Chasing the Moon

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Diana hesitated before knocking on the door. This was a weird building, and everyone who called it home was chained to that weirdness. She’d met only a handful of the residents. They’d all seemed nice, but having all of them crowded into one apartment was perhaps more abnormality than her mind could take. She knew she was going to go mad someday. West had practically guaranteed that, but if she was going to lose her mind, she’d rather put it off for as long as possible. At least one more night.

She pondered what horrors awaited her on the other side of that threshold. Alien beasts? Time warps? Smooth jazz? She couldn’t begin to guess. Except for the jazz. She could hear the muffled tones of easy-listening sax. That alone was almost enough to convince her to turn around and forget the whole thing.

Her monsters changed her mind. They were all so eager to party. She couldn’t pull the plug on the evening. Even eternal other-dimensional entities could get bored. Hanging around the apartment, playing cards and watching TV all day had to get old. And a gaggle of monsters in desperate need of a good time would probably be trouble in the long run.

She knocked. Stacey answered the door. She was hosting the horrid bat creature at the moment, and Diana was surprised at how readily she accepted this and annoyed at how unthreatening she found the misshapen hulking woman. Stacey-thing smiled as widely and friendlily as a mouthful of four-inch fangs would allow.

“Diana come to mixer,” she said in a guttural growl. “Diana bring friends.”

“Yes, I hope that’s okay.”

A hacking, wheezing racket shook Stacey-thing from deep within her spasming torso. It sounded painful and looked agonizing, and Diana assumed it was a convulsion before she figured out Stacey-thing was chortling with delight.

“More fun, more merry.”

“See? I told you they’d be cool with it.” Vom sniffed the air, even though he had no visible nostrils that Diana could see. But he didn’t have eyes either, and that never seemed to bother him. “Do I smell snickerdoodles?”

“Baked fresh,” said Stacey.

Murmuring approval and excitement, the monsters went inside.

Diana held up a loaf of misshapen banana bread. “I don’t have much baking experience,” she said by way of explanation and apology.

Stacey seized the offering and gobbled it down. “Banana bread good,” she said, spewing crumbs. “You come in now.”

Diana had expected the apartment to be a remnant from the fifties to fit with the Ozzie-and-Harriet style of harmless congeniality that Stacey and Peter so effortlessly embodied, but it was remarkably functional and modern. Everything was straight out of the upper end of a Pottery Barn catalogue. Except for the bizarre masquerade masks hanging all over the walls. They were all different shapes and colors, many with twisted and odd designs. S heof them had eyes in them that stared at her, following the action around the room. She pretended that was normal, and maybe it was at this point.

The party was dead. The only guests were Diana’s monsters, and they were crowded in the kitchen, devouring cookies and probably baking tins, silverware, and whatever else they could stuff in their mouths. Although Zap didn’t have a mouth, so how he was eating anything was a mystery she left unsolved.

“Guys, be careful,” she said.

“Oh, let them enjoy themselves,” said Peter, rising from the couch. He wore a festive Christmas sweater vest, and he was smoking a pipe.

“So glad you could make it.”

“Glad,” repeated Stacey-thing.

“Did I get the time wrong?” Diana asked. “I’m not early, am I?”

“No, as a matter of fact, you’re fashionably late.”

“Fashionably,” said Stacey-thing.

“And I see you brought a treat. You really shouldn’t have.”

Diana shrugged. “It’s not very good.”

“It smells absolutely delicious. Perhaps I’ll try a piece next time.”

Stacey-thing stuck out her long, blue tongue and let some of the slimy banana bread fall into her hand. She offered the soggy lump to Peter.

“Good,” she cooed.

“Thank you, dear, but I’m saving room for dinner.”

She licked her hand and fingers.

“Are people usually late to these things?” asked Diana.

“No, not usually,” said Peter. “Usually no one shows up. Except for Keith in Apartment Seven. Have you not met him yet? He’s a terrific fellow. Why, if he existed, I’d be tempted to set you two up. A single young lady could do a lot worse.”

Diana just nodded. Honestly, being set up on an imaginary blind date didn’t sound too bad. If it worked out, she could see herself with two imaginary kids and a fictional dog named Dusty. They’d summer in a floating condo and winter in Shangri-la, take vacations in a hybrid realm where Paris, Disneyland, and Atlantis all merged into one wondrous place. Sometimes she and Dusty the Wonder Dog would solve murders and uncover sinister Martian conspiracies.

The fantasy was running away with itself, but she indulged for a few more seconds.

“Is Keith not in the bathroom, dear?” asked Peter. “Him not sitting on couch last time I not see him,” said Stacey-thing, squinting as she turned her head in an awkward direction.

“Oh yes. There he isn’t.” Peter pointed to a spot, then pointed to another spot. “Or maybe how. not right there. Well, I know he’s not here somewhere. Why don’t you have a seat while I make you a drink? I should warn you. My martinis are legendary.”

