2019-07-29 - First Date

The diner is pretty dead right now. Everyone is still out drinking, dancing, so on, and so forth. Blake is settled in a booth, his ever present backpack next to him, closest to the window. He's huddled over his placemat mouthing out the bear facts as he turns it around.

"Sweetheart, you ready to order?" The waitress doesn't actually sound friendly, but harried and well past the end of a sane shift. She taps a pen on the end of her pad as she waits through Blake's silence. "Hon? You okay? Are you waiting for someone? You want me to call someone?" she finally asks, taking a step back.

Blake looks up at the waitress, confusion swimming through his gaze. "Call someone? No."

The bell above the door rings as Zoiya enters, her walk a swaying dance in itself. She has the remnants of body glitter splashed all over her inked form, her outfit brief and revealing. An off-shoulder frilly pale green cotton crop top and a pair of jean shorts, distressed beyond all belief. She's tall to begin with, so she only wears heels on stage, right now she's wearing a pair of flat sandals, the leather laced up to the ankle. She waits for a hostess, sees none, so she makes her way further in to plop down in a booth, it's almost directly across from Blake. One of the reasons being, the waitress is right there and getting her order taken might not be such an ordeal. She watches the waitress ask her questions, rolls her eyes and pulls a menu from the middle of the table.

"Oh, yeah. Hey," Blake suddenly tries to lock eyes with the newcomer when she comes into view, so opportunistically near enough for him to pretend he'd been waiting for her. There's a look of mild desperation in his eyes, like he might be trying to send some kind of telepathic signal (but he's not, is he? He wouldn't know). Please. Please. "You made it."

"You were waiting for her?" This seems normal and seems to already put the waitress a little more at ease. "You're here to watch after your boyfriend?" she asks Zoiya. "He seems like he might be on something. A little out of it." Yep, talking about him right in front of him. The staff in this place is a real piece of work.

"She is. And she'll have whatever she wants," Blake says quickly.

Zoiya glances up, and then between, Blake and the waitress. The desperate look isn't missed, and neither is the offer of food. She gets to her feet, shoulders past the waitress to take a seat across from Blake. She decides how far she wants to take this game, turning to stare down the waitress. "He's old enough to watch out for himself. First off. Secondly, don't pretend you didn't come over here to try to hit on him. I smell the stink of desperation wafting off of you, it's not a good look. I'll take a Coke while I decide how hungry I am. Don't spit in my drink." Waitress forgotten, she turns toward Blake. "How you doing honey."

He may be old enough to watch out for himself, but Blake has clearly been placed as not being the one wearing the pants in this situation...and he doesn't give a fuck. He just looks up at the waitress with an angelic tiny grin as Zoiya tears her a new one. "I want a milkshake, strawberry, chocolate if you don't have it. And I want time to read the bear facts."

A burning squint is aimed at Zoiya, but she doesn't dare interrupt the woman. Her nostrils flare slightly before her eyes flash away from Zoiya to Blake, and then she turns on her heel.

"Better. Thank you," Blake says softly when he leans forward to /obviously conspiratorially talk about the waitress/, she's sure of it. "It's just not every day you end up at a place with bear facts...and....all this. Last time I was here, I didn't get to read them." Is he serious? Well, he's no longer reading them.

Zoiya doesn't see the squint, she already dismissed the waitress so she ceased to exist, even if Blake is ordering from her. "Milkshake sounds good, maybe I'll get one with my food." She opens the menu, scanning the bear facts for a few seconds before the food gets her attention. "No problem, honey. You can tell me the good facts if you find any." Her hazel eyes lift to study Blake for a few beats after he's done speaking. Clearly she doesn't judge weird, she works in a strip club. "So I usually eat like a ..bear.." She pauses, eyebrows raised to see if he gets the joke, before putting her attention back on the menu. ".. after work, so what is the limit of your generosity for my help?"

