thecapitol | the drinking never stops because the drinks absolve our sins

Entry tags:

the drinking never stops because the drinks absolve our sins

Who| De and Venus, Punchy, Bucky, Chris and/or Spike.
What| De trying to avoid thinking about the upcoming arena.
Where| The Speakeasy and the roof.
When| The few days before the arena. Separate days for each prompt.
Warnings/Notes| Drinking, hooking up.

Bar; evening

So this place wasn't a dive, but it was becoming a comfort to De. It was the closest thing to homey she had found outside the training center. She didn't feel like she was on parade here, a performer with no backstage to escape to. This was a place a girl could have a whiskey, and not feel eyes crawling all over her.

And to think De had once considered running away to Hollywood.

It was obviously people recognized the tributes here, but whatever unspoken rules stopped them from whispering and tittering was an unspoken rule De was going to take advantage of to hell and back.

Sitting at the bar, she stared into the amber liquid in her glass, considering the light in it, and trying to keep her mind empty. It wouldn't stay that way, not yet, but the alcohol was already starting to do the trick. The tension was seeping out of her, drink by drink, and she was starting to feel like a real human being again.

Standing, she took her drink with her, shooting a grin to anyone who's eyes she caught, and searched out some bar flavored entertainments. Pool, darts...she wasn't feeling too picky. A bit rusty maybe, but not picky.

Roof; night

Tonight De knew drinking wouldn't settle her mind.

Sure, she could call up for a bottle and knock herself out. But this close to the arena she didn't want to pull that shit.

And she wasn't 100% sure it would work anyway. Which was an even worse thought. Insomnia was better than waking up half drunk and disoriented at 4 am.

Then again, with the way things were going, she might be seeing 4 am from the other side. Leaning against the edge of the roof, she tucked the small blanket she'd hooked around her shoulders tighter, working to keep out the cold. The days in the Rockies were getting warmed (and she was 95% sure they were somewhere in the middle of Colorado) but the night were still a tad bit nippy. Luckily she'd ditched Victory's idea of PJs and found a t-shirt and boxers, plus some horribly ugly but stupidly comfortable boot slipper things. Even with all that thought, she could feel the chill edging in around her blanket.

The Capitol wasn't quiet the city that never slept, but she could still see plenty of traces of night life. From her, it was almost possible to pretend she was just back home, in some crowded city.

Almost.

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There was more than one person unable to sleep here on the lovely rooftop garden.

It wasn't that Bucky hadn't tried. He knew he'd need his sleep, so he'd done his best. But dreams waited on the other side of consciousness like a crouched predator. He couldn't slip into a comfortable sleep without also drifting into the jaws of his worst memories.

Being trapped in a place where he had no choice but to fight and kill at the command of others did that to him. For some reason.

He threw his clothes back on and made his way up to the roof without really thinking. He still automatically watched his surroundings and took note of possible threats, because that was how he was trained, but his head was full of knives and blood and sniper fire.

So when he saw someone else on the roof, it was all he could do to come up alongside her and say in a weary, benumbed voice, "Remind me again whether this shit is real or not. 'Cause if I was gonna finally snap, this is about how I'd do it."

"Well, if it's not real, that opens even more complicated philosophical questions, an I don't think there's enough alcohol around for me to deal with that."

She looked up at the man, hitching up what she hoped was a companionable smile. Because he had just hit the nail on the head of something that she hadn't wanted much to think about, but that had still been lurking.

Could this shit really be real?

Maybe this was hell. Like some fucked up Twilight Zone episode. Sounded about right for her life.

And his, too, apparently.

"Have a seat and contemplate the great unknown."

When he sat down beside her, the tension didn't leave his body. He crouched more than he sat, really, ready to get back up at a moment's notice. His latest nightmares had left him unable to shake the feeling that this was a battlefield, or at least some kind of mission.

"I guess I wouldn't bother with the whole 'different world' thing," he admitted after a moment. "Or the weird Roman theme they've got going on...that's not my style. So yeah. It's probably real. I'm not sure if that's better or worse than going crazy."

