Part 4 of "Devil Plays Mr. Darcy" (P&P modern comedy retelling) -- The Party Crashes & Burns
All it took was one unexpected martini shower to flip the whole world around on its axis, then everything began colliding all at once.
[If you're new to this series, please read these first to catch up quick:]
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Ben swooped in to grab a hold of the party's most-eligible-dripping bachelor before he could retaliate against Linda, which seemed like a good idea since the alcohol-drenched "victim" had so much virtual smoke coming out of his ears that he looked as if he could steam himself dry.
Yet even if Ben hadn't grabbed his arm behind his back as a precautionary measure, the humiliated James Bond impersonator did not feel like striking back just yet.
In fact, this gloomy Darcy understudy was suddenly overwhelmed with visions of Linda in nothing but a skimpy, tight black-leather outfit with a whip in her hand like the dominatrix of his dreams, making him doubly annoyed with himself now that he realized he had insulted her far beyond the brink of any future reconciliation. And he hated Linda all the more for trapping him in a way that he never had been before.
He wracked his brain for submissive tactics, anything he could say or do to pacify her long enough for him to at least say his name or get her phone number. But the problem was that he'd never been submissive to any woman in his life, which is why his brain came up with nothing whatsoever to help his doomed cause.
"All right everybody, let's take it down a couple of notches," Ben piped up, but his voice was drowned out by the sudden eruption of music from the DJ who had just set up across the room.
"Come and dance with me, Dan," Carrie chirped as she cat-walked up to his side trying to pull him out. "What happened to your face? Here," She said, giving him a napkin to wipe off the traces of martini he'd forgotten about from his face.
"Leave it! You know I don't dance," Dan grumbled to Carrie, not wanting to give the impression that she was his girlfriend. He hastily wiped his face and looked back up at Linda, who by now was shocked to see Brad coming up to them and saying the unbelievable:
"I'm so glad you guys finally met each other! Linda, this is my best friend Dan. You know, Linda, the director was telling me that he never saw someone with so much potential to play Lizzie like you can. Don't you think she's perfect for the part, Dan?"
Dan half-nodded, speeechless.
"Oh, well do tell me why you agree, Dan," Linda countered with a challenging look. "You know, Brad, you're buddy Dan here was just telling me how he thinks-"
"How I think that it's so hard to find someone to play the part of Elizabeth well enough these days. It's such a well-misunderstood part," Dan interrupted.
"Since you sound like you must understand Elizabeth's part better than anyone, I guess it's a shame that you can't play it," Linda teased.
"You see what I mean?" Brad laughed. "Oh, me and Janice were just thinking of inviting you guys to go out with us to a movie this weekend."
Linda stood stupefied.
Dan couldn't decide whether to tell his friend to shut up -- or go with it on the remote chance that Linda might turn out to actually be a wildcat in bed -- if he ever got that far. He thus remained silent.
"What a great idea! Let's all go together," Carrie chimed in.
"Yeah, why don't you guys just go ahead? I'd rather work on memorizing my lines anyway, you know, since I have such a deeply misunderstood part that's so challenging to play and all," Linda answered.
"Oh, ok Linda. Well, maybe next time then," Carrie twittered back in mock sympathy. She then turned to make eyes at Dan as if she was inviting him back already to join her in the Playboy palace she lived in.
Janice and Linda exchanged glances of amazement at Carrie's reaction like:
Linda couldn't imagine how things could get any more awkward ... until she caught a glimpse of someone out of the corner of her eye go running through the crowd of dancing people who should never have been there!
"No! Um, Janice, come with me. She's here," Linda said, pulling Janice away as she dashed off toward the back of the house.
Linda pushed her way through the people frantically with Janice in tow. What they saw once they got out back horrified them both.
Their 15-year-old little sister Lily had crashed the party and fell into the swimming pool outside while trying to impress a random, hot stranger.
They ran over to her, and by the time they were pulling her out of the water, they overheard her saying to her male spectator:
"You should see how fast I swim with my mono-fin! I'm like a super mermaid. I could beat both Michael Phelps and a great white shark in the ocean. Put me down, Lindy! He wants to see me swim now!"
"What in the hell are you on now?" Lindy snapped at her.
"Oh, calm down. You know I can't drive yet - I just took an Uber. And besides, a little ecstasy never hurt anyone. Don't act like you've never tried it before," Lily grinned.
"We've got to get her home NOW before anyone else sees her." Linda said to Janice.
"I'll get the car and send Ben out to help," Janice offered before running off.
"How did you find this place?" Linda asked her little "tripping" sister.
"Haha - I'm not as dumb as you thought, am I?" Lily laughed.
"How?!!"
"Well, I saw Ben's tweet, and the rest was easy with a little Googling."
"Mom is going to kill you, if I don't kill you before we get home."
"Hey, loosen up. What are you trying to do? Put me in handcuffs you don't even have? Oh my God, that would be so funny if you did have hand cuffs, and then I could have brought them here and locked you up when you tried to take me home!"
