The Fear Of Jello

I was reminded today of a dark time in American cuisine.

For some reason, during the post WWII era, there seemed to be an intense desire on the part of some Americans to do weird things with commercial gelatin.

Many of these experiments are still with us, and have been successfully integrated into Generic White People Cuisine. Ambrosia, a jello based treat that incorporated Cool Whip, marshmallows, and fruit and nut bits, was a staple at Thanksgiving, and there are any number of fruit salad recipes in which the fruit is embedded in sweet jiggling fruit flavored deliciousness. And that's okay. They've stood the test of time. They have outlasted their haters, and have taken their place in the hierarchy of the Food Pyramid, so to speak.

But a long time ago, I was young, and some of the outliers weren't quite so far out there as we might wish.

Y'see, I was raised Methodist. And with the Methodists, while the "covered dish supper" is not a sacrament, per se, you'd THINK it was, what with the frequency with which these gatherings are held. The rules are simple: each family brings a covered casserole dish containing some sort of food product, and the dish is placed on a buffet, and after a short socialization and chatter, grace is spoken, and everyone gets up and files along the buffet table loading up a plate with whatever there is to eat. Then you sit down in groups and eat and chat and hang out. There are other parts to the ritual, but that's the gist of it.

And I remember learning, over time, that Covered Dish Suppers were a sort of White Protestant version of "trial by ordeal."

It would have been sometime in the early seventies, and I would have been seven years old or so, and I was cheerfully loading up my plate, but I was aware there were RULES to be followed. Politeness. Just because Old Lady Melonballer's fried chicken was particularly delicious did not mean one took more than one piece. Leave some for someone else. In addition, desserts were fine, but not too much of any one in particular, even if Dan Dan the Insurance Man thought it was funny to cut a slice of cake and then take the whole cake and leave the slice, a joke he performed at Every. Single. Church. Supper. Ever.

And above all, one did NOT point at a given concoction and say out loud, "What the &#%@$ is THIS &@#$%?"

No. Politeness was hammered in from an early age, and I do think that if Jack the Ripper showed up and started sawing off the minister's head, I would have betrayed no more than an expression of mild surprise. If a given foodstuff was unidentifiable, one looked to see if anyone else was eating it. One did NOT ask what it was. And unless one wished to risk a weird surprise, perhaps one would be best served by avoiding it.

But I remember that one particular Sunday night when I saw the shining green Jello thing. It was very pretty. It glowed a translucent green, and was not transparent, but translucent, hinting of yumminess within. No one else had touched it, so I hefted the serving spoon and cut myself a reasonable but generous portion, added it to my plate, and went and sat down. First, of course, I ate Mrs. Melonballer's chicken. Priorities, of course. After that, Mrs. Stonebreaker's brownie. I had a routine, after all.

But eventually, I worked my way down to what I thought was some sort of lime Jell-O fruit salad. And I took a bite. And I sat there, for what seemed like a very long time, trying to figure out what I was eating.

I was indeed right about the lime Jell-O. But the chunky bits were the wrong consistency and flavor, and the cloudy stuff was NOT Cool Whip; it was something heavier, with a different texture and flavor... sour? Was this SOUR CREAM? And what was this ROUND thing... was this MEAT? Hot dog coins? No... too soft... mighod, it was SLICED VIENNA SAUSAGE!!!

"Are you all right?" my mother asked archly. Dad was still laughing like hell at Dan Dan the Insurance Man and the amazing cake joke that never gets old.

"I didn't say anything," I said defensively.

"No, you did not," she said approvingly. "But your eyes are different sizes and if the wheels were spinning any harder, you'd have smoke coming out your ears. Go throw it away and get another plate, if you want."

And with the imprimatur of authority, I did so. But this was how I learned of the perfidy of Jello Salad.

Over time, I would learn that Jello was, to some folk, more than a mere dessert; it was to some a base raw material that one could use to construct a sort of food EDIFICE, an agglomeration of various foodmatters fused into one... um... THING, using a mortar of sugared gelatin. At least half the congregation of the church was over sixty, and some of these folks had learned in decades past that some VERY questionable things were acceptable to serve to an unsuspecting public. The olive/cucumber/tomato horror seen above was one that I have seen... and luckily avoided.

I was also learning, around that time, that veterans of the Great Depression had some odd ideas about food. Namely, that once it was on your plate, you ATE it. No buts. No exceptions. Food wastage was apparently the cosmic key that made it possible for Satan himself to come collect your body AND soul, right there on the spot, just because you left three peas and an overlarge smear of gravy. And, of course, as a CHILD, all rules applied triply to ME.

Over time, I learned to be wary as hell of anything made of Jello.

Fortunately, Jello is a forgiving food. It's TRANSPARENT, meaning if there's anything IN there, you can examine it and make an informed decision. Olive slices, for example, were right out. Diced pears were iffy; LOTS of cubed vegetables look like diced pears. But cherry halves and grapes were generally a good sign of edibility.

But vigilance was called for.

Which brings us to the horrible Christmas dinner of '72, the night Mrs. Garweed ambushed me.

I was working my way down the buffet, and had selected my fried chicken leg and my brownie and was casting around for anything appealing, when suddenly, a wet red slab of something resembling a translucent internal organ came flying out of the skies and slapped wetly onto my plate, atop my poor brownie and chicken leg.

"TRY THIS," sang Mrs. Garweed with a note of desperation in her voice. Mrs. Garweed would have been pushing eighty around that time, and her covered dish offerings were not popular. Looking back, I suppose one might have got the idea that she and her husband had stumbled through a spontaneous portal from a parallel universe, one where canned meat and raw vegetables were considered "dessert," canned fruit in syrup was an entree, and actual fresh meat products and raw fruit either didn't exist or were not trusted by the natives. I would later develop a theory that Mrs. Garweed had survived the depression by eating rodents, tumbleweeds, and perhaps her own children, possibly suspended in aspic, but I was young and not quite that imaginative yet.

I looked up at her. She smiled brokenly at me, tongs and spatula in hand. "TRY it!" she said brightly. I noticed she was the only person actually trying to serve any food; everyone else was just letting everyone else choose what they ate. Apparently Mrs. Garweed had grown tired of taking the same food home that she brought with her, and had decided to be more proactive in its serving. I was apparently her first victim; she'd sawed off a rubbery wet slab of something embedded in cherry Jello that was easily half the size of my plate. SOMEONE, by ghod, was going to eat her offering!

I glanced around, trying not to look panicked. Mom wasn't even in the room, she was out with the decorations committee, and Dad was over at the drinks table, laughing because Dan Dan had poured himself a small glass of Pepsi and was walking away with the quart bottle, leaving the glass on the table.

I looked up at Mrs. Garweed again. She tried to grin. She showed teeth, anyway. The effect was ghastly.

"Ah," I said. "Well. Thank you." I looked at my plate. There wasn't any room on it for anything else, and it was going to take an excavation project to see if the chicken leg and brownie could be exhumed. And so I turned and headed for the children's table, thinking to carefully dissect the damp red thing, retrieve the actual food, perhaps autopsy the jello thing to see what it contained, and then casually dump it in the trash can and get another plate. And I sat down, picked up a fork, and prodded at the wet red thing.

It had not had time to set completely, and was sweating red juice. It reeked of a cherry smelling apocalypse. Through its translucence, I could see little cubes and triangles of something diced up fairly small. No spheres. Just cubes, squares, and little pyramids. What the hell was IN this stuff? And far, far, below, like a shipwreck barely visible from the surface, I could see my chicken leg and brownie, sunk beneath fathoms of sweaty red horror, looking forlornly up at me as if to say what did we do to deserve this?

I glanced up at the buffet. Sure enough, Mrs. Garweed was staring at me intently. I wasn't going to get out of this gracefully. So with a mental shrug, I sawed off a medium sized bite and put it in my mouth.

Cherry. Gah. Cherry. What had she DONE? I'd HAD cherry jello before, but this was CHERRY cherry, this was cough syrup intensity, and how did you MIX cherry jello this strong? Still, it was livable. I began to dissect the gelid mass with my tongue, seeking data on what the chunks were. A suspicion became a certainty when I moved one of the little squares between my teeth and bit down: raw onion.

I glanced at Mrs. Garweed. She was still staring intently at me, aware that I had taken a bite. A ghost of a smile was flickering at the corners of her mouth. She apparently fully intended to stare me down until I choked down that entire plateful.

I decided I wasn't as curious about the chunks as I'd thought, and simply swallowed the whole mouthful. It slid down obligingly enough, albeit reminding me of every bad cough and sore throat I'd ever had. I took another bite. Cherry CHERRY cherry CHEEERRRRRY raw onion and was that Spam? Ohghod, it was Spam. Straight from the can, and greasy as anything. I swallowed, quickly.

And Mrs. Garweed beamed like I'd chosen her to lead the Christmas Pageant, carrying a slab of raw meat jello on high. And then she suddenly pounced on someone else in the line, and slapped a hunk of bleeding red glory onto their plate.

And I realized that I had a chance. I began pretending to chat with those around me, although the chatter with my fellow children was largely, "Good lord, what is THAT stuff and are you actually EATING it?" while dissecting and moving red wobbly sweaty chunks around the plate. Soon I'd exposed part of the chicken leg. And when Mrs. Garweed attacked another patron, I took advantage of her distraction to whip a half pound of the stuff under the tablecloth. And she glanced at me, and I smiled and nodded and waved my fork at her. And she beamed happily and shoveled twenty pounds of the stuff onto Dan Dan the Insurance Man's plate, and I got easily half of what was on MY plate under the table. After that, I was able to eat my chicken leg and brownie, although they'd suffered somewhat; they had no crisp or crunch remaining, and tasted like they'd been marinated in Smith Brothers Cough Syrup. I also discovered that the pyramids were carved from tomato.

And shortly thereafter, I excused myself and went to the bathroom on tippy toes, and once there, emptied an amazing amount of red mush into the toilet from out of both shoes. I hadn't been as on target as I would have liked, and was quite sure there was a place on the floor before my seat, under the table, that surely looked like someone had sacrificed a goat there. I ate nothing else that night, as everything tasted like the juice in a jar of maraschinos, and I honestly wasn't sure I could keep anything else down; Mom agreed that perhaps I wasn't well, and took me home.

And from then thereafter, when at covered dish suppers, I made a point of being wary not only of Jello, but of Mrs. Garweed; she died a few years later, and I am certain, from my glances around the church, that I wasn't the only person who felt a tad of guilty relief at that particular funeral.

MILLENIALS! While I recognize many of the problems presented ye pioneers of the 21st century? Be glad that by the time you came around, the Jello Corporation had done with trying to sell all the housewives on the gelatin based diet.

Letter From Home

Hello, beloved. I hope all is well where you are now.

It is hot outside, here. Hotter than it should be, hotter than I like it, which may be why I waited longer than usual to take the trash out. Bein’ off at the moment, the trash usually goes out at two, but today I waited an extra half hour, and thus, when I rose to collect it, Sunny was more’n a little excited.

Y’see, the normal routine is that every day at two, I take the garbage out.

On the way back in, I water the flowers in the front yard. Sunny goes berserk, barking like mad. We then go in the back yard to water the plants on the deck. Sunny gets worked up like CRAZY.

And THEN we WATER THE DOG, an event which is surely Christmas, Birthday, and Payday, all wrapped into one glorious doggy picture, as Sunny gleefully chases the stream of water from the hose around, barking and biting and whuffling, chuffling and choking and still biting the stream like her worst enemy, and getting soaked in the process.

It’s hot out there. Probably feels good.

But today, we had a bit of an alteration in the routine. It all went okay, right up until we stepped out onto the back deck to go turn the faucet on, right?

Well, as I mentioned, Sunny was SERIOUSLY worked up. She’d apparently been anticipating this, and was as cranked up as a five year old at two in the morning on Christmas Morn, you know?

You might also remember that I keep a big pot with the cherry tomato growing in it in the exit to the deck on the left, the way I have to go to get to the faucet, right?

So I’m about next to that big pot with the tomato growing in it when suddenly, POW, out of nowhere, I have a Moment of Discontinuity.

One minute, I’m walking across the deck. Next minute, I’m flat on my back on the deck. And for some reason, I have no pants on.

Since I’m off today, my uniform consists of a T shirt and ... you remember those ratty old shorts, the ones two sizes too big that have the Atari logo all over them? That.