"Debating the various pros and cons will keep you up tonight. And tomorrow night. And the night after. I think at this point I've sorta settled on crazy having been better."

Because that would mean there's no world where murdering your kids for sport was a normal thing. Man she was going to appreciate the Olympics a lot more if she ever got home.

"I'm De, by the way."

He shook his head. "Let's hope I'm not stuck here long enough to settle on that, myself. That sounds like a lot of sleepless nights."

"I'm Bucky. I'd say it's nice to meet you, De, but these really aren't the right circumstances for that kind of talk."

"Here's hoping."

It wasn't like people didn't vanish, hopefully to home, all the time.

"I know what you mean. Making friends, acting normal feels dirty here." She looked over at him. "It hasn't gotten better."

"'Ey, shawty."

Punchy tends to frequent boozy establishments less because they feel like home and mostly because no one cards in Panem. While liquor wasn't impossible to come by back home, there's a certain novelty in actually getting it served to him by a legit bartender.

He's gotten the face tattoo removed, thankfully. It gives him the odd look of having freckles on only one side of his face. His stylist wanted to put them back on with makeup, but he refused. Now he's in a leather jacket and baggy pants with a belt-buckle in the shape of his face.

He sits next to Deanna, a grin as big as hers on his features.

"Lookin' a little lop sided there, buddy."

Her smile is still there, tone teasing, as she circles her index finger around her own cheek, sprinkled liberally with it's own freckles, as if he would be confused as to what she meant.

Which, you know, was possible around here.

"Punchy, right?"

"Word. And you's Deanna, right?" He really doesn't watch the Games, but it's pretty easy to pick up names by osmosis - especially the names of fox ladies. Punchy rubs his own cheek (his face is slightly red from drinking and the wind outside).

After giving it a pat, he sprawls on the stool, taking up more space than even his lanky body should allow. "Just got a tat removed. It was pretty hardcore."

"Oh yeah? Ex's name across your face?"

She snickered, leaning into him as she took another sip of her drink. It was almost gone, and she had a feeling with present company, switching to beer might suit the mood better.

"Where are you from? Originally?" The accent sounded very familiar. She would guess Missouri or Alabama. Not too far from home, and it gave her a sudden, unexpected heart ache to think about it.

"Nah, I got a dragon but that shit got infected." He pulls the neck of his shirt aside to reveal the dragon's body, which hasn't been removed and spells Punchy's name in cursive across his chest.

"I'm from the streets." He totally isn't. A playa's just gotta play. "You? You got an accent that sounds, uh, not sure, Kansas?"

"Hot."

A headless dragon wasn't hot. Either he'd pick up on the sarcasm, or he wouldn't, and she didn't much care either way.

Deep coversations weren't really on her mind tonight.

"Wild streets there. And yeah. Lawrence."

It was always nice to name a place and know someone would know it.

Punchy shrugs. He's not all that pleased with the headless dragon either, but maybe he'll get the neck bit retattooed to be some oozing stump or something. Either way, it coaxes a snicker out of him.

"Shit, I knew I was good with the way a shawty's mouth worked." His grin, like his face, is a bit lop-sided, but it goes all the way up to his eyes and is all the more charming than any attempt at a smoldering, piercing stare. "Lawrence ain't that small, though. It's got like, schools and all."

Yeah, she can't help but grin back at that smile. She was a sucker for a cute, sincere smile, and being around here she was desperate for sincerity.

Truth be told, that wasn't exactly a new thing in her life.

"I guess that's true. It still has that small hometown vibe to me, I guess." It wasn't like KU was any concern of hers. It didn't fit in with the picture she had of 'home', even if that image was skewed quite a bit by nostalgia.

"So, you worried about the way my mouth's working?" Her eye brow shot up, suggestively.

Punchy's smile is nothing if not sincere. That's always been his selling point; he wears everything on his sleeve, his emotions and his goals and his unabashed idiosyncrasies.

