ℓιηα ιηνєяѕє (dragonspooker) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2014-07-24 12:00:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, lina inverse, neal cassidy (baelfire) |
WHO: Neal Cassidy and Lina Inverse
WHAT: Old friends meeting up. And cookies.
WHEN: 7/23/14
WHERE: Baxter’s
RATING/WARNINGS: Language, but that's it.
STATUS: Complete when posted
Lina just had to finally submit to the fact that everyone she knew once upon a time, was eventually going to pass through and show their face in Orange County. Ever since she’d arrived it had been the case, and most of the time the reunions were actually pretty pleasant.
Most of the time.
Neal was one of those pleasant ones, on the bright side.
She got herself a plate of cookies - warm, fresh, and still gooey on the inside - as well as an iced frappuccino of sorts, generously covered in whipped cream, while she waited. She was hungry, damnit, and some of the cookies were for him, too. If he got here in time.
Which if he didn’t, more for her.
Oh man. Lina.
How long had it been? Seemed like forever. Years though. They passed too quickly.
Neal remembered Chicago. It wasn't so much the windy city as it was really fucking frigid, at least when he'd been there. The neighborhood was rough, halfway houses and crackheads the main staples, a place where the main piece of advice should have been 'watch your back and your front.' Affluent digs were a stone's throw away, but it was like looking behind plate glass - you'd never really touch it, would you? Instead he spent a lot of time in Little Vietnam, which sufficiently fueled his addiction not to meth like so many others before him but to pho and bubble tea instead. Cheap grocery stores and bakeries, he'd take those.
Neither of them had stayed a terribly long time. She was having issues with bounty hunters, and he was mostly just attempting to stay afloat. But there was a camaraderie though, once he got past the jaded exterior. He hoped she was doing well. Pretty crazy to find her in Orange County now, of all places.
After ordering a black coffee and spotting her lava-hair at the table, he headed over and took a seat, mouth tipping up in a crooked smile. "Shit. Thought you'd never see me again, huh?"
She’d been sticking her fingers in the cookies, testing the temperature and trying to find the softest one of them all, when Neal plopped down. At first she jolted, but then the widest grin ever spread across her face when she recognized the person across from her.
Ah. Chicago.
“Shit’s right, Cassidy,” she greeted, and then decided to be nice and push the plate of cookies in his direction. She was sharing. That was a good thing. “Long time no see, buddy! Last I remember, we were running and getting shot at.”
Aside from her head having a price on it, Chicago had been pretty fun, all things considered. It happened not long after Lina said goodbyes to Shabranigdo by blowing up one of his offices and it’d been at the height of his rampage after her. Those early days were awfully dangerous, and Lina’s only friend had been the bottles that had gotten her drunk enough to pass out.
Neal began as a stranger she was wary of. And then an actual friend. It was kind of a shame they had to split ways, though.
“Right, the good old days,” he chuckled throatily, a spray of gravel. That perpetual smoke-coated throat, but Neal had given up the vice awhile ago, when he didn’t need them to stave off hunger or keep him warm. Mostly. Sometimes he just needed one though - a pack lasted him awhile.
One of the cookies was taken with a thanks and they were still warm. Nice and gooey. “Damn, those are good,” was the assessment after he swallowed. Now he’d be back at this place whenever possible. “You seem like you’ve come a long way since we were getting shot at. Lots of major developments since then, I take it?”
“Got my record cleared, so the feds aren’t after me,” Lina said, rather proudly at that. “Doesn’t stop the people I pissed off still, but, it’s progress. I’ve got no plans to budge from this place, so we’ll see how that goes.” Moving around was easy when you didn’t have any friends to leave. It was a different story now.
She paused, giving him a look over, and cocked her head to the side. “A legit Vegas job, huh? When’d leave the dark side?”
Not having the feds after you deserved some celebration. “Hey, congrats,” Neal would have high-fived her if he wasn’t sucking a bit of extra chocolate off the side of his thumb. “I owe you a drink for that, some other time.” As for him, he should have started a collection of ‘wanted’ posters. Maybe even wallpapered whatever crappy apartment he had at the time with them.
“A few years ago,” he answered Lina’s question. Now that the coffee was cool enough to sip without burning his tongue, he picked up the mug to make a first assessment. Drink enough of the stuff and you could become a professional when it came to how you liked your road tar. “I met someone, didn’t want to impress her by being a deadbeat, basically.” Though picking locks and hot wiring cars as easy as you breathed was pretty impressive, wasn’t it? Moving on. “So I cleaned myself up and got my GED, started getting real jobs - random ones, but they paid alright so I became a working man.”