I sat up on the deck. I’d bumped my head on the wood, but not hard, and was preoccupied with avoiding splinters and figuring out what had happened to my shorts. Wha’HOPPEN?

In the yard, Sunny was running blindly around with my shorts on her head. She ran in circles twice, and then plowed into the back of the garage. She’d tried to squeeze between me and the tomato pot, gotten her head hung up in the floppy leg of my shorts, and had kept going, being a largish dog, and had accidentally yanked my pants off, knocked me on my can, and was now confusedly running around the back yard, with my shorts on her head, completely blind.

Well, I can tell you, it was a bit of a moment. I stood up and stood there, my dangles flapping in the breeze, while Sunny staggered around the back yard, unable to get my shorts off her head. I stepped forward, intending to go GET her, but then stopped. After all, our backfence neighbors have a fairly clear view of our backyard. I had no great urge to be videoed and become a YouTube star, chasing the dog around the back yard all Donald Duck style.

Sunny tripped and fell down. She barked twice, and got up again. Bark!

I whistled.

The effect was immediate; Sunny suddenly knew where ONE thing in the universe was, oriented on it, and ran at it full tilt. Only some alacrity on my part kept her from plowing into me. I grabbed her collar, and extricated her from my trousers, and upon dressing myself, the usual water hose games and plant watering commenced.

So how was YOUR day?

6/24/18

Still miss Sunny Dog.

Flowers For George's Grave

Y'know, the way we teach history? Shit happens FAST.

The American Revolution ended overnight, on July 4, 1776, when the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence and emailed it to the leaders of the thirteen colonies and King George III, who said, "Well, shit. That's it. Game over. Damn them colonials!"

Slavery in America ended overnight, when Abraham Lincoln, a democratically elected president who'd been against slavery from the beginning, because he was such a wise, benevolent, and all around great guy, signed the Emancipation Proclamation, and emailed it to all the Confederate leaders, who said, "Well, shit. That's it. Might as well head for the Appomattox Courthouse, and sign those surrender papers. Because even if we were to win the war, the slaves all got the email from the White House that they're free (never should have let them have smartphones!), so there's really no point in fighting any more."

Us history buffs know better. The American Revolution didn't quite end until the 1780s, and I'm amazed that Canada isn't still pissed at us. The Confederacy ignored the Emancipation Proclamation and kept fighting, and for YEARS after even THEY admitted they'd lost, they fought like BASTARDS to hang onto slavery in some form... some distant regions simply didn't tell the local brown folks that they were technically free, there were any number of "black codes," laws that only seemed to affect black people (my favorite were labor contracts that only required you to pay your black employees once a year, after deducting costs of housing, food, clothing, and anything else you felt like charging them for), and so on.

Slavery did NOT disappear overnight. The better schools teach that that was the entire point of Reconstruction: a great many people did not WANT to alter the social order, and came up with some ingenious and legal ways to DO so... and eventually had to be MADE TO DO SO by law and force of arms. And as much as a century later, George Wallace was STILL making political hay by standing in the doorway of a public building and defending segregation.

But now we all agree that slavery was wrong, even if there is justification for it in the Bible, blah blah blah. Yup. Slavery is wrong. We finally got that far. Some of us even go so far as to say that racism is a myth, a relic of the distant past. I won't go that far, but I've heard it said.

Which brings me to the whole gay thing.

History will record that one day, the Supreme Court upheld gay marriage, and that all the gay folks who wanted to get married immediately ran out and got married, and all the bigots and hate freaks and evil poison trolls just threw up their hands and said, "Well, shit. That's it. We've lost. Might as well head for the Appomatox Courthouse and join King Triple George for commisseration and drinks in the dustbin of history."

As is patently obvious, 'tain't so, McGee. There are a load of politicians out there making political hay off the issue, though. They threaten to do everything from "we will simply ignore this law," to "we will find legal workarounds and end runs so we can legally ignore this law." The upshot is, Lincoln freed the slaves, but they're still n*****s to US, goddammit!

So, yeah, all you gay folks, I certainly don't wish you any ill. I personally know one gay couple that's got their license and getting married, and I very much wish I could fly in to attend their wedding, because they're neat people. I know others that are still fighting the battle. They're mad. The law of the land and the march of history is on THEIR side, dammit, and no asshead politician is going to stand in their way!

Me, I think about George Wallace. He was a politician, and a populist and he made political hay out of hate and oppression. And his shining moment in American history is now that time he stood in that doorway, and shouted "SEGREGATION FOREVER!"

And I think about how he bitterly regretted that in his old age, before he died. He wasn't a monster. He was a politician. He did good things as well as bad. And because he played the people to his own advantage at the exact wrong time in history, he is remembered... well, as a monster. And he was damn sorry for that.

I'm sorry too. He realized his mistake. He realized he was wrong, and he publicly admitted it before he died. And he was a better man than other politicians (coughcoughSTROM THURMONDcoughcough) who went to their graves ramrod straight and as arrogant as Caesars and as unrepentant as fallen angels.

I look at these governors and clerks and public officials who say, "I will not obey this law," or "I will find a way to legally ignore this law," and I wonder who among them will look at this moment twenty or thirty years from now... and who will say, "Oh, man, I was so wrong, and I'm sorry," ...

...and those others, who will simply spend that time thinking up further rationalizations for doing the wrong thing... and for refusing to admit it.

Keep fighting, people. I know it sucks, but the arrogant and the evil remain with us.

6/9/2015

Role Models

Nearly every super hero has his roots in one of two things: despair, and money.

SUPERMAN was the ur-hero, the first of many. Y'know what? First year he was in publication? He had no super-villains to fight. Who did he fight? Street crooks. Wife-beaters. Slumlords and profiteers. Corrupt politicians. One of Superman's creators? His dad died as a result of an armed robbery. Superman was created by two Jewish teeners out of Cleveland, and they were poor, bullied, and ANGRY, and Superman was born out of the honest desire on these kids' part to power up and punch a deserving bastard in the chops.

Power fantasy? Sure. That's why Superman's still around. Goin' strong since 1938, baby!

CAPTAIN AMERICA's another one. Captain America was created by a Jewish-American guy, BEFORE World War Two, but far enough into Hitler's jolly jamboree for him to be angry about what was happening. Like Superman, Captain America was born from the righteous desire to kick a deserving villain in the pants. Both heroes were a response to the burning desire for a powerful, honest, incorruptible hero, somebody who could grab the world by the nuts and MAKE IT RIGHT by finding the RIGHT BASTARD, and PUNCHING HIS LIGHTS OUT!

Simplistic? Sure. Stupid? Certainly. Power fantasy? Definitely. You can buy a plastic Captain America shield, nowadays.

BATMAN, surprisingly, doesn't make this cut. Batman was the creation of a guy who was told by the suits, "We need a super-detective for our book "Detective Comics." Somebody in tights and a cape with a gimmick, cuz that's popular with the kids these days. Make it happen." So Batman's creator invented a super-detective in a Lone Ranger mask, red tights and black cape who flew around because his cape actually folded up into a GLIDER, and...

...and then his uncredited collaborator, Bill Finger, stepped in and reworked Batman into the grim avenger of the night that you might have seen in the movies. But the first guy got all the credit.

Batman's a great power fantasy. Handsome rich guy who could have any girl he wants, but at night he dresses up like Dracula and goes out and finds irredeemable scum and terrorizes them and beats the living crap out of them and hands 'em over to the cops. And mighod, the toy collection this guy has! But Batman wasn't born out of despair, or rage, or the need for a hero. Batman was created because Bob Kane wanted a paycheck. But it worked; there's still plenty of wish fulfillment in there for any bullied kid. Punchem inna face! Take that! Teach YOU a lesson!

It's been pointed out that superheroes are, in a real world context, kinda fascist. This isn't quite wrong. Superman, in his early days, once went berserk and tore down a whole neighborhood, destroying tenement buildings and leaving hundreds homeless. He did this to force the evil slumlords and their corrupt politician buddies to build better housing for poor people. Sure, he was careful to make sure no one got hurt, and it was all for a good cause, but I dunno that I'd have taken that into account if I was one of those guys who suddenly found himself and his family homeless on the sidewalk because Superman got his cape in a twist.

And of course, Batman has been hunted by the law lots of times. He doesn't want to hear any of this "due process" crap, he wants to go find the Joker and put his foot in the clown's ass. None of this "Legal oversight" and "accountability" nonsense; he's richer than you, he's smarter than you, and he can punch you in the face if you give him a hard time. He's incorruptible, after all, and isn't that enough for anyone?

Captain America didn't have this same issue, being an agent of the U.S. military, but there have been any number of times he disobeyed legitimate orders from real Army officers, because "screw you, I'm doing what's right!" For some reason, he never seemed to come a cropper for any of these incidents. Incorruptible, after all.

Over time, though, the super hero changed. Why not? We changed. The world changed. And by the seventies, we began to see a different sort of comic book character. This brings me to the Punisher.

Funny thing? The Punisher started out as a villain. Bad guy. He was a bad guy with an AGENDA, though; he wanted to kill OTHER bad guys. For the good of society, don'cha know. He KNEW he was a villain, but didn't CARE; end justifies the means. And rather stupidly, he allowed ANOTHER villain to convince him that Spider-Man was a bad guy, and needed killing, hence the cover of the comic above.

But there was never any whitewashing of anything; the Punisher was a self-aware bad guy, fully knowing what he was doing, and very aware that he was doing evil... even if he justified it for the sake of good. Bad guy.

Later, though, we find that the Punisher had a hard life. His family was murdered by gangsters during a picnic after he got back from fighting in Vietnam, and, well, one thing led to another and... the Punisher wasn't exactly a BAD guy. He was just another vet with PTSD, some psychological issues, y'know, who'd have sorted things out on his own, except those bad evil Mafia guys went and slaughtered his wife and kids for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and pushed this finely tuned killing machine over the EDGE, y'know... what did they EXPECT?

(Funny thing? Batman killed some people, back early in his career, third or fourth issue. After he shot down some guys "for their own good," Editorial noticed, and threw a screaming stink, and Batman NEVER killed anyone again. In fact, he hated guns, now. It unhappened. Because heroes don't kill people, ever. Incorruptible!)

In the eighties, two of the most popular super heroes were The Punisher and Wolverine. Interestingly, both of these guys had psychological issues, anger control problems, a tendency to keep their friends at arm's length, and oh my, they iced bad guys left and right. The eighties was a time when, y'know, killin' bad guys was ALL RIGHT, y'know. Because we're the good guys, and they're the bad ones.

Power fantasy? Definitely. Incorruptible? Not so much.

I believe it was in this decade that both Wolverine and the Punisher got their own comic book series. Hell, in the nineties, Wolverine appeared on the cover of durn near every Marvel comic, whether he belonged there or not. He was good for sales. He was in the Avengers at one point, a thing that made me wonder like hell, because Captain America was in the Avengers, and the Captain America that I remembered would NOT have been okay with a short Canadian with a weird haircut who killed the guards while sneaking into the hideout because it was more convenient than knocking them out, you know?

These guys never seemed to face much in the way of consequences for their actions. The X-Men would give Wolverine a stern talking-to from time to time, but it seemed to bother him about as much as halitosis would. The Punisher got arrested and sent to prison a couple of times, but he'd just seethe and try to cooperate and try to contain himself until bad guys and corrupt prison guards finally pushed him too far, and then he'd beat everyone up, kill some with prison silverware and a jelly sandwich he had in his pocket, and then knock down the wall with sheer raging testosterone and run off into the night... to appear the next day with his familiar black and white skull tights festooned with a whole gun shop's worth of armament he no doubt had stashed somewhere, just in case.

The Punisher has no faith in the law, the legal system, the penal system, any of it. He is the authority, judge, jury, executioner. He IS a fascist. I can do this, therefore I will, because I can. I am right, you are wrong, so fuck you.

He was BIG in the eighties, and the nineties, and even into the new century. Made the news when a comic story was published where he meets some cops who not only don't arrest him, they squee over him like fanboys. They're ADMIRERS OF HIS WORK. And they have a Punisher Skull Sticker on their police car. Apparently, this is a real thing. I've seen Punisher Skull stickers on cars and pickups. Never on a police car, but I'm told it happens.

Because I am right. You are wrong. Fuck you. I will act to cure the disease, and I don't care who it hurts. It's for your own good. The end justifies the means.

