The Birdcage

Chapter Four

Enjoy

X-_X-_X

Mal's assistant is in the middle of updating her curriculum vitae, something she does several times a week when her employer gets on the bad side of demanding, when Mal's direct line rings through to the desk.

"Hello?" she inquires. If it's Mr. Cobb again she's going to have to stop answering Mal's direct line. There's only so much fraught emotion she can handle in one day.

Amara is surprised though. "No, Mr. Halpert. I'm sorry, she's already left for the day. Yes? Yes, I can take a message; she normally calls in to check them. Uh-huh, go ahead. Okay, don't…come…to…dinner. Got it, Mm-hmm, you too."

X-_X-_X

Robert felt like he'd been in a fog for days. He couldn't understand how he'd survived the car ride so far, and was starting to wonder how he'd survived his childhood. His father had taken the last half hour to illustrate how nationalized healthcare would corrupt the country.

Robert almost felt like pointing out that it was technically the largest middle class tax break in years, but felt that the following lecture would actually, probably, kill him.

Needless to say, Robert felt in a much better mood when they crossed the state line into New Jersey, and were that much closer to arriving in the city.

Maurice was listening to the radio.

"The Reverend Al Sharpton says that Senator Browning's last words of 'You're money's on the dresser, chocolate' are racist and demeaning…"

Maurice made a disgusted noise. Robert couldn't help but agree, though for a different reason. Senator Browning had been his godfather, and Robert was more concerned about trying to remember if he'd ever eaten off the same plate as the man when he was a child. He was almost certain that at one point there had been a hug.

Robert wanted out of the damn car.

"That idiot, Browning!" Maurice snarled, "Now the blacks will start in."

Robert's mother tried for a soothing tone, but was closer to an opioid induced mumble. "Now, Maurice, Robert's wedding will go a long way towards smoothing everything over. And I mean, come now, the Harpers are the perfect family really: modern enough, with traditional practices. Really, you should be thanking Bobby. We're on our way to salvation."

Maurice didn't look convinced. Robert could sympathize.

X-_X-_X

Ariadne's head was in her hands. Her father was still trying to explain what had happened, but she really couldn't understand what he was saying. She thought that the sound of air rushing in her ears might be the indication of a panic attack approaching. She wasn't sure though.

"And really," Arthur sounded like he was trying to be purposefully light; "it was a question of your mother or Eames. I had to make a choice; everyone makes tough choices like these. So, I chose Eames."

Arthur's hair was slicked back, and his somber suit was finely pressed. He was ready except for the tie. He couldn't get it perfectly straight; his hands were shaking.

"I thought you'd understand, Ari."

Ariadne nods into her hands. She thinks she might be being selfish, but can't muster up the energy to figure it out. All she can picture is the arrival of Robert's parents and the inevitable fall out.

Arthur's not paying too much attention to his daughter though. He's nervous and feels off his game. He's not a man used to too many things being out of his control. "I can't get this damn tie straight. Well, the jacket will cover it, hopefully."

Before he steps away from the full length mirror he'd been standing in front of in his and Eames' bedroom he couldn't help but say, "I look like my grandfather in a proper suit; he dressed like this in every picture. He killed himself when he was thirty five."

Ariadne starts to jiggle her leg. While doing so she notices that her pumps have somehow gotten scuffed. Her heart begins to beat quickly at the bundle of irrational nerves that this realization has kicked up. She forces herself to look up at her father for lack of anything more constructive to do.

"Any last instructions?" Arthur asks, airy and sarcastic. He feels like pacing.

"No," Ariadne says, frustrated. "Just don't walk unless you have to."

Arthur agrees to that but mentally saves that statement for later. He's going to bring her down to the club sometime and ask her who walks worse: him or Big Danny Porter. Because, Big Danny Porter has twitched his hips at a forty five degree angle since the eighties. Ariadne should probably see it and use it as a learning experience.

"And, try not to gesture too much," Ariadne continues. She nods at Arthur's already airborne hands and he reluctantly brings them to his sides, "and don't talk…too much."

Arthur's feeling less and less willing to go through with the night by the second.

"What does it matter," Ariadne groans. "There's no way this is going to work. This is going to be worse than that incident with Eames and the Kool Aid at that soccer game in junior high."

"Football," Arthur says, mainly because Eames isn't there yet to say it for himself. Although Arthur privately agrees with Ariadne's assumption he manages to come up with a halfhearted, "It'll be fine. I'll take care of everything and we'll manage to get through it."

The door of the room opens and shuts quietly and Ariadne and Arthur turn to take in the sight of Eames standing at the door, looking like a completely different man. Arthur can't believe how suddenly and how completely this entire situation feels wrong.

Eames was good at getting into character, always had been. He could be entirely different people on stage and off. This situation was no different. He was playing a character, and he was doing it well, but his air, his confidence, and even something about the way he moved was off. It was obvious that this was one character that he could not force himself to be.

His steps over towards Ariadne and Arthur are stiff and uncomfortable. When he reaches them he takes a seat on the settee at the end of the bed, and for just a moment he loses character. Something that has almost never happened before.

It was obvious that this was something Eames just couldn't do, not for five minutes, and definitely not for an entire night. Arthur's face twists up.

"What?" Eames demands, "Doesn't this farce pass muster?"

Arthur gives the slightest shake of his head.

"Why? I'm dressed just the same as you two. Got rid of all the cosmetics, took my rings off; I'm just a mate now, aren't I? Ariadne's Uncle Eames."

Arthur looked slowly down to Eames' ankles and clears his throat. "What about those?"

Everyone's eyes go to Eames' crossed feet where hot pink cashmere socks can clearly be seen.

"Well," Eames said, eyes shifting away and voice becoming flippant and haughty, "what twit would go to a dinner party without a bit of colour?"

When neither Arthur nor Ariadne replies Eames sighs, frustrated, and stands. "Let me guess, I'm even more bloody obvious trussed up like this?"

"Maybe you could try…" Arthur's voice dies before he can finish. It's obvious to him now that he should have taken Ariadne at her word. There was no way that he and Eames could pull this off. It was an impossible job.

"No, this isn't right, love," Eames was tired and angry, and was willing to give up than go deeper into this. His shoulders sag and he shrugs at Arthur. Arthur feels guilty for not having another solution available for his partner.

Eames runs a hand through his hair and starts walking towards the door.

"You know," he says weakly, turning a bit to look at Ariadne, "I really did just want to help."

Ariadne doesn't have a response for him. Eames tugs at his tie, jerking it from around his neck, and changes direction, heading into the en suite. He closes the bathroom door firmly.

"Come on, Eames," Arthur goes to the door and knocks on it. "We'll just deal with it okay? It's not like we haven't gone into things riskier than this? Remember disco night? If we can pull that off than this is easy."

"Go away, Arthur," Eames replies. He sounds exhausted and not shrill or upset like Arthur expects. "I'll stay in here tonight, where I bloody belong."

Ariadne leaves the room, feeling sick.

X-_X-_X

Ariadne enters the main room feeling as though she is spiraling out of control. Everything is slipping through her fingers and she doesn't think she's going to be able to manage getting her control back ever.

Nash is singing what sounds like "I work hard for the money" while he puts makeshift candy dishes on every flat surface. He is wearing his more professional uniform though he is completely barefoot.

"Can you put some shoes on, please," she asks, following behind him and picking up each candy dish as he puts it down.

Nash waves a hand, when he speaks he's over enunciating in a way that conceals both the queens and faux Guatemalan accents but makes him sound like a rugged Canadian. "No point. I can't wear loafers. I fall over when I do. Flat, right onto my face."

"Look, it's going to be worse if you answer the door with no shoes at all. Just please put some shoes on and stop talking like that. And check on dinner please. Something, just do something."

Nash huffs and walks off. The phone begins ringing. Ariadne only begins to pay attention when the answering machine picks up.

"Arthur, it's Mal. I'm on my way but I just got a message telling me not to come…"

Ariadne has the phone picked up and against her ear within a moment. "He said not to come late, I was there. He said not to be late."

"Oh," the other voice replies. Ariadne notes a dozen different things about the voice. Its tone, the amusement playing behind the words, the way the other woman's accent rounds itself on the vowels. It's her mother on the other end of the phone. "Is this Ariadne?" her mother asks after only the barest of hesitations.

"Yes, it is," Ari admits. It's not easy. As a kid sometimes she used to have full arguments in her head with this woman that she never knew. Always demanding why she had left her. Ariadne had told Eames once. He had calmed her down, and his sweet words back then were part of the reason why she could really only muster up nervousness, and not resentment speaking with her now.

"I want you to know," Mal says, voice clear, "how very happy I am to be able to do this for you."

"Thank you," Ariadne says, her parent's bedroom door opening and closing behind her. "See you soon…mom."

"Mom?" Arthur demands and Ariadne hangs up. "Did you just say mom? Was that Mal on the phone? I told her not to come."

"I know," Ariadne admits. "But you know it'll make it more normal if she's here. Things will go much smoother."

"And Eames?" Arthur demands, "Think about what Eames will do when she turns up."

"Nothing. He won't embarrass me."

Arthur wipes his brow. "So this is hell," he says glancing around. "And it has a crucifix in it."

X-_X-_X

The chauffeur is stuck in the beginning of rush hour traffic just outside the club that Robert knows the Halperts own. A six foot gentleman in fishnets walks past them on one side, and a group of teens with leather jackets and colored hair on the other. Robert doesn't think his jaw will properly hinge itself together again. His parents are looking around in befuddlement.

