The Dreamatorium

[saysalice]

She watched as the receptionist returned to her desk - sure she was only going to call security to have Sadie escorted off the premises - and was surprised when the woman punched a button on her phone, and the buzz of the intercom filtered through his closed door.

After a moment: "What?"

He sounded annoyed, impatient. His tone sent a chill through her veins even as his assistant snatched up the phone to speak to him privately. The instinctive fear Sadie felt just made her angrier, and she turned to glare at his office door, expecting him to sweep it open any minute.

She heard the receptionist say her name, babbling apologetically, and then stop. Listening. She protested briefly, then fell silent again, nodding as she glanced up at Sadie.

"Yes, sir. Goodnight, Mr. Gordon."

She put the phone down quietly, pressing her lips together over whatever else she might like to say, and fixed Sadie with a cool gaze.

"He says he'll see you. I will remind you that Mr. Gordon is a very busy man, and that it is after business hours."

She was switching her computer off and opened a drawer to retrieve her purse. "In addition, I will remind you that there is a police station just one block away. We have them on speed dial on all office extensions."

The metallic click of a bolt being retracted from the lock interrupted her speech, and the two women looked at his closed door expectantly. He would - he would step out any second now to accost her, Sadie was sure - maybe to throw her out, himself. She clenched her jaw and watched the door handle for the slightest twitch.

Nothing. The two of them stared in silence for an absurdly long moment. Finally, the receptionist shouldered her bag and huffed around the corner of her desk, trading her heels for a pair of running shoes.

"There is also a closed-circuit camera over the front entrance," she continued rather doggedly, pointing for Sadie's benefit, narrowing her eyes at the girl. "Your visit here has already been documented."

The woman paused in front of the door, looking again like she'd like to say more, but she only drew a jangling set of keys out of her purse as she pulled the door open.

"You'll have to ask him to let you out," she muttered in parting, and glowered once more at Sadie as she closed the glass door between them and turned her key savagely in the lock.

Sadie watched her walk away, and was left staring at his name in mirror-writing on the inside of the glass. He would have heard his assistant go out. She waited, but still he didn't emerge. Of course, she thought after a moment, he'd make her come to him. He would have guessed why she was here. If she wanted a confrontation, he wouldn't make it any easier for her.

She walked to the door and then hesitated, trying to rouse the fire that had driven her here. He had humiliated her - dragged out excruciating details on purpose, just to humiliate her and discredit her. He had twisted most of the facts and ignored the rest, until he had a story that pleased him. He'd made her out to be a flighty, shallow, spiteful slut, and he'd made everyone believe it. And then, after everything...that smile. Good luck with everything. Yes, that was really what'd had her seething.

Still, her hand trembled slightly as she jerked the handle and flung the door open.

And he was there - closer than she expected, on the wrong side of his desk - to meet her fierce eyes with a calm smile, and a drink. As if he suspected that she might need one. Sadie's scowl deepened with her uncertainty as she crossed the threshold. She didn't want to accept anything from him. It wasn't how this was supposed to go. But she wanted the drink. The watered-down cocktail she'd had at the bar was long gone, and she could use a little liquid courage. The truth was, now that she was here, she wasn't sure what she wanted to say to him - or whether it was a good idea to be here.

Her panties. She strode across the room to him. He knew about the panties she'd worn on the night Daniel raped her, and he'd made sure everyone else knew about them, too. She swiped one of the tumblers from his hand with a careless slosh. Took a step back and brought the glass to her lips, holding her other arm across her waist. Breathed in the band-aid smell of the scotch as she just rested the cool rim against her lower lip, not taking her eyes off him. She could almost feel grateful for this small kindness, could almost allow that icy something inside her to thaw slightly. Maybe, outside of the courtroom, now that he'd been paid and the job was done - maybe he wasn't -

Wait.

He'd poured himself a drink, too. She blinked belatedly at it over the rim of her glass. Were they - drinking together, then? Raising a glass? Not - celebrating? Not...toasting his success? Sadie swallowed without tasting, hearing the roar of her pulse in her ears even as she felt the heat rising in her cheeks. If he hadn't met her with a smile, she wouldn't believe it - if he wasn't smiling as he watched her now...

She stepped up again and threw the drink in his face, gasping at her own outrage, letting the glass thump and roll on the floor. Nodding at him with wild eyes, feeling her hands shaking again, this time in fury.

"You. You know - you know what he did." Her voice was barely more than a whisper. She had to stop and remember to breathe.

"I just want to hear you say it." Clenching her hands into fists at her sides. Not sure if it was the truth.