Found myself thinking about that on January 6, 2021.

Buncha guys in costumes. We Are Right, You Are Wrong, Fuck You. We have guns, and we will set things right. People might get hurt, but fuck them, they were bad people. We Are The Law!

Wonder how many of these people grew up reading comics?

Zombie Mouselings: A Love Story

We met again on Facebook.

We'd known each other more than 25 years ago. I was a college student. She was a stunningly beautiful high school senior. There had been some definite mutual electricity... but we were both with other people at the time, and by the time our respective romances of the time had crashed and burned, her family had moved out of state.

I thought about her often... but I had no idea how to get in touch with her.

Life moved on.

I thought about her from time to time. Back in the mid nineties, when I finally got on this "internet" thing, I tried googling her name in a dozen search engines. No dice. Maybe she was married, and had changed her name. Maybe she wasn't online.

I got married. Later, I got divorced.

And it was on Facebook that I saw her name. She was replying to something a mutual friend had said. I about broke a finger getting in touch with her. She immediately remembered me, to my amazement. She was amazed that I remembered her. I even remembered her stuffed toy's name (Edgar Allen Hippo. How many high school girls make literary jokes about their stuffed animals?) And we began an email correspondence. We talked a lot, online. Weirdly enough, we had a remarkable amount in common, even after all these years.

And we became friends, again.

And then... I sent her some mouselings. Hey, why not? Mouselings are cute. And I like to paint them. And I thought a cute little handpainted thing would be a nice personal gesture.

She about melted.

I've said it before, and I will say it again: Mouselings are utter catnip for women, guys. You wanna draw the chicks like an all-night shoe sale? Forget the space marines, buy Mouselings. I am firmly convinced that Gene Van Horne (the guy who sculpts the things) must have to hold the chicks off with a torch and pitchfork just to get from his front door to the car in the morning.

Our relationship progressed. I started having real feelings for her. Well, I'd had real feelings for her since about 1986, actually, but... well... you know, you aren't SUPPOSED to find yourself attracted to someone you only talk to online, you know... but...

We talked about actually getting together in the flesh. This was exciting. It was also terrifying. Man, last time I saw her, I was buff as could be and had shoulder length hair. Now I'm a bald middle aged school teacher with a spare tire that could fit on a tractor. Did I really wanna do this? She said she didn't care. She'd seen my pictures in my Facebook profile. She knew what I looked like. And she still wanted to see me again. So we made plans. We live in different states, so yes, there was some planning involved.

As the time came closer, I felt like I needed to take her something. Flowers or something, you know? What could I take her that wouldn't, you know, be too cliched, or too MUCH, or ... hell, what was I going to give her?

Zombies.

In the course of our conversations, it turned out she liked zombie movies. Who'd have thought? I like them myself, but I know better than to take a date to one. She said she'd LOVE to be taken on a date to a zombie movie, which did a lot to convince me that this woman was right for a bizarre depraved reprobate like myself in the first place. And who brings ZOMBIES to a first date? Truly, a stroke of weirdness AND originality. And if she couldn't handle weirdness and originality, then truly, she and I were NOT meant to be.

But what to get her? Zombie movie DVD? Zombie toy? Stuffed zombie?

Zombie Mouselings.

I remembered that Reaper'd done a zombie mouseling set a few years back, for the artists' get together. No WAY would she have zombie mouselings! It was a no brainer (if I can be excused the gawdawful pun). But.... they'd been limited edition, though, and not for sale through conventional means. But... but it was TOO PERFECT A GIFT! I HAD to lay hands on a set! Crap! Wherethehell was I going to find a set of limited edition zombie mouseling minis that hadn't been in production for a year or more?

And that was when I got in touch with Obi-Wan Kenobi*. "Help me, Obi-Wan," I said. "You're my only hope."

*No, I am not going to reveal his real name. He did me a hell of a favor on short notice, and the last form of repayment this fine, splendid, and salt of the earth person deserves is half the friggin' world calling him up on the horn to bug him about out of production minis. Develop your OWN black market sources.

And Obi-Wan used the Force, and hooked me up with a set of Zombie Mouselings. Quickly, I set to with paint and brush, and sticking closely to Michael Proctor's most excellent example from the Inspiration Gallery. I'd wondered like hell how to point up the fact that the two Zombies were in fact Zombies, instead of ordinary gray mice, and his "green glowing eyes" trick, as seen in the Inspiration Gallery, was pure genius. Gladly would I steal Michael's idea and take full credit for it from my sweetheart... If, in fact, she WAS my sweetheart. Remember, I hadn't seen her in 25 years. My brush hand MIGHT have been a little shaky.

We met a month later.

I will spare you all, dear friends and readers, most of the corn syrup. Most of it.

Me? I'd aged. Her? She'd matured. She was still stunningly beautiful. And she looked at me like a deer looks at a speeding eighteen wheeler on the highway. And I stood there with my mouth hanging open. Truly, I had learned confidence, suavity and style in the quarter century since we'd last laid eyes on each other.

We sat. We talked. And she said to me, "You are still so handsome."

And then I think she kissed me. I don't know. I might have kissed her. Someone sure's hell kissed someone. And I'm pretty sure I was there for it. Some of my neurons are STILL tingling.

A couple days later or so, I emerged from the pink fog long enough to remember the mouselings. "I... brought you something," I said, and brought out the little wrapped package. She glowed for a moment. How do they do that? Men don't do that. At least, no men that I've ever known could actually emit light. But she did. And she opened the package, and carefully unwrapped the tiny, tissue wrapped parcels... and looked at the first zombie mouseling, with his undead glowing green eyes. And then she looked up at me with her mouth open.

Oh, ghod, I'd blown it. Whatthehell was I THINKING, zombie mouselings for a hopeful romantic reunion? What kind of a moron WAS I? Oh, &%$#@....

She unwrapped the rest of the mouselings, and looked at them with an expression I couldn't read. She almost looked like she was about to cry, for a moment. And then, she looked at me, and said, "I brought you something, too." She dipped into her bag, and handed ME a parcel. I looked at her. She didn't seem offended. She didn't seem put off. She seemed... weirdly... hopeful.

So I opened the package. Two blisters of Zombie Mouselings.

I looked back up at her with my mouth hanging open again. She looked to be on the verge of tears. "You'd said you loved the zombie mouselings, but that they were limited edition, and you didn't get to the artists' convention... so I went online... and I found this guy who resells stuff online... and I was... going to ask you to paint ME a set..."

And she looked back down at her handpainted mouselings with their glowing green undead eyes. I've changed my Facebook status from "Divorced" to "In a relationship."

We've managed to get together a few times since then, and barely a day passes that we don't at LEAST do a little chat... or texting... or emailing back and forth from work. And we spin dreams, and fantasize, and even plan for the future a little.

So... anyone going to ReaperCon who doesn't want their pirate mouseling? Please let me know; she's really hot to get one of THOSE, too. Ghod knows what she might do if I bring her a painted one...

Mouselings.

Gene, I'm quite sure this is your fault, somehow...

Ain't No Such Thang

“Well, there’s no such thing as cowboys,” the child said. “They’re imaginary, they’re in movies and TV and stuff. They’re not real. Like Santa Claus and dinosaurs.”

The conversation between the sixth graders had been about Halloween costumes, and whether or not Li’l Shannon could reasonably go as a cowboy. Not a cowgirl; a cowboy. Jeans, boots, and so on. She seemed to feel that cowboys were cool, whereas cowgirls were lame, and where does one find pink jeans and pink Stetson, anyway?

And Josh blew it all out of the water with “I don’t believe in cowboys. They aren’t real.”

And it was at this point where I had to ask, “Josh, what makes you think cowboys aren’t real? I grew up in deep south Texas. I knew lots of cowboys. Who do you think raises the cattle that go to make your hamburgers?”

“Well,” said Josh, a little taken aback, “There USED to be cowboys, sure. But now all that is automated, and stuff.”

I had a bizarre vision, out of nowhere, of robot cowboys riding motorcyles, herding cattle, and squealing ‘yee haw’ in electronic voices.

“So... you’re honestly telling me to my face that you believe that cowboys are extinct?”

He looked troubled. Contradicting one’s teachers isn’t normally standard procedure for sixth graders, but he felt like he needed to stand up for his belief system. “Well, I said there USED to be cowboys,” he said. “I mean, someone had to fight the Indians*, and fight at the Alamo**, like Sam Houston and Davy Crockett, and all that. But now, there’s just people who dress UP like cowboys. They don’t carry six shooters, they don’t ride horses, and they don’t have anything to do with cows. Nowadays, it’s all about being in movies about old timey days, back in cowboy times. Y’know? Like private detectives.”

I may have stood there with my mouth open. Admittedly, I can’t say I knew any private detectives in high school, but...

“Um... Josh,” I began, as gently as I could. “Cowboys exist. So do private investigators. Look up PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR in the Yellow Pages, and--”

“Yellow what?” he said, confused. Errrgh. Okay, I stepped into that one.

Sigh. “Josh, you live in Colorado. Colorado has mountains at one end, and plains on the other. Those plains are full of farms and ranches. The ranches are infested with cattle. You’ve seen them, every road trip you ever took. Who do you think looks after those cattle? And you can hire a private investigator any time.”

“Well, that’s just silly,” said Josh, indignant. “Why would you HIRE a detective when you can just call the cops for FREE? Private detectives aren’t REAL, they’re just in TV shows and movies. Like cowboys. Or dragons. It’s all PRETEND. You dress UP as one, you can’t really BE one. And cattle are domesticated, these days. You just CALL them, right?”

I had yet another unbidden vision of a rancher blowing a whistle, and the cattle queuing up neatly to jump into a meat grinder. He was so durn sure of himself. Howthehell do you explain the truth to a child who’s quite sure you’re wrong? I know that insurance companies employ hordes of private investigators to check insurance fraud, even if they don’t look like Tom Selleck or Humphrey Bogart, I know you can hire a PI to see if your spouse is cheating on you and get photos for the divorce lawyer, and I went to HIGH SCHOOL with cowboys, fa potato’s sake, but how do you explain all this to a SIXTH GRADER--

He smiled at me. “Look,” he said. “I appreciate you want to help preserve my sense of childish wonder. My parents felt the same way about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. But it’s okay. I’m grown up***, now. And you have to let go of your childish dreams sometime.”

And that was how I witnessed the Twilight Of The Cowboys, right there in the sixth grade...

My Friend Camille

So I have this friend named Camille. That’s not her real name. At least part of this is because Camille is one of those women who didn’t quite start out that way, if you follow me.

I knew Camille back when she was named Bob, and used a whole ‘nother set of pronouns. We weren’t best buddies or chums or anything, but we knew each other. Acquaintances. I was a big admirer of Bob’s work, was all, and was in a position to say so. Talent, humanity, and humor. High drama, but surprisingly subtle! Good stuff! Not enough out there like it!

Eventually, we became Facebook friends, which doesn’t say much, as I am also FB friends with people like Sarah Silverman, Bob Dole, and the Ghost of Elvis; I don’t know ‘em personally, and they wouldn’t know me if I bled to death on their front lawn.

But I knew Camille a little better than that, which is why I was one of the people in on it when she decided to become Camille. Bit of a jolt, that, and it got me to thinking at the time. What the hell? I mean, I knew this sort of thing HAPPENED, but I’d never had much personal experience with it. I’d known a few trans folks out of Austin, Weirdness Capital of Texas, but I was about as well acquainted with them as I am with the Ghost of Elvis.

So Bob is weary and done with bein’ Bob, and wants to be Camille. How did I feel about this? I sat down and thought about it.

First of all, was this the right thing to be done for Bob’s sake? She said that it was. That it was a thing that had been inside for a long time, itching and needing to be free, and that Camille was no longer a thing to be denied. I’ll get back to this.

Secondly, would it affect the work that had drawn my attention in the first place, and which I admired so much? Didn’t seem likely. Hands, talent, and inclination seemed unlikely to change all that much.

Thirdly, how was this going to affect the rest of the world? How were the relatives in question going to react? Parents? Siblings? Family? This is a BIG thing; I once was involved in a situation where a gay guy came out to his family and damn near got lynched over it. Yeah, that’s hyperbole, but not by much. I was one of the couches on Frank’s support network when he needed places to stay after his parents explained to him that he needed to choose between goin’ back to bein’ straight, or killing himself immediately, because God hates fags but He might forgive a suicide, you know?

