“Brilliant,” Roy gushed, because Wendy’s adroit party charm was infectious. He was a bit worried she’d be standoffish. She did that when she was nervous. But she seemed to be in her element.

“Cheers.” Wendy clinked glasses with Mandy.

“Mazel tov.” Peaches raised her bottle of Brooklyn Lager and took a sip. Any moment now Elizabeth would burst out of the basement and things would get weird.

Peaches was very mellow for someone hosting an entire community gathering. Stuart wondered if she’d been sampling Dr. Conway’s merchandise. Stuart certainly had. He’d been eating pot cookies nonstop. And he was still jealously curious about the connection between Peaches and Roy Clarke. Then again, Mandy was probably wondering how he’d become so friendly with Peaches himself. She was a very friendly person.

“I should text Greg,” Peaches muttered to herself and pulled out her phone. He never went out and this was so low-key. Although he hated crowded rooms full of noisy, talking people. It aggravated his tinnitus.

Stop by Monte after your music group if you can. Fun times.

“How’d you two meet?” Stuart asked, slouching casually in her direction.

Peaches pressed her beer bottle against her flushed cheek. “Who, me and Greg?” she asked. “He’s not here. He’s not into crowds.”

“No, you and Roy Clarke,” Stuart clarified. Only when he said it did he realize it was a weird question. How did anyone meet anyone, and what business was it of his? Roy Clarke was helping his wife and Mandy pass out containers of food. He was a congenial man, he was famous, and he was around, it seemed like, all the time. Why wouldn’t Peaches have met him?

Eat pot cookies now my brain’s all sweaty

Staring at the nurse like she’s Apple Brown Betty!

Was Stuart Little jealous of Roy Clarke? Peaches wondered in amazement. Oh yes, he was. Even in the throes of Elizabeth’s crazy artist weirdery, Peaches found she could still flirt with him.

She cocked an eyebrow. “It’s a pretty small neighborhood.”

“Um, what exactly are we protesting again?”

Liam lay on his back, shirtless, while a woman named The Professor painted a giant “tattoo” on his bare torso.

“Is the tattoo words or pictures?” he asked, as if it made any difference.

“Both.” The Professor tucked one paintbrush into her purple-and-gray dreadlock bun and extracted another. “You don’t work out or wax. I worship that. In a model, I mean. Model boys all look the same, all muscular and hairless.”