"I ain't gotta worry about the way your mouth's working. I'm bewitched already." He's trying so hard to be smooth, De. "Chases my worries straight away, shawty."

"Awww, aren't you sweet." It was a touch patronizing, but...endearingly patronizing. He was sweet. In that certain way. She leaned back in her stool, and let her eyes look over him.

Not badly looking either, if you ignored how hard he was trying.

"So got any plans tonight?"

She didn't dance around it.

Punchy lets any condescension ricochet off his protective Ego Shield, now additionally bolstered by the presence of Excited Incredulity.

"Actually, shawty, my night's wide open, and I'm hoping it ain't the only thing."

He tries really, really hard to waggle his eyebrows.

"You are just 10 pounds of classy in a 9 pound bag."

But there's not even teasing really in that. Leaning forward, she nibbles the end of her pinky finger, a coy little look that she knows can get her far.

The idea of something that was, for once, very normal for De was appealing in a way she hadn't even realized. Picking up a guy in a bar? Done. Picking up a guy in a bar who felt like home?

Better.

Punchy takes that invitation with a sort of gutsiness he so rarely allows himself romantically (the last time he kissed someone uninvited, he got a black eye). He leans forward and plants a chaste kiss on De's mouth.

It's only chaste because he figures if she's sending different signals than he's reading, she's probably got a killer right hook.

"Mind if I join you?"

Despite all the reasons Venus has to be upset lately - and there have been plenty of reasons, between the upcoming Arena, her exposé and her boyfriend getting tossed back in the ring - she can't really figure out what it is that's spurring her current malaise. It's just rolled into her like a tide, and her thoughts feel damp, grey.

She decides she may as well soak her body as well, and as such she goes to the bar and finds herself across from one of her victims from the last Arena. One of the people who helped her take down Kevin. At first she doesn't know if she wants to approach, if she should just stay with her hands in her designer coat's pockets behind De. Some people don't take kindly to death, and Venus has only now started to feel the impact of bringing it with you outside the Arena.

She settles down on the stool beside De, resting her chin on her fist as the bartender makes his rounds.

De is surprised to turn and see the woman she'd face off with not once, but twice in the arena.

Surprised, but not unpleasantly.

Kindred spirit felt like a sappy cliche, but she understood now where the woman had been coming from. And she couldn't hold it against her. In there was a whole different world, and she wasn't sure what rules she was going to play but in there just yet. Having all of Venus' pieces at her disposal, she sure as hell understood her choices.

Whether she was going to be the same was yet to be seen. But she certainly wasn't above it.

"Hey, you." She lifted her glass in greeting, giving the other a warm smile.

The smile's invitation enough. Venus gets herself a fruity little drink that's more sugar than it is alcohol and holds the cool glass against her clammy palm.

She normally doesn't get stressed. Do butterflies feel this flustered when they wrench themselves, wet and fragile, from their crysalli?

"You know, I didn't get your name back in the Arena. Was kind of busy trying to stab you. But it's- well, I guess you already heard that we got the same name, more or less. De, Dee." She shrugs, both with her shoulders and her face. "Kinda funny."

"Mine's significantly less artistic."

She laughed softly, glad suddenly for what ever awkward footing they seemed to be on right now. It felt good to have another barrier between in there and out here. She had a feeling it wouldn't be true with every encounter, but this felt more sane then most things around here.

"So you like Dee or Venus?"

"But more action-packed. A Winchester's a kind of gun, right? You could be in my line of work and just go last-name only." She uses her straw to knock some sugar off the rim of her glass into the drink. She pulls the lime wedge out and sets it aside. 'Sour' isn't a taste that she's really acclimated to yet.

"I like Venus. Dee feels too personal. I don't know, I don't usually like to do personal."

"Yeah, it's pretty fitting."

She grins, before plucking up the lime set next to Venus' drink, lifting it up for permission.

"You mind?" Sugared limes were always a favorite of hers.

"I know what you mean. I've given up on trying to lay low here, but everyone knowing my name before I say it? I'd rather be running around naked."

