Feeling Special

Participants:

delilah_icon.gif sable_icon.gif

Scene Title Feeling Special
Synopsis Roundabout talk about simple subject over a first(?) glass of wine.
Date January 1, 2011

Restaurant


It's thanks Elaine Darrow's grace that Sable was able to arrange this meeting. A baby, however wee, is no small burden, and with the city so badly segmented, finding reliable nannyage is a feat unto itself. Friends in need, friends indeed, you know the drill. With gratitude, as well as with a certain nervousness that harks back to the earliest days of the now seven month-long Courtship of Delilah, the diminutive yellow eyed girl stands in the limbo zone between entrance and restaurant proper, her absurd, puffy black winter coat held bundled in her arms, obscuring the front of her button up shirt and black vest, that one-of-very-few formal outfits that Delilah has seen quite a fair bit of.

Sable shifts from foot to foot, casting occasional glances at the host's podium, where complete parties go to be seated. In the wake of New Years Eve, hangovers being nursed, it's not that busy, so Sable figures it's okay she doesn't have a reservation. This meeting was a bit off the cuff, as her now strained and con-strained schedule demands. It's only been since Christmas that Sable's seen Delilah. But it was last in middish-November that the two had any one on one time. Hectic lives, busy ladies.

With the last of her saved cash now slowly dwindling in Sable's pocket, long since out of the job at the record store (a job, note, itself taken on as part of the Courtship) thanks to weeks upon weeks of absence, it's not the most astonishingly upscale of places. Nice, but not, say, the Corinthian. Dim lighting makes it at least minimally romantic, and Sable doesn't look overdressed (though when does she ever?) even in these, her most swanky duds.

Yellow eyes cut back to the door. Anticipating.

The thing about being pregnant was going through no small amount of clothes, even if Delilah tended to buy larger sizes or fix her own; she hasn't quite gotten used to not dressing for two yet, as she realized almost out the door that the long, short-sleeved sweater she was wearing tended to sag. A black belt over the cream colored mockneck, and a dark brown and quite plain pencil skirt are as fancy as she dared getting under her coat. Not out of the dressing mode, nor will she be out of 'I can be spit on at any time' mode for quite a while. Her red hair in a loose plait, Delilah nearly mistakes Sable for a busboy when she comes in from the chill, knocking her boots against the inside rug before taking a better look. Dee is all smiles when she sees Sable though, any worry about whether she looks okay hobbling out of the door before it closes.

"Hey." Lilah preempts anything Sable does by stepping over and leaning in to put an affectionate peck onto the other girl's cheek. "You have no idea how much I needed this."

Sable brightens up the moment Dee's through the door, darting over with an attentiveness that doesn't do much to dispel the initial suspicion that she's working here. Goddammit, she asked if the vest made her look like a waiter. Like, ages ago. They said no! They said no! The burden of her coat stops her from offering an embrace, but she turns her cheek into the kiss and beams wide with a pleasure and sense of privilege that is the besotted's sole province.

"Think I've mebbe got jus' th' smallest-type clue, darlin'," Sable says. The girl retains that deep smell of woodsmoke, though thank God, a recent shower has gotten the scent of dog off. Canine cologne is not what one needs for an (ideally) romantic encounter. "Makes me feel a touch better, though, knowin' it's both 'f us ain't gettin' out much. Only acceptable 'xcuse f'r seein' so little 'f y'." She wrinkles her nose, tone faux-chiding, "guessin' y' haven't had much time t' practice on yer guitar," pronounced 'gee-tar', "what with th' little pink thing, 'n' all."

A quick sidle and a quicker request, and the pair are led to a table, not to far from the bar. Sable, a consummate gentleman when she remembers to be, pulls out Delilah's seat for her, giving a wide and slightly wicked smile. "Y'all better not tell me y' still can't drink. I been worked t' th' limit 'f my natural charms, darlin', without liquor t' help make m' job easier."

"A little, once in a while. If I sit him on the floor and do it there, he likes that. Worked a couple times when he was fussing." Delilah knows the power of music, recorded or not. She follows Sable to the table, after taking off her coat, waiting quietly while her chair is pulled out for her. Finally, someone doing something for her again outside of private. It's been simply ages. Dee offers Sable a laugh for her comment, sitting down with her hands in her lap.

"I can have a bit. Not too much, or it'll take too long to get out of my milk. Even if I gave Elaine more than enough, I try to be moderate with it now. Society frowns upon drunken babies." A man at the next table over glances up, lost without context, though he does go back to his meal. Not something anyone says! "I think with dust settling, we may be seeing more of each other. Too much happened all at once, you know?" Chaos and shit, right?

