk set of Blondie’s I knocked on the door while Natasha sang \u2018Rip Her to Shreds’ under her Eileen opened the door and her eyes instantly narrowed when she saw “Glad you made it Nacho,” Eileen said, never taking her eyes off of “Sorry, brought the gang,” I said.<\/p>\n Eileen was weighing possibilities, no doubt a whole galaxy of possibilities. “You’re not here to ruin my party, are you?”<\/p>\n “Of course not,” I replied a little too quickly.<\/p>\n “She looks like she don’t know better,” Nat was singing.<\/p>\n “I have office people here,” Eileen looked over her shoulder with wide eyes.<\/p>\n “I have office people here,” Natasha said in a mocking voice.<\/p>\n “Cool it, Nat.” I put a hand on Eileen’s arm, “we’re not going to do anything bad.”<\/p>\n Natasha sighed and pushed past Eileen, “Out of the way, tall girl!”<\/p>\n “Please don’t let anything insane happen,” Eileen whispered as she let the rest of us in.<\/p>\n I kissed her lightly, “Darling, I haven’t done anything crazy for years.”<\/p>\n In the narrow foyer, Paulie fell down in a tangled mess with a flimsy I must say, the first hour did go well. There was a moment when Natasha The trouble began when the Last Guest arrived. It was around eleven and The Last Guest ran long fingers through a tussle of brown hair, turning “What’s up, Nat?”<\/p>\n “It’s happening…again.” She hissed.<\/p>\n “What is?’<\/p>\n Her jaw dropped open and she began to shudder, “I’m going boy-crazy.” James leaned close to my ear, “There’s only a few thousand years I looked at him for a long moment, then we shook our heads and turned “Nice party.” James said after the last of the women had fluttered to the Last Guest.<\/p>\n “I hate my fucking life.”<\/p>\n “Oh, come on, Natasha eats guys like that for breakfast. You have “I hate my fucking life.” I said again, chopping at the cheese with the knife until white chunks were flying around us.<\/p>\n Midnight; the finest hour. James and I had set out to track down Paulie made it to the bathroom in one piece and we slammed into a few of Eileen’s office mates outside the door.<\/p>\n “Who’s the latest guest?” I said, sounding like Natasha whenever she looked at a picture of one of my old girlfriends.<\/p>\n “Martin,” one of the guests answered, “Accounting.”<\/p>\n “Martin Accounting. Strange name.”<\/p>\n “No, it’s…” The guy trailed off. I was still holding the cheese knife His waterhead buddy was more adventurous. “I’m Jack, this is – ”<\/p>\n “That’s fucking great, thank you.” I pushed past them with James in “Are you getting worked up?” James asked.<\/p>\n “Fucking hell,” I snarled, pouring another glass of rum.<\/p>\n A wide, malevolent smile spread slowly across James’ face, “You are Martin Accounting sat down with Eileen giggling like a goddamned six Fuck. Total regression. I knew it must happen some day but not now, not like this…<\/p>\n Eileen looked at me in broken-hearted horror, but Natasha was immune to James muttered something along the lines of \u2018uh-oh’ but I was trying to hold Eileen’s gaze again.<\/p>\n Natasha had this terrible, hungry vampire look on her face. She clawed “Both Natasha and Nacho are tripping out!” James shouted excitedly, as if letting a radio audience in on the events.<\/p>\n Then Paulie burst out of the bathroom with a box of tampons and, after When Blondie’s \u2018One Way or Another’ started, the party guests were James grabbed me and I slid along the floor, hitting the wall with my “We’ve lost Natasha!” I shouted.<\/p>\n “She’s a fallen hero, Nach, we gotta run!” James replied. We were “Do you mind? We’re having a meeting here.” He pulled the closet shut.<\/p>\n “We’re in a fucking closet!” I screamed in his face, “There’s no way out!”<\/p>\n “Punch through the walls, Nach! Hurry!” He shoved me into the coats and I began flailing against the drywall.<\/p>\n “This is all your fault, bitch!” I screamed back at him.<\/p>\n “My fault? I’m not the one who went out with a girl who got kicked in the head by a donkey!” James shouted.<\/p>\n This time Eileen ripped open the closet door. “Okay,” she barked, “This I think that was the first time I had heard Eileen curse. James and I I thought briefly about slapping her, but my fear of her right hook was “Come on Wednesday,” I said, “We gotta go.”<\/p>\n “Pretty boys!” Natasha screamed. Then, as if she had startled herself
