A new short story - The Party

July 13, 2021

By the time Justin arrived at the house, the party had already started. The reveling was in full motion to the loud music, so loud you had to shout directly into the other person's ears. People were drinking, drunk, sitting, milling around, or dancing. Those who were outside on the patio, in the swimming pool, out in the yard somewhere, were having sex. Justin was alone, not having sex, not shouting, not drinking. He was one of the ones milling around.

Brenda had arrived earlier and had already had a few drinks but wasn't yet drunk, though she was feeling a bit tipsy.

"Hey, wanna dance?" some guy asked her.

"Sure," Brenda said. She tried to sound excited by the idea of dancing, but this particular guy didn't appear to be very exciting, to her.

He looked at her and said, "Okay, come on over here." He led her to a chair in the corner and sat down. Then he pulled her down onto his lap, or rather, he tried to. Her skirt was tight and didn't allow her to fully spread her legs to sit on him. The guy grabbed her skirt and pulled it up to her waist, revealing her white lace thong.

"Hey! What are you doing?" She yelled at him. She stood up and pulled her skirt back down to its proper position.

"What? You wanted to do this," he yelled back. He tried to grab her again.

She moved away and said, "No, I wanted to dance, that's all." Then she turned away from him and walked out to the patio.

She saw a guy leaning against the wall, alone, and went to him, "Hey, you want to dance? Dance, only dance?"

He attempted to reply, but managed only, "Sh, sh, sure." Then he pushed himself away from the wall and fell down.

"What the fuck? Seriously?" asked Brenda.

She looked around at the others outside on the patio, all couples, all having sex. Guys with girls, guys with guys, girls with girls, it didn't matter to them, everything was fair game. Probably the pills that had been dissolved into the drinks, unbeknownst to the partiers, had something to do with that.

Brenda walked back into the house, looked in the kitchen, "My god, what happened in here?" She asked another woman who was eating something she found in the fridge.

"Hmm, looks like a tornado hit this place," the other woman said.

Brenda said, more to herself than anyone in particular, "Fuck, this is a disaster and will take days to clean."

The house belonged to Brenda's sister, Ashley. "Hey, do you know Ashley? Have you seen her?"

"Who's Ashley?" the woman asked.

"Nevermind."

Brenda went upstairs. She looked in Ashley's room and found three people having sex in, not on, Ashley's bed. Then Brenda went to the next bedroom, which belonged to Ashley's son. There she found two people on his bed, pouring a bottle of wine on each other and licking it off their naked bodies. On the son's bed. She went into the spare bedroom and found a few people sharing chocolate syrup, also on each other's bodies, and all over the bedspread.

"My god, guys! Look at this fuckin' mess! You don't live here! This isn't your house, not your bedroom!" Brenda was getting a bit upset with all of this. The two guys and two girls in the room only gave her a passing glance.

She went back downstairs and into the rec room and found one lonely guy. She introduced herself, "Hi, I'm Brenda."

"Hi, Brenda, I'm Justin."

"Somehow, you have found the only reasonably quiet, and unused room, in the house."

"Yeah, I noticed that, too. I have no idea how this room was missed by all those crazies out there."

"Neither do I, but I'm sure glad it was. Hey, do you know Ashley?"

"Yeah, she works in the office next to mine."

"Oh, okay, have you seen her?"

"Not for a while. The last time I saw her she was going outside wearing only her bra and panties."

"Shit," Brenda said under her breath. "Figures. I shouldn't be surprised."

"You look a lot like her, are you two sisters?"

"Yeah, she's my younger sister. And apparently, she decided to have a party to celebrate her divorce, and I think it has gotten out of hand."

"I think I know how that happened."

"Yeah? How?" She looked at him suspiciously.

"Oh, no, I didn't do anything. I saw some dude crushing some pills and putting the powder into the drinks."

"Oh, shit! Seriously? Everybody here is drugged? That's just great!"

"Well, I suppose as long as nobody dies it shouldn't be any big deal."

"Oh, thanks, that's reassuring."

Brenda walked away and Justin caught up to her, "Hey, you want to dance?"

"Yeah, but first I should find my sister."

They both walked outside and stood on the patio, and looked for Ashley. They heard screaming mixed in with the laughter coming from the pool. Brenda ran to the edge of the pool and found her sister floating face-down. Justin yanked off his shoes and shirt and jumped into the water and pulled her out. Everybody else was too drunk or drugged to know what to do.

On the pool skirting, Justin started chest compressions and Brenda did the mouth to mouth. Within a few seconds, Ashley was coughing up pool water. Most of the partiers were still partying, oblivious to what was happening to their hostess.

Ashley slowly sat up, vomited on the top of one of the pool skimmers, and laughed. Then she coughed up some more water, and laughed again. She was still in another place in her mind because of the drugs.

