Burnie Miller pulled up in his car - his new electric car that he'd only had for a few weeks - and parked in the lot amongst the other vehicles. He got out of the car, straightened his tie and watched as another car pulled up a few cars away from his and also parked, before Delia Pleek climbed out in a stunning short, tight black dress and her beautiful chocolate brown hair down up in a bun. The twos eyes caught eachother, and the smiled.

"Nice car," Delia said, grabbing her pocketbook from her seat and stuffing it under her arm as she adjusted a bracelet around her wrist.

"It's my new baby," Burnie said, glancing back at his vehicle.

"Sounds like a painful delivery squeezing that thing out," Delia remarked, the two of them chuckling.

"Well, you know, I'll cherish the memories, soon enough they'll be all grown up and off to car college," Burnie said as Delia walked towards him, reached out and adjusted his tie, which made him a bit nervous. After she was finished, she patted it down, then stepped back and, folding her arms, smiled at him.

"You did it wrong," she said.

"You some sort of tie expert now too, in addition to the wine?"

Just then another car came turning into the lot, its tires angrily screeching as it rolled into a spot between the two cars and came to a slow crawl as the drivers side door opened and, stumbling out of it, came Flo (Florence) Stevens . With her braided hair and her dazzling smile matched with her awful fashion sense, she stopped and looked between Burnie and Delia before scoffing and shaking her head.

"What?" Burnie asked.

"You guys willingly chose to park here, they made me park here," Flo said, "that's discrimination."

"How is it discrimination? Because your car is an ugly old beater?" Delia asked as Flo slammed her door shut and adjusted her hat before putting her hands on her hips.

"Yes, exactly, they don't want me bringing down the look of the club," she replied.

"First of all, I don't think you can discriminate against a nonsentient inanimate object," Burnie said, "secondly, I chose to park here because it makes more sense than trusting some teenage valet to haphazardly park my new car that's barely had time for the new car smell to leave it."

"I'll make sure it leaves it if you want," Flo said, "I'll get wine sick and throw up all inside that bitch."

Together, the three of them began heading through the lot, going to the main estate, Burnie and Delia walking closely together, Flo sideyeing them as they did. Flo had long since suspected something had either happened between them or was eventually bound to, but had no definitive proof so she ignored it mostly.

"I like your hat, Florence," Delia said.

"Don't call me by my full name," Flo grumbled.

"It's a compliment, take it," Burnie said, "Lord knows how rarely she gives those out. They're in high demand."

"Oh she can compliment me all she wants, just don't call me by my full name," Flo said.

Just then, coming around the corner and, clearly heading to the lot, came a classic Camero, bright and shiny. Burnie, Flo and Delia stopped and watched as the car came to a crawl beside them and the window rolled down, revealing Preston Plummer, sitting behind the wheel in a leather jacket and sunglasses, a heavy stubble on his face. The three of them stared at him momentarily before Burnie admired the car.

"Wow, slick ride," Burnie said.

"It's my dads," Preston responded quietly.

"What about the leather jacket, that your dads too?" Flo asked, jokingly.

"...yes," Preston whispered, before putting his window back up and driving away towards the lot, the three of them snickering amongst themselves. Flo always knew that, even if she was a fuck up, Preston might be even lamer, and that made her feel better about herself.

                                                                             ***

Ivana Blomp was not someone the group was familiar with, at least personally.

In fact, they'd been trying for years to get into her Wine & Dine event, but it'd always been packed to the gills. However, Burnie had recently done an event with his childrens school, and had befriended Ivana there, and she'd been so impressed by his candor and personality that she openly invited him and his guests to attend this years Wine & Dine. When Flo, Preston and Delia got told they were actually going to be able to go, each one reacted differently - Delia with absolute delight, Flo with indifference, and Preston with curiousity - but all were seemingly excited regardless. Now standing in the foyer of her property, admiring the wine racks on the walls, Burnie couldn't help but feel like this was a dream come true.

"God, I hate high ceilings," Delia said, looking upwards, causing the other three to do the same.

"...yeah, that's way too high," Burnie said.

"Be a good height to hang oneself from," Flo muttered, and everyone looked at her; she shrugged and added, "What? Just a fact."

"Yeah, well, try to keep 'em to a minimum. These are high class people, and we're just people pretending to be high class people. Well, except Delia, she's actually kind of high class," Burnie said as they headed further into the large home, teeming with guests - a wine glass in everyone's hand as was the case with tastings - as Burnie's eyes scanned the room for Ivana. She was tall, lithe, with small shoulders and long sleek bright blonde hair. The usual kind of woman one would see at a runway model show or perhaps a debutant ball. More than anything, his goal was to thank her for the invitation, introduce her to the others, and then spend the remainder of the evening drinking wine.

"Hey, check this out," Flo said, nudging Burnie, who turned to look at the small statue on a little table by the doorway.