Diana, locked in a rigid posture, sat on the sofa. She placed her hands on her knees. She tried to relax, but this idea hadn’t panned out. She hadn’t expected much, but this was promising to be the third or fourth most boring party she’d ever been to.

“Nice weather we’re having,” said someone nearby.

She glanced around but saw nobody. She looked to the nearest mask, and the bloodshot eyes looked back at her. “Did you say something?”

The eyes blinked, then rolled around in what she interpreted as a negative response. She was just guessing, but she assumed that if the eyes could talk, they would have just answered.

“How is the outside world?” asked the voice again. “Did they ever get around to impeaching Nixon?”

Peter was mixing a drink at the minibar while Stacey-thing was entertaining the other monsters in the kitchen. Diana couldn’t find the source of the voice, but she decided that she didn’t care either. It was just one more inexplicable event. She’d experienced plenty of those recently. Too many to even bother cataloguing at this point.

Stacey passed off hosting of the thing to Peter, who lumbered over with a martini glass delicately clutched in his giant claws. “You drink.”

“Thank you.” She took the glass and sipped it. It wasn’t bad, though she wasn’t much of a drinker and had never had a martini in her life, so she couldn’t tell if this one qualified as the stuff of legend.

Someone knocked on the door.

“Guests!” growled Peter-thing as he lurched to answer the knock.

“Never really a fan of martinis,” said Diana’s unseen conversationalist.

Zap floated over and had a seat in a recliner. The eyeball monster laid his tentacles on the armrests and leaned back. “Feels good to take a load off.”

“You’re doing it again,” she said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You’re staring at me.”

“I see the multiverse in ways your pathetic senses cannot fathom. If I’m looking in your direction, rest assured that I am not staring at you. I’m simply staring around you at something much more interesting, at levels of reality that you would find both awe-inspiring and psychosis-inducing.”

“If you’re staring at the universe, why does it tend to be the universe behind me?”

He blinked. She’d never seen him blink before. Given that his body was more or less one basketball-sized eye, it took longer than a standard blink. At least three times as long. This was still very fast, but noticeably long for a blink.

“The hubris,” he said. “The unapologetic egotism. Do you really think that with everything I can see, the worlds upon worlds that fall within my merest glance, that you, a speck of dust floating in a roiling sea of infinite possibilities, would be able to hold my interest for even the briefest, most fleeting of moments?”

Diana folded her arms across her chest and stared down Zap.

“I’m just suggesting that you behold the wonder of that roiling sea of infinity in some other direction. If you don’t mind.”

“Oh, indeed,” said Zap with a sarcastic squint. “Yes, sir! Right away, sir!” He offered a crisp salute with one tentacle. “As you command, so shall it be done.”

“Knock it off,” she said.

He sputtered, rotated thirty degrees to the right, and focused on one of the masks staring back at him.

Peter-thing approached. When the misshapen host moved to one side, Chuck was revealed.

“New guest. Chuck, this Diana. Apartment Five. Diana, this Chuck—”

“Apartment Two,” she interrupted. “We’ve met.”

Peter-thing clicked his fangs together. “Chuck brings pie.”

“Just a little something I whipped up,” said Chuck.

“Pie good.”

Peter-thing was scant moments away from devouring the gift when Stacey snatched it from his hands. “Now, dear. Leave something for our guests.”

The creature glared, baring his terrible teeth, flexing his long, claw-tipped fingers.

She rapped him on the knuckles with a wooden spoon. “We still have leftover carrot cake in the refrigerator. Have some of that.”

“Did someone mention carrot cake?” asked Vom from the kitchen, already opening the refrigerator. Peter-thing dashed off to scrap with the other monsters for his piece.

“I’m sorry about those guys,” said Diana.

“Oh, they’re no bother,” said Stacey with her unflappable June Cleaver smile. “It’s just nice to have company.”

She went over to try to keep order among the monsters. If anyone could, Diana figured, it would be Stacey. Chuck sat on one end of the couch.

“Hello,” said Zap, waving a tentacle.

Chuck nodded. “Hi.”

“So, some mixer,” said Diana, without any thought behind the statement. Just something to say.

“Yeah,” he replied in his own vague manner.

She opened her mouth, but then shut it. She was about to comment about his evil puppy dog and how it had let him out again, but she assumed he was probably tired of talking about that.

Small talk proved difficult. Every subject seemed either inane or absurd. The problem with being trapped in an abnormal situation, even with company, was that there was no normality to seize hold of to balance things out. A harmless topic was hard to find.

“Seen any good movies lately?” she asked.

“No. Dog won’t usually allow me out of the apartment that long, and my TV only picks up Hanna-Barbera cartoons.”

“Oh. Well, Scooby-Doo can be fun.”

“Don’t get Scooby-Doo,” he said with a sour frown.

“Flintstones?”

He shook his head.

“Yogi Bear?” she tried. “Hong Kong Phooey? Captain Caveman? Squiddly Diddly?”

