Participants:
Scene Title | Losing My Goth Cred |
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Synopsis | That's me in the corner. That's me in the spot. light. losing all my goth cred. Oh, no, I've said too much. I haven't said enough. Odessa, Melissa, and Luke share a table at The Surly Wench. |
Date | March 14, 2010 |
A punk rock pub through and through, The Surly Wench is dim, cramped, and incredibly popular. It's a small, rectangular venue with a bar bordering one entire wall. Despite this, ordering a drink on a weekend can be an exercise in line-waiting and rib-elbowing. There are a few small tables ringed with high stools for seating, but these are prime real estate. The majority of the patrons are forced to stand shoulder-to-shoulder on any given night. Almost half of the cramped interior is devoted to a low stage for live music. There's no dance floor. If you feel the need, you'll have to thrash in place.
Despite the weather there are always people ready to go out and about and have a little fun. Even on a Sunday night. Especially on a Sunday night. Melissa is one of those, and has found her way to the Surly Wench. She's not in one of her black skirts for a change, and her long coat is tossed over the back of her chair.
She's apparently been here for at least a little while, as there's an empty and a filled glass on the table in front of her. Her lips are curved into a bit of a smile despite the fact that her face and half of her body aches from the accident the day before. Though perhaps those aches are why she is simply people watching for the moment, rather than trying to find an empty foot of space to dance in.
One of the few people to escape the Brooklyn Bridge incident unscathed, Odessa Knutson has decided to celebrate life, as it were, but somewhere that isn't where she sleeps for a change. Whiskey sour is the drink of the night, and the place is packed. She surveys the bar, head bobbing up and down to the thump-thump-thump of the music until she spots a mostly empty table.
The table occupied by Melissa.
"Heeeey!" Odessa greets cheerfully, "Would you mind if I sat with you? I've got an aversion to creepy guys and you look like you could send them away with just one look."
Luke has mixed emotions for the events that transpired the day before. On the one hand, he totally blew up a bridge, which was awesome. The downside was, he blew up a bridge. He's more or less torn between guilt and pride, and finally got aggravated and went out to the same place Melissa went, armed with a fake ID that proclaims he -just- turned 21 a week ago. He's close enough in age that it should go unremarked. Pretty brazenly, he walks into the bar and sits at a table near Melissa after having flashed said ID that claims his name is Larry something. Speaking of creepy guys…
Melissa arches a brow, her head tilting. "You can sit…but why do you think I could send creepy guys on their way with just a look? I'm hardly scary lookin'," she says, sounding more curious than anything else. Then she spots Luke. She never asked his age before, so there's no motherly disapproval at his being in a bar while underage. Instead she just motions for him to join her and Odessa.
"You look like you'd be good at glaring," Odessa offers with a shrug as she takes a seat next to Melissa. "You also look like you don't take shit from anyone. Probably the eyeliner," she concludes with a nod. "Which is a terrific look on you, by the way."
Luke shrugs and joins the two at the table, looking from one to the other. "Hey… weren't you at the…" yeah, well, anyway, the less he speaks of that the better. "Come here often? and yeah, I agree with that." he smiles innocently at Melissa. "You look fantastic." why yes, he's hitting on her just because.
Melissa laughs. "Thanks. This isn't quite my usual look, but…Ah well. You should've seen me a couple days ago. Had black streaks to go with the eyeliner. Looked awesome." She glances at Luke, arching a brow. "Oh my god. A compliment. I think I just had a heart attack." She reaches over to try to lay a hand on his forehead. "You feelin' okay?"
Odessa smirks as she watches Luke attempt to sweet talk Melissa, who seems to be wise to his games. "Well, it's workin' for ya." She raises her glass, taking a drink while she lets Melissa pretend she's concerned that Luke has a fever. "What're your names? I'm 'Dessy."
Luke snorts and leans away from Melissa's mothering. "Would you prefer it if I called you a crazy bitch then?" he tells her, and the Odessa asks for his name. He pauses for a second or two, then shrugs. "Larry." he tells her, pretty adept with lying by now.
"I'm Melissa," Mel says with a grin for Odessa. Luke gets an arched brow and long look at his introduction, but she doesn't rat him out. Instead she looks back to Odessa, studying her for a long moment. "He's right. You were at the bridge," she murmurs.
