Zack peered inside the barroom, letting his eyes adjust to the dark from the Sunday afternoon sunshine outside. Sam and Alan were just where they were usually to be found at this time on a Sunday, at the far end of the bar. Zack grinned in relief and headed for them. All was as usual: Sam with his pint, Alan with another fruity drink -- this one looked like a cosmo to Zack. Good old Alan, the only straight guy Zack knew who wasn't ashamed to drink girlie drinks in public. Such a shame that Alan was straight, really. But Zack wasn't here to pick up guys. There was work to be done.
"Gentlemen!" Zack called as he approached them. "So glad you could join me this afternoon!"
"Hey, we wouldn't miss this," Alan said. "Who knows when we'll all get to have another round together, with Sam graduating next quarter?"
"Yeah," Sam said. "Guess I'll be gone when you get back from your internship."
"My thoughts exactly, boys," Zack concurred, pulling up a third barstool. He pointed at Alan's drink and gestured at the barmaid for one of his own. She nodded and set to work on it, and Zack turned his attention back to his friends. "So, this sorority party you guys were talking about the other day. It was last night, wasn't it?"
"Aw, Zack," Sam said with his usual goofy grin. "We don't want to kick Alan while he's down. Maybe we shouldn't talk about that."
"Nah, man, it's fine," Alan said. Turning to Zack he added, "I had a great time."
"C'mon, man, you don't have to lie for me!" Sam said.
"I'm not lying!" Alan protested. "Mary Beth and I hit it off great."
"Mary Beth?" Zack asked innocently.
Sam took over the conversation as usual. "Yeah, Zack, look, maybe I ought to apologize to Alan again, seriously. Already have a couple of times but he's not giving me the satisfaction of even admitting there's anything wrong. Mary Beth was this mousy little chick he ended up with last night after I made a move for the hottest gal in the room and bagged her. I mean, she looked like a cross between a librarian and a lunch lady! Alan, I am sorry I ditched you with that nerdy little thing, but wouldn't you have done the same if you had a chance with Kasie? C'mon, man, admit it."
Alan just laughed and turned to Zack. "Hope you never get stuck on dates with guys like this," he deadpanned.
"Happens all too often, my friend," Zack said, taking his first sip of his new drink. "But this sounds like a juicy story for both of you. Sam, I know you're going to tell us all about this Kasie lady."
"Man, I'd love to," Sam said, "Lady is right. But I really don't know if I should rub Alan's nose in it all yet again."
"Go right ahead," Alan said with a smile. "You probably haven't had another mental orgasm for a whole ten minutes now."
Zack laughed so hard he had trouble swallowing his latest sip, and Sam was persuaded. "If you say so. So we got there just around nine last night, maybe a little later, and the place was full. Nice clean sorority house living room, but it was jammed. So we each got a beer and we're groovin' to the tunes, waiting for the buzz to take hold so we'll be up for dancing, and I notice this tall gal across the room who already is dancing."
Alan found his mind wandering back into the boozy haze of the previous evening. Whatever else Sam might have exaggerated about his own feats and whatever he had guessed wrong about Alan's, his telling of the beginning of the story was accurate. Though he was in his third year at the university, Alan had never been to a sorority house before last night, owing to his animosity to the Greek system going back as far as he could recall. But a mutual friend had scared up invitations for Sam and himself, and he had allowed his naughty curiosity to take over. Sam had naturally expected an erotic wonderland, while Alan had figured he was wrong but hoped he was right.
"Good looking crowd," Alan admitted as they mingled through the crowd into the common room.
"Told you they would be," Sam said. "Want a beer?" And he was off to get one before Alan could answer. This was of little consequence to Alan, who was always happy to accept a drink. While he waited for Sam, he admired the dancing girls and guys and wished he were feeling loose enough to jump in and join them. But he wasn't feeling it yet.
"Whoa, look at that!" Sam exclaimed, appearing from behind with a beer for Alan. After handing off the bottle, he pointed at the far corner of the room. As Alan's eyes had adjusted to the dark by then, he could see a tall, lithe blonde in a short red dress whooping it up to the music. Standing off to her side, admiring her friend and swaying only slightly, was another young woman with bobbed dark hair and glasses. She wore a worn long dress and a white sweater over her shoulders -- "Looking for all the world like an extra from a fifities sitcom," Sam described her the next day at the bar. "I'm thinking they're like Mutt and Jeff, you know? One of them a perfect ten, legs like a Greek goddess and looking like she poured herself into her dress, and the other one's a total frump. And as I head through the crowd I'm already thinking how can I get this clingy little mouse away from her friend?"
"And that's where Alan comes in, is it?" asked Zack.
"That's how it worked out," Alan said. "But at first I just wanted to see how hard Sam fell on his face when he went to talk to the centerfold model."
"Sour grapes, man," Sam told Zack. Alan just smiled and took another sip.
"Good evening, ladies!" Sam really only said it to the tall blonde, never even making eye contact with her friend. They could both see that, and so could Alan as he sidled up beside his friend and repeated the greeting to them both.
