Joseph Tropiano (luckandchance) wrote in city_limits, @ 2009-04-06 20:57:00 |
|
|||
Current mood: | working |
Entry tags: | jessica haines, joseph tropiano |
Good Service
Jessica shifted on the stool, thanking the bartender for the drink she had been given as she waited for Joseph. She was ten minutes early for their meeting; she had spoken to him on the phone the day before to arrange this meeting.
On the bartop next to her was a folder containing some information on the particular items she wanted him to procure for her. She tapped her fingers on the folder and stirred the ice around her coke with the straw, held between two long fingers.
She chewed her lower lip and leaned forward to take a couple of long drinks before she glanced around. Her hair was loose and her jeans were a little baggier than usual, after her actions of the past couple of weeks, she felt she should probably spend some time dressed rather more modestly, but she had to admit that dressing the way that she had and the way that people had looked at her had felt good.
Not to mention that night she had spent with Tseng. She chewed the inside of her lower lip and smiled to herself with the memory, though she was a little nervous about going to see him again. What if he had changed his mind?
It bothered her that her stupid insecurities came back to haunt her. She had enjoyed being free of them.
Taking another sip, she glanced up at the time. She was glad she had come early, but she was a little anxious to meet up with Joseph. At least the pool hall had a nice feel; the quiet noises of the jukebox playing and the clinking of balls creating the perfect ambiance.
Joseph had spent the better half of his life getting his hands on things nobody else could, procuring them in his own unique ways. Hell, he'd paid nearly three years worth of rent with under the tables deals. The police had him a couple times for those sorts of things, but the truth was he'd done it more than any legal record could tell.
He had a feeling about what Jessica wanted so had already made enquiries, sourcing out the local supplies and making friends with the right people. It never took long, old habits paved the way into partnerships that most people couldn't even fathom.
Finishing a cigarette Joseph got to his feet, brushing away a few lingering traces of ash from the edge of his denim clad thigh. No harm in checking out the main pool hall area, see if Jessica had arrived.
His office wasn't much of an office but give him a little more time and he'd have it looking exactly how he wanted it, he'd focused all of his attention on the pool hall itself and not enough on his office. Patience was a virtue or so his mother used to tell him.
Joseph was in the process of pulling his hair back into an elastic band when he came out of the back and into the pool hall itself. "Jessica," he called. "You wanna come through?"
Jessica lifted her eyes when she heard her name. She crunched on a piece of ice and nodded, sliding off her stool and sliding her folder off the table.
She thanked the bartender again and then headed towards Joseph with a smile, holding out her hand in greeting when she approached, standing in front of him and looking up at the taller man.
"Hey Joseph," she smiled and took a slow breath. "Thanks for agreeing to see me again."
"Don't mention it," Joseph said with a smile. He kept the door open with one hand whilst he took hold of her offered hand with his other, squeezing firmly before shaking. After a moment he stepped back and ushered Jessica into the back area of the hall. "It's why I gave you my number, figured you might be in need of something sooner or later."
He pulled out the crumpled pack of cigarettes from his left hip pocket, sliding one out to light with a lighter he never went without. "I trust you know exactly what you want?" He tilted his head and regarded Jessica through a haze of smoke.
Jessica moved into the back room and sat down on one of the chairs. She held onto the folder for a moment before she offered it to him. "I did some research," she said as she held it out and smiled.
Inside the folder were three images and accompanying information: a Beretta 92, a Combat Dagger with accompanying arm sheath and a folding blade with arc lock.
"I'd like two of the combat daggers," she said after a moment, "Payment won't be a problem." She had been very careful in making sure that she saved herpay cheques from Bethany, even if she was going to have to start looking at somewhere to live; therefore having to pay rent or whatever she had to do when she was living somewhere that wasn't in Oliver's hotel room. "They shouldn't be too hard to find; standard military issue in this place, better spec than anything I've ever been able to get my hands on before."
