Chapter 2: The Sorting Shorts

"Is...is that...who I think it is?" Harried asked.

"Yep. That's Brenda Barrett," Taggert replied. "Bobbin' Brenda, we call her now, for obvious reasons."

"What's she doing in the moat?"

"Well, you had her drown, didn't you? So she's stuck in the water until it's written otherwise."

"But then Jax sighted her in Paris..."

"So far, no one knows if that was really Brenda or not, so until we do, she's confined to the moat and the plumbing," said Taggert.

"YOU THERE! PLOTTER!" yelled Bobbing Brenda from the moat, "I GOTTA BONE TO PICK WITH YOU!"

Plotter gulped and leaned over the railing. "What do you want with me?" he asked, already dreading the answer.

"Do you have any idea what this is doing to my hair? My make-up? My clothes? My shoes?! I'M TOTALLY WATERLOGGED AND IT"S ALL YOUR FAULT!" she yelled.

"I...I'm sorry," Plotter stammered, "I had no idea this would happen..."

"HAH!" she said, trying to toss her hair in a defiant manner, but it was stuck fast to her shoulders, making the movement look like an odd spasm instead. "You just watch your back, Harried Plotter," she warned, and then disappeared beneath the surface of the water.

"If I were you, I'd take her advice," said Taggert. "She can pop up anywhere there's water. So look before you sit, if you know what I mean..."

Harried's "gulp" was audible, even to Andreas, who cracked an evil smile as he stood tapping one foot impatiently, waiting for his passengers to debark.

"Show's over, gentlemen. Off you go then," Andreas said.

"What's got you in such a damned hurry anyway?" asked Taggert.

"Well, first I have to park Madame's yacht, and then..."

"PARK MADAME'S YACHT!" Taggert guffawed, giving him a good-natured slap on the back. "That's a new one!"

"No, I literally have to..."

"C'mon Plotter," continued Taggert, as if he hadn't heard, "let's get off this tub and into the castle. I think we're crampin' Andy's style here." And so the two men alit onto the drawbridge and approached the massive castle door. Taggert raised his fist and knocked three times. With a loud creak, the door swung open, revealing Audrey Hardy on the other side.

"Oh, hello boys," she said cheerily, "do come in. And welcome to Backburner's, Mr. Plotter."

At last, a friendly face, thought Harried.

As Audrey pulled the door open wide, Harried's eyes widened proportionally at the magnificent sights inside. The entrance hall was enormous, enclosed by massive stone walls lit with flaming torches. An Italian marble staircase led upwards, presumably to even larger spaces ahead, and the room was topped with a ceiling so high, Plotter couldn't make out any detail from this distance, in this light.

"Quite a place, isn't it?" commented Audrey, upon seeing Harried's rapt expression.

"Yes! I've never seen anything like it," said Harried. "The Quartermaine mansion and Wyndemere pale in comparison."

"Well, when one has a lot of time on one's hands, there's no telling what one might accomplish," said Audrey. "And those of us here have certainly had more than their fair share of spare time these past couple of years, wouldn't you say?"

"Er...yes, I guess so..." Leave it to Audrey to take the scenic route to the jugular, he thought. Harried glanced back at the front door, which was now in the process of swinging shut, and wondered if he should try to make a run for it.

As if he could read Plotter's mind, Taggert's hand clamped down on his shoulder, effectively dousing all plans of escape, for the moment. "C'mon now, let's get you sorted..." he said, with a smile.

"Sorted?" asked Harried.

"Oh, it's great fun," said Audrey, in a manner that suggested it would be fun for everyone else but him. "This is where it's decided where you should go..."

"Where I should go?" thought Plotter, with a sidelong glance at Audrey. "I'll bet you'd just love to tell me that..."

Audrey hummed a merry tune through a closed smile and led both men through the hall to a pair of large double doors. Taggert pulled one of them open and gestured for the others to proceed.

This room was even larger than the entryway. There were four tables, each draped in its own banner. At the one labeled "Hold-the-door" sat Andreas, Johnny, Leticia, Reginald, Claude, Tammy, Jake, and Mrs. Lansbury. Helena, Stefan, and Cesar Faison sat at the "Sly-villain" table. Audrey waved to her compatriots at the "Hospi-toil" table, where sat Alan, Monica, Tony, and Amy, while Taggert joined the "Brave-in-law" table, which included Mac, Garcia, Officer Rick Johnson, Dara, and Justus.

"You see, Harried, there are four houses at Backburner's, each with their own history and raison d'etat," Audrey explained. "Each of us, when originally called to attend, had to be sorted into our respective houses in the same manner you're about to be now. The sorting process is important as it determines where you'll be staying while you're here and with whom." She extended her hand and Tony came forward, holding a stool and carrying a pair of very ugly, and from the looks of things, very old boxer shorts. Certainly nothing the wardrobe department would've approved.

