Difference between revisions of "Logs:Say It Sober"

Blizzardy conditions keep people inside even more than just the usual crappy winter of the region manages. Jadzia is no exception, even if she doesn't actually live here. No one wants to do anything outside, so she's stuck until it passes. Or she's just enjoying the warmth of a few drinks. Right now the blonde is sitting at the bar, claiming one end that gives her a decent view of the whole bar. She doesn't smell anymore and her hair, loose now, is still damp underneath from taking full advantage of the Weyr's lovely bathing cavern.

Whirling snow and icy wind are no match against a guilty conscience. It's driven Valenros to maddening thoughts all day long. He has paced his way through many of the inner caverns, and finally, he's walked his way to the Snowasis. His target is sitting at one end of the bar, where he was told she would likely be. Shuffling steps led him up to her chair, where he stops, a few steps behind. Hands brush away his hair, his dark eyes focused on a spot above her head. "Jad..zia.." he says quietly, then coughs loudly. "Can I?" gesturing to the chair next to hers. Still, his eyes don't meet hers.

She's apparently aware of him back there. "Don't walk up behind people. Or at least not me. I don't like it." Jadzia glances over her shoulder to give the man a quick once over. "Sure. Why not. Not like anyone else is going to take it with you hovering. What's up? You change your mind about that private chat?" She's already ordering him a drink from the bartender she waves down.

Valenros looks like he might run the other way, but he handles the chair and sits down in it. His leg is doing a nervous bounce and he makes a point of keeping his hands clasped firmly between his knees. Who knows what would happen otherwise. "I just want to.." he squeezes his eyes closed, "..to apologize. For earlier." There, he laid that down properly, like it or not. "This whole Weyr business is overwhelming and I let my temper get away from me." He sighs as the bartender plunks a drink in front of him. "I figured you didn't deserve that." Apologies are just as painful with him as talking about sex - it's awkward at beast. His hands wrap around the glass, bringing it to his lips. Half is gone before he hazards a look at Jadzia, "Sorry. I'm not normally an ass."

"That was your temper? I guess I'd better watch out for you, huh. Dangerous man." Except not really. Is she always this sour? Jadzia takes a drink from her mug before she spends a few moments chewing on her lip, thinking. Finally, "It's fine. But I hope you aren't looking for an apology from me. Because I didn't do anything wrong." She gestures at his drink. "If you don't drink it, I will. And it's probably not right for you to let a lady," she says it with a straight face, but there's sarcasm in her voice, "drink a whole 'nother beer."

"No. You didn't." There she goes bringing up /that/ subject. Valenros sighs into his glasses, eyes fastened on the bartender's back. His own shoulders are hunched, his bearing quite defeated looking. "It has nothing to do with.. did some man treat you poorly?" Eyes flick over to Jadzia, eyebrows rising as he lights on that thought. Maybe this isn't about him! Ok, it probably still is about him. "There isn't anything wrong with showing respect to 'ladies', you know." He drains the rest of his drink and sets the glass back down, sucking in his lower lip. "You never did tell me where you're from." And he doesn't know when to stop, either.

Jadzia and Valenros are sitting at one end of the bar, Jad on the end and Valenros next to her. She's drinking, he's finished, which seems vaguely surprising to the blonde. "Men have been treating women poorly since before..." Where was she going with that. She can't decide. "It's just a thing. But I'm not a lady. And most women around here probably don't want you calling them ladies, either." Jadzia lifts her mug for another drink before, finally, offering, "Crom."

"UGH, watch where you're GOING!" A fairly rude voice shouts. Okay, it's Evanthe's voice. Evanthe's voice shouts it, with barely a glance at the bluerider whose foot she probably tripped over entirely of her own accord. He looks baffled, she looks surly, and she presses forth to the bar to thud down on a stool just on the other side of Valenros. "Beer!" She requests firmly. The barkeep gives her a raised eyebrow - being that she looks like she's about fourteen. "Damnit. Tea?" Better than nothing.

