Loren knows not what he's done. (skelterhelter) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2012-05-01 13:56:00 |
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Entry tags: | tate langdon, violet harmon |
Who: Loren & Jules
What: Meeting for the first time. Gumbo. Flirting. Rough handling.
Where: Caesar's.
When: UM. After Loren finds Hannah's body(that log is in process, so you all must learn to read out of order).
Warnings: Language? Jules make Loren uncomfortable? Loren having poor people skills?
Jules’ work shift ended with a clatter.
There were new prep cooks working that night, ones that didn’t know their way around a kitchen, and that didn’t have the sense God gave a baby. Jules spent most of the night saving pots of this and trays of that from being filled with vegetables that were cut too thick, or cut too thin, and there was little he liked less than his cooking ruined by folks that didn’t know better. He was all business in the kitchen, hair tucked under a hair net and Caesar’s kitchen whites on his long, lanky frame. He looked almost normal then, a little young to be playing chef, maybe, but that was all, and he was in a fine fiddle once the night ended, glad to let someone else deal with the prep cooks.
Duffle over his shoulder, Jules left the kitchen and winked at the attendant at Caesar’s spa, walking on in and using one of the changing rooms to wash up and discard the night’s sauces and desserts. By the time he walked back on out, a wink for the attendant, he was dressed in a long cream-white gypsy skirt, all soft and feminine and bells at the drawstring waist. He paired it with a simple, gray, long-sleeved shirt, holes for his thumbs and a thick black belt low on his hips over the thin white of the skirt. He had boots on his feet, gloss on his lips, and his hair was pale blond, long and loose along his back. He was all straight up and down, hip bones just visible beneath the shirt’s gray, and he was just the right height to make things confusing. Not tall enough to definitely be a man, not too tall to be a tall woman. He drew attention, but he liked it that way, and he stashed the duffle in the kitchen and went looking for trouble.
Now, Jules’ brand of trouble came straight, and it came masculine, and it came broad in the shoulders and with a glint of trouble in its eye. He played with other things, but that was his favorite flavor, and he knew he was looking for something just like that this evening. See, Jules was actually hunting someone down, someone particular. He only had a vague inkling of what the man looked like, the memory not being real clear, seeing as it wasn’t actually his, but he knew the man worked security at the hotel, and he knew the man’s name was Loren, and Jules had no issue getting close enough to read nametags.
This particular nametag was hiding out by the blackjack tables, where money ran high and tempers boiled hot. He liked these tables the best because the game was simple enough for him to understand and notorious for cheating. The casino's official position on card counting was that it didn't classify as cheating, but management still encouraged a strong hand and a rough shake to dissuade those capable. It was still fairly early, as far as Vegas was concerned, so the drunks weren't in hyena mode yet. Loren would take trouble where he could find it tonight, especially after what he'd seen in the desert.
Hannah was dead. For too long he'd held onto the strange hope that she wasn't, the laughing disbelief that it couldn't be true.. but the desert changed all that. Reality was hard and cruel. It hit him like a ton of lost memories and it made the plate in his head ache with the echoing sobs of a demon teenager. The drive to find her was lost in a sandy grave, and its absence felt strangely dangerous. He needed something to do with his hands. Those hands were wide of knuckle and presently tangled in the plum silk collar of a familiar face. This particular pimp was notorious on the Strip for flooding the casino floors with his girls and raking in the money of the high rollers. Loren imagined that Caesar's frowned on such things as he took a two-handed grip on the man's shirt front and shoved him against the sturdy side of a slot. Coins jangled out for some lucky winner on the other side. "If I catch you in here again, I'm going to put your head through this machine." The pimp didn't argue, he just nodded while in the line of fire from such phantom blue eyes.
Jules didn’t even need that nametag, in the end. Violet, who he was coming to think of as a real sullen teenager, recognized all that anger in the man shoving the pimp against the slot machine, and Jules didn’t argue with her, not when it came to this. He knew the pimp for what he was, despite never having sold a damn thing about himself, and he came up around the side of the slot machine and leaned a shoulder against the metal. He watched the pimp nod for a spell, and then he dragged lined blue eyes up to look at the man he’d been hearing about in his head since Violet had woken up. He had to admit, the girl was right about things; Loren was good looking, and he did have a whole lot of anger to him (which Violet attributed entirely to Tate).
