Chapter 1

Ron Fleming felt relieved as he finally began to free himself from the clutches of the artificial redhead who chattered mindlessly at him in a secluded corner of the smoky, half-lit room. He sensed the girl making one last attempt to catch his attention, as she punctuated a particularly inane remark by leaning her empty head up against his shoulder in a tipsy parody of suggestiveness, smiling up at him with a naivete as transparent as the watery drink she was holding in her hand. Ron pivoted expertly, caught her free arm in his, and maneuvered her effortlessly to a small sofa, where he'd spotted a small, quiet, mousy man sitting silently alone with a glass of untasted ginger ale clasped tightly in both hands Ron hurried through an informal introduction, not knowing either of their names, and then turned back to the party leaving them already engrossed in a vigorous smiling, one-sided conversation.

Moving his tall, handsomely built body through the strident jumble of cocktail conversation, Ron made his way once more to the bar, stopping along the way to pick up another odorless, tasteless cheese thing from a tray filled with unimaginative snacks. He was famished. There was nothing worse than coming to a party expecting dinner, only to find that there was none. It took a particular kind of host to invite people at 7:00 in the evening and ignore the fact that they just might possibly think the early hour indicated dinner, and Oliver Lewis was just such a host. Ron poured himself out another drink, passed a hand through his dark, styled hair, and wondered why the hell he'd come in the first place.

He spotted his wife, Sharon, through the maze of lighted cigarettes and clinking glasses, standing across the room in conversation with a short, balding man. Ron could see her forcing her smiles, and nodding her head in response to his undoubtedly boring conversation, and he smiled to himself as he wondered just what purpose this kind of party had, except to allow a group of dull people to infect their friends with the emptiness of their own lives.

He noticed that Sharon had caught him looking at her' and saw the plea to come and save her written all over her face. He smiled and waved teasingly at her, and then made his way through the crowded room to her. As he approached, he could hear the balding man saying something about what a wonderful time he and his wife had had the year before she'd died, touring the ancient Aztec ruins of central America.

"Oh darling," said Sharon, interrupting her tormentor gratefully, "I'd like you to meet Mr... ?" She turned to the short man questioningly.

"... Larsen is the name, Nils Larsen. I'm Norwegian." And he stuck out a small, pudgy hand.

"Well, I thought I saw: something of the Viking in you Mr. Larsen. I'm Ron Fleming." Ron took the preferred hand, felt it rest limply in his grip for a moment, and then restored it to its owner.

"I was just telling your lovely wife about the magnificence of some of the old, pre-Columbian American Indian civilizations, Mr. Fleming..."

"That sounds fascinating, Mr. Larsen. In fact, I've always thought there were valuable lessons to be learned from old, pre-Columbian American Indian civilizations..." Ron stumbled over the words. "... but I hope you don't mind if I spirit my wife away from you for a few moments, I've got an old friend over here she's just got to meet."

"Not at all, sir, not at all," the little man beamed. "I'm privileged to have been able to converse with the lovely lady for as long as I have."

"You're so right, Mr. Larsen," Ron said, guiding Sharon around him towards the other end of the room. "I promise we'll get back together before the evening's over. How's that?"

"Splendid, sir, splendid! I shall look forward to it!"

"Thank you Mr. Larsen, for your little lecture," Sharon tossed back over her shoulder at him.

The pudgy man said nothing, but beamed modestly, and then turned to seek the crowded room for his next victim.

"Oh God," Sharon whispered as she made her way with Ron to a far corner of the room, "Torture me, stretch me on the rack, anything but that."

"You mean Mr. Larsen?" Ron teased. "A truly fascinating man, I think. And a Norwegian too. How exotic. You know, he's the first bald Viking I've ever met."