"Ah, well, I don't quit being polite just because someone doesn't want me to be." Meaningful look is very meaningful. "Ladies can drink, anyway, but.." here the shading of his earlier blush returns, "some things you should probably keep yourself. Whether you're a man or a woman. I can't see the gain of airing out your business like that." He purses his lips as he signals with one hand for the bartender to fill his glass as well. This one he takes more slowly, drumming his fingers along the sides of the frosty mug as he speaks. "Crom, eh? What are you doing way over here? I can't imagine if I wasn't on official business that I would come here willingly." Valenros looks over at Jadzia, his youthful face all alight with curiosity. "Wha-" his sentence is cut off as someone sits down noisily on the other side of him. He turns his head that way, eyebrows knitting together over concerned brown eyes. "Ahhh. Are you lost? This place is impossibly large and overwhelming." Sure, he's just being nice, right?

Jadzia glances over at the voice. But since that's not entirely unlike how she might talk to someone, especially a few drinks in, she doesn't pay Evanthe much mind. "I'm not going to keep the fact that I like sex to myself just because you're uncomfortable with it. I can assure you there are plenty of guys in here who would be plenty interested in that, too." So there. "I'm on business," she explains, glancing around Valenros to the new face. "Don't listen to this guy," she tells her. "He's scared of boobs." What does that have to do with anything? What does it /need/ to have to do anything, is the better question.

Evanthe gets her virtuously unalcoholic tea and wraps her fingers tightly around it, savoring the warmth as it seeps into her skinny, faintly blue-tinged fingers. It's cold out there. Only then, as she really settles in, does she turn her head to look at Valenros. His comment there, at the end, gets the most suspicious look - brows drawn together as she stares. "/Is/ it?" she asks. "Well... this is the /bar/." Helpfully, she lifts a hand to gesture towards his drink. "You're drinking here." Sounds like she's not the one who's lost, eh? Jadzia's explanation is listened to attentively, and Ev's expression clears as though something important was explained. "Ohhh 'kay. Gotcha. Did I hear you're from Crom? Same here."

Valenros looks left to right, obviously to see if, indeed, any guys in here are interested with her proposition. "You would have them think of you like that?" he says with a frown; foreign concepts and all that. "I knew they were free in the Weyrs, but I didn't think Crom had that reputation." He's probably rethinking his position on Crom Hold at that very next moment in his head. But then there's /boobs/ and he's turning as red as the star. All these women at High Reaches, they seem to have something against him. His expression says as much. "Are manners so old fashioned now? I don't see how your.. ah," he can't even say the word without difficulty, "breasts, have anything to do with anything." Evanthe is graced with a most peculiar look. "Does the Weyr allow young children to drink too?" he asks, but to Jadzia, even as he stares at the other girl. "I can't imagine I could be here if I didn't have to be." Scowl, swear, swig liquor.

"Oh, yeah?" says Jadzia to Evanthe with mild interest. There might be more if she weren't on her... whichever drink this is. It's not her first, we'll just leave it at that. To Valenros, "I don't think my sex life needs to reflect on Crom's reputation. But there were plenty of guys willing to make it interesting." She shifts in her seat, sticking out her chest a little like she might try to touch him with her boobs if he were closer. "Well, are you scared of them? You can touch them if you want." She glances past him to Evanthe. "Do you want to touch them?" Then she's adding, "If the bartender won't serve her, maybe? I don't know what rules they have here. You should buy her a drink."

Of all the things that Evanthe could latch onto from what Valenros says, it is the remark on her age. "Oh for..." She pushes her mug away with an impassioned expletive and sits back in her chair, arms crossed against her terrifying boobs. "How bleeding old do I look? Honestly? I can not damn well look like an infant. You don't exactly look like a fucking seasoned sage!" Possibly it is a sore spot. She is distracted though. Boobs will have that affect, and she blinks past Valenros as Jadzia makes that /oh/ so generous offer, but with a flicker of a smile holds her hand up in a gesture of halt. "'Preciate it, they're lovely, but I like putting my hands on man parts." She hesitates. "In theory."