It was still kind of strange to wrap his head around, but Neal would never be one for 9-5 jobs, sitting at a desk all day and becoming an office vegetable. Then, of course, this is where the explosions happened because when you were Neal Cassidy, all good things came to a swift and abrupt end.
“Anyway, caught her in bed with some other guy. Turned out she’d been fucking him the whole time we were engaged. That’s when I decided to just say to hell with it, and move out here.”
Awww was what Lina first thought at the beginning of the story. That was actually pretty sweet. Meeting a girl, ditching the bad stuff for her, becoming a normal working human being.
Up until she got to the whole ‘bitch cheated’ part, and that’s when that sweet little look she had was interrupted by a wince.
“Christ, Neal.” What the hell do you say to that? Lina didn’t know. Words weren’t her thing, so she was kind of stumped. She couldn’t help but feel angry for him though. Doing all that, just to get fucked over? She mixed some of the whip cream into the coffee since there wasn’t much of it anymore and took a quick sip. “Well, leaving was probably the best thing to do. Fresh start. Plus there’s me, and I’m adorable, so you’ll have a friend around.”
A little joke to lighten up the mood.
Well, with that kind of logic, how could he argue? Neal just laughed though, a shake of his head. Mostly finding his own terrible luck and misfortune to be a real riot. If you couldn’t laugh about it, what would you do? He’d probably be dead in a ditch by now. Had to keep moving, there was no other choice in the matter.
“You are pretty adorable,” he agreed. In that cat scratch fever, flinging hot coffee in your face, lightning strikes of a temper sort of way. “So being here doesn’t suck completely. Once I find gainful employment I’ll be set. Though I’m curious about the more ominous aspects. You sure you don’t want to share about what I just got myself into?”
He’d even give her Puppy Eyes™ if he had to, because those things were effective weapons by now, on Neal. Big, dark eyes and the sweet, scruffy face with cactus bristle crawling up his throat, who could resist?
Oh, the ominous aspects. Lina’s chuckle came out rather nervous and she scratched her cheek, attempting to even come up with the explanation on how fucked up everything could get around here.
“You might see for yourself, eventually,” she said, although she knew that answer wouldn’t suffice. She thought again and bit her lip. “It’s hard to explain. Well, no, I take that back - easy to explain, hard to believe. Have you scrolled around in that network? Just...read some of the stuff people have said yet?”
When Neal moved into his apartment, info about the Valar network had been given to him - or just ended up mixed in with the rest of the pamphlets and fliers and takeout menus for restaurants in the area - so he hadn’t thought much of it, and needed to register for a local sort of message board anyway, right? All he assumed was that it would help him make connections and meet new people. But scrolling through it? Yeah, that had been...interesting. Most of it was too confusing for him, and he only skimmed. Wanting to get to messages from anyone hiring, or similar things.
“People talk about their dreams a lot,” he said, unsure if that’s what Lina meant. He shrugged, sipping his coffee. “I just thought it was random chatter.” Yet a common theme, maybe? Who knew why.
Lina’s eyes darted around the shop awkwardly and spent a good ten seconds, just sipping the rest of her frappuccino, until there was nothing but meshed ice left at the bottom. Explaining it would make her seem like a crazy person. Like, a legit crazy person. There were excuses that would go around - it was all drugs, or there was something in the water - but everyone who had said that eventually took it back once it started happening to them.
“Yeah. Dreams. Weird ones. That’s a thing.” A big thing. “I think everyone has them. Some ignore them, some get wrapped into it too much.” Others reap the benefits, like me. “Dreams about another life. And they start to seem...very real.”
Well, okay.
Neal wasn’t exactly sure what to make of all of that. He didn’t think she was insane; obviously she was telling the truth but it wasn’t exactly an easy situation to wrap one’s mind around. “Mass dreaming?” he said, running a hand over his mouth. Hm. Most obvious ‘explanation’ was sure, something pumped into the air or water. Or mass brainwashing via means of radio frequencies or something - subliminal messages. Scandal in the OC.
“That’s interesting.”
He wouldn’t immediately dispute the idea, or tear it apart. It would settle instead. Percolate. Like this coffee. “What are your dreams about, Linabean?”
Oh, this was going to sound more ridiculous, but she did have the evidence to back it up. On the bright side. Nothing she wanted to show in such a public setting like this, though.
He didn’t look at her like she’d grown two heads. Maybe he was keeping up a calm front and secretly thinking she was absolutely batshit insane. Possible, she thought, since she’d probably do the same and then awkwardly excuse herself to leave.
Lina cleared her throat and fiddled her thumbs. “Like they say in Cards Against Humanity, I’m a motherfuckin’ sorcerer?”