"Dunno, darlin', David Byrne might dig it," Sable says, grinning wide, as heedless of social convention as anyone still describable as civilized, "Baby, baby, please let me hold him - I wanna make him stay up all night," she half-sings as she takes her seat, slinging her own coat over the back of the chair - "Sister, sister, he's just a plaything - We wanna make him stay up all night…"

"See, now, thass th' thing 'f it," is a turn to more serious topics, though it doesn't take much to count as more serious than talk of intoxicated infants, "I wound up with a, like, sorta job to do?" the sharp swing of her voice up into the interrogative register coming only at the last three words, "makes it real, real fuckin' hard t' get out here. Like, I wanna say more, but it's like…" she wrinkles her nose, "secret type stuff. Which I'm sure y'all are safe t' tell, but I dunno how safe it is t' have y' know, dig?"

"Bottle 'f wine f'r the table," Sable immediately informs the waiter when he arrives, "jus' somethin' nice. Red, eh? Red good?" this question set to Delilah herself. She's quick, as much to get rid of the waiter and thus allow for continued conversation, as to secure alcohol. Server dispatched, barring Delilah's objection to keytones, Sable folds her hands on the table before her and leans forward a bit.

"Which, like," Sable continues, picking up where she left off, more or less, "forces 'pon me certain, like, decisions, not least, darlin', havin' t' do with howall I keep questin' after you." She gives a smile, just a little wry. "But thatall c'n wait, lovely, since it's sorta, like, serious talk 'f th' sort I feel like mebbe y' don't need, this bein' time t' cut loose a little, eh?"

Dee quirks her lips and allows Sable to ask the waiter for a bottle, the expression sticking there for the length of Sable's explanation. "I know the big parts of the picture, but it'll be up to someone else to decide whether or not I am privvy to the smaller ones. I do have Walter to watch over now, too. I can't be- as spry as I was." The Ferry may trust her, but it may be a question of Delilah only wanting to know what she absolutely needs to know.

"As for your questing- well- consider your inquiries from last month as reconsidered and welcomed." The redhead pauses a moment, searching for a word or two further. "But I know that that depends on what you want to do now and all, what with everything else. I just want you to know that if you were still thinking about it…" It's an awkward thing to bring up, because of the Garden and everything, and Dee seems to quiet a little more. "At the very least I'd like to know where you're staying now, provided everyone else with you will allow that." Like she implied before, it is more a case of Delilah's choice to know, as she does know where all of the old houses were, not of their states at current.

"But, you're right, I should be letting myself take a break." Delilah laughs now, realizing she'd been sitting on wanting to know where Sable was, this whole time. On that, and on letting her know that if she wanted to come stay with Dee, the idea struck her as promising.

Sable's head tilts, birdlike, as she regards Delilah. There's a purposefulness to her gaze, one that Dee's seen before, if briefly, during the last time this very topic was brought up. Sable has never been very good at hiding what she's feeling. She's also not good at hiding that she's thinking, though the content, unspoken, isn't as easily discerned.

"We're bein' awful formal 'bout this, ain't we?" Sable says, at length, smiling just a little, and even then lopsided, "and mebbe it's ice t' be broke, gettin' it out 'f th' way. 'cause, put simply, I know I'm part 'f yer life. And I'm damn fuckin' glad 'f it. And that I don't intend t' ever change. Love is undyin' if it's love at all, dig?

"I guess," Sable says, rolling a shoulder and glancing at a passing waiter. With a bottle of wine… but it's for another table, false alarm, "it's jus' which part 'f yer life I'm gonna be in, that's what seems t' be unsettled, eh? If I move in with y', Dee, I sorta, like, want it t' mean somethin'. 'cause doin' what I do now, th' job I got, that definitely means somethin', dig? It's mebbe selfish, put this on you now, but… I want to. Lord knows, long as I've been chasin' you? But I gotta know it's somethin'."

Her face half falls, apologetic. That… wasn't much of a break at all. "You make a gal pine so."

Delilah is sort of having a moment of uncertainty, mixed with her wanting the waiter to get there soon because this isn't quite going terribly smoothly out of her mouth. Insert foot.

"I could say the same about you." Dee's wrists are on the edge of the table, fingers knitting with her eyes on them. The gesture does seem somewhat childish, but it is still a universal symbol of nervousness. "For all the weeks of being with my son, there were always days where I was wishing I hadn't been silly before when you asked. Wishing you'd be there instead of somewhere else. I'm damn sure that means it's something. I'm not trying to yank your chain."

There's a slight delay while Sable tries to parse Deetalk and transpose it into Sablespeak. Are they talking about the same 'something'? Two highly disparate trajectories have brought these women to this moment. British and American, they were bound to be separated by a common language.

