Rhiannon Lee (rhiannon_lee) wrote in birthrightrpg, @ 2020-08-25 23:49:00 |
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Entry tags: | rhiannon lee, ~phanuel |
Thou Shalt Get Drunk With Me
Who: Phanuel & Rhiannon
What: Girls’ Night Out
When: Late Evening, Day After Blindeye Meeting
Where: Golden Nugget Casino, Vegas
Ratings: Language
“C’mon eight, you beautiful, bloody bastard!”
A slender hand picked up the six-sided die from the stickman and gave them a vigorous shake. The dice flew across the table and rattled as they hit the rubberized target surface and tumbled back.
“Eight, shooter wins,” cried the stickman.
The crowd erupted in cheers. Phanuel was in a groove. She’d enjoyed Krabs since it was introduced back in the Crusades, and pleased to see it feature prominently in recent years, especially here in Las Vegas. The Golden Nugget was her casino of choice; she’d been there at its opening in 1946 and would be damned if she wouldn't be there when some asshat finally got the idea to demo it and build another monstrosity.
“Let it ride!,” she proclaimed, turning to the person approaching the table on her left. Phanuel held the dice in the palm of her hands. “Blow on ‘em for luck.”
“I’m afraid you’re gonna have to earn that.” The woman to her left stood four inches shorter than the Angel in her bare feet, but a pair of stiletto ankle boots put her at eye level when she slid into the empty space. Rhiannon rested a hand atop the vinyl rail and surveyed the placement of the other gamblers’ chips on the felt. There was a whiskey on the rocks at her mouth, her red lip color a shade darker than her dress.
Going to Las Vegas was a way to avoid running into any neighbors from Searchlight, but here she stood, shoulder to shoulder with the least likely of suspects.
“Place your bet, then.” The woman was very familiar, but Phanuel couldn’t quite place where. She swallowed the last of her vodka tonic. “Pass or no-pass.”
The stickman gave the Angel a look. “Plaaaaaaaaace yer bets!”
“Take the risk, sweetheart.” Phanuel squeezed her fingers around the blood red dice.
Shake. Rattle. Roll.
“Eight, the hard way!”
“There went September’s utilities,” Rhiannon said, watching her chips disappear. “Who needs running water in the desert?” She took it in stride, a less raucous reaction than some of her table mates. No time had passed before the machinations of gambling continued, its swift turnover lassoing gamblers in for another round, and another, with little action demanded on their behalf. It reminded her of the addictive properties of Netflix.
Her glass was empty. The hunter considered biting an ice cube. She wasn’t drunk enough.
“I need another one. You want?” Rhiannon smiled at the Angel. “I’m sure they serve coffee.”
Phanuel, already three vodka tonics in, snorted loudly. “THAT’S where I know you!” She sized the woman up. “You brought me that urn at the diner.” She looked down at her empty glass. “This is unacceptable; two empty glasses. To the bar!”
“Technically I slid it to you,” Rhiannon said, picking up the glasses as they vacated the table. The Angel was lucky the hunter didn’t overshoot. She crossed to the nearest bar, set the empties on a tray, and awaited attention from a female bartender who shoveled ice into a glass and sprayed seltzer water into it. “Settle a debate for me,” Rhiannon asked, leaning closer to Phanuel. Her hair created a curtain of privacy for what she asked in a quieter tone. “Did you not see it or do Angels like saying jump to see who asks ‘how high’?”
The Angel chuckled. While not as potent as other alcohol odors, the ethanol on her breath suggested she wasn’t interested in coffee. “Of course I saw it. And I felt your belief. Catholic, right. Did you want a fucking medal?
“Rhiannon, right? You clean up good.”
“Thanks. And if you’re handing them out, I’m not opposed.” Rhiannon set a vintage handbag on the bar, its chain long and silver. She opened the clasp and fished within its contents, past the identity cards, key, phone, tube of lipstick, lighter, and a cigarette case, until she found what she was looking for. She withdrew a roll of cash and tipped the bartender’s jar. The woman came over to take their drink order.
