The sound of the door shutting behind them echoed in the room as Richard hit the light switch illuminating the surroundings. One of his closest friends, Matt, stood next to him and he whistled as the light from the overhead fixtures revealed something far different than the "Man Cave" Matt had expected.
"Wow, this is some mad scientist shit right here," said Matt as his eyes took in the interior.
"Yeah, I guess I like to bring my work home with me," laughed Richard.
Richard Collie was a research scientist who specialized in the study of human physiology, his claim to fame had been discovering a new dietary supplement a decade earlier that had taken the market by storm and made him a wealthy man. He and Matt were now standing in his private home lab where he sometimes worked on his own when he wasn't doing the government funded stuff at the local university. A lab table dominated the center of the room looking like a kids chemistry set gone wild, with beakers, test tubes and other lab paraphernalia scattered everywhere across the surface and notebooks filled with Richard's almost illegible handwriting sitting in the middle of it all.
Matt walked around the room looking at the shelves of books and electronic equipment, "What are you working on, anything exciting?"
Richard wondered at how much he should say, his new work was not exactly top secret, but it was the kind of thing that some folks would probably frown on if they found out. Still, Matt was an old friend, they had gone to college together twenty years earlier, and he had never kept secrets from him before and didn't want to start now.
Matt turned waiting for an answer, his almond shaped eyes squinting as he smiled, his looks favored his mother, who was Asian, though he was built more tall and slender like his Caucasian father. The more athletic of the two, Matt carried himself with an easy grace, his lean six-foot frame showing very little fat since he was a vegetarian who ran marathons for fun. He had recently returned from running in a triathlon in California, and his skin was darkened even more than its usual light brown color.
"Well, if you can keep a secret, it's actually a project for the prison system, a way to...How to put this delicately...Reduce the problem of sex drive in inmates," answered Richard.
"What, like chemically castrate the poor bastards?" said Matt.
"Oh God nothing like that at all!" said Richard as he crossed his arms, taping one foot on the carpet absently.
"This is more along the lines of temporary behavior modification, tricking the brain into forgetting about sex, suppressing the urge as it were," elaborated Richard.
Matt walked along the edge of the lab table finally stopping at a row of test tubes each containing a grainy looking supply of white crystals like table salt or maybe sugar.
"Is this the stuff?" he asked, leaning down to get a better look.
"Those are the latest test batches, separated by degree of potency, I have to bring in some rats for the testing," explained Richard.
"Looks harmless," said Matt.
"The idea is that it would be slipped into existing condiments and baking ingredients like salt or sugar, the inmates would never know they were being drugged," said Richard.
"Is that why you have the sugar bowl here?" asked Matt pointing to the porcelain receptacle sitting near the test tubes.
Matt lifted the lid revealing what appeared to be sugar contained inside, but Richard quickly stepped forward pushing the cover back down with his fingers.
"Actually that is the one batch I did a test on, I ran out of glass lab containers, so I had to make do, got an old sugar bowl from the kitchen. I need to destroy that one, it was unsuitable," said Richard with a frown.
"Oh really, why is that?" questioned Matt.
"Not sure were the mix went wrong, but it caused exactly the opposite reaction, turned a cage of my testing mice into a sex-crazed mob, they were going at it so hard it was almost scary to watch," answered Richard.
"Well the prisons might not go for it, but I bet you could find a market," said Matt laughing.
"Don't be ridiculous, if it did that to a rat who knows how a human would react," said Richard though he did chuckle a little at Matt's suggestion.
The ringing of the doorbell downstairs forestalled future conversation, and Richard led Matt out of the room shutting the door behind them and locking it with a silver key. They continued down a long hallway that gave way to an open area that connected to a grand staircase leading down to the first floor and the foyer. Matt and Richard stopped at the top of the stairs as the group of people now clustered near the front door raised their eyes to look up at them.
"Well, let the festivities begin," whispered Matt under his breath.
Richard just smiled as he looked down at the faces of his house guests. This weekend his oldest daughter, Chelsea, was getting married to her longtime boyfriend and in honor of the occasion, Richard had invited his closest friends to stay at the house while they attended the wedding. He had known most of these people for many years, since college as a matter of fact.
Richard's wife, Kelly, who had answered the door was still standing near it hugging a short, ash blond. Kelly was at least a head taller than the woman she was embracing, her dark brunette hair a contrast to the other ladies, as they pulled away from each other Richard recognized the face of Kelly's closest friend Sabrina. Kelly and Sabrina had been inseparable in college though Richard had wished it weren't the case. He had never appreciated the influence that Sabrina had over Kelly back then, Sabrina was very much a party girl, and she often pulled Kelly into her messy social life. The two women couldn't have been more different in terms of both looks and general temperament. Kelly was tall and slender with wavy hair that fell across her shoulders and the elegant looks of a young Natalie Wood, and she was a serious and calm woman with a head for numbers which had led her to a career in finance. When she got around Sabrina though her better judgment sometimes eluded her, Richard had been forced to pick up Kelly from more than one party where she had imbibed too much and couldn't make it back to her dorm.