Odessa had been hoping that that wasn't what Larry had been referring to. Caught, however, she leans in a bit, "Keep that to yourselves, would you?" She crosses one thigh-high boot-clad leg over the other and hunches her shoulders up just a bit, smoothing one hand with splinted fingers first over the leather of her corset at her stomach and then over her tattered denim miniskirt. As if there had been any wrinkles to smooth that weren't purely metaphorical.
Luke lifts his hands up in a gesture of compliance. "Hey, I'm the last person who'd blab about things people may or may not have done yesterday." he tells her with a quick look at Melissa. "Did they ever find out what caused it, or are they still blaming the weather?"
Melissa smiles at Odessa. "Don't worry. I won't rat you out. Like…Larry…I'm the last person who would do that. Especially since you were helping to save people yesterday." She glances back to Luke and shrugs. "No idea. But it's the second accident I've seen in a week. And the first was…there was some sort of meaning behind it. Just not sure what."
"Whole world's going to hell," Odessa surmises. "Seems like there's a new disaster every single day, huh?" The woman shakes her head and takes another long drink from her glass. "At least no one was hurt in the explosion." Thanks to her, but she's not about to pat herself on the back for something she probably had some sort of moral obligation to do. Why can't Sylar be here so she can discuss things like this with someone who understands?
"Yeah, that was some explosion, huh? Too bad.. er, I mean, it's a good thing the bridge didn't get completely destroyed." Luke remarks, then goes to get a drink. "Whaddya want?" he asks Melissa, since the money he has was provided by her. Gee, at least he's not being rude or anything.
"I'm just glad no one was seriously hurt in the accident either," Melissa says, nodding to Odessa, sipping at her drink. A drink which she lifts at Luke's question. "Another one of these'd be nice. Amaretto sour."
Once Luke has retreated from the table, Odessa leans in toward Melissa. "Did I hear that right? Did he say it was too bad the bridge didn't get taken out?" She giggles behind her hand. "Isn't that just like a boy to want to watch things go boom?"
Luke makes the orders, and comes back looking vastly irritated. He must've ordered the wrong thing, because it's bright pink with a little umbrella and probably tastes like fruit. "Here." the pink monstrosity is placed in front of Melissa instead with an expression of deep disgust, and Luke keeps what would've been Melissa's.
Melissa's lips curve. "Gotta be the testosterone poisoning," she murmurs back to Odessa. Then she's pausing, her head tilting as she stares at the drink in front of her, then to Luke, then back to the drink. Finally she holds up her half empty glass, and the frou-frou drink, holding them side by side. "…Larry? Do you see a problem with this thing that you just gave me?" she asks, brow arching. "One of these things is not like the other."
Odessa hides her laugh behind her hand again, though her eyes give her away to both Melissa and Luke. "That is definitely not a sour anything." She tilts her head to assess the pink concoction. "It does appear to have potential, though!"
Luke nudges the frou frou towards Odessa then. "Have at." he shrugs in Melissa's direction, turning to scowl broodily at the bar. "Damn bartender must've screwed it up. I didn't order anything like THAT. Seems like no one knows how to do their job these days." his contempt for the establishment made clear, 'Larry' takes a sip of the drink he was supposed to get Melissa. Oh well.
Melissa's lips twitch. "What did you order?" she asks, setting her girly drink in front of Odessa to enjoy. "And since you just stole my drink, you can go get me another one," she says, smiling brightly at him.
Odessa isn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. She instead takes the last gulp of her whiskey sour, shoves the empty glass aside, and is quick to take a large drink of whatever the fruity abomination is in front of her. I licked it, it's mine. Fortunately for Odessa, she seems to like it. Whatever it is. "Mmm. It sweet! And fizzy!"
Luke frowns at Melissa, then at the bar. With a long suffering sigh, he gets up and goes to the bar, leaving his drink unattended like a total noob. Why, Melissa or Odessa could slip date rape drugs in his drink and then have their ways with him later! …well, he can dream, right? Eventually he comes back with the right drink for his 'landlady'.
Alas, Melissa doesn't slip anything into Luke's drink, she just grins at Odessa. "Well, glad you like it. Me? I make it a rule to never drink anything with an umbrella in it. I might lose my goth club card," she says, draining the last of her old drink, and reaching for the new. "Thanks."
Odessa tips her head to one side thoughtfully before nodding. "You raise a valid point. You might lose goth cred." She leans just enough to indicate to her boots under the table. "I think so long as my shoes are taller than my drink, I get to keep my accreditations." Who says accreditations?
"Well whatever." Luke drinks Melissa's original drink pretty fast, then goes up for another.