“Hi.” Rhiannon was about to repeat her earlier preference, but changed her mind. “From the smell of things, my friend is drinking vodka tonic, so let’s do two of those. Actually make mine a double, why bother fucking around.”
“Fucking right.” The Angel was in the mood for a good time, and it seemed the brunette was as well. She pocketed her minor winnings from the craps table into her pocket, to cash out later. Pockets. Such a good invention, especially as she hated carrying her satchel when she didn’t absolutely need it.
Phanuel spied the cigarette case and lighter in Rhiannon’s bag. “Mind if I have one?” She hadn’t smoked in decades, but she was in the mood to this evening.
Rhiannon looked up, surprised. “Yeah, sure.” The Golden Nugget was one of few casinos left where you could smoke in the open like this. She opened the case, which had been engraved on the inside -- ‘we’re just passengers’ -- and offered the Angel one of her Luckies. “I quit every few months,” she confessed. “I’ll be fine and then something sets me off and I’m right back where I started.” A cigarette went to her own mouth, then Rhiannon held the lighter at the ready for Phanuel to use first. “Here.”
The drinks arrived.
Phanuel took the offered light and inhaled. The smoke immediately coated her lungs and she let out a short cough. “Like I said. Decades.” She inhaled again. This time the smoke curled in her mouth before letting it out as a steady stream. “So many chemicals,” the Angel continued, picking a flake of tobacco off of her tongue. “I bought mine off the Reservation. Cheaper too.”
She took one of the drinks and brought it to her lips, before she hesitated. “Oh, fuck, was that racist?”
Rhiannon choked on her vodka tonic, lurching forward to keep from dribbling it down her dress. She set the glass down and used the hand that wasn’t holding a burning cigarette to wipe her chin with a cocktail napkin. “Normally if you have to ask, it is,” she said. “But in this case…” Rhiannon reached for a glass ashtray. “I’d say buying native-made, tax-free tobacco is a decent way of sticking it to the government and corporate America, both of which are historically white. It’s a two-for-one deal,” she concluded.
The hunter angled her face away from Phanuel to smoke her cigarette and blow the cloud in the other direction. “Are all of our vices up for grabs, or just the substance abuse?”
“The answer would surprise you.” Nothing like throwing in a Buzzfeed reference. The Angel had a laugh at that. “People take the Bible waaaaaay too literally. If anything, my Father wanted a guidebook but He also gave you free will. Can’t have the latter if you’re following the former down to the punctuation.”
She ashed her cigarette into the tray and took another drag. “Don’t get me wrong, the Commandments are pretty sacred. A shame Moses dropped one of the tablets.” Phanuel tried to keep a straight face, and failed. She burst out laughing, her drink sloshing about. Drops narrowly missed Rhiannon’s red dress.
“Don't tell me. I don’t need any more ways to be a sinner.” Rhiannon sighed, observing Phanuel’s sloppiness with a sort of irritated bemusement. “Go ahead, pour it down my cleavage. I’ll find a way to ruin it before the night’s over, trust me. Mustard. Mascara wand. Nose bleed.”
It seemed as if Phanuel had a decent head-start on the proceedings while Rhiannon’s whisky had barely made a dent in her sobriety. There was only one way to avoid being annoyed by a drunk and that was to join them. No time like the present to catch up. She picked her glass up by the rim, tapped Phanuel’s, and took a few heavy swallows. Vodka burned her mouth and throat as her head tipped back, arching until she reached the bottom. By the time she wiped the corner of her mouth on her hand, the brunette’s neck was flushed pink. “Mm,” Rhiannon grimaced. “I should’ve done shots. It’s quicker and this is gonna make me pee.”
“I know, right? The one downside of alcohol. You only rent it.” Watching the hunter down her drink and then express a desire for shots, the Angel proclaimed, “Shots it is!” She swallowed her vodka tonic, and slammed it onto the bar. “L’Chaim!”