Frank’s situation at the time gave me tremendous pause for thought. Frank’s a great guy, loads of fun, and when I found out he was gay, I did not particularly care. He was pretty much the same person after I found out he was gay that he had been BEFORE I found out. He was just sick of HIDING it, and having to PRETEND.

I sorta sympathized. A few years after Frank’s dilemma, my grandmother sat me down and gave an awkward speech that boiled down to “if you aren’t married by age 25, people start thinkin’ you’re queer and why aren’t you married?” My answer, boiled down, was “Because I ain’t found the right woman, yet.”

Her response, boiled down, was “Bein’ married to the wrong woman is still better than people thinkin’ you’re queer.”

It gives you a hint into the world I grew up in... and the world around us.

A great many people seem to have endless need to poke their noses into everyone else’s business. I took a TREMENDOUS amount of flak in my youth for BEING WHO I AM, for not bein’ more like a “regular guy,” and what was all this writing and reading and stuff? What’s with all the books and art and stuff? Why don’t you talk like a normal person? Why didn’t I follow football, like a regular guy? Why aren’t you more like ME, more like US? WHY ARE YOU SO WEIRD?

Truth is, I’m nowhere near as strange as I was led to believe I was. And I developed the attitude that as long as I’m not in jail, earning a living, harming no one, paying my taxes, and not running for public office, I owe you no explanations. You can take me as I am or go to hell, as it suits you. And equally importantly, you have the right to that same attitude.

Frank was a good guy, and a chum, and it never occurred to me that he might sneak off the couch and slither upstairs and tie me up and molest me or anything. He knew I wasn’t gay. He was just a guy having a very tough, bitter, UGLY time who needed his friends about then, and what kind of friend won’t let you couch surf a couple of days in an emergency?

Then again, to me at least, gay guys made SENSE. Gay people, as far as my experience has taught me, are just like any other people, aside from sexual preference. They see members of their OWN gender the way I tend to see WOMEN, is all. And the fact is? I don’t want to screw all women. I don’t even want to see them all naked. Even in my tender and callow youth, when I was sure I wanted to screw every woman ever born, and was sure I had the stamina to do so, there was actually a very small fraction of the feminine gender that I wanted to get to know in a Biblical sense. The rest of them were just... people.

This all seemed self evident to me, but it seems to be a real Unified Field Theory to a lot of other folks, complicated and inexplicable and probably wrong. Not to mention arguable, regardless of proof. Judgment is just way more damn fun than acceptance, much less ignoring someone and minding your own life.

This brings us back to Camille. What did I think? How did I feel about all this? What was I gonna do or say? Was this RIGHT for her? What about her work? And how was this gonna affect the people around her, what were THEY gonna do or say... and how would this affect Camille? Why was she DOIN’ this?

Fortunately, Camille was pretty forthcoming about her reasons. She WANTED her friends to understand. And she had quite a bit to say about it. She frankly answered a lot of awkward questions.

And I still didn’t get it. How can you be a different gender inside than you are on the outside? I mean, GAY folks, at least their processes are like MINE, if only directed toward a different GENDER, sure, but at least THAT I can understand. Yeah, I know, every culture has HAD transgender folks, I’m not sayin’ it’s deviant or insane or anything, I’m just sayin’ I don’t GET it, is all...

And so I sat down and I thought about it. Hard.

I WANTED to understand, but this wasn’t something simple or self evident, and it was going to take some work. My mind is a dark and twisty place, and it’s BIG in there, and twittering bats soar through the vast and darky places, but you can find all sorts of things, experiences, remembrances, and emotions floating through it, and I went looking in the deep... tryin’ to understand.

Transgender folks ain’t gay folks. There are a few parallels, but it’s a very different thing. Bein’ gay ain’t a choice. There are gay folks in Mississippi, which tells me that if it WAS a choice, they’d choose otherwise. Transgender folks take as much shit or more for bein’ transgender... which told me they NEED to do this, that it ain’t really a choice, either. Furthermore, gay folks can stay in the closet, and often do, for survival’s sake. Ain’t that simple for transgender folks; their “choice” involves a shift in identity.

But why?

I kept drifting back to the idea of all the SHIT you must have to put up with as a result of this. Relatives bugging out on you, friends getting all bent out of shape, trouble with employers, insurance, plain old documentation and government bureaucracy, all this nonsense about bathrooms... hell, that alone would be like when a woman gets married and changes her name, but worse. A whole world of shit.

Why?

And I thought back hard, to a time when I got a buncha shit for bein’ who I am... for being not like the others. Different. Weird. Not all THAT weird, but where I grew up, reading books, watching Star Trek, and not attending high school football every Friday night marked you as a goddamn strange duck indeed...

And I abruptly heard my fifteen year old self spouting off, across many, many years, after finally getting sick and goddamn tired of being prodded by empty headed chumps: “Because this is who I AM, ya goddamn chucklehead! Because I LIKE what I do, and I LIKE reading books, and I LIKE painting stuff and writing shit down, and I LIKE all this shit, REGARDLESS OF WHAT YOU THINK, YOU VAPOR BRAINED YAHOO! AND I’M GODDAMNED IF I’M GONNA PRETEND OTHERWISE, AND IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT, YOU CAN GO TAKE A FLYIN’ FUCK AT A ROLLIN’ DOUGHNUT!!!”

I blinked. The anger and stridency I’d felt at the time was somethin’ I hadn’t felt in a long time. It’s been a LONG time since anyone attacked me for just bein’ me. I hadn’t felt those feelings in a long time...

...and just like that, I got it. I didn’t NEED to understand Camille’s need to be Camille, as opposed to Bob, or anyone else. I didn’t feel what she was feeling? I didn’t get it? It didn’t MATTER, any more than why I preferred Robert Heinlein to Zane Grey when I was fifteen, or why I couldn’t give a rat about watching high school football, much less playing it, or why I wasn’t married at 25, or a million other things my friends and relatives and complete strangers couldn’t wrap their heads around.

As long as she’s not in jail, earning a living, harming no one, paying her taxes, and not running for public office, she owes you no explanations. You can take her as she is, or go to hell, as it suits you.

This wasn’t ABOUT me. This wasn’t mine to understand... or decide... or judge. I reoriented and thought in a different direction, one that WAS mine to ponder:

Is Camille a friend, or not? And what kind of asshole doesn’t have a couch for a friend who needs to surf a day or two when the shit comes down? And even if she wasn’t, what kind of asshole serves up the shit buffet just because you aren’t what they think you should be?

Plenty of people are like that. Am I one of them?

***************************************************************************

The rest was easy, and I formed my views on the topic from there. Camille’s still a friend, and I continue to marvel at her work. And this was all several years ago.

I never published this note, then. I was kind of afraid I’d give offense, afraid my white male privilege was showin’. I didn’t want to look stupid for not immediately grasping the whole complicated issue and, you know, having to think about things.

And then someone else came out. Again, not a bestest buddy, but someone I knew, someone who knew me. An acquaintance. Someone who needed to be what she WAS. Someone who had decided to face up and challenge the enormous shit salad that goes with transitioning into who you are inside.

And if she has the courage to stand up and do THAT, well, dammit, the least I can do is to have the pathetic little scrap of bravery it takes to stand up and say, “You’re okay with me. Be who you are, stand up, and don’t be afraid. Yeah, I know it’s rough. But you’re okay in my book. I support you. And I’m not alone in that.”

“Live, love, grow. Do no harm. And be who you are.”

1/29/2017

Naked Twister

Originally published somewhere back around 1996.

For Moon, who asked me to...



It would have happened sometime in the early eighties, when AIDS was just for people who knew it existed… back when the Sexual Revolution was in full swing. Drug abuse and rampant sex were considered acceptable forms of self-expression. The Reagan years had begun, but we hadn't noticed yet. The hostages were home from Iran, and we hadn't figured out that the Seventies were over yet. The drinking age was eighteen. Political correctness hadn't been invented. Videotape players were a newish thing.

It was a great time to be a guy. Speaking as a guy, that is.

I make no apologies for this story or any offense you may take from it; I figure changing the names is enough. If you're offendable, proceed no further.

**************************************************************

This tale is mostly true, and sometimes the truth is not all we'd like it to be. I will make a point of saying I'm not the same guy now that I was then, and neither are most of the people in this story -- the ones I've kept in touch with, anyway. For all I know, the Creature still sleeps in a nest made of his dirty laundry…

Dramatis Personae:

BOB, best known for his pyrotechnic asshole

JUANA, because she really, really, juana…

ROCKET BOY, boy genius

LOIS, who refused all nicknames

The CREATURE, who was exactly what he appeared to be

GALADRIEL, who could form an emotional attachment to a rabid skunk if she slept with it once or twice

The DEWY-EYED WONDER… a sweet guy, but still a virgin at 21

The WINDOWPANE GODDESS, who saw the edge of the universe and came back to tell us about it whether we wanted to know or not

WET WILLIE, best known for his antics with watermelons

BRISTOLS, unwillingly named for her most prominent features

AND YOUR HUMBLE FIRST-PERSON NARRATOR

************************************************************************

I could spend a LONG time trying to explain the soap opera that was unfolding around this story. I won't. It'd take too long, and the worst sin there is is to be boring… and each of these people could make for a good essay in and of themselves… I've already written about Bob and Willie. I'll settle for the list of players, above, and a short list of relationship markers…

BOB: Single and loving it. These events occurred after Bob learned to ignite his flatulations, but before his butt exploded. Wickedly good-looking, Bob got laid more than almost any human I've ever met.

JUANA: Single and desperate. Could be counted upon when drunk to attempt seduction on any man nearby. Was also experimenting with bisexuality, apparently to increase her options.

ROCKET BOY: Single and looking. Liked Juana well enough, but did NOT want to sleep with her. Would happily have slept with Bristols, but hadn't managed to arrange that. Had been involved with Galadriel once, and had had quite a time breaking it off...

Because when he got horny, he'd take her back…

LOIS: an item with the Creature, which confused the hell out of all of us. Creature got his name for his complete indifference to any form of cleanliness more than an inch from his own skin, while Lois was an anal-retentive housekeeper if there ever was one. It was rumored they spent their dates cleaning his house in the nude, and he wasn't allowed to touch her until the place was spotless...

GALADRIEL: Off and on with Rocket, and involved in The Dance with the Dewy-Eyed Wonder… not because they were particularly attracted to each other, but because she just knew he'd come out of his shell and get over this silly fixation on his virginity if someone would just FUCK the boy… whereas he was terrified of sex for fear of doing something wrong and looking stupid, but he was also going crazy with the knowledge that he was the only remaining male virgin on the North American continent…

WINDOWPANE: occasionally involved with Your Humble Narrator off and on. At the time, it was off. When one of us got desperate or wanted to try something weird, we knew we could count on each other, though.

WILLIE: Terminally single. Even Windowpane and Juana weren't up to some of his antics. A practicing bisexual (and vegesexual, for that matter).

BRISTOLS: after years of fighting the expectations society has of a nineteen-year-old Loni Anderson lookalike with 44DD breasts, she was in the process of … um… learning to use it, so to speak. Hear her roar… and she wasn't attached at the time, but she was often very much in … demand… at parties, particularly after she'd had a few. She wouldn't sleep with most guys, but that didn't stop them trying. Watching the show was a hoot.

The story began when Windowpane threw a party at her place. She'd apparently gotten hold of some high-grade marijuana, and felt like sponsoring an intimate gathering of her nearest and dearest to field-test the stuff. This group consisted of the people named above, and a few others.

It was necessary to go, of course. Parties at Windowpane's were always interesting affairs; she prided herself on that. They would begin with the setting out of refreshments (soda, snacks, and/or a keg), and when everyone was settled, the North American Dope Ritual would begin, starting with the cleaning of the buds, and culminating in the ignition of the bong. She ran the thing like a Japanese Tea Ceremony, very silent, very dignified, very ritualistic… although I don't think the Japanese ever consumed their tea out of anything resembling a foot-long ceramic penis.

She'd made the bong herself, apparently in her high school ceramics class. I still am not sure if I believe that story -- if you'd tried anything like that at MY high school, you'd have been summarily executed. Still, she had a large ceramic bong, shaped like an erect penis. The bowl was set at the base, nestled in its pink scrotum. You placed your mouth on the tip to smoke it.