 

[Scuttle Buttin']

Neither of them had changed since their encounter in court, though his jacket was off and his tie had been pulled down, top button opened to expose his throat, allow him to breathe. He'd never liked having things sit on his throat like that, but it was a necessary evil of the job. The distance between them was short, a handful of feet at most, and instead of a greeting, a question about her presence here, a demand she turn around and leave, he held out one of the two glasses to her. A drink offered and, a bit clumsily, a bit uncertainly, accepted. He watched, a sip taken from his own glass, as the rim was lifted to her red lips, and his mind flashed quickly, an alcohol-fueled replaying of the lurid details of the blowjob they'd given his client. Not his fumbled, innocence-protesting telling of it. Instead, in that silent moment as they stared at each other, he remembered it in her voice. It was a false memory, created by a whirling combination of alcohol and fantasy, the most she'd said in court on the matter was a stammering "yes," but no matter. It was her voice now that he heard. And he smiled at the thought.

Later, he would reflect that it was pure instinct that kept alcohol out of his eyes, his brain somewhere registering the swing of her arm and clamping down his eyelids in some small fraction of a second before the liquid hit. Her voice then, and he half expected her to slap him, his eyes still closed as he awaited it. Instead, she just whispered again, but the words were quite clear in his ears with only his heartbeat for competition. His empty hand swiped down the length of his face, wiping away most of the amber liquor, and only then did he open his eyes and meet hers, closer than before he'd last seen her.

Her eyes were wide, crazy he could've called them, but he was calm in the face of her fury, the pair of them a perfect picture of contrast. Extending his arm, his own glass was set to the corner of the desk he leaned on, and he lowered his hands to the legs of his pants, drying them there. Every movement was slow, deliberate in his pace, his patience seemingly without end. He doubted hers would be the same. More than that, though, he doubted her fury would carry on for long before that same self-doubt he saw inside her on the stand, and at her table afterward, and then again when she'd first walked in and saw him waiting for her, made it's way back into her head. She was a girl who stammered and blushed and was unsure of herself perhaps more often than not. She was a girl that found herself blowing a guy, and then professed outrage when he raped her later. Some might call it innocence. He mostly thought her young, and stupid, and easily taken advantage of.

"Do you know how they piece together a crime scene, Sadie?" he began at last, his voice low and even, but the tone unmistakably professorial. The learned man educating the poor, dumb girl on the ways of the world.

"They're not here now, obviously, so they have to look at the evidence and from that try to figure out what happened. All those drops of alcohol behind me, for example, will leave a residue on the desk and chair and probably even on the wall that they can use to see that you threw the drink at me.

"The only glass with your fingerprints on it there on the floor," he continued, a wave of the hand indicating the glass that had tumbled to the floor near their feet, before moving to point to his glass set on the desk, "While the one with only my fingerprints sits on the edge of the desk, with some liquid still left in it."

He straighted up off the edge of the desk then, standing to his full height above her. A single step carried him closer to her, the distance nearly swallowed up that one could touch the other with virtually no effort at all.

"And then there are the phone records they could pull, from both my office and my cell phone," he continued, looking down at her now, "Showing that I didn't call you, and so it was wholly your decision to come to my office tonight. Plus, there is the security video, showing you both enter the building, and enter my office, despite the protests of my secretary.

"Speaking of my secretary, there will be her testimony that she told you I was not seeing anyone now, but that you could return during office hours, and your wild-eyed insistence that you see me now.

"Oh, I know," he said, his voice shifting to a tone of mock sympathy, "You think that your fellow sister will have your back, see what a poor victimized girl you are and take pity on you, but Sadie, I'm afraid that won't pay her bills. She rather enjoys her nice car and her nice house and her ability to put a little aside for the future, and lying about her boss would put an end to all of that, wouldn't it?"

The question was rhetorical, and instead of waiting for an answer he stepped forward as if walking through her. His hands found the fabric of her dress where it flared out at her hips, and he pushed her back until her body met the solid plane of the door behind her. He stayed very close, hands still on her hips, his breath accented with alcohol as he pressed on, his voice lower. A secret shared between them now.

"And they'll have all those witnesses, judge and jury and your own lawyer, that saw you be exposed for falsely accusing someone of raping you. And now here you are, assaulting the attorney that did the exposing. Oh, dear Sadie, things would not go very well for you at all if the police showed up here, would it?"

He clicked his tongue and shook his head slowly, sadly.

"But that's what they'll think as they cuff you and put you in the back of their car. We, though. We know why you're here, don't we Sadie? You thought you'd march up here and empower yourself, didn't you? You thought you'd walk through that door and say your peace, exorcise your demons and walk out with your head held high. Take control of the situation, right Sadie?

"Or-"

He moved back a quarter step, his hands leaving her hips, and his index finger lifted to touch between her breasts, his head tilted slightly as he considered her.

"Maybe you really are just here because you want to hear me say what he did. Which I'm more than happy to do for you, Sadie. Normally I wouldn't, but... just for you."

Bending at the waist, he leaned close to her and whispered.

"He gave you what you secretly wanted, but couldn't bring yourself to ask for."

He straightened again as soon as the words were out, his finger leaving her and both hands held up, palms out towards her.

"I know, Saide, I know how outraged you want to be. But it's just us here, so let's be entirely honest with each other, shall we?"

The hands were dropped, and then Jeremiah's index finger returned to press between her breasts.

