singillatim | GIRLS NIGHT, GIRLS NIGHT!

Entry tags:

GIRLS NIGHT, GIRLS NIGHT!

Who: Various!
What: Girls Night!
When: Early in the month!
Where: Ruby's House

Content Warnings: N/A Will update as necessary

[A few days after putting the ad up on the bulletin board, the promised evening has arrived. Ruby has a banner hanging up on the patio of her cabin that reads “GIRLS NIGHT” and every once in awhile she can be seen at the door checking for new arrivals, or poking her head up at a window to do the same.

Her cabin is interesting to say the very least. She did her best to clean up all the clutter but it's pretty obvious she isn't exactly the cleanest person in town. Her giant scythe and snowboard are hanging by the door. And there's a green gem sword on display above her fireplaces' mantle with a little hand carved plaque that reads “The Protector of Mantle.” There's also a framed photograph of her looking a couple years younger with her team from home. The kitchen is a bit of mess with a few obvious scorch marks, melted bits on the counter, and just signs that there had been more than one fire in there.

But she had managed to gather up as much as she could for the big party. Including a handful of basic snacks like cookies, chips, and whatever she scrounge up that didn't require any actual cooking skills. There are a handful of games like Risk, Connect 4, and a partially torn up game of twister. There's even an old red and blue boom box playing some hits from the 80's and 90's courtesy of Kate Marsh like Eye of the Tiger, Can't Touch This, I Don't Want To Miss a Thing, If You Want To Be my Lover, and Hit Me Baby, One More time, and many more!]

[OOC: Feel free to make a top level! I'll have one up soon myself! Anyone is free to mingle or try to infiltrate the party.

Feel free to contact me at jjabarrett on plurk or discord for any plotting]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[He just knows his face is tomato red. There's a peanut gallery hovering about the Girls' Cabin because of course there is.

Tim opens his mouth--

closes his mouth, in what is his crowning moment as a boy genius...!

Nnnnno, nope, y'know, on second thought, he's good.]

[ The thought that maybe she should feel bad about threatening a teenager crosses her mind. She immediately dismisses it.

Teenagers are the worst. ]

Okay.

[ She's close enough to reach out, and --

-- flick a little snow off his shoulder. Smile. ] Then have a good night.

[ Before she heads back up and into the house, passing by Kate and the wolf without breaking stride. ]

Edited 2024-01-09 17:15 (UTC)

[ Kate's just... still staring, Diefenbaker still at her legs. Wynonna heads back inside and for a brief moment, she might feel the tiniest bit sorry for him. Mostly for the plunge in the snowbank because ouch. But then, actually, she's mostly annoyed with him for breaking into Ruby's house and into their girls only party — which is the height of rudeness.

She's so over him, tonight. Why does he keep pulling stuff like this? ]

In terms of bright ideas, that was probably the worst.

[ Lord, he is so dumb. Please help him with his dumb. ]

Go home, Tim. Please—?

[He's still as Wynnie (note to self, never call her Wynnie) flicks snow off his shoulder, like he's expecting and well resigned to getting a solid smack. Cringing over with, Tim just exhales-- long suffering.

The breath floats up in the frigid air, and he feels like a gloomy little dragon.

The wolf is still with Kate, and Tim perks up at her voice (which is pathetic but he just got bodily thrown off a porch so he's allowed to be pathetic) aaaaand then immediately deflates.]

The phrase is--

[Why the fuck does he keep talking.

Tim doesn't know.

Like an urban coyote, he's so ready to sprint away.]

You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here.

[He stares at the wolf and the wolf stares back.

This is the wolf's fault.

As if reading his thoughts (which is freaky), Deafbarker lowers his head and Tim raises both hands in abject surrender-] I'm going! I'm going.

[And indeed... he is.

God damn.

....he needs to find some gloves

and maybe find a way to steal his staff back from the chicks.]

[ 'Why does he keep talking' is something Kate asks herself, constantly. She folds her arms across her chest, her expression set into a frown in a mix of disappointment and dismissal — as if he's just really hit it home about how done she is.

So dumb. The dumbest.

But he's going, and she shakes her head with a sigh. He's going. And maybe they can enjoy the rest of their night in peace.

(Hey, is that a cow? There's a cow in Milton? Surely not.)

Kate turns her attention to the wolf, looking down at him and letting her arms unfold. Her hands go to gently reach into the wolf's warm, soft fur as she fusses over him for a moment.

And perhaps, to add a little salt in the wound, the last thing Tim'll hear from her is: ]

Poor, Diefenbaker. You were such a good boy, yeah. A really good boy!