"If it was a peach or an orange, I'd be throwing down for that lime, but I don't like anything that hurts me to eat it." She pulls a face, wrinkling her nose for comical effect.

"You get used to it after a while. Them knowing all your business is a bit rougher." Even a seasoned spinmaster like Venus has been thrown for a loop with how little power she has over her own image. "This was my line of work back in the day. I was a televised mercenary."

It's more honest than 'professional superhero'. It builds fewer expectations.

"...televised mercenary?" She's way past disbelief at this point with just about anything anyone could say, but that's intriguing enough she wants to hear more. Bad 80's sci-fi movies are already flashing through her head, and she has to keep from smirking at the image.

The sour sweet bite of the lime helps as she pushes it into her mouth whole, her face twisting up at the burst of sour. After a few unlady like expressions, she pulled the rind from her lips.

"You know. Teleport to Afghanistan, kill some terrorists, get a nice big check from the US government and my producers, then hit the red carpet a few hours later?"

She flashes her toothpaste smile, then poses with a hand on her hip like she's modeling the world's most expensive couture gown and not a t-shirt and short-shorts. Her comfort with the role shows.

"So you're a super hero?"

She sounded like a super hero. There might be a spark of fangirling in her eyes. Just a little.

"Damn girl, you've got that Miss America shit down." She nodded with approval. Even when she was playing glam, she couldn't fake it that well. It was impressive.

"I used to call myself that, then I realized people thought that I was actually, like, heroic." Fact is, she used to be pretty damn pleased with herself too. She faked it until she believed it.

True fact in Hollywood - faking it never actually makes it.

She puts that flashy smile away. "I'd say it came natural, but god damn, I went through so much coaching. I had someone teaching me the most attractive way to sneeze."

"Oh yeah? Any pointers? That's a vulnerable time for a woman's looks."

She grins, hoping the joke comes across. This is still tender territory, and she knows it, but she's hoping to talk out of here with an ally. Because Venus would be a damn good ally.

A little more heroic than she seemed to give herself credit for.

"So were you a spandex suit superhero, or a gritty reboot one?"

"Lift your tongue when you sneeze. It'll make it higher pitched and more feminine."

She folds her arms and rests again against the bar.

"Spandex. I'm in bright red and yellow with a big X on my chest, like I'm making a target out of my rack." She gestures to her breasts like but really, though, who wouldn't drag attention to these?

Spike chalked the end of his pool cue and sized her up, which just meant any excuse to predatorily look her up and down. A small smile eked out of him, ignoring the slight buzz behind his eyes. The warning in his sinuses when he was having nasty thoughts - his own personal doggy collar. "Ladies first."

She picked up her cue, moving around the table to lift the rack off the balls and set it to the side.

Leaning down, she carefully lined up the break shot, not entirely innocently arching her back as she did, knowing she was making a very different sort of pretty shot from behind.

With a loud crack, she broke the formation, standing up and blowing at the end of her cue as the balls rolled across the green.

"Looks like I'm stripes." She said as one, than a second plunked into the pockets.

"...Looks like it." Damn, she was actually good. Not that he was expecting otherwise, but it still gives him a little shock, leaning against his cue since it didn't look like he was going to need it soon. "By all means, sweetheart, don't let me break your streak."

"Oh, I won't."

She tosses a grin up towards him, lining up her next shot.

"So are you native or not?" He didn't look native, but he could be in that blurry line where the normal looking Capitol citizens, and the more over the top Tributes seemed to live.

"Native to what? Here? You serious?" He could've almost laughed, resting his chin on his pool cue thoughtfully. "Originally I'm from England. You ever heard of it?"

She was about to ask who hadn't heard of England, before realizing here quite a few people hadn't.

"Good to know I'm in sane company. And yeah. never made it over the pond though. I'm from the good old U S of A."

She lined up a shot, grunting as it failed.

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the drinking never stops because the drinks absolve our sins

roof;

Re: roof;

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please ignore that I have no idea how to play pool

only if you ignore the fact that i learned from a transvestite

sounds fair.

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