Time: Monday, 16 August
Place: The Fiendish Glow
Follows: The Atholl Brose
[The Fiendish Glow Office, Friday afternoon, 20 August, mid-afternoon]
Pen yawned and reached for the large mug of coffee sitting on her desk.
"Bills. Bills. Taxes. Statements. Bills. Reports. Bills. Taxes. Damn, this stuff is tedious," she said, standing and stretching every muscle in her body.
The fuming Cousin in Plaid banged the door and stomped in, an equally angry Lucius trailing behind her. "I dowan believe it," she stormed. "I just dowan believe it."
"What's up, Heather?" the taller woman asked, glad for a break -- any break.
"Chris was supposed tae watch Lucius while I went for my wedding-toga-fitting this afternoon. Here's Lucius, my fittin's in a half-oor, an' Chris is naewhere tae be foond. Men!" she said, plopping herself into the nearest chair.
Lucius took his mistress's sitting down as a signal that it was okay for him to go exploring. Finding appropriate way-points, he crawled up into MacHeather's lap and jumped onto the desk, scattering Pen's documents all over the place.
"Lucius!" the two women scolded.
The cat sat down on the desk and rubbed a thoughtful paw across the side of his head.
"Down frae there!" MacHeather told him.
"Make me," Lucius responded. It came out as "Meow-oww."
As the Cousin in Plaid went to grab the black feline, it escaped across the hutch, making a circuit about the room and coming to land on the desk that still held the large, ursidine object that had come packed in with Brenda's clothes. He nudged the vampbear, sniffing it carefully, noted that it didn't respond to him, and then decided it was in the way of a good grooming spot. "Go take a flight," he told the vampbear, butting it out of his way towards the front of the desk.
"Lucius!" MacHeather scolded from her chair, just as the vampbear came tumbling off the desk, its artificial-nail fangs connecting with the side of her neck. "Ouch!" she said, lifting the two kilograms of fluff and fur from her neck and lap. "That hurt!" she said, shaking the bear as she turned him around to look at her.
"I was hungry. You were there. You smell of Atholl Brose... honey ..." the vampbear told her, threatening to attack again.
The woman ignored the bear and went after the feline again. "Lucius!"
The fangs engaged the Addict just above the swell of her breasts.
"That's it!" she said, slamming the vampbear back on the desk. "I've had enough of this," she said, storming back out the door.
"Hold on a minute!" Pen yelled back. "Hold on," she said, her voice lowering and taking on a hint of evil. "You want to get Brenda back for that filk?" she said, moving her eyes from Heather to the vampbear and back.
Heather turned and followed Pen's look, coming to rest on the vampbear that had already attacked her twice, and had sprained Pen's wrist as well.
"Aye," she said, getting the same idea. "Hey, you," she addressed the vampbear, "how'd you like to help the Addicts set up for a bridal shower?"
[The Toronto Compu-Geek store, the same time]
"You're certain about this, Chris?" Brenda asked, as he shoved the box into her hands.
"She'll love it," he told her. "She's a big Braveheart fan."
"Right," the woman answered skeptically, noting the man's drool. "Then how come she's never mentioned it?"
"'s a secret passion," he said. "She lo'es lookin' a' the man in kilts," he smiled, looking down on the MacDuff sett lying above his own exposed knees.
"And men in togas. I know..."
Chris flinched at the word "toga", thinking of Heather's Nunkies addiction.
"Look, I think I'm in the doghouse enough after that filk. Though she should know by now, I can never resist the opportunity to filk..."
"She'll lo' it," the man insisted.
"Just like you love First Knight?" the woman asked, wondering how anyone could enjoy a film that totally wrecked any shred of the centuries-old Arthurian legends.
Chris flinched. "First night -- any night -- is my night, not his night. I dinna care wha' the law is, she's mine."
"I meant the Sean Connery and Richard Gere film."
"I dinna care wha' movie star has designs on m' lassie, she's my lassie."
Brenda sighed. Time to change tack. "You're sure you don't need any of the more traditional stuff -- dishes, flatware, serving pieces, linens?"
Chris shook his head. "Heather said the Faer Hibernians'll be providin' a lot of tha' stoof, an' at a discoont, a' that."
Discount. Beautiful music to the ears of any Scot, or anyone of Scottish descent.
"An' look -- there's a one-day-only discoont wi' a mail-in rebate for Braveheart: The Game," he deliberately noted.
Brenda calculated out the end result of the mail-in rebate... like most of the computer software and accessories she and Frank had, it would be a legal copy -- and would end up costing almost nothing. "You've sold me," she said, heading towards the check-out line. And if she doesn't go for it, I can always find something else, later.
[Upstairs at the Fiendish Glow, just before the bridal shower]
"Tell me agin where you're going?"
"For the thoosandth time, sweetie, the Addicts are holdin' a shoower for me."
"An' ye can't shoower here?"
"A bridal shoower, love. Where ye get food and presents and soch."
"Is he gowan t' be there, too?"
MacHeather shrugged. "He's been invited. Dowan knae if he'll shew or nae." The MacCousin readjusted her tartan toga to cover the bruised scratches on her neck and breast. No need for Chris to question my loyalty to him, she reasoned.
"The 'General's' been de-vamped," Brenda reminded her friend's fiancé.
"Besides, Pen and I and all the addicts will be there to protect her."
"You? Protect her?" Chris scoffed, looking at the heavyset woman in Edwardian fluffery and her pixie-ish companion in tailored silk slacks with a matching silk sweaterblouse.
"I've studied martial arts," Pen said.
"And if worst comes to worst, I do have my handbag," Brenda leered. The 4+ kilogram Coach™ shoulder bag, given a full circle's warm-up, could pack a considerable wallop -- except that it telegraphed itself a mile away.
"I'll be okay, Chris," MacHeather comforted him again. "An' I'll be back afore ye know it."
The three women picked up their handbags, tote bags, and boxes and left for the party.
There really is a Braveheart CD-ROM game for the Windows platform. You need a fairly loaded machine to run it.
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NEXT STORY: THE GREEN-EYED MONSTER, TAKE ONE: SHOWERS ARE FOR SLOSHING
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