It's Brittany, Bitch | Ερις (eristic) wrote in paxletalelogs, @ 2017-08-27 18:18:00 |
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Entry tags: | ares, eris |
the world moves on, another day, another drama, drama
Who: BB & Daniel.
What: BB stops by Daniel's to coerce...ah, convince him to definitely go with her to CASKET, using some liquid persuasion, and gets more than she bargained for.
Where: #209.
When: Aug. 15, evening.
Still dressed in workout clothes, BB all but quietly closed the door to her apartment and bounced the few feet over to Daniel's. From one hand hung a bottle of Jameson, the other her phone and keys; wrapping her hands around the latter articles, she banged as well as she could on Daniel's door.
"DANNY," she called out in a singsong manner, punctuating the name with more raps. "Danny boy, open uppppp, you've got until the count of five before I open this door myself..." The same hand holding too much moved to attempt to rattle the doorknob for effect. Considering the relative silence of the past few weeks, she had a good idea that he'd been taking his nighttime romps with his still unnamed boyfriend to another floor, which gave her the idea that, if he was home (and she could see lights on), he was clad in pants. Hopefully.
"One....two....three..."
The door swung open to reveal her neighbor, fully clad and subtly sweating. He had only just returned from a work-related jaunt, a long overdue meeting with a client who was finding his transition from prisoner to civilian to be particularly difficult. Daniel was stressed, and it showed in the slight furrow in his brow, the small downward curve at the corners of his mouth. Slowly he finished what he had been doing moments ago: tightly rolling up his shirtsleeves, cuffing them just below his elbow.
"Hey." He stepped away from the door, leaving it hanging wide for her to enter. He padded barefoot into the kitchen. "C'mon in. Are we doin' shots or drinkin' like civilized folks?"
BB groaned as she walked in, kicking the door shut behind her. She at least set the whiskey on the table in his kitchen before her effusive movements might have put it in danger.
"God, you're in a mood. My gift to you, you can pick if that'll make you happy." She grabbed one of the chairs shoved neatly beneath the table and spun it about, sitting on it backward with her arms folded on the top of the back rest. Her chin came to settle on top of that as she watched him, her dark eyes studying his form. "What happen? Boyfriend dump you?" It was an extreme suggestion, but there was some thought that such a thing might calm him if there were worse things that might have descended from on high to mess with his day.
He scoffed, rolling his eyes as he returned to her, a shot glass in each hand. "No." He punctuated this by setting both glasses down with a sharp little click. "We're doin' just fine, as I kinda mentioned on the forum. Not that you wanted to hear..." He hooked one foot in the rungs of the nearest chair and pulled it out toward him. As he sat, he gestured for her to pour.
"It's just work. Got a client not handlin' stuff too well, and a lot of 'em on edge lately. Tough to keep everybody calm in this kinda climate."
BB rolled her eyes once more, grabbing the whiskey and uncapping it to pour them both a finger's worth of the liquor.
"Well, you can thank me later for getting you laid. But, shit, yeah, that's a lot to handle, with all the crap going on. At least, like, nothing crazy is happening, right? You're not getting maced in the face?" She put the open bottle down gently on the tabletop, turning to wrap her hand around her own shot glass and lifting it into the air, holding it out for a toast with Daniel's. "Salud?"
"Ganbei," he answered, and clicked his glass to hers. He downed the shot in a single go, wincing afterward. He set the glass down with a sharp snap and waited for another pour. "No mace yet, but if this shit keeps up you can expect it. You gonna bail me out if shit hits the fan? Not sure I could count on my boyfriend to make such a public display of affection. Though he's surprised me lately—thanks, again, by the way—so I guess I can't say that for sure..."
BB tossed back the shot, grimacing both from the nasty taste of the alcohol and from the barest hint of raw details that, for once, she did not want. Her hand moved to make quick work of refilling their glasses.
"Maybe, if there's something in it for me," she replied to his earlier question, stepping around the thought of any public affectionate gestures. "At least like break someone's nose this time, or, hell, maybe curbstomp a Nazi? Well, I don't think I have that much, not enough to get you bailed out from murder charges. But, anyway, that's not the reason why I came over." She picked up her shot glass and moved to tap it against his again, liking the ritual. "I'm here to talk CASKET. If you think your boyfriend could help there, you're welcome to bring him along. Just keep it in your pants the entire time."
"Or under my skirt?" he teased. He tossed his second shot back, immediately reaching for the bottle to pour a third for each of them as BB finished hers. "He won't come with us, I can promise you that. But yeah, whatever. I'll go. Do you actually have a plan this time? I dunno why you expect him to give up more information than he already has, unless you've got some new carrot or stick. Or both."
"I know this will come as a shock," BB replied, pulling her refilled glass toward herself, the brown liquor inside wobbling with her movement. "But I do. The person I hired to hack the network came through for me; and, shit, did she find some whoppers." She tossed back the glass, gritting her teeth as she brought the instrument back down to the table top. Her hands spread wide, pressing palms to the table top.
