Author's note: Each story in this series is complete and separate, with no plot or characters in common with the others. Only one thin thread connects them.
Many thanks to author/editor
HMAuthor
for first editing and improving this story and to editor extraordinaire and fledgling author
LovelyAnon
for later fixes and suggestions that challenged me to do better.
Legendary author/editor/organizer
BlackRandi
was kind enough to go through it and find even more problems that needed fixing, despite obligations that would have made even an unselfish mortal bow out.
Peter is in outer space, and his orbit widens.
As the DJ builds the mix to frenzy level, everyone is dancing wildly. His friends are blurred in a haze of drugs and booze. He feels as though his feet have detached from his body and are circling around him, his friends and everyone in the club.
As he looks around, he sees a group of beautiful girls dancing together. They are all holding up their phones, taking selfies. One is breathtaking. She is the most beautiful of them all, the most beautiful girl in the club.
He reaches into his pocket, pulls out his iPhone, and raises it above his head. He feels as though his arm is a pole and he is dancing around it. His orbit moves him closer to the beautiful girls and the one who is the fairest of them all.
Peter nears her and jumps high in the air. As she raises her phone to take another photo, it happens. He reaches out and their phones touch.
Bump!
She is startled and looks confused at first. Then her face registers anger. She stops dancing and starts walking toward him, but he is in another orbit now, and he's forgotten her.
She puts herself directly in his path several times, but he never engages with her again. She shouts at him, but he doesn't hear her over the music.
For a while, she stands and glares at him, and then she turns and looks for her friends.
**************
The next day is Sunday, and Peter wakes up at three in the afternoon, after sleeping nearly twelve hours. He remembers nothing of Saturday night, as usual. Saturday night is for frying his brain. Sunday is for coming down. Monday is for going back to work in the research department of the large investment banking company, twelve- to fourteen-hour days until Friday night, when he begins another two days of swallowing and dancing.
He's bumped a lot of beautiful girls on Friday and Saturday nights. Even though the touching of phones exchanges contact information, he rarely calls or messages any of them.
The ones he does call are usually happy to share their bodies and drugs with a fellow weekend wildie, who means as little to them as they do to him. The trouble is that when he looks at the new contacts at lunch on Monday, he rarely has any idea who they are. Some weeks, he doesn't even look at them. They remain in his growing contact list, untouched.
**************
Two weeks later, on a Wednesday afternoon, Peter's cell phone rang: Mira Barton. He didn't recognize the name, figured it was a mistake and ignored it.
The same person called back fifteen minutes later and every ten minutes after that. He was busy with some important calculations, but finally picked up the call and in the fake officious voice he used when he was irritated, he said, "Yes, Mira, how may I help you?"
"Is this Peter Madison?" asked a pleasant voice.
"You know that already, Mira."
"I just wanted to make sure. Peter, I need to meet you tomorrow for lunch."
"But I don't know you, Mira. You sound very nice, and I'm sure if I ever met you, I'd love to ask you to lunch. Tomorrow happens to be a busy day for me."
"I know you don't know me, Peter," she replied in her same pleasant voice, "but that didn't stop you from raping me a few weeks ago."
She paused to let her statement sink in.
"If you don't want any trouble, you better be at the Denny's across the street from your office at one tomorrow."
"Wait a second! What is this?"
"I've got to go now," she said. "If you aren't there tomorrow, you'll be sorry. I know where you live and where you work."
Peter was starting to burn, but he kept up his fake politeness.
"Sorry, Mira, but I don't believe you."
She blurted out his home address and work phone number and hung up.
**************
Peter was certain he didn't rape anyone, but he was nervous because of those Sunday mornings when he couldn't remember the night before. He often didn't know where he'd been or how he got home.
When he asked his friends if he had done anything stupid, they always laughed and told him that when he was high, he was totally helpless and incapable of doing anything except smiling idiotically, dancing or wandering aimlessly.
He would never force himself on a woman. The thought was repugnant to him. She certainly didn't sound angry, just insistent. Something was fishy.
The next day, he arrived at Denny's ten minutes before one and sat at a table in a corner as far from everyone else as he could. A few minutes later, a stunning brunette entered the restaurant, looked around, headed straight for him and sat down across the table. She gave him a quick smile, followed by a serious expression.
"Mira?" he asked.
"What did you say?"