"I know you've thought about it, somewhere in that fucked up mess of a head you've got. Hell, maybe you've been getting yourself off to the thought regularly," he said, with a glance down her body, "But the problem is the stupid fuck that you let talk his way into your panties, isn't it Sadie? You probably knew when you were blowing his limp dick that he wasn't going to be able to really give you what you wanted, and that's what you're really upset about, isn't it?

"You're not upset that he 'raped' you," he said with a quick roll of the eyes, as if it was ridiculous to even use the word, "You're upset that he didn't do it good enough for you."

His finger fell away, and he took a step back, then turned away from her. Walking to the desk, his fingers worked to loosen the knot in his tie further as he continued on, his tone entirely dismissive.

"Get the fuck out of my office, Sadie. You're not worth the cum I'd spill raping you."

Standing in front of his desk, in nearly the same spot he was when she first came in, he turned back to face her, the silk length of his tie now simply hanging out of both sides of his starched collar.

"You're a stupid, boring girl who can't handle the things that make her cunt wet," he said with a back-handed wave towards that very part of her anatomy, "And who probably couldn't even make me hard if her life depended on it. Go shake in your pathetic rage somewhere else, girl."

Falling silent, his hands slipped into his pockets and he leaned back against the desk again, and he watched her. And waited.

 

[saysalice]

She was holding her breath. Waiting for - something. An explosion: for him to bark obscenities in her face, smack her, grab her and throw her out, grab her and...something. She held her breath and waited - any second now. It was an insult that must be answered - she could hardly believe her gall - did anyone actually throw drinks, anymore? As she watched, he only raised a hand to wipe his face, opening his eyes to look back at her placidly, and Sadie felt the trembling in her limbs become more violent as she struggled to hold his gaze. Livid. She was.

Any second now.

She stiffened, nostrils flaring on an alarmed intake of breath as he leaned forward slightly to reach across the desk - but it was only to set his glass down, having had his fill of scotch for the moment. He wiped his hands on the pant legs of his expensive suit, the kind only a lawyer can buy, and she thought he must be - must be fuming inside, must be just as irate as she still was - she was. But he presented the very picture of unruffled calm, serenity, civility. He seemed to be waiting, too. At least he had stopped smiling.

"Do you know how they piece together a crime scene, Sadie?"

She blinked at him. His first words to her were so unexpected - she didn't understand the question - was he talking about her night with Daniel? It would be so like him, she thought, making tight fists with her hands, to remind her again - now - of the findings of the rape kit.

But as he continued speaking, she felt her face grow cold as she realized he was speaking of evidence the police would find in this office, after tonight. Piecing together...this scene. He was calling it a crime scene. She swallowed hard as he took a step closer to her and she lowered her gaze as he described all the little details - the phone records, the video, the secretary who wouldn't lie about her boss - all of it serving to prove that Sadie had come here looking to instigate something. That she was asking for it. She was beginning to sweat. What was he going to do to her? She focused on the empty tumbler laying on its side on the carpet - all for one reckless, impulsive moment - what was she doing here?

Wait...what?

Mary - he had called her Mary - wouldn't...lie about her boss? What -

He moved in even closer, he was right up in her face and forcing her back against the closed door, and the smell of scotch on him made her eyes water, and to her horror she felt his hands on her hips, positioning her - ohgod! She gasped for breath and tried to bring her arms up to keep him back - here she was, with her pathetic attempt to assault him, and it wouldn't go well for her, if the police came.

The click of his tongue made her whine through closed lips. She couldn't look at him. What was he going to -

Wait.

When they...cuffed her, and took her away? Her eyelids fluttered and she lifted her chin to stare at him, bewildered, as he kept talking. He meant when they arrested her...for her assault of him, for her crime, not his. She was so confused!

He stepped away, took his hands off her, and she could breathe and then his accusatory finger was prodding her between the breasts.

"Maybe you want to hear me say what he did."

Did she want that? His finger burned like a hot poker. She couldn't remember what she wanted.

Sadie turned, resting one cheek against the door as he leaned in close, turning her naked ear to him and averting her eyes from his intense stare, his whiskey breath in her face.

"He gave you what you secretly wanted - "

Her head whipped around before he could finish to glare at him, horrified, as he stepped back, raising his hands as if he knew her first instinct would be to lash out at him. She panted at him, holding herself in check, remembering that he said he would call the police if she -

"...let's be entirely honest with each other, shall we?"

It made her uneasy. She pressed her lips together, biting back a protest and glancing over her shoulder as she pressed back into the closed door. She didn't come here for another dose of his brand of honesty. Then his finger jabbed into her breastbone again, pinning her like a twitching butterfly.

"I know you've thought about it, somewhere in that fucked up mess of a head you've got."

Sadie dropped her head so that her curls fell across her face, but they couldn't conceal the color spreading across her cheeks.

There had been a moment - should she just assume he knew everything? - early in the evening, when Daniel had slipped his hand into her panties, and she was glad that she'd shaved. He had curled his fingers and strummed her clit expertly, making her croon, and when she'd opened her eyes wide, gasping up at him helplessly, he had smiled: Are you going to come for me? - one second before she'd dissolved into shudders, clutching his sleeve to keep her balance, bucking on his fingers and gushing into his hand.

