Mikey’s Best Birthday Party, Ever!

“Oh Lauren, he’s wonderful!”
“Do you think so? Really?”
“Oh, yes. Most definitely.”
“Not too…strange for a children’s party?”
“No, no – just look at them! They love him.”
The two women looked out from the kitchen where they stood drinking sparkling wine to the neat, striped lawn of the well-appointed property. Beneath the shade of a large cedar a man in an expensive-looking suit laughed expansively with a group of children sitting at his feet. Every now and again the group thrust up their small hands in response to some question or invitation that went unheard behind the triple-glazed windows of the air-conditioned kitchen. Deeper in the shade a younger, larger man wearing sunglasses and a dour expression held a two-way radio to his mouth. The younger man looked into each corner of the garden for the fiftieth time in the last hour and glanced at his wristwatch. In the kitchen the slim, attractive, thirty-something brunette took a sip from her glass and turned to her blonde friend and host, confident in the success of the afternoon,
“I think he’s absolutely brilliant! Where on earth did you find him?”
“Well, as a matter of fact, we’d booked a clown who ........