“I think he got the picture, honey,” Jules told the man across from him, and he reached out a hand and traced the name on Loren’s nametag. “Loren,” he added, all slow molasses and sweet southern tea in his accent. His voice was somewhere in between male and female, in that safe androgynous space, and he tugged his hand back and crossed his arms over his middle. “Better ways to let go all that anger,” he suggested, slow and casual. Jules’ demeanor was, if anything, the opposite of eccentric. He was soft spoken, his words slow and unhurried South, and when he smiled it was all cherry lipgloss and unspoken promises.
It was the honey that detached his grip, and the pimp politely excused himself from the conversation with a sideways slide and a sleazy, half-cocked wink of thanks for Jules. Loren took an unexpected step back, not accustomed to interruption. The stroll of a fingertip across his nametag made his eyes drop, and Loren frowned. It was a scrunch of a scowl, and his default response to just about everything that confused him. "I'm not angry," he explained with a click of teeth, giving charcoal swept eyes the full dose of his attention. "This is my job." The explanation was gentle, as if Loren didn't ever get angry. But he got the feeling that if he let himself get to that point, there'd be no stopping him. More and more, he was getting the feeling that all of this rabid, bareknuckle aggression had very little to do with Tate.
Jules just rolled his eyes at the half-cocked wink. “Not my type,” he told the retreating pimp, slow insolence and enough confidence in the words to indicate that Jules was sure of his own appeal to a certain ilk of men. The frown and scowl made Jules smile, slightly gapped teeth and a certain youth and softness in the grin. “You’re angry. Might be your job, but you’re still angry,” he assured Loren, but the words came with a honeyed tone that softened the words, made them easier to swallow. He canted a hip forward as he settled more comfortably against the slot machine, an indication that he wasn’t intending to run off somewhere quick as he came.
Now, Jules had no intention of just coming on out with the truth. Whoever killed Hannah, and he didn’t actually know who’d done it, was still out there. And they might think he did know, so Jules was quiet and caution, his arms uncrossing just long enough for him to touch a hand to Loren’s arm. “It’ll all come right, honey. Whatever it is,” he assured the other man, expression serious and still, despite all the clinking and clanking and flashing lights around them. “How long ‘til your shift ends?”
Loren had to doubt that, things coming right. He wasn't entirely sure what the statement meant, but it didn't sound possible, all things considered. It might be impossible for anybody else to understand the chasm of loss that he felt over Hannah. He hadn't been in love with her, and they'd really barely been friends by most standards.. but Loren didn't remember many people, and he connected with even fewer. He'd wanted to help her, she just didn't belong here. There was also the yearning guilt that pawed at him every now and then, maybe she'd still be alive if he'd left her in that convent. Fuck what Violet had said, what the hell did she know about anything? She wasn't exactly a good judge of character, all things with Tate considered.
As those thoughts spun, Loren zoned out. His winter blue eyes scanned the casino floor mindlessly, but things were running smoothly and that let his mind wander to places it didn't need to. The comforting brush to his arm brought him back with a stiffening of suited posture. That frown of muddled confusion returned, although it was difficult to say if it was more attributed to the touch or the question. "Why?" He stared at the young man, because it had taken Loren a minute to decipher, but he was fairly certain this was a boy. The lipgloss threw him for a loop, but in the end, he concluded that no young woman in Vegas would dress like that.
It was as good a way to determine gender as any, the clothes Jules wore, because he was real covered up for Las Vegas, especially for a woman (if he’d been one). But he’d grown up real conservative, and despite his complete willingness to do near anything in bed, he wasn’t the kind to run around half-naked. He didn’t identify as trans or gender-queer, because he didn’t mind his own gender in the slightest bit. He wasn’t in line for fake breasts, and he didn’t want to turn his outie into an innie. He liked himself, just the way God made him, and it showed in the unapologetic way he trailed his fingers down the crook of Loren’s elbow and to his wrist. “I was wondering how many other folks you were going to have time to shove against slot machines,” he said easily, though it wasn’t the real, plain truth. “I’m Jules, honey. I work in the kitchen.”