In spite of the way the rest of the evening had unfolded, she couldn't forget that instant - when she still thought he was sexy, when she still thought he would respect her boundaries, and he had seemed to will her orgasm, claiming it for himself. In her young sex life she had never known anything so erotic, and yes - her cheeks burned and she couldn't hide it - she still thought about it. She'd made herself come on that memory again and again, hating herself for it every time.

She'd never told anyone, but somehow - somehow, Mr. Gordon knew.

"You're not upset that he 'raped' you...you're upset that he didn't do it good enough for you."

He stepped away, releasing her and turning his back, utterly unconcerned that she might spring up and lunge at him as he returned to his desk. She felt hot and sick, pressing against the solid door behind her, knowing she could open it and leave at any time, but just staring at the back of his head as he commented without even looking at her that he wasn't going to rape her - that she wasn't worth it.

Sweating and trembling, her chest heaved on painful breaths as he faced her again, leaning casually against his desk as he casually insulted her. Why did it sting, why did she wince when he said that she couldn't make him hard? Ms. Davies's crude question from earlier that day resounded in her memory: If he wanted you, would you have sex with him? And she had blushed.

Let's be entirely honest with each other.

Sadie made herself look at him. He looked slightly impatient now. He had told her to get out. He wasn't going to -

She felt sick. "I - I didn't come here...because I wanted you to - " She couldn't say it. She blinked at him.

"How dare you?" But there was no fury behind it, no breathless indignation. It was what she was supposed to say.

And she should leave. Tell him - tell him to go fuck himself, and storm out of here. He stood there watching her, waiting for her to do it. He'd told her to do it. He wasn't going to rape her. She wasn't worth it.

The moment, the window of moments in which she could have made her exit and still retained a scrap of dignity had passed. She'd hesitated too long, her hesitation had been noted - and even now she stayed pressed against the door, just staring at him.

He had ordered her out. If she left now, didn't he win? If she stayed, did he win? He wasn't going to rape her, she wasn't -

Had Daniel told him she wasn't worth it, or had he come to that conclusion on his own?

If he wanted you -

- but he didn't want her. Sadie shook her head slightly, reaching back with sweaty palms to grip the door frame and leaning her head back, keeping her eyes on him. Really? Did that matter? What kind of fucked up mess was she? She should leave. She didn't feel any better, but...she should leave before he made her feel any worse.

Only, she didn't want to do as he said. That was it, wasn't it?

She swallowed. He had spoken about what made her cunt wet, like he knew that, too. Something uncomfortable stirred in her belly.

"I'm not leaving, Mr. Gordon." Her voice was shakier than she would have liked. She took a step away from the door. "So you can throw me out -"

put your hands on me, and -

"- or you can - you can keep insulting me, if that's what helps you sleep at night." She pushed her curls up off of her face. Her cheeks were still warm. "You - called me a slut in front of everyone, and you know it's not true."

She took another step, but stopped before she was too close. "It's just us here, so let's be honest," she felt more confident, echoing his words, and pushed her chin up stubbornly.

"You know what he did. I didn't want it." It felt good to say. She folded her arms tightly across her chest, trying to stop the trembling.

"So I'm not leaving until - until you apologize."


OOC: This scene has been moved to its own thread. Link here.

 

[Scuttle Buttin']

 

[Scuttle Buttin']

There is never really a good time to be in the airport. There are good reasons, plenty of them, but the airport in general is a miserable place for miserable people to gather into lines and be miserable together. This was only compounded when one found themselves in an airport because they had a layover and, worse, had to change planes. Make it an airport in the middle of nowhere, like Eppley Airfield in Omaha goddamned Nebraska, and the misery was so thick you could make a stew out of it.

It was this very stew that Eamon found himself swimming through as he walked from the gate and into the airport proper. He was a tall and wiry man, clearing 6'3" with ease, and while the height typically was advantageous for seeing above crowds, such a thing was unnecessary at this hour. While 'deserted' was perhaps not the correct word to describe the state of things, 'virtually empty' seemed close enough to the target to be useful, and it was this phrase that ping ponged in his head as he strolled unhurriedly past dark and empty luggage carousels and rental car desks.

A check of his watch showed him that he had a good couple hours to wait for his next flight, a snaffu caused by bad weather and made worse by a travel company that could be charitably described as less than helpful, a grand series of fuck ups by God and man that conspired to leave him stranded here, now. Pausing at a three-way intersection, he scratched absently at his full beard, dark brown hair accented with a tinge of red that matched the messed mop atop his head, and then decided to try his luck with a left turn. It wasn't like he didn't have plenty of time to check the other way when that proved to be as much of a dead end of closed up nothingness as he expected it to be.

His expectations were quickly met when he came upon a row of dark restaurants and newsstands, their metal gates pulled down and locked, the lights all extinguished and chairs flipped over on top of the tables to make things easier on whoever swept up for the night.

