Gavin Lucas (viciouscircle) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2020-01-18 22:27:00 |
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Entry tags: | #january 2018, gavin, gavin x roxy, roxy |
Who: Gavin & Roxy (with Miles)
Where: Back Porch Pub
When: Saturday evening, 01/13
Status: Complete
Warning: Yikes
Gavin eyed the clock as he pulled his coat on and fished his pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. Roxy was coming in to take over for the evening and normally he would have waited until she was already there before leaving but it was quiet and Miles was at the bar so it seemed fine to leave. He was sure she was just minutes away and he'd be back to help them close but right now he wanted to go home, get something to eat and hang out with his daughter for a couple of hours. She'd been a little weird lately, tired all the time and with everything that was going on with Jasper it only added to his worries.
He lit up a cigarette as he walked to his truck, snow crunching under his feet and the cold air stinging his nose. There was so much on his mind, he needed to go see Reagan or call Ollie and he'd been dragging his feet on it because both of those things were like nightmare fuel he wanted to avoid. The fact remained that Jasper needed him and Jules Cooper would fret at him more and he really didn't need her to come back to the bar. Gavin was plenty used to people giving him disappointed looks but that didn't mean he needed more of them, damn it. Tomorrow he'd call Ollie, he decided. Failing that, he'd suck it up and go to Belladonna on Monday. It just seemed smarter to go see Reagan at her business rather than try to call on her at home - where her asshole husband was more likely to be hanging around.
His options really sucked and Gavin was kind of down about it all. He was snapped out of his thoughts the second he unlocked the truck by a sudden and intense pain lacing through him. It was right in the center of his chest, so sharp it had him stumble backward. Heart attack! some panicked part of his brain screamed and it stood to reason that his shitty lifestyle would catch up with him. He dropped his cigarette, clutching his chest as he dropped to his knees, the wind knocked out of him. No, not heart attack. A bullet? Fuck. Did someone shoot him? He clawed at his jacket to get it open, groaning in pain but there was no blood, nothing wet and hot under his desperate fingers. "What the fuck," he wheezed, barely aware of the car pulling up next to his truck.
Roxy didn’t love working the night shift, but Miles would be there, so she wasn’t exactly scared, and she never complained. Saturday wouldn’t usually be a slow night, but Roxy hoped the weather would keep people under their own damn roofs for a while. She’d had a good nap in the afternoon before getting ready, grabbing a snack, and kissing Caden goodbye. As she was pulling into the parking lot, she thought she spotted someone duck down behind Gavin’s truck. Frowning, Roxy pulled up beside it, but hesitated a second before she opened the door. She took out the big folding knife she carried in her purse and clicked it open before she got out. If someone was trying to jump her, she was going to make them fucking sorry for it. Roxy cautiously walked around the back of Gavin’s truck, the knife gripped tight in her hand ... then gasped a bit and took a few quick steps forward. “Gav?” she asked urgently, quickly thumbing the knife closed. He was down on the ground and clutching his chest, so heart attack was her first thought too. “Gavin, you okay?”
Gavin felt both relief and annoyance that someone was there to see him crumble. Like with everything else that went wrong in his life he just wanted this to be over so he could brush it off and slink off in precious denial but at the same time... If it didn't stop, having someone there was good, even if he hated the idea of needing help. He shook his head at her question, raising one arm to wave her off as he tried to breathe. No blood and it wasn't his heart giving up, he was sure of that now. It was the old wound in the center of his chest, like that monster was back, digging its slender finger into his flesh. Only this time it was worse than it had been, so much worse, it felt like it vibrated throughout his whole sternum.
He didn’t answer verbally and he was still touching his chest, so Roxy could only assume he was having a damn heart attack in the bar parking lot. Considering the way Gavin smoked and drank and stressed, that shouldn’t have been too surprising, but it was still a shock. “Shit,” she hissed, glancing around them before she crouched down next to Gavin. She fumbled her phone out to start calling 911. “Can you breathe? Pain in your left arm? Nod or shake your head, I’ll get an ambulance ...” As she dialed with cold fingers, all she could think about was Amelia losing her dad and that was just fucking awful.