The answer was enough of a surprise that it brought the corner of his wry mouth up in a twitch that bordered on trepidatious amusement. Loren carefully withdrew his arm from the reach of trailing, flirtatious fingers. When paired with his single step of retreat, it managed to be polite and dismissive. Although as Jules introduced himself, eyebrows gnarled into a contemplative pinch when Loren realized this was a co worker. His expression softened immediately, not so much as a lick of discomfort or suspicion. "Oh, hey." He'd never heard of Jules, but that didn't mean much, Loren really didn't talk to that many people. It seemed that even the Caesar's kitchen staff were exotic peacock plumage. "Never been back to the kitchen," he admitted after a moment with a scratch the back of his neck, knowing that would explain why he'd had no idea who Jules was.
Jules wasn’t the least bit insulted when Loren withdrew his arm; you didn’t have a penchant and hankering for straight boys without expecting some retreat from them. It was alright though, that was part of the charm of it, and Jules just crossed his arms over soft gray fabric again and watched the other man’s face. He wasn’t expecting being a co-worker to carry as much weight as it apparently did, and he wondered why it mattered so much to this man, whether or not he was working with folks. When Loren scratched the back of his neck, Jules watched him with eyes gone too fond for someone he’d just met (even for Jules). See, Jules fell in love at the drop of a hat, and he fell out of love just as quick, but there was something about this man that he liked straight off, and not in a “love you ‘til you’re naked’ way - not that he would have minded naked just then. “I know,” he said of Loren’s admission of never being back in the kitchen. “I would have noticed your pretty face, honey.” Let it never be said that Jules wasn’t blunt as a baseball bat.
The compliment, if that's what it was, left Loren on hollow ground, not really sure of how to proceed in order to neutralize the situation. Ignoring it entirely seemed like the best option. He wasn't used to compliments from women, much less from men. Husky blue eyes continued to search the floor, hoping for an escape. Everybody, even the drunks, seemed absolutely civil and jovial. Goddamnit. He set his teeth and rubbed the side of his neck, it was his only nervous gesture to date. "Nice meeting you, Jules. I should get back to work." The little black radio on his hip buzzed just then, a gravelly voice informing his ten foot vicinity that Richardson came in early, so Loren was off the clock.
When the black radio buzzed, Jules looked down at it. He let his gaze linger long enough that there wasn’t even a hint of doubt that he knew who Richardson was, and what that meant for Loren. “You don’t like me real well, do you?” Jules asked, and it was all plain candor without any hurt feelings behind it. He straightened. shoulder coming away from the slot machine and attention on Loren’s face. “Tell you what. I’ll go and leave you be, if you want. Or you can come on back and I’ll get you something warm in your belly, seeing as your shift’s over. Your choice, honey,” he said, despite the screaming girl in the back of his mind that wanted a whole lot more than that. She was a little crazed, Violet, but Jules could ignore her real well as long as he was concentrating on not letting her take control of things. “You can tell me why you got all that anger wound up inside; I won’t tell a soul.”
Loren forced himself into a standstill pause when Jules verbalized his assumption about Loren not liking him. He opened his mouth to say something, but clamped it shut again a moment later. It wasn't that Loren disliked him, he just didn't want the kid getting the wrong idea. He probably would have brushed a woman off the same way, especially while at work. He raised an eyebrow at the offer of a warm meal. He hadn't had one of those since the shelter in Reno, and a homeless soup kitchen barely qualified as food. Everything that sustained Loren these days was microwavable or capable of being ordered over the phone. "I'm not angry," he repeated. This time the words were steady with insistence, and paired with those leveled eyes of stardust and salt water. Then, because it did sound good, and because he thought it might make him seem less offended, Loren nodded. "But some food would be great."
Jules didn’t ask if Loren was sure about the hot meal, because he was real positive the other man might change his mind if pushed. He considered dragging Loren home with him, sitting him on down and asking him if he’d gone to the desert to find the girl buried there. But he didn’t want to run Loren off in the enclosed space. Part of having such a hankering for straight boys was understanding how they tended to scare like skittish colts, and Jules didn’t expect Loren to be real different on that count. There was something knowing in his eyes when Loren said he wasn’t angry, something that said he knew better, but he didn’t counter it yet. He just jerked his head toward the back the kitchen, the one that wasn’t used this late at night, and he led the way in a soft jingle of long skirts and the steady footfall of combat boots. “You feel like gumbo or curry?” he asked, just to make sure Loren stayed close enough to hear during the wind through the casino and the folks losing their lives to loud silver machines.
