A Tale of Two Parties

"Kitchen?" Peter's question as he spun them, Anna squeezed his hand, he led them toward a staring Roger and Jeanie.

"This is Roger, the last airline pilot you want flying your plane," Peter indicated his friend, his same height but heavier and with something of a tummy, "and his fiancé Jeanie, the only stewardess who could tame him!"

"Congratulationssh, the two of you," Anna said brightly but then her voice thinned, "I... did not take my opportunaety. A long life to both of you."

"Thank you," said Jeanie, the first one to master her voice, "your costume is..."

Her voice trailed off.

"One of a kaind?" Anna offered, Jeanie smiled shyly and nodded.

"Anna's visiting us from...," Peter stopped, looked deliberately at Anna, who squinted her grey eye tightly and let her green eye bore into him, "somewhere very far away..."

"That is but the half of it," Anna said quickly and laughed lightly, Peter focused tightly on the green eye amidst the sea of red skin, which he swore had deepened in color. He went silent, smiled back to let her statement be the end.

He'd had an unrequited crush on a girl in high school with a small port wine stain and a much milder degree of heterochromia than this Anna, a combination he'd never expected to see again. But neither of that girl's eyes had been green and this green eye recalled Carole, by whom he'd been driven beyond frustration since the beginning of the school year. The last thing he expected was to have another green-eyed woman draw his attention just as he'd decided to never see Carole again.

More wide eyed views as Peter led Anna into the kitchen, he noticed that Cat and Dave had apparently held back with Roger and Jeanie just in the dining room. The guards had made up the gap and he wasn't sure if they or Anna were the biggest draw.

"Food and drink prapearashion, here," Anna said, Peter grunted in acknowledgement, "naeeds a good cleaning."

"Oh, yeah," Peter agreed, "here, empties here."

He tossed his empty can into a round tub next to the stairs, half-full already. Anna tipped hers back then lowered it and tossed it to follow his.

"Refills on the way back," she said, "what is down there?"

"We'll find out," Peter had just led them onto the short flight of stairs when the back door below them burst open and a tall, broad masked man stepped through and shouted at the top of his lungs in a voice he apparently hoped sounded friendly enough to mask the threat.

"Where are you Stevie? STEVIE! Come on down!"

Peter stopped quickly and pulled Anna's hand, he felt the pair behind him react instantly but there was no space for them to get around him and Anna, and they couldn't retreat past the suddenly very tense pair.

"Whoa, SHIT!"

The masked face turned toward them and Peter saw the eyes behind the mask go wide, brown circles lost in seas of white. Richard Fucking Nixon, Peter's mind raced before his lips went tight. He squeezed Anna's hand, nudged her and stepped forward down a step and moved to put the left half of his body in front of Anna.

"Who the fuck are YOU?"

"What's up Prez," a second masked visage half emerged, Peter saw a wolf man mask, "whoa! Hey!"

The second man was a few inches shorter and considerably thinner than Nixon. Both of their faces locked on Anna but they slowly registered the two presences who squeezed either side of her. Peter watched as they looked completely past him to evaluate Anna's companions.

"Hey, Tommy," Peter said sharply, neither of the masked men reacted, "Jake. Hey. TOMMY!"

The Nixon mask finally turned to face him, followed by the wolf man.

"Oh, hey, Petey," the voice went thick, syrupy, "whatcha doin' here?"

"Question is, Tommo boy, what the fuck you doing here? And shouting your lungs out?"

Wolfman held up a couple of small plastic bags with green contents, shook them.

"We go where our customers are," Tommy said, "and collecting a debt. Heard our boy'd be here tonight."

"Nice of you to warn...," Peter stopped, glowered.

"Anna," Peter half turned his face and spoke quietly, "go with your folks there, but stay by the big table with Dave and Cat and Roger and Jeanie. Please. DO NOT go out the front door."

"Danger?" She leaned whispered in his ear, stared at the two masked men.

"We're the opposite of danger," Tommy said, "right Wolfie? We're the fun squad."

"Please, Anna, now," Peter said softly, she squeezed his shoulder and backed up the stairs and the besuited pair led her front and back.

"Who's your girlfriend, Petey? Hell of a costume!"

"Who's out the front, Tommy? You're just hoping whoever this Stevie dumbfuck is will take a runner. Right into who? Jed?"

"Hey, STEVIE! YOU UP THERE? GOT MY CASH?"

Peter saw the glittery eyes and smile through the mask holes.