“No. None of those either.” He half-smiled at her. “I don’t think I’ve met anyone who was such a Hanna-Barbera fan.”

“I have this tendency to remember unnecessary trivia,” she replied. “And yes, I do realize that unnecessary trivia is a redundant phrase. But some bits of trivia are more unnecessary than others, and I assume that knowing nearly every Hanna-Barbera character ever created is probably in the more unnecessary category.”

He laughed.

“Well, what do you get?” she asked.

“It varies. Mostly Galaxy Trio reruns and the occasional Speed Buggy episode. Sometimes, if the planets are in just the right alignment, Fangface comes in.”

“Fangface was a Ruby-Spears production,” said Diana. “Not Hanna-Barbera.”

“Boy, you weren’t kidding about the unnecessary trivia, were you?”

“Everybody’s got a talent.”

“Just do me a favor,” he said. “Don’t tell my TV that. Fangface may not be great, but I’d hate to lose it.”

She put a finger to her lips. “Mum’s the word.”

“I was always partial to Grape Ape,” said Zap.

The invisible voice spoke up behind her. “I think it’s criminal that Wait Till Your Father Gets Home is all but forgotten.”

She jumped. It wasn’t a big reaction, but Chuck noticed.

“That’s just Keith,” said Chuck. “He doesn’t exist.”

“So ILve been told.”

He tapped his temple with his finger. “It helps not to think about it too much.”

She imitated the gesture. “Can do.”

They shared a smile. Diana wasn’t given to romantic fantasies, but she felt a connection, a spark. She noticed it because she’d so rarely come across it before. They had something going on here. Something undefined, but promising.

Vom came over and plopped onto the sofa between Diana and Chuck, ruining the moment.

“So what are you two crazy kids up to over here?” he asked.

“Flirting, I think,” said Zap. “Fascinating ritual, really. I’m not familiar with how the custom proceeds, but I believe they were about to engage in intercourse.”

“By all means,” said Vom, “carry on. Didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“Actually,” said Smorgaz, “mating usually only proceeds when the female has been properly inebriated to levels that impair her judgment without imminent threat of inducing vomiting.”

Chuck excused himself to go to the bathroom.

“Thanks a lot, guys,” said Diana.

“Did we do something wrong?” asked Vom.

“Forget it. It’s no big deal.”

She caught Zap staring at her again. He folded his tentacles and turned his giant eye toward the ceiling.

Stacey and Peter-thing came over with a plate of cucumber sandwiches.

“Everyone behaving over here?” asked Stacey with her warm smile.

“Snack snack,” said Peter-thing.

“Don’t mind if I do.” Vom grabbed two handfuls and devoured them in one gulp. There was one left, and he gently plucked it from the tray and, with one furry green pinky out, moved it toward his mouth. “Uh… anyone want this last one?” he asked.

Nobody did.

“Delicious,” he said. “Absolutely delightful. You must give me the recipe.”

“It’s an old family secret,” said Stacey. “My lips are sealed.”

“Cucumbers and mayonnaise,” said Peter-thing. She wagged her finger at him, and he recoiled.

“Now, Peter, why would you do such a terrible thing. I don’t think I’ll ever forgive you.”

Peter-thing pouted. His large, red eyes welled up with tears.

“Sorrrrryyyyyy.”

“Oh, you know I can never

Grinning, he leaned forward, and Diana assumed he was about to bite her head off. Instead, they kissed, and the batthing switched hosts as their lips touched.

Despite all efforts not to think about it, Diana wondered how the couple managed sex. She could imagine it, but managed, through sheer willpower, not to dwell on the images that went through her head.

“You’ll excuse us,” said Peter.

When Stacey-thing turned around, he slapped her rump. The thing jumped hosts again, and Stacey giggled.

“Oh, Peter, you naughty boy.”

Diana smiled. The couple weirded her out, but they were also kind of sweet at the same time. Take away the bat-creature one of them always had to be, and they probably had the best relationship she’d seen in a long while. They seemed to enjoy each other’s company and were making the best of a tough situation. There was something special about that. Weird, but special.

She got up and caught Chuck as he came out of the bathroom.

“Hey, sorry about the monsters,” she said. “Don’t worry about it. You get used to that sort of thing around here. And you can’t really blame them for getting confused about how our reality works. Hell, I was born here, and I’m still figuring it out.”

He ran his hand through his hair, and a few strands fell across his forehead, cementing forever his resemblance to Superman for her. She’d always loved Superman. Never been a fan of the bad boy. The rock-solid, dependable good guy was underrated.

She caught herself staring into his brown eyes. They twinkled.

“You want to grab a drink?” she asked. “I hear Peter is a superb mixologist.”

“Don’t mind if I do.”

Bowing, he indicated he’d follow her, and when they walked he put his hand on her back. Not too high. Not too low. Just the right spot to indicate friendliness without familiarity.

You could keep Batman, she decided. She’d take the Boy Scout any day.