On the clock or not, Loren panned for violent gold in the riverbed of tourists. Cards and chips flew all around them, casual and carefree across tabletops or into the gaping, greedy mouths of light-up machines. Waitresses in their patterned fishnets and microscopic skirts swished by with vaseline smiles and false fringe winks, half of which landed on Loren himself. He didn't take it to heart, all of the girls made a point to pour their charm onto the security, just in case they ended up getting hassled by some grabby customer in the course of the evening. Although Loren knew the precise layout of every square foot of the casino and hotel, he followed Jules. It only seemed right, seeing as how he was venturing into the other's domain. "I.. don't know what either of those are." There was nothing embarrassed or hesitant in the admission, just brutal honesty.
Jules noticed all that winking, and he didn’t like it a bit, which was strange. He wasn’t all attached to Loren yet, though it didn’t take a whole lot for Jules to think himself in love so strong he might could die from it. But it took more than one meeting against a slot machine, and he blamed the haint in his mind for the sudden jealousy. It was all he could do not to bare his teeth, and he was real grateful when the kitchen came into view. He swung the door open with too much force, ushering Loren into his world.
The kitchen was all stainless and tile and drains on the floor, and it was empty of every last person. It was a big old place, and Jules thought it was more home than his home was, and he pressed the button on an old CD player he had propped near the prep counter. Elvis started crooning, and Jules hummed along as he started pulling things out of the commercial refrigerator. He decided on gumbo, thinking Loren might be too traditional for the spices in curry, and he set a pot to heat what was leftover from an hour ago.
As it simmered, Jules walked up to the man in the security guard uniform, thinking the kitchen lights did a real fine job of making him look handsome. He stopped just shy of him, and he didn’t reach out and touch. “You ain’t at all the gentleman rocking on the porch, are you?” he asked, because he’d been expecting some kind of savior, and this was a flesh and blood man, all wound up and tense. Jules thought it was like Christmas come early, standing in his kitchen.
The lonely kitchen gleamed sterile It reminded Loren immediately of the hospital he'd woken up in all that time ago. Polished steel and a silence that bordered on holy. Loren didn't hesitate at the entrance the way anyone else out of their element might, he took to the facility with a puppy's curiosity. Inspecting gadgets he'd never seen before, opening drawers and cabinets with investigative interest. Although once Jules started heating things up at the stove, all of his blue eyed attention went there. Loren positioned himself on the opposite side of the counter from where Jules worked, watching everything with a discerning knot of eyebrows and mouth scrunched to one side. He glanced up with Jules took pause of all his stirring and simmering in order to approach. Loren straightened on instinct, but the question threw him. "I don't.. have a porch."
Jules laughed, and it was all honest and appreciative. No, he hadn’t been expecting someone like this to be sure, and he turned down the heat and turned around, taking a real long, real fresh look at the man across from him. “So all that anger, it ain’t there all the time?” he asked, moving forward across the shiny space to the opposite counter. The gumbo would need a few minutes to simmer, and he planned to use it to get to the bottom of the pretty thing standing in his space. He leaned against the counter, beside Loren, shoulder against the other man’s, close enough that his skirt tangled in Loren’s work pants. He looked over at him, and he just looked a spell longer, before smiling. “Alright, maybe a savior without a porch,” he finally decided, but all that anger he’s seen out there? That was still there, and it wasn’t even hidden real deep. The girl must have been something small and fragile - well, he’d known that, but more so than he expected. He touched a hand to Loren’s shoulder, and he went for an almost-truth. “I kinda knew her, your girl.”