"Don't worry, this deal's important to him, ten bills," Tommy said conversationally to Peter, "but he's respecting the boundary. Gail's out front and a hired hand you don't know. What about you?"

"I don't give two fucks what you do to Stevie, whoever he is, so long as you do it elsewhere. And leave my friends alone."

"Your girlfriend's got her own muscle, whadda ya care? STEVIE, LAST CHANCE!"

"It's my business, Tommy, that's all you need to know."

There were distant shouts and a ripple of noise that was muted by distance and the thick walls. Peter half turned but didn't take his eyes off of the Nixon mask.

"Wolfie," Nixon said to his companion, "go through if Lord Petey doesn't object, I'll go around outside. Check our trap."

Nixon slipped out the door and the Wolfman mask looked at him. Peter shrugged and backed up the stairs.

"C'mon, Jake, you just here to sell dime bags? Anybody other than Stevie on the shit list?"

"Just him," Jake shrugged, "and I'm not handling that end."

Peter sighed, stepped up into the kitchen and waved the shorter man to follow.

Dave & the Cat

'...STEVIE! YOU UP THERE? GOT MY CASH!"

The shout came from past the kitchen where Dave saw a few wide-eyed spectators around the edges and Anna strode back, her guards in front and behind her, tight and grim expressions on their faces. Cat stepped forward but stopped when Anna's eyes caught hers, what Dave took was a relaxed, almost joyful expression on the foriegn woman's incredible face.

"Friends of Paetor's," Anna said in an almost giddy voice, Cat sniffed, "wae are to await him here."

Anna swept her arm around the dining area as her female dark-suited guard nudged her toward the single beer cooler and stood looking into the kitchen. Dave and Roger had used a couple of the dining room chairs and placed two of the coolers on the far end of the table, nearer the entry foyer with its ever-rotating crowd of masked drinkers. That left them with a protected redoubt their side of the table.

The male guard stood alongside his female peer but faced the front door. Dave and Cat were pushed further along. Roger and Jeanie stood along the far side of the dining table and looked at Dave.

"Hopeless," he said to the couple, "but maybe not serious."

"Come, you two," Anna said to Dave and Cat, "tell mae, which is the best of these? I naead refreshment."

"STEVIE! LAST CHANCE!" Came from out of sight, the same gruff, fake friendly voice as before.

This time there was a commotion in a knot of revellers near the front door. Suddenly a tall young man dressed as a pirate, long curly blond hair bounced beneath his tricorn hat as he pushed a couple of other people aside and sped out the front door and down the short step on to the covered front porch. He nudged a girl hard just before he leapt off the porch to skip the three front stairs. He landed off balance and stumbled which allowed the two people who'd been crouched either side of the stairs to converge on him.

A series of shouts, curses and grunts as the three bodies struggled and went down in a heap on the grass alongside the concrete path, people already on the front porch moved to watch. A loud female voice in the pile screeched before it morphed into a long series of loud laughing syllables.

"That must be Staevaea," Anna said with her own laugh just before she lifted a beer can to her lips and drank, Dave and Cat looked at her then at each other. Two pairs of dark glasses didn't react to the commotion but slowly scanned their assumed directions.

"This is crap beaer," Anna said with another laugh before her voice went wistful, "it brings back maemorays. Me and my Eian..."

"Ian? Who...," Dave said quietly to Cat, who looked at him, her head shook slightly and her mouth quirked in denial. They both jerked as the female guard almost growled.

"Peace," Dave heard Peter's voice, Anna turned and the guard backed up. Peter led a man, thin and a few inches shorter and in a wolf mask but otherwise jeans and a sweatshirt with a sleeveless down vest over it to stand in front of the guards.

"Hey, everyone," Peter said, "this is Wolfman Jake, call him Wolfie. If you're in need of, uh, smoking accessories he's the man to ask. He's cash up front, not on the lending side. Right?"

That last directed at the masked young man.

"Harmless as a teddy bear," Wolfie agreed, flashed a plastic bag, "anyone?"

Cat snorted but Anna stepped to Peter, whispered in his ear. Dave couldn't hear but saw his friend's eyebrows arch then he shrugged and reached into his back pocket. He pulled out a ten dollar bill and held it out toward Wolfie.

"Hey, Petey, you don't have to pay..."

"Bullshit, Jed doesn't do me any favours... Gimme... Then, shoo..."

Wolfie shrugged and they exchanged bill for bag, he slipped the bill into a front pocket.