[ She'll turn to head back inside. ]

Let's get you some jerky.

Louis saw the ad for Girls Night, smiled--thought of his daughter, felt slightly nervous about the "weapons" part--and carried on. He expected that maybe he would hear a little partying, but nothing too loud. He's up at night anyway, prowling around looking for rats to eat.

Instead there's a commotion in the street, and he thinks of brawls and people being tossed out of bars. Louis wanders over to the lone figure, hat pulled down and gloved hands shoved deep in his coat pockets against the cold. He has to stick his tongue in the corner of his cheek to keep from laughing outright when he sees who it is. The young man needs a proper scolding. Louis puts on his best disappointed face.

"Do not tell me you were tryin' to sneak into this get-together for nice young ladies."

The peanut gallery continues to grow, and Tim doesn't know how he's still standing with all his blood running cold as the voice of the newest gawker reaches his ears. Tim stubbornly continues to dust powdered snow off his pants.

It's a fun little trick called taming the wedgie that Wynonna had left him. But in a subtle way. Shut up, he's an expert and the dawning realization that he is, in fact, a loser, is a tough pill to swallow.

"Do or do not," he recites and much like Thug Life, the bravado is all show. "There is no try."

On second thought, that's maybe not a great thing to boast. Tim pauses, furrows his brows, pins Louis with a look- "They're not nice! They have a wolf in there!"

Why is he the only one Concerned!!

The quote stands even without context of its origin. Louis coughs in the back of his throat to hide another urge to laugh. Then he takes a breath to settle himself and points emphatically between Tim--who is dusting himself unnecessarily, classic case of wounded pride--and the house.

"Young man, I couldn't give a rat's ass whether they're nice or evil or have a pet wolf, it's Girls Night, not 'Tim's Night' or 'Night for Boys Who Think Creepin' Around Girls Is A Fine Thing To Do.' What are they doin', skinnin' the wolf alive?"

"No, I was the one screaming in there," he points out because even in this state it seems rude to pin that brand of shrieking on an innocent party. Even if that so-called innocent party happens to be a literal wolf with a dumb name.

His eyes widen comically at the very obvious idea that his shrieking was heard outside the cabin walls.

Euuugh.

With a determined shake of his hands (red-ish now from the freeze), he dives right into his defense with a twinge of sad exasperation, "I didn't peep anything!"

Creep. Peep. Freud.

Euuugh.

He bristles in earnest, jewellike eyes flashing even in the dim light from the houses. He remembers something Claudia said once and then never said again.

"You what? If I find out you been peepin' on girls, it's over for you, boy. You goin' catch hell."

He's a little less scary when he blusters and points rudely. It's when he goes quiet, or very loud, that he is truly incensed. Still, the threat is real.

Then, because this is only a piecemeal picture of tonight's events, "Why were you screamin'?"

"I said I wasn't," he whines (honest-to-god whines), and he wonders if every person over the age of thirty is so hard of hearing or if it's a side effect of the snow. With pleading and wide eyes, he cringes at his own excuses (and people say honesty is the way to go for deliverance) and decides that the best course of action is to... stop screaming across the front yard (what used to the house's front yard). He slinks over to his first real victim of breaking-and-entering, and is already bracing for a-- something. A hard shove to make a point, maybe. A pull on his ears, because Mr. L is old-fashioned in that he is older than dirt.

If all he warrants is a nasty look and a finger pointed his way, then Tim figures it's all alright.

Again:

he wonders if he's going to have to get used to repeating himself, on account of all the ancient, rickety-jointed men congregating now to have their laugh.

He says,

"...there was a wolf. Inside the house."

And it absolutely warranted screaming.

Louis's hearing is very good actually, but not believing Tim's side of the story means his hearing is a bit selective. Tim's too old for a good scruffing in Louis's opinion, and he's not his kid, and Louis is more inclined to use his words anyway. Call it a predilection for being the good cop to Lestat's bad. Louis thinks Tim ought to be practicing carrying himself like a gentleman.

Louis is the kind of man who wanted to teach Claudia her table manners even though, bless her heart, the little vampire would have no reason to use them.

"If the wolf were attackin' them, Miss Wynonna would be less concerned about throwin' you out."

Thus he isn't afraid of what this so-called wolf might be doing. Logically, Louis thinks they just made friends with a wolf dog or scraggly husky. It happens; people take in strays all the time.

"Guess it's not just ladies who dislike you. Come on, away from the house. Miss Ruby likes to throw snowballs at people." Judging by the way Louis pulls the collar of his coat closer around his scarf, he's been a victim.

