Beating down heat on the flesh of a million standing bodies wasn't as uncomfortable as it might have been, for They, the mob, were here for a PURPOSE. The stench of perspiration reeked the air as it clashed with the other harsh scents of booze and marijuana. But the sweat was the loudest.

"This guy next to me stinks," whispered Carlos.

"So do you," snapped Taylor, who happened to be the body wedged next to him.

"Hey! Could someone please get their elbow out of my FACE?!" Maria shrilled.

Taylor turned to the woman. Well, he would have turned to the woman. There was absolutely no room to move; the crowed was so thick, not even gunfire could have cut through it. "My elbow's not IN your face, darling!" Taylor said, his accent coming out thickly with a growl lodged in his undertone.

Maria snarled and shoved the offending elbow away. The person she pushed didn't even stumble, immobile against the packed wall of bodies surrounding him. A breeze carrying Calvin Klein's "Obsession" mingled with a week-old Budweiser squeezed its way through and Carlos gagged.

Hissing, Maria attempted to place her hands on her hips and face Taylor but she ended up being stuck in the exact same position as before. Jet-black strands of her hair stuck to her neck and shoulders, glued by the sweat; the weather refused to give any hint of a cool breeze to come along and stir it. It was going to be stuck this way for the rest of her life and she just knew it. Everyone would laugh at her and call her "plastic-head" or something. Her lips curled into a snarl. "You came up and rang my doorbell at SIX O' CLOCK this morning telling me that we were going to see Yanni at the Acropolis. I see no Yanni."

"Hey!" Taylor glared. "I said we were going to SEE Yanni. I didn't promise there would be no Yanni, all right?"

Maria was about to reply when the sun inched its way across the sky and sent a blinding glare straight into her eyes. If she could have actually seen the sky, she would have known that there were no clouds in it. The huge downturned bowl was a perfect robin's egg blue with the white-hot orb dominating it, staring down at her with a teasing, baleful eye. A hurricane would have been a blessing right about now. She painfully swiveled her head a little to peek over her shoulder, where Carlos was leaning weakly against Taylor, pale as a can of Crisco and much pastier.

"The guy in front of me passed gas," he moaned, trembling all over.

Taylor stroked his hair gently, using the other hand to hold the man's shaking shoulders. "It'll be okay, honey. The scent will go away, you know?"

The man behind Maria had a hairy stomach. Maria hated hairy stomachs. Somehow, though, the sight was mesmerizing her. His belly just kind of spilled out over his tight little jeans and jiggled in the summer's heat. Sometimes his equally hairy hand would scurry down and scratch the stomach, but that didn't keep her from her trance. The fat was hypnotic.

She wants me, thought the man with a sly smile.

"Hey, bubbula," he belched, grinning an oily grin, "maybe after this crowd thing, we can kind of take it to the bowling alley and shake, rattle and roll, huh?" He winked a few times.

"I know fifty-five ways to kill a man," Maria stated.

Carlos doubled over and retched on an elderly woman's shoes.

Taylor really wanted to bow to the old woman, but he settled for a slight incline of his head. A little bead of sweat dripped down his left eyebrow. "Senora, I apologize for the--"

Stars exploded behinds his eyeballs as the toe of her stiletto shot into his crotch. Taylor moaned and began to sink to his knees.

"Is the line moving?" Maria asked politely.

"No," the woman replied.

"What line?" Taylor moaned weakly as Carlos held him up to keep him from getting trampled. "I see no line."

"There should be a line," Maria stated emphatically, setting her hands on her hips and poking two people sharply in the ribs as a result.

"I ain't no senora," the old woman added.

Taylor nodded fearfully and clung to Carlos. The hairy-stomached man winked at the old woman and nodded his head.

Carlos' white sleeveless was sticking to him, thinly veiling his nipple ring. "How long has it been, man?"

Taylor shrugged just slightly. "I sold my watch to some guy in exchange for knowing if the line had moved."

Maria heard a dull thud. "Did someone just die?"

Carlos squinted. "...yes."

--end--

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