The loft was on the west side of the city, in the seedier, industrial part near the tracks. That was part of the appeal, having to brave the slightly meaner streets in order to get to the best Halloween party in town. The other reason was landlords for old converted warehouses left their tenants well alone.

I couldn’t believe I’d been lucky enough to score a coveted RSVP spot -- a friend on Facebook had said they couldn’t go, and asked did anyone want the slot? I’d been on my phone when the post appeared and had immediately replied “YES”. My first post was followed by twenty others in the first 15 seconds because people didn’t even realize someone else had replied.

So I felt all the more ashamed that I was going to be best Halloween party in town without so much as a half-assed a costume -- I’d be lucky if they even let me in. I had no excuse, it’d just been a busy week and I hadn’t left any time to go shopping. Stupid, stupid.

I climbed the fire escape described in the private message I’d received an hour before, heading for the door with the lamp burnt out on the second floor, and made my way past old discarded pallets and paint buckets toward the sound of thumping music. Finally I reached the door, in front of which was a small table where some half-drunk bro was taking entry fees.

I gave him my name, and yes! I was on the list.

“No costume? That’s double, 20 bucks,” he yelled over the dance music pulsing behind him.

I nodded confidently, like that was the plan all along, and handed over a bill.

The party was just what I hoped, loud music, free flowing booze, plenty of weed, and amazing chicks. This was a crowd that had taken the Sexy Whatever costume trend to heart, and I enjoyed watching the sexy leprechauns, sexy pirates, and sexy zombies, all with tight corsets or flimsy bras. There was even a woman going as Catwoman whose costume was painted on -- literally.

I didn’t know anyone at all and tried to talk to, ok, hit on, some of the women, but it was so loud we couldn’t hear each other anyway. So for the first hour I danced and got myself pleasantly buzzed.

After a few hits and several drinks, I was feeling woozy and left the dance floor to find the toilet. There had to be at least 20 people in line and after five minutes it hadn’t moved an inch. There had to be more than one bathroom in the place. The loft was a maze of corridors and temporary walls -- during one of my awkward yelling conversations a sexy cowgirl had mentioned that they redid the interior for every party so you never knew where anything was. I figured if I saw someone moving swiftly and somewhat stiffly and followed them, there was a good chance they’d lead me to a less heavily-trafficked bathroom. If I was lucky, maybe it would be the cool-people’s bathroom and they’d be doing cooler drugs, or something. I was out of my element, you know?

I saw a sexy bunny girl moving quickly across the dance floor in my direction, so I let her pass and followed her. Her glow-in-the-dark puff of a rabbit tail was easy to follow away from the crowd and down a hallway. But then she turned one corner, then another, and then I lost her. The bathroom couldn’t be this far out of the way, I thought, so I shrugged and tried to follow the beats back to the party.

Had I come from the right hallway, or the left? In my state I wasn’t sure, and there was no one else around to follow. I tried the right, and then another right, and then had to duck under a low pipe that I’m sure I hadn’t seen before. The sound of drum beats was all around me, now, and I had no better ideas than to keep going. Finally I reached a dead end with an old, badly-fitting door that had a hand-written sign taped to it reading “KEEP OUT.”

I opened it of course, and was greeted with a closet whose floor had been cut completely out with a ladder poking up from the level beneath. Another hand-written sign on the wall pointed down: “ZOO.” My immediate biological needs were forgotten. I didn’t want to get too hopeful, but what if I wasn’t just going to find the secret bathroom, but an entire secret party? That sounded like something cool people like these would arrange. The possibility was too good to pass up so I climbed down the ladder.

The lower level was barely lit, just an old half-gone string of Christmas lights. The room was small, also seemingly a closet. I opened the door outward and nearly knocked over the girl in the sexy bunny costume.

“Oh!” she cried.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

“That’s ok,” she said, but she touched her shoulder, testing for a bruise. She was cute and probably would have seemed even shorter were it not for her heels and bunny ears. The rabbit nose held to her face with elastic had stiff little whiskers sticking out of it. I couldn’t tell if her pony-tailed hair was died green or if that was just the light. She was busty, too, so that was a plus, and I was pretty sure she wasn’t wearing a bra. I probably spent more time looking her over than was polite, but the short shorts she was wearing made politeness difficult.

She glanced me over too, noticing the lack of costume.

“First time?” she asked.

Having sneaked into a secret party inside an exclusive party I had already scammed my way into, the opportunity to play dumb seemed like my best option: “Yes.”