He set the stool down in the middle of the room, and set the boxers atop the stool. (Not surprisingly, the boxers were able to stand on their own.) The room grew quiet and everyone stared at the shorts. Harried stared too, feeling foolish for doing so. Then suddenly, the fly opened up like a mouth and the shorts began to sing:

"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
Smarter shorts than me.
You can keep your briefest briefs
Your G-strings, great and small.
For I'm Backburner's Sorting Shorts
And I can cup them all.
There'll be no secrets in your pants,
No veils of sturm und drang.
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to hang.
You might belong in Hold-the-door
Where all the servants dwell,
Obedience and aim-to-please
Make Hold-the-doors so swell.
You might belong in Hospi-toil
Where medicine's the scene
And those who quote Hippocrates
Are doomed to live off-screen.
Or yet in poor old Brave-in-law,
For those of legal mind
Just don't expect to ever win
In battles waged with Crime.
Or perhaps in Sly-villain
You'll make your real friends
With cunning folk, reduced to jokes
To serve a story's end.
So put me on! Don't be afraid!
'Tis only harmless sport.
You're in safe hands (though I have none)
For I'm the Sorting Shorts!"

The whole hall burst into applause, save Harried. "You mean, I have to put these on, and they'll decide my fate?" he asked, eyeing the dreadful-looking things.

"C'mon, we all had to do it," said Tony, indicating the crowd assembled with a sweeping gesture. "Each and every one of us had to wear the shorts until they spoke and declared which house we belonged in."

Harried reluctantly donned the shorts, accompanied by assorted snickers and muffled laughter, and scanned the four tables, wondering who his roommates would be. The Sly-villains were probably the most dangerous lot of the four; he knew that Faison in particular was none too happy with the way his story turned out. Some of the Brave-in-laws were already glaring at him, Dara and Justus in particular. The Hospi-toils were the most compassionate of the four, considering their chosen profession, but given the fact that the hospital had been on the backburner for the better part of his tenure, that compassion might not apply to him. And after Andreas made his feelings clear on the trip over, Plotter knew the Hold-the-doors' penchant for deference and accommodation extended only so far. Which house indeed would be best suited as the new home for the ex-headwriter?

The shorts were silent.

"Wow," said Tony, "it's never taken this long before."

Harried looked down at the ragged shorts. "Maybe they're defective," he said.

"I can assure you, they're not," said Tony. "I tested them myself earlier today. You see, they're tuned to what your instincts would tell you yourself, were there not so much interference from your mind. Like the song says, they listen to your gut."

"Hmmm..." said Harried. "It looks to me as if they're listening to my..."

"...well, that too," laughed Tony. "But you gotta admit, it's probably a lot more accurate system than a consumer survey or a Nielson rating. Even though I'm a neurologist, I sometimes think that thinking itself is overrated. We spend hours and hours analyzing things to death without realizing the solution has been right there in front of us all along."

Harried smiled. "There's no place like home, right? Perhaps if I clicked my heels three times..."

But the shorts were silent.

Faison stifled a loud yawn. "Well, isn't this anti-climactic," he drawled. "And I oughta know..."

Tony and Audrey looked at each other. "His could be a difficult sorting, you know," said Audrey. "We've never had a writer here before, after all..."

"True," Tony agreed. "Maybe he needs to wear them for a while."

"Great," said Plotter, cringing inwardly at the fashion statement he and the shorts would make. "And in which house do I stay in the meantime?"

"How about all of them?" offered Claude. "I mean, a lotta Luke's customers gotta sample everything on the menu before they declare a favorite, so why not the shorts?"

Johnny stifled a laugh. "Just like you had to sample every teeny-bopper band in the country last summer, when Luke was on vacation?"

"HEY!" protested Claude. "That was not my fault. I mean, look at me! Do I look like I'd go for that kinda music?" he asked, shifting his glare to Plotter.

Wonderful, thought Plotter. Another Hold-the-door who'd no doubt be short-sheeting his bed...or worse. "That wasn't my fault either, y'know," he said. "Do you really think I'd write in that parade of boy and girl-bands? That was strictly a marketing ploy, and I had nothing to do with it."

"Extraneous arguments aside, Claude's idea does have some merit," said Dara. "You should spend a night in each house, and then perhaps a decision can be made."

"Right!" agreed Mac. "And I think we should proceed in alphabetical order, which means you're bunkin' with us first!"

"Translation: you'd like the first crack at me," thought Harried.

"Well, that's settled then," said Audrey, with a smile. "You'll go with the Brave-in-laws tonight, Mr. Plotter."

On to Chapter 3

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