"Nice doin' biz with ya," he said then he walked toward the folks who slowly moved away from the front door as shouts and grunts receded in the distance. Stevie apparently had no close friends nearby or at least none close enough to assist him and Dave thought he'd seen a big man join the fray in the front yard. They were quickly out of sight and conversations slowly resumed. He glanced back and the female guard had just slipped the bag into a jacket pocket.

"What the hell, Anna...," Cat's voice, low, hard.

The strange older woman turned mismatched eyes to her, Dave had encountered but not personally known people with port wine stains but he didn't think they could change color like Anna's could, it seemed to pulse very slightly. He'd never met anyone with heterochromia and wondered how rare was Anna's case.

"Info,"Anna said, turned, handed Peter a beer, "now, Paetor, a toast. To unexpected surprises."

He popped the top, tapped cans and he and Anna drank.

"What the hell was that all about, Peter," Dave asked for the group of friends and Cat, "that guy and the Wolfman?"

"Stevie fucked up," Peter said, drank again, "he owes big bucks to the wrong people. If any of you are looking at a loan run the lender's name past me, okay? And this Wolfie's no friend of mine but he's just dime bags."

So stated, they silently watched as Wolfie's hands quickly exchanged his bags for bills twice before he slid into the bedroom.

"The guys who live here," Jeanie said to Peter, "they don't care about, um, that?"

"One of 'em's right there," Peter grunted, "just bought himself a bag."

Anna slipped her left arm through Peter's right as Cat glared at him, Dave wasn't sure if it was jealousy, anger or some lingering issue about the dime bag Peter'd bought for Cat's strange friend.

"You young paeple," Anna addressed the quintet, "will you vote for your laeaders next waeak?"

"Hah," Roger spat the word, "in this state if you're not voting for Ronnie Rayguns you may as well not bother. Carter doesn't have a chance, I'm sorry to say."

The others smiled tightly and nodded their heads in agreement.

"But hey," Roger said in a conciliatory tone, "there's some local stuff, so yeah, I'll be there. I'll just write in Peter for prez."

"Shit," Peter chose to snort out the word, "my first act after my election will be to arrest everyone who voted for me. Can't have those sorts of people running loose on the streets!"

That drew laughter from everyone except the guards, whose pictures would've fit alongside the dictionary definition of 'dour'. Just then there was a yellow flash through the windows they stood beside and whoops and shouts from outside. Everybody turned, saw a huge flame billow up out of the metal firepit as half-lit shapes moved and muffled laughter and shouts came through the glass.

"Finissh my tour?" Anna asked Peter as she looked back at him after watching the flames and shadows for a few moments.

"Cold out there," Peter said as he looked at her plentiful exposed patterned skin, "you be okay?"

"Better than my Cat will," she told him as she glanced at the masked brunette, "I will be fine. Laead on."

Peter set his beer on the table and slipped his goggles over his eyes with his both hands, retrieved his beer and drained it in a long pull. Anna matched him. They put their empties on the table.

"Get us both fresh ones, Dave," Peter said as Anna nodded, Dave shrugged and pulled a couple out of the single cooler still near them and handed them across.

"Cat, pleashe be a dear and put thosshe in the tub in the kitchen," Anna said, "let'sh go!"

She and Peter followed the female guard into the kitchen, Cat looked at Dave then at Anna's and Peter's backs, he wasn't sure if she was angry at him, or Peter, both of them, or the tight line of her beautiful red lips meant something else. Joy and happiness weren't it, he was relatively sure.

"Want one for the road, Cat?" What the hell, he thought.

She turned on him and her eyes flared, black pinpricks in brown surrounded by glittery white. Her mouth opened but then she froze. Her eyes softened.

"No," she growled, a very catlike tone thought Dave, "one of us has to keep a brain in her head."

She grabbed the two empties, Dave carried a full one and after long looks Jeanie and Roger followed. The male guard took one last look and followed them into the kitchen.

Bonnie and not Clyde

Wolfman Jake sat hard and bounced the people each side of him already seated on the bed.

"Hey, hey, the wolfman's got what you need," he said as he put each arm around a set of shoulders, on his left black lacy cloth competed with dark brown curly hair to make up what Jake took to be some sort of witch. On his right some lame-ass dude in a cowboy getup.

"C'mon," he said to stony silence, "ah well, how about you?"

He looked at another guy, seated in a desk chair across the room, a bland smile his only return.

"Well, wastin' my time here," he stood, "now, anyone kindly tell me where that cute twenties chick went? She was in here when I looked a while ago."