"Why did you think this was a good idea?"

Edited 2024-01-23 05:42 (UTC)

I didn't know there was a wolf inside the house, is the missing piece to this story. Tim has no energy left in him to fight against the current. He succumbs to peer pressure and his fourth step towards Louis has him slip on ice, packed and hidden below fresher snow, and then he's on his ass.

Can somebody please start playing the world's smallest violin, just for him? Please.

Looking up at the man, he ponders springing some quip about having been firsthand witness to Louis getting pummeled by snowballs- it's been great- but even Tim can feel the longing of having his words taken for truth occasionally.

"Right," he tries, and Anti Life laughs at his fate, "I'll tell you, and you'll totally understand."

Louis's exasperation is at such highs that he just lets Tim fall without trying to catch him. His reflexes aren't that good anymore anyway. He sticks a gloved hand out to help him up. No one likes a wet frozen ass.

If Tim won't be forthcoming, Louis will hazard a guess, scrunching his face with incredulousness. (Even as he does, the preternatural smoothness of his skin only makes what lines do appear sharply defined like a cartoon.)

"Hormones??"

His eyelashes feel wet when he takes the offered hand; Tim shoves that aside, into a box, and he tells himself instead to get a pair of gloves. Louis is a sturdy man, Tim doesn't put his whole weight on him as he hauls himself up though.

He mumbles an uncharacteristically meek, "Thanks," and his mouth pulls down along with a narrow eyed look in the next moment. Instead of bristling, his shoulders hike up a fraction and Tim's blue eyes track the path ahead. Not Louis.

"Don't get gross about it," he says. Suggests.

What it is with old guys and sex he'd love to never know. But silence is... not helping him, not right now. Tim feels betrayed by it. He glances elsewhere and then he's intrigued by the ground, and so his sight stays down as they trudge on. "I'm not exactly dying to get noticed by girls, 'nyway," he confesses, and wow this is hard.

Louis bolsters him upward with the stability, if not brute strength, of someone accustomed to ushering the inebriated around his former club. He's not an Olympian, and there is a slimness to the details of his features that precludes brawn.

Louis is an old guy, but he holds back out of politeness and consideration. He resists quipping that teenagers are gross and smelly no matter what. At least Louis isn't Lestat, who likes to jump straight to the obscene for shock value.

"Oh they sure noticed you alright, unfortunately for you."

He could refrain from asking Tim what he means by that. That's prying, and it's the sort of question one doesn't ask in 1910-20-30s New Orleans, about whether a young man even likes girls. But Tim brought it up. Maybe it's just that he actually has a girl he's sweet on back home? Louis flicks his eyes at him sidelong, then away. He doesn't know how to ask, and he could be wrong in so many ways--and if he were right, it might hurt Tim anyway.

"Thievery, then?" he continues along the path of ridiculousness. "I'm goin' keep guessin' wrong until you tell me. Why break in?"

Helping Tim up did highlight something though. Louis tugs at each finger until his gloves are free. He holds them out to Tim with the long-suffering of someone used to a bit of chaos where someone else's accessories are concerned. A lost broach of some value, hair ribbons, a favored pen...

"Don't lose them, I want them back. They're my good ones." They're the best ones he could scavenge, anyway.

He takes the gloves, grateful in a way he hasn't been in a long time.

"Who says you're wrong?" He challenges. He wonders why he's like this. But it's the missing link that Tim had neglected and a wonderful alibi that meshes with his brand of desperation. "They advertised their guns. Weapons. They were all laid out, actually."

Louis buries his hands (and pointed nails) in his coat pockets for warmth. He should be able to see his breath in this cold, but he's a vampire and runs cool except when he's just fed.

"Yeah, ruthless uncarin' weapons smuggler, that's you. You busy stealin' weapons from people who are awake and alert, smart."

He doesn't believe him for a second. Maybe it's the pathetic way in which Tim was thrown out in the snow, protesting every bit of the way. Boy looked near tears. (Louis surreptitiously glances at him again, half afraid of the hammer of teen mood swings falling.)

He doesn't have mood swings.

Tim can feel eyes on him and he turns to make his point, met by green. It's always the green that makes him so agitated. "Stealing a look at the weapons," he clarifies. It's still a good cover and he's bound to grab for it another time.

He raises his eyebrows dubiously.

"Now, I don't claim to know every one of them well, but every lady with a weapon in this town has been all too happy to show it when asked, and even when not asked. I seen what Miss Wynonna's packin'."