Valenros looks like he's going to throw up again. "I don't think that will be necessary. As you said, there are plenty of guys in here who would.." He just leaves that unfinished thought hanging, but he may have scooted a little closer to Evanthe. "Buy her a drink?" Surely she's not asking him to commit such debauchery! "I couldn't.." floundering, "..that wouldn't be.." Proper? Cool? Legal? "Why don't /you/ buy her a drink?" he mumbles against the rim of his glass. In the background, the bartender is shaking his head and mumbling under his breath. Evanthe's outburst is a bit unexpected, and now he's looking at her like she's a three-headed dragon. "Twelve at best. I'm twenty." That's cleared up now.. sort of. He's happy enough to take a full swallow of his drink, but then "putting my hands on man parts" is said and he's turning an unpleasant shade of green.

"I like handling man parts, too," points out Jadzia like she doesn't know how that's relevant. "Doesn't mean I wouldn't touch your boobs if you said I could." That's obviously to Evanthe, not Valenros, but she's not looking at either of them right now. She has a drink, full of alcohol, to attend. "I think this one likes his hands on man parts, too, maybe," she says after a healthy swallow. That would explain everything to her. Somehow. "I'll be generous and give you sixteen," is Jadzia's added commentary on Evanthe's age.

"/You/," Evanthe says to Valenros, in a tone that suggests that she is about to bestow a crushing epithet. "Would like my sister." She snorts, shaking her head with obvious derision. "/Proper/. Etiquette. Manners. Appropriate. Airs and graces and utter bullshit," she mutters, her little rant probably very much not-so-appropriate, but it wasn't as though there was much of that going on anyways. Jadzia's willingness to touch her boobs gets consideration, and then an appreciative nod. "Well, thanks then." The guesses at her age - well, she invited it, but there's still utter dismay in her dark eyes as she gets the estimates back. "/Twelve/." Oh, the bitterness. Sixteen is a bit better, but she still just shakes her head and takes a swig off her tea. Ridiculous, all of it.

Another glass is knocked back by the time Jadzia has finished speaking. He raps his knuckles against the bar top, summoning the bartender back with another round. "You're quite vulgar, " he says at last, settling a passive gaze on Jadzia; there could be worse insults, anyway. "Better be glad you're not some Lord's daughter or you'd never find a proper match." His tone insinuates that that's the highlight of one's life. "Quite right, quite right, manners are important and so is etiquette. /You're/ not some Lord's daughter, are you?" now with a bleary eye focused closer on Evanthe. "Wouldn't want to be caught in a conversation talking about indecencies with one anyway." Valenros relaxes back in his chair, stretching out his legs as best they can stretch on a bar stool. "Please, do tell, how old are you really?"

"Well, thank you." Being called vulgar is, evidently, a compliment according to Jadzia. "I'm pretty glad I'm not a Lord's daughter. But my parents are dead, so that sort of rules that out." She seems to be throwing that out more for shock value than because it bothers her much these days. Trying to make Valenros feel bad, most likely. Something about the way she sits might suggest she'd leave if she didn't have a drink to finish. But she does, so for now she stays.

Evanthe snorts, which is probably an answer in and of itself as to whether or not she's of blood. "Hell no. My ma may have fantasized 'bout marrying me /in/ to one of those families, since she has some kind of noble ties, but... I proved a disappointment," she says wryly, with an open handed gesture down herself, gesturing to it all. The whole package. Small, egregiously youthful, with a smart foul mouth. Every mother's dream. "I'm seventeen." After a pause, and directed towards Jadzia as well, she feels compelled to throw out: "I'm Evanthe."

"There are worse things than having dead parents." But Valenros doesn't elaborate, simply hums under his breath and drums his fingers against his shirt. "You two are pitiful," he says on the tail-end of a yawn. "Bartender, a round for these two /ladies/." Note he stresses the last word; so, you see, he has some sarcasm and humor in him yet. Being well and truly foxed has loosen his tongue, and purse-strings a little bit. "Evanthe, I'm Valenros and that," hooking a lazy thumb towards his blonde companion, "is Jadzia." Now, they're all properly acquainted. If Jadzia looks to be leaving, he doesn't seem to notice, and continues right along humming to himself.