If anything was going to push Loren past the point of civility, it wasn't the buttercream skirt fabric brushing flirt dangerous against the starched obsidian of his work slacks. It was the continued, pressing inquiry into this anger. He wasn't angry, goddamnit! Even the strange, rich aroma of simmering gumbo couldn't pull him back from baring his teeth in a defiant, fight dog grimace. No matter how he denied it, Loren was angry. It raged in his sky dyed eyes, and it lurked unspoken in the rough, unshaven carve of his jaw. "I'm not--" The words crawled on battered knees from between his clenched teeth, victims trying to escape the torture that burned inside of him. It burned all of the time now. The words halted when Jules interrupted with that last part, and Loren reeled back like he'd just been struck by lightning. "You what?" The anger was gone, washed away with the cool water of intrigue and something that nearly seemed like longing. "Hannah?" What other girl could there be?
Jules was perfectly willing to let the man lie to him; didn’t make it any more true. But Loren didn’t manage to get it out before he was asking about Hannah, and Jules was turning toward him, leaning his hip against the stainless steel that Loren was leaning against. “I said I kinda knew her, your girl. You’re not exactly what I was expecting, I gotta tell you. I expected something all someday my prince will come, young and idealistic. You ain’t like that at all. You’re all man with a whole lot of anger simmering,” he said, and then he pushed away from the counter and went to fish out a bowl for the gumbo.
A ladle later, Jules quirked his head, grabbed the bowl and the spoon, and led Loren to the back room, where the chefs ate. It was too late for dining now, and the round table was empty. Jules set the bowl down, and he pulled a chair out and sat himself down, waiting for Loren to sit and bring his questions all along with him. “You find her? I saw that man talking on the journals.” And there was that confession, out and clear as could be.
Loren didn't have a clue what Jules was going on about. One day my prince will come, was that something Hannah had said? Loren couldn't really envision her being the type to dive longingly into fairy tales. She was more fire and brimstone, shepherds herding lost lambs, and angels that watched over you. He gave the blond boy a crooked expression, trying to understand why Hannah might not have ever mentioned this one before. Then again, it was a little too late now to wonder about such things. Taking a seat, Loren shoveled a spoon into the gumbo without question. It smelled like pepper and something more exotic than a TV dinner, so he took a bite without even bothering to blow on the steaming rice. He was hungrier than he thought.
Loren ate his way through half the bowl with all the passion of a man on death row, and he kept his eyes downcast amongst the roux and shrimp, trying not to think about what he'd found in the desert. It didn't seem like Loren was going to answer at all, but then he dropped his spoon into the bowl and laid a palm of sudden exhaustion against his icy eyes. "...Yeah, she's dead." It felt godawful to say it allowed. This was the first time he'd actually said it, and immediately his stomach turned with a loss of appetite. He pushed the bowl away.
Jules watched him, and not like he normally watched folks eating his food. Normally, he looked for signs of them liking it (he never expected anyone to hate anything he cooked), for whether he should have added more heat or less heat, more sauce or less sauce, but this time it was different. He was looking to see how alright this man was, just how he was doing, and he got his answer when the spoon was dropped and the food was pushed away.
“I know she’s dead,” Jules said, plain as day. “I was asking if you found her.” Because they were two different things, knowing and finding, and he thought Loren shouldn’t have gone seeing that little girl’s body in the first place. “You know you couldn’t have done a thing to stop that, don’t ya?” he asked, because that was real important, the fact that this big old, strong man not blame himself. He reached across the table, and he touched the hand that was still within reach. “I can’t make it any better, but my Momma always said Jesus took care of his. Seems she was a good child, and I’m sure she’s somewhere a whole lot better than here.”
Jules reached into the gray shirt he wore, and he tugged his Momma’s old rosary from beneath the fabric. A second later, the old beads were in Loren’s hand, and he was closing Loren’s fingers overtop them. “We mighta been the only Catholics in Memphis,” he said with a genuine smile.
Coma blue eyes followed the rosary beads, and he offered no resistance when Jules laid his fingers over them for safe keeping. But something didn't seem right. Jules had said that he'd known Hannah, and maybe it was from some kind of church orientation.. but all things considered, Jules didn't strike Loren as the type to be accepted by Hannah's church. Hannah, with her gray pilgrim dresses and her religious books piled up in his living room. Hannah with her wide, innocent eyes. Eyes that stared up at him from their sandy, worthless grave. She had deserved better than that. It wasn't difficult for Loren to imagine that a great many people in Vegas deserved to die, so why her? Why slaughter the angels? And, most importantly, how did this Jules know she was dead? Loren hadn't told anybody yet what he'd found out..