"Yeah," he said aloud, a bad habit he'd picked up some years ago and had been unable to shake, and which had caused him more than a couple awkward moments when overheard and asked who he was talking to. Hooking a finger between the knot of his crimson tie and his collar, he loosened the silk around his neck and then opened the button at his collar, wondering only then why he hadn't thought to do so before. With time to kill, he decided to stroll to the end of this path before turning back to see what disappointment waited for him in the other direction.

It was at the end of this that he came upon what he had to convince himself was not an airport mirage. Last among the row of coffee shops and book stores, closed restaurants and past even the empty shoeshine chair, an airport bar seemed to stand with open arms, beckoning him to her bosom. Standing outside the entryway, his suit a bit worse for the wear after his hours spent in the last airport waiting for the weather to clear, he stared inside unbelieving, watching the unaware man behind the bar as he washed glasses. For a place that seemed as if it would want to attract customers, being tucked way back here couldn't help. Still, not his concern, and it was an open bar in an airport where he expected to be stuck staring at a wall for the next couple hours, so he wasn't going to complain.

He was going to fucking drink.

The lighting within was dim, and the place actually seemed larger once past the threshold than it did from outside. Deeper, at least, and he thought perhaps that was why the bartender hadn't seen him as he stood outside and tried to convince himself he wasn't hallucinating until he saw the woman seated at a table not far from the bar. It was her legs under the table that had held the man's attention instead, and he couldn't help the knowing grin he gave the startled man when he jerked his attention away at the realization that they were no longer alone.

"Evening," Eamon said to the man, moving between two of the barstools to lean a forearm against the bar, the laptop bag over his shoulder rebounding against one of the padded leather stools and swaying behind him. "I don't suppose I could get a bourbon, could I?"

Some part of him still expected to be told that the place was closed and he'd have to go back to his airport nomad lifestyle.

"One bourbon," came the reply with a nod, the bartender happy to turn away from the person who had caught his gawking and grab glass and bottle.

While he waited, Eamon half-turned towards the woman. Ordinarily he wouldn't attempt to strike up conversation with someone, male or female, unless they were sitting at the bar and their posture seemed to indicate an openness to conversation, but with each second he stood in here and not out there, he felt increasingly like a refugee that had found salvation, and the need to share it with another person was almost overwhelming. In short, he couldn't much help himself, and didn't really try to.

"I'm surprised another person was even able to find this place," he said, his voice raised a bit to project to where she sat. He was very likely interrupting something, they were clearly not having a conversation when he came in and that seemed the most likely reason why, and he may even feel bad about it later, but now, right now, he felt like he just needed some human contact. Something to ground him to the reality of the world outside the airport. And the stammering guy who left his drink on the bar, mumbled something about opening a tab for him, and then retreated to the far end of the bar to clean glasses that seemed suspiciously clean already was clearly not going to cut it.

 

[thestruggle]

“Can I get a Boulevard draft, please?” She rubbed her left eye as she shifted on the bar stool. It served as a mere perch when she leaned forward and crossed her forearms on the bar, one pink-glossed fingernail tracing a circle on the gleaming bar top.

Adeline was tired, worn to the bone exhausted. It had made her punchy enough to work her way through the concourse and find the hushed, clubby atmosphere of an airport bar. By rights, she should have already been out on the road and halfway to Lincoln by now. Maybe even pulling into the hotel parking lot, tottering dazedly up to a desk and then down a lushly carpeted hallway. Surely she would have drifted off, floating away in generously appointed pillows. Yet, getting off the flight from Dallas had left her too drained to work her way to the car rental area. She hadn't even made it to baggage. Like a siren's song, she saw the vision of shuttles lining up outside the doors and stacks of faceless motels as a secret reprieve. The meeting wasn't until two in the afternoon the next day. If she needed to, she could just take the short hike down to Lincoln in the morning.

“One draft. That'll be four-fifty, please.”

Addie tried to not go cross-eyed at the ridiculous price and slid over her debit card. “Can you open a tab?”

“Twenty dollar minimum, ma'am,” the bartender said, in what was probably a courteous voice. Mostly he sounded tired and ready to go home.

I'll leave a big tip, was the silent bargain she made.

“So I'll keep buying,” was what she said. She clicked the pen he had set down closed and laid it gently next to her cocktail napkin. The condensation from the beer was already starting to dampen the print – phone number and email address, store hours, bland chain name. Addie lifted the glass and drank, leaning back in her chair as the ale circled her mouth and down. Fatigue stabbed again at the slender line of her jaw, her neck, the curvature of her spine.

The trips were getting longer, it was true. It was enough to run her own schedule and she didn't mind the consultation. It was the anxiety of the flights and the endless travel that got to her. It was packing perfectly sized travel bottles of shampoo and conditioner, just so the brunette locks she paid upwards of one-fifty to keep glossy didn't fray. It was learning how to iron in ten minutes because the car service canceled or no taxis could be found. It was not being able to go out and weed her garden, to miss her dog for extended hours. She rolled her shoulders and set down the glass. A respectable fourth of the beer was missing and foam flecked the interior in a swath up the side. She wasn't about to sit at a lonesome airport bar and cry into her drink. It wasn't the time to contemplate big career decisions. Addie was plenty happy where she was. The hours could do that to a person.