"Fuck you." That's said to Valenros. How's that for vulgar! She could probably do a lot better, actually. But she's annoyed now. She'll wait just long enough for the drink he ordered for her to arrive. And then she's taking it and leaving. That apology went super well, obviously. She'll go find someone that appreciates her feminine qualities, vulgarity and all.

The bartender gets Evanthe a drink, all right. He serves her more tea, and the roll of the eyes she sends him has just enough tolerant humor to suggest that this is a byplay that has happened before. Nonetheless, she takes the mug and is on her way to a steaming sip when she hears Valenros's comment, and pauses. Brows furrow again, eyes dark, and voice? Voice just incredulous. "You're sitting in a fucking bar in a fucking weyr and complaining 'bout us acting like we're in a fucking bar in a fucking weyr." Head cocks to the side. "Shit, at least I only /look/ immature." Well. Okay, maybe she more than looks it sometimes, but saying so would lessen the dig she just made. Jadzia's leaving is acknowledged with a completely understanding wave of the hand - if the older woman is not too drunk to notice.

Success! Wait, what? Valenros is left scratching his head, watching the other girl retreat. "Not sure what I said." He shrugs and turns all of his attentions to Evanthe - lucky girl. "You're vulgar yourself. Maybe that's why, as you say, your mother is so disappointed." Probably should have stopped after the first drink, but there's no filter to slow his word flow. Not that he looks particularly concerned. His voice is matter-of-fact in tone. Somewhere behind the bar, the bartender is watching this little scene play out. "I said no such thing. I don't saying *fucking*." Except, yep, he said it. One eyelid is too heavy for him to lift, so he stares at her through one eye, wavering on his chair. "What brings /you/ to the Weyr? You seem about as pleased to be here as I am."

"My mother was disappointed anyways, so why should I *fucking* watch my mouth?" Evanthe replies, though there's no heat in it. Wryness, perhaps, both at her mother and herself as it's telling about both of them. She watches with interest, if mingled with dislike, as Valenros begins his slow devolve towards drunken stupor. "I was condensing. Sitting here, criticizing Weyrs, criticizing the freedoms of Weyrs and the openness available to women in Weyrs... why the fuck are you at a Weyr? And if you /have/ to be here, why are you socializing in a /bar/?" She takes a healthy swig of her tea, her second cup draining much more quickly than the first - surely nothing to do with the company. When it's set down again, she fixes him with an irritated look. "/I/? I love it here." That's all the explanation he gets.

Every time she uses that particular word staring with 'f' he pulls a face. "There are better words you can use to explain yourself than that one." Valenros looks down at his quickly-emptying glass and sighs. "I'm here on business. I most certainly wouldn't come here of free will. I don't have a choice. Something like that." He finishes off the rest of his drink in one swallow, pushing it back across the bar with one finger. "Doesn't seem like it, but what do I know, right?" A self-deprecating smirk follows his comment. "Bastards don't know a damn thing." He slides off his seat at that point, obviously intending to make his goodbyes, but he gives a wobbly lurch and catches himself on the bar. "'pologies." But to whom?

"But /that/ one is having the desired effect," Evanthe replies promptly, not at all oblivious to the distaste it's apparently inspiring. She shows no sympathy, or even much interest in the matter of his birth, just shrugs one shoulder. "Yeah, well, if that's what you are you sure aren't giving 'em a good name," she agrees. Automatically a hand goes out to steady him when he wobbles, a gesture that may be a bit incongruous with the attitude she generally portrays - but then there, the wipe of her hand on her pants afterwards, that makes more sense. "Yeah, well. Say it sober, then we'll talk."

Valenros gives Evanthe one more one-eyed stare - maybe it's because he can't remember who she is, maybe it's because he's wondering why she has two noses - before grumbling something that sounds like, "yeah, who asked you anyway." He hitches up his pants in an ungentlemanly manner and stumbles towards the door, bumping his fair share of people on the way out.