Free All Shook Up by Josey Alden

Scene 1 ~ Sophie
    The second I hear the doorbell chime, I know I'm screwed. I sit up and assess my ability to walk from the couch to the front door with no injuries. On a scale of one to ten, dizziness is a five. I have a fifty/fifty chance of cracking my skull open on the Italian marble. Before I can test my luck, though, my guest lets herself in. As I feared, it's my real estate agent. And the guy standing next to her? A dead ringer for Mark Dillon. The Mark Dillon.
    I have to get a closer look. With all due caution, I cross the room at half-speed, using furniture as handholds, until I reach the foyer.
    "Sophie, we had an appointment this morning?" Friendly Neighborhood Real Estate Agent Mary says, turning her statement into a question. Translation: "Sophie, why are you here, and why are people passed out in random places in your living room?"
    I stare at Mary's matte-finished face and powder-blue Chanel suit, trying to wring a coherent response from my sodden brain. Unfortunately, I seem to be fresh out of coherence. So, I turn to study the Mark Dillon look-alike instead.
    He sure seems like the real thing, down to the guitar-string callouses on his fingers. In fact, he's even better than the real thing. I remember Mark Dillon as a tall, gaunt lead guitarist who never looked at the audience while he played. This version of him seems more … alive. It's too bad that guitarists are not my thing. I can ignore how his black t-shirt molds to his muscled chest and arms, and I don't care if his jeans look custom-stitched for him. And those aquamarine eyes? They have no effect on my breathing. None at all.
    When I fail to break the awkward silence, he steps forward and holds his hand out to me. "I'm Mark," he says. "Thanks for letting us intrude."
    I take his hand. My thumb glides over the smooth skin and tattoos on the back of his hand, and my fingers brush against the rough spots underneath. A second later, I realize that I'm supposed to shake his hand like a normal person—not make a love connection. I let go like he shocked me.
    Then, I remember the incident. The one that sent Mark to mandatory rehab instead of jail. After an after-show party, Mark had downed ten too many and punched out a guy cold when he said the Never More Alone show sucked that night. It was something my father would have done.
    "Lang Winter's daughter," Mark says. Right away, I recognize the reverence in his voice, and I groan to myself. "Your father—"
    "Was a selfish, immature, wasted asshole." Kind of like me.
    Mark raises his eyebrows. Damn, damn, damn. I didn't mean to say it out loud. This is not the way to unload this monstrosity of a house before the equally monstrous tax bill is due. I sigh and look down at my feet. And bare legs. And the world's skimpiest pair of panties. I'm not even sure they can be classified as underwear. My cheeks catch fire.
    "Excuse me," I say. "I'm not wearing pants."
    My fast exit is foiled when I trip over Hondo's foot and catch myself two inches away from smashing my face on the floor. Hondo moans and swears at me. I recover my footing and skitter out of the room to the safety of my bedroom. Luckily, it's the second master bedroom downstairs, so I don't have to suffer the humiliation of climbing stairs in my current state of undress.
    I go straight to my closet and sink down on the velvet chaise lounge, fanning my overheated face with the cardboard from a package of tights. This closet is the size of most normal bedrooms. Every wall is stuffed ceiling to floor with clothes and shoes, obliterating the clever system of hangers, shelves, and drawers that were intended to organize this grand mess. I grab a pair of jeans from the end of the chaise and tug them on, careful not to jostle my stomach too much. On a scale of one to ten, nausea is approaching a seven.
    Mary appears in the doorway. "Sophie, a word, please?"
    "You might not want to stand between me and the bathroom," I say. A look of disgust clouds her neutral