"This is less like fifth avenue than I imagined," Robert's mother offers.

"Well, over the decades a lot has grown up in this area," Robert tries to say seriously. "They invested when the market was really good."

"A lot changed in the nineties," Maurice mutters, watching a bike messenger in a tutu fly by the car.

X-_X-_X

Arthur tries the handle again. "He's locked himself in."

Ariadne has a club soda instead of a brandy this time, administered under her father's watchful eye, but he hasn't spared himself another tumbler of whisky. He and Ariadne pause in front of the crucifix.

"I'm a Jew, and not a very good one," Arthur says by way of introduction to the crucifix. "But if you could help out at all tonight I'd really appreciate it."

Ariadne purses her lip, and the doorbell rings.

"Christ."

Ariadne turns quickly to Arthur. "About the Jewish thing."

"What Jewish thing?"

"I know you're non-practicing dad," she says straightening his tie, "but Robert told them our name was Harper on the spur of the moment. To sound, well, less Jewish I suppose. More Anglo-Saxon."

"Harper?" Arthur mutters, vaguely lost. He gives the crucifix a last baleful stare before following Ariadne to the apartment's outer entrance.

Nash has reached the door before hem but trips over himself, landing as described face first on the floor. "It's the shoes," he replies mutinously.

"Perfect." Arthur says.

When Nash opens the door the three people standing on their doorstep are the picture of a tasteful Time magazine cover. Dressed modestly and professional the Fischer family looks as though they just came from a charity auction. Nash invites them in, introducing himself as "Ignatio."

"What a—exotic name," Mrs. Fischer smiles politely.

"Welcome to the Halperts' home," Nash replies. He's robustly reverted to his faux Guatemalan accent and seems damned determined to prove some sort of Latin heritage.

"Halpert?" Is Maurice's first word. "I thought it was Harper?"

Ariadne is quick to step forward. "You'll have to forgive Ignatio, he's…"

"From Queens," Arthur jumps in.

"Guatemala," Nash protests.

"Right," Arthur nods, "Lovely to meet you all, I'm Arthur Harper."

Maurice introduces himself and Margot before introducing Robert to Arthur, whom Arthur finds himself shaking hands with warmly. Robert looks just as nervous as the rest of them are.

"Lovely dress, Mrs. Fischer," Arthur says, "Favia Fraboni spring collection this year if I'm not mistaken."

"You aren't," says Margot, taken aback and quite impressed.

"Oh dad," Ariadne says, waving her hands in the air, panicked. "Always listening to me go on and on about fashion. What a great guy he is."

Ariadne wouldn't know a spring collection if the label stapled itself to her, and Margot's curt smile says as much.

Arthur moves on quickly. "My wife is visiting her parents in Long Island, and I'm afraid she's a bit caught up, she'll be a few minutes more."

They move into the sitting area, exchanging further pleasantries about the house and the Fischers' trip down. Arthur's eye twitches slightly when Maurice compliments the solemn décor of the apartment.

Margot notices the books that Nash had brought in earlier. "What lovely old books," she says, approaching them. She reads the title, confused. "Nancy Drew…lovely. You have the whole series."

"Sit down!" Arthur not so much says as shouts before nervously adding, "Please."

Robert and Ariadne exchange a look as their parents sit down across from one another.

"Champagne?" Arthur offers, "To celebrate the occasion?"

"Oh yes," Margot replies.

"Nash," Arthur calls.

"Ignatio!" Ariadne calls over him quickly.

"Ignatio Nash!" Arthur amends, calling for their housemaid a third time. "His full name," Arthur excuses. He feels sweat dampen his temple.

After asking for champagne Nash offers an elaborate bow before walking carefully back out of the room. Each step taken as if over landmines.

Ariadne smiles brilliantly across at her would be in-laws. She has no idea how they're going to make it through the night.

X-_X-_X

Mort's sweating by the time he and Tadashi navigate their way into a parking space. The sun has dipped below the horizon and street lights and neon signs dazzle every angle along the streets. The high buildings around them disappear into the sky with ease.

With sharp eyes he had caught sight of the Fischers' chauffeur, leaning menacingly against the family's town car. Pulling out his wallet with a sigh Mort jogs across the busy street and gives the man his best winning smile.

Without a pause the chauffeur says, "Double."

"Not much of a negotiator are you?" Mort asks, not altogether displeased with cutting right to the chase. He eyes the pedestrians, a variety of young people in tight clothes, sequins, and myriad accessories, before he takes out his wallet. "You can guess what I want to know?"

"You want to know where the senator went," the chauffeur drops his cigarette and grinds it against the pavement, glaring at a group that steps too close. "He went in that club."

Mort hides a quiver of anticipation. He could salivate he's so intrigued. "A club?"

"He used a back staircase and went up, but it's the same building isn't it? Wherever he is, he's under the birdcage's roof."

Mort practically shoves the money into the man's hands so he can start making his way back across the street. He hears the chauffeur mutter "God Bless." On the curb he meets back up with Tadashi.

"He went up that stair," Mort says hurriedly. He points around the side alley and grabs Tadashi's arm in excitement.

"But that looks like it goes into the same building as that gay club," Tadashi says doubtfully. He adjusts the camera in his grasp. He's pretty sure they aren't going to make it out of this without losing something expensive.

"Exactly!" Mort crows.

X-_X-_X

"It must be exhausting keeping up with two households," Margot is saying offhand, trying not to stare at Arthur wringing his hands. "How long ago did you purchase this one?"

"Oh, we've had it for years now. We bought it ages ago," Arthur struggles to sound the appropriate level of snobbish. "The area was mostly Jewish back then."

"Jewish, really," Margot says, rather too aghast. "New York City is shocking isn't it?"

Nash returns to the room before Arthur has to reply. Ariadne beams in nervousness from her chair and crosses and re-crosses her legs.

"Champagne?"

"And a scotch if you have it?" Maurice adds politely.

As Nash sets the champagne bucket on a sideboard there comes a horrific clang that echoes through the spacious apartment. Ariadne's eyes go first to Nash, confused and wondering if the bucket has tumbled, but Arthur's eyes dart over the living room and towards the master suite. He knows exactly what the clang is.

"Is someone else home?" Margot asks, smiling to cover her confusion.

"Just our dog," Arthur confirms mildly. "Piranha."

"With a name like that it must be a vicious mutt!" Maurice laughs, accepting a tumbler of scotch from Nash.

"A man eater," Arthur confirms. Ariadne chokes into her champagne glass, blushing and excusing herself when everyone's eyes turn her way.

Nash fumbles the champagne bottle and grabs the edge of the table to stop from tripping himself up. Ariadne murmurs "We'll manage," and takes the bottle from him.

"Go finish dinner," she hisses at him once she's taken the bottle.

"He's a terrific cook," Arthur assures the table. Ariadne looks towards the cruciform and wonders if she should try a blasphemer's prayer as well. It really couldn't hurt.

Arthur lifts his wrist jerkily, trying not to appear anything but traditionally masculine in his movements. In a way that he hopes is stereotypically red-blooded American male he says, "Now, I wonder where the wife could be."

X-_X-_X

Twelve blocks away Mal is stuck in traffic while a group of New York City police officers attempt to break up what is either a political protest or a baseball rally. She can't make out which.

Thumbing her phone she wonders if she should call ahead, and glances around outside the car before picking it up. Before she can drudge up the right number her phone flashes, buzzes, and begins humming Edith Piaf.

Dominic

Mal drops her phone into the cup holder and stares back out her window.

X-_X-_X

Arthur is trying to ignore the way that Ariadne is laughing amorously as Robert tells the parents in the room the story of how he proposed to Ariadne. Errantly, Arthur wonders what the technical term is for killing one's in-laws.

"He was so odd and stiff!" Ariadne is laughing. Her eyes are bright, and her cheeks are flooded him warmth. She mimes his asking the question, her movements robotic and exaggerated. "It took the longest time to work out what he was saying!"

"What a lovely story," Margot gushes, or tries to; she's looking somewhat dissatisfied with her son.

"So, Senator," Ariadne says when she's calmed and sat back in her chair. "How was your drive?"

Arthur furrows his brow and tried to remember if he knows where Mr. and Mrs. Fischer are from. Illinois? Indiana? The senator goes on to wax poetic about the foliage on the drive and the stunning geography they passed, and the beautiful American landmarks they passed, and the majestic pasts of the states they drove through.

"Goddamn campaign speech," Arthur mutters incredulously under his breath.

"Hm?" The Senator pauses in his stump and leans towards Arthur.

"The foliage sounds lovely," Arthur assures.

The house phone rings and Arthur and Ariadne perk their ears.

"Hello? It's Mal. Arthur? Ariadne? Eames? Oh, merde. Listen, I'm stuck in traffic I don't know how much longer I'll be…"

Ariadne rises as subtly as she can and moves the phone from the receiver, stopping the voice recorder. The Senator launches into further exclamations concerning the beauty of the Pennsylvanian mountains and the rural forests.

Arthur, looking anything but enraptured, takes a beat and then clears his throat. "Was that my wife I heard on the answering machine? Ariadne, was that your dear maman?"

Ariadne hesitates to speak with her father sounding as strangled as he does. The words themselves are foreign in his mouth, and there's no way that the tone of thinly masked disdain isn't obvious.

"She's, uh, stuck. But, she would like us to start dinner without her," Ariadne manages a smile. "I would have answered but I was just so interested in the Senator's story."