“Mine too, but you don’t even have a costume! I think the extras are down that way -- I brought mine.”

She was being dismissive, but helpful. I could work with that, it was better than kicking me out. Thank goodness I’d kept it simple. “I like it! And the bathroom? I’m Tim by the way.”

“Elise. I think it’s the first door the same way. See you inside.” She gestured at the large industrial sliding door behind her. Very hip.

I thanked her and went into the dimly lit corridor. Behind me I heard the rumble of the door sliding open, then shut. I found the bathroom easily enough and took care of business. On the inside of the bathroom door was an old placard that read “Mr. Fantastic Mascots and Costumes”. It looked like it had been there forever -- the whole floor probably used to be a warehouse for the costume company.

Outside and around the corner I found a hallway lined on one side with racks and racks of costumes, and on the other with countless rubber masks. The smell of mothballs was nearly overwhelming. I had sobered up enough to remember that I had my phone, so I turned on the flash and looked at the options. The material was all old, but nothing looked too worn or falling apart. Everything looked clean enough, but I didn’t really want to think too hard about that.

After a couple minutes of looking through the costumes, I realized that they were all animal costumes. Not a single sexy pirate among them, just jumpsuits for tigers, bears, and even a bird. The masks, similarly, were all animal masks.

“Of course,” I thought, “The Zoo.”

Now you might think that I would try my damnedest to find an awesome costume, seeing as I was already clearly not worthy of this party, but the moment I set my eyes on a particular mask my lazy instinct kicked in and I knew I had to look no further: The horse head.

The horse head is the perfect lazy-dude’s costume. You’ve all seen him at parties. Don horse head. Try to drink bottled beer through horse head. Laughter ensues. Simple. Done.

I stretched the thing over my head, trying not to pass out from the rubber stink. I was going to sweat like a pig in this for sure. Or, I guess, a horse. Do horses sweat? I could barely see out of it, but well enough to find my way back to the door. I pulled the door to the side and went in to the real party.

It looked a lot like the party upstairs, only quieter. There was still music, and free flowing booze, and plenty of weed. Everywhere there were cat ears, wolf masks, and fox tails, all paired with form-fitting jumpsuits with the right shades and patterns. Elise’s costume, which I thought had been fine, was definitely nothing compared to these. If anything the girls were hotter than upstairs. Lithe bodies glided around the floor or practiced spinning their light-up hula hoops. All of the guys, mostly going as carnivores like wolves, bulls, and dogs, clung to the edges of the room with their snouts pointed in the direction of the beauties in the center.

The anonymity of the mask helped me relax and blend in. Everyone assumed I was supposed to be there, and nobody could see my face to know otherwise. After a few attempts of trying to make myself heard through the thick rubber failed, I was content to be silent and pantomime my reactions to things people said. It was a huge hit, actually, and I found a group of guys to hang out and resume getting drunk with. My hunch was correct: I quickly realized it was impossible to drink out of anything except a long-necked bottle, shoving the whole thing in the mouth of the mask until it reached my lips. When I took a swig I had to tilt my head all the way back, which made the act of drinking almost a theatrical performance. I liked it.

In the back of my mind I was wondering what all the fuss for this uber-secret party was about. I had a feeling I just had to wait. There was some electricity in the air, an anticipation that was going unfulfilled.

I spotted Elise a few times wandering around the floor, shaking her little puffball tail. I excused myself from my new buddies approached her and made a big “well what do you think?” motion. I hadn’t changed the rest of my clothes, so she knew it was me.

“They’re supposed to hand out the stuff soon,” she said.

I cocked my head: “oh?”

“You know...”

Even under the mask my confusion must have shown through like a beacon. Her eyes went wide and she took me aside.

“You’re not ... crashing are you?” she hissed.

I looked down at my feet and kicked the ground: “yup”.

She punched me in the shoulder. “You jerk, I had no idea! I should kick you out!”

I got down on my knees and begged operatically. Despite herself she smirked. “OK not this time, but watch it.”

I noticed that a line had formed in front of a table in the corner, and some sort of drug was being handed out. It looked like everyone was having some. Elise noticed too.

“Oh that must be it. You ready for an intense experience Tim? Nope, you aren’t!” She rolled her eyes.