Joseph perched on the edge of his desk, cigarette in mouth and folder in hand. He flipped through it and caught the filter end of his cigarette between his index and middle finger after a few moments.
"You wanting any of these customised or do you want them as they come?" He could get customisation easily enough, his own Eagles had been done years ago and it had stuck even with the scrapes and imperfections over the years of use.
Jessica reached into her pocket and pulled out another sheet of paper. "Yeah... I have a- uh- I'd like these images put on them all." She showed Joseph the paper, two viking runes clearly sitting there; one for protection and the other for invulnerability in battle. "Call me superstitious..." she gave a small smile and watched the end of Joseph's cigarette light up when he took a breath in and dim as he exhaled smoke.
She shifted and cracked her knuckles, then tipped her head to the side, her neck making a couple of cracking sounds too. "But that's it for customisation."
Joseph reached out and took the sheet of paper, tilting his head at the designs and transferring those images to the weapons in his mind's eye. It could work, definitely.
"Nothing wrong with a little superstition," Joseph said around a mouthful of smoke. "Just as long as it doesn't rule your life as it does a couple of my friends."
He held up the file and the papers. "I'm gonna hold onto these so I get it right when it comes down to it."
"I had them on my old weapons," Jessica confided with a smile. "I was taught they would bring me luck." She shrugged, "Maybe it's stupid..." But before, she had needed all the luck and protection she could get. "What do you mean by that?" she asked, tilting her head; how could a superstition rule someone's life?
She nodded and waved a hand, "Keep them for as long as you need. I won't need them once I've got the actual weapons themselves." She leaned back against the seat and stretched, eyes closing as she arched her back. "This is a nice place you've got here."
"I have this friend," Joseph began to elaborate. "Nice guy, but he believes way too much in superstition so he does stupid stuff like throw salt over his shoulder, not step on cracks and go around ladders. Of course it was the last one that cost him his legs." He placed the papers down on his desk and pushed up to circle it, sliding onto his chair as he rummaged through drawers for a pen and pad of paper so he could pass a quote to Jessica. "And by that I mean a car hit him and he couldn't walk anymore." He settled the pad on the table and shook his head at the story. "And here we all thought he'd cripple himself by doing something stupid like jumping through a window which he did once when he was drunk. We were on the third floor at the time."
Joseph scribbled down a price and ripped the paper away to pass it across to Jessica. "I'll need half up front and the other half is paid upon delivery." With that out of way he relaxed back into his seat and smiled slowly, taking another drag from his cigarette. "Thanks, it certainly took long enough."
"So, what, he can't walk anymore?" Jessica asked, looking a little surprised. She wondered if he was still alive - people who needed to rely on others wereeuthanised in her experience, if they couldn't run when they were attacked, being dead was a safer and more humane alternative. It wasn't until she was living in this world that she realised how brutal (but necessarily so) the world she had come from. "I suppose if you aren't watching the road..." She frowned thoughtfully. "I've never been drunk. Am I missing out on anything?"
She reached forward to take the piece of paper, looking at the number for a moment before she shifted, trying to work out what half of it would be. She was getting good at reading, but she was still failing at mathematics. She chewed on her lower lip and then lifted her eyes to look at Joseph. "Can I just pay you in full?" she asked, not wanting to admit that she couldn't work out what half was. She was still trying to get around her problems with arithmetic.
She watched the smoke curl lazily from his mouth and disappear up towards the ceiling with abject fascination. "Yeah? It looks like it was worth the time."
"Yeah," Joseph said with a nod of his head. "He can't walk." He flicked ash aside and slid his tongue along his lower lip, closing his teeth over the corner of it as his gaze lifted to Jessica. "It's kinda fun and you get a buzz but it does make you very stupid so that's the bit you're not missing out on."
He watched her closely, the way in which she worried her lower lip and fidgeted in the chair, clearly uncomfortable with something. A tattooed edge of a finger appeared on the corner of the paper as Joseph caught a hold of it. "You can pay me in full if you want but people generally like paying half up front and half later. It usually puts their mind at ease, reassures them I'm not about to make off with their money."