\nand I led my troupe of misfits up to Eileen’s front steps. There was a
\nbrief moment where I felt like I was part of the opening scene of Reservoir Dogs<\/em>,
\nexcept Paulie was slamming into trashcans and falling down, Natasha was
\nseething and James was singing some Sinatra tune in a voice louder than
\nany creature on Earth was capable of matching. He was okay, too. Still,
\nthough, on the last leg to the townhouse, he started on \u2018It Was a Very
\nGood Year,’ and I suppressed the desire to drive a pencil into his eye.<\/p>\n
\ngreatest hits, “Let’s rip them to shreds, boys.” I was glad to see that
\nshe had recovered from the Paulie incident.<\/p>\n
\nbreath. I’m sure I’ve mentioned that there was no love lost between
\nNatasha and Eileen. Haven’t I?<\/p>\n
\nNatasha at my side. Nat, in reply, smiled smugly and shook her head
\nwith her whispered song. Yeah, you know her, miss groupie supreme. I
\nstepped away from the two women as one would a basket of angry
\nwolverines.<\/p>\n
\nNatasha, “I don’t recall – ” She stepped back when she saw James and
\nPaulie behind me. “No, no, no,” her desperate smile and nervous laugh
\nwere strangely pleasing.<\/p>\n
\nlittle table. I flinched as a bowl of peppermint candies shattered on
\nthe floor. I tried to hold Eileen’s gaze, but that old trick didn’t
\nwork anymore.<\/p>\n
\ndowned about seven shots of Grey Goose and hugged the stereo like it
\nwas a dog, playing \u2018Poet’s Problem’ over and over. I always loved that
\nsong, so it was no bother, but it sure got Eileen in a snit.
\nFortunately, Nat’s easy to keep in line if you give her control of the
\nstereo. (Another secret is to give her a basket of glitter pens and
\nconstruction paper. She’ll bite her tongue and mindlessly draw swirls
\nand flowers deep into the night.)<\/p>\n
\none of Eileen’s friends opened the door. We all turned, Blondie filling
\nthe air, booze filling our heads, when a man stepped into the living
\nroom as if he were in his own personal movie. There was something about
\nhim that was simply beautiful. Like the basic ingredients of beauty –
\nsugar, spice and everything nice. I think James even licked his lips
\nbefore I shook him violently.<\/p>\n
\na glowing face towards us as Eileen burst from the ranks of the party
\nand fluttered around him like a suicidal moth making a final run on the
\nU.S.S. Hot Toddy. Despite the music, there was a hushed silence in the
\nroom. Natasha appeared beside me and grabbed my arm. I looked down at
\nher. Her eyes were wide, her face more pale than usual.<\/p>\n
\nThen she peeled herself from my arm and went to flutter around the Last
\nGuest.<\/p>\n
\nstanding between us now and drinking wine from that guy’s skull.”<\/p>\n
\naway. Still, though, I had picked up the cheese knife just in case. A
\nfew thousand years equals about half a bottle of vodka in my world, and
\nI’d long since zoomed past the mark.<\/p>\n
\nnothing to worry about.” He put a hand on my shoulder, “You’ll always
\nhave Nat.”<\/p>\n
\nDrunken Paulie, who had vomited a strange and repellant mixture of
\ncheese, cereal and blood on all of the coats in Eileen’s bedroom. We
\nfound him in the closet and I went to turn him on his side while James
\nconducted an impromptu search for Eileen’s panties, stuffing whatever
\nhe found in his pockets with frenetic movements.<\/p>\n
\nwhile James, hovering feverishly behind me, held a pair of navy blue
\npanties to his mouth and nose. Eileen’s co-worker looked contemplative.<\/p>\n
\ntow. We hovered over the booze table and I poured a glass of Bacardi
\nfor each of us. “Martin Accounting,” I hissed, slugging the drink.<\/p>\n
