Marc Russo (bluelined) wrote in remains_rpg, @ 2017-05-09 07:42:00 |
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"So this is the place, huh?" They'd been talking on and off ever since Marc had gotten out of jail -- and fuck, but he never actually thought he'd be able to say that about himself -- but seeing Torrie's business for himself was something else entirely. He hadn't known what to expect, even though he'd had the place described to him more than once, and he couldn't deny the pang of jealousy he felt seeing her in her element. It was a good look on her, too. Different than most of the memories he had of her, but good all the same. He kept his hands in his pockets and himself at a distance despite the inadvertent closeness they'd had two months ago; that was just a blip, no doubt, and he was here to support her as a friend now that he could do so. His life may have been a hot fucking mess, but hers wasn't. “This is the place,” Torrie confirmed with a sweep of her arm. “I have the building payments to prove it.” And hopefully she would be able to cover them in the long term, otherwise Nocturne would end up a pretty big failure. The phone calls and messages that had been exchanged back and forth had done their share to douse her anger, but it still wasn’t like it was easy to reconcile for her. Russo had always seemed smarter than dumb shit that even the Dogs wouldn’t have pulled. But, it felt hypocritical for her to hold it against him forever. Her own recent brushes with sins from her past had opened her eyes to that. “You could have helped KC move that piano in, if you hadn’t been locked up.” She smirked at him. "Want me to haul it back out and back in again?" He did his best to mirror her facial expression, though his amusement didn't quite reach his eyes. Small consolation was that he was feeling a little less like a sucker for taking that plea deal, though. Even a small reminder of shit he'd missed made that clear enough. “No,” Torrie replied, losing some of her smirk. "Suit yourself." He shrugged, unbothered by the rejection of a lackluster offer. "When's the first show here?" “It already happened. It wasn’t huge. Just a twentysomething jazz singer.” That had been fucking amazing, despite her lack of experience, and Torrie had patted herself on the back pretty good for finding that gem. “I have her on the schedule again for next month.” She wasn’t open every night, she didn’t have enough talent to sustain those kind of hours yet. "I'll have to see if I can get over here when she's back." Another thing he'd missed when he'd been locked up. "Must've been good if you booked her twice." A pause, then: "You thinking of performing any time soon?" Chewing her lip, she shrugged before she added, “I haven’t put myself on any schedules, not yet.” The last time she’d really played for anyone with any seriousness had been Clover in that penthouse apartment. Lita has probably heard her through the house, but she hadn’t sat her roommate or anyone else down to watch her play. “Why?” Torrie hadn’t played for Marc or any of the Ghouls, although she’d always had her guitar in a corner of her subway car. "'Wanna know when to go out here and protest," he said dryly. Leave it to Torrie to overlook the obvious, or skirt around it. "Or come see your gig." Marc shrugged again, studying her carefully. "Whatever you want." Oh. She was an idiot. “You would have to sit close to the stage,” she told him, pulling a laugh out of him. “Think you could live with that?” It was weird that she didn’t even know what kind of music Marc liked. Before the outbreak it was one of the first things she’d ask people, but music had become an afterthought for a long time. “And you’re not allowed to heckle. That’s just fucking rude.” Gratefully they hadn’t had any of that happening at Nocturne so far. She had had someone ask for a death metal band, but she had been able to sidestep that with the excuse that she hadn’t found one yet. "You better not suck, then." Marc looked around the place once more, trying to imagine it full of people here to listen to whatever act Torrie had booked, or maybe picturing her performing herself, then let his gaze fall back on her once more. "But yeah." Curious, he moved a little closer to her, just to see what kind of reaction it'd provoke. "I can work with these conditions, Reed, even if it is an hell of a lot to ask." Torrie didn’t think that she was nervous about the idea of performing again, but the more that they talked about it, the more it became a reality, and the butterflies started to wake up. “It’s not that much,” she argued. “Come listen to music, keep your mouth shut through a short set, and be a fucking supportive friend. That’s it.” She stepped forward, like she couldn’t help challenging him a little. “For what it’s worth, I think you could manage.” Some of the edge bled out of her tone. “God, I don’t even know why, but I’d want you there. For support, or what the fuck ever.” "Come on, Reed." Marc poked her on the shoulder, a grin settling on his face. "First you don't pick up on me wanting to see your gig, and then you think I actually don't want to go. Can't even catch a joke, you're too busy thinking I wouldn't show up or know how to behave." His smile turned a little more fond. "For fuck's sake, whenever you decide to do it, I'll be there." Torrie’s shoulders relaxed, like the invisible string that had been holding her posture had been severed. She was frustrated with herself for a fraction of a second, because she was all over the board. “Okay.” She punched his shoulder lightly in return, and he rocked back on the balls of his feet as though the blow had knocked him back. “You know, it’s all your fucking fault, right. Those damn flowers mixed everything up, jackass.” It wasn’t, not really. Torrie had been as much a part of what had happened as Marc. She hadn’t thought it would confuse things as much as it had. “I used to know how to read a situation, and now I don’t know what to think.” But she wasn’t angry about it, it was just new. A little weird too. "I don't really know what to think half the time, either," he admitted. "With this, or with… anything." Unlike Torrie, though, he'd been aware of his lack of a mental anchor for too long. How could he not when his life was such a mess? He was in deep shit legally, despite his release, zombie hunting could prove to be the literal end of him, and his romantic life was more complicated than he'd ever thought it could be. Things with Rebecca still felt unfinished, but he was beginning to realize that maybe he'd been holding onto things with her for the wrong reasons. Torrie, though, that was another thing entirely. And maybe if Marc tried to figure things out between the two of them, it would at least be one thing he had going for him that wasn't a shitshow. "Maybe we should, you know." Once upon a time he'd been good at this kind of thing. "Go out sometime. Figure out what it is on purpose, instead of trying to figure it out here and there." Marc raised his eyebrows slightly. "I hear Dick's is pretty good." She gave him a thin-lipped look. There was some indefinable feeling in her gut. Nerves? Anticipation? Hell, she didn’t know. “Yeah,” she replied slowly. “Okay.” What was there to lose? Knowing would feel better than living in this weird loop where she didn’t know what to the hell to think. “But if you make even one damned dick joke, I’m done, Russo,” she warned, half-heartedly at best, her mouth widening into a more relaxed smirk. “Unless it’s actually funny.” Torrie didn’t know if it was a bad idea, but at least it might be closure for whatever was started Valentine’s Day, and she could move on. "I will try to prepare only the best dick jokes for you," Marc said as solemnly as he could get it. He couldn't help the way he was starting to smirk back at her, too, though, especially as the realization that he hadn't entirely fucked this up started to settle. He tilted his head slightly, studying her for a moment, before he allowed himself to really smile. "Just let me know when's good." “Do you want me to check my calendar right now?” she teased flatly, the effect ruined a little by the smirk that had morphed into a smile and wouldn’t go away. What was her life that something as simple as pizza with Marc made her smile. Maybe it was just the relief at figuring out what exactly was going on with them. “It’s back in my office,” she added, like that would get the point across that she wasn’t serious, in case her traitorous face wouldn’t. “I’ll text you a day and time.” "Okay." Marc shrugged in an obvious, failed attempt to seem less excited about this than he truly was. "It's a date, then." |