Her stomach pinged and she glanced at the slim band of silver around her wrist, the watch face on the pale side of her arm. She fiddled with it as she leaned forward again, smiling apologetically at the guy behind the bar.

“I'm sorry, what's your name? Do you have any pretzels or anything like that back there? I know the grill is closed,” Addie tacked on the last part as an amendment, trying not to sound like a pain in the ass.

“Norm. Sure. Just Rold Gold. Is that okay?” He was already reaching under the bar, passing over a miniature package of salted pretzels.

She held his gaze for just a minute at the mention of his name, but otherwise didn't react. “Yeah, fine. Thank you.”

The bag crinkled as she tugged it open and set it on the bar, carefully tucking another bar napkin underneath as she shook out a handful of bites. They didn't seem the least bit appetizing to her, but she had to eat something. The beer was already making her vision a bit fuzzy, but she finished the first and ordered another. It had been twenty minutes since she got in. Her hair felt tight in its loose chignon, and she reached up to pull out the tie. Addie was struggling with the atmosphere – the rain outside, the muted airport surroundings. People were still milling around but there was a clear air of desertion. Poor Norm. He just wanted to get out of here and go smoke a bowl. He couldn't have been more than twenty. The least she could do was order her limit and get out of there. He took her glass at her nod, and foam spilled only slightly over the side. She drank.

She had pulled out her phone for a lack of something else to do, wondering if it would seem too out of line to shrug out of the dark blue sweater she wore over a gray a-line dress. At least she had worn flats on the flight – heels would have her weeping for a release. What am I doing in here? Two more drinks to go.

Norm had been determinedly rubbing a cloth around some glasses, interspersed with minimal sighing. Addie was about to make awkward conversation just to get her tab's worth when old Norm leaned forward and set down the glass, tilting just enough away from her that it registered – another customer. Well, good. Now she didn't have to feel so guilty about keeping Norm from his after-work activities. A tiny laugh rolled in her throat as she tilted her glass up to her lips, and ran her tongue out to the edge of her mouth. She glanced out of the corner of her eye at the newcomer. Loosened tie, full beard. She wondered if he lived out of travel bottles, too. The bag he wore seemed like an encumbrance he was used to. She glanced down at her own, tucked neatly next to her purse. Why does it matter? He's just getting a drink. Briefly she wondered if she should order a bourbon of her own, just to fill up the tab and zip on out of there. In a hotel room in twenty minutes.

“I'm surprised another person was even able to find this place,” the guy said. Addie had a stunned second in that fish-bowl of a bar, a weird delay from the beer and the fatigue. Oh. He was talking to her.

Well, it was kind of hard to find. She cleared her throat, gave a little smile and laugh that was obviously a force of habit.

“Oh, yeah. It's um – it's kind of tucked away back here,” she ventured. Her voice had that classic Midwest pitch, pleasant and probably shy. She wondered if she was supposed to offer more, to turn on her stool. She reached up, pushing back her hair to tuck it behind her ear.

Silence.
Oh, why not?

She turned then, her legs without stockings briefly catching the light and her skirt sliding just a bit up her thighs. Addie kept her glass in her right hand and her gaze on its contents. “Are you caught by the delays?” Her eyes, gray, flicked up then. Her legs uncrossed and she tucked her ankles, side by side. The glass was finished, and she set it on the counter. But by then, she had already committed. It would be rude to leave now, wouldn't it?

 

[Scuttle Buttin']

"Mm," he said by way of reply, his brows lifting a bit to accompany the half nod sent in her direction. Tucked away was one way to put it. Perhaps he'd missed a sign somewhere, some indication that there was a place a person like him could go to find a drink at this late hour, but he doubted it.

The glass was lifted to his lips then, half of the bourbon drained with a rotation of his wrist, the alcohol burning his throat as he swallowed it down. The glass was returned to it's spot on the bar, his fingers making spider legs and holding it by the rim, his hand absently rolling it on the edge of the base, swirling the remaining liquid within.

Movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention, and he turned his head in time to see the woman pivoting towards him. A flicker of his eyes, quick as a darting dragonfly, caught the rise of her skirt, and he smiled a bit awkwardly when his eyes found her face, hoping it was a glance that went unseen. The terrible side of it, however, was the nearly magnetic pull her legs seemed to be exerting on his eyes, a beckoning he could hardly resist. Busying himself with a drink, instead, he nodded again and rolled his eyes as the freshly emptied glass was replaced.

"Unfortunately. I'm not even supposed to be in this godforsaken airport, but," he paused, turning away from her to lift his empty glass in the direction of the bartender, a silent request for a refill before he turned back to her, "Two canceled flights and one rescheduled one later, and here I am."