Melissa leans to one side to peer at Odessa's boots, grinning. "That might save you," she agrees, before she arches a brow at Luke. "Boy needs to learn to settle down," she says, shaking her head.
Odessa nods her slow agreement. He does appear to be rather eager to drink. A feeling she can definitely sympathise with. "So long as we don't have to call an ambulance…" Or, really, so long as she doesn't have to act responsible. Jesus. There was enough of that on the Brooklyn Bridge to last her a freaking lifetime.
Luke returns with this second drink and overhears them talking about him. "Hah, I can hold down plenty of drinks!" he informs them haughtily, regaining his seat with the latest drink set before him. He's not wobbling at all, to prove his point.
Melissa smiles slowly. "Oh…I don't know. An ambulance isn't always a bad thing," she murmurs to herself. That look, is it an evil one? Maybe. A little. If you're this predator's prey. "And sure you can, Larry. Let's see you stand on one foot and touch your nose with your eyes closed after this drink," she teases.
Odessa laughs at Melissa's teasing. She likes this girl and her dark looks and darker murmurs. "You know," she says, "I don't usually hang out here. Not really my kind'a place. But you two? You should check out Old Lucy's sometime, if you haven't already. Love it there." For reasons less obvious to those she shares a table with.
"Like hell will I do anything like that. Even sober you'd look like a complete moron. I'm not getting my face plastered on Facebook or something because of some idiot with a camera phone." Luke glowers at someone nearby who seems to have one of the aforementioned phones, although isn't using it for that purpose at the moment.
"I've been to Old Lucy's. Just wanted some place different tonight. Feelin' a little restless lately," Melissa explains. She busts out laughing then at Luke, and she can't help but pull out her own phone, which is capable of pictures, and snap a shot of Luke.
Odessa sucks down a bit more of her drink, laughing as Melissa snaps a photo of Luke. And then, it seems to sort of hit her. "I should, ah… I should get going." Pictures of her floating around anywhere are not a good thing. Traffic cameras are already danger enough when she doesn't skew with the passage of time to obscure her comings and goings around the city of New York. "It was nice meeting you both. Hope I see you at Lucy's sometime!"
"Not funny!" Luke snaps at Melissa, snatching at the phone. As he does so, it sort of fizzles a little. Oh, it doesn't break or become unusable or anything, but it seems somewhat… disrupted, like static. "The hell are you going to do with that?" now he's kinda pissed. "You should know better than that! What if you lost the phone, huh?" Odessa is nodded at distractedly, but Luke is in full-blown paranoia right now. "Old Lucy's, right." cough. He's, uh… been there.
"See you later, Dessa. It was…" Melissa's eyes narrow then as Luke takes her phone. "Boy, you do not want to be stealin' my phone. I was plannin' to delete the picture as soon as it was taken."
Luke sets the phone on the table and spins it over to Melissa. "Delete it now then, so I can see it." he tells her, narrowing his eyes.
Odessa polishes off what's left in her glass, because one cannot let a free drink go to waste, and stands up from the table. But before she takes off like a bat out of somewhere considerably more tropical climate than what New York City is experiencing currently, she stops and eyes Luke's agitation at having his picture taken. That boy has a healthy dose of paranoia. It's something Odessa can appreciate. But rather than get in the middle of it, she simply nods at the two. "Avoid exploding bridges," she offers as a farewell before she disappears into the crowd.
Melissa takes the phone and looks rather irritated at Luke. "You do not tell me what to do, Larry. It's my job to protect you, and I take that very seriously. But I will not put up with shit from you. Got me?" she whispers to him.
"Well taking a picture of me as a joke wasn't funny." Luke mutters sullenly back at her. "Someone could've stolen your phone and it could've ended up in the hands of government agents. After all, I took it from you easily enough. It's one thing to be in a crowd of people, but another to have a picture of me passed around."
Melissa looks like she's just getting more irritated. "Listen to me, and listen to me good. If anyone had even thought about taking my phone but you, they would've been dropped to their knees, screaming in pain. I take my job seriously." She taps on her phone for a minute, before she stands up and turns to walk out. No more happy fun time for her!
Luke glowers after Melissa, then shoves himself to his feet as well, having already finished his drink. He slouches out of the bar, leaving in a different direction than Melissa. Eh, a few hours wandering the streets in this weather seems the way to go right now, it'd match his foul mood. And it's not like he'd freeze to death or anything.