TWENTIETH SHOT -- drunk drunk drunk

[dog_eat_dog]

Who: Tess
What: Drinking >:'[
When: Tonight?
Where: Death Match
Rating: idk



Time passes so easily in Paradisa.

Tess looks at the calendar only to realize that a month has flown without even realizing it, and it all becomes a blur: Ellie left, leaving her alone with some sense of responsibility over a girl she barely knows. Lee left. The people she’s closest to are her quasi-hostage medical officer, an undead vampire, and an uptight detective, and she hasn’t talked to any of them in weeks.

She used to be a big player on the streets of Boston, but here, ten months into her stay in Paradisa, she’s the one lingering around the doors to the Death Match until it opens in the afternoon, barely an hour after she’s dragged herself from bed. She doesn’t talk to many people, not even the bartenders, she just sits and drinks until it’s time to wander off and drink elsewhere until it’d be somewhat acceptable to come back again –– she times it like clockwork so it doesn’t feel excessive, though it probably seems that way anyway. She spends more hours trying to find something productive to do than she does actually being productive. When she sleeps, it’s on a luxurious bed, when she eats, it’s off fine china plates with inlaid gold, and the meal itself is mouthwatering. She has running water twenty-four hours a day when she previously had to scratch the right people’s backs to get more water than the average civilian of Boston.

Everything she devoted her time to her entire adult life –– everything she ever did as a survivor –– is now a given for every single person in this place. What does it even mean to be alive now with everything laid at her feet? Tess imagines she’s no more useful than a phonebook twenty years out of date, full of connections and information completely obsolete. Functionally useless, barely even human.

That’s why she’s at the Death Match again, wearing a t-shirt and sweatpants, sitting there with a glass of whisky ordered neat. For once, though, she isn’t engrossed in a book or anything -– she’s just looking around.

And then she says to the nearest person: “Buy you a drink? You know, pretending we have money here."

Comments

[thebestseller]

Castle had been avoiding talking to Tess as much as he could when she'd shown up at the Death Match; he was well aware of the antagonistic relationship between her and Kate, and quite frankly, he wanted no part in that.

However, this time it was late, there were fewer staff around, so he had to shrug and walk toward her, polishing a glass.

"No thanks. Ever since the horse suit incident, I'm stay away from the drinks."

[dog_eat_dog]

Tess almost laughs.

"You won't last long," she says. "You work in a bar, for fuck's sake. How are you going to stay away from drinking?"

She raises her glass almost pointedly and then takes a hearty swig. It's half-full when she sets it down again, a little harder than necessary, the amber liquid sloshing wildly.

"What was the horse suit incident?"

[thebestseller]

"The same way I've managed to avoid coffee since coming here- very very carefully."

Castle set his glass down and began polishing another one.

"Surprised you didn't hear about it. Meg and I got seriously drunk and thought it would be funny to wish up stupid outfits, and I managed to get stuck inside a pony costume."

[dog_eat_dog]

Tess scoffs, though it's not too unkind –– maybe just a bit skeptical. No one can avoid creature comforts for long.

"I haven't exactly been present lately," she says, pointedly, and she gestures at her dwindling glass of whiskey. It's nicer to put it that way than to say she's just been drinking her days away, she supposes. "I didn't even know Meg could get drunk."

[thebestseller]

"Say no more," Castle replied. "I did notice a distinct lack of arguing and loud snark over the journals, but I'm not in the business of prying." Well, not about Tess, anyway. "Normally she doesn't- she can drink me under the table. I guess it was a temporary loss, because we were both smashed after two shots."

[dog_eat_dog]

Tess does smile this time, enough that her nose crinkles and her laugh lines deepen.

"That's a saddle I need to get back into. All these new people running around like they own the place when they really just need to be put in their place, huh?" If she were with Joel, that might be a funny inside joke about being out of her prime or off her stride, but with someone she barely knows it just feels passive aggressive. "You're a bit of a lightweight for a barkeeper, anyway."

[thebestseller]

"Hell, someone needs to stop peoples' egos from getting too big," Castle agreed. Kate was usually responsible for doing that for him, but as he knew Tess and Kate didn't get along, he didn't bring that part up. "Eh, being drunk on the job makes it harder, anyway," he replied. "I save the harder stuff for after hours."

[forsometimenow]

Jennifer knew that what she was doing was probably a big, stupid mistake- but it wasn't like she hadn't make big, stupid mistakes before in her life.

And anyway, Tess was still her charge in a way, and she still felt like it was her responsibility to make sure the other woman was at least alive and breathing, if not well.

It only took a little asking around before she found out that Tess had been hanging out at the Death Match a lot, so Jennifer spent some time to gather her nerves before plunging in.

You're an idiot sometimes, you know that? she admonished herself, before she spoke aloud in response to the question, her voice with an edge of sarcasm.

"No, thanks, I'm the desiginated driver tonight."

