Who: Liam and Sam What: Lunch Where: Blueberry Hill When: Saturday Afternoon Warnings/Rating: None!
It was just before noon that Liam arrived at Blueberry Hill, and he had to admit that he was somewhat surprised by Sam’s choice of locale. No liquor, just home cooking and a warm atmosphere. It seemed almost too quaint for words, but he didn’t argue now that he was here. Instead, he gave a nod to the hostess before asking for a table for two, and he was soon shown to a booth against one wall, the window letting the Las Vegas sun stream over the table. Settling into the booth, Liam glanced towards the entrance as he waited, wondering if this was any sort of a good idea. Truly, he didn’t mean to be an asshole, and even less did he mean to be an asshole to Sam, but she was just one of those people where snide remarks came easier than his normally gentle, friendly nature. He didn’t know what it was about her, but he simply acted differently around her than others.
Fingers tapped a thumb drive against the table as he waited, turning it round and round in his hands, fingers keeping it constantly in motion. When the waitress arrived to take his order for drinks, he waved her off and told her he would order when his companion showed up.
Sam had no fucking idea why Liam wanted to see her, but she didn't think he was the crazy kitchen rapist either, so at least meeting him didn't involve hours of convincing herself to get out the door. That didn't mean she had any idea why he wanted to see her, and she wondered if whatever he was going to give her involved a whoopie cushion or something that buzzed when she shook his hand. In other words, she didn't trust his motives, but it was a safe kind of distrust, and that was actually a good thing. Still, their last conversation on the journals, where she'd tried to actually be decent to the ass, had gone particularly badly, and she wasn't expecting any kind of awesome reunion over lunch today.
But she went anyway.
She liked the diner because it wasn't pretentious and, admittedly, since the incident in the hotel she'd needed lots of booze and a sidecar of pills to walk into a club or bar. So, yeah, breakfast was about as wild as she got without pharmaceuticals, and the crowd at the Hill tended to be local and older, families and grandparents, and she could actually sit down with her back to someone there and not lose her shit.
It was over a hundred degrees of disgustingly dry Vegas heat, and she walked in wearing a wifebeater and denim shorts, flip flops and a messy pigtail finishing off the decidedly un-designer ensemble. The start of the fairly fresh, pink scar was visible at her shoulder, but whatever, she wasn't going to die of heat because of the kitchen psycho. She found him easily, and she took the long way to the table, avoiding people along the way. Once she was there, she turned the chair around, straddled it, and asked the waitress for a coffee as she sat.
It wasn’t hard to pick her out from the handful of people milling around in the entrance to the restaurant, and as Sam wove her way through the place to the table he had been seated at, he followed her with his gaze, saying nothing, even his expression unreadable. The waitress was hot on her heels as she sat, and after Sam’s order of coffee, Liam followed it up with grapefruit juice before he leaned back in the booth, pushing the thumb drive over towards her. It was a generic thing, dark green and worn around the edges, proclaiming that it wasn’t a new thing he was giving her. “Glad you didn’t stand me up,” he said quietly by means of a greeting, the corner of his mouth lifting in a faint smile, his gaze dropping to the scar that decorated the skin of her shoulder. Liam’s eyes narrowed slightly at the sight, the smile turning into a frown, but he knew better than to ask. If she wanted to tell him, if she wanted that subject to be breached, she’d give a sign. Until then, he’d just wonder.
“You come here a lot? I’ve never been, to tell you the truth, but it seems popular enough.” The conversation was friendly, easy and light, and it carried none of Liam’s usual bravado.
There would be no broaching the subject, thanks, and she just took the thumb drive between her calloused fingers and turned it over a few times before holding it up. "Ok. This is me biting. What is it? Something to do with the Opera House?" Because that place opening was the only real reason she could think of for Liam to ask to meet her somewhere without punches being thrown. But maybe it would be good to talk about that, especially if there was any fucking hope of everyone staying in one piece once the Parisian bastards were all in the same place again. But it seemed liked betrayal to the girl in her head to run her mouth about her secrets, and life had turned into a really complicated bitch since Sam had moved to Las Vegas.