Blood hungry knuckles twisted the rosary into his hand just before he grabbed the scrawny blonde by his shirt front. The boy had a genuine smile and some cherry scented gloss that Loren could smell even over the gumbo, but that didn't stop him from roughly pushing the boy back against the wall. "How?!" There was a pitbull gnash of his teeth and a little shake to Jules' gray collar. "How'd you know she was dead?!"
The chair went crashing, but Jules didn’t fight the hold of the man that shoved him back against the wall. He was a real slight thing, compared to Loren, all sapling and height and not a whole lot of meat on his frame, despite all the cooking he did. He hadn’t been expecting the reaction, but he wasn’t going to shy away now he’d gotten the thing. “The anon told me,” he said, which wasn’t the whole truth of it, but it wasn’t a lie neither. The anon had told him. Jules closed his fingers around Loren’s, long digits and a young man’s strength in the grip, nothing that would break if Loren didn’t back off, cherry lipgloss and skirt notwithstanding. “I didn’t kill her, honey, and I don’t know who did.” Which were two very true statements. “And you go on and be careful. Whatever did her in, it’s still out there, and if it knows you might be after it, if it thinks someone might know who he is, then nothing good’s gonna come of that.” Which was Jules’ real worry, and it shone in his blue eyes like a candle, flickering and badly hid. “That man, he can read, and I’m sure he saw that anon post same as everyone else.”
One moment, Loren was white knuckled hell clutching delicate shirt collars and rough handling of the kitchen help... the next, he seemed to remember himself. It had something to do with the boy's eyes. They weren't afraid, the way Loren expected the guilty would be. Besides, Loren wasn't Tate.. he didn't have the appetite for this kind of interrogation. His grip slackened and dark loafers led him into a slow retreat. He sniffed, notably disinterested in the warning that Jules cast his way. "Good, I hope that murderer knows I'm after them. I hope they come and find me."
“Don’t go looking for that trouble,” Jules said, and for a moment there was fear in his eyes, but not of the man standing opposite him. He tamped it down, but it took a fair bit of effort, and then he slid his hand over Loren’s shirt at the belly, smoothed the cheap work fabric down after pursuing the other man’s retreat. “Let it be,” he suggested, though he knew it wasn’t real brave, and thought Violet said Tate wouldn’t let Loren quit, even if Loren wanted to. Jules thought the haints had too much control, but he couldn’t go on saying that, not without giving himself away, which he didn’t want to do. Ending up dead, it wasn’t something he was planning on, haint or no haint. “The folks through those doors might not die, but we sure do, honey.”
"You think I should just let him go and carry the fuck on after what he did?" Loren reeled back, and all of that incredulous burning blowtorch blue in his eyes had nothing to do with the gentile slide of Jules' palm over the guard's shirt front. He was too revved up to acknowledge it, really. "What if he kills somebody else?" But even that wasn't what ate at him, it was only Hannah. What kind of monster could kill such a wounded saint? Tonight was too close to the incident, there was too much rage here. Too much hurt in such a short aftermath, there was no talking bloodshed down from these great heights. "I'm not leavin' shit be," and this time he did swipe Jules' hand away from him. Maybe he finally noticed it. "What the hell do you know about it, anyway?" He somehow doubted that the slender cook in the chantilly skirt knew anything about murder. Shaking his head, Loren scowled and turned to navigate his way out of this fucking kitchen. Spitting a final hint of politeness(which sounded like anything but) over his shoulder, "Thanks for the gumbo."
Jules didn’t stop him. He propped his hip back against the counter, rubbed at the hand that had been swiped away, and watched Loren go, all piss and vinegar and anger that was going to take more than a few days to heal. He’d wanted to know how close the man was to the dead girl; well, now he knew, and he wasn’t real sure he liked the answer. He sighed, turned for the discarded bowl and began cleaning up. Violet was chattering all over in his mind, wanting to cross, wanting to talk to Tate, and he did his damn best at ignoring her. He wasn’t going to end up dead as dirt, not for anyone, and that was just the way things were. Too dangerous out there by far, and Jules didn’t like playing with fire, even for a real pretty man in a security uniform.