"Oh, it wasn't that good!" Maurice laughs off without humbleness.

"It was." Arthur says with stringent finality. He rises and pins Ariadne with a measured look. "I better go let Nash—Ignatio Nash—know about the changes. He hates any dinner upsets."

Arthur uses a side door and escapes out onto the lanai'i with Ariadne mumbling an excuse and following close behind him.

"This is worse than that time the club tried selling tapas!" Arthur hisses. He reaches, for the tenth time that day, for the pack of cigarettes that don't exist and is forced to settle for rubbing his face and shaking his head. "What are we going to do? Do we wait for her?"

Ariadne rushes to smooth her father's hair where it has come un-gelled and has begun springing into waves. "God, dad, you're soaked? Is that sweat?"

Arthur shoots Ariadne a furious glance. "Show me a person that doesn't sweat under this McCarthyism!"

Back in the sitting room a completely different conversation is being hissed between family members.

"There's something very odd going on here," Maurice declares, eyeing up one of the several candy dishes on display.

"It's this thing with Browning!" Margot hisses back. She throws her back against her seat and empties her champagne flute. "The mother probably doesn't want to be in the same house with us! The father is obviously a nervous wreck."

"I'm sure that's not it," Robert says desperately.

"I agree," Maurice says, shaking a finger, "No, there's something else. It's something about the father and the butler. I just can't put my finger on it."

"It's nothing!" Robert whispers several times in panic. "You always think the worst!"

"Mark me boy…"

"Ariadne's mother will be here soon," Robert continues, tugging at his shirt cuffs. "You'll see!"

"Sorry!" Arthur calls stepping back into the room. He visibly composes himself and gives the Fischers his best smile. "We'll give her a half hour and then if she isn't…"

The front door opens and shuts.

"Here I am!" The voice calling from the entrance hall is light, airy, and refined. The feminine lilt to the words is accentuated by posh vowels. It's a proper Queen's English that seems to be calling to them.

Appearing in the doorway is a sight that makes Arthur's heart drop to his toes. Ariadne goes stiff and gasps. The Fischers turn towards the new arrival.

Striding into the room with confidence is Eames. In drag.

He's wearing one of his best wigs, a sandy curled piece that sits in waves around his face, softening his cheeks and chin. He's draped in a powder blue skirt suit and is wearing pearls, pumps, and a white silk scarf. Sitting predictably on his arm is a white leather handbag.

There is no way that a person is unable to realize that this person is a man wearing make-up and women's clothing. Arthur begins fumbling through apologies and explanations in his head.

Eames beams at the room when he enters, waving a hand and sashaying towards the table. "Oh, you will forgive me for being late I hope. Traffic was dreadful, but it's completely unforgiveable to have missed your arrival. Senator Fischer, Mrs. Fischer, I am so pleased to meet you at last. Ah! And this must be Robert, oh but he is a strapping lad isn't he? Oh do come and let me have a look at you, my boy."

Robert, with wide eyes, goes slowly towards Eames. Eames in turn titters and says delightedly, "Oh what a shy one you have here, nothing like our Ariadne in that regard I'm afraid."

"It's wonderful to meet you, Mrs. Harper," Robert says on instinct. He reaches out and briefly clutches Eames' hand in greeting, his eyes wandering over to Ariadne and Arthur. The Fischers are looking taken aback from their seats.

"Halpert," Eames corrects offhand.

"Oh, is it Halpert," Margot asks, shooting Robert a chastening look. "I thought it was Harper?"

"We've had some confusion," Robert murmurs to Mrs. Halpert.

Eames, ever one to catch on quick, shoots a look at Arthur, and when he receives a nod, begins quickly mumbling through an explanation. "You know how it is on the continent dear, Halpert in old Europe and er, Harpier in France where my husband's family is from, the name referring to those who historically played the harp, and of course, the name is Anglicized in America to Harper. Yes, you see you're not wrong to be confused."

Eames give a frivolous laugh and Arthur feels his heart re-starting in double time. When he looks over at Maurice it's to discover that the senator is looking Eames up and down with approval.

"Oh that explains it," Margot says faux warmly, looking more confused than before, but too polite to say differently. She eyes Mrs. Harper's jewelry with some envy.

In obvious relief Robert shoots Ariadne a look and says, "Please, let me hug you, Mrs. Harper. It's so nice to finally meet you."

X-_X-_X

"What the hell are you watching?" Chris pauses in the doorway to the production studio, a forkful of raman halfway to his mouth.

"Footage for the Browning special," Dodd, assistant producer of Atlantic Cable News, replies. "And I think we found something interesting."

Everyone in their room pins their eyes to the screen as the image is superimposed and magnified, bringing into view two men standing off to the side and speaking over one of Senator Maurice Fischer's garden gates.

"Isn't that the guy that writes for that Hollywood tabloid? The one with the harassment suit?" Chris comes fully into the room and distractedly puts his meal to the side. "What is he doing?"

"Well…" Dodd pushes a few buttons and slides and then let's the image play.

"Hey," the reporter calls, jerking his head towards the edge of the gate. After a moment the Fischer family's chauffeur comes into view. "Where are you driving 'em?"

The Chauffeur looks around himself and then takes the money that the reporter is offering. "Greenwich Village, in New York City."

"What the hell is this?" Chris breathes.

"That," Dodd says, spinning around in his chair. "Is proof that moral order Fischer isn't out west at his ranch, he's in goddamn New York City."

Chris almost trips over himself trying to get out the door. "Jerry," he shouts down the hallway, "Get our affiliate in New York on the line!"

X-_X-_X

"It's wonderful what you've done here," Maurice comments offhand, shooting a second look around the 'Harper' house during a lull in conversation. "So simple; so uncluttered."

"Our home is a bit different," Margot murmurs demurely. "But then again Maurice has so much work to bring home. Our men, they rule the world but they can't pick up after themselves."

Eames adjusts the pearls at his neck and gives a polite laugh; he looks at Margot as if they share a secret. "Oh absolutely, I'm lucky if Arthur can manage getting his clothes in the clothes bin instead of beside it."

Arthur puts his hand on Eames' and mentally begs the other man to be quiet. They only have to make it through some small talk, eat dinner, and then they can kick the Fischers out and call the whole thing finished.

Maurice, leaning into Eames' personal space and smiling along says, "Oh, Harper I think these women are picking on us!"

Arthur, unused to mainstream fraternity in every way, has no response and finds himself crushing Eames' knuckles in his hands. Eames' own polished nails cut crescents in Arthur's hand in revenge.

"But then again, maybe I'm just an old fashioned girl," Eames recites, leaning back into Maurice's space. "But I do pity the woman who stays home and can't take care of her man."

Ariadne gives her father a look and tries very hard not to laugh.

"Hear, hear!" Maurice cheers, refilling Eames' champagne flute and ignoring his own wife's empty one. "You're my kind of people!"

X-_X-_X

"Harper," Mort repeats, "H-A-R-P-E-R."

A moment later he shakes his head at Tadashi. "They can't find any records."

Tadashi furrows a brow. "But the club is registered to a Halpert they said right? Halpert, Harper; it's sort of similar right?"

Mort takes his cell phone of his chest and puts it back to his mouth. "What about Halpert?" he asks, "Like the drag club out front?" In an aside to Tadashi he mutters, "Wouldn't that be something?"

Tadashi shrugs, seems normal for a politician at any rate.

X-_X-_X

Maurice has relaxed completely ten minutes later. Eames has the man eating out of the palm of his hand. A few well-placed comments about the horrors of free speech and Maurice Fischer was looking at Eames like he was the greatest thing since sliced bread, and still hadn't realized he was a burly Englishman wearing a skirt.

Arthur was still sweating though.

"All this fuss about school prayer," Maurice rises to help himself to another scotch, "I've just never understood it. As if anyone, even the Jews, would object to their kids praying in the classroom!"

"Oh it's insane, I agree," Eames rushes to say, fluttering a hand at the senator. Mrs. Fischer is looking at the tabletop in clear boredom.

Nash appears from the living room and stops in the doorway as if physically struck. He takes one look at Eames and breaks into uncontrollable, shrill giggles.

"Thank you Ignatio Nash!" Arthur says loudly, he jumps to receive the ice that Nash has with him and imperiously commands, "You may go," with a heavy look.

"He's very nice," Eames is assuring their guests, "Though quite odd. We've never really understood what makes him laugh."

Margot, sensing a topic she can get behind, becomes lively again and shoots a sardonic look at Nash's retreating back. "At least he speaks English!" she sighs, "If you knew how many chauffeurs we've gone through in the last year…"

Maurice puts a hand on his wife's leg to silence her. Margot trails off, and Maurice says, "Now, now, no need to bore them with that, dear."

Arthur rejoins the table and stands behind Eames' shoulder, the bucket of ice anxiously clutched between his hands. Eames doesn't spare him a glance, merely leans towards Mrs. Fischer and says sympathetically, "I do know what you mean. If you knew how many maids we've gone through in the last five years alone. I could name a dozen! Why there was Rodney, Harry, Jojo, Augustine, Vinny…"

With a start Arthur is loudly saying "Look! You all need more ice!" Without an invitation he begins circling the table, leveraging ice cubes into any glass he can reach. At the same time he shoots Eames a quelling look.

Eames, the picture of PTA defiance, gives a slight shrug of his shoulders and smiles into his glass. He flutters his eyes once at Maurice and sits back into his chair. Maurice looks charmed.