"I worked the construction site across the road when I first came to Vegas," she said pointing at the building that was visible out the window. "This was a good place for eggs and coffee in the morning, and it wouldn't break anyone's budget," she said of the place, taking the coffee from the waitress and sipping it black. She closed her eyes, made a sound of pleasure at the bitter taste on her tongue, and ordered some eggs and hash without looking at the menu. If she had come all the way out here, he might as well feed her.
“It’s a surprise. Nothing to do with the Opera House, just something I thought you might like.” Liam glanced up at the waitress as she arrived with their drinks, nodding his thanks as he took the juice in hand, giving it a sip as Sam ordered, familiar with the menu. Liam went safe, ordering a waffle and eggs, waiting until the waitress had taken her leave before he turned his attention back towards Sam. “This seems nice enough. I might have to put it on my rotation of places to go for breakfast,” Liam said, taking another drink of juice before he sat back, giving her a long look before he released a sigh. “Unrelated to why I asked you here and on my mind since you brought it up, maybe we should talk about Paris.”
"A surprise?" she asked, like surprises were the most unfamiliar things ever. Because, well, they were. There were too many mouths in the Alexander family, and there was never enough fucking money, even after selling off some kids. Surprises? Yeah, so not happening. She set the thumb drive beside the coffee, and she stared at it for a few seconds, like it might disappear when she wasn't looking, and then she looked back at him. "Paris," she repeated, her uncertainty coming through clearly in her words. "Listen, I just want everyone to stay alive in Paris, if we can fucking manage it. I would have made her stay in the hellhole she's at, but she's a stubborn little bitch when she wants to be, and she wants to go home."
Fingers toyed with the spoon he had plucked from its napkin’d embrace, twirling it around in his hands, seemingly ignorant that he was even doing it with the way he carried on the conversation without pause. “Raoul will keep his space from everyone if that is what it takes,” Liam said. “He’s had his warning, and from what I can tell, he truly wants life to get back to normal. Hence his purchase of the Opera House. He won’t impose upon Christine, and he won’t bother Erik should he return to the building. Is he happy about this? No, not entirely, but he’s learned enough as of late that his happiness in this does not matter.” As Liam spoke on the topic, his voice turned slightly towards the tones Raoul used, his Southern accent taking a backseat to the aristocratic lilt Raoul kept. “Christine is safe from him, and he will not keep her from her home.” It was all said very matter of factly, without huge amounts of emotion leaking their way into the words. It was a speech that seemed almost practiced, rehearsed until it was perfect and distant in its neutrality.
Sam didn't believe all that shit for a minute, but she didn't say it. For once, she held her tongue and just let him recite the speech as practiced. At the end of the fucking day, they were who they were - Erik, Raoul and Christine. They would be who they were, and that was that. Erik was still angry, and Raoul was still Raoul, and Christine would forever be stuck between them. Sam had just accepted that shit, and she was pretty sure they'd all be better off if everyone else did the same. "Yeah, right," she told Liam, thanking the waitress as she set the eggs and hash down. It smelled fantastic, better than anything at the Ranch, and so maybe she'd gotten a little spoiled by life at the Aria. She took a forkful, and then she pointed her empty fork at Liam. "They're who they are. That fucking ugly composer asshole wrote them a certain way. They might grow, but they're still who they are."
It wasn’t so much what Raoul or Liam wanted to believe, but it was what they had come to a decision was the best thing to believe. Liam gave a nod to the waitress as he accepted the waffle, busying himself for several moments by buttering up the thing and drenching it in maple syrup. “Christine is doing a remarkable job of not fawning over Raoul, if we’re going to bring that up,” Liam said through a mouthful of waffle. “Who’s to say they can’t change. Maybe this time the story is rewritten and Christine ends up with Erik. Raoul will find someone and he’ll forget about her and manage the opera house, and all will be sane in their little Parisian bubble.” Or something. Even Liam was having a hard time putting much faith into that.