Not a brag, judging by the way his shoulders hunch a little (from the cold, surely). Louis is not a man excited by guns or hot women, apparently, and prefers them not pointed at him.

"Ain't any looks worth stealin', except the gross ones you claim not to pursue. Quit lyin' to me, boy. It's tirin'."

And he does look tired, the tired curve to his shoulders such a human thing, like the rest of the human gestures he clings to out of habit. It's the weight of all his own damn lies on them.

Ah, and there it is. Wynonna's name brushes off some of that mask of Tim's; even Louis' skepticism goes thankfully in one ear and straight out the other because Tim smirks. He smirks like he's one heartbeat away from illumination and then his teasing is immediately too much for him; he turns away again and his lips rest as that neutral... downturn.

Give a little, get a lot.

Winnie's packing heat.

Got it.

Mister du Lac is then sounding like Jack, maybe, and Tim is feeling like

his freedom is so close. Always so close, always unattainable. To cross one line is to endanger several others getting erased and his morality is always a cement shade of gray. The noise of the party is already lost to the power of the natural soundproofing of snow. Tim opens his mouth--

closes it with a click of teeth.

Another look to Mister L and the weight of the night and his own demons accompanying him, and Tim figures he has to thank the man for gloves.

Has to pay him for the kindness of the gloves.

(He just wants to be believed,)

"You know how I'm paranoid?" he leads, bold in his charge. And Despair and Self Worth and Alienation begin to write the longhand of the equation of everything-- the proof of pointlessness is staggeringly simple. Tim's eyes harden. He stands taller, even, as if he'd somehow be able to prove himself-- formidable.

Give a little, get a lot.

Tim shouldn't be smiling about guns so easily. Wynonna's was scary-looking.

He throws him a crooked smile with too much teeth. A warning for Tim, who seems addicted to pressing recklessly on. At least Tim is leading with a truth this time.

"No, I couldn't tell." Wounded bird came crashing into his house shaking like those tiny little dogs, and if Louis didn't suffer his own anxieties, he'd wonder if Tim was on something. Being at the business end of his collapsible stick wasn't great either.

"Go on."

Forfeit is his right to bullshit in the face of the bullshitter.

Yet there's a soft ache to bury himself in comfort. Tim's eyes show vulnerability where his body doesn't, some yet undead part of his soul still searching and wishing to be understood though he knows he's alien to the world of humanity and he hasn't spoken the language of civilians in years. Tim shifts, his weight letting his boot sink a centimeter further into crunching snow. It isn't that he's stalling so much as

"I don't know what else I'm supposed to say," he says, and it's a tiny, detached sort of voice. A kid who did admit to stealing from the cookie jar. A sinner who's confessed to the Father.

And he knows there's some... more, expected of him and that he's failing to meet or even grasp, and it can't not feel like salt on an open wound when it's difficult enough to admit to delusion.

"You asked a question leadin' into what I thought was an explanation. So you're paranoid. I noticed. Why?"

There are times when Louis tries to exact something like contrition out of people. Maybe it's a Catholic thing. But there are other times when he just wants to know why a person does a thing, and he picks at it like a particularly difficult passage in a book.

"I'd ask if they teach that at ninja school, but you say you dropped out."

Tim swallows back the urge to explain, that is the explanation. Left with nothing but the fact that he's never voiced the idea before, that nobody has heard him say these things before, he's drowned in a shame that sparks hot color back into his face.

It's not paranoia if everyone is out to get you, is what the Riddler had piped up.

In his subconscious.

Because the Riddler is Tim's subconscious and he couldn't make this shit up if he tried.

His eyes light up with conviction, dim with hesitation.

First of all, it was ninja camp and not ninja school, and Tim has never been so out of practice with making words happen.

He's never told anyone, it's-- painful, and humiliating, and maybe exactly what he deserves for being such an ass. He says, "That's... just it."

It's irrational and wrong and harmful in every way (and that makes it, sometimes, good). A compulsion isn't what drives a detective to action. Not... usually.

"I get it in my head that every..."

Everything. Everyone. Everybody. Everything. Everything.

How can it not be in his head? He agreed with the equation. The self loathing is nothing new but it's rarely been written so loudly on his face. His guilty, stupid, deluded face.

"That something is going to happen. And I know it's better to be near, and try, than to be... out, and not get there until it's too late."

The weak ramblings of a crazy man, is all Tim hears.

GIRLS NIGHT, GIRLS NIGHT!

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cw brain washing up in here, bad self talk, paranoia and other mental health issues e t c

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