"I have such a good feeling about you people," the senator declares, staring at Eames. "Not a lot of fancy art on the walls, not too many books cluttering up the shelves: just the crucifix! Now this is what Clinton didn't pay attention to when he began rambling about school prayer and gays in the military!"

"Gays in the military," Eames sighs and gives the room a bemused look, "now there's an idiotic idea. Those haircuts! Those uniforms! Who cares?"

Ariadne rushes to join the conversation while Arthur does his best to elbow Eames with the arm holding the ice bucket. The last thing they need is Eames inspired into a chorus of "In the Navy!"

"Now, mom," Ariadne murmurs, "you shouldn't talk about things you don't understand."

Immediately, and rather sharply, Maurice comes to Eames' defense, "Don't patronize your mother Ariadne. I have found her to be an extraordinarily intelligence woman; such refreshing ideas. You know I've always thought homosexuality—,"

"Lots more ice!" Arthur hums, filling the senator's glass.

"I'll have some more ice, dad!" Ariadne chirps, shoving her own still full glass into the senator's space.

"Homosexuality," Maurice says again, speaking over Ariadne, "Is clearly one of the things that is weakening this country."

"Really?" Eames eyes go wide and he looks imploring at the senator. "You know, that's what I thought until I found out Alexander the Great was a pouf, talk about gays in the military!"

Eames laughs and flutters his eyelashes at the senator again. With no other excuse at hand Arthur stands up straight and exclaims, "How 'bout those Giants!"

When all motion in the room stills and everyone turns their attention to him Arthur twitches and drops the ice bucket entirely. He tries to grin nervously, and manages to grimace.

"I'll get that," Ariadne says resigned.

Shaken out of his relaxed state the senator finally moves out of Eames' personal space and sits back in his own chair. Taking a deep breath he says, "You know I think we're skirting an issue here that apparently has Mr. Harper very nervous, and I don't blame him."

Stealing himself Maurice begins, "Now I know you've all heard the news about Senator Browning and how he died…"

After a beat Eames reorganizes his facial features into a somber from and says, "Oh, that. What an ugly story, of course we don't believe a word of it!"

"What do you mean?" Maurice asks, intrigued. Margot uncrosses her arms and leans forward.

Arthur doesn't know who Senator Browning is but he guarantees that before ten seconds ago Eames had no idea that the man had been living let alone had recently died.

"Well he has obviously been framed," Eames declares with passion, "And I for one demand that there be a post-mortem examination!"

Arthur is one hundred percent certain the line is from a murder mystery that Eames played in a few years back.

"Mom," Ariadne murmurs.

Reverently, Maurice, as if drawn by sunlight, leans back towards Eames. Hushed, he says, "That's exactly what Rush Limbaugh said."

"Oh?" Eames nods emphatically, trying to remember who Rush Limbaugh is. From Maurice's look this appears to be a positive comparison. Eames tries to look satisfied.

"Excuse me," Arthur says faintly and leaves the room.

Eames tips his champagne glass at the senator.

X-_X-_X

In the kitchen Arthur takes advantage of the distance to say, "I've never been this tense in my life! It's like Don Quixote on approach to the windmill."

Nash is paying very little attention to his employer. His hair is lank with sweat and grease and he's pawing at various ingredients laid across the countertops. The kitchen is barely recognizable, and groceries of every variety are haphazardly piled on almost every surface.

"Dinner is going to be a little late," Nash says. "Here have some wine."

Arthur takes the wine from Nash and doesn't hesitate to swallow the first mouthful straight. "The boy is nice," he says, his mind still on his guests, "I suppose. He hasn't said more than ten words. Hopefully he's more than a pocketbook with a pretty face."

Nash is frowning at the leafy stalk in his hand, uncertain if it's a vegetable or a spice. "I feel bad for laughing but did you see Eames' hair? It's like a mop on a prize fighter."

Arthur, as has always been a better choice in his life, ignores Nash. He takes another swig of the wine and discards it in the first empty spot he can find. "Fuck it. It's just for one night. I can live through it. Or die. I could die too. That might be nice."

When Arthur reappears in the living room it's to hear Maurice Fischer lament that it's illegal to kill abortion doctors.

"Dad," Ariadne whispers, strained past her point of composure.

Eames is beginning to show signs of wear seated across from the senator. His jaw is hanging limply.

"I don't necessarily agree with them," Maurice admits, "But some people do say that if you stop the doctors you stop the abortions."

"Well," Eames manages to say incredulously, "that's ridiculous. The doctors are only doing their jobs. If you want to kill someone, why not the mothers? That's who's really to blame at the end of the day."

Arthur crosses the room in three quick strides. "Can I have a word with you? Dear?"

"Oh I know what you're going to say," Eames continues, shaking Arthur off and giving the senator a pompous eyeroll. "If you kill the mother then you kill the fetus. But the fetus is going to die anyway. Why not let it go down with the ship?"

Arthur sets his hands firmly on Eames' shoulder and smiles at the Fischers from behind his wife's chair. He digs his fingers as hard as he can into Eames' shoulder blades. "I really need a word."

Eames manages to avoid grunting in pain and sets down his wine glass. With a sheepish smile he says, "Excuse me."

Maurice watches Arthur jerk Eames from the room with barely disguised disdain.

Ariadne clears her throat. "I assure you my mother is just following a train of thought to its logical but absurd conclusion, much the way Jonathan Swift did when he suggested the impoverished Irish peasants feed their babies to the rich."

"I don't know anything about a Jonathan Swift," Maurice replies suspiciously, "but I know one thing about your mother: she's a very passionate woman who follows her heart and I just adore her."

Margot makes a low noise in her throat and turns to glare at her husband with raised eyebrows. "Adore?"

X-_X-_X

Mort is trying to make sense of what his producer is telling him over the phone. "So, in other words: Halpert owns the club, and lives above it, and owns the building…and he's gay?"

A moment later he ends his call with smug satisfaction. "We're going to sell the story of a year!"

Tadashi eyes a group of leather daddies cutting through the alley and making their way towards the front of the club. "Okay."

X-_X-_X

Arthur has managed to regain some composure when he and Mrs. Fischer manage to strike up a lively conversation about music. Delighted, he leads her to his piano on the other side of the room and invites her to play a familiar tune with him. Moments later she's joining him in reciting the words to the song.

Arthur feels his spine loosen when Margot Fischer shoots him what may very well be her first genuine smile of the night. Her fingers dance across the keys just as quickly as Arthur's do.

Across the room Maurice invites Eames to dance and Robert and Ariadne are quick to mimic them. Disregarding the actions of her husband, Margot doesn't spare Maurice and Eames so much as a glance.

Eames raucously joins in at the next chorus, an entire register higher than he normally sings. He has very kindly allowed Maurice to lead their dance.

"I hope your mother doesn't expect us to have children right away," Robert says to Ariadne, still very clearly affected by the right wing track that their night had taken so far. Abortion for Christ's sake.

"Not my mother," Ariadne reminds him.

"Right," Robert doesn't seem reassured and Ariadne shakes her head, exasperated.

Nash bursts through the French doors at the other end of the room on the final chorus and gives a robust, and surprisingly good, rendition of the verse. The mood of the night has lightened considerably and instead of being taken aback the Fischers applaud Nash when the piano finishes.

Arthur, relieved, claps along gamely before glancing at his hands and his posture and attempting to straighten them both out, literally and figuratively. Mrs. Fischer appears not to have noticed.

"Thank you all," Nash replies with a Broadway worthy curtain call. "Dinner is served!"

Eames leads Maurice towards the dining room. Remarking on the song he says, "You know, I've played Liza Minelli."

With warmth Arthur hears Maurice reply, "And I bet you were lovely!"

He can't help but bark a laugh.

On the way in the dining room Arthur grabs Ariadne by the elbow and murmurs, "Go write a note to Mal and tape it to the gate downstairs. This might not end like the Spiderman musical after all."

X-_X-_X

Arthur is willing to concede that occasionally Nash is competent. His eyes sweep the dining room and Eames directs their guests into their seats and Arthur fails to see anything other than a properly set table with fine dining adornment.

With some relief Arthur takes his seat, opposite Eames, at the far end of the table. Maurice, of course, has sat on Eames' right and is nodding along to everything the man, or rather woman, has to say.

"Just what I've always dreamed," Eames sighs dramatically and sets his hand over Maurice's, "A large family all gathered around the dinner table. The same way it was when I was a girl."

"Yes, that's the way it was when I was a boy back on my father's farm!"

"It was a wonderful world then, wasn't it?" Eames looks imploringly around the table and wistfully recounts the past, "Everyone was happy, and everyone spoke English. There were no drugs, and no AIDS!"

"Easy on the wine, Mom," Ariadne murmurs rejoining the table and politely tugging the wine from Eames. She fills her own glass and extends her arm to fill Margot's. Margot squints at the label of the wine and then looks away with a slight hum when Ariadne looks at her.

"This is very interesting china," Margot sniffs, sounding anything but interested. "It looks like boys playing leap frog. Is it continental?"

Arthur whips his head around to connect eyes with his partner at the other end of the table and even as he drops his gaze down to look at the plates and bowls Eames is picking one up with confusion.

"Oh!" Eames exclaims, his falsetto bouncing between the walls of the dining room. "I—I have no idea, I've never seen these bowls before."

"Robert, go fetch my reading glasses," Mrs. Fischer commands her son, there's a sneer hanging around her upper lip and she's trying to look more closely at the plates.