"Oh, please. He cut off their engagement, which disgraced her ass, and now she's living in hookerville. What the fuck is there to fawn over? She didn't want to end it, remember?" she asked, taking another bite of her food with an equal show of pleasure. "And she was always in love with both of them, so that's fucked up from the very beginning. They're dysfunctional, baby." She grinned, and she took a sip of her coffee. "Kind of like us." Even if his version of Paris sounded like some fucking pastoral, she didn't buy it. There was just too much ego and too much love and too much hate for it to go that smoothly. She pointed her fork at the thumb drive. "Going to tell me what's on that?"
“Are we forgetting the part where Raoul had his ass handed to him by Loki?” Liam asked with arched brows, and while he was sympathetic to what Christine had to deal with when it came to the Vicomte, there were other circumstances that had to be taken into thought. “He was scared and he was shutting down. That’s all there was to it. I’m just grateful that he’s not moping around any longer.” Liam took up his napkin and wiped his mouth clean of syrup, washing it back with a drink of juice. “Didn’t realise we were dysfunctional. I thought it was just hatred.” Liam cracked a smile before he turned his attention towards the thumb drive, giving her a shake of his head as he dug back into his waffle. “Surprise. Told you.”
"Loki told Raoul to leave me the fuck alone, not Christine. He doesn't give a shit about Christine. That was all Raoul, baby. He rolled over, and he played dead, and he sent a teenage girl into the fucking streets. Woo. Fucking hero. And every time they've talked, he hasn't even asked where she is, or if she needs anything. Come on. Douche all over," she said, and that scared business didn't hold water with her, no fucking way. His comment about hatred shut her down, though, because it was a strong word, and why the fuck was she sitting here with someone who hated her, anyway? "A hate surprise?" she asked, tipping back what remained of her coffee. "Goodie. Go on, it's your turn to say something scathing in return."
Liam wiped at his lips again before taking leaning back in his seat, rubbing at the bridge of his nose with a long sigh. “Raoul is very all or nothing. There is no medium ground for him, and I thought that was obvious. He felt as though he coerced Christine, yourself, into the marriage, and the entire situation had him unable to tell the difference between the two. He simply didn’t want to cause any more problems.” He dropped his hand to his lap, giving Sam a long look. “It’s not a hate present. It’s just. Something I thought you would like. I put some work into it so...” And now he was feeling stupid for even doing it. “You’ll probably hate it anyways. So don’t get too excited over it.”
"So, why do that if you hate me?" she asked plainly.
He glanced over towards her sharply at that, surprise etching itself over his features before he started to shake his head slowly back and forth. “I don’t hate you, Sam,” Liam said softly, gaze dropping back down to his waffle.
"You brought up hate just a fucking second ago, Liam," she insisted, her voice already starting to escalate, because it was hard being in public, and being in public with him not making any fucking sense? Yeah, not any easier.
“This was a mistake,” Liam said after a moment, leaning to one side and pulling his wallet out of his back pocket, peeling off a couple bills and laying them on the table. “I don’t hate you, Sam. I wouldn’t invite you out if I hated you, and I wouldn’t have spent the last three days working on that if I hated you.” Sliding out of the booth, he looked down towards her, pushing one hand through his hair before he let out a long, dragged out sigh. “I’m sorry for what I said. I was just talking out my ass like I tend to do around you. Don’t ask me why I do it, I just...” He made a helpless gesture with one hand before he dropped it down to his side. “I feel like that kid on the playground throwing rocks at the girls. I’m sorry.”
She wasn't expecting the retreat, the reach for the wallet, any of it, and she just put her fork down and wondered why the fuck this was so difficult. She stood by her theory that fucking would get it out of his system, but she wasn't about to make that offer again and get another lecture on his superior morals. And, anyway, she couldn't climb on a dick these days without drugs and booze. "It's more like pulling fucking pigtails, Liam," she said as he stood. "I'll let you know how I like it," she added, picking up the thumb drive, because she really was trying with this fucker. It just never seemed to work.
Liam looked ready to say something more in response, but instead he kept his silence with a shake of his head before walking off, leaving his waffle half-eaten and his eggs untouched. The thumb drive contained a several hour long audio version of his book for her, recorded over the past days, just because she had asked. He doubted she would enjoy it, but it was something. A token.