Needless to say, cameras and so forth were not allowed. Part of the show was seeing how people reacted when handed a smoking erect cock to suck on. You earned points by playing it up; Bob in particular would happily fellate the thing until smoke came out his nose, just to watch any homophobes squirm. Juana had an uncomfortable habit of locking eye contact onto her target of the evening, rubbing the thing all over her chest, neck, and face, and then, slooooowly sucking on it… while never breaking eye contact with the target. Harrowing, to say the least.

To make a long story short, a party at Windowpane's required a sense of humor and a tolerance for other people's saliva… and they did tend to start off with a bang. Much of the fun was in seeing where and how they ended…

I think it was Wet Willie who suggested playing Twister. It just so happened that his Twister set was out in the car, and who was up for it? By the time he brought it up, it was good and dark and everyone was stonkered and agreeable, and it was too cold to use the pool, anyway. He ducked down and came up with the box a moment later and set it up.

Within an hour, I realized why Twister has sold so consistently since its invention in the 1960s. The game is all about sex. Within the first dozen spins of the spinner, Willie was putting the moves on Bristols, Juana was pressing her boobs against Dewy's chest, and Windowpane was merrily straddling Dewy's leg.

Dewy looked nervous.

Window thought this was great fun, and began rubbing up and down his thigh.

Dewy swallowed. Hard.

Juana mashed her breasts against him harder… and stared at him until he made eye contact. Rubbed her torso against him. Breathed hard.

Dewy looked like he was gonna short-circuit any minute.

Window and Juana noticed. Juana purred and nuzzled at his neck.

Dewy's eyes did a Roger Rabbit ah-oo-gah thing.

Window grinned sharkishly and squeezed his thigh between her legs.

Juana licked his ear.

Dewy gasped audibly.

I had a great view. I was standing there, not touching anyone. I had Left Foot Green, and had spun Left Foot Green four times running. I was the only one in the position to see the show. I was having a grand time.

Juana rubbed her pelvis against Dewy's crotch. From the immediate giggle, I deduced that poor Dewy had a hard-on the size of Baltimore.

Bristols wasn't having fun, though. She thought Willie was a rodent, and didn't particularly wanna get groped, at least not by him.

On Willie's turn, when he finally made his move across her torso, she yelled, "Oops!" and promptly dropped to the mat, taking everyone with her.

After the third time she did this, the game kind of petered out, if you'll pardon the pun Everyone else was getting kind of steamed up, and no one particularly wanted to get all hot and bothered, only to have Bristols shut the whole thing down again. Rocket in particular was kind of irritated; I found out later he'd had an incredible hardon pressed firmly against Galadriel's butt… and that last time, Bristols had dropped the entire mass of people onto it. Not serious, but certainly painful.

The night dragged on. Orange juice and vodka were consumed. A couple people passed out. A couple others left. Then, finally, Willie left, and suddenly for some reason, things perked up. Juana promptly brought up the idea of Twister again. Everyone looked at Bristols. She thought about it, and said, "Sure, why not?"

"Nah," said Rocket.

Everyone looked at him, surprised.

He looked up. "It's a kid's game. No fun."

"Sure felt like you were having fun when I sat on your crotch," said Galadriel. "Felt like a whole party in your pants."

Dewy had a weird look on his face… somewhere between terror and terminal lust.

"Well, yeah," continued Rocket. "Can you blame it?" He leered at Galadriel.

Galadriel blew him a kiss.

"How about… strip poker?" commented Creature casually.

Several people grinned. Lois and Galadriel promptly vetoed the idea, though. "You guys would have the advantage," said Lois. Window disagreed -- she'd played many a hand of poker -- but Lois and Galadriel stood firm. They didn't know the rules, and were way too looped to try and learn them now.

"You didn't know how to play Twister, either," said Bob, "but you learned the rules for that after a dozen bong hits."

"Twister's different," said Lois. "You can learn as you go along."

I think it was Creature who said it: "Well… how about strip Twister, then?"

************

Everyone looked around. Sure enough, Willie had left his Twister set. Probably forgot all about it, stonkered as he was when he left.

"Wuh-oh," said Bob, suddenly. "Fire in the hole!"

Rocket and I knew the drill. We immediately scooched away from him on the couch. The Creature obligingly grabbed the coffee table and pulled it away from the couch. Bob responded by abruptly scooting his butt off the edge of the couch, and rolling onto his back, and swinging his legs behind his arms, positioning his feet behind his ears, and flicking his lighter on... and holding the flame just out beyond the end of his ass.

A bright, perky little puff of blue flame popped smartly into being, with a crisp fuff! noise, and then vanished.

Juana and Lois stared, bugeyed. They'd never seen Bob pull his favorite party trick, before, and, like most women, they had no clue what to do or think when he did it, particularly considering the intoxication level of most everyone in the room. They solved the problem by bursting into hysterical laughter. Bob grinned. Mission accomplished. He put his lighter away, and sat up again.

Bristols stared. "Jesus," she remarked, "he's limber. Seems like he has an advantage."

Well, y'know, limber doesn't necessarily cut it," said Dewy. It was the first thing he'd said in the past hour that hadn't been a guttural noise or a whimper. "I mean, the whole point of the game is to not fall down, right? So how about we make that the forfeit point?"

"You mean," said the Creature, "that if you fall down, instead of being "out," you have to remove an item of clothing, and rejoin the group?"

"Sounds workable," said Juana. Was that a touch of evil grin I saw?

"I don't know," said Lois. "Seems like it would take an awfully long time to play."

"No longer than any poker game," said Rocket. "Did anyone have anything real pressing to do in the morning?" To punctuate his point, he took a looong pull from his beer.

Lois and Galadriel looked a little dubious. Juana had a look on her face I couldn't read. Dewy looked like he was about to enter the Valley Of Barbarian Pornstars or something. No one objected.

There was some argument over who was going to be the caller, though. We finally agreed that EVERYONE would play, and that the spinner would simply be kept adjacent to the mat, and that whoever had a free hand would operate the thing.

"Left hand yellow."

"Left foot green."

"Right foot blue."

"Right hand yellow."

Twister's an interesting game, and it didn't take long for all of us to wind up in a mad tangle of arms and legs. The Creature was reasonably lucky; he wound up with both feet on the same color, and his hands free, which left him free to work the spinner. Next to him, Bristols had both hands free and both feet on different colors, so she simply sat down on the Creature's back, like a bench. Lois, on the other hand, had gone spread-eagled early, and was looking a bit concerned; she was, after all, wearing nothing but a halter top, shorts, and sandals, as far as I could see. Galadriel had a hand and a foot free, and was going crazy trying to make sure Lois wasn't going to fall.

Me? I had a hand free, and I had Lois' butt on top of my head. I was rather hoping she wasn't going to lose her balance, because if she did, my face was going down into the mat rather hard.

"Right hand red!"

Dewy caaarefully reached between Galadriel's legs and slapped his hand onto Red. He pulled himself forward, trying to get his balance... and clipped one of Lois's legs. She fell on me like a ton of bricks. Luckily, I turned my head, and landed on my ear, rather than my nose.

A debate followed. True, I had been the one to hit the mat, but it was clear to all that the collapse had been caused by Lois, and therefore Lois would forfeit. She was a bit irritated with Dewy... but couldn't stay that way. She knew durn good and well he hadn't meant to knock her down. It did bring about a new rule, though: anyone causing anyone else to fall would also pay forfeit. Lois discarded her sandals, and the game began anew...

...and if you've ever played Twister, you know how dumb a rule this is, which also tells you something about how blitzed we all were at the time...

And, so, the night continued.

Round Two lasted all of five minutes, and cost Bob, Juana, Dewy and I our shoes; Juana had been on top of both of us, and had finally collapsed when Galadriel, wildly swinging a leg around for balance, had clipped her, collapsing us. By way of compensation, Galadriel removed her top. Much commentary was made of Galadriel's lovely black lace bra.

Round Three was maybe seven minutes, not too bad; it cost the Creature, Rocket Boy, and Bristols their shoes... and Lois was stuck in a terrible moment of indecision. She finally elected to remove her shorts, revealing very attractive blue pastel panties (and doubling her determination not to lose anything else for the rest of the game).

Round Four lasted nearly twenty minutes, as many of the participants felt that they no longer had enough to lose, and were determined to keep what they had. At one point, Lois latched a free arm around the Creature, and said, "If you slip, so help me, I'm gonna bite your fucking nipple off."

The Creature did not slip, but when Bristols had to move her left foot from blue to yellow, she failed to successfully thread it through the tangle of bodies between point A and B, and instead simply accidentally kicked ME over, whereupon I fell on Galadriel, and, well, abruptly, the only people not on the floor were Dewy, Creature, and Lois, hanging onto the Creature, upside down like a baby sloth.

Sharp looks were given. Sexual tension rose. Bob, Rocket and I promptly skinned out of our shirts... and grinned gleefully. Galadriel and Windowpane shrugged, and kicked their shoes into the pile.

...and with deliberate slowness (nervousness or showmanship?) Bristols and Juana peeled their tops off. Both were very attractive young ladies, but Bristols... well... you had to know Bristols. Ever since she was a teenager, she'd needed custom bras, big giant underwire things that looked like they were intended to load some sort of frilly cargo onto pink cargo ships, so to speak. She really was remarkably top-heavy. And at that point, Bristols was greatly amused by the goggle-eyed staring of every male in the room... but more'n a little nervous by the rising level of sexual tension.

...which led into a VERY tense Round Five, which ended very abruptly, when Bob's butt hit the mat. Seems he'd slipped on a wet spot.

There was much questioning and speculation as to how a wet spot had suddenly appeared on the vinyl Twister mat.

"Time to lose those bottoms, sweetie," chuckled Windowpane.

Bob shrugged, and skinned out of his shorts. He was wearing black and yellow striped ballhugger underwear.

The ladies cooed and ahhed and generally made more lascivious noise than any of the guys had when Bristols had had to strip her top off. Bob grinned and did a runway strut for their benefit. Man was a shameless ham, and he really was in very good shape.

"Gee, Dewy, you're looking... overdressed," remarked Galadriel.

All heads turned to look at Dewy. Sure enough, he was fully dressed, except for his shoes. Dewy turned red again; he seemed way more embarrassed to be fully dressed than any of us did to be seminude.

Galadriel slinked over to Dewy and began stroking the sleeve of his T-shirt. "Playing to win, dear heart?"

Juana slinked over on Dewy's left and began running her finger in little circles on his stomach. "Don't be selfish, sweetheart. Let us see what you've got."

Dewy's eyes got REAL big.

Galadriel snuggled close to his shoulder, and began running a bare foot up and down Dewy's leg.

Juana snuggled close on the other side, and began to nibble on his shoulder while stroking his stomach with her fingernails.

Dewy's eyes looked like they wanted to retreat right back up his eye sockets and go hide in his cerebellum.

"Man, wimmens is evil vicious creatures, ain't they?" whispered the Creature, in my ear.

"Far more devious and savage than the most brutal man ever to walk the earth," I agreed quietly.

"Next round?" said Rocket, picking up the spinner.

"Break time," said Lois, who had picked up and began to load the bong again. "If I'm going to get naked and groped, right here in Window's apartment, I'm going to be good and loaded when it happens."

********

A break was taken. Drinks were mixed and consumed, and the bong loaded, and passed around. I pondered the reasons why certain people seemed so suddenly interested in replenishing their buzz...

Windowpane, I knew, did it to enhance the experience.

Juana, I suspected, did it to lower her inhibitions. After all, wouldn't wanna be all embarrassed, come across like a prude, now, would we?

Lois, I was sure, did it to deaden the agony she was going to feel when she found herself nude... and, perhaps, to lessen the chance of waking up and remembering what she'd let the Creature talk her into the night before.

Galadriel did it because Windowpane did it. Goddamn it, if that bitch can smoke half a brick of dope, drink a gallon of rum, and go dance naked on the rooftops, then so can I, goddammit!

...and Bristols... well, I'm not sure why Bristols was doing it. This was a bit more extreme than her usual venue. Then again, she knew she wouldn't get date-raped with this crowd, at least... and no one could say the experience was dull.

Perhaps she was afraid she'd miss something. She often said she'd been sorry she missed Willie's climactic moment with the watermelon... not because she was especially interested in watching Willie fuck a fruit, but because she'd wanted to be a part of the experience. She needed to be a part of some legends, I guess. Me, I couldn't help but look at her breasts and think, "Man, if and when you get around to raping teenage boys in the backs of their cars, you are going to make legends aplenty."