[dog_eat_dog]

Tess smiles, though it's somewhat leery. Look who came crawling back, she wants to say, but the truth is Jennifer isn't crawling, and Tess gave her perfectly legitimate reasons to go. Regardless, Tess sits up a little straighter, just so she has her usual confidence. She always has to act like she's in the right.

"I bet you drive like a little old lady anyway, drunk or not. Slow as hell."

[forsometimenow]

"No, just sensibly," Jennifer replied calmly. Tess was sitting up straight, but Jennifer was pretty sure she was already drunk. "So, I've heard you've practically set up residence here."

Stupid stupid stupid.

And yet, she wasn't going to walk away.

[dog_eat_dog]

"It's not like there's anything else to do around here," Tess replies, and she gestures by lifting her glass pointedly. "Better than all that Merry Christmas shit, better than being bored."

[forsometimenow]

Right, Jennifer thought to herself. Yeah, that sounds a lot like her.

"Because drinking is the only other way to pass time around here, surely."

[dog_eat_dog]

Tess leans an elbow against the bar.

"And do you have any suggestions?"

[toobravehearted]

He wouldn't normally find himself in the Death Match. It's not like he has anything against these sort of places and he has been in far worse establishments, it's that for pleasure, it isn't really his taste.

He looks up quickly when he does enter, pulls a face, then casts his attention back to the thing he has in his hand. It's just a little box with an aerial extended, and it beeps furiously. Waving it around, he follows where the signal is strongest until he comes to the bar.

Distracted by the voice and looking around, his face breaks into a smile just a moment before he catches the smell of whiskey.

"Hello. That's kind of you. At least, I think the sentiment counts."

[dog_eat_dog]

Tess's eyes drift up from his little mechanism and to his face, and she wonders if it was stupid to even offer a drink to someone who looks so... quaint. The man is wearing a celery, for fuck's sake.

"Is that a yes, or a no?" she says, a little irritable. "It's rude enough to question how genuine I am."

[toobravehearted]

His eyebrows raise as she looks at him. "Question how--? Madam, I promise I never did any such thing."

He glances at her drink and back. "Allow me to start again: thank you very much. I would love an orange juice if you're offering."

[dog_eat_dog]

"You 'think' the sentiment counts," Tess replies. This many glasses in, it's less about showing him how carefully she listens and more about taking everything personally, and with the subtlety of a machine gun. Alcohol makes her trigger-finger itchy. "Orange juice. Jesus christ. Fine. One orange juice."

And the moment the bar offers up the juice, she slides it to him.

"You're welcome."

[toobravehearted]

Far be it for him to further antagonise a person (at least just yet) that has evidently taken more than just one whiskey. With a patience-bolstering breath in and a smile, he is quick to reach his hand to the glass as she slides it towards him.

"Thank you. You're not fond of orange juice yourself?" No, he couldn't help that one. "I normally find out a person's name before letting them buy me a drink."

[dog_eat_dog]

"I like it just fine," Tess replies, "I just take it mixed."

A half-truth, anyway; she could drink orange juice for the rest of her life and not get sick of it. But between that and good alcohol, she'd take the numbing effects of booze without hesitation.

Still, she turns enough on the bar stool to offer a hand to shake.

"Tess."

[putuporshutup]

When Meg decides to show up (hey, it's her bar - she does what she wants) she notices Tess and gives a small, friendly nod. She sees Tess around often enough, but it's been a while since they chatted. After she's situated, she comes over to say hello.

"Hey, can I get you anything? On the house," she greets her with a wink.

i wrote this days ago and didn't press send.

[dog_eat_dog]

"I'd hope so," Tess replies, and she finds herself pleasantly surprised to see Meg. "If this place kept tabs, I'd be keeping the lights on single-handedly."

Ha ha, lighthearted poke at the slow burn of alcohol dependency.

Goes perfectly with me tagging in about 17 years late haha

[putuporshutup]

"And I would have drank myself out of business sometime around March," she jokes back, happily serving up Tess' usual. Three cheers for alcoholism, or something. Not that Meg even remotely recognizes that as a problem. "How have you been?"

[dog_eat_dog]

Tess chuckles under her breath, pulling the drink closer to her.

"Miserable," she replies. "Joel and his kid are gone, as are the rest of my crew, leaving me with an unruly teenage girl and a nervous teenage boy and that's it."

[putuporshutup]

"Shit, that sucks," she mutters in reply, pouring her own glass of bourbon and giving the other woman a sympathetic look. Gone... yeah, she knows about gone. "How'd you end up with kids tagging along?" Meg wrinkles her nose in distaste at the idea, never mind the fact that she's even got one or two that she makes a point of keeping an eye out for.

[dog_eat_dog]

"Long story short?" she says, "I would never pick them up on my own, but the first one –– Ellie –– she was a job. Joel and I had to smuggle her out of Boston and Joel got attached."

That's the only way to put it that doesn't get into the whole death and sacrifice thing she'd pulled.