If Neal could remember how much, in a past life, he feared and loathed magic and would only use it when absolutely necessary because it came with a price, always - how living with his father, who had been addicted to the dark arts, was literally like living with a drug addict - then he might be a bit more wary of the idea of a friend practicing motherfucking sorcery. But he had no idea. Nothing really nigged at him now, other than the standard confusion that one might feel trickle into their brain in a situation like this.
“In your dreams, you’re a sorceress? Sorcerer?” A wry chuckle. “I guess there are worse things to be.”
As for him, maybe he’d just leave the theatrics for other people. Neal couldn’t imagine that he’d be anything special in dreams either. Certainly not anyone who would be the inspiration for a three-hundred year search by the father who abandoned him, thus the reason the Dark Curse was made, only to go on and father the child with the Heart of the Truest Believer, or some bullshit like that.
“I’ll keep you updated though,” he offered. “...man, moving here is already more than I bargained for.”
“There are definitely worse things I could be. I could be some sort of evil monster.” Lina shrugged. Neal didn’t seem to be running towards the hills though, and he seemed to be taking it...fairly well. All things considered. “Sorry to just, uh, dump that on you. I promise I’m not crazy and I’m not doing any drugs, ‘kay? Because those were my first theories and I ended up taking them back fast after my first two weeks here.”
Her dreams weren’t so terrible. Sometimes they could be scary - a fifteen year old taking down demon lords and almost destroying the world - but a lot of the times, they were surprisingly entertaining. If her dreams were a TV show, it’d be mostly comedic. Mostly.
Others aren’t so lucky.
“Aside from the weird talk,” she said, changing the subject with a chipper smile. “You’re in Santa Ana. I’M in Santa Ana. You’re stuck hanging out with me for awhile. My friend Rogue and I just moved in together, so there’s a house party that’s obviously in the works. She doesn’t know about it yet though.”
Neal waved off the crazy talk. Or the insistence that Lina wasn’t crazy - he knew she wasn’t. “It’s fine, I asked for it, right?” He offered one of his crooked smiles, easygoing and languid. “Just gotta...look into all this more. Or something.” It definitely wasn’t a tidbit of information one brushed under the rug, or at least he wouldn’t plan to. But that network suddenly just came a whole lot more bizarre.
But mention of a house party peaked his interest in a new way. “Her name is Rogue? Or is that a nickname?” he asked, but as for whether or not he’d go, the answer was a rousing yes. “I’ll be there. Have to celebrate your housewarming properly. I might even bring my infamous Gates of Hell chili.” It was a good way to blissfully wreck your tastebuds - or cleanse your sinuses, along with the rest of your body, either one.
Hanging out with Lina wasn’t something he’d complain about at all. Just as long as she didn’t turn him into a toad with her newfound sorcery!
“It’s a nickname. She doesn’t like to use her real one,” Lina clarified, waving a hand dismissively. She grew up knowing her as Anna Marie, so the transition was still rocky. Her real name would sometimes slip but that was usually when they were alone. “She’s another pea in our pod of questionable history. And yes, bring all the chili! I’m not going to complain about anyone bringing food.”
Lina was practically beaming right now. Seeing a familiar face that she actually had good history with had brightened her day completely.
“Although give me some time to set an actual date. And to tell her. Because I’ve just made this decision of a house warming party and she’ll go all grouch if people suddenly started to show up.”
Hey, anyone who was an honorary member of the pod of questionable history was alright in Neal’s book. “Sounds good.” Another cookie - even though they had cooled considerably, they were still fucking delicious - was taken and broken in half. He’d save the rest for Lina. “Mum’s the word until you ask her...or spring the news on her, whichever.”
Making sure he didn’t have leftover chocolate in his teeth, a swipe of his tongue across the pearly choppers, he grinned over the redhead. “I still can’t believe you’re here. If you need anything, just let me know, okay?” A pen was procured from his pocket, along with the paper he’d written the directions to Baxter’s on, in his manly chicken scratch, and he ripped off a piece from the edge. “Here’s my cell phone number, obviously it’s changed from a billion years ago,” and it was slid across the table to her. When one was a criminal, it was all about the cheap phones with barely any texting plans - ones you could ditch easily, weren’t traced, and used for shady purposes only.
“Score. Now I can harass you with pictures of cats I don’t own!” Lina whipped out hers - which was an upgrade from those old shitty ancient things that were disposable - and punched his number in quick from there. “And you know that courtesy is extended to you too, you know.”
Anyone who could help her from a tight pinch and then drink with her afterwards was someone she could instantly bond with. Besides, part of her still like she owed him after that entire Chicago fiasco. Most of those bullets were meant for her, anyway.