Chapter 3

Despite Cassandra's efforts, I really didn't feel clean until I'd showered; after more or less presiding at the ladies' brunch, I excused myself and took one. By the time I was out and dry, most of the women had headed back off to Mimi's parents' place to start on preparations for day two of the barbeque.

Mimi took me there and plopped me on the couch in front of the TV, where the baseball game was on, with another Bloody Mary. Mimi's dad looked up and smiled tolerantly, "You had quite a bit yesterday."

"The girls kept plying me with liquor," I replied. "I'm on guard today."

"You're still here today," one of the husbands observed, bouncing a six year old boy on his knee.

"Yeah..." Given what I knew about the situation, nobody was more surprised than me.

I don't do baseball, as a rule, so I couldn't discuss stats; I just watched the game. Nobody complained. Over the next hour or so, eight or nine women wandered in from the direction of the kitchen and either beamed or eyed me warily -- all of them from the married subset of the family except Polly. Polly was Cassandra's sister -- the one that got the looks in the blonde, fair-skinned branch of the family. The day before, Polly had been with Ray -- who was conspicuous by his absence.

Like a lot of the others, Polly didn't say anything -- she just looked at me -- but in her case, it was an extremely lengthy examination. Mr. French finally looked up and asked her, "Something wrong, Polly?"

"No," she said shortly.

"Why are you giving Pete, here, the evil eye?"

"It's not evil," she protested, "I just can't see how Mimi picked him out."

Mr. French turned an eye on me. "Is that how it is?"

I took a slug of my Bloody Mary to gather my thoughts, then said, "Well, Sir, that's really up to Mimi. I'll abide by her decision in the matter, whether I want to or not."

Mr. French eyed me for a moment, then grinned. "Somebody give you Women 101 at some point?"

I shrugged. "It takes two to tango, Sir. I'll dance until she gets tired of having her feet stepped on."

"Huh," Polly grunted. "If she's that dumb, I can count ten other women who'll line up to take over..." She eyed me. "Maybe I know why, now." Turning on her heel, she headed off.

Mr. French eyed me. The husband with the boy on his knee eyed me. Every OTHER male in the room eyed me. "You seem to have made an impression," Mr. French said carefully.

"Probably no one is more surprised than I am, Sir," I told him. I turned my attention back to the TV; eventually, they all did, too.

Twenty minutes later, Mama French came boiling through the door with a plate of baked goods -- and despite the fact that I was halfway across the room from Mr. French, I got the plate right after he did. She didn't move on, either -- just stood there, smiling until I backed up and said, "Thank you," with a brownie I really didn't want in my hand. Even then, she was slow to move on. This was in direct opposition to the day before, when I'd been greeted VERY warily and watched closely from a distance; I think the late Ray fared better. "Mimi says you like chocolate," she burst out when it appeared that we had no more reason to be in each other's presence.

"Mimi is right, as usual," I replied, wondering where Mimi would have garnered such information. Probably Mama French just made it up...

It didn't keep her from beaming at me before finally moving on -- and handing the plate to one of the husbands to pass to the others. I wondered just how obvious THAT was... Mr. French noticed, for sure. Rising, he speared me with a look, "Let's go start the grill."

I knew when I was being summoned; I swigged the remains of my Bloody Mary (coughing on some pepper that had dropped to the bottom of the glass) and followed him outside.

He made a production of squatting to check the gas tank connections and turning on the valve, then punching the igniter as he turned on each of the burners -- then he turned to me. "You want to tell me what magic spell you just cast over Emily?"

"Emily?" I asked blankly.

"Mimi's mother."

"Oh." I hadn't gotten her name the day before -- just Mama... "They're up to something, Sir -- those women. I'm a victim."

He pursed his lips, eyeing me, then nodded. "Yeah, that sounds about right. From the looks of things, unless you run real fast, I'll be welcoming you into the family."

"I'm a slow runner, Sir."

"Glad to hear it." He got out a brass brush and worked over the grilles; our conversation was over. We went back inside and he stuck his head in the kitchen, "Ten minutes." Then he waved me back into the living room and I resumed my seat on the couch. About half of the distaff males eyed me with one expression or another on their faces; the other half ignored me and concentrated on baseball. I pretended to be fascinated with the stuff.

