ADVENTURES AT THE BLAKE ESTATE PART ONE

Neil's car arrived promptly at eight o' clock. A man in a black suit got out from the driver seat and opened the door for me. I threw my green duffel bag into the back seat and got in after it. The man shut the door and we were off.

Last night had been rough. I had spent half an hour telling Grandma that I didn't need a pedicure. Then I spent another hour convincing her that I didn't need birth control. She argued that if I was going to sleep with this boy, I better not get pregnant, because she hadn't approved him as a father to her great-grandchildren. I told her over and over again that I (or Neil, for that matter) wasn't like that. I wasn't sure if she believed me, but she gave up around ten at night.

So then I called Adam and asked him to help me. I wasn't sure what he could do, but he knew my secret and could come too. As Neil's childhood friend, it wouldn't have been too bad if he invited himself. Apparently though, Adam's influence wasn't as strong in the real world, and he said he was already doing me enough favors by letting me off work for an undetermined amount of time.

"Undetermined?" I repeated. "But I'll only be gone for a day."

Adam laughed and hung up.

At nine, the car pulled into a tree lined drive. Through the palm trees, I could see a wide, open, and well manicured lawn, and then, as we came around a slight bend, a magnificent house with so many windows that I could see the white beach on the other side.

"Amazing" I think I said, because the driver chuckled as we pulled around the circle drive. As I got out of the car, I was hit by a light spray of water from the tall fountain. It was so beautiful.

I walked up to the white double doors and raised my hand to ring the doorbell when they sprang apart. A girl whose beauty put the house to shame stood in the doorway, and could only be Neil's sister. She had his same dark brown hair and the same blue eyes and wore a lacy white dress and several heavy gold necklaces. She looked so sweet and innocent that I felt a strong desire to have her as a little sister.

"You must be Ishtar." I remembered Neil calling her that. "I'm Ethan, Neil's friend."

"Oh, yes." Ishtar said, sounding slightly flustered. Maybe they didn't get company much. "Come in."

Inside the house, it looked as if a genius interior designer with a fetish for plants had arranged the whole place. There wasn't a single book out of place and no clutter to be found. I couldn't help but wonder if anyone really lived here.

"Where's Neil?" I asked.

"Probably the second basement." Ishtar answered. "I'll take you there."

On our way through the beach house, I couldn't help but wonder why every said that the Blake family was crazy. Neil was almost mundanely normal, and, though Butterfly had his quirks, he wasn't that bad. Ishtar, too, seemed pretty normal.

I was thinking that maybe the rest of the family would be just as ordinary, when a vase flew through the air, straight at Ishtar. I could only think about saving her beautiful face--it was just so perfect, and, even as a totally straight female, she was just too pretty to lose--and I brought my hand up and blocked the vase from hitting her, cutting my hand on the glass in the process.

Several butlers rushed to the rescue and began to clean up the shattered glass. "Are you hurt, Miss Ishtar?" One asked.

Ishtar just looked at me, her big eyes wide and in shock.

"Are you alright?" I asked.

Ishtar blinked. "Tammuz?"

"What?"

"Tammuz?" She repeated. "You're..." She reached out a hand to touch my face. "You're...Tammuz."

I stepped back quickly. "No, I'm Ethan." I knew my Babylonian mythology. Tammuz was Ishtar's (or Inanna's) lover. Though I thought she was beautiful, I didn't swing that way. So I just ran for it. It was my only defence against women. After about fifteen minutes, I was pretty sure that I lost her. The problem,was, I had also lost myself in the process.

I stood in a tropical garden, heavily shaded by tall palm trees and densely foliaged. I could hear the sound of the ocean to my right and the chirp of some tropical bird to my left. I wondered which way to go for awhile, until I heard the sound of footsteps. Damn. I thought. What strange ritual would that crazy girl make me go through?

But it wasn't a girl who stepped through the trees; it was a boy, probably about fourteen years old, holding a rose and muttering to himself. "My poor heart." He said, clutching his chest with his empty hand. "Caught in her web of long black hair, clutched in her dainty hands. O woe is me. I beg you, Heart, do not love again. It is too painful. Too much like a sword. O--" Then he noticed me. "Stranger, this be not public land. Come hither, and I will show you the way out."

Was it just be, but was this guy taking in poetry? Not good poetry, but stuff that he seemed to make up on the spot? What a pretentious little rich kid. "I'm here to see Neil. I got lost."

"Let us go then to the main house." The boy declared. He pointed and we left the forest garden by cutting through several giant ferns.

The light dazzled me a moment after we stepped out. I hadn't noticed how dark it was in there. But when I looked around for the boy, I found him two steps behind me, staring with the same rapt attention as Ishtar had.

Oh no. I thought.

"Beautiful maiden." The boy said, dropping to one knee. "Until now, I knew only of the beauty of plastered faces and powered cheeks. But you, you are still more lovely, without such things. Your style of dress, your mannish disposition, I almost mistook you for a boy. But with such--"

"I am a guy." I interrupted.

The boy looked shocked. "No. No god in heaven, no matter how wise or cruel, could have made such a lovely boy. No boy should have such bright eyes, such an inviting smile, such perfect skin. The curve of your arm, the blush in your cheeks, the seductive crevasse of your lips. A boy! A boy! If you are so, then why art thou yet so fair?"

Seductive crevasse of my lips? I had to hold back laughter. This guy was pathetic. "I don't know." I told him. "I guess I just look like a girl.

ADVENTURE AT THE BLAKE ESTATE PART TWO COMING LATER.