"Ashley, you stupid little imp!" Brenda yelled at her little sister who was slowly rocking back and forth, smiling.

"Ashley! Do you hear me? Do you recognize me?"

Ashley didn't respond. She continued to rock herself and smile. She was staring at nothing.

"Justin, will you help me get her out of here?"

"Of course, let's take her to her room. Um, where is her room?"

"We can't, it's being used as a smoosh room."

"Smoosh room, now that's a word I've not heard before. So, let's take her to the rec room."

In the rec room, they found two guys going at it like a couple of horny rams and Justin yelled at them, "Hey! Break it up! Break it up!" He got them separated and pushed them out of the room. Justin and Brenda laid Ashley on the couch, and Brenda sat next to her. "I hope she doesn't throw up again."

"She might, but my guess is she's already gotten all the water out of her lungs, and anything else will be from her stomach."

"Okay, thanks, that's real helpful."

"Sorry, guess it really wasn't of much help."

"Justin, you don't have to stay here with me. Go out and dance and have fun."

"Fun?" He pointed towards the closed door. "That's not my idea of fun."

Outside the rec room, the house was a total wreck. Frank, the guy who put the drugs in the drinks, had over-done it quite a bit, and the party had gotten completely out of hand. The neighboring houses were far enough away to not be disturbed enough to call the police.

Throughout the night, people were passing out everywhere in the house, including the bathrooms. There was a guy floating on an air mattress in the pool; two guys in one bathtub with no water in it; two women passed out in a shower stall, with the water showering down on them; and every chair and seat of any kind had at least one person each. People were halfway into the lower cabinets in the kitchen and one guy had his head in the fridge with the door leaning against his shoulder.

Brenda woke up around 9 the next morning and slowly opened the door to peek at the disaster she expected to see on the other side. Justin stepped up alongside her. They slowly opened the door, and before them was a house that barely survived an internal hurricane.

"My god, Justin, this is terrible," Brenda said in a quiet voice. "What on earth am I going to do with this mess?" She had tears in her eyes.

"I'll help you clean it up. But first, we have to get these people out of here."

They went throughout the house, rousing the passed-out partiers out of their stupor.

"Can you believe this?" Justin asked when he saw the kitchen.

"Holy shit, how? I mean..." Brenda was at a loss for words. They got the people out of the kitchen and out of the house, then proceeded to the upstairs rooms.

"Two men in the bathtub with no water. Hmm? And they're both fully clothed. I don't understand," Justin said, not wanting any more information about them.

Brenda said, "In the other bathroom, in the shower, are two women, not fully clothed, in fact, not in any clothes. Oh, and the shower was still on."

"Really? I gotta see that!" Justin said.

"Oh, Justin, of course, you would." They went back to the two naked women and woke them up.

"Hey," one struggled to speak, "Hey, where's my clothes?"

"And mine?" asked the other.

"I have no idea. There are no clothes in this bathroom. You don't remember where you took them off?" asked Brenda.

"No," they both replied. The two women slowly stood up, stretched their arms and legs back into normal positions, then walked downstairs to look for their clothes.

"Wow, now that's interesting," said Justin, as he watched the two exit the bathroom.

"Okay," Brenda said. "Looks like the upstairs rooms are cleared of all bodies, now the back yard."

"Yay." Justin tried to sound excited, but it was just sarcastic.

It took about a half-hour to get everyone awakened and out of the house, with the one guy on the floaty being the most difficult to wake up. They almost took him for dead, but he did, eventually, wake up when Brenda turned the hose on him.

"Hey! We can't find our clothes!" one of the naked shower women said.

"Yeah, what do you want us to do, go home like this?" the other naked shower woman said as they stood in the patio doorway.

"Well, if you can't find your clothes, I guess you can just go home like you are. So, please, just go."

"Really! You're rude!" The two women stormed out of the house and headed down the street, naked.

"Hey!" one shouted back at the house and Justin was watching them from the front porch, "my cellphone! It's in your house somewhere. If you find it call me."

He turned and went back inside. "Well, those two are gone. Apparently, there's a cellphone somewhere that belongs to one of them."

"Well, I've already found three cellphones," laughed Brenda. "I have a feeling this pink one belongs to little naked missy out there. How does she expect me to call her if she doesn't have the cellphone that we have here?" They both laughed and put the three cellphones outside on the front porch in case anyone returned for their missing phone.

Ashley slowly got up off the couch in the rec room and walked out into the front room. She stopped and stared at the disaster that was her home.

"Oh, my god! What happened?" she asked.

"Well, look who woke up, finally. It's after 1 pm, girl! And, what happened? Your party, that's what." Brenda took Ashley's hand and walked her through the disaster zone, which included every room except the rec room.

"My party did this? Oh, no, look at the pool! It'll have to be drained! There's no way to clean that with the filters."