"OK, so, like, for one, there was this brother and sister pair who lived here and, guess? Wait, no, I wanna say... They had stalkers. Sound pretty fucking familiar for a couple of people living here?" BB canted her head in Daniel's direction, looking pleased with herself. He nodded agreement just before putting back another shot. "Like, I don't know if you read the news or not, but there's been some pretty weird shit. That one chick's place getting burned to the ground, and the only suspect being her ex, which, I will say, has been seen around her apartment complex. And then the dude who offed himself in Rafe's apartment. I mean, is this place just a magnet for weirdos or what?"
She rubbed her hands on the table, seemingly pausing for breath.
"Yeah, it—"
"But wait, there's more. The woman who was murdered the night of the Halloween party? The party fucking held at CASKET? Man, you should see some of the messages about her; her sister lived here, too, and just... it's some really weird shit. Those people were at CASKET all the time, so I don't believe for a second that that guy doesn't know anything." She shook her head as she spoke, her whole body imitating her words.
Daniel ceased his chewing at his lower lip, pouring each of them another shot. He lingered over his for a moment, staring into its depths as though he might read some omen in that dark pool. He swallowed hard, did the shot, and blinked to open his heavy eyes. "Okay. You've got a pretty strong case this time around, I'll give you that. He's obviously worth talkin' to. What do you mean, weird shit, though? Did she have a stalker, too, or did they say anything on the forum that might give you an idea who killed her? Like… could it have been someone from the club, or you don't think it's that connected?"
"No, no, no, no," BB replied, waving her hands as she shook her head. "No, like, she got...weird. I guess she had a whole personality change since moving in here. Or, like...after moving in here, after living a couple of months or something. Like... not like she was doing drugs or something, but just acting different." That sort of thing could easily point to a mental issue, supporting the idea that the woman had indeed killed herself, but BB was reading it in another way. "It kinda matches... in some ways it kinda matches how, like, the dreams, the stuff happening here to us. And the fact that we're dreaming about gods and shit. It's like..."
Here she fell uncharacteristically quiet, pausing for a much longer moment as she carefully pulled her shot toward herself but did not drink it, instead leaving it on the table with her gaze carefully trained on it. Daniel, in the meantime, took another much-needed drink, and found himself wishing he had opted for larger glasses.
"Doesn't it kinda feel like, sometimes, there's someone else inside your head? Inside your skin?" She glanced sidelong at Daniel, her face guarded from whatever his reaction might be.
He did not hesitate. Nodding, he curled his hand around the shot glass and forced himself to wait for another drink. "Yeah it does. Dreams are the worst, strongest, whatever, but that's not all of it. The floor changes, the shit we found in that room downstairs, even some of the… animals who've showed up here… it felt familiar. Like some part of me really dug it, recognized it, whatever. Meanwhile I'm in here tryin' to keep my apartment in one piece and not lose my whole security deposit."
Daniel rubbed idly at his nape. He did not like where her suggestions led. He liked even less where they appeared to have led in the past. This dead girl was becoming a problem Daniel was uncertain he wanted to wrestle with, and yet he saw no other option.
"I dunno, BB. You… you think this shit could happen to us, too?"
She made no immediate reply, instead carefully studying his face for a long moment. Then, finally and a little unsatisfactorily, she shrugged. "I'd really like for it not to. My brother lives here, my best friend lives here. And, I mean, I like you too," she added with a slight smirk, waving her hand condescendingly in his direction. He chuckled in reply. "So I really don't want anyone to get hurt, not more so than they already have. And this, this chick who died, there's just... There's something there, and the only lead I can find is this dude at this club, and the more I poke around there, the more it just stinks." BB lifted her glass, tossing the liquor back in one throw. She made a faint hiss, and then gently slammed the container back onto the table.
"I know I'm one to make a mountain out of a molehill, but I seriously feel like there's something here this time, Daniel. Seriously." She shrugged again, fingers around her glass making it tip to one edge of its flat bottom. "So what's up? Are you gonna come poke the bear with me or not?"
"I'd rather poke somethin' else," he said, laughing drunkenly; BB sneered slightly, rolling her eyes, but she did her best to keep said reaction at least partially under wraps. "But there's time for that when we get back, I guess, if he's not too busy and we don't get arrested for trespassin' or harassment or somethin'…" Daniel poured her another shot glass full to match his own. He raised the glass to hers, waiting for a toast. "To you, nosy Nellie. Let's go bother an upstanding businessman."
BB grinned wide, the expression less of a smile and more of an open wound, as she tapped her glass against Daniel's.
"Good," she replied, bringing the brown liquid to her mouth. She paused just before, the liquor shivering from her breath. "'Cause none of this stuff is half as fun by yourself."