Uriel walks into the kitchen and finds his father dicing yellow bell peppers. When he sees his father, Uriel begins to perspire. This happens every time he needs to ask Zaphiel advice. He takes a quick deep breath, but before he can address his father, Zaphiel addresses him. "Hey man!" His father sings, still dicing the pepper. "Hi Dad," he says. Zaphiel knowingly asks to know what is wrong, "Uriel," he pauses then turns "What's up?" Then he tightens up his face waiting for his son to confess some wrong doing - or maybe ask for money - or something out of the usual conversation.

"So this girl wants me to go to this party with her."

"Yeeees?" Zaphiel asks, urging him to the point.

"Well she's really hot and I just don't know if she is serious or what!"

"Well has she ever been mean to you before?"

"No."

"Do you think she dislikes you?"

"No."

"Have you ever caught her looking at your mouth?"

"What!?" Uriel shakes his head.

"Never mind. Let me tell you a story boy." They walk to the dinning room and sit across from each other, at the table.

"When I turned eighteen I had lived in the City for four months and was old enough to go. I went to a lot of Goth clubs, at first, never dancing - only watching the pale skin, delicate lace, and cold metal reflecting blue, green, and magenta. The girls moved like fluid, some of the guys did too. I took up smoking as an excuse to stand outside and talk; I had smoked in high school, but scarcely. In the Goth clubs I learned how much a smoke could be a fashion accessory, I learned to use matches to prolong my time with kids who needed a light, I quoted Pulp to some of the girls, I drank in the parking lot; I met a lot of girls and never saw them again - it was not much different than high school."

"So?" Uriel shakes his head. "She isn't asking me to a Goth club--"

"I'm getting there!" Zaphiel places his left elbow on the table and brings his head down scratching above his ear where the gray has begun to dominate. Uriel takes this as a sign of frustration and as a sign to listen.

"I started going to a sort of rock fusion club. They played 1960's and 1980's Mod, they played Glam Rock, they played dark wave; they played all sort's of music that I found myself dancing to. I came to find that I knew how to dance - I don't know where I picked it up, but I was good. I found that I didn't need to try and talk to people anymore, they came to me. I made a lot of new friends and found that some of my other friends -- my neighbor Charlotte, an ex-coworker, Dan, who insisted on being called Piggy, and Claire's ex-room mates, Wendy and Lisa -- had been going to the same club for a while.

"I met a girl whose name I do not remember. She was attractive, but more in the general sense than the 'Wow, I want to talk to her' sense. She had fire-engine-red hair just past her shoulders. She loved dancing and singing on the dance floor, so when she wanted to go outside for a smoke, I gladly went.

'I'll meet you outside.'

"I looked at her with a question on my forehead.

'Gonna grab a drink!' She clarified. 'I'll grab you one too.'

"Outside I ran into Piggy. 'Hey Piggy!' I said. He said hi by raising his chin. 'Have you requested anything?' Piggy was not the best at starting conversations. 'Naw, they're playing good stuff... I gotta pee.' And as he walked into the club, out came my new friend. Her red hair was swaying behind her. She knew I was looking at her, though I think she got the wrong idea because, she bit her lower lip, letting it slide free slowly. I tried to think of something to say, something about another girl, to stop this before I had to flat out say no. I knew I wouldn't, and that I probably wouldn't do it again sober. But there she was in my face with a Cosmo.

'There you go! A pretty drink, for a pretty boy!' She smiled.

'Thanks. You know...' I took a drink for time to think, it was a long drink, and not helpful. '...They make a good Cosmo here.' I smiled raising my cocktail glass.

'Yeah they do!' She said squeezing the lime wedge into her drink. 'I know a place that you would really like Zaphiel. What do you say?'

'Okay! I should find my friends first, see if they're okay...'

'There they are.' She waved bouncing in her heels. 'Hey, we're leaving!'

"I remember getting into her car. I remember her putting on For Your Pleasure, by Roxy Music. I remember her skipping the first track. I remember waiting at a stop light during the intro of Beauty Queen and taking off just as the song picked up. That's when things became hazy -- someone spiked my drink, and it wasn't the bartender.

