The Party Crashers
Donna Moriarty
Word Count 1062
An hour after the couple’s arrival at our apartment, my husband and I were still trying to figure out who they were. The beautifully dressed man and woman greeted us warmly at the door, then moved into the living room, confidently mingling and engaging our guests in what appeared to be a series of scintillating conversations.
Now the man had positioned himself in the center of our gathering, tapping on his glass and clearing his throat as he prepared to give a toast.
It was summertime. This would be our last party before the baby was born in the fall. The windows were open, and loud talk and laughter floated down to the street. Guests had been arriving for hours—neighbors, old friends, some of my husband’s coworkers and their mates. At the height of the festivities, I’d opened the door to an attractive couple wearing evening clothes and broad smiles.
As I ushered them in, the woman held out a small gift bag from an expensive boutique. In lightly accented syllables, the man said, “I am Arturo and this is Cecilia. You have a lovely home.” Mystified, I called over my shoulder, “Honey, come say hi.” My husband joined me in greeting the charming twosome. Noting his fixed smile I realized: he doesn’t know them, either.
Still curious, I began circulating among our guests, casually asking if anyone knew who’d invited the couple. No one did. My nerves began to thrum. What unsettled me—more than the mystery of how these strangers found their way into our apartment—was the growing sense that I needed to take control of the situation.
I stood for a moment, resting a hand on my pregnant belly and watching the pair as they chatted with our neighbor Charlie. I waited until Cecilia noticed me. She touched her partner’s arm and they both looked at me expectantly, moving closer as Charlie wandered off.
I took a deep breath. “I don’t mean to be rude, but remind me who invited you?”
The two exchanged a glance, and the woman gave a nervous laugh. “You are so perceptive. I was just telling my husband it would be a sin to deceive a pregnant woman.”
My apprehension spiked into fear. The baby in my belly stirred as if echoing my alarm. I couldn’t be sure this man and woman posed a threat, but whatever they had come here for, I meant to neutralize any danger.
As a child, taught by nuns whose swinging moods and sporadic violence were their primary tools for maintaining order, I learned to get by with frightened obedience. Seeking emotional balance in my twenties, I experimented: transcendental meditation, I Ching, even Wicca. While these practices didn’t erase my anxiety, they taught me to trust my intuition. The sweaty palms and rapid pulse I’d developed in childhood spoke louder than any acquired knowledge. There was just one hitch: how to tell the difference between a real threat and an imagined one.
Now, facing two strangers who had breached the security of my home, I didn’t need a magical incantation to recognize something was off. Across the room, my husband threw me a baffled glance and a shrug. His lack of alarm only confirmed what I already felt in my bones: I was the one attuned to hidden frequencies, so it was up to me to act. Whether through maternal instinct or a signal from the baby in my belly, a fierce protectiveness arose like the flapping of wings around a hidden nest. I opened my mouth, preparing to expose the interlopers and remove them from our home.
The woman had leaned forward and was now speaking to me intently. In the genial tone of someone addressing a garden club, and using the most careful euphemisms I’d ever heard to describe the act of sex, Cecilia explained that she and Arturo had crashed our party to recruit candidates for an orgy.
“We heard the music and noise from the street,” Arturo explained. “We counted the floors and asked the elevator operator to take us to the party on eight.” His smile was dazzling and unapologetic.
Dumbfounded, I stared at the pair. Neither burglars nor kidnappers for a cult, they were here to engage in some frisky networking with a new crop of potential sex partners. My intuition had caught something, alright—but nothing like what I had imagined.
Cecilia was still talking softly, and now she patted my hand. “We have decided not to organize tonight,” she said. “A pregnant woman is a powerful force for goodness. To tamper with that energy would be a bad omen. We will leave now.”
A wave of relief swept over me, along with a sudden urge to laugh. Just then a hush fell as Arturo moved into the chattering throng and began tapping on his wine glass. I glanced about, looking for my husband. Someone pushed him forward and he took his place beside me, his puzzled expression betraying his confusion. “I’ll explain later,” I whispered as Arturo began to speak.
“Raise a glass to Michael and Donna, two beautiful souls who are about to embark on a new life with their precious baby,” he began. The toast was expressive and sincere, the kind of tribute one might deliver at a wedding reception, minus the embarrassing anecdotes. Cecilia continued to cast her radiant smile our way, as if she and her partner had known us all their lives, as if they were special to us and we to them. The air shimmered with warmth and grace. Our friends raised their glasses and toasted us and the new life growing inside my belly. And then the strangers swiftly took their leave to a chorus of goodbyes.
“What lovely people,” one guest remarked as the door closed behind the couple. “I hope you invite them again.”
Still lightheaded with relief, I resumed my hosting duties as the party wound down. Later, when my husband and I were preparing for bed, I told him the whole story.
“I guess my maternal instinct just passed its first test,” I said to his reflection in the bathroom mirror.
“Well, you were right to worry, but wrong about why,” he said, pulling off his tie.
I thought again about the two interlopers. Then I set down my toothbrush, padded out to the foyer, and made sure the door was double-locked.
Donna is a longtime writer and editor whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Next Avenue, Ms., San Francisco, HerStry, and more. She is the author of Not Just Words: How a Good Apology Makes You Braver, Bolder, and Better at Life. Her one-act play, The Waiting Room, won first prize in a playwriting competition produced by the Dubuque Fine Arts Society. She and her husband live in Ossining, New York, where they raised three children and a succession of dachshunds.