Sharon giggled, and passed her smoothly exposed arm around her husband's lean waist. Her long blonde hair ran with carefree abandon down her neck, stretching itself out to the small of her sensuous, voluptuously formed back. She was a full head shorter than her husband, and as they crossed the crowded room, looked like a college cheerleader out on a date with the football team's star end. Her youthfully alive body belied her 28 years, and with her husband they made an exciting, beautifully exuberant couple. They loved each other with the same delightful abandon that had marked their earlier dating years, and it contrasted sharply with the tired, dull faces of the other couples at the party.

Just then, one of the couples they'd been introduced to at the beginning of the evening, Dick and Myra Green, made their way over to them. Dick Green was of medium height, and fairly heavy set, but had the build of a former athlete who still managed to keep in shape. He had dark, intelligent eyes, and a broad, friendly, contagious smile that complemented his easy-going manner. He was carrying a half-finished glass of beer in one hand. His wife, Myra, was tall and lithe with raven black hair and a pair of luminescent, green eyes. She wore a tightly clinging red dress which hugged and caressed her slender, high-breasted body, and accentuated the easy, sensual sway of her tightly mooned buttocks. As they approached, Ron's mind immediately and unconsciously pictured her as the archetypal seething seductress, the kind of woman who, at one time or another, manages to occupy the dreams of every man.

"Hello there, Fleming," Dick Green said heartily as they came up. "Rotten party isn't it?"

"Do you want the truth?" Ron answered, returning Dick's smile.

"The whole truth, but keep it clean."

"Well, it's not only rotten, it's tortuous."

Dick laughed aloud, and hugged his beautiful wife closer to him, gazing at the same time at Sharon Fleming's curvaceous body with unabashed admiration.

"Myra was just saying mat if this disaster was any duller, we'd have to send out for the morticians." He laughed with infectious amusement.

"Well, I wish we could send out for the caterers," Sharon moaned. "We thought it was for dinner, and we're about to starve to death."

"Oh no, that's too much," Myra Green said in a low, almost breathy voice, "Not you too!"

Ron and Sharon looked at each other in surprise.

"You mean you two thought..." Ron asked.

"Of course!" Myra laughed. "Who gives a party at 7:00 without food. We've been hovering like vultures over the snack bar just trying to keep our stomachs from turning inside out. I don't think I ever want to see another... whatever they are, those awful cheese cracker olive things..."

"Well, at least they're better than the green pepper cream cheese things!" Dick laughed out loud. And the four of them began to giggle uncontrollably with their private joke, trying to suppress their mirth unsuccessfully until a few other couples around them began staring and wondering what was so funny.

"Shhhh..." Sharon managed through the tears that were forming in her eyes, "People are looking."

"What the hell, honey' they're probably as hungry as we are," Ron whispered, and they all convulsed again.

Finally they quieted down, and after talking awhile longer, agreed to leave the party and go together to find something to still the growlings in their stomachs. It was only nine, but they could always say they were coming back. They agreed to meet out by their cars, and separately made their way across the room to find their host. Ron and Sharon carefully avoided one corner where the bald Viking was entertaining some particularly ugly wallflowers with a description of Scandinavia as it must have been in the time of Eric the Red. The host was found, Ron and Sharon thanked him warmly for the wonderful party, and then fled gratefully out into the cool summer night. They waited for a few moments, until Dick and Myra Green joined them and then, giggling again, piled into their cars. Ron and Sharon followed the Greens, and laughed as they pulled into the first diner they came to, a rather dirty looking greasy spoon.

"It may not look like much," yelled Dick Green as they climbed out of their cars, "but it's better than olives and cream cheese."

They made their way into the diner, which wasn't as bad inside as it had seemed outside, and ordered the deluxe $2.75 steak all around. They settled down in their booth with four tall glasses of beer, and the men loosened their ties.

"Well," Dick said raising his glass of beer, "here's a toast. Let's all drink to... the S.T.E.D.A.B.P."

They all laughed, raised their glasses high in mock salute, and drank long and hard. Sharon finished first, and turned her head to Dick.

"What's the S.T.D.P... whatever it was," she asked innocently.