But I was a drunk stoned college guy. What did I know?

As the bongfires burned low, all the women suddenly had to go to the bathroom. Together. In a herd. Even Bristols, who at first said, "No thanks, I don't need to," before being led in anyway, after various signs, signals, and portents were made by the rest of the women. All us guys looked at each other as if to say whathafuck? and then reloaded the bong for one more pass. Mm-hm. If we'd been a bit soberer, we'd have seen what was to come.

Round Six was a short one; after about four minutes, Windowpane ended the round by extending a shapely leg and rather deliberately pushing Dewy over with it. Dewy fell on his ass. Round over. "Ooops," said Windowpane, predatorily. "I'm sorry, baby. Guess we'll have to lose something... and go back in the ring, hm?"

And with that, she langorously peeled off her shirt.

Dewy looked like a deer caught in the laser-pointer crosshairs of an atomic bazooka wielded by a steel Schwarzenegger.

"Better lose that shirt, man," said Bob, without quite snickering.

"Uhhp," said Dewy, and skinned out of his shirt.

"Mm," said Windowpane approvingly.

"Yum," said Juana lightly.

"Rrrowr," said Galadriel laughingly.

"Nice," said Lois, licking her lips. The Creature looked at Lois sideways. Whatthehell?

"Tasty," giggled Bristols.

Dewy goggled. I don't think he could have looked more like a duck in a shooting gallery if he'd have suddenly grown feathers and a bill.

"Ready for Round Seven?" said Rocket Boy, picking up the spinner.

We had to help Dewy get positioned; he was jangled to the point where he couldn't tell his left from his right any more, and was having difficulty distinguishing yellow from green.

The women .... giggled.

And snickered.

And purred.

Whatthehell?

As the round dragged on, Dewy found himself spraddled chest-up... with Galadriel straddling his middle. And Galadriel had her hands free. Naturally, she couldn't resist, and teasingly did Picasso drawings all over his torso with her fingernails while whispering evil thoughts into his ear. He trembled and moaned, but when the call came, "Right hand red," he somehow managed to shift his hand from blue to red without collapsing the pile.

This apparently put Galadriel out a little, so she quit doing Picasso patterns on his torso with her fingernails.

She began using her tongue, instead.

"Uh -- UNNNNNGIH!" gurgled Dewy, and his knees gave out on him; he hit the floor like a ton of bricks, with Galadriel right on top of him. The Creature was under them, though, and seemed less than pleased. Windowpane, who got clipped as the mass went down, though, seemed most amused.

Four people had to forfeit; the Creature skinned out of his shirt, Windowpane kicked off her shorts, and Galadriel slithered out of her jeans. Her panties matched that black lace bra, and she looked quite fetching.

Dewy stood there, locked up with terror. "Need some help?" asked Galadriel archly, reaching for the snap of his cutoffs.

"Uht! Uht! Uht! snapped Bob, approaching sharply. "Be nice, Gal. Dewy's new. Dewy's not used to your feminine wiles, and your grabby hands; he's used to girls who take him out and talk to him, not the ones who just wanna get their hands under his shirt and ask if he'll go down on them. Show a little class, here."

Dewy's eyes had already reached Roger Rabbit proportions, and every nerve in his body was dead rigid; he looked like someone'd hung him out with piano wire. But he peeled his cutoffs off...

...and stood before us all, clad in naught but tighty whities and pukka-shell necklace. The women made approving noises, and glanced at each other.

By now, of course, it had grown obvious what was afoot. Those naughty women! They were... they were victimizing the poor boy, taking advantage of his innocence! They were ganging up on him, each woman sacrificing an item of clothes in order to strip the poor boy nude without a chance!

Creature, Rocket, Bob, and I looked at each other. No words were necessary. We immediately sized up the situation, and knew what needed to be done.

********

Round Eight began.

Sure enough, Juana proved to be the antagonist this round; as soon as Dewy had all four limbs placed, she began jockeying towards him. The Creature, though, managed to stymie her placement, simply by virtue of staying between them. After a few more spins, Juana began to get frustrated, and began trying to work around and/or over the Creature to get to Dewy.

The Creature stopped her by the simple expedient of dipping his head under her and doing... something. We don't know. I couldn't see. But every time his head dipped under her torso, she'd jerk, perhaps gasp, and go back to where she was before. After a few episodes of this, she really began giving the Creature some venomous looks.

...until, finally, her chance came with Right Foot Yellow, and she proceeded to rise, to move her foot to the yellow circle that would put her right NEXT to Dewy--

--whereupon the Creature nobly sacrificed himself by hooking her right foot with his arm as she tried to step over him, bringing her crashing down on top of him.

"Ooops."

The Creature cheerfully arose and stripped to his Jockey Juniors. Juana stumbled to her feet, staring daggers at the Creature... and shed her shorts. Down to bra and panties, now.

The girls exchanged meaningful glances. So did us guys. We knew what we were up against, and now, so did the girls. A war for the heart and mind (and gonads, I suppose) of a Dewy-Eyed Innocent.

Y'know what? Women do NOT get more wicked, evil, and ruthless than when they're tryin' to snare a guy. Even if it's just to get his undies off. Time has taught me that this is a relentless truism.

We studied the situation. Windowpane, Juana, and Galadriel were all down to bra and panties; they likely wouldn't wanna sacrifice, just to get Dewy down to his skin. Our likely assailants, then, would be Bristols and/or Lois. Then again, would they? Lois was utterly determined to hang onto what clothing she retained, whereas Bristols was... unpredictable. She might well decide it'd be more fun to get Bob naked, especially if everyone was expecting her to go for Dewy.

And there was Windowpane, after all. She didn't subscribe to nudity taboos the way some people do; she might well shed what clothing remained on her, just to get Dewy naked. Plainly, there was an agenda here. We would have to be careful.

Round Nine was a long one, and perhaps the cruelest of them all. It became obvious, quickly, that Lois was the chosen assailant for the round, although she gave the distinct impression that she was working under protest.

It was also clear that it would not be an easy round, though. Bob and Rocket moved in quickly to cover Dewy, for all that Bob didn't have a lot to lose, either; his nudity taboo wasn't a whole lot stronger than Windowpane's. Then again, Bob looked really good naked, and knew it.

Furthermore, Lois had another impediment -- Dewy himself. Dewy's experience with Galadriel had taught him the folly of trying to play crabstyle; if he had to spread out, now, he would do it face DOWN, thank you. This made his face and upper torso harder to access in a comfortably sexy manner, and to even get near them, you had to deal with Bob and Rocket.

The round dragged on. Fortunately, I spent most of the round shifting my right foot from red to blue, with a short sojourn on green. I was in a dandy position to watch the interplay on the field, so to speak. In about the fifteenth minute of the round, though, there began to be trouble.

Bristols had successfully maneuvered in such a way that her hands and feet were on the same colors as Bob's... and she'd realized something.

Bob was not a large or tall fellow; he only stood about 5'4. Bristols, on the other hand, was nearly six feet. She simply spraddled herself into the exact same circles that Bob was on, literally covering the man like a sheepskin on an undersized wolf. Gleefully, to complete the picture, she draped her breasts over the top of his head.

Bob moaned.

Bristols giggled, and began humping his butt.

Bob moaned again.

Dewy glanced over, and his eyes got REAL big.

"Goddamn," moaned Bob, "but this would be all KINDS of fun under different circumstances."

"All's fair in love and war," giggled Bristols.

"Keep him busy, girlfriend," snickered Windowpane.

"Oh, Bob," moaned Rocket.

"Take heart, comrade," said Creature. "We will avenge you!"

And the spinner spun again. It was Lois' turn. "Right hand green!"

She advanced on Dewy, eyes alight with triumph.

Now, this just didn't sit right with me. Defeat is one thing. Humiliation is another. But to suffer the both of them, heaped upon us like ....?

No, this would not do. I leaned forward, rolled onto the mat, and tackled Lois.

"Huh?"

"What'r'y'DOIN'?"

"It's not your TURN!"

"Oops," I said guilelessly.

Lois' eyes bugged.

The Creature grinned. "Time to lose something, sweetheart."

Lois shot him a look that could have melted lead.

Bristols stopped humping Bob and looked up with interest. Bob, too, peered up and out from between Bristols' breasts.

Lois stood up, and with granite dignity, skinned out of her halter top, revealing crisp white strapless bra, to match the panties. "And you, oh mighty hero?" she growled. "The fruits of your sacrifice?"

I blinked. Huh? Oh, wait, yeah, that's right. Fortunately, I was prepared. I carefully slipped two fingers into my waistband on either side, and popped the snaps, then just shook my right leg until my underwear fell out the cuff of my jeans.

Windowpane giggled. "Oh, THOSE underwear! You should have saved those for last!"

"Dignity above all, madam," I said with as much of it as I could muster. I stood there, wrapped in my dignity. Lois stood there, looking considerably nakeder than she was.

"Pardon me, honey," said Bob, "but as much fun as this is, do you suppose we could stand up? I can put my head back between your tits when we get there, if you like."

Bristols giggled and swatted him, but she stood up.

"Well," said Rocket briskly. "Anyone for a drink before the next round? I think we're gonna need it."

********

Round Ten began, tensely.

The girls were grimly determined, but nervous -- only Bristols could lose this round, and yet remain "dressed" in any way. Still, I had my doubts; Windowpane would bear watching.

The guys were equally determined; we were defending one of our own, here.

And Dewy looked like those Aztec maidens must have felt during that long hike up the side of the pyramid. Terror, excitement, fulfillment, and terror, all wrapped up in one very tight package.

The hour of truth was closing, and the mountain of clothes on the sofa grew higher.

Time to play.

"Left foot green!"

"Right hand green!"

"Right foot blue!"

Soon, all the players were on the mat. Sure enough, Rocket moved to cover Dewy, but we couldn't keep Lois from flanking him on Dewy's other side. On the other hand, I was fairly sure that Lois wasn't about to try and tackle Dewy. Hell, she'd probably help keep him upright, if it meant getting to keep her bra on. Meanwhile, Bristols was over on Rocket's side, but seemed less interested in getting to Dewy than in teasing, tickling, and generally abusing Bob.

At least until Bob revealed that he was far less embarrassed than he was amused. Or perhaps "amused" is the wrong word. Ballhugger underwear hides very little, and Bob was an easy chap to read, so to speak. Juana seethed with determination, but Juana was at the far end of the mat; she'd been the last one to spin, this time. Windowpane, on the other hand, was much closer... and she had a look in her eye I did not like.

"Left hand blue!"

"Left hand red!"

"Left foot yellow!"

The tangle of bodies grew denser. Everyone was motivating towards Dewy, and we couldn't surround the poor bastard. I finally settled for slithering under him, and bracing my elbows on the mat, where no one could see. I could support Dewy's weight and that of a few others, if I had to... and, interestingly enough, it also made me privy to a whole new level of the game. In the little, dark, breathy cave under Dewy, I could hear the edge of whispers happening on the far side of the mound...

"Dammit, get in there and take him down!" muttered Galadriel.

"But why me?"murmured Bristols.

"Because you're the only one with any clothes left to lose!" snapped Lois.

"But I'm not the one who wants to get him naked," said Bristols simply.

"But you're the only one with anything left to lose!" snarled Juana.

"Not quite," said Rocket, conversationally. "I still got my shorts on."

"Goddammit, no one's talking to you!" hissed Juana.

"Right foot RED!" called Bob. Abruptly, a great deal of weight came down on Dewy, and I gasped in spite of myself. What the hell?

Three inches in front of my nose, I saw a delicate foot thread through the dogpile and come down on a red circle. Toe rings. It was Windowpane.

"Jeez, sweetie," she remarked casually, "you have strong arms."

"...hurk..." said Dewy. He was sandwiched between Windowpane's butt and my spine. Then again, Windowpane wasn't a big girl. I would have thought he could still breathe. Then again, he had a beautiful woman riding him piggyback, and all she had on was satin panties and bra. Perhaps breathing was more difficult than I would have thought.

"Jesus, what's keeping him up?" asked Juana.

"Doc's under him," said Lois.

"Good ghod, Doc, that's got to hurt," said Galadriel.

"Some guys don't like to lose," said Windowpane. "He's always been a bit persistent. 'Specially when he thinks he's got the edge."