Ten minutes later, Mimi stuck her head through the door, "Pete, Honey, would you come here a minute?"

I gathered my glass and clambered up off the couch and waddled into the dining room. A half-dozen of my poker buddies from the night before were standing in various positions in the room, eyeing me, and another half-dozen of the already-marrieds were leaning around the kitchen door. Mimi took my glass and handed it to Trina, then asked casually, "What did Daddy want?"

"He wanted to know if I was up to something."

"What did you tell him?"

"I told him it was a big female conspiracy. He's familiar with such things," I grinned.

"What else did he say?" Mimi asked, eyeing me sidelong.

"He asked me if I thought I could run fast enough not to get caught. I told him the truth -- I'm a slow runner." That got me pushed against the wall while a pair of ten thousand volt lips mashed themselves against mine. I launched a tongue and grabbed a big double handful of ass and worked hard at holding up my end -- and apparently did a respectable job, since Mimi lost her breath. When she backed off, it was only far enough to whisper, "That's my ass you're squeezing!"

I grinned and whispered back, "Are you sure? Maybe it's mine..." That got me another lip-lock. After that, though, she broke out. "Go back to your game, you animal!" she exclaimed, clearly trying to pretend that my advances were unwelcome. I glanced around; nobody was buying -- including Mama French, who was somewhat scandalized. Aunt Betty was grinning from ear to ear.

I looked penitent. "Don't I even get a refill?" Trina glanced down at the glass she was holding and took off like a shot, her oversize ass swaying. I had to hand it to her -- she managed to be graceful despite it, doing these little swinging jinks that got her past the slow-moving females in the kitchen door without any apparent collisions. Ninety seconds later she was back, still hustling. We'd kind of hung out in tableau while we waited, nobody really moving much; Mimi was pretending that I was a brute for squeezing her ass, and everyone else was basically waiting on Trina. When she solemnly handed me the glass, I cocked an eyebrow at Mimi and leaned down and bussed Trina on the lips while deliberately squeezing a big handful of her ass. This elicited a startled gasp from Mama French and a cackle from Aunt Betty -- and I'd never seen anyone with their heart in their eyes until I got a look at Trina's as I backed away. I turned and headed back to the living room, deliberately ignoring the general uproar behind me, knowing that it was generally favorable.

Two minutes later, Mimi swayed in and plopped -- rather heavily -- in my lap, bracing herself against the couch arm. I limited myself to a quiet "Oof!" Mimi got glares from various quarters for her clear invasion of 'man territory' -- but no overt action. Mimi leaned in and whispered, "You set expectations in there -- Trina is gonna be Hell on wheels -- and the others are all gonna be lining up for sugar..."

"It's your fault," I countered, "for pretending to be outraged at having your ass squeezed a little."

"How do you know I was pretending?" she asked, eyeing me sidelong. I just returned her look. "Okay, so maybe I was -- did you have to set the whole place on it's ear?"

"Your aunt seems to think I need to deliver on expectations," I whispered.

"Well you can disappoint THEM a little, as long as you don't disappoint ME!" she whispered back.

"Have I?"

"No. But be careful, okay? Trina..."

"... Needs lovin'," I finished for her. "I'll be careful."

"Okay." She kissed me on the cheek and swayed out. I became aware that Mr. French was eyeing me in amusement.

From there on, the day proceeded fairly smoothly. Without anyone else trying to bump up my alcohol consumption, I controlled it easily, staying just lit enough to be loose and easy and not freaked by the crowd of people. Couples and families started punching out at about five o'clock, headed home; we headed out a bit later, since we were only going to Aunt Betty's and she needed to back out of the party first.

Mimi and I walked into Aunt Betty's living room at about eight o'clock to find about eight of the female relatives gathered there, plus guests -- Cassandra, Polly, Trina, Annette, her friend Trish (a Goth chick), Michelle, her girlfriend Lily, Irene, her friends Leticia and Kenya, Elaine, Aunt Kate and, of course, Aunt Betty... I swept my eyes over that mass of feminine flesh and the first thing out of my mouth was, "Um, look, there's only one of me..."