"Well hello there!" said the object of Sam's lust. To the surprise of both young men, she gave him a lusty grin and presented her hand for Sam to kiss, which he did. "I'm Kasie. I haven't seen you here before. Pretty sure I would have, too." She said every word in a slinky, flirtatious tone. "So rare to have cute guys come to these parties. Isn't that right, Mary Beth?"
"Oh, I know!" gushed her friend the shorter brunette, in a loud and brash voice. "Hardly any cute guys to pick from, and finally we get two!" She followed that with a squealing laugh that made Sam flinch.
Alan remembered his manners and kept his bemusement at Mary Beth's nerdy laugh to himself. "Hi, I'm Alan," he told her, and she shook his hand. They made eye contact for the first time as she did, and Alan got his first good look at her: thick glasses that looked left over from middle school, a dress that looked straight out of "Happy Days," and a hairdo that reminded Alex of his mother's high school yearbook. But if she had no sense of style at all, she did have a delightful crooked smile and a sense of welcome in her dark eyes. Alan got the exact opposite impression from Kasie, who was dressed and coiffed to perfection in her tight red dress, but paid him no mind as she was busy flirting with Sam.
"Hi, Alan!" Mary Beth sounded giddy just to be there, just as Alan had wished he could feel a moment before. "So great to have someone to chat with in this place! Usually everybody just wants to dance and drink!"
"Well, that's why they call it a dance," Sam said as an aside, before turning his attentions back to Kasie. That brought on another honking laugh from Mary Beth. Alan joined in with the laugh; for all her oddities, he was finding her endearing.
"And that's when she grabbed my hand and pulled me out on the floor," Sam recalled to Zack the next day. "Just like that, it was 'hey speaking of which, come on, let's dance!' Couldn't have set it up any better if I'd tried."
"Is he bullshitting us?" Zack asked Alan.
"No, he's right so far," Alan admitted. "Kasie was all over him all right."
"And you're left with her nerdy friend," Zack continued.
"You say that like it's a bad thing," Alan said with a grin.
"Man, I said I was sorry!" Sam interrupted.
"That's what I said to her, too," Alan recalled.
"I'm sorry Sam wasn't friendlier with you," Alan said to Mary Beth as they watched their friends dance their way off into the crowd.
"Oh, it's fine!" Mary Beth assured him with an earnest smile. "Parties like this are Kasie's thing, I mean, she's all about just having a good time. Me, I come along because it's my sorority and she's my best friend, but I can take or leave dancing."
"I know just what you mean!" Alan said. "It's great to go a little crazy now and then, but after a while it's kind of boring, isn't it? I'm like you, Sam's the party guy and I'd rather be off at the bar just chatting with friends."
"Oh, I know!" Mary Beth squealed -- by now Alan was starting to enjoy her offbeat style. Here, he thought, is someone who is who she is and doesn't care what anybody else thinks. "I mean, a party like this is better than sitting home alone, but who wants to dance when you could talk? I even remember back in high school, going to dances and I'm like, what's the appeal? And that was with no drunken frat boys!"
Alan laughed. "Yeah, I know a thing or two about drunken frat boys." He cast a glance at Sam and Kasie, who were bopping hard to the music now. Not touching for the most part from what he could tell, except their hands now and then, but Kasie was grinning suggestively at him and running her fingers through her long hair again and again. When the music slowed momentarily, she gave him a come-hither finger motion, and he did, only to be rebuffed with a wicked grin when the song picked up again. Undeterred, Sam shook his hips both ways and then reached around Kasie's back with one hand, only for her to slip out of his grasp.
"Heavens, they're perfect for each other, aren't they?!" Mary Beth shrieked, loud enough to be heard clearly over the music, though Sam and Kasie didn't appear to hear.
"So they're dancing hot and heavy," Alan told Zack, "for I don't even know how long, but I don't mind because Mary Beth and I got to talking. I mean, really sweet, easy talking, like old friends do, only it's a little hard to do with the music being so loud, and I'm thinking maybe I should invite her to take a walk outside." He didn't need Zack to tell him Sam was looking skeptical over his shoulder. "It's true, man," he said to Sam, "We saw you two were having a great time and we were having a great time of our own. No big deal."
"Sam, what makes you so sure he didn't like Mary Beth for real?" Zack asked. "You keep looking like he must be making this up, but he keeps saying he isn't."
"Because I saw Mary Beth, that's why!" Sam said. "Nerd material, big time. Probably never leaves the library during the week, that kind of girl."
"Smart is sexy," Alan replied.
"If you were there dancing with Kasie, didn't you see if they were talking or not?" Zack asked.
"Yeah," Sam admitted. "I remember seeing the two of them in the corner, looking like they're trying to be wallflowers or something, and I thought maybe I ought to ask Kasie to help me out with finding another chick for him. But that might've pissed her off, you know, and I didn't want that. Besides, Alan could've made some excuse to leave."
"If I wanted to leave," Alan corrected. "In any case, we did actually dance after a while."