Joseph hadn't missed the way she watched the cigarette and the smoke, trying to work out what made it so fascinating to her. She looked like the girls he'd gone to school with, the girls that had wanted to be at the back of school stealing a smoke with the troublemakers instead of going to classes and being good little girls.
"Yeah, it was." He turned the paper over and replaced the full figure with a half of it, offering it back to Jessica. "Feels like I finally fit, you know?"
"Does it always make you stupid?" Jessica asked, "Seems to be always happening on the news when I watch it." She smiled a little and then shrugged, looking at the ashtray before she nodded and rubbed the back of her neck, fingers digging into a couple of pressure points to relieve the pain in her neck.
She watched him take the paper before she shook her head. "I'd rather pay it in full," she said, "I'd just have to come after you and break your kneecaps or something if you ran off with my money." Her lips curled up in a smile, obviously just joking, even if she had done it before. "I don't think it would be good for your business if you did stuff like that."
Cigarettes were as fascinating to her as the microwave, even escalators. Just things that she hadn't really seen before that she still marvelled at. People here took them for granted.
She took the paper again and relaxed a little as Joseph presented her with half the figure. It was better that she hadn't had to ask. She looked at the number and nodded. "We can do it in halves if it's easier for you... it doesn't matter to me." She was due to be paid that day anyway. She blew out a breath and lifted her eyes, surprised to hear him say that. "You do? I'm still trying to find my place," she admitted, "But I don't know, maybe I'll find it soon enough."
Joseph lifted an eyebrow at the comment about breaking kneecaps and decided to keep his own delightful stories about incidents like that in his past to himself, some things were meant to be said whereas others were not. He knew when to keep his mouth shut. "No, it wouldn't. Very counterproductive."
He sat up and knocked ash into the ever expanding pile in his ashtray. "Just to make your life easier I'll take full payment up front and you'll get exactly what you want and need."
"Aren't those supposed to be bad for you?" she asked, watching the ash fall into the ashtray. "That's what the news says, but then someone told me that I shouldn't believe everything I see on the TV." It was very confusing. "Even if the TV is very awesome."
She smiled, "But obviously you're good for your word otherwise you wouldn't be able to promise me these things. And yeah... if we could pay upfront it would be good." She reached into her inside pocket and pulled out her cheque book, tipping her head, "Is cheque okay or do you want cash?" If he wanted cash, she would make sure to take some out to get it to him, or else arrange a transfer. She was just learning the wonders of cheque books.
Joseph tipped his head at the cigarette and gave a whiskey rough laugh. "I haven't got cancer yet and I've been smoking a while." He lifted his shoulders and took another drag from the cigarette, welcoming the dance with the devil. "Besides if I didn't do things that were bad for me I'd be a very boring person."
He eyed the cheque book dubiously before considering Jessica. "Cheque'll be fine and if it bounces I can always hunt you down and break your kneecaps." He smirked as he echoed her words back to her before winking at the very tail end.
"I suppose that's true. I need to find something that's bad for me in that case." Jessica smiled, "I would take up smoking but it smell funny. No offense." It was just a smell she was still getting used to. "Maybe I'll take up fighting. I'm good at that. That's kinda bad for you." She wondered whether or not she would be able to get her hands dirty at work tonight, she was kind of itching for a fight, again. Pent up frustration from everything that had happened with Faith and a way to work through what had happened with Tseng - since she hadn't been herself that night. Not that she regretted it. Far from it. She just needed it to make sense to her.
Her handwriting was almost too neat, like a second grader who had learned to write but was just starting to master the art of doing so. She wrote the numbers in the box and signed the bottom slip before she turned the book around and held the pen she had taken from the nearby table out to Joseph. "You can fill in the rest so I don't get it wrong," she offered. "If it bounces, my kneecaps are all yours. Can't promise my boss won't be very unhappy with you if you did though." Her lips curled up into an answering smirk.