Maurice, not to be left out, picks up the bowl in front of him and pats a hand against his breast pocket looking for his own glasses. "Yes, the coloring does seem European. There's well, it looks like naked boys…"

"And girls!" Eames interjects. He tilts his bowl away from the senator and says, "I have a girl here, don't you?"

Ariadne raises her head from peering into her own bowl and fixes her father with a horrified face. "I have a girl too!"

Margot cranes her neck to see into Ariadne's dish but Ariadne deftly maneuvers out of Margot's eyeline and to the side as if she were trying to get better lighting to look at the bowl.

With rapid clarity Arthur is remembering a 1998 trip to Saint Petersburg, Florida and he and Eames buying pornographic tableware from a little shop downtown. He has no idea where Nash has managed to dig it up from.

"Oh look," Eames murmurs, "Look at your bowl there Senator Fischer, that one looks like a girl…"

Maurice looks to where Eames is pointing and replies, "Then it's been a long time since you've seen one, that's a boy. I may need glasses, but that's a boy."

Arthur dives for the kitchen as fast as he can.

"Well, ah, yes," Eames shrugs his shoulders at Ariadne in a 'he's not wrong' sort of gesture.

"I couldn't find your glasses," Robert tells his mother with faux regret, rejoining the table and giving Ariadne a heavy look. "Sorry."

"Well I've got mine here somewhere," the senator mutters, patting his pocket again.

X-_X-_X

In the kitchen Arthur has only just refrained from strangling or beating Nash but is berating him as the maid ladles spoonfulls of soup into a large decorative bowl.

"What kind of idiot doesn't look at the bowls first?" Arthur demands, "Or did you just think that the senator and his wife needed depictions of toe curling orgasms with their soup?"

"It's not my fault!" Nash whines petulantly, "I was busy cooking dinner!"

Arthur's rage has very nearly peaked, all of his stress returning in light of this newest disaster. He knocks the ladle out of Nash's hand and picks up an oven mitt with one hand. "We don't have time for this! Hand me that ladle."

Arthur picks up the saucepan and storms back towards the dining room. Nash holding a handful of shrimp up, fruitlessly, in his wake.

Re-entering the dining room, Eames shoots him a pleading look as Maurice Fischer has just apparently succeeded in finding his eye glasses.

"Now let's have a look!" Maurice cries jovially, patting at Eames' arm. Eames gives him his best impersonation of a supportive smile.

"Ah, here's the soup." Arthur rushes to the senator's side and hastens to ladle a large spoonful into the man's bowl, obscuring the fine hip bones and large endowments of the young men painted there.

Arthur rushes to fill as many of the guests' bowls as possible, lies falling from his lips as quickly as he can form them. "Ignatio's famous soup. He doesn't make this for just anyone. This seafood chowder is an old family recipe and hails from…uh, his ancestral home in—Guatemala."

"Isn't that an egg?" Margot questions as Arthur dispenses her own serving.

Arthur casts a suspicious glance into the pot. "Uh, yes, a huevo as Ignatio's people call them. This is so Guatemalan, they put hard boiled eggs in everything down there. After all the chicken is their only real form of currency."

When Arthur reaches Eames the Englishman gives a panicked tug at Arthur's trousers but Arthur's logic and reasoning has left him entirely and he's speaking quickly in panic, hoping no one has managed a good look at the bowls. "A woman is said to be worth her weight in hens and a man's wealth is measured by the size of his cock."

Eames hands twist so hard in the table cloth that he jerks his napkin from the table and his cutlery falls to the floor with a clamor.

Arthur, chest heaving and forehead slick with sweat, politely smiles. "Will you excuse me?"

The entire table watches Arthur retreat to the kitchen in silence. Eames clears his throat. Twice.

X-_X-_X

"What the hell are you serving?"

Nash scuttles across the kitchen after Arthur as the taller man throws the pot of soup wholly into the sink.

"Sweet and sour peasant soup! What are you doing telling them it's seafood chowder?"

"What the hell is sweet and sour peasant soup?" Arthur barely manages to contain himself.

"I don't know," Nash exclaims, his eyes wide with panic, "I made it up! I made it up!"

"Oh, God." Arthur closes his eyes and breathes. "This is a nightmare."

Nash turns around with a huff and trips in his new shoes, tumbling to the tile. Arthur takes ownership of the cooking wine.

X-_X-_X

Eames has managed to return some form of relaxed ambiance to the room and smiles politely as he leads the table in picking up his spoon and swallowing his first mouthful of soup. He pauses, smile turned to concrete against his cheeks, and tries not to react as salty, bland, sourness batters his taste buds.

Almost as one the table reaches for their water glasses.

Giving himself a moment to recover Eames adjusts his lace cuffs and turns to Margot. "So, where are you staying in New York?"

Margot sets her spoon down with relief. "We'll be staying with the Trumps in Manhattan. Old friends of Maurice, you know."

"Oh, Manhattan," Eames eyes light up with genuine appreciation; appreciation that only someone not originally from New York can have for the city. "My parents loved making trips to Manhattan before they died."

Maurice's brow furrows, "I thought you were just visiting your parents in Long Island. Isn't that why you were late?"

Caught unawares Eames' put-upon female soprano dips into masculine baritone. "What?"

Catching Ariadne's eye Eames clears his throat and tries to create a seamless recovery. "Oh yes, now that they're, er, dead they moved...were moved— to Long Island…because…"

Eames gesticulates in the air with a bit of French bread, unsure of where exactly to go next. He dabs at his forehead with his recovered napkin. "My mother always said they loved Manhattan so much that they wanted to be buried in, er, Long Island."

Not even Maurice Fischer is sure how to respond. Eames swallows and gives the room his most winning smile. He asks Margot to pass the bottle and refills his wine.

Ariadne very quickly excuses herself and heads for the kitchen.

X-_X-_X

Ariadne rushes across the tile and grabs her father's arm. Arthur is sitting at the breakfast bar with his head in his hands and his hair has begun rising in every direction.

"Dad you've got to help, everything is going to hell in there."

Ariadne can't quite catch Arthur's response. "What?"

"He didn't make a fucking entrée," Arthur groans, dropping his hands.

Ariadne very slowly turns to look at Nash who is huddled at the other end of the kitchen island. "What? What do you mean we don't have an entrée?"

"The peasant soup is an entrée," Nash wails, "It's like a stew!"

Ariadne feels her knees go weak and she feels herself begin to give up right then. She leans heavily on the counter top and focuses on her breathing.

"Why do you think I put so much in it!" Nash protests.

"Shut up!" Arthur hisses, rising in one long movement.

"Go check the door downstairs and see if Mal has been here," Arthur instructs Ariadne, "I have to get back in the dining room before they all eat enough to see the bottom of the bowl."

Nash bursts into much aggrieved tears.

"Shut up!"

X-_X-_X

"There's CNN!" Mort is pissed as yet another news agency has pulled up in front of the club and has begun staking out the area around the Fischers' very noticeable town car.

"Look," Tadashi points at the apartment's stair entrance from their vantage point. A young woman has just come down the stairs, checked a piece of paper hanging discretely on the rail, and disappeared up the stairs again.

Mort hurries across the alley, looking each way once before snatching the paper off the railing. "Mal, whatever you do don't come upstairs. I'll call you tomorrow, Arthur."

"What the hell do you think that means?" Tadashi asks.

"That this is going to be good." Mort says confidently.

X-_X-_X

"And from that day forward," Eames is finishing a story, "My parents always refused to live in any district represented by a labour politician."

Ariadne rejoins the table again, trying to read Robert's parents' faces. Margot looks exquisitely bored and Maurice looks as though he's still rather enthralled with Eames' neo-conservatism but failing to understand it's finer points.

"Just in time for desert," Arthur says pointedly when his daughter sits.

The Fischers, still bravely sipping at the horrid soup from their mostly full bowls, pause and look confusedly towards their host.

"Lovely," Eames says. "Who would like some coffee, hm?"

He stands, dusting his skirt off, and leaves the room with the table's last bottle of wine before anyone else can follow.

X-_X-_X

Outside, the Fischer's chauffeur is holding auction with ACN's associate producer.

"Three hundred," the woman is telling him severely, "And that's out best offer."

The chauffeur shrugs and takes the cash.

"So where are they?" the cameraman demands. "All that's here is a bunch of gay clubs."

The chauffeur leans forward and begins describing the side alley.

Three blocks down Mal has managed to find parking and is hurrying as quickly as she can towards the birdcage. Dance music is filling the night air.

X-_X-_X

"Well," Arthur says after an espresso. "What do you think of these kids getting married?"

The senator makes an unhappy face. "Well, Robert's only twenty-one, and with quite a few responsibilities already naturally I feel he's…

The senator trails off when the floor underneath them begins to shake almost imperceptibly and heavy music beats can be heard from below them.

"Good heavens, what on Earth is that?"

"Is that coming from the nightclub on the corner?" Margot demands. "This must be the same building?"

"Oh, you're joking," Eames says, pretending to listen to the sounds coming from beneath them. "I always thought that was someone's television set."

Arthur gives Eames an incredulous look, trying to tell him with his eyes to stop baiting Mrs. Fischer. "Now, now mother," he says, trying to imitate Maurice's air, "You know we live above a night club."

Trying to imagine what a middle-aged straight man might say to cover his wife's gaffe, Arthur continues, "She's travelled the world with me, but deep down she's still the girl from the Sussex countryside."

Maurice, instead of nodding solemnly as Arthur expects, shoots him a dirty look instead. To Eames the senator says, "Now, the Sussex countryside may not be the same as high faluting French society, but it sounds like a darn good place to call home and you have nothing to be ashamed of."