Fresh bourbon found it's way into his glass, which he acknowledge with a nod in the direction of the retreating bartender, and then his eyes were on her again. She felt like a lifeline, a, his lone escape from a tortuously slow night waiting for the flight that would whisk him away from this creeping hell, and he found himself afraid the empty glass in front of her meant she'd be abandoning him in his time of need.

"And here I shall stay until the airport gods decide I've suffered in purgatory long enough!" he exclaimed, with a glass raised to the heavens, then brought to his mouth for a drink. A little hiss between his teeth followed, another satisfying burn of alcohol in the back of his throat, and he plunked the glass on the bar top.

His eyes drifted from her, scanning the empty confines of the room they were in, surveying unused tables and empty chairs, a deserted room that was probably full and bustling in the middle of the day. After spending hours on planes and in airports, in uncomfortable seat and hard benches, the thought of sitting on a barstool for the long wait was entirely unappealing.

His gaze settled on her again, and he straightened up from where he leaned against the bar. Lifting his glass again, he tilted it in the direction of her own, his brows raised.

"I'm going to go find a comfortable chair to sit in, since the idea of going back out there makes me want to die a little. But... if you have time you're welcome to join me. I'll even buy you another. And, if not," he adjusted the bag on his shoulder and stepped from between the two stools at the bar, "I hope you get out of here soon, and have a safe flight."

With a final nod, he carried his drink over to a table some distance from the bar and lowered his bag into one of the legions of empty chairs, then lowered himself into another.

 

[thestruggle]

If she hadn't been a few drinks in, she never could have kept facing his position at the bar when he glanced her over. As it was, her cheeks were faintly tinted with pink but she chalked it up to the alcohol. It wasn't unwarranted – drinking did that. The spreading of capillaries, the cooling of the skin. She should either get over the barrier or leave. Addie didn't like the idea of being some red-faced stranger at a bar with no escape avenue. Her head turned back towards her drink, the empty glass. She traced her finger around the sodden bar napkin and listened to the trickling of liquor from the neck of a bottle. The airport was starting to feel like an enclosure: a surreal experience in a place she knew she had chosen. She could have left before he had made his way to the bartender, but when he said he was stuck...

“Ohh,” Addie said, a rueful note – these things happen – creeping into her voice. “That sounds terrible! What a pain.”

She thought there was more she should ask – where was he going? Did he have a deadline to meet? Those weren't questions, she reasoned, that were put to random acquaintances in airports. People had all sorts of errands to complete over airways and state lines. She should know; she had certainly seen enough of them in her time period as a consultant. Norm scooted his way back over to her after he refilled the guy's glass. He made to refill hers with a tiny gesture of his wrist and she shook her head minutely, better to wait. It was an odd circumstance. She had places to go and things to do, and it was probably time to head on out. Addie decided to search for a good way to wrap up the brief interaction – even if a tiny dart of guilt pricked her. He had opened the door, conversationally, and now she was going to politely lock the deadbolt.

“I - “ She started, her voice strangely absent. Oh, airport purgatory. That was funny. A smile crinkled at the corners of her mouth and she felt a small reprieve. Well, just another minute. “Oh, I know! It gets so circular. What a crazy way to travel, huh?”

Really? How else are people supposed to travel?

She paused and then scooted forward on her stool, thinking about her tab and how far she could get without fulfilling its requirements. He was drinking bourbon and the idea of warmth traveling past her throat, outlining the line of her chest down-down-down, to an eventual hotel bed was very seductive. Don't mix beer and liquor, don't mix beer and liquor, don't- Don't talk to strangers! The pause was stretching as her glass stayed empty, Norm hovered, and the guy drank.

Their eyes met, and Addie felt a small shift – momentarily at sea. She had been so concerned with getting out of there, she had never considered that she may be the one left pursuing the conversation. He offered, he was collecting himself, he was finding a chair, and then he moved away with his glass. The bar seemed dark and conspiratorial, not at all the warm and sociable place – albeit empty – that it had been when she first came in.

“Oh – um, thank you. Thanks, you too,” She said, politely. The bar seemed very large in front of her, and Norm kept circumspectly washing his glasses. She refused to sit there and consider herself – it was time to get out of there.

“Norm, hey, I'm sorry. What's the surcharge on canceling a tab? It doesn't matter, I'll just -”

“We don't really do that, I mean, I'll have to charge you out. Are you sure -”

“Please. It's not a big deal, it's late -” Addie stopped, slipped off the stool, and righted herself. “Just let me have the slip, please?”

With misgivings, Norm punched in the rest of her information and handed off the receipt. She tipped – heavily, even though she was already being taken for a ride. She suddenly felt a surge of resentment at airports and places of transience in general. She shouldered her things, bag and purse. At least she packed light. Ignoring the small wave of dizziness that surged when she tried to skirt the chair was harder, however. Her hair floated forward when she tried to tug her bag free, inconspicuously. Well, shit.