"Can you reach any of him?" asked Juana. "I can't."

"Who, Doc or Dewy?" asked Bristols. "Somehow, I don't think Dewy going weak in the knees right now is going to help us," said Galadriel. "What of Doc's can you reach? With hands... or mouth?"

I felt something with lots of little cold feet run across the bottom of my stomach. Somehow, this wasn't something I'd planned on. Jumping up and down on me, now, that I could handle; my back was strong. But... oh, geez, Windowpane knew ALL my sensitive spots...

"I can reach his butt, but he's got jeans on," said Windowpane. "Can't get a hand in the waistband."

"Can you tickle him?" asked Juana.

"Now, what fun would that be?" replied Windowpane. "YOU tickle him. Some of us are too proud to go for the easy win."

"Goddammit, I can't reach him, except for his head!" snarled Juana. "What the hell am I supposed to do?"

"Do you give good head?" giggled Bristols.

"They say the mind is the most erogenous zone there is," snickered Windowpane. "Use your imagination."

Just forward of my face, the cluster of arms and legs parted, and Juana poked her head in. I smiled sweetly at her. She looked at me like I was a parking ticket. Perhaps this wouldn't be so bad after all.

She looked at me speculatively. I leaned forward and licked her nose.

"Eeeeeewww!" she shrieked, pulling her head out of the pile.

"Woa! She's taking her hands off the circles! Woa! Forfeit!" called the Creature.

I heard the slap of her hands hitting the mat again, and a muttered curse, under her breath.

"........heek........" said Dewy. Jeez, was she really THAT heavy? I craned my neck and looked around. Windowpane was riding Dewy's back slooowly and langorously, sliding her crotch uuuup and dooooown his spine. Meanwhile, a hand touched my shoulder, and began to feel around; another one touched my back, and a third began fumbling around on my butt. Oh, dear. We were going to need to take measures of some kind, and soon.

Fortunately, Bob plainly felt the same way; I abruptly heard him cough, followed by a string of machine-gun giggles from Bristols, and the hand on my back abruptly vanished. Meanwhile, the hand on my shoulder groped around, plainly not sure what it had, but trying to find out. The hand on my butt, though, seemed to have a pretty good idea. It slunk down to my stomach, and began stroking my middle with long fingernails. Urrrgh.

"Right hand green!"

I felt a shift, and more weight added from the right-hand side. "Sorry," said Bristols.

"I'll get there as soon as I can, sweetie," said Bob.

The hand got as high as mid-chest, and then began traveling back down my stomach.

Windowpane moaned.

Dewy whimpered.

The hand found the buttons of my jeans... and began fumbling with them. Waitaminnit, I thought, no, can't do that, FOUL--

"Left foot red!"

WHUMP.

Windowpane abruptly stopped riding Dewy... and burst out laughing. The pile of people shifted. "Goddammit!" said Juana.

Enough arms and legs moved that I could see what had happened. Everyone had forgotten about Rocket, apparently. He'd finally taken matters into his own hands and simply seized one of Bristols' ankles and yanked her off the pile. He sat on the couch, gleeful expression on his face, still holding Bristols' ankle up like a prize fisherman displaying his catch.

Bristols hung partly in midair, and partly splayed on the mat with a stunned look on her face. Her breasts were mashed against the floor, and still gave her considerable room to move her head. I swear, that girl couldn't have fallen flat on her face if she'd wanted to.

"Now, that's just not fair!" cried Galadriel. "This makes twice you guys have sabotaged us by just diving it when it wasn't even your turn! I think YOU should have to lose something, and SHE shouldn't have to!" Bristols was agreeable to this, but there were some arguments -- after all, wouldn't this make it unfeasible for the girls to tackle Dewy? They'd be shedding clothes every time they dived, and he'd get to keep his briefs, yes?

A joint was passed, once more. "Anyone want out?" asked Bob. "I mean, if this isn't going to be any fun--"

"Hell, no," growled Juana. "I'm in."

"I'm there," trilled Galadriel.

"Sure," said Windowpane.

"um," said Dewy, but no one listened to him.

"Most fun I've had in ages," purred Windowpane.

Lois paused. Everyone looked at her.

"All right," she said.

Rocket solemnly shed his shorts. He was wearing a g-string underneath, which amused the ladies to no end. Who knew?

Bristols skinned out of her top, revealing cleavage that should have been designated a national monument, except then forest rangers could arrest you if you tried to molest it. Mighod, that girl was built.

The joint was passed, and died.

Round Eleven began.

Windowpane had a record collection that could be considered "eclectic" at best; she chose this point to draw a record from its sleeve and put it on the turntable. It was an instrumental, with lots of guitars. Twangy. Mighod, it was porn film music.

On the other hand, it seemed remarkably fitting for the occasion. The women were all lined up across one side of the mat, staring at us. The tension was so thick, you could cut it with a knife.

Bristols was trying to cover her chest with her arms, rather inadequately. Her expression said, "Hm. So this is what they mean by 'in too deep.' "

Lois looked like she wanted to bolt and run. Ohmighod, down to bra and panties. What if someone knocks me down? She likely would have bolted and run, except she wasn't dressed enough to make it to the car, and it would take too long to dig her Calvin Kleins out of the pile of clothing on the sofa...

Galadriel was flushed, and excited, and nervous, and ghodawful sexy. This had begun as a matter of simple seduction of a Dewy Eyed Innocent, and had become ever so much more!

Juana looked like she wanted to bite someone's nose off. This evening had definitely NOT gone the way she had planned, apparently; she, too, had had plans for the Dewy Eyed one, and not only had she discovered competition, but events had conspired to have her standing here nearly naked. Then again, a bunch of near-nude men were looking at her. This wasn't bad, perhaps. Certainly enhanced her options for the evening, no?

Windowpane looked like the cat that ate the canary. Window loved nothing so much as drunken chaos, and the party was certainly teetering on the edge of that. She, too, was flushed, and excited. I was kind of surprised she hadn't yanked her top off, yet -- that was generally her trademark, at around this time at a good party... but she hadn't. Perhaps she, too, was waiting to see who'd be the first to fall.

Bob, Rocket, and the Creature, on the other hand, were simple, masculine creatures, and their thoughts were as one: who's gonna get topless first? And how about the round after that?

Dewy: I'd begun to worry about his blood pressure. I mean, this was a guy who desperately wanted to be rid of his hated virginity, and yet dreaded the occasion, for fear he'd do something stupid... and truly, it had come down from the heavens that Tonight Was The Night. He hadn't said a word in ages. He looked terrified. He looked resigned. He looked excited. He looked as horny as three sailors on a two-day leave after a six-month tour in Thule, Greenland. I kept expecting him to faint or explode, one of the two... but he continued to hang on and hang in there.

The music grew loud. The guitars crashed. There were no lyrics, no voices... only the Porn Music. The time had come.

Round Eleven began.

"Right hand red!"

"Right foot green!"

"Whoever's messing with my bra strap, QUIT it!" shrilled Lois.

"It's only the Creature," said Bob.

"Rrrgh!" said the Creature, who had Lois' bra strap clenched in his teeth.

"If you don't leggo, you aren't going to touch me for a MONTH!" howled Lois.

The Creature looked chagrined, but released the bra strap. I'd never noticed before, but Lois had a very nice butt. The Creature noticed me looking at it, and gave me a sour look.

"Left hand blue!"

"Left hand green!"

"UuuunNNNGH!" burbled Dewy.

"Oh, you BITCH!" shrieked Juana, and their side of the cluster collapsed. Interestingly enough, Dewy did not; the collapse revealed him on all fours, and as red as a summer tomato. Everyone craned their necks. From their pile on the mat, Bob grinned cheerfully back at us. On top of him were Juana and Galadriel, who were giving each other poisonous looks.

"Tops off!" cheered Rocket.

"Bottoms off!" giggled Bristols.

"Fuck off," growled Juana.

"Now, dear," said Galadriel archly. "Grace and dignity, above all. Even in defeat." She stood up, strode over to the bar, poured herself a shot of rum, and downed it... shuddered (which did interesting things, considering she was standing there in her underwear)... and reached behind her and undid her bra strap. Much crowing and hooting greeted her nipples, as they came out to join the party.

Galadriel grinned (with some chagrin) and made a gesture of invitation to Juana.

Juana did a slow burn... but stormed to the bar, ignored the glass, seized the neck of the bottle, took a pull, and reached for the snap between her breasts. As one, the two women twirled their bras, and flung them atop the pile on the couch... and turned to greet the group, nakeder than when they began.

And there was much rejoicing.

"Not quite done yet, though," said Windowpane. "Bob?"

Bob grinned. "Ready?"

"Quit stalling, Bob," said Lois.

"NOT stalling," said Bob, indignantly. "I just didn't feel like sharing MY fanfare with the girls, that's all." And, with that, he leaped up onto the couch, and began doing a fairly passable bump-and-grind to the music.

Bristols' jaw dropped.

Windowpane whistled approvingly.

Bob turned, slowly, showing his back to the audience... and with a sudden, theatrical move, was mother-naked. He wiggled his behind at the audience (to much appreciation from the girls,) and twirled his underwear over his head.

"Turn AROUND!" laughed Windowpane. Bob looked back over his shoulder as he danced, and waggled his finger at Windowpane, as if to say, "Naughty," and continued his butt-wiggling dance. It occurs to me that years later, Billy Ray Cyrus would make a fair amount of money doing that same move, fully dressed, in front of a much larger audience...

...and then, Bob leaped, spun in midair, and landed, facing us all, naked as a jaybird, arms spread, laughing. Being fairly blitzed, he then fell on his ass.

And lo, there was much hilarity.

"Next round?" said Juana, with some small edge to her voice. Bad enough she was near-naked and in competition, now she was being upstaged. By a guy, no less.

"AbsoLOOTley!" laughed Bob, from his place on the floor.

...and Round Twelve began... and ended, nearly as soon as everyone was on the mat. The cluster suddenly became a shoving match, a sort of sumo tangle with way too many wrestlers, and suddenly, the entire cluster was lying in a tangle three feet off the mat!

"That lacked style, dear," said Windowpane, removing her bra. "And it cost you your last item of clothing."

"What can I say?" said Galadriel, innocently. "I had to put my hand on a red circle, and everyone was in the way."

"She didn't do it alone," hissed Lois, who seemed to be having trouble with her bra strap.

"Are you accusing me of knocking everyone over?" said Juana, peeling off her panties. "After all, you've still got one thing to wear."

"There are compensations," said Bristols, laboriously removing her bra. "Lose the briefs, boys."

She had us there. Windowpane obliged by putting on Rod Stewart's "If You Think I'm Sexy," and Rocket, Creature, and I flexed, pouted, posed, pressed, popped our pecs, and delayed yanking our clothes off until the last stanza. The women were most appreciative, which helped. Nothing like a little ego boost to ease the pain of public nudity, right?

"Um," said Windowpane, "someone's still a little overdressed."

All eyes turned to Dewy. He stood there, paralyzed, the only part of him moving being his eyes. They flicked from Bristols' chest to Lois' chest to Windowpane's chest to Juana to Galadriel, and back to Bristols' chest. He looked for all the world like a kid standing outside the candy store window who's been told to pick one kind of candy in the next five seconds or be shot to death. I can't decide!

"Dewy?" said Lois.

Dewy stood there, paralyzed.

We all looked at each other.

Windowpane sighed. "I have some experience with this," she said, slowly parading around behind Dewy. His eyes followed her, and I swear, they tried to keep following as she vanished behind him. "It all calls for some understanding... a woman's touch... a gentle touch..."

Rip! (Sproing!) "HEEEEK!"

"...and a quick hand."

All the girls burst out laughing, and applauding. All the guys bit down on grins, and covered their mouths with their hands, as if pondering weighty matters. Poor Dewy had had an erection, anyone could tell that, but now it wasn't hidden in the least.

"Oh, my," said Galadriel.

"Mmmm," said Juana.

"Put someone's eye out with that," giggled Bristols.

"Well, he's sure not bored, at least," said Lois, wryly.

"Round Lucky Thirteen," said Windowpane predatorily.

Rocket looked up suddenly. "Kinda silly, now, isn't it?" he said. "What's the point? Only three of us have any clothes left on at all. What happens to me if I lose again?"

Windowpane smiled.

Everyone stopped talking. We all looked at Windowpane.