"Oh, thank you," Eames replies warmly, and more than a little smug. He rises to pour himself another cup of coffee and offers the senator a few more gracious words while he does so.

The moment Eames leans over to pour the coffee Arthur can see disaster looming once more. Between the heat of the night and sweat from nerves, Eames' wig has become loose. When he stands again, smiling disarmingly at the room, his hair is hanging sideways on his head.

Robert has noticed the wig as well and jumps up quickly, putting his frame between Eames and his parents. "Where's the bathroom?"

"I'll show you," Ariadne offers on impulse, only just noticing what's happened as she does so.

"That's alright," Robert says, trying to be as charming and as innocent as possible. "I would love for Mrs. Harper to show me."

Arthur is standing the next moment as well, wrapping his arm around the base of Eames' neck and doing his best to shoulder the man out of the room. "I'll go with you darling."

"Why don't I go too?" Ariadne joins the tangle of limbs and provides coverage for Eames' left side as they all attempt to walk towards the hallway in tandem.

"Oh my wonderful family," Eames is gushing, trying to figure out the motive behind this newest effort. "They're so wonderfully supportive—I could just cry!"

The door to the master bedroom closes firmly behind them.

Alone in the living room Margot turns accusingly to Maurice. "Something very strange is going on."

"I know," Maurice agrees with a 'tut'.

"That dinner," Margot continues, "And I know there was something on those bowls. And then the daughter disappearing like that while we were eating?"

"I know exactly what's going on," Maurice declares. In the absence of their host he stands and pours himself a scotch from the sidebar."

"You do?"

"Mm-hmm, oldest story in the world."

Margot leans forward. "What is it?"

Maurice, with great authority, says, "She's a small town girl and he's a pretentious European wannabe. Him with his decadent china, Latin butler, and Italian suits. Ha! It's obvious."

"What's obvious?"

"She can't stand him!" Maurice says emphatically, "You can tell. He's such a snob! With that dig about Sussex, and him going on and on about his world knowledge. The contempt that Harper has for her. Did you see him when she was talking? He looked almost afraid. And he's in the kitchen and he's serving dinner. He doesn't let her run the house at all!"

After a few moments Maurice's stewing calms and he catches sight of his wife's face. She looks thunderous.

"What?"

X-_X-_X

The group in the bedroom is gathered around Eames' vanity, the various creams, accessories, and cosmetics of his daily life scattered around them.

"I'm so bloody sorry," Eames is rubbing his forehead tiredly. "I've ruined everything."

"Don't be ridiculous," Arthur says, rifling through the drawers of the vanity. "Neither of those idiots noticed the wig." He realizes Robert is still with them and murmurs "Sorry."

Robert is far from minding. He's enthralled with the items that Ariadne is pulling out of the vanity and handing to him to hold. Both she and her father appear to be searching for something.

"Where's the spirit gum?" Arthur grumbles.

"I don't know," Ariadne mutters back, one hand still rubbing soothing circles into Eames' shoulder. "Oh, here's a barette?"

"If you don't move your head too much that might work," Arthur says.

"Thank you, Ariadne," Eames touches her chin. "That's my sweet girl."

X-_X-_X

"I notice you didn't have this same sympathy for poor Mrs. Browning!" Margot says cuttingly, rising from her chair and taking long strides away from her husband. She hasn't taken kindly to Maurice's infatuation with Mrs. Harper.

"Maybelle Browning is an insensitive cow, Mrs. Harper is a lady!" Maurice protests, "I don't understand you, she's going to be your in-law too!"

"Well, if you think Mr. Harper is so terrible then maybe your son shouldn't marry his daughter, hm?"

"I don't think he's terrible in that way," Maurice reasons, "I mean, he's not going to get mixed up in some awful scandal like Browning did."

Margot rounds on her husband. "I don't think I've ever seen you before."

"What on Earth do you mean?"

"We're halfway across the country and you're not worried about Robert at all! What am I supposed to do? Carry the family while you sit there and worry about your career? And Mrs. Harper?"

"Oh please!" Maurice returns, "You're just as worried about my career as I am. And you're the one that's pushed for Robert's marriage. Mrs. Harper isn't like you, she's vulnerable; she needs compassion. It just breaks my heart; they don't make women like that anymore."

Margot brings her arm back to smack her husband across his puce colored face, but the doorbell rings before she manages to do so.

"'Allo!" A musical voice trills from the front door. "I'm home! I forgot my key!"

"Who is it?" Maurice calls out, confused.

"Ariadne's maman," The woman at the door calls back. "Mrs. Halpert! Is Arthur there?"

"Ariadne's mother?" Maurice turns his question to Margot. Despite the argument a moment before they exchange confused looks. Maurice sets his scotch onto the coffee table.

"Mrs. Halpert?" Margot calls towards the door, complete derailed. She drops her finely manicured hands to her waist and she and Maurice head closer to the entryway.

"Aha," Maurice grabs his wife's elbow and shuffles her towards the door at a quicker pace, "This is the whole story! The son of a bitch has a live in mistress!"

The woman standing outside knocks again and Nash comes from the direction of the dining room with wide eyes.

"I'll get the door," Maurice says imperiously and rushes ahead of Nash.

"No, no, no, no, no." Nash, sans fake Guatemalan accent, throws his hands in the air and tries vainly to think of something to say. Panicked he calls: "You're at the wrong house!"

When Maurice opens the door an elegantly dressed Mallorie Cobb strides confidently through the door.

"Good evening!" Nash coughs and tries to put his accent back in place. He sidles up to Mal and awkwardly asks, "May I take your coat…as usual? Or—uh—for the first time?"

Mal murmurs her thanks and shoves her coat and purse at Nash, breathless from her quick walk up the steps she turns to the Fischers and begins to introduce herself with well-crafted manners. "You must be Senator and Mrs. Fischer, I am Mallorie Halpert, I am delighted to meet you."

Mal has the perfect mix of charm and respect, but lacks the knowledge of what has transpired in the Halpert home for the past hour and a half. When she turns her smile on the Fischers they simply gape at her in return. "Please excuse me for being so terribly late but…"

"Sorry for taking so long," a refreshed Eames calls as the group returns to the living room, "But Robert wanted to see the rest of the house…"

There's silence as the two groups struggle to take in the situation around them.

"What is she doing here?" Eames demands, his hands and arms lose their feminine grace and fall flat to his sides.

"Let me explain," Arthur murmurs quickly, conscious of his guests' eyes on him.

"Yes, please do explain," Maurice demands, "Why don't you explain it to all of us? I don't want to embarrass the lovely Mrs. Harper, but exactly how many mothers does your daughter have?"

"What?" Arthur asks, stunned.

Ariadne and Robert exchange a glance.

"Well," Maurice continues, pinning Arthur with as much disdain as he can manage. "This woman here has just introduced herself as Ariadne's mother. So, I'll repeat myself, Harper, how many mothers does Ariadne have?"

Arthur looks to Eames for guidance on this, and the look on his partner's face mirrors his own. The jig is up. Eames, shrugs his shoulders, relaxing out of his character, and opens his mouth to explain.

"Just one," Ariadne speaks up. She comes out from behind her parents and puts one of her hands in Eames' larger one. With the other hand she draws the wig from Eames' head.

With an intake of breath Eames puts a hand to the top of his head, discomfited at being unmasked, as such, in front of the Fischers. Looking at Ariadne though, his mouth curves with warmth. Perhaps his little girl isn't ashamed of him after all.

"This is my only mother," Ariadne says simply. "My father owns the nightclub downstairs and my mother is the club's most successful star."

Maurice is wholly taken aback. "What?"

"We lied to you," Ariadne replies. "Robert and I lied to you, and everyone else lied to help us. These are my parents."

With a gesture Arthur feels the day's tension go out of him. Whatever comes now, they have the truth on their side and that, at least, they can take pride in. He takes Eames' hand from Ariadne and approaches the Fischer as a couple.

"I own the club downstairs," Arthur admits, "And this is my partner, Eames, who has been Ariadne's other parent, a mother in every sense of the word but gender."

Turning to Mal, Arthur says, "And this is the woman that gave birth to Ariadne."

Mal, with a flippant look at the Fischers, comes forward. She reaches a hand out and offers it to Ariadne. "It's wonderful to meet you, Ariadne, you're a lovely woman, and you have your father's honest compassion."

To Eames, Mal turns kind eyes and says confidently, "You've done a wonderful job with her."

"Thank you," Eames murmurs cautiously.

"I don't understand," Maurice murmurs, looking practically lost at sea.

Margot, always the most put together face in the crowd, clarifies "Robert? Arthur owns the nightclub downstairs? And he's not a cultural attaché?"

"No," Robert says, more than impressed with the integrity of Ariadne's family. He feels himself bolster. "And, he isn't married to a housewife. Their name isn't Harper; it's Halpert. They're Jewish."

"I don't understand," Maurice repeats with feeling.

"He's a man," Margot hisses, pointing at Eames still standing there in his powder blue skirt suit. "They're both men."

"This can't be," Maurice's brow frowns and he rounds on their hosts. "You're Jewish?"

"Maurice!" Margot throws her hands up and almost loses her very finely honed patience. With exasperation she strides towards the Halperts and yanks Eames forward with impressive strength. Holding Eames hand up Margot exclaims "This is a man!"

Maurice still seems to be having difficulty. The golden image he has in his mind of Mrs. Harper is clogging up his logic.