"What is it?" Delia asked.

"I've heard stories about this, they call it 'art'," Preston said, making the group chuckle.

"Burnie!" a voice said, as an older balding man in a ash grey suit approached them, his tiny round spectacles bouncing on the bridge of his nose with every step her took.

"Oh god," Burnie mumbled, rubbing his forehead.

"Who is that?" Delia asked.

"It's Charlie Fletcher," Burnie said, his voice low, "he's on the local wine tasters association board, he's often one of the people they look to for managing events, finding venues, things like that. He's absolutely insufferable."

"Burnie Miller!" Charlie said, reaching out and shaking his hand.

"Charlie Fletcher, good to see you again," Burnie said.

"You mean that?" Charlie asked, grinning.

"Oh, do I mean it? Then no," Burnie replied, the both of them laughing.

One of the few things Burnie had discovered about the semi-elite after spending quantities of time amongst them at various wine tasting events was that they often too your outright cruelty as ironic humor, and couldn't tell when they were genuinely being insulted. Burnie decided a long time ago to use this to his advantage, to make it easier to be around them and so far it had served him well.

"I didn't know you were coming!" Charlie said, adjusting his bow tie, "this is actually a pretty high profile event, you know? One of the 'bigs' of the season, so I just...I'd never seen you here, so I didn't expect to see you here. How'd you get in? It's tough to get an invite."

"Ivana's daughters go to my kids school," Burnie said, "simple as that. We became cordial, she invited me, and I, in turn, invited my...is it right to call you guys friends?" he asked, turning and looking at them with a look of delight on his face.

"Friends seems a little personal, honestly," Delia said.

"I prefer antagonists," Flo replied, shrugging.

"These are people I...wish I didn't know," Burnie said, the entire group smirking, "so I invited them because they've always wanted to come to this. Do you know where we might get glasses and get started on tasting?"

"Actually, Ivana doesn't serve the good stuff until the meal," Charlie said, "that's the whole idea of 'Wine & Dine', get it? She wanted it to be different from the other tasting events, so she figured she'd pair each tasting with a different dish."

The group stared at Charlie with a look of absolute horror on their face.

"And...and just how many wines are there to taste?" Burnie asked.

"I think this year she's sharing around 17."

"...I'm expected to eat 17 meals?" Flo asked, her voice low.

"They're small dishes, appetizers, and nobody is forcing you to eat them," Charlie said, "it's just the way the event is situated."

"Burnie!" another voice called, and this time they finally saw Ivana approaching them; she was wearing a long, glittering white dress with gold flecks adorning it, her hair done up in a neat bun, her makeup flawless, likely done by a professional hours beforehand; as she reached them and shook his hand, she said, "Um, there's a situation. I don't have enough room for everyone. Because your invite came so late, and because you invited people, one of your party is going to have to be seated elsewhere."

"Like the kids table?" Preston asked, as Flo smacked him in the arm.

"What kind of wine tasting event has a kids table?" she hissed, as he reached up and rubbed his arm where she'd hit him.

"I don't know, a house full of drunks at Thanksgiving?" Preston responded.

"Please, discuss amongst yourselves which of you will be okay sitting table adjacent," Ivana said, "I have to go make sure everything is almost ready."

As Ivana left, Charlie also said goodbye and followed after her, leaving the group alone. Burnie turned and faced the other three, all of whom looked at one another, none of them exactly eager to volunteer to sit away from everyone else, which meant that it would come down to their usual way of making a decision...Short Cork. This had ben a thing they'd started shortly after meeting at various wine tastings, and had had trouble making decisions, so Burnie invented Short Cork. The premise was simple: it was essentially the short straw, but with corks. He'd take out the corks, put them in a cup you couldn't see through, and then have everyone reach in and draw one out. Whoever got the Short Cork was the loser. They tried to agree that whoever got the Short Cork didn't take it personally.

But exclusion is rarely met with such understanding and acceptance.

                                                                            ***

"Do you have any idea how embarrassing this is?" Flo asked, looking up at Burnie. She was seated on a tiny ottomon at the end of the table next to him. Burnie looked down at her and smirked.

"I'm sorry little girl, what was that?" Burnie asked.

"You're a real dick, you know that?" Flo replied.

Burnie turned to his other side and looked at Delia, who was happily sipping away from her glass while picking up and pushing into her mouth another small appetizer - this one goat cheese and smoked salmon on a bed of caviar - before washing it down with more wine and making a horrible face before looking at the glass in her hand.

"I don't care what year this is, nothing's gonna make up for rich peoples poor excuse for a diet," Delia muttered, making Burnie smirk; Delia looked at Preston beside her and asked, "what do you think?"

