It wasn't difficult to recognize when someone didn't know what they wanted. The bartender gave her a look and slid a menu with a martini glass on the cover. Beauty took it gratefully and opened the laminated pages. Everything seemed strange and exotic.
"Is this one any good?" she asked, pointing to a soft pink beverage in a curvy glass. The bartender raised an eyebrow, but nodded. "Well, I'll try it, then," she said warmly to him, hoping to diffuse the impatience in his patient smile. When the man went away to mix her drink - how many bottles did he have to use for that? - she set the drink menu aside and folded one hand on top of the bartop. That sensation of being watched hadn't diminished, and the restlessness was only mildly quieted. She shifted uncomfortably on the hard barstool, then set her toes on the top of the metal bar that served as a foot rest on the stool.
Oh. Oh! The stool swiveled! Beauty forgot the strange prickling at the back of her neck and flat-out grinned, swiveling back and forth in her place. Giving an experimental side-push against the wall of the bar itself, she ended up spinning herself 180 degrees around.
And that's when her eyes fell on a dark figure -- a dark figure looking straight at her.
A peculiar sensation rushed her, something too mild for pain but nothing like pleasure. It felt like awakening, surprised and befuddled, out of a dream that had become too intense for sleeping. Her mouth dropped open in her bid for breath. Too late for grace, she managed to give him a polite smile. But even when the bartender returned, setting her drink at her place, she could only partially turn to thank the man. She didn't know why, but she couldn't - she just couldn't - look away from that wild, stout figure.
Who are you?
She hadn't realized she'd mouthed the question, though her voice thankfully had remained still.