Gavin groaned when she got her phone out and before she finished dialling he knocked the phone out of her hands. "It's not a fucking heart attack," he got out through gritted teeth and even before he looked up, he knew he there, could feel presence like a bad memory rendered flesh. "It's him," he whispered, looking up and there he was, unmistakably the same man - not man - long and shadowy, that horrible grin somehow worse than Gavin had remembered it. "Run, Roxy. Get inside," Gavin said and that was a small blessing, the not-man wasn't between them and the door, she could get away. Gavin didn't much feel like running, the pain was still intense but now that he knew what it was (even if he might not fully understand it) he started getting to his feet, pulling his gun from its holster under his jacket.
Roxy gasped when Gavin knocked her phone to the ground and opened her mouth to indignantly ask what the hell it was, then realized he was looking at something behind her. One hand came up to brace against Gavin’s truck as she half-turned to look in the same direction, and a thin scream escaped her throat. She didn’t recognize the ‘man,’ since she’d been lucky enough to have never seen him before, but there was no mistaking that whoever or whatever he was was wrong. It was unnatural and threatening, and Roxy’s first instinct was to obey Gavin’s directions and flee. But he was getting up and reaching for something in his jacket and Roxy still wasn’t sure if he was dying or what -- had the man-thing hurt him? Roxy hadn’t even noticed him as she was approaching Gavin -- and fear made her legs feel impossibly heavy once she had straightened up herself. Instead of running she backed up, away from the dark man, until her body was pressed against the side of Gavin’s truck.
Gavin didn't know if guns even worked against something like this but he refused to act like a scared and helpless child again. It had been eighteen years since he last saw the dark man but he had never been able to dismiss it as an hallucination or bad dream, especially not with the scar on his chest telling him it had been real. The memory was too vivid and yet it shook him to the core that Roxy was obviously seeing him too, like it stripped him of whatever chance of denial he might still have. "Get inside," he whispered hoarsely as he planted himself firmly between Roxy and the man as he took aim. The grinning abomination took one step closer and Gavin pulled the trigger without thinking, three shots ringing loud in the dark, loud and jarring.
Roxy had cowered harder against the truck when she caught a glimpse of the gun in Gavin’s hand, then something about his second exhortation to run got her moving. Half-crouched and terrified, Roxy rushed toward the bar, headed for the closest door. The shots made her flinch away and scream again, even though she could barely hear herself. Shoulder pressed against the brick of the building, she turned back to see if he had killed the thing.
The thing did not go down and if anything it just looked amused that Gavin was actively shooting at it. That didn't stop Gavin from continuing to do so. At this point there was nothing logical about his actions, he was running on pure adrenaline and terror. At least the man or whatever the fuck it was wasn't coming closer, it just stood there, hideous grin unflincing as Gavin fumbled for another clip in his pocket. Of course he didn't have one, he didn't exactly leave the house every day expecting to empty the one already in his gun. That fact got him moving again and while he only glanced away from the thing for a second as he stumbled over to where Roxy was screaming - and god he couldn't blame her - the grinning thing was gone by the time he looked up. In its place a car rolling in and a deputy jumping out, shielding himself behind the door. Gavin didn't hear what he was yelling, blood was rushing in his ears and he was about as cognitive as a rabid dog at the moment but he knew to drop the gun and raise his hands, pressing himself against the rough wall behind him. How the hell had the cops gotten here so fast? And why were they never this fucking efficient when they actually needed them?
It seemed like and endless supply of bullets, the hugely loud sounds melting together in Roxy’s ringing ears. She’d fired guns before, of course -- one didn’t spend as many years with the Lucas family as she had without encountering guns -- but that had always been out in the open somewhere. Places that weren’t surrounded by brick to bounce the noise back. Then there were no more shots, just high-pitched ringing, and Gavin was headed toward her. The thing was there one second and gone the next as Roxy blinked. “Ohmygod,” she said but couldn’t hear. The arrival of the police car and the cop inside drew another little shriek of surprise out of her, and her hands shot up into the air. It was just their fucking luck, wasn’t it? Monsters and pigs, one right after another. Her heart was still trying to beat its way out of her ribs with fear. First the dark man and now this. She couldn’t hear what the cop was yelling, and she was a Latina and even in tiny-ass towns racial violence could happen.
