"Come run, Annie."
Nan followed her, watching the girl's round bottom wiggle as she ran. After a nice long run of it the girl dived into the surf with a squeak Nan kept running.
She might have kept on running, for miles and miles and miles, if she hadn't got her feet all tangled up in the robe and fallen down. Once she'd fallen down it wasn't so easy to get up. Her head was swimming. She saw the wet girl come running up, mad as blazes.
"Where the hell do you think you're going?" she said.
Nan didn't answer. She didn't even know where she was.
"Can she feed herself?"
"How the hell do I know? Ask her."
"When I ask her she don't say nothing."
"Maybe I ought to help her or something. Here, III swap you. You hang the decorations, I'll feed the baby."
"Where are the costumes."
"Yours is in the closet, next to your jumpsuit I still got to do some sewing on mine."
"What about her?"
The woman giggled. "She's wearing it…less a few little frills."
"Buckass nekkid?"
"Yeah, only with little gold chains. She's gonna be a Roman slave."
"Hey, that's groovy. Hand people drinks and stuff."
"Right She seems to be able to hold things now without dropping 'em."
"What is that slut she took, anyhow?"
T don't know the Latin name. Too long anyhow.
That doesn't matter. What matters is it makes you…what's the word…suggestible."
"Amenable."
"Yeah."
"Far out"
"I guess I gotta do a few things with her. Wash her up. A little makeup wouldn't hurt maybe. Blushing virgin stuff."
"Zora, you are a groove."
"Artie, you old fart, you're gettin' a little old for that dumb-ass hippie talk."
"Everybody I know talks that way. Young an' old And besides, look who's talkin' about bein' old. You got five years on me easy."
"Now look what you did, you dumb bastard. It's all unbalanced to the left To your left, there."
"No it ain't"
"Sure it is. Get down and look."
"Look at yourself. I never saw anything like that Grown-up woman, sittin' there on your lap, bare ass nekkid, bein' fed Grape-Nuts Flakes one spoonful at a time."
"Never a dull moment, I always say. Never a dull moment around ol' Zora's house."
The chains didn't really hurt. They were actually kind of pretty, on her tanned skin, and they didn't have any sharp edges to cut or bind. They did get in the way if you tried to walk with normal stride, being hobble-short between her ankles; but with a little mincing step (slaves always walked that way, Zora said, and they never said anything to anybody or looked anybody directly in the eye unless they were spoken to first; she'd read that in a book somewhere). The wristlets were far enough apart on their own little chain to allow her to carry the little tray with the drinks on it. It was kind of fun; she smiled at Zora when she was being primed on what to do.
"Look, Artie, I…"
"Yeah?"
"Maybe I better not put the chick through this." "Oh, Jesus Christ"
"No, really. What if she freaks? What if…"
"God damn. You're not gonna chicken out on me now, are you? Stop playin' the fuckin' mama hen and come help me set up the buffet table."
"Oh, all right… "
"Damn right, all right. You thought up the fuckin' thing, you go through with it. Hell, look at her. She's smilin'. She's enjoyin' it."
Artie was wearing a sort of Steve Reeves outfit that showed off his massive upper chest and his thick muscular legs. With his trimmed beard he kind of looked like Steve Reeves. Zora wore her Salome outfit, she called it. It was marvelously flattering to her figure. She had a plaster jewel in her navel and more jewels on her bare toes. She looked exotically beautiful. What fun it would be! And here she was, with all the lovely little gold things on her body, here and there, and little tinkly chains with gold bells on them. The thick rug felt nice under her feet.
Artie turned off the overhead lights on now, and the hi-fi came up at the same time as the black-tight show. It was so lovely! With ah the little dancing lights and everything! And the music was deep and sensuous and gorgeous: something from a big-budget movie, she guessed. Very, very heavy in the strings, heavy enough to allow someone to give the tune at the second time it came around to a pair of French horns. She liked the French horns. She'd had a crush on a boy in high school who played the French horn in the school orchestra, only she hadn't told him, he was from the other side of town and they didn't mix with the Polacks after school much.
"Answer the door, Artie."
"Hell, get the chick to answer it"
"Oh. Oh, sure. What better way to get a party off to a good start?"
Zora came along, though, and told her to bow her head when she opened the door. Just bow your head, honey, and step back with your hands folded to let them through. She stood behind Nan to see everyone's reaction.
"Well how do you dooooooo?"
"Why, looky here, Nettie. Ain't that a hell of a way to get a party off to the right start?"
"Look, there's Zora. Howdy, Zora. HOW-DEE THERE, SWINGERS!"
"Hello, Fred. There's only me and Artie so far. And…our little slave here, as you see. Go on in the back and find yourself a drink."
"Why sure. Sure, Zora. Nice to see you, honey. My, my. That was a right nice little surprise. Ain't nobody gonna believe that back in Dallas."
"Ain't she a pretty little tiling, Fred? Look at them cut little titties."
"Right near eatin' size."
"Everything's eatin' size to you, you old goat"
"Fuckin' ay, Nettie. An' you know you couldn't get enough of it if you tried."
"Oh, you old fool!"
It was fun for a while. But when the place got really crowded people started jostling her-it was the rock and roll music, really, and people kept trying to dance to it and that meant a lot of sharp elbows in her ribs-and she dropped a tray, not once but twice, and spilled everything. Down on her knees, trying to pick it op, she started to cry. Somebody in a clown suit got down on his knees with her.
"Hey, don't feel bad, cutie. Take some of this. It'll make you feel fine." He dropped a powder in his drink and helped her drink some of it "Thass right. Drink up. Everybody gotta feel fine, everybody gotta have a little fun."
She didn't say anything. The drink had tasted really strange. Strange.
"Say, you're kind of cute, you know that? And that's a real original outfit you got on, you know? My name's Sammy. Would you like to go out on the deck for a minute with me?"
She tried to stand up; her head swam. She couldn't seem to get her feet under her for a minute. Then something happened in her head and it got to be easy again. It was all very odd.
"You hear me, honey? Would you like to go outside?"
"Sure I'd like to go outside. Yes, yes, that'd be fine." All of a sudden everything seemed to be a bit clearer to her. And she understood. Nothing could hurt her. Nothing could reach her. So she might as well do anything, anything for kicks, anything anybody asked her nice about
Outside was real funny. It was like it was cold but it wasn't She could feel the goose bumps on her naked skin but there was a sort of layer of something on her that kept her from really feeling awful despite the fog and the chill. It was kind of nice, really.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Well, gee, I…I mean…"
"Maybe I ought to suck you off. That's what everybody seems to want That's what everybody seems to be doing in the bedroom and the bathroom and the kitchen."
"Why, look here, I…"
"Here, let me. Oh, how nice. That's a nice little one. That won't be any trouble at all. I bet I can get it all in without gagging. Oh, see, how nice and hard it's getting. Oh, say, that's cute. Look, let me put it in my mouth now. You just stand there and hold on to the piling. I'll get down on my knees again. See? I'm a slave on her knees before you."