"Wait a minute, let me get it again its... the... S.T.E.D.A.B.P. The Society to Eradicate Dull And Boring Parties." Dick answered and they all laughed again. The beers were quickly finished, and they ordered another round.

"Tell me Ron," Myra said, her smoldering eyes resting on him in a way that made his heart imperceptibly quicken its pace, "how did you get invited to this evening's abortion?"

"Ollie Lewis is one of my many bosses," Ron answered, putting his: arm around his wife's small waist. "I guess he just felt like being democratic."

"One of your many bosses?" Dick echoed. "What kind of work do you do, Ron?"

"Well, that's kind of hard to say," Ron chuckled. "I'm sort of a free-lance dabbler in the arts. I write a small syndicated column about artsy things in the area."

"Oh, darling, you make it sound so casual," Sharon broke in, and went on to explain, "He writes for four or five newspapers and a couple of magazines, you know, art criticism and film reviews, that kind of think. He just got back today, as a matter of fact, from an assignment in Hollywood."

"Really?" breathed Myra. "What were you doing down there, Ron?"

"Oh, nothing much really. Martin Epstein, the film director, had an interior set he had to make look like a l9th century art gallery, and he needed some help making it look authentic, you know, so that all the paintings and sculpture and things were in keeping with the times and the tastes of the people involved. It was much duller than it sounds, though."

"Well, it doesn't sound dull at all to me," Dick said. "It sure beats working in a bank."

"Dick's vice-president of the City National Bank," Myra explained, straightening her delicious, high breasted body proudly.

"One of many vice-presidents," Dick added. "It's even duller than it sounds."

"Well, I don't think it sounds dull at all," Sharon interjected. "Just think of working with all that money!" They all laughed.

"Myra's something of an artist herself," Dick said.

"Oh, really? What kind of work do you do?" Ron asked her.

"Mainly oils," the dark-eyed woman answered. "But it's all strictly amateur. I don't really have much confidence in it."

"Well, you should," her husband asserted. "I think it's fine stuff, and she just goes around all the time bad-mouthing it. You ought to get Ron out to see it sometime, dear, I'm sure he'd be able to convince you it's pretty damn good." Ron and Sharon didn't catch the look that passed between the Greens.

Their steaks arrived, and all four of them looked doubtfully at the dry, tough slices of meat. Ron asked for ketchup, and they began to bravely attack the leather-like slabs.

"I think it's fighting back," Dick chuckled as his knife finally managed to saw through his steak, and they all laughed.

After they'd finished, and paid their bill, they went outside into the freshness of the summer night, and stood by their parked cars saying goodnight.

"Well, I guess even the party was worth the chance to meet you folks," Dick said, again smiling his personal, contagious smile.

"We feel the same way," Sharon answered, "Don't we, dear?"

Ron nodded his head, and turned to smile warmly at Dick's seductive wife.

"We'll have to get together again sometime," he said, "maybe under slightly more convivial circumstances."

"That's a deal," Myra smiled invitingly. "Maybe I can talk you into coming over sometime and taking a look at some of my little scribblings, I mean my paintings."

"I'd love to," Dick smiled at her, "Why don't you call me sometime and arrange it."

"All right, but that's a promise. No backing out. And you've got to promise to say nice things."

"Cross my heart and hope to die."

They all laughed once more, said goodnight, and climbed into their cars. With a final wave, Dick and Myra sped out of the parking lot, and disappeared down the unlighted street.

Ron turned to his wife, and kissed her warmly. "I like the Greens. They're good people."

"Mmmm, I think so too. But you're nicer."

"And you're a little tipsy."

"Well," Sharon smiled into his face, "You're not mister cold sober yourself."

Now that she mentioned it, Ron did feel quite high from all the party drinks and the three beers they'd had with dinner. He turned to his wife and caressed her suggestively around the smoothly rounded mound of her breasts.

"I guess I'm not. What do you say we go on home and fall into a nice warm bed, mmmm?"

"I bet that's been on your mind all evening," Sharon chided, almost properly.