nothing ever absolutely has to happen

[trouvaille]

WHO: Gwen Wynne-York & Alfie Solomons.
WHERE: His place, Maurtia Falls.
WHEN: Aroundish now, an evening.
WHAT: A spontaneous visit.
WARNINGS: May contain discussion of medical treatments, cancer. Their personalities.

When Alfie answers his door, Gwen holds up a bottle of scotch and a paper bag that smells like it contains food that she more than likely paid for and did not cook. It's hard to tell if these are intended as offerings or as a preemptive protest against having the door closed on her, since she didn't call ahead—

“I was...not in the neighbourhood,” upon reflection, because she definitely can't sell that and isn't going to try to, “I was trying to decide what I wanted for dinner and I thought, you know, it'd be nice to have company, and then I thought, who do I know who almost certainly doesn't have any plans, and I did actually think of a couple of people,”

but Bruce might actually have plans, just not ones that involve socializing or, like, smiling at people,

“but I decided you were my favourite.”

Or the least likely to tell her to fuck off.

Comments

[trouvaille]

He's not wrong, which is inconvenient in that it means she doesn't immediately have a smart answer for him.

“You didn't tell anyone I can mind control people,” she says, after a moment. It doesn't really pertain to anything except the logical leaps that had led her to think he'd be an appropriate confidant—already a keeper of what she's willing to acknowledge is something somewhat troubling about her, and rather more experienced in the realm of doing crimes.

An effort to apply logic to just trusting him, more than she actually trusted the man in black, in retrospect—

though she'd liked it, that he involved her in things. That he talked to her and took her seriously—she liked the attention. It's that thought that she keeps circling, not entirely comfortable with the implications, contrasting it with the secrets she's recently been entrusted with. The attention she doesn't want to admit she likes, when she keeps coming back and circling it, picking it apart in different conversations with anyone else.

[devoutish]

"I didn't, no," he says, eyes still closed. The food is great, but he's exhausted; he needs a short break even just from lifting a fork to and from his mouth.

"This man who took you on a drunken heist adventure, was he an imPort?"

[trouvaille]

“Yeah. He's gone, now.”

Probably for the best no matter which way it's sliced—she's a little wistful, all the same. “He was responsible for that bum statue Merlotte was so hot and bothered about,” she carries on, in an upbeat tone that mostly disguises the thing her face does when he keeps his eyes closed—normal, probably, right?

He's not well.

She pokes her salmon around her plate, eats some of it.

[devoutish]

"Mm. Young? Inexperienced? With new superpowers, most likely, that he was itching to try out?" His reasoning for these guesses is that someone experienced and wise would have picked a better heist partner than a drunk Gwen.

[trouvaille]

All perfectly reasonable conclusions to make based on the evidence, and the way she laughs (quiet, musical) is knowing. Yeah, that'd make sense, wouldn't it.

“Old,” she says, shaking her head, “like, Methuselah in the face old enough to be your grandfather probably. He never said if the superpowers were from here or from home; I didn't like to ask.” It seems like (to her, at least) sort of a personal question to approach someone with, unprompted; she wouldn't have cared to explain herself, early on.

What with how she'd been lying actively about it, but nevermind that.

“He was like—there's this actor, at home, he's been doing it for like, ever. He's done all the Shakespeare, he's got a knighthood, he's been around the block, all of that, and he takes all kinds of jobs, you know? Like he's done everything and he's bored and he's not so worried about his artistic reputation, he'll do some nonsense for a lark if it sounds fun. I think it was more like that, but like, substantially more violent. He'd been building his company, he worked really hard, he was involved in the import community—I knew him because I did freelance for him, I managed some of his charitable projects. He was a model upstanding citizen. Also, he robbed banks and fucked with people.”

[devoutish]

"Mmmm." A thrill-seeker, then. Someone who didn't care about consequences, and likely didn't care much about the reward beyond the rush he got from the robbery. "That sort's dangerous, you know - to themselves, to those around him. That sort never knows when to stop."

He pops his eyes open, finally. On second thought, he'll give her a genuine answer, rather than picking out the most sensational stuff he's done just to shock her. "Yeah, I've committed crimes. Never robbed a bank, though; you've got me there. Mostly I've sold things I shouldn't've been selling without a business license for it. Owned weapons without a firearms certificate - I do not have a firearm certificate, because of my intemperate habits. Shot men with those weapons, or had them shot by other people."

[trouvaille]

William Walker did not strike her, she concedes in the privacy of her own head, like a man with an off-button. She thinks Alfie's probably right in the same breath as it'd be nice to see him again, and then she lets the segue happen because it's interesting and doesn't require as much self-examination.

He is aware of her feelings about self-examination.

“My godfather got shot once, getting his brother out of the sort of trouble that gets people shot,” she recalls, taking a drink. “He told me about it this one time, it was all gambling and getting in over his idiot head. He'd think the world of you, probably, but he's not a real criminal, he just has this idea in his head of what it'd be like. Whereas Uncle Seven just seems to regard the law as like, a quaint thing that happens to other people and is sometimes useful. You know, you can call the police, but it's probably going to be neater and quieter to just handle things oneself.”

In other words, Septimus is a very wealthy man.

[devoutish]

Gambling and getting in over his head. That sounds familiar to Alfie, and he can't quite place why for a moment - it's a hazy, drunken sort of memory.

"Dess...?" he asks, not totally sure if he's remembering right. "That's the one who'd like me?"

[trouvaille]

“Yeah,” after a brief pause, and less hesitant. “Decimus. Beauchamp. He's my godmother's husband, my godfather's brother.”

She doesn't remember mentioning him, she thinks—has she told this story? Or, and some part of her thinks 'more likely' and then thinks 'what the fuck is my life any more', is it that memory bullshit again, because she's not going to forget the thing with the goat in a hurry. That she didn't remember, exactly, because the memory isn't hers, just like anything containing Decimus Beauchamp is soundly unlikely to be Alfie's.

She takes a very ladylike drink of scotch. Says, “He's a twat,” but fondly.

[devoutish]

"Oh, he can't be all that bad," Alfie says lightly, his eyes drifting shut again. "He has good taste, doesn't he."

[trouvaille]

“You should see his wife,” on that note, because Prisca Beauchamp is a stunner by any measure and to anyone who hasn't seen them at their most scheming and theatrical together it is a bit of a mystery as to how he pulled that one off. It's because, Gwen has realised, they are as bad as each other.

(She loves them both very much.)

[devoutish]

"Mm. Describe her to me."

[trouvaille]

“Tall,” she says, after a moment where she'd considered pointing out that if he opened his eyes she could just show him— “like, five ten, I think? And she wears high heels, so she's over six foot most of the time, I've only ever seen her in heels or bare feet. She probably has shoes to work out in, but you'll never see my aunt Pris out and about in athleisure.”

The way her voice softens with fondness is easy, familial, wistful; she misses her terribly.

“Her hair's—I was going to say it's like mine, but it's more like I wear mine like hers. Hers is long and dark and she has that sort of wave naturally, mine's curly if I leave it to its own devices.” Which: she doesn't. “Hazel eyes. She's more tan, all year round, sort of golden. High cheekbones—always smiling. She was quoted in some article about high flying socialites, like, before I was born, saying how she planned to live in sin with a priest, but she married Uncle Dess and in the announcement about it she said she'd just never been able to find a man of the cloth who could compete. My father nearly got into a fistfight at the wedding with her sister-in-law's husband—I sort of remember but I was all of about four so I think I just assembled memories out of the pictures and how they talk about it—and she pushed Uncle Dess into the champagne fountain to distract everyone. Worked, too.”