"We went to an after-hours club, or party, or something; I am not sure. I had not eaten and I'd been drinking, so the drug hit me pretty hard. I remember being in a dark low ceilinged room, the music was fast -- maybe jungle -- there were black lights setting the walls on fire. Lime green and magenta swirled. 'This is the sort of place trippers go,' I thought. Girls with glitter on their faces jumped with bobbing pigtails beside me, while on the other side two gay boys exchanged saliva. Behind me, the hands of my Judas, untucked my shirt just enough, so that she could reach the bottom button. She undid the last three buttons and caressed the hem of my boxer-briefs. After that I vaguely remember meeting another girl with short bleached hair and lots of piercings, I also remember a fast food drive-thru, and the two girls putting something up their noses inside of a painfully bright bedroom.

"I awoke to blinding sunrays filtering though vertical blinds. My redheaded captor was nowhere in sight, though I was sure I was in her room. A petite girl passed by the open door. Skin like ivory and underwear to match. Her hair was cut in a short bob with sort bangs -- typical of the times but some how with extra bounce and shine. I wanted to get up and talk to her; I wanted to find out everything about her, I wanted to feel her cheeks with the backs of my fingernails. I wanted to know her name. But I was bound to the bed, so my head fell back to the pillow and I was asleep again.

"The second time I awoke was both better and worse. Without the creamy skin to distract me, my headache was more apparent, though, I was able to move. I arched my back with my arms above my head until they reached the frame of the bed. Though my eyes had been open for some time I had not noticed the emptiness of the room; it was then that I realized the bareness of the walls. Aside from the bed and stool where my clothes hung, the room was empty. The white walls were so clean that they just might have been freshly painted. The carpet had been vacuumed so recently that some of the stripes still remained. As I stepped out of the bed the clean carpet felt like a massage on my sore feet. The movment of getting dressed was too much for my head to bear, I tried again, this time sitting on the bed - it wasn't much help.

"I walked into a connecting bathroom, quickly turning on the cold water to rinse off the stickiness that masked my face. The icy water was like a baptism for all the sins I might have committed the night before; it made me feel a bit more like myself. I reached to my left for a towel but none hung on the rack. With wet hands I looked through the cupboards and medicine cabinet for mouthwash. But like the bedroom, they were empty.

"As I walked out of the room water dripped from my hands. I tried to think of what to say to the redhead, thoughts running through my head faster than I could process them. I mean just about every thought possible - from 'Fuck you!' to 'Good morning.'

I walked into a dining area, next to a kitchen. To my right was the living room, separated only by the loveseat. There was a bar stretching towards me which separated the kitchen from the living room. At the bar was the girl in the underwear; unfortunatly she had found some clothes.

'Well look who's awake!'

'Hi,' I said. 'You think I could I use the phone?'

'Sure, are you okay?'

'I am a little hung-over. I think your sister put something in my drink last night.'

'She's not my sister, she was my roommate; she moved out yesterday, strange she brought you here. You should probably have a drink!' She smiled pulling out the barstool next to her. I smiled back at her. And with her lips moving back to their pouty fullness, she said, 'No, I'm serious.' She was nodding so lightly that I couldn't see her moving, but her hair was bouncing away from her jaw, letting me see where it turned up to her ear.

'Do you like tequila?' She asked.

'No.' I said.

'Neither do I, but it is all we have and it's the perfect remedy! You know if you're ever sick, you can take a shot of tequila and bundle your self up in blankets - you'll sweat that sickness right out!' She turned around to the counter and mixed me a drink. I didn't know what she was giving me, but it didn't matter. Her tee shirt was short enough that I could see the arch of her back. It was so, well, arched! Her spine went in and I thought my fingertips could fit so perfectly there.

"She was holding a tall glass filled with something red, 'Have you ever had a Bloody Mary?' She asked.

'Yeah,' I answered remembering the spicy Tabasco, and the fresh celery - the celery sounded nice. 'They're okay.'

'Well this is kind like a Bloody, only without the celery, and without& actually its just V8 and Tequila. Drink it fast, it's not very good.'

'Thank you,' I said, taking the glass as she put it on the bar; I hoped to feel her hand as I did it. It looked so soft and smooth, and somehow her chewed-up thumbnail was endearing. She came around to the bar, leaning on her left arm. I drank the imitation Bloody Mary as she said. It was thick and I could feel the vegetable fibers pass over my tongue. The cold tonic coated the walls of my empty stomach before settling.