"Would you shut up? You're practically yelling!"
"Handcuffs, handcuffs! Linda forgot her handcuffs at home, everybody!" Lily sang out as loud as she could.
"What's that about handcuffs?" a surprised voice spoke behind Linda. She twisted her head around to see Dan looking at her with raised eyebrows.
"Nothing. Why don't you go back inside and enjoy the party like a normal human being?" Linda barked at him.
"Oooh, Linda made a new friend! And he's hot too! What's your name?" Lily asked.
"Shut it!" Linda hissed, trying to restrain Lily before she jumped onto Dan.
"I'm Dan. And you are?"
"I'm Lily, her sister. She would keep me locked in a cage at home if she could, but that's just SO inhumane, don't you think, Dan? Can I call you Danny? Or do you prefer Dan?" Lily perkily answered.
Ben finally came running up with a towel and threw it around Lily.
"What are you doing here, my little ray of fabulous?" Ben asked.
"Linda never thinks I'm fabulous. She's a 100%-pure killjoy. I think that's why she can't get boyfriends," Lily laughed.
"That's it! We're going!!" Linda yelled, pulling Lily hard. "Ben, if you don't help me with her, then I'm going to kill you too."
"Alright, alright!" Ben agreed, and together they led her around the yard to the front of the house to avoid being seen.
Dan was left behind standing next to the pool, forgotten by all of them except Lily, who couldn't stop talking about him the whole ride home.
"Oh my God, Linda! Did you get Dan's number?" she kept asking from the backseat.
"For the 10th time, No!"
Ben whispered to Lily as he sat next to her, trying to occupy her attention, "But he sure was 50 shades of sexy, wasn't he?"
"He wanted to know more about the handcuffs that Linda doesn't really have!" Lily giggled.
"Let's just get one thing straight once and for all: Dan is the most arrogant, two-faced, scum-sucking piece of crap excuse for a guy that ever walked this earth! And I don't care who he's friends with. If he acts like a friend, he's just pretending. Brad must be too good to notice, but Dan doesn't deserve to be his friend," Linda proclaimed from the passenger seat, surprising Janice so much that she nearly missed their exit off of the highway.
"What do you mean?" Janice asked.
"Before you all came up to us, I was just trying to make polite conversation with him. I was all smiles. And you know what his response was? He thinks that you only got the part opposite Brad because we staged the accident. AND he thinks that I slept with the director to get cast as Lizzie! Then he told me to leave him alone because he's just 'not interested,' like I'm the freakin' neighborhood slut!"
"He did what?!" Ben exclaimed.
"Oh yeah. Why did you think I threw that martini in his face?"
"You didn't!" Lily shrieked, exploding into laughter. "The only really hot guy who's looked at you in like 2 years is playing a little hard to get, and you dissed him with a MARTINI to the FACE?! And you think I'm the one who's dumb? Seriously?"
"But if he's really Brad's friend, then please try not to fight with him, OK? I really like Brad, and ..." Janice worried aloud.
"I know; I know. It's only for your sake that I didn't hit him in the face with my purse when he started talking to Lily by the pool," Linda remarked.
“That rat bastard!" Ben called out. "What the hell is wrong with him? I picked out the best outfit for you. No trust me, you look like you could be Keira Knightley’s fine younger sister in that skirt. No straight man in his right mind would have insulted you like this! And I tried hitting on him too! You know what his problem is?"
"He's asexual? Because no gender is good enough for him?" Linda guessed.
"Oh no, he’s not asexual or too good to be here. I think the man is straight-up ANTI-sexual.”
They all laughed.
“What?! How can anybody be anti-sexual? Do you think he was born without sexual organs or something?” Linda joked.
“Maybe he’s planning on being a priest, or a satanic cult leader. Well, let him go find another woman to sacrifice at his next ritual then. Who needs him?” Ben concluded.
So it was settled between them all that to date a man like Dan would be the worst curse possible for any woman, or man, for that matter. Their minds remained so unanimous in this decision that they all dreaded seeing him again at the first rehearsal.
And despite all that, when Linda and Cherise were the first ones to show up at the script read-through on Monday afternoon, they were supremely annoyed when it was none other than Dan who decided to sit directly behind them.
{To be continued...}
Thanks for reading, and please let me know what you all think so far. I'd also love to start a FanFiction tag. Anyone else interested?
Updated Feb. 13, 2018:
The next chapter will come out here on Steemit on Feb. 16, 2018. Normally, I'd post following installations every 3 days, but I need some time to brainstorm about the direction I want to take in the next one.
Plus, I need more feedback from you all! Please tell me what you like so far.
If you could change one thing about it, what is it?
I'm also thinking about starting a GifStory hashtag on Steemit to support other fiction writers who want to illustrate their stuff with gifs and share our work together. Anybody interested?
***Updated Feb. 16 ***
Keep reading...
Chapter 5: The Devil's Read-through Hell - A contest where you guess what's next to win Steem!