Phanuel leaned on the bar and waved at the bartender. She ordered a total of ten shots for the two of them. “Thou shalt get drunk with me.”
Rhiannon watched the glasses get lined up on the counter and did a little math. She was already three shots in. Three plus five, empty stomach, time of consumption… “Jesus fucking Christ, I’m a hunter, not a Sumo wrestler.” At this rate, she’d be falling out of her shoes by the time she hit the midway point. Rhiannon reached for one… stopped. Reached again. “Do me a favor, Phanuel…” She picked up the tiny glass and bit her tongue as she looked down through the clear bottom.
“Don’t let me anywhere near my phone.” The brunette threw back the first of her shots. The slightly bitter taste zinged the back of her tongue. She tapped the bar next to her, signaling that Phanuel was up, and wiped at the corner of her eye.
“Hand it over, I’ll make sure you don’t get it back ‘til you’re sober again.” Of course, this meant Phanuel would see the hunter again, if only briefly. Still, a request of this drunken angel was usually a request granted. She took the first shot and drained it in one gulp. The burn in her throat was comforting. The Angel immediately took a second shot glass, and finished it as well. Both were placed, top down, on the bar top. “So, no midnight booty call, then?”
Asking someone to keep her from texting was one thing. Faced with the dilemma of actually handing off her phone, Rhiannon faltered. “Um.” She withdrew the device from her bag and stared at the black and white photo on her wallpaper, at a current time that was starting to seem meaningless, as it did whenever you were in a casino. Throw a couple of shots on top in quick succession and they were just blurry numbers.
‘Don’t you know better than to answer a midnight text?’
The knot in her chest was quick but fierce. Rhiannon didn’t want to feel that, or anything resembling how she felt before she put on that dress and climbed behind the wheel of her car. No one ever left Indian Street so fast.
“I don’t think that’s in my best interests, or anyone else’s. Where are the…” ‘What’s the word, what’s the word…’ “Stools?” She looked around. If this was going to be a standing situation, she was in the wrong footwear. Ah, there was one. Rhiannon pulled it closer and climbed onto the seat. As she crossed her legs, the dress shot up her thigh. Obviously sitting wasn’t a factor when selecting it. She picked up the next shot, took a breath, and tossed it down the hatch. That burn on her tongue, past her esophagus, down into her stomach made her arms and legs feel loose.
Screw it. “Here.” Rhiannon tossed the phone at the Angel. The two fingers clasping her cigarette wove a languid figure in the air. “I looked you up.” The hunter concentrated on her words. “Angel of exorcism. I’ve got all these things I want to ask you but, oh my god, that’s so boring. So let’s play two… three questions, any topic except the boring shit.”
Phanuel caught the phone in her free hand. She took a few long drags of the cigarette before she stubbed it out in the ashtray. She peeked at the black and white photo. “Don’t worry, I won’t snoop,” she offered. “I don’t even own one of these.” She put it in her front pocket with a mental note: ’This is not yours; make sure you return in the morning. And oh, note to self. Find out where she lives so you can return it.’
Two more shots disappeared in quick succession. The Angel had to admit, she had a healthy buzz. She leaned against the bar and slipped. The hunter had the right idea. A second stool was procured and brought next to Rhiannon’s. “Three questions. Any topic. Nothin’ boring. Gotcha.”
Phanuel scrutinized the woman seated opposite. “This should be, whatsit called... fun. You go first, yeah?”
Rhiannon mirrored the extinguishing of her cigarette and rested her chin on her hand. It was effortless to sit there next to Phanuel. She wasn’t sure why. She watched the bartender plopping lemon slices into someone’s else’s mixed drink . “Okay. What’s something… that every human looks stupid doing, unilaterally? Like full on hilarious, makes you laugh every time?” She pulled the third of five shots toward her. Bad idea. Bad idea. Her body still hadn’t absorbed the others. She held onto it and didn’t drink just yet.
