I tried not to show how startled I was at the voice, but jumping three feet in the air probably didn’t help my case at all.  Pressing my back against the door, my free hand, the one not holding my heels, snaked behind me and grabbed the door knob.  Never know when you’ll have to make a quick exit.  “I—no. No one.  Just not really a party kind of girl.”  Whoever this guy was, he was sitting in the dark, window open, the fresh air diluting the smell of the cigarette he was smoking.  He took another drag, the cherry briefly illuminating his face as he did.  “Who are you hiding from?  Or do you always just go to parties to sit in the dark by yourself?”  One lesson Dee had taught me since they’d been in LA.  Always ask questions, because people tend to be too busy answering to ask any themselves.  Also, most of the people out here loved to talk about themselves, and once you got them going, just nod or make some kind of affirmative sound every so often and you’re gold.

Eyes slowly adjusting to the darkness, I was able to see his arm snake out, flicking on the lap next to him, forced to squint as my eyes were being forced to readjust yet again.  It didn’t take as long this time, and I finally got a good look at this man of mystery, so to speak.  Even sitting down, I could see he was long and lanky, his feet kicked up on another chair, shaggy blond hair that near covered his eyes, his mouth smirking in obvious amusement, probably because I looked a damn fool.

“I just always go to parties to sit in the dark by myself.  You gonna sit down and stay awhile, or go back out to who you’re not hiding from?”  He dropped his feet down off the chair, shaking his hair back and and looking up at me like he knew what my answer would be before he even asked.  There was something in the way he looked at me, like he was taking an x-ray of me, seeing through the silly dress and the make up and the hair that was already starting to fall apart from the perfection Dee had style it to before we left.  I decided to take on the unknown evil over the known and slid into the seat his feet had vacated, after first very primly dusting it off.  It wouldn’t hurt to wait a few minutes before venturing out again and, despite the tattoo’s covering both arms, he seemed harmless.  Plus, I had mace.

“So, what’s the point in coming to these things if you’re just going to hide away like this?” I asked, after a slightly uncomfortable silence during which he stared at my legs for longer than was decent.

He shifted in his chair, taking one last drag on his cigarette before dropping it into a near-empty bottle of beer he had sitting on the windowsill.  Taking his time, he reached down next to him and pulled a fresh drink from the six-pack sitting on the floor, twisting it open.  “Probably the same reason you’re here,” he said finally, after a long drink.  “Someone made me.”