We got in line, got our little red pills, and popped them. No hesitation, although I had to reach my hand way into the mask to find my mouth. Elise soon wandered away, to my lack of surprise, and I found an adjoining room where I could have my trip without too much external stimulation. The room was completely lined in pillows, bottom, sides, and even the ceiling. They were all shapes and sizes, and I settled into large cushions in one corner of the small room while I waited for it to hit. I didn’t even know how long the onset was.

It was past two, and I must have dozed off because the next thing I remember is Elise touching my shoulder to wake me up.

“Cheer up, buttercup,” she said as I emerged from the fog. She was smiling dreamily and she had a faraway look in her eyes. “They’re having a costume contest, let’s go.”

She’d come back, that was good. Maybe I hadn’t messed it up completely after all. I stood up and was thankful for the pillows on the walls because I lost my balance immediately. Whatever was in those pills wasn’t making me feel intense so much as incoherent. Elise was a little woozy on her feet too, but we staggered out to the main floor without making a scene.

The large room was now bathed in dim light, and the music was off. There was a tall woman standing in the center underneath a slightly brighter pool of light introducing herself. We were back against a wall, and I was grateful for something solid to lean on. The woman was already speaking.

“ ... sends her apologies that she couldn’t be here tonight, she really wanted to judge the costume contest again this year but was regrettably detained. In her stead, I’m Demi.”

There was a glint in Demi’s eye that implied she wasn’t altogether sad the other woman wasn’t there. If she weren’t the judge, she’d have won the contest herself. With horns and tail she looked like a devil, and she’d even painted her entire body a glossy red. She was nearly naked with the outlines of a bra and panties barely visible on her toned body. Her black leather and steel boots were a statement of force all by themselves, but the yellow contacts she wore were the crowning detail. Maybe it was whatever I was on, but her eyes seemed luminous, a flash that caught my eye every time her head turned. She carried her toned body with a confidence of a woman much older, making her age difficult to place.

With Demi illuminated in the center, the rest of the crowd was reduced to a vague silhouette around the edge of the room, the shapes of various ears and tails looking more convincing in the dim light.

I realized I’d been staring and had missed some of the rules. At least I think she’d been talking, but with the drugs it was hard to stay focused.

“ ... so it’s my job to set a good example, am I right? So let’s be clear that from this point on, this party is strictly clothing-optional. OK?”

“OK by me!” I blurted out, like the drunk idiot I was. Now that the music was off, I guess the mask didn’t muffle the sound much. There were nervous giggles and Elise rolled her eyes at me.

Demi smiled, revealing nicely-done pointed canines. Her yellow eyes locked on to mine. Having the undivided attention of that woman was nearly heart-stopping.

“Yes! I like your enthusiasm Mr. Horse Head! ... what’s your name?”

“Tim,” I croaked.

“Tim. Come to the front so you can see better!” She beckoned me and the crowd let me through. I tugged on Elise’s arm and she followed. We sat on the floor, my enjoyment of our front row seats reduced by the narrowness of my field of view.

But I was still able to see Demi reach around her back, thrust her chest out, and release her bra clasp. There was a sharp intake of breath somewhere in the room as she revealed her firm breasts topped with ring-pierced nipples. Her body paint hadn’t been done over her bra. The color was seamless all the way over, and a second color had been used to make her nipples a dark, blood red. You would have thought the guys would start hooting at the sight, but you could hear a pin drop.

Hardly a moment passed, however, before she efficiently lowered her panties, revealing the same attention to detail in the rest of her paint job. I had assumed her tail was attached to the underwear, but it remained after she kicked them to the side. Not that I was trying to look, but other than her jet-black hair, it looked like she was completely shaved.

“Much better, don’t you think? Nobody has to get naked that doesn’t want to of course. Now, ladies first, come on up, don’t be shy!”

The dance music started back up, and one by one the floor filled with a dozen or so females of various species. Cats posed and stretched, mice danced, and rabbits bounced, as Demi looked them over and made notes on a small pad. Some got in the mood and removed their tops, jiggling a little for the audience. Everyone was getting in to it now, cheering encouragement. I saw the Catwoman I’d seen at the beginning of the party. She looked nervous for someone who was already pretty much naked, but she got a great response.

I gave Elise a nudge and after a moment’s hesitation she got up and joined them. Maybe her costume wasn’t as complicated as some of the other bunnies’, but with her compact body coupled with those sizable tits on her chest, I couldn’t keep my eyes off her. She kept her top on, but I didn’t care. I admired her ass too, and thought the glow-in-the-dark tuft of her tail balanced her figure perfectly.

