The Devil's Nest, Friday Evening

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

Technically the weather didn't effect Allie. Unless she focused on it, she didn't really feel the heat or cold any longer. That being said, cold, damp rain was still annoying, vampire or not.

After listening to Allie grumble, Tiny added a special to the board.

Irish Coffee 50% off.

It was a damn shame Allie couldn't drink one.

[La! OCD-free]

Comments

[filleauloup]

Because I have to Éponine wasn't impervious to the cold or the rain; she was just used to having to put up with it and so had learned not to care about the weather. (A drink or two helped with that too, admittedly.)

"You're in a mood tonight," she observed as she dripped her way to the bar. Pot, kettle; she was still in a fairly dark mood herself.

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"I hate feeling soggy," Allie admitted with a wry smile. "Stupid weather."

[filleauloup]

"It's a shame we can't have lovely sunny days all the time," agreed Éponine with a touch of sarcasm. "It's much nicer when one has someplace warm and dry to be when this happens, at any rate."

Which she did! She was oddly proud of that.

"I don't suppose I could have a coffee, at least? A regular one, mind."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"Believe it or not, I'm not the biggest fan of sunny summer days," she replied as she headed towards the coffee pot. "They make the nights too short. But you're right. Warm and dry is nice. I'll make my circuit around the island after I'm done here then I'll be in for the night."

[filleauloup]

"I think I like the night better myself, sometimes. I can never quite decide." Éponine picked up a napkin off the bar and proceeded to worry it into tiny, soggy bits between her fingers, something she was concentrating on far too fiercely. "If only because everything looks so different in the dark, and it's dreadfully interesting."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

Sometimes it's better to walk alone at night?

"At home night is dangerous. We'd usually go to ground and hide out. I had a room in an old, abandoned school." It was quite different the nice apartment she called home now. "Once the sun started going down, you were safer indoors. Now, here, it's quiet. Almost too quiet."

[filleauloup]

When everybody else is sleeping, yes.

"Yes, it's queer, how quiet it can be," agreed Éponine as she started in on a second napkin. "It's not safe at home at night, either, but I learned how to manage."

Montparnasse had taught her a few things, for one, and mostly it was people like her father that you had to worry about after dark.

In an overly casual tone she added, "I used to hide under the bridges. There were other people sleeping there, so it was usually safer."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"Take turns watching each others backs," Allie nodded. "We did the same, safety in numbers and all that. Even if we were a small group. It worked." Until it didn't.

[filleauloup]

"Something like that," Éponine said with a humorless little smile. "Only people weren't always willing to let you share their space for free."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

Allie's expression grew grim. "Lucas wasn't like that. But some of the other gangs...yeah, you had to earn your protection."

[filleauloup]

"How nice to know some things don't change," Éponine said sarcastically. "Of course, more often than not it was my father making the bargains, him and his friends."

She lapsed into a sullen silence, staring at the far wall and shredding the napkin in her hands more viciously, until she snapped out of it with a harsh laugh.

"Still, it's nice you managed to fall in with someone like Lucas."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"He took over, we were still young. Maybe twelve, thirteen, I guess," Allie said as she set the cup of coffee in front of the other girl. "The guy who'd been running things started demanding extra food for himself. Lucas said it wasn't fair and beat him down. After that, well I always earned my place. But it was more about what food I could bring in and not about warming someone's bed."

[filleauloup]

"Getting food, yes, Azelma was always better at that than I was," Éponine said -- murmured, more like, in a distracted tone that made it seem like she wasn't actually speaking to Allie. "She's still a kid, looks pitiful enough, especially when she cries, so people feel sorry for her. I was fourteen, when we came to Paris. It wasn't long after that when my father . . . well, now, I've made a mess on your counter."

Awkward non-segues were awkward.

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"Cleaning it up will give Tiny something to do." She wasn't phased by lack of segue. Awkward would have been trying to reply to what Eponine had implied without making things even more uncomfortable. It's not that Allie was innocent. She wasn't. You couldn't grow up in the Fringe without dealing with depravity on a regular basis, but hearing about it third or fourth hand was different then hearing about it happening to someone she knew.

[filleauloup]

Well, half of Éponine's function in any given social situation was to make it more awkward. Okay, maybe that was a slight exaggeration. Anyway, she seemed to realize she'd said more than she intended to and was now entirely focused on this new, lighter subject, asinine as it was.

"Is he impossible to deal with when he's entirely at loose ends?" she wanted to know.

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"No, but only because he's intimidated by Eric."

Everyone was intimidated by Eric.

[filleauloup]

Unless they had no sense of self-preservation.

. . . which explained why Éponine wasn't.

"Well, as long as that works," she decided. And reached for another napkin, because she needed to do something with her hands. "Still, it'd be a shame for him to be bored."