They surely seem to be taking their own sweet time about getting here", Mom noticed. "It's been what? Two hours?" More like 25 minutes, I thought, but I knew what Mom was saying. Where were they?

Still, could have been worse. A lot worse. Mr. Abrahmsen had family. And the family had friends.And the friends had family. And people kept on pulling in more people, until any crazies coming in to this place would have found themselves seriously outnumbered.

"Meg? That's your name? Do you mind if I call you Megadeth?", asked an acne encrusted 17 year old boy. As always, he was clad in a "Sisters of Mercy" t-shirt so badly tattered through the years as to threaten to break loose and reveal far more of young Bernard Ahrahmsen than any girl would have wished to see. "Yes, Barnacle, I would mind very much. Tell me, how long do you plan on wearing that t-shirt?" "As long as the sisters go on being effing rad!", he yelled, spinning into a air guitar riff before his uncle took him down, hitting the base of his skull with a slap delivered with such precision and expertise as could only have come from years of practice. "Does he know it's 2010?", I asked Mr. Abrahmsen. "I'm not even sure that he knows he's on the floor", Lev replied, as his nephew started bouncing spasmodically to music that, blessedly, only he could hear, spinning on his back like a turtle.

"A mutant ninja turtle!", he cried, looking in my eyes and smiling. How did he ...? Forget it. The bad news was good news? So many people had turned up to be there with us, that this had been the first party I'd been to in since forever, and if spazoid needed his ritalin, who could blame him? This was probably the biggest day in his young life.

"Meg, go mingle." OK ... I started to say before Mom added, "Yes, Meggulah, go mingle. Have fun." "With the Manson twins downstairs?", I wondered, by why not? The furniture was back up against the door, the place was packed with friendlies, and a few of Mr. Abrahmsen's ... "Lev's", he had corrected me ... fine, Lev's buddies from the force were out standing watch. Which looked cool, but ...

"Why don't you just go out and bust those guys?", I asked.

"Because we're about 100 feet outside of our own precinct, sweetie. Downtown doesn't like it when we go stepping on toes like that, wouldn't be a good career move."

OK, fine. I guess nobody was going to get me here, and streets rolled up the way they were tonight, I didn't have a better place to be. Neither did Mom, who was frozen in eye lock with Lev Abhramsen, talking about something - what, I couldn't hear. Not that I wanted to. There were boys, real boys in their 20s. Real possibilities, so as the belle at this particular ball, had to be grabbed by some old guy who had more questions than sense. "Meg, I was just wondering ..."

"What soap was for?", I thought, too much the good girl to say this.

"... if the guy ... what was his name?"

"Guys. Jack and John."

"OK, the guys gave you any idea of what they were thinking about? Why are they here? If we could get into their heads, maybe we'd known what to expect and be ready for them?"

"If you could get into their heads, I don't think you'd survive the experience. At least, not as yourselves."

"I'm confused".

"You're not alone. I tried talking to Jack, and it wasn't just the crazy things he said, it was the crazy way he'd say them. Like he couldn't remember his own words, 10 minutes later, and then an hour would pass, and he'd remember them again and think he'd just said them. Then he's forget them again, completely, and remember something else he had said an hour and a half before. It was like he wasn't even one guy, one real guy, but a hundred different bad actors playing the same badly acted role, without being able to get a good look at the script. Me get into his head? I don't think that even he has managed to get into his head. I have no idea of what's going on in there."

"Sorry about ... You mentioned a John?"

"I'll guess that I did. Nobody there. Total blankness. Doesn't have the initiative to flip a light switch."

"Yet there he is, down there."

"I know. That's what's creeping me out. It's what's creeping Mom out. None of this is right. Honest, I've got nothing. No idea."

Hands in the air, I must have looked a little crazy, myself, because grandpa excused himself quickly. Without having introduced himself in the first place? Who was I talking to? What was that?

Oh. Right. Off duty cops. Maybe we were going to finally see some action. Not that I was counting on it.