This time, her smile is a little bit easier, a little more certain. "I can't say it don't feel nice t' know I w's missed," she says, dipping her head, gratitude there, "…like I said, I want to. That sounds jus' fuckin' perfect," she cracks a crooked grin, lightly joking, "What I'm doin' now? Killin' my music career," trying, fruitlessly, to cover sentiment, "it's just…"

This is why Sable is maybe not the best choice of safe house operator. She has such a bad time keeping secrets from some people. Brain to mouth filter, ragged, threadbare. Overworked. "It's jus' that I got a place 'f my own," she says, trying to be 'subtle', "like th' old place I lived at, dig? Only, like, I'm th' super. Get me?"

If the waiter is a secret agent, he's sure to be stumped by that code! But he doesn't seem confused or befuddled as he interrupts any further absurd analogy/doubletalk by arriving with their wine. Cabernet Sauvignon. Sable points to Dee. "Let th' lady taste it first, eh?" Fancy enough, this place, that the waiter shows Delilah the label first, and pours her a small glass first. Presenting it for inspection.

Delilah gives the waiter a small nod in thanks as he passes her the small glass, and though she wants to backtrack the conversation she was having- they seem to have gotten wires crossed-, tasting the wine offered her is apparently a priority. Hey, it's not her fault she found it necessary to keep that fake ID. Lips aren't that colored on tonight, and so virtually nothing is left to spot the rim of the glass. "I think this is perfect, thank you. Could you leave this and give us a few minutes?" The slightly younger of the two hardly waits for the waiter to leave before she is leaning forward to say something to her date.

"I'm going to go back to the start here and speak English, and not in implication. If you ever want to live with me, that would be okay, but I know you're busy now-" No need to get all code-y. "-so at the very least I want you to know that I'm willing to see where this relationship can go." All things considered? That's some nice English for Sable to be hearing.

Oh, no, that's just wonderful. Crystal clear. And clearly needed, also. Never was a more roundabout discussion had. Sable looks almost a little struck at Delilah's bluntness. For someone who prides themselves on being forthright, Sable sure beats around a bush pretty good.

"Yeah…" Sable says, if slowly, momentarily stuck in that previous, elaborate mode of thought, "thats sounds extremely groovy," she suddenly pulls a smirk, squinting at Delilah, "I never had t' slow play like this b'fore, darlin'. You have a hell of a poker face, whether y' know it or not." She leans forward, taking Dee's hand and catching her eyes. Classic stuff. You can just see the camera angle.

"I ain't askin' no more than that, I pledge. I jus' need t' know I got a shot at th' highest seat in yer heart, and that if there's another who takes m' place, y'll have th' mercy 'n' carin' t' tell me 'n' break m' heart t' my face. Everythin' else… that's fine print. What I truly care 'bout is bein' that part 'f yer life, dig?"

"I dig." Delilah grins, and up close the pearl studs in her ears seem to shimmer along with her mood. Her hand nestles right into Sable's. "I know I can be hard to read sometimes, but it took the cake when I kept thinking about you when I couldn't see you every day." You don't know what you'll truly miss until you suddenly don't have it anymore, right? "I'm no good with the obvious stuff sometimes, when it comes to this."

"Thanks for sticking it out. Really. I dunno where my head would be otherwise."

"Yeah, well, if I ain't a bit too obvious 'n' free," Sable says, happy to admit her own shortcomings. Not to be beaten in such a contest. Dee gets to be a saint and Sable a sinner. That's the fantasy, at least from the musician's end. Artists. Always painting you into a picture.

And and awful pretty picture, now that seems to be resolving into focus. Or so Sable dares to hope. "I'll see 'bout how long this here thing I gotta do is gonna last. It makes me give up a whole lot I love real dearly, 'n' nobleness only goes so far. Sometimes y' gotta give a girl roses. Part 'f havin' a life worth livin', 's far as I can figure."

The yellow eyed girl releases Delilah's hand and plucks up the bottle of cab. "Now, time I claimed th' honor 'f pourin' you yer first drink as a mum." Tink. Glug, glug. Delilah's wine glass fills with dark red. Sable gives the young mother a squinty eye, "'n' don't correct me if I'm wrong, Dee darlin'. You jus' lemme feel special."

Delilah cares enough to allow Sable to savor her special feeling. She'll not say a thing about it. The only thing that matters now is having a nice- probably long-winded- date night, whether or not dinner is the only thing they use spare time to do. For now, they have the evening.

"To feeling special." Is the toast that she offers. A good a toast as any, after all.


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