Demi dismissed all of the contestants and then summoned the men. I watched as the carnivores, some of them practically salivating from watching the women, jumped at the chance to show off. More than one dropped trou enthusiastically, eliciting cheers from the girls. One guy was dressed as a ninja turtle and tried to do some kung fu. I wasn’t planning to compete, but I saw a glint off to the side and saw Demi jerk her head ever so slightly toward the center. I knew I had to join. I felt stupid going up there, and when I was face to face with such expensive-looking full body suits I knew there was no way I could win.

We were dismissed and I sat back down next to Elise while Demi disappeared off to the side to go over her notes. There was a brief musical interlude, and Elise and I agreed that one of the wolves, with a full articulating head, was the best male.

“Which girl’s costume was the best?” she asked innocently.

This was a trick question, duh.

“Silly rabbit,” I said, “of course you should win.”

“Oh please,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Not Catwoman?”

“She did have a badass utility belt, but I know who I’d prefer to keep looking at all night.” She made gagging motions.

Demi came back and announced the third place and second place pairs to great applause. A bunny and the ninja turtle, a neko-style catgirl and a bull. The winning pair, of course, was Catwoman and wolf dude. They looked very happy with their new ribbons. Ambient music started oozing from the speakers and the crowd began to drift away, thinking the show was over. Then Demi interrupted.

“Wait everyone, we have one more prize to give away! You were all great contestants, but truly there was one whose costume is in most need of improvement, shall we say.”

My stomach dropped. Uh oh, embarrassment time.

“Tim, get your half-ass up here!”

Demi looked right at me, and there was yet more laughter all around. A sad trombone played from the speakers. I must have looked shell-shocked. Though maybe the horse mask always looks that way? And, I thought bitterly, she did this after she dragged me into the contest in the first place! The crowd backed up behind me, nudging me forward.

“Oh don’t look so sad, I have a special consolation prize for you!” Demi looked reassuring as only a devil woman with bright yellow eyes can.

“You earned it, party crasher!” yelled Elise behind me. I jerked my head in her direction, and she had a look of purely evil spite on her face. She’d been toying with me, dammit.

Demi didn’t break stride. “Now now, that’s none too kind. Everyone who finds their way to the Zoo is welcome. Elise why don’t you come forward as well.”

Elise’s face dropped and she too was nudged into the light. I was furious at her, her having waiting for the moment of maximum embarrassment before calling me out.

Demi grinned. “It’s only fair that I pick two worst costumes, and those silly plastic ears are doing you no good. You both have such good-looking souls, it’s a pity your costumes don’t do you justice. So you each get a free costume upgrade -- come over here, Elise, sit down. You too, Tim.”

She motioned to a pair of chairs I hadn’t noticed due to my tunnel vision. There was also a large canvas sack between them. Elise sat down, looking pained. I sat too and glared at her, even if she couldn’t tell. The crowd was mostly a blur, but I think some people had wandered away to adjoining rooms, thank goodness. Others were curious, clearly giggling at our embarrassment, and stayed.

“Wait,” I said, “like now?”

“Hush you,” said Demi. Then to Elise, “Chin up dear-- no, I meant that literally. That nose simply must be fixed.”

She reached into the bag and then bent over Elise, doing something I couldn’t see. I couldn’t help but look at Demi’s ass. Being so close to her, her nude skin practically radiant, it was difficult to pay attention to anything else. I still couldn’t figure out how the forked tail was attached.

“Naughty naughty Tim,” said Demi suddenly without turning, “so obvious when you are staring.” She reached up a hand and covered the end of the horse mask with her hands to block my vision. But then she added, “just kidding, of course you can watch.” She released the mask.

She turned back to Elise. “Ok, that’s better, but now those ears are just not convincing.”

Demi moved around behind the chair and reached back into the bag, and out of the corner of my eye I saw Elise shoot me a glance. Her whiskers wiggled. I shook my head, trying to clear it. Elise’s eyes went wide, and she opened her mouth to say something but then stopped. I blinked, and wondered why I was able to see anything out of the corner of my eye at all.

“Great, those are much better...” Demi had replaced Elise’s stiff, dollar-store ears with something much more soft and natural-looking. Maybe they had come from the bag? They pointed up for a moment, and then flopped down behind her head. Elise reached up and touched one, pinching it. She yipped, and her mouth dropped open. She touched her rabbit nose, then wiggled it back and forth cutely.