"Don't you understand," Robert demands, his face mirroring his mother's in a rare moment. "They're gay. Like, George Takei gay. They own the nightclub downstairs. The drag club. They're both men."

Eames clears his throat and steps around Arthur and Ariadne. He approaches Maurice, heels clacking on the tiled entryway. "Senator, I want you to know I meant exactly what I said about a return to family values."

Maurice takes a half step back for every step that Eames takes towards him. Nearly backing into Nash the Senator stops and raises his hands, "I don't understand what you mean."

Mal, losing patience herself, mutters "Americans," under her breath and opens her mouth to try to add clarity to Ariadne's conception. Before she can explain the time she tempted a gay man into her bed Eames interrupts and tries, again, to make Maurice understand the situation.

"Maurice, it's still bloody well me," Eames assures the pale man. "Nothing's changed, I'm still Ariadne's parent, Mrs. Harper if that name makes you feel better. That hasn't changed. There's nothing different. Well, just one small difference really," Eames chuckles, unable to help himself. "Well not that small."

Maurice drags his eyes up from where they have wandered down to Mrs. Harper's skirt. He looks to Margot for help. "I don't understand."

Margot rolls her eyes. "I'll explain it to you in the car, come on. Robert, come on."

With a nerve that Robert rarely has the opportunity to feel he waits for his mother to reach the door by his father before he says, firmly, "No."

"Oh, Robert!" Margot is beginning to reach the end of her own rope, "Don't do this now. I may not be as vulnerable as Mrs. Harper but you will respect me as well! Someone around here needs to start respecting me!"

With the frustration of the evening clearly boiling over Margot begins to stream angry tears. Maurice, on instinct if nothing else, bundles Margot towards him and commands, "Robert! You need to come with us!"

"Father, please," Robert swallows hard, his hand clasping at Ariadne's. If he has the choice he'd rather stay with this family, with this affectionate family.

"Robert, please don't do this now," Maurice's eyes are wide and wild. "I've made your mother cry, I'm up for re-election, I'm in the middle of a scandal, I'm in the home of a gay couple who own a nightclub; I know you want to get married, Robert, but how many lives do you have to ruin to do it?"

Arthur's eyebrows shoot upwards. He may have finally just seen what true dysfunction looks like.

Robert, feeling stunned and appalled, waits a moment before forcing his body into movement. With such a profound feeling of disappointment, he looks once more at Ariadne before, yet again, obeying his father.

Pausing in front of Arthur and Eames Robert murmurs, "I, ah, I would have really liked being part of your family."

Eames looks at Robert with pity. He wouldn't have minded if the lad were part of his family either. The boy is clearly in need of a strong role model, and Ariadne would have done the job beautifully. Parent or not, if he or Arthur had ever ordered Ariadne's life around like that she probably would have knocked one or both of them in the nose.

He and his daughter are both modern, independent, fierce ladies.

Maurice, apparently not quite having his fill of dramatic moments, pauses before opening the door. "Oh, uh, Mr. and Mrs. Harper. Or Halpert. Or, ah, Mr. and, um…..whatever your name is. I, well, I hope this doesn't influence your vote come November."

Arthur very nearly rushes the man. Ariadne jerking on the back of his suit jacket stops him short.

Maurice flashes a campaign smile and opens the door.

Suddenly the entire entryway is exposed to shouts and bright lights. Directly opposite Arthur and Eames are a dozen or more journalists, all waving cameras and demanding attention. Margot stumbles back from the door and Maurice shouts, pulling his arm back to slam the door.

With only a moment to spare, a sandy haired man tumbles through the open door, his shoulder catching on the casing as Maurice does his level best to throw him back out. After a small scuffle the man ends up sprawled out on the tile and Maurice slams the door in the crowd's collective face.

"Who the hell are you?" Arthur shouts, the group springing into action and stumbling away from the man or, in Nash's case, grabbing up an umbrella from the stand and waving it threateningly at the newcomer.

"Dominic Cobb," the man says, looking around at Arthur's home with a great deal of resignation. He stands; dusting his knees off, and doesn't look twice at Eames, surprisingly. "I'm Mal's husband."

"Mal?" Ariadne says.

"Her husband?" Arthur turns to gaze at his one-time flame.

"Oh, no," Maurice is looking mournfully at the door, "There's the morning post."

X-_X-_X

"Did you get him?" Mort shouts over the journalists clamoring at their side. He'd had to elbow the jerk from Fox News to get him and Tadashi front and center at the Halperts' front door and he was hoping it had paid off.

"No," Tadashi says with disgust, "If everyone hadn't been braying like donkeys maybe I would have."

"Damn it!" Mort grunts, and begins pulling Tadashi downstairs. "Let's see what else we can find out in the club."

"I'm not wearing a dress," Tadashi says very firmly. "I'm serious."

X-_X-_X

With resignation Eames calls, "Another news van has just arrived, and a car too. Oh, the 'New York Eagle,'" Eames sighs, "That's just print news."

Maurice groans darkly from the corner of the living room that he's been collapsed in since their discovery of the journalists at the door. "Don't worry, they'll all come now. I can read the headline already."

Margot shushes Maurice, and tries to settle him in a chair. She tries to lay a cool cloth that she'd demanded of Nash onto her husband's forehead. Since everyone had gathered in the room she's been acting as if she dares anyone else to comment on her wifely prowess.

Maurice takes the damp cloth from Margot, covering his eyes with it in abject horror. "I can see The Post now: Senator Browning and his women; Senator Fischer and his men!"

Eames struggles to maintain a straight face, covering his laugh with a cough.

"It's perfectly innocent," Margot assures, "You simply came to meet the parents of the girl that Robert wants to marry."

"Margot, no one believes in innocent these days! They look at Anthony Weiner and the twitter and the internet with the facebook! No one believes real media anymore! They'll all think what they want and call everything else fake! Bah! Millennials are ruining this country with all their avocados and loose morals."

"Well, if I can put in my two cents," Dominic Cobb says, "They don't really have anything on you. They can't confirm that you're really here. It's just an idea right now; not reality."

"You may not put in your cents," Mal says harshly from his side, her accent thick with rage that is far from being concealed.

"Mal," Dominic says sweetly, trying and failing to reach a hand out to his wife, "I just want you to come home, we need to talk about everything that's happened."

"Please don't be upset," Ariadne says from across the room, mortified. "This is all my fault. Mo –uh, Mal wouldn't be here if I hadn't wanted her to be. Please don't feel that you have to argue about what's happened here."

"Here?" Cobb blinks and looks around the room like he's considering everyone in it for the first time. "Why would we argue about anything here? I want Mal to come home and talk about the baby."

"Baby?" Arthur chokes on air and looks at Mal in shock.

"Stop it, Dom," Mal shuts her eyes and this time the rage is tempered by the tears that are clinging at her eyelashes. Her elegance is only intensified by her dangerously downturned lips. "I told you that I needed time to think about whether or not to keep the bebe."

"What is there to think about?" Dom counters, "We're going to be wonderful parents."

"You think I will?" Mal demands, "You sit across from the child I abandoned decades ago and you think that just because another child grows inside of me that I will be able to raise it?"

Maurice sits up, the cloth falling from his face and into his lap. "I hope we aren't talking about abortion right here in the sitting room like it isn't a cardinal sin…"

"Oh, Christ," Robert closes his eyes sinks as low as he can manage into the armchair.

Mal rises from the couch in pure indignation, curses dripping from her lips in rapid fire French.

"Mal!" Eyes turn to Mr. Cobb. He's not looking at Maurice or the rest of the room however. He's looking at his wife, and he looks absolutely distraught.

"Is that why you won't talk about the baby? You think you're going to be a bad mother?" Cobb stands, unfolding his long frame from the delicate cabriole that he and Mal had been crowded on. "Mal you're going to be a wonderful parent. I've always known that. Only a parent that truly understood the responsibility of raising a child would have done what you did all those years ago. Look at the wonderful home that your daughter has been raised in! Look at how much she is loved! You gave her the best life she could have had by walking away from her back then. How were you every supposed to do anything else when you were broke and on your own?"

Arthur exchanges a look with Eames, the quick glance saying it all. The situation they find themselves in couldn't possibly get any weirder. He might as well watch his ex-lover's new husband beg her to keep their baby while sitting across the room from the grown child she's never met, a conservative senator, and a drag queen.

"Please," Cobb is begging softly, his arms circling around his wife, "Please think about the family we could have."

After a very tense moment, and half a dozen faces watching the private conversation, Mallorie Cobb nods into her husband's neck, silent tears leaking their way onto his collar.

"Another television crew!" Eames half shouts from the window, everyone jumping at the abrupt turn of face. "And they're going into the club."

Maurice turns from the Cobbs, looking as if he has a few more things to say but being more concerned about his own situation. "What do I do? Someone will notice if I'm just never seen again. I can't live out my days above a drag club."

"Wouldn't you know it," Eames says regretfully, completely ignoring Maurice, "The one night I'm not performing and the club is going to be on channel five."

Arthur perks up, "Free publicity."

"Can I get anyone more soup?" Nash calls from the doorway.

"No!"

"I'm sorry, father," Robert says stiffly. He's been wondering what more he can say and comes up with nothing.

"I know, Robert," Maurice sighs. He pulls a couple of miniature candy bars from his suit jacket pocket and settles more comfortably into his chaise.

"Another drink?" Nash refills the Senator's glass before he can be answered.

"I don't really drink," Maurice makes sure to say. The several whiskies from earlier apparently notwithstanding.