Sabrina was a different breed of cat from Kelly, much shorter, barely reaching five-foot-two inches she was arguably a beautiful woman with the kind of sultry looks that turned heads when she entered a room. Her face was tanned as was the rest of her from many trips to the beach, and she had strikingly dark green eyes and a head of curly ash blond hair that surrounded her like a halo. As her eyes darted around the room and settled on Richard, she favored him with a smile revealing rows of perfect white teeth, her soft, full lips shining with dark red lipstick. Stepping away from Kelly had exposed Sabrina's outfit, as usual, she was wearing a shirt at least a size too small that accentuated her very large, round breasts and shorts that looked as if they were painted on.
Richard did his best to return the smile, but the man who was standing just behind Sabrina reminded him all too well of her limitations as a person. Sabrina had dated a seemingly endless parade of young frat boys in college, and that approach hadn't appreciably changed even as she grew older. The gentleman with her was her latest flavor of the month. A tall, strapping fellow looking as if he just stepped out of a surfer magazine, his name was Chad, and according to Kelly he worked at a local dive bar called "Slammers," right now he was brushing his longish blond hair out of his tanned face and appeared bored.
At the foot of the stairs with a pair of bulky suitcases was a much more welcome sight, Richard's close friend Toby, and Richard moved to shake his hand.
"Toby, it's so good to see you, what has it been almost a year?" said Richard, wincing a bit as Toby took his hand in a bone-cracking grip.
Toby Harrah was ex-military, a former Army Ranger with a body still honed from his time in the service, though just a shade over five-foot-nine his body looked like it had been carved from chiseled marble not an ounce of fat to be seen anywhere on him. His hair was still trimmed high and tight though it had a few wisps of gray in it now as he slipped into his late thirties. Toby had spent three years in college as Richard's roommate but had dropped out before their senior year to join the service, a move that had surprised everyone including his girlfriend at the time, Kelly. Though it had been awkward at first, when Toby returned four years later he had shown no animosity toward Richard for stepping in and picking up the pieces with Kelly after Toby left, he had even been the best man when the two had married.
"Yeah about that, time seems to fly when you travel as much as I do," said Toby in his usual quiet voice, he could be heard on the other side of a battlefield when he wanted to be but hardly ever raised the volume otherwise. It was an interesting affectation, but it didn't matter since the woman next to him talked loud enough for the both of them. Toby's wife Kathy was a tall woman, towering over even Kelly and a good two inches taller than her husband, slender and small chested her hair was a short and straight waterfall of straw blond that fell around her comely face. Kathy was a serious chatterbox, with her voice pitched so that anyone within a block of her could easily get in on the conversation. She would have been annoying if she hadn't been so sweet. Friendly and outgoing, with a quick smile that split her thin pink lips and lit up her fair-skinned face, Kathy was everyone's favorite in the group. She stepped around Toby to hug both Richard and Matt at the same time, her excitement at seeing her friends gave her face a pink flush that showed off the smattering of freckles across her upper cheeks and nose.
"YOU GUYS! IT IS SO COOL FOR ALL OF US TO BE TOGETHER!" Kathy nearly shouted.
Matt and Richard held on for dear life as Kathy squeezed them into a three-way hug all of them grinning foolishly.
"Good to see you too Kat," laughed Richard.
"Yeah, but don't strangle me!" said Matt with mock seriousness.
"Now that everyone is here why don't we get you all to your rooms and then I'll have some sandwiches brought out to the patio. I hope you all brought your suits it's a gorgeous day for a swim," said Kelly.
With Kelly leading the way up the stairs the group fell in behind her, she started to parcel out rooms to her guests with Toby and Kathy getting the first one off the hallway. Toby laid his bag on the bed to unpack as Kathy slipped into the bathroom to freshen up, she returned to find him hanging his suit in the small closet.
"It never bothers you?" Kathy asked her question apparently not needing an explanation though Toby was quick to ask for clarification anyway.
"What?" replied Toby as he turned from the closet.
"Seeing Kelly, the one that got away," said Kathy, her voice sounding far less enthusiastic than it had out in the foyer.
"Are you going to start with that again, Kelly is ancient history, our relationship ended many years ago," said Toby with an exasperation in his tone that indicated they had been down this road before today.
"Sorry, I know it did, it's just, whenever she is around I always feel a little jealous she is so pretty and smart," said Kathy, even as Toby walked up to her and gently wrapped his arms around her slender frame.
"Kelly is a lot of things but she isn't you, and you're the one I married, the one I love," said Toby kissing her lightly on the lips.