She was drunk. No food, except for a few pretzels, and compound that with two beers over a day of travel. She wasn't falling down, but the idea of making her way down to the reclamation and car rental with her bag knocking at her knees made weariness crest. She glanced shyly over her shoulder to where he had settled. It would be... She had already closed out, hadn't she? But he said he would buy. She could stay for awhile, get her head right. In fact, it seemed almost pleasant. He was kind, handsome, another tired traveler. Better to do that than check into some hotel where she'd wake up at 3 am with a raging headache and dry mouth. She grabbed a couple more pretzels and chewed them quickly, hoping they would fight off the flip-flopping of her stomach.

“Sorry, Norm. Let me get a Knob Creek, double.”

“But you closed out your tab,” Norm said, dubiously.

“I think I'll be fine. I'll just leave my card again. I know... I'm silly,” Addie tried for winsome, which wasn't hard. He had said he would pay, but better be safe than sorry. She licked the salt off of her fingers and picked up her glass, carefully meandering her way towards where he was holding court. She settled into a chair – almost a flop, really – and arranged her bags next to her. When she smiled at him next, her face was much warmer than it had been. Something about her decision made the speech more relaxed, the atmosphere less awkward.

“I don't really have anywhere to be just yet. I thought I'd stick around for a bit, wind down.” She took a sip of her drink and placed it close by with a noise of satisfaction. “Oh, and, I suppose – I'm Addie. Adeline. Pleased to meet you - ?”

 

[Scuttle Buttin']

Were he to sit and reflect on this moment later, he would have recognized that he didn't actually expect her to join him at the table. She and the bartender didn't seem to be terribly involved in conversation when he arrived, but then she didn't seem to be very interested in any conversation at the moment, so it was of little surprise. Still, he'd found a place where he could sit in relative comfort, where the alcohol flowed like milk and honey - if you had the money to keep the spigot open, of course - and conversation or no, he was happy to spend his time there until his flight.

Her appearance in front of him, then, was a pleasant surprise, and he found himself sitting up straighter while she arranged her bags. His attention diverted momentarily to her hands, the quick search for a wedding ring beginning and ending before she turned away from her bags, though why exactly he thought to do such a thing he couldn't entirely say. What were they going to do, fuck right here in the bar? The place may be empty, but it was hardly that empty. Never mind the fact that they were essentially complete strangers, and she didn't even-

"Eamon," he said, his smile easy and his head bobbing in another quick nod of greeting, "I'm glad you decided to stick around for a bit."

He paused, leaning forward over his glass, his head swiveling first left, then right, his chin sinking nearer to the table as his voice dropped to a more conspiratorial level.

"I'm sure our friend the barkeep is nice and all, but he doesn't seem like much for conversation."

He let slip a little laugh at his own joke, and straightened up some from where he'd hovered over the table. No need to make himself seem like a whispering crazy when she'd only just arrived. His thumb and forefinger closed on opposite ends of the glass, and he lifted it for a sip, narrowing his eyes against the pleasant burn of swallowing the liquid down.

Across the table from her, he considered her for a moment. His elbows were on the table, on arm parallel to his body and the other extending up, the glass held not far from his lips. Perhaps it was the alcohol already flowing through him, or the sheer lead weight of boredom that seemed to be threatening to crush him at any moment. Perhaps it was the need for some kind of thrill, some measure of excitement to break up the monotony that was his existence in this place at this time, and the woman in front of him happened to find herself in the crosshairs of that need.

Whatever the case may be, he found himself setting his glass down, his arm crossing against the other as he leaned forward again. The table pressed his tie to his chest, acting as if a strange kind of tie tack, pushing a crease into the silk. His eyes focused on hers, and he threw his words down on the table like a gauntlet.

"You know, Adeline... I was about to ask you where you were headed. And then I'd tell you, and then we'd talk about how long we'd been in other airports getting to here, and how long we had in other airports getting to our end point, and we'd eventually leave here, with our wallets lighter and our B-A-C higher, and vaguely remember the conversation we had with that stranger in that airport bar in Nowheresville."

He paused, shifting in his seat, his hips sliding closer to the edge of the chair as he drew in a breath to continue. No turning back now.

"But what if we skipped all that? You don't know me from Adam, I don't know you from Eve, so let's dispense with that stupid small talk. I'll keep my tab open, and your glass full, for as long as you'd like, and let's have a conversation about... about something. Spill our secrets. It's..."

He stopped, taking a drink to wet his throat. His heart was beating hard now, and a strange kind of adrenaline had found it's way into his blood stream. A nervous energy had found it's way into his legs, and under the table, hidden by the leather of his shoes, his toes bounced up and down quickly, the only evidence of the fight he was currently engaged in to keep his legs from bouncing.

"Have you seen Strangers on a Train? I haven't even, actually, but I know the concept. Two people that have never met, have no other earthly reason to know each other-"

He stopped short, and grinned, one hand lifting off the table and held out in front of him like a stop sign.

"I'm not proposing any murder or anything like that. Just talking."

He scooted his hips back then, the glass lifted off the table and brought to his mouth, his proposal apparently ended.

"Who knows," he said after swallowing, his shoulders lifting in a shrug, "It could be a fun way to pass the time, at least."