He'd seen a quick glance of the brown hair, red cloche and dress before he'd entered the bedroom. He knew she hadn't left through the open door into the common area, so the door to his right, in the back corner of the room had to be it. He thought through the floor plan he'd scoped at a glance, it led to some sort of corner room that connected back to the entry foyer. Shit. She could've already escaped. A quick glance told him none of his new acquaintances would be of much use so he exhaled loudly and nodded and stepped quickly to the door, grabbed the handle.

With a quick quarter turn he confirmed it wasn't locked. He thought he heard a snapped 'hey' from the bedroom but he turned the handle, pushed the door and stepped quickly in, pushed the door closed behind him.

He heard a deep, long inhale in front of him, focused on it. A hatless head with loose medium length brown hair that fell around it. The head jerked up rapidly and turned toward him, a thin glass tube held to her right nostril.

It was a bathroom they were in, a double sink vanity to his right, past that a toilet and then a glass-walled shower. A door in the far wall was closed. The woman was young, near to his age, cute, her face was thin but even, her nose thin and with the slightest upturn to it, her skin was light and clear, her light brown eyes spun for a second as they looked at the Wolfman mask. With his hand still on the doorknob he quietly flipped the door lock.

"Hey," she finally managed, anger appeared to build in those cute eyes.

"Oh, um," Wolfie said, his mind clicked and he pushed the mask up to sit on top of his own shaggy light brown hair, "sorry, didn't mean to scare you."

He looked away from her and saw two more lines of white powder on the long-out-of-style blue veneer of the vanity. She looked down, then they both looked up and caught each other's eyes again.

"I'm Jake, this," he tapped the mask, "is just for special occasions. But hey, if you want to party..."

He pulled a plastic bag from one of the many hidden pockets in his down vest, held it up.

"You've got the good stuff there, I'll trade a bag for one of those lines, Bonnie, if that's your name?"

Her expression softened to a smile as she looked at the bag.

"It's really Bonnie," she said, "that's why I wear this getup. Sure, c'mon."

She stepped backwards, held out the glass tube. He stepped forward and exchanged his bag for the tube and saw the red cloche and her mask set on the toilet tank.

"Thanks," he said before he set the tube in his right nostril then leaned over and hoovered up one of the two inch lines of white powder. In his line of work he knew taking such an offering at face value could be a mistake. But in for a dime in for the whole dollar. He rose up, blinked.

That's a nice rush. Just a bit. He reluctantly handed the tube back to Bonnie.

"Split it with you," she said to him, stepped close and split the last line with a razor blade.

"You carry that with you," Jake said in a low voice. She didn't seem to object to him holding his ground, their bodies abutted.

"Go ahead," she said. He leaned and snorted up his half line, rose, sniffled, handed the tube over and Bonnie quickly followed suit before she stood straight again.

They looked at each other, two pairs of brown eyes danced with the rush. Jake slid his arm onto Bonnie's lower back, just above the curve of her cute if slender ass, rubbed upwards slowly.

"Sneaking in here," he said softly, "your own private party."

"This was all I had," she didn't move away, leaned her back just slightly into his rub, "not enough to share. Well, trade, sure."

She smiled at him.

"You carry that blade just for this?"

"Hah," she snorted the syllable, "I knew a bunch of college boys lived here, there'd be a razor blade somewhere. You're a cute boy, not one of them..."

"I'm just a delivery boy," he said as he felt her hip adjust to nudge closer as he rubbed her back, "lots of brains up this part of town but not too much sense most of the time. But what's your story, Bonnie Parker?"

"Bonnie, not Parker," she said through a smile, "not my usual haunt either. Girl I used to hang with in high school's out there, we ran into each other at the mall and she invited me. We've... well, she's not who we used to be. I needed to pep myself up, too much talking about the woes of the world, or about whatever lame ass 101 or 202 class or Professor Pain In the Ass... Yeesh..."

"They're good up here for my business, not much else..." he said.

They both laughed at that.

There was a tap at the door Jake had used, they heard the doorknob rattle, then a harder tap.

"Hey, fall in or something..." came from outside the door.

Bonnie and Jake looked at each other, then at the door.

"Just finishing," she said.

She nudged Jake slightly away but as he sidled away she put her hand on his arm, gripped it and kissed him quickly. Her mouth started closed but urged his open and she touched her tongue to his then as quickly ended it.

"Get your stuff," he said quietly, "I'll clean here."