"What happens if you lose, again?" she said, throatily. "Well... basically, it's like this. At the end of Round Thirteen, the people who fell down are the losers. The people who don't fall down are the winners... and the winners get to do anything they want to the losers, you see. Just like in Ancient Greece."

And she grinned, showing lots of teeth.

The room went dead silent, except for the near-silent "dink, dink" sound of various extremely red sets of eyes, blinking.

"No way," said Lois.

Creature looked glum.

"If you want out, now's the time," smiled Windowpane. "I mean, no one's going to MAKE anyone do anything... but if you stay beyond this point, well... don't be surprised at what happens. This is our Consent Point. After this, .... anything goes."

Bob grinned like a wino who just found a case of Muscatel on Christmas Eve.

Lois looked only slightly horrified.

Bristols flushed.

Lois looked at the Creature.

The Creature looked mournful. He glanced around the room at everyone else.

Lois looked at him, as if to say, "You're kidding."

The Creature looked mournful some more.

"Goddamn it," said Lois. She stormed over to the bar, and poured herself about three fingers of rum, downed it, and chased it with a shot from the Coke two-liter. "All right, I'm in."

At that point, there was a general rush to the bar.

But no one bowed out.

Windowpane looked ecstatic. She selected another album, and another, and another, and stacked them on the turntable, to drop one at a time, so they wouldn't need changing for a while... at least an hour, from what I could see. The first one dropped and began to play. More porn music. Eesh. And this time, it was considerably louder.

It began to occur to me that it was after midnight, and that the house was a fourplex townhouse; what might happen if the neighbors decided to complain about the porn music? I envisioned the door bursting open, and the cops finding a mad tangle of naked people piled in the living room... but the front door was locked, and Windowpane assured me that the walls were thick enough that the neighbors would never know. After some thought, I decided she was right; if they hadn't complained about the noise up until now, they were absent, dead, or deaf, as far as we were concerned.

"Left hand yellow!"

"Left hand green!"

"Right foot red!"

Dewy wound up on the far edge of the mat, this time -- he was quite determined not to be the focal point. So was Lois, although fate had conspired to put both her hands on blue and both her hands on yellow, which stranded her in the middle of the mat. We all worked around her as best we could -- nobody wanted to be the one who knocked her down -- but there, um, well, sure was a lot of touching involved. And rubbing. At one point, Bob's face was firmly pressed into her armpit, whereas the side of my face was against her butt.

Y'know what? In some ways, a bare butt is far less distracting than one in satin panties. Except, of course, when it's pressed against your face.

"Right hand blue!" And with that, all four of Dewy's hands and feet were placed. Unfortunately, no one had been able to block Juana, whose face was now adjacent to Dewy's torso. She grinned wickedly, and began nuzzling him up and down his ribs. He whimpered, but did not fall.

Bristols giggled. Sure enough, Rocket had insinuated himself between her breasts, and was gleefully rubbing his head all over her chest. By now, though, Bristols was far gone enough that she didn't mind. Lois, on the other hand, stiffened every time anyone touched her.

"Sorry," I said. "Not your fault," said Lois, through gritted teeth. "I mean, it's not like I don't like being touched, fondled, and caressed all over by several virile, handsome nude men that I know quite well. It's just... well, I am NOT going to lose this round, you know?"

"Yeah, I can dig," I said. "Sorry."

"No need to be sorry," she said. "In fact, feel free to do that thing you were doing just a minute ago... that was nice... but if you knock me over, I'm going to rip your dick off. I just thought you should know that."

I blinked twice. She rubbed her rump against my cheek. I frantically wondered exactly what I'd been doing just a minute ago.

By now, I couldn't see Dewy any more. Everyone was on the mat, and placed. Where was Galadriel? Where was Juana? And were they anywhere near Dewy? I could hear giggling, grunts, sighs, and the occasional moan. What the hell? But Bob was still calling off colors, and the mound would still shift occasionally...

"Creech?" I said. I could see his head, off to one side of the mound. The Creature looked at me quizzically. "Can you see Dewy?"

The Creature craned his head, and looked around where Dewy had been. "Oh, wow," he said.

"Yeah?"

"Oh, man. I can't see him any more."

"So why the oh-wow?"

"Because Juana's on top of him, I think. His head's between her legs!"

There was a moment of silence, and then a brief shift as everyone began craning around, trying to see.

Juana yelped. "Oh, AH, um, WOO!"

"IF SOMEONE MAKES ME FALL, I'M GONNA KILLEM BEFORE I DO THE SEX SLAVE THING!" hissed Lois. The entire pile froze. Gradually, people settled back into where they'd been.

"Um," said Juana. "Ohh.... Wow!"

Somewhere, on Dewy's side of the mat, I heard a wet mouth sort of sound. There was, then, a sudden, brief shift in the pile, again, as everyone tried to see what was happening, followed by a growl from Lois. By now, she was at the bottom of the pile, where I'd been a while ago, and plainly she was not as willing as I had been to support the weight of the many. "Call the next fucking color, damn you!" she growled.

"Baby, you really should relax more," began the Creature.

"I could relax a lot more easily if Doc would do that thing he was doing earlier," she said.

"What the hell were you doing to Lois earlier?" said the Creature, looking at me accusingly.

"Um," I said. I would have shrugged, but my shoulders were busy elsewhere.

"Right hand red! Creature, that's you!" called Bob.

The Creature shot me a look, and then shifted forward... under Lois' other end.

"Wo!" said Lois.

"Oooooooooo..." said Juana.

Bristols giggled.

Hm. So this was Naked Twister, I thought. Took long enough to get to the fun part. I looked at Lois's behind, and wondered precisely what it was that I'd been unintentionally doing a little earlier that she'd liked so much. Perhaps this...

"Uhh," said Lois, in a not unwelcoming tone.

"MmmmMMMmmmn," said Juana. "Yes. Yes. RIGHT there..." Man, what was going on over there? For someone so terrified that he'd make a mistake or look stupid, Dewy was certainly turning out to be a fast learner...

Rocket's head poked out of the top of the pile. He had a VERY surprised look on his face. "Um, YEAH," he said.

"Um," said Juana. "Um. Uh. Uh. Uh."

The cluster of bodies moved. Then it began to rock a little. I shrugged, mentally, and went back to what I'd been doing.

"Mmmmhhh," said Lois. "More to the right..."

"Left foot, um, yellow," said Bob. "Bristols? Your turn. Left foot yellow."

"No," said Bristols. "Your turn. Right hand pink."

"Huh?" said Bob. "There's no--"

"Sure there is," she said, leaning forward and grabbing his hand. "Right here."

And for a moment, there was, um, well, not silence, but not exactly anything coherent, either. The porn music roiled and swelled, throbbed and moaned.

"MmmmNNNNNNNAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" screamed Juana. Startled, someone else jerked. Lois twitched, hard, and abruptly... the whole pile of people collapsed.

"Oh, shit," said Lois in a small voice. "Oh, fuck. Does being a sex slave mean I have to allow penetration if the winner demands it?"

"Um," I said, thorougly bumfuzzled. "Who IS the winner? Is anyone still upright?" I got up on my knees and looked around.

Juana was sprawled out on the far end of the mat. Her panties were missing. She didn't look like she gave a damn.

Creature and Lois were in an incomplete sixty-nine, their noses plugged into each other's navels. No wonder Lois had been in trouble; the Creature's hands were free.

Bristols was face down on the left edge of the mat. I could see the top of Rocket's head sticking out from between her breasts.

Windowpane was lying on her side on the right edge of the mat, looking very pleased with herself.

Bob was partially under Windowpane and partially under Bristols, but his upper torso and one arm was off the mat to allow access to the spinner.

Where the hell was Dewy?

"Where's Galadriel?" asked Bristols.

We looked around. We got up. We looked under and behind each other. Dewy and Galadriel were nowhere to be seen.

"Found 'em," said Windowpane. She was standing in the hall. I wandered over, followed by everyone else.

One of the bedroom doors was closed. Behind it, I could hear the rustling of sheets, the creak of wooden furniture joints. "Umnmahnah," said someone in the room, muffled.

Rustle. Creak, creak, creak. Rustle.

Ah. Well. That seemed to answer that question.

"So if no one won, that means..." said Lois.

"Guess you're off the hook," said Rocket.

"I don't know as I'd say no one won," said Bob, glancing at the door.

"I don't know as I'd say anyone lost," I said, glancing at Juana, who was still lying on the mat, breathing heavily.

"Waitaminnit," said Rocket. "Last I heard, Dewy was the one whose head was between Juana's legs. If he's been in the bedroom with Galadriel, then who..."

Windowpane smiled.

Several pairs of eyes jerked across the room to land on Windowpane so hard, they practically clicked when they got there. Almost as quickly, they clicked back to the left to glance at Juana.

Juana was still breathing hard, but seemed to have regained some strength. "That was YOU?"

Windowpane smiled.

And licked her lips.

"Well, it's been fun," said Lois, furiously digging through the pile on the couch. "We'll have to do this again sometime, won't we? I'll bring my fondue set next time, sure will..."

I poured another drink, one finger of rum, the rest coke, with a squirt of lemon. While I let the ice chill it, I loaded the bong. What a night.

...and Lois and the Creature vanished out the door, Lois with alacrity, the Creature with some reluctance.

After a brief pull, Rocket was standing there, so I handed the thing to him. He shrugged and took a hit. Bristols did, as well, and Bob. "Here's to the sexual revolution," said Bob, when he popped the carb.

"Where'd Juana go?" said Rocket.

We looked around. Juana and Windowpane seemed to be missing. With bong and drinks in hand, we stalked around the ancient townhouse, wondering where they might have gotten to. We didn't have to look far, though -- the door to the other bedroom was now closed, and the sounds of rustling sheets could be heard from within. Apparently, Juana had chosen experimentation over coming out second best.

We all looked at each other. "Another rounda Twister?" said Bob hopefully.

"Three guys and one girl?" I said, doubtfully.

"She's a whole lot of woman," chuckled Rocket.

"Well, I'm sure drunk enough," giggled Bristols, "but... you realize that if I win, and you guys lose... well... you have to do whatever I say."

"And?" said Bob, leering.

"And if you do do whatever I say, well... it might involve me... and it might not. You guys might well have a tough time looking each other in the face come the morning. You might want to have a few more drinks before we hit the mat."

Bob's leer vanished abruptly.

"Ah," he said.

"Um," said Rocket.

"May I suggest an alternative?" I said.

Everyone looked at me. Bob made a face.

"No, no, not like that," I said. I picked up the bong, a lighter, and the remaining herbs. "Bob, get the rum and the two-liter. Rocket? Get the bag of ice. Bristols, see that bag of peanuts? Grab those."

We went up the stairs, to the second floor, where I pulled down the steps to the attic. We went into the attic, and out the garret window, onto the roof. It was a gorgeous night. The stars were out in force, twinkling for all they were worth, and in the distance, we could see the lights of town. There was a moon out, too. Everything we needed.

We sat down in a circle on the flat part of the roof, and laid out the picnic. "How'd you know about this?" asked Rocket.

And as the bong and bottle made its rounds, I told the story of Windowpane's moon dances, how she'd begun dancing nude on the roof in celebration of the Goddess during the first night of each new moon, and how it apparently drove these teenage boys crazy in that house across the way -- see that window, there? But those boys were apparently too smart to tell their folks, because no one had said anything, but they'd be in that window every new moon, with binoculars. I knew, because I'd be parked in the street, down at the end of the block, with MY binoculars. Windowpane knew about all this, and loved it; she swore she'd keep it up until the cops arrested her for indecent exposure.

And in the meantime, she danced.

Rocket choked. "Really? How come you never told ME about this?"

"Because," I said, "if I told you, you'd tell all your friends, and soon half the planet would be out here, and the cops would show about the same time someone started sellin' tickets. Some things are better when you keep 'em intimate."

"Here's to that," said Bob. "Fire in the hole!" And with that, he rolled onto his back, flicked his Bic, and let loose the torch of liberty. We'd never seen him do it naked, before, or in the dark. Flared most impressively.

"Oh, jeez," said Rocket. "I don'know if I wanna light my bong hit with that lighter, now."

"You're going to set your ass on fire doing that one day, Bob," giggled Bristols.

"And when I do, Doc will tell the story for years to come," said Bob.

And I guess I couldn't argue with that.