"I think I should've stayed home," he replied, looking at the same snack in his hand, "the wine is good enough, but these appetizers leave a lot to be desired. In fact I'd go so far as to saying they're an outright insult to the term, as they're not remotely 'appetizing' in the least. If anything, I think I'll never be hungry again after this."

Burnie felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see Charlie behind him, who then jerked his head to the side, indicating he wanted Burnie to follow him. Burnie nodded, tapped Delia on the arm and, together, they got up and followed Charlie. As they walked away from the table, Flo and Preston looking at them before looking at eachother, Flo cleared her throat and eyed his chair.

"Do you think I would get in trouble for sitting in his seat?" Flo asked, and Preston shrugged.

                                                                              ***

Charlie opened the door to the room they'd stopped in front of, allowing Delia and Burnie to enter before entering behind them and shutting the door again. He then turned on a light, illuminating the beautiful wine cellar Ivana had, which made Delia genuinely gasp and even Burnie did a double take.

"Does she know you-" Burnie started, before Charlie interrupted him.

"She does, and I think you are the perfect candidate," Charlie said.

"Candidate for what? You're not gonna harvest my organs, are you?" Burnie asked, making Deliah chuckle.

"You're here to decide which wine shall be our topper for the night," Charlie said, approaching one of the shelves and, pulling a small rag from his pocket, slid one of the bottles out from its cubby, before turning towards them, grinning and adding, "Every year, Ivana pulls one person from the dinner to make the decision for our final wine of the night, and this year she left it up to me, and since you're new here, I figured you deserved to make that choice."

"That's a lot of responsibility," Delia said.

"It most certainly is," Charlie said.

"I'm a dad, I can handle responsibility," Burnie said.

"You left your daughter at tennis practice last week for an extra 2 hours because you flat out forgot she was there," Delia said as Charlie handed Burnie the wine.

"I remembered eventually," Burnie remarked, as he admired the label on the bottle; after a moment or two of reading it he looked up and said, "this is from 1997. This is old old. Is this even still safe to drink?"

"Can't be anymore dangerous than the food," Delia mumbled, to which Charlie snickered and nodded, taking his glasses from his face and wiping them down.

"Yes, that certainly was dreadful wasn't it," he said, before hearing someone calling to him and excusing himself momentarily. Burnie turned the wine bottle over in his hands, looking at it again while Delia watched as Charlie exited, the door shutting behind him, before she turned to Burnie.

"This is awful, why did you invite us?" she asked, lowering her voice.

"I didn't know we were expected to feast like kings on food made out of peasants," Burnie replied, his voice a harsh hiss, "I have no idea she was going to be serving this much food or that the food would be this god awful, alright? I was tyring to be nice! We all were curious about this event for years, so when the opportunity arose I snatched it!"

Burnie looked from Delia to the bottle and sucked his lip before nodding.

"We should teach her a lesson," Delia said, and Burnie nodded.

"Screw Ivana and screw her despicable pallet," he said in agreement.

                                                                            ***

Preston handed Flo a new appetizer, this time one that was visually incomprehensible in terms of its ingrediants. Flo recoiled as he placed it in her hand and smirked.

"Okay, now...the rule is I asked the chef what's in it, and he told me, so now you have to guess each ingrediant, of which there are 3, and if you win, you get five bucks," Preston said, as Flo nodded, opening her mouth and preparing to eat it before stopping.

"First prove you even have five bucks," she said.

"Seriously?" Preston asked, eyebrows raised, "You don't trust I have cash on me?"

"You showed up in your dads car AND jacket," Flo replied, "who's to say you have anything an adult would have."

"Does it matter if the money was also my dads?"

"Goddamn you're sad," Flo muttered before popping the appetizer into her mouth and chewing momentarily, before starting to gag, her eyes widened; she forced herself to swallow and then quickly grabbed the nearest glass and downed it, without even caring whose it was; as she wiped her mouth on her arm she sputtered, "that was downright vile."

Preston threw his head back and laughed, before fishing his wallet out from his pocket and pulling it open, pulling out a five dollar bill and waving it at her.

"Alright, remember what's at stake here," he said.

"Yeah, your allowance, apparently," Flo said, sneering, thinking about what was in what she'd just eaten. After a moment said started counting, holding up a single finger for each count, saying, "Well, one flavor was unmistakably fish. These people love their goddamned fish. Second would be..."

Flo made a face and investigated the aftertaste momentarily before snapping her fingers.

"Second is definitely blue cheese," she said, "Bluecheese, absolutely, I would know that taste anywhere, generally because it's been forced upon me more often than I'd like to admit throughout my life. These people can't even pick good cheese, let alone wine."

"You're two for three, bring it home," Preston said, leaning back and grinning as he waved the bill in her face.

Flo took a long pause and smacked her lips, thinking. She finally sighed, rolled her eyes and shrugged.

"I have no idea," Flo said.

"None at all?" Preston asked, and Flo shook her head as he sat up and put the bill back in his pocket before saying, "shaved Walnut."

