as she stomped back and forth, her soft, round buttocks flexing under her long-johns.

On the night that Alan and Natalie put the first coat of paint on the wall, Mimi came down in a little baby-doll dress, thigh-high striped tights, and chunky shoes, her face painted with swaths of glitter.

“You look wonderful, baby,” Natalie told her as she emerged onto the porch. “Going out?”

“Going to the club,” she said. “DJ None Of Your Fucking Business is spinning and Krishna’s going to get me in for free.”

“Dance music,” Link said disgustedly. Then, to Alan, “You know this stuff? It’s not playing music, it’s playing records. Snore.”

“Sounds interesting,” Alan said. “Do you have any of it I could listen to? A CD or some MP3s?”

“Oh, that’s not how you listen to this stuff,” Natalie said. “You have to go to a club and dance.”

“Really?” Alan said. “Do I have to take ecstasy, or is that optional?”

“It’s mandatory,” Mimi said, the first words she’d spoken to him all week. “Great fistfuls of E, and then you have to consume two pounds of candy necklaces at an after-hours orgy.”

“Not really,” Natalie said, sotto voce. “But you do have to dance. You should go with, uh, Mimi, to the club. DJ None Of Your Fucking Business is amazing.”

“I don’t think Mimi wants company,” Alan said.

“What makes you say that?” Mimi said, making a dare of it with hipshot body language. “Get changed and we’ll go together. You’ll have to pay to get in, though.”

Link and Natalie exchanged a raised eyebrow, but Alan was already headed for his place, fumbling for his keys. He bounded up the stairs, swiped a washcloth over his face, threw on a pair of old cargo pants and a faded Steel Pole Bathtub T-shirt he’d bought from a head-shop one day because he liked the words’ incongruity, though he’d never heard the band, added a faded jean jacket and a pair of high-tech sneakers, grabbed his phone, and bounded back down the stairs. He was convinced that Mimi would be long gone by the time he got back out front, but she was still there, the stripes in her stockings glowing in the slanting light.

“Retro chic,” she said, and laughed nastily. Natalie gave him a thumbs up and a smile that Alan 

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