When she looked at the Angel again, something seemed to be easing in Rhiannon, as if the edges were finally wearing off. ‘I should get some water…’
Phanuel’s eyebrows furrowed as she considered the ask. “Gooood question.” There’ve been millenia to choose from. “Taking a shit!” she snorted out loud, “Jesus, you should’ve seen Adam’s face the first time his bowels moved. Poor bastard. But the faces you make!” The Angel mimicked five different expressions. “Oh! It’s not like we intentionally watch you all go to the bathroom; it’s when you start crying out ‘Oh God, help me!’ when you’re stuck on the toilet and my Father inevitably sends one of us down to see if it’s a real emergency.”
She leaned in closer, whispering. “Now you know why there aren’t a ton of miracles anymore. We got tired of the paperwork.”
It may not have made perfect sense, but in the Angel’s brain, it was clear as a bell.
“My turn, then.” Phanuel considered her question carefully. “You’re Catholic. What’s the first thing you wanna ask God when you die?”
Rhiannon folded her arms over her head and rested it on the bar. No. Noooo… she had expected something like ‘running while wearing a backpack’ but this opened a whole new can of worms. Her voice was muffled. “So wait… you peek in on us… every time we call out ‘Oh God’ or just when we say ‘help me’— you know what… don’t… don’t answer that."
She sat up on the stool too fast and almost tipped off the back. “Whoop!” Rhiannon’s high heel grabbed onto the rungs. Steadying hands shot out for balance. She was good.
Of all the burning questions she had about the expansion of the universe and good versus evil and the origin of bloodlines and whether prayer even affected destiny, one thing stood out the most. “Okay. I would ask… wwhhaaaaat’s up with the clitoris? Why is it where it is? It doesn’t make any sense.” She drank the third shot. Half of it landed on her cheek. “Now you go… Are cats evil? Domeshtic ones. Domeshtic...” That didn’t sound right.
“Domeshtic?” came the giggled reply. The Angel took another shot. “That’s a species with free will. Holy shit, you’d think the little bastards would show some thanks for scoopin’ their crap, and feeding them the wet stuff, and saying ‘Who’s a good girl? It’s you! Yes, it’s you pspspspspspspspspspspsps…”
God, you know what she wanted in this moment? Chocolate pudding. “I really want pudding.” Fingers fidgeted. She recognized the sign. Nicotine craving. “Hey bartender, you guys selling cigarette packs?” She turned to Rhiannon. “Want one? On me.”
“Second question time. If you could go back in time and kill Hitler, why do people like Country and Western music?”
Rhiannon cackled, head tipping so far back she got dizzy. "What?" She raised her hands in helpless confusion. “Oh yeah, yeah,” she said, hooking her finger in a ‘come hither’ to the offer of a pack of cigarettes. She snapped open her case, placed a fresh one between her lips, and searched her ‘pants’ for her lighter. Where the hell was it? Fingers snatched up a book of casino matches, which finally struck on her third attempt.
“Um.” Rhiannon knuckled her eye and studied the make-up that she smeared. “What was the question… Oh, country music. Because it’s per-dictable,” she said. Why did all the words in her head have so many syllables? “No thinking required,” she swiped her hand, “Which is why I hate it. Okay, last one. What’s the weirdest thing you do by yourself?” She blinked at Phanuel but the Angel’s face wasn’t getting any sharper.
She slouched on the bar and took a drag.
‘Oof.’ Talk about throwing the heat. Wait. No one was talking about throwing the heat. But it was a good metaphor. That pitch, you couldn’t help but swing at. ‘But I don’t even follow baseball.’
Where was she? Oh, right. “I pray.”
Well, that slipped out.
Phanuel leaned forward, took the cigarette from Rhiannon and inhaled. She passed it back. “I’m an angel, remember?,” she continued. “I can’t get your diseases.”
The bartender returned with two packs of Lucky Sevens. The Angel gave a pack to her drinking companion. She ripped open the soft top and shook out a stick for herself. She stole the matches and lit hers. “Yes, I pray. When I’m particularly disillusioned, I check in Upstairs. I get their voicemail. I dunno if they play it back. I haven’t seen any of my brothers or sisters since I walked away.