Gavin found himself wishing it was sheriff Grady himself standing there with a firearm aimed at him, as much as he hated cops, Grady had done good things for his family and Gavin had a feeling he'd be more inclined to understand. He didn't know this guy and he didn't really look like he was comfortable holding a gun so Gavin was almost sure he was about to get a bullet in him. It didn't help matters any that he could barely get a word out but as the deputy shuffled closer, still yelling directions Gavin barely heard, he seemed to do things right even if the instructions were anything but clear. It wasn't the first time he'd been arrested, it had just been a while, his body seemed to remember what to do even if his brain was just noise at the moment.
"Are you alright, ma'am?" the deputy asked once he had Gavin on the ground, twisting his arms back to cuff him. He seemed wary still, ready to draw his weapon again if she made a wrong move but for now it did look like she was a victim in this and not an accessory.
Roxy was still keeping her hands up in front of her, gnawing her bottom lip and rocking from foot to foot as she watched the deputy cuff Gavin. It was a terrible sight, but at least there hadn’t been a shootout or some shit. Caden was going to be so unhappy about this. And the kids, fuck. “It was self-defense!” she blurted once the cop spoke to her, her voice high and a little unsteady. “There was a man out here, fuckin’ threatening him! I’m fine, he wasn’t aiming at me, I know him, okay? He’s my brother in law, please don’t do this!” Roxy knew that her pleas and side of things probably wouldn’t matter at all, Gavin had been shooting a gun off in a populated area of town, and there was no way they could even prove there was a man in the first fucking place.
The absolutely worst part about this for Gavin was being cuffed. The pain in his chest had dulled to almost nothing but his long since injured arm hurt when the deputy twisted it back and the thought of being helpless in case that thing came back was soul crushing. He didn't resist despite all of this, feeling a little numb as he listened to Roxy plead with the cop and feeling weirdly irked by it. She wasn't his sister in law yet, she and Caden weren't married. What a dumb thing to be irked about, even Gavin realized it but there it was anyway. He clambered to his feet when the deputy pulled him up to do so, grunting something in Roxy's direction about it being okay. Did he want her to call someone? Fuck. No. He'd ask for the sheriff, see if Grady believed him.
"I need to take him in, ma'am," the deputy was telling Roxy, waving her back. "Unlawful discharge of a weapon." He didn't even bother to point out there was nobody there to shoot. "We'll sort it out at the station, I'll take your statement in a minute but right now I need you to stay back, alright, ma'am?"
The only bright side that Roxy could see was that the cop wasn’t trying to arrest her too, and she finally put her hands down. She stayed back, as instructed, gnawing on her bottom lip while she watched the cop stuff Gavin into the back of his cruiser. It took him a minute to get to her while he picked up and bagged the gun and the empty shells. Roxy’s gaze kept roaming around looking for that tall scary asshole, but there was nothing to see except the street and some curious onlookers who had wandered out of the bar. Roxy talked to the cop when he was ready, trying to explain that there had been a threatening man Gavin was shooting at. She left out the part about the ‘man’ looking like a fucking carnival barker from Hell, and how she suspected it hadn’t been a man at all. He didn’t need to know that part, and he probably wouldn’t believe her even if she tried to tell him.
Gavin felt like a damn sitting duck in the car while he waited for the cop to do his job. Fucking cops. If he was gonna get killed just because he was cuffed in a police car he swore he'd become a fucking angry ghost and haunt the damn police station. There wasn't much comfort in that vow of revenge, he was still scared, staring out the window with a sense of dread. Something told him the thing was gone, his chest no longer hurt and it felt like it was over, but Gavin was well used to being low-key scared all the time and now he had a good reason.
The deputy wasn't too keen on Roxy's story though he didn't outright say it, he hadn't seen anyone running away, he hadn't found any clear evidence of anyone else being there but there were a lot of footprints in the snow so it was hard to be sure. "He'll probably just get a fine," he told her reassuringly as he tapped his pen against his notebook. "Nobody got hurt and if nobody files a complaint I don't really see a reason to make a big deal out of it." He pocketed his notebook and turned to head to the car. "You have a nice day now, ma'am."