\ngetting worked up.” He breathed reverently. “Beautiful. Do you want me
\nto find some matches?”<\/p>\n
\nyear old on his lap. Natasha was sitting on her legs and gazing
\nwondrously at his face while a bevy of other girls swirled around him
\nlike autumn leaves. It was at the 2:41 mark of the four minute ten
\nsecond version of \u2018Heart of Glass’ (a moment I knew well) when a dull
\nrage settled in my heart and I threw the empty rum bottle across the
\nroom. It exploded against the wall and I looked around, momentarily
\nunsure of what had happened, until James leaned close, his face still
\nbroken in a joker’s smile, “That was you,” he whispered.<\/p>\n
\nsuch things. She took advantage of the frozen moment to reach out and
\ntouch Martin Accounting’s face, her black nails raking across his cheek
\nwith enough force to draw blood. He shouted out and jerked to his feet,
\nholding a hand to his cheek, and looked down at her.<\/p>\n
\nout like a zombie, reaching for him, her eyes locked on his face, her
\nmouth gaping. “Pretty…boy…” she hissed.<\/p>\n
\nthat, things went bad. We ducked down as Paulie leapt onto the food
\ntable, screaming maniacally in Spanish about cotton Satan and the death
\nof chastity, then he started throwing tampons at the guests, causing a
\nmass panic. I started to roll under the table, but James caught me as
\nthe table, and everything on it, including Paulie, came crashing to the
\nfloor with such force I heard the window casements shaking over the
\nblaring music.<\/p>\n
\nscrambling in ice and food, Eileen was reaching for me with what I
\nhoped wasn’t a knife, James was laughing himself sick, I was stuffing a
\nbottle of Scotch into my pants and Natasha had Martin Accounting pinned
\nto the floor, tearing at his shirt.<\/p>\n
\nhead. He half-dragged, half-carried me through a door into darkness.<\/p>\n
\nclutching each other close, nose to nose, when one of the guests yanked
\nopen the door. James had taken me to a closet. It seemed that everyone
\nat the party had clustered at the door, hungry for revenge. Some of
\nthem were smeared with food and many of the girls were crying. Someone
\npulled the plug on the stereo and a deafening silence washed over us. I
\ncould hear knuckles cracking, the menfolk shuffling towards us, Paulie
\nscreaming through what must have been a gag and Natasha’s harpy-like
\nscreeching. She’d been captured, too, by the sound of it. James and I
\nturned slowly to look at all of them, then James leaned forward and
\ngrabbed the doorknob.<\/p>\n
\nis the last straw, you childish motherfuckers! Collect Wednesday Addams
\nand that goddamn Spaniard and get out of my house before I bring the
\ncops down on you!”<\/p>\n
\nsidestepped out of the closet and he went for Drunken Paulie who,
\nindeed, had been gagged and restrained. I went over to Natasha, who was
\nrocking back and forth, hugging her legs to her chest and staring into
\nmiddle space. She was mumbling a mantra and, as I drew near, I could
\njust make it out: “…boys, pretty, boys, pretty, boys…”<\/p>\n
\nso deeply ingrained I gently touched her shoulder with a broom handle
\ninstead.<\/p>\n
\nawake, she cast desperate, confused glances around at the party guests
\nand the mess we had created. She allowed me to lead her out of the
\nhouse and it took about three hours and several beers before she
\nfinally threw that right hook.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[352],"tags":[353,179,367],"class_list":["post-2451","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gsarchive","tag-gs-archive-2004-2008","tag-james","tag-natasha"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2451","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2451"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2451\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2890,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2451\/revisions\/2890"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}