A look of terror came over Flo's back as he laughed, but then quickly stopped when he saw her expression.

"Wh...what is it?" he asked.

"Shaved Walnut?" she asked quietly, "Nuts make me sick."

"Not like deathly, right?"

"No, but still, I could easily-"

Just then Burnie and Delia arrived back at the table, bottle of wine in Burnie's hand, immediately interrupting the conversation.

"Where'd you get that lil number?" Preston asked, pulling his sunglasses off and looking at the wine bottle.

"This came from Ivana's personal wine cellar," Burnie said, "apparently every year she has a guest pick out the finisher, and I guess this year I'm the lucky recipient."

Ivana walked up to them and Burnie handed her the bottle, which she graciously took, thanking him as she moved past. As she walked away, Burnie and Delia smirked at one another, confusing Preston who furrowed his brow at them.

"What are you guys so happy about?" he asked.

"What's wrong with her?" Delia asked, looking at Flo, who had now put a hand over her mouth.

At the other end of the table, Ivana stood tall and proud, holding the bottle in her hand as she tapped against it gently with a knife, getting her guests attention. Everyone stopped chatting and looked in her direction, going quiet, allowing her to speak.

"This year's been another rousing success," Ivana said, "and of course it couldn't have been done without my fabulous chefs, Charlie Fletcher and, of course, our guest of the evening, Mr. Burnie Miller, who's picked out our finisher wine for the years event. So, without further ado, let us open up Burnie's pick and partake in the final tasting of the evening."

Someone handed Ivana a corkscrew, which she took, thanking them, as she jabbed it into the cork and twisted, popping it out before pouring herself the first glass. She set the bottle on the table - this was tradition, apparently, she always went first while everyone else waited - and lifted the glass to her lips, taking a nice long sip. After a moment of pausing after the sip, she pursed her lips as a mortified look spread across her face. She then looked at Burnie, her eyes slanted in anger, as she stormed around the table.

"Is this your idea of a joke?" she asked, "What did you do to this, because it's so clearly not what you picked."

"I can't help it if your wine has gone bad," Burnie said, shrugging.

"Burnie," Flo said, tugging at his sleeve, while Ivana continued berating him.

"I want to know what you did with the actual wine you chose," Ivana said, hand on her hip like a frustrated mother, "because you've clearly done something either to it or swapped it or-"

"Burnie," Flo repeated, tugging at him again, now getting Ivana's attention as she turned to look at Flo, who was starting to stand up.

"Ma'am, we are in the middle of an important discourse, so if you could just have a modicum of patience, that would be-"

And then, without warning, Flo put her hands on Ivana's shoulders and vomited all over the front of her dress. Everyone scooted away from the table immediately, except Preston who doubled over in laughter, tears streaming down his face. After she finished, and glanced up to see the mortified look on Ivana's face, Flo grimaced weakly and shrugged.

"...sorry?" she said softly.

The group was escorted off the premises fairly quickly.

                                                                               ***

Parked on a lookout, where teenagers often drove to make out on, the group - who were all seated on the hood of Preston's dads car - were having a much better evening now than they were the entire time at Ivana Blomps. Sitting there, Flo still somewhat sick and Delia helping her drink water from a straw so as not to drink too much to settle her stomach, Burnie just shook his head and clasped his hands.

"Well, I can safely say after having attended it that I don't see the big deal. It wasn't like she even served anything of note or particular interest," Burnie said, "I think she only does well because she's wealthy."

"I will admit," Flo said after taking a long sip of water, "her being a total snob made vomiting on her feel a lot less worse than had she been a nice person."

"You guys, be careful not to sit on the hood too hard, my dad will get mad if there's indents," Preston said, almost hovering over the car as Burnie reached into his coat pocket to retrieve something.

"Thankfully," Burnie said, "I was able to swipe this with no issues."

He held up a bottle that had the wine he and Delia and exchanged it for, the 97 wine sloshing around against the glass. He stood up and tried to pry the cork back out, but was unable to do so, struggling and grunting.

"Be careful," Preston said, sounding nervy.

"After all that, I don't know if I could drink more to be honest," Flo said, "and Preston, I know it wasn't your fault cause you didn't know, but if you ever get me sick like that again, I will kill you and bury you in your dads car."

"Gimme that," Delia said, standing up and taking the bottle from Burnie, "there's an old trick to opening these, see, you just have to-"

And within a second the cork blasted from its orifice, smashing into the windshield of Prestons fathers car. Everyone stood around, trying not to laugh, as Preston hopped off the hood and started gesturing towards it, causing them all, even Flo, to crack up. Delia said she'd pay to get it replaced tonight, and apologized, and despite Preston being annoyed, he couldn't help but laugh a little himself.

Flo was right.

Antagonist was the right word for these people.