Roxy was pretty fucking sure it wasn’t going to be a good day. Night, whatever. Gavin wasn’t looking at her in the back seat, and his face looked just as stony as it ever did. This wasn’t his first time in handcuffs, of course, Roxy remembered Caden getting that call more than once. But she’d never been right there as the only witness before. It sucked. She watched the police cruiser drive away and turned to stalk to the back door of the bar, cursing under her breath the entire way. “What are you gawking at?” Roxy curtly asked the loose clump of people who had come around the side of the building to see what was going on. She waved her way through them and walked inside. She didn’t know who Gavin would ring up for his only phone call, but she definitely had to call Caden.
Miles was behind the bar and aside from giving her a deer-in-the-headlights look when she first entered, he left her alone at first and served up a couple of drinks before sidling closer to her in a casual manner. Anyone who had worked for the Lucas brothers as long as they had was kind of used to shit going down but still. "Did anyone die?" he asked her quietly, making a show of grabbing a bottle from behind where she was standing. "He's coming back, right?" Yeah, Miles had seen his share of Lucas brother rage, but he was pretty sure he'd never heard shots fired.
While Miles served a couple of drinks, Roxy tied her apron around her waist. The owner of the establishment might have just been arrested, but that didn’t mean business was shutting down. It was Saturday night, after all. Miles approached her as she was getting a towel to tuck into her pocket and her order notebook, and Roxy shot him a flustered look. “No, there wasn’t -- nobody got hurt,” she said, turning her back to the patrons sitting at the bar and keeping his voice low too. “They arrested him, that cop just showed up like two seconds later, so I don’t know, probably not tonight. ... I’m gonna run to the back and call Caden, okay?”
Caden was not going to be happy and they both knew it. Miles shot her a look that said as much but he was smart enough not to comment on it. "No sweat," he said instead and opened the bottle. Years of working there had taught him not to ask too many questions and despite the craziness he did like this job. It just... yes. Got a little crazy sometimes. He wasn't used to the Lucas brothers using the parking lot as a shooting range though - that bit was new. "Could check if Jocelyn can come in for the night too," he suggested. "I'm sure she could use the money."
“Yeah, call her,” Roxy agreed, already turning away. When there wasn’t a brother present at the Porch, she kind of turned into the de facto boss, and tonight felt like one of those nights. “And if you can’t get a hold of her, try Aaron.” Roxy paused and turned back, reaching out to lightly touch Miles’s arm. “Imagine I said ‘please’ somewhere in there ... and thanks.” She gave him a weak smile, then hesitated again, her grip tightening on his forearm. “And don’t go outside, okay? Not for a while. There was ... it wasn’t a person Gavin was aiming at, I’ll just say that.” Miles was friendly enough to all of them, but they’d never had any in-depth conversations about what they believed about the truth of reality. Roxy knew some things she wasn’t sure if Miles knew. But that thing had been ominous as fuck and had felt dangerous, and she didn’t want him to get hurt.
"Oh, okay," Miles replied, eyes going wide as saucers. Whether it was surprising that there was something supernatural or that she believed there was wasn't clear but he was taking the warning to heart either way. "It's fucking cold, I'm staying put," he reassured her. "Dare I ask?" He added and winced. "Do I want to ask? Probably not. Judging by your expression it was something not good." His wincing had turned to scowling as he considered his options.
Roxy wasn’t sure how to read Miles’s face journey, but she didn’t have a lot of time at the moment to try and figure it out. She had to call Caden, every minute that passed would be another degree of anger with her for not calling him the instant Gavin got arrested. Maybe. Or maybe he wouldn’t give two fucks, sometimes it was impossible to tell. Stupid crazy-ass family, fuck. “It was not good,” she confirmed to Miles, releasing him. “But neither is Gavin getting cuffed, so let me call Caden. I’ll be out in a few minutes.” Roxy shot him another tiny grateful smile for being so understanding, then hurried off to duck into the back to make the call. It was going to be a long fucking night.