“Okay, last question for you. Hearing all of this, meeting me, does it shake your faith or strengthen it?”
“Mm, neither,” Rhiannon said. She was drunk but clear enough to answer. “I don’t jus’ believe. I know.” It sounded arrogant but who cared. She swiveled on her stool to see what had changed in their surroundings and a wave of dizzy nausea came over her. Rhiannon was able to hold it in check, the singular advantage to not having eaten a meal earlier. Two shot glasses remained by her left hand. ‘Oh god.’ This night was going to end with getting her stomach pumped, wasn’t it? All because there were two left, and she had two hands, and that’s how math worked. Rhiannon put down her cigarette and picked up the drinks.
The bartender paused in her wiping down of the counter to make an ‘eeeeh… I wouldn’t’ face.
The brunette consumed them back to back. “Uggghhh….!” Then she waited with eyes squeezed shut for the alcohol to hit her stomach, wondering when they had gotten into a people-sized centrifuge. “’m wasted,” she said. She was on her way to wasted before the last two shots. Maybe standing would help! Rhiannon lurched off the stool, took two wobbling steps, and sat down in the middle of the casino floor. She made a grabby-hand at Phanuel. “I nee… I need m’phone.”
“Nope! No… phone for you!” Phanuel put down her cigarette and pushed her right palm against the hunter’s forehead, effectively keeping her seated in place. She made sure to keep her defences up so she didn’t accidentally get a read on the hunter. “See? This is why I confis-- why I confis-- why I took it.”
Rhiannon sat there like a sleepy house pet. “No, you c’n-- you c’n do it for me! Text ‘im. He won’t answer... unless he’s a cat.” She started laughing. “The cat’s not mad at me. C’mon,” she beckoned Phanuel to join her on the carpet. “Take a selfie w’me!” Rhiannon propped herself back on her hands. “Cheeeeese.”
She was drowsy. This ugly carpet with the leaves wouldn’t be the worst place Rhiannon had slept.
“Ooooh, selfie!” It didn’t seem like the worst idea in the world. Because she didn’t know what it was. Still, Phanuel got down on the carpet as asked, and sat next to the brunette.
“No sleeping. Gonna… gonna get you home.” She paused. “I dunno where home is. I’m gonna get us a taxi. No wait, that’s too far. You live too far. I dunno where you live, but it’s too far by cab. It’d eat up all my wuh-wuh- chips. Oh! I c’n fly us home!”
Rhiannon blinked. “You have a helicopter?” She shook off that revelation and snatched her phone from the front pocket of Phanuel’s clothes. Haha! The camera was extended to arm’s length. Click! “I liv’in Searchlight,” she said and hiccuped. Oh, that one tasted like vodka. “Uber’s like… seven’y bucks. It’s cheaper to sleep here but,” she shivered, “I don’t like hotels.”
A brilliant thought came to Rhiannon’s mind.
“I drove!”
“You’re in no state to drive, missy!”
“No, Rhiannon.”
She crawled to the bar stool and used it as a crutch to stand up. If she hadn’t needed to retrieve her purse, she might have rolled out the door. “We’ll just, we’ll just go sit in it!” she said, imagining a fantasy world in which she’d be sober enough to drive in a few minutes. “I’ll sit shotgun, you can...” Rhiannon mimed turning the steering wheel of a race car.
“Ready?” She swayed and blinked at the drunken selfie on her phone. Just two girls inebriated on the floor of a public casino, doing fine. She clicked the arrow to send it and picked the first bubble that popped up with Cian’s name, unknowingly populating the entire group text from the Blindeye meeting. Send.
Phanuel got back up off the floor after Rhiannon, steadying herself by placing a hand on the bar top. She wrapped one arm around the hunter’s waist and took a frugal step forward. “Right. Jus’ sit in the car ‘til we sober up.”
What could go wrong? Absolutely nothing. It was a brilliant plan.