Joseph held up both hands. "None taken." He took a final drag from his cigarette and stubbed out what was left of it, making a mental note to swing into an all night store so he could stock up again.
He took the cheque as it was given, rubbing his thumb over the letters and numbers. It kind of reminded him of his cousins when they'd been younger and had been trying to grasp how to write words. Not that he said that outloud. "Your boss a hardass?"
Jessica just smiled at Joseph and watched him hold the cheque. She knew that meant she would have to be careful with what she spent money on for a while until the money came out. She was pretty sure that was how it worked... She made a mental note to ask Bethany or Tseng - whoever she saw next - to explain it to her.
She glanced up at the mention of her boss and her lips curled into another smile. "Something like that. But she takes good care of her staff, so I've got no complaints. She's pretty cool."
"It's all you can ask from a boss," Joseph murmured with a nod of agreement. He placed the cheque to one side and ran over times in his head. "I can probably get you what you need in two weeks max. I have a guy that's pretty good with requests like this."
"That fast?" Jessica looked impressed before she nodded and picked at the fabric of her jeans. "Works for me, you have my number so you can just call me when they're ready?" She smiled and shifted on the chair, hoping that she had no more run-ins with anything supernatural (or human-with-powers) related that she couldn't handle before then. "I really appreciate this."
"Anytime," Joseph said easily. "This is what I do." He couldn't do much as far as fighting the demons and monsters but he could supply people with enough weapons to do their own fighting. "Besides you're paying me very generously for the service so we're both getting something out of this."
Jessica smiled. "Still, thank you. I haven't felt as comfortable walking around with what I have at the moment." It was all she needed, really, but it wasn't enough to get her going for when she needed to really fight. One tiny little blade was barely enough to do any damage at all. Not to things that didn't have a weakness for pointy, steel objects. "I'm glad you feel like you fit." She offered after a few moments of silence, almost as if she had been trying to work out what to say.
Joseph let that silence linger before he finally broke it, "Something on your mind?" He opened up a drawer and rummaged in it, hoping that maybe just maybe he had a pack of cigarettes hidden somewhere that he could smoke his way through.
"No, not really." She lifted a shoulder and ran her hand through her hair. She slid the cheque book back into her pocket and leaned back against the chair, feeling the wood through the fabric. "Just looks like I'm thinking half the time." Her mind briefly cast to Tseng. She ought to call him, or in the very least go and see how he was doing. It had been a while since she had spoken to him, after all. She wondered what was going on there; it was more than just a one night thing in her mind. She wanted to do it again, but more than that, because she enjoyed his company. She supposed sitting in a back room of a pool hall wasn't the time to be deep and philosophical about her life and relationships, though.
Joseph snorted. "I don't believe you but I know when to call people on their bullshit and when to keep my mouth shut." His fingers finally closed around a packet of cigarettes and thankfully it wasn't completely empty, nearly though.
He lit his cigarette and rose to his feet. "C'mon, I'll see you out."
Jessica smiled and shrugged back into her jacket. "Thanks," she got to her feet and straightened her shirt, turning on her heel towards the door, waiting for Joseph to lead the way. "It's been a pleasure doing business with you."
And it had. He was a good man and he seemed to do a good job. "I look forward to hearing from you."
Joseph did lead the way and glanced over his shoulder at Jessica, offering a smile. "I'll be in touch shortly." He opened up the door and exhaled the smoke he'd just inhaled as he did, catching the eye of the bartender who gestured at a man sat at the bar. He was the next person Joseph had to see today.
"You take care, Jessica."
Jessica held a hand out for Joseph to shake. "You too, Joseph." Her handshake was firm and once he had shaken it, she withdrew her hand and stuck it into the pocket of her jacket. "I'll be seeing you soon."
She tipped her head at him and turned again, disappearing through the crowd in the bar to find the exit and head home to get ready for work.