"Oh, girl, you've only seen the tip of the iceberg. And, some of you is in that water," said Brenda.

While Brenda gave Ashley the grand tour, Justin continued filling lawn debris bags with beer bottles, all kinds of other beverage bottles, and bits and pieces of clothes. He hadn't come across any full outfits that might have belonged to the two naked women.

"Oh, Justin, you don't have to do that, you should go home. This isn't your concern, it's ours." Brenda took his hand and tried to lead him to the front door.

"Of course I'm going to help. I wouldn't dream of leaving this catastrophe to you and your barely-there sister."

"You're such a dear, thank you. I'll make it up to you," Brenda promised.

"You help Ashley and let me continue cleaning up this, hmm, wreckage."

Brenda found the beds in the upstairs bedrooms to be unusable. So, she fixed up the couch in the rec room for Ashley to get more rest and sleep off the effects of the party.

Brenda returned to the kitchen and found Justin knee-deep in debris from the cupboards and the fridge. It took another hour and a half to get the kitchen cleaned up.

While tying another large lawn waste bag closed Justin said, completely straight-faced, "You know, you're going to have quite a time making up for this day."

"Oh, yeah, I'm so sorry. I said you don't have to do this-"

"I was just kidding," and he gave the bag a little toss to her and she caught it and just about dropped it on the floor.

"Oh, don't drop that one, it'll break open and you'll have another mess to clean up."

"Great, thanks."

"My pleasure. Looks like we've got another room finished. How about a break, then we tackle the backyard?"

"I like that idea. I'll order some pizza."

During lunch, their small talk started getting more personal, and Justin flirted with Brenda. She liked his being forward with her, but she didn't let on about it.

"Let's get the patio and gardens cleaned up first, and save the pool for last," suggested Brenda.

"Okay, good idea. I hope the pool will be clean enough for a dip when we're finished."

"Seriously? Look at it, I think that will be impossible."

"I suppose you're right, now that I've looked a little closer at those floaty things that are covered in something, vomit, I think. Gross!"

"Yeah, and don't forget - Ashley puked into one of the skimmers. I'm not going in that water," said Brenda.

Ashley came outside, paused to let her eyes adjust to the sunlight, and said, "How did this happen? I told everyone no drugs." She started to cry again when she looked at the pool and saw the mounds of bottles of various kinds of alcohol and beers and the vomit-covered floaty things in the pool.

Brenda hugged her and said, "It's going to be okay. Don't worry about anything, we'll take of it for you. You just rest. I don't know exactly what you did, but I have a feeling it was a lot more than you remember."

"Oh, god, no, don't say that!"

Justin took her by her hand and sat her in the only clean lounge chair. "Ash, sweetie, try to rest, okay? Let your sister and I clean up this disaster."

As bad as it was, Justin flirted with Brenda every time they passed each other with bags of garbage. Brenda would act nonchalantly and just give him a look, which only caused him to try even harder.

Ashley fell asleep on the lounge chair; birds were chirping in the trees; the sun was warm, and Justin made one more attempt to get Brenda's attention. This time he walked up behind her, tapped her on her shoulder, and when she turned, he immediately kissed her on her cheek. Then he poked her in the ribs and ran to the other end of the pool.

Brenda walked casually after him and found a hose in the garden. She turned on the water to wash off some of the yard chairs, and Justin just happened to be within range of the water.

When he had his back turned to her, she pressed the sprayer handle tight and the water shot out in a straight stream and hit its target, directly in the back of his neck.

Justin turned, but the water kept coming. He started walking towards Brenda, and she kept the hose aimed at him, now a little lower, and lower. As he approached her, now soaked through, she let off on the water pressure, but not all the way. It was still spraying him below his waist.

Just as she was about to turn and run, he stepped right up to her and grabbed the hose from her. He pressed the handle and sprayed Brenda. She turned, and he soaked her backside from head to toe. She reached the other end of the pool, out of reach of the hose and water. Justin picked up a bucket of soapy water and ran to her and threw the water at her, splashing her above her waist. Soap-suds running down her arms and legs.

They both stopped and looked at each other. Then Justin took Brenda in his arms and pressed his lips to hers. She responded by shoving her tongue into his mouth. Ashley was still sleeping on the lounge chair. The patio wasn't yet finished, but that didn't matter. Brenda took Justin by his hand and led him over to the outdoor shower. He turned it on and they stood under it, in each other arms, kissing and unbuttoning shirts.

About the time they were both in only their underwear, Ashley woke up. "What's going on? Hey! Oh, Jeez, you guys!" Ashley laughed at them and went into the house.

After Brenda and Justin finished making love in the shower, they finished cleaning up the yard and the pool, then they washed each other in the shower in the house.

By the time Ashley had dinner delivered the house and the yard were just about back to normal. And Brenda and Justin were on their way to starting something better than normal for themselves.