Nash laughs, in a much better mood since he discarded his shoes. "I know, hunny. But now's the time to start."

Ariadne sighs and tugs at Robert's hand. If anything, she hadn't thought the night would end with everyone drunk and morose in the living room. Her father's looking more rumpled than he does at the end of Pride.

A thought occurs to her as she's looking at her father.

"Hey, Dad," Ariadne says, "Couldn't the Fischers just slip out with the crowd at the end of the show?"

Arthur shakes his head, "No, they'd be recognized in two seconds. The news crews are waiting for that."

Eames, with a look that Arthur has come to associate with some of the larger disasters in his life, turns to face the room from his window. "Not necessarily, darling."

Arthur turns contemplative eyes to Maurice, understanding his partner's idea immediately.

Maurice begins to feel unsettled.

X-_X-_X

Arthur's feeling fantastic. His club is packed, his servers are stacked, and he's back in his element.

Out of the ridiculously somber clothes from earlier he's back in usual jacket, Armani silk shirt tight across his chest, and Italian leather boots setting trends. Carmen and her dancers are finishing a Latin number and the whole club smells like booze and sweat.

It's fantastic.

"Arthur!" Yusuf is surprised to see his employer, and more than a little nervous at the wide grin stretched across his face.

Arthur claps Yusuf on the back and leans past him. Flipping a switch he cuts into the club's sound system, his voice echoing out across the heads of the patrons.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for joining us tonight. As we come to the end of the show we have just one important message for all of our guests: Family. No matter who you're going home with tonight," Arthur says, "No matter if you're going home alone, going home with a twink, a bear, your daddy, or Brian-fucking-Kinney remember that this is your home. The Birdcage will never shut its doors to you. Our family is our family, and we are God damn proud."

The crowd starts screaming. Arthur tells Yusuf what track to load and then he disappears from the sound booth, spring in his step.

Arthur is triumphant.

"We are family! I got all my sisters with me! We are family! Get up everybody and sing!"

Eames slips onstage, his favorite silk hugging his body and his wig red and curly on his shoulders. Arthur, by comparison, is slipping through the crowd, weaving his way through the producers and television crews that are lining his bar.

Arthur relays his message to the bartender, and the taps the ankle of the dancer on the nearest platform.

"Yeah, Mr. H?"

"We're marching out tonight!" Arthur shouts up to him, "At the end of the show, we'll take the crowd into the street. Spread it around!"

The dancer gives a wink and a shake of his ass, turning back to the club.

Arthur pops the collar of his shirt, "Showtime."

On stage Eames' dips are low and his hip thrusts deep. With a smirk he fades to the back of the crowded stage and ducks a head between the curtain part. "Just remember to keep smiling, mate!"

With a yank he pulls Senator Fischer on stage.

Only, it isn't Senator Fischer. It's the Ice Queen from one of Eames' most applauded performances. With a tall white wig, and glitter spread across every piece of exposed skin, Maurice Fischer looks anything but the conservative lawmaker. His mascara is flawless.

"Keep moving," Eames shouts, "And don't stop dancing!"

Arthur joins the stage from the wings and gives Eames a nod. With professional execution they begin to take their number to the floor.

On Arthur's arm is Mrs. Fischer, yet another brightly covered wig wrapped expertly around her head. She's wearing a heavily beaded flapper dress that Arthur pulled off a delighted club regular, and she's got an aqua colored feather boa wrapped around her neck.

Turning to look over his shoulder, Arthur makes eye contact with his daughter. With delight he realizes the wide eyed look of happiness on her face mirrors his own.

"I love you, Dad!"

"I love you too, Ari. Never forget that!" Next to her Robert has been made up, gelled, and poured into the tightest pair of leather pants that Eames could find in their closet. Contrary to his parents, Robert is looking around himself with amazement, holding onto Ariadne's hand as firm as he can.

Arthur shoots the young man a grin and turns back to face front. He'll make a son-in-law out of that boy yet.

When the dancers reach the floor they're parted by the crowd, but determinedly most of them manage to keep the mass moving towards the doors. Maurice is left frighteningly on his own for a few moments, and begins mumbling the chorus of the song under his breath to swell his bravery.

Several feet away, Margot finds herself being hip bumped by an attractive man with a thick Brooklyn accent. Sparing her no shame, he grinds his hips into hers. "I've never done this with a man before!"

Margot recovers, feeling some of her usual walls crumble away. Everyone in the club seems so content with themselves, so confident of their surroundings; they're not pretending all the time like her bridge club or her damnable charity council.

"Well," Margot shouts back at the young man, deepening the baritone of her voice as much as she can, "There's always a first time for everything!"

Arthur appears at her side a moment later, tugging her back on track. They join Robert and Ariadne who have found Maurice and hear Maurice remark to Robert that no one is dancing with him.

"It's this dress!" Maurice shouts in Robert's ear. "I told them white would make me look fat!"

"Maurice!"

Arthur puts an arm on Maurice's elbow to try and keep the group together in the crowd and the other father latches back onto him in return. "Don't leave me," Maurice implored him, "I don't want to be the only girl not dancing!"

"Keep moving towards the door!" Arthur pushes Maurice in front of himself and into Eames' waiting arms.

"Care to dance?" Eames winks at Maurice, and after a moment of struggling to see who would lead manages to begin a tango, strutting the man towards the doors.

"We are family," Maurice sings to himself for comfort as they dance right past Mort and Tadashi who are waiting by the door, eyes darting from one club patron to another.

X-_X-_X

Outside, Mal and Cobb are waiting double parked a block down from the club entrance. The Fischers' car is visible on their other side. The driver is leaning against the door, smug ridicule on his face.

"Here," with a great deal of strength Eames helps settle the senator into the car next to Mal, Margot climbing in the other side. Robert and Ariadne crowd into the back.

The senator rolls down his window as soon as he shuts the door. He waves to his driver. "Meet us at the corner of Bank and Waverly Place in twenty minutes!"

Mal lays the gas pedal flat and the driver shouts "Lady, not for a million dollars," after the car, not even recognizing his foul tempered employer.

"These kids," Arthur says, turning and crowding Eames up against the curb. "What are we going to do?"

"Well," Eames says, laying a couple quick, chaste kisses against Arthur's lips. "I'm going to wear my Michael Kors to the wedding for one."

Arthur grins helplessly against Eames, confident in his own skin. "I love my fucking family."

X-_X-_X

Epilogue, June 2015

"Are you sure we have the right house?" Arthur asks, glancing under the sun visor at the gated off colonial home in front of them.

"Of course I am," Eames says, "Just look at the awful lawn ornaments."

Arthur shakes his head and pulls up to the gate. "This is a terrible idea."

Eames rolls his eyes, "Just ring the buzzer will you? I'm surprised there's not a bloody butler at the end of the drive to welcome us."

Arthur thumbs at the intercom, and waits until a somber older woman asks him his business. "Fischer family reunion," Arthur calls back into intercom. "We're Ariadne's parents, the Halperts!"

The gates open in front of them and Arthur puts the car into gear. Eames' phone buzzes in the glove box.

"Do you think the kids will be glad to see us?" Arthur worries quietly.

"Darling," Eames gives Arthur a fond look of exasperation, pulling his mobile from the glove box. "They've been on their honeymoon for weeks, I'm sure Ariadne has misses you terribly."

Arthur sighs, parking in front of the house and watching a teenage valet come to life by the door. "Surrounded by Fischers at a family garden party, are we crazy or what? Eames?"

Eames is somewhat slack jawed in the passenger seat staring at his mobile. Arthur waves off the valet trying to get his attention through the glass of his windows. "What is it? Jesus, did someone die?"

"No," Eames' eyebrows climb into his hairline, "Supreme Court ruling actually. It looks like you yanks got something right for once."

"What?" Arthur breathes, his mind already connecting the dots.

Eames holds up his phone and grins. "It seems as though gay marriage is now legal in all fifty states."

Arthur laughs. He laughs in delight and in success, and dimples a wide smile at his partner. Climbing halfway out of his seat he catches tugs Eames up by the collar of his pink paisley shirt and into a kiss that ends up a great deal filthier than he intended. The valet stares awkwardly from in front of the Fischers' house.

"Arthur?" Eames asks, hips lips finding their way to the hollow between Arthur's neck and ear. "Shall you tell Maurice the good news or shall I?"

THE END

X-_X-_X

After years and years and years it's finally finished! And, I couldn't be gladder about it. This fic originally started with inspiration from Beyonce's "Single Ladies" as I walked to class one day in 2012, and quickly gained steam after New York legalized same-sex marriage that summer. And, with same-sex marriage getting legalized in 2015 across the entire US it seemed fitting that Arthur and Eames get to celebrate that in the end too.

I hope this was enjoyed and well received. It's not often I take the comedic road, and The Birdcage is such a special film. This last chapter was especially hard for me because the dinner scene and the end of The Birdcage is so reliant on situational comedy, and made all the better by the terrific job the actors did with it.

I had planned on giving Cobb a bit of his due since the beginning, though that was more for my own pleasure than anything else. I didn't want to leave the poor boy out! Although, he is quite irrelevant to the story.

I hope anyone who hasn't seen The Birdcase takes an afternoon to watch it. It's truly a one of a kind film. That magic is hard to come by, and no one could do as good a job as Nathan and Robin did. It's available on Dailymotion.

And of course, a quick word of thanks to Robin Williams for all the work he did in his lifetime. The talent of an age!