"None yet," Blake reports. "Unless you really like puns. Like, really like puns." Blake grins softly when he isn't immediately dismissed, even if his new accomplice is probably just in all of this for the free food. "Then we came to the right place," he says as he lifts up his menu...covered in bears like everything else. For a moment, it's bear-ception. There's bears in the background, bears in the foreground, bears closing in from the sides. If one stares close enough, hard enough, and long enough, some secret message from the illuminati will surely reveal itself. "Like I said. Whatever you want."

"Not very punny unless I'm high off my ass. Even then? Bad puns." Zoiya frowns down at the menu, and then cuts her eyes toward the counter. They're being watched, there is not a Coke and a milkshake in her hands. The muscles in her jaw jump as she clenches her teeth, but the tone of her voice is syrup and honey. "We're getting thirsty over here sweetheart, you want a tip, right?" She meets the waitresses gaze and holds it, the other woman looking away first. "Christ, you'd think they hadn't seen a loving couple in here or something." She is louder than she needs to be, but what fun is it if you're good all the time. None.

The waitress finally arrives with the drinks. She sets them down politely, places straws on the table and asks what the pair would like. "I'll take a cheeseburger. Lettuce on the side, bacon on it. French fries, one of those milkshakes. Cherry sounds good." She cants her head, considering. "Apple pie for dessert." She gives Blake a brief look, nudging him under the table with her toes. "What'll you have, sweetheart?" She might have noticed that his attention drifts.

"I think she's used to getting shitty tips," Blake says with a shrug, not as loud as Zoiya. Then he leans forward to confide, "I might have annoyed them the first time I was in here. I demanded...water." For shame. He says this completely deadpan with that intense, earnest look of his.

Blake's attention shifts down to his menu again and sure enough, as if she is intimately familiar with his nature, Zoiya prompts him out of a momentary reverie or something. "Oh. Um. Fries. Cheesy fries. Real cheese. Not that ballpark nacho sludge. Thanks. I'll figure out dessert later." Much to the waitress' dismay. She's going to have to sit through his absentmindedness /again/?

Blake waits till the waitress is off again, out of earshot. "You do some kind of work that takes a lot out of you?"

Zoiya watches the waitress leave and then she turns to grin at Blake. "You demanded water? What kind of fucking guy does something shitty like that?!" She might seem serious for a whole fraction of a second before she breaks out laughing, putting the menu away. "Yeah, I'm a stripper. Three dances, plus two lap dances and a few table shimmies. I'm ready for food, fucking and then bed. At least one of those is negotiable." There is a noise near the counter, the waitress looks scandalized, and a little old lady looks like she just lost her dentures in her water.

Zoiya turns toward the eavesdropping pair, because they're not talking all that loudly anymore, and stares. The pair at the counter stare back. "Some. Body. Bout. To. Get. Clapped. Tonight." She claps with each word, and she doesn't look friendly. They finally look away and she turns back in her seat, rolling her eyes. "Hit me with a bear pun, at this point, I need it."

"Fuck. That's a lot of dancing. How long are your shifts?" It's not every day Blake can talk to a stripper about the ins and outs of the job and not get slapped. There's still time for that though. "Naw. How is sleep ever negotiable? If I hear it calling, I'm out." Can't miss that opportunity.

Blake glances back when the dentures make that little cartoonish splash noise, a perfect drop. He frowns slightly and then looks back to Zoiya after she's done warding off the jerks. "What is a polar bear's favorite band?"

"How I stay in shape, baby." Zoiya leans back against the uncomfortable booth chair, doing what she can to make it comfortable enough for her meal. "I was there for about six hours tonight, half of that in heels." She puts one foot up on the bench seating, her eyes shifting from Blake to the counter. No eyes on them, finally. "Sleep isn't the negotiable one, like you, once my head hits the pillow fuck everything else. I need to be bright eyed and bushy tailed for tomorrow night. Weekends are killer."

She takes a deep breath, putting actual thought into this joke. Her head tilts back so she can regard the ceiling as her eyes narrow into slits. "I have no fucking clue. Tell me. This should be good."

"Your job is much harder than mine. I wouldn't last two minutes in heels." Blake'd probably fall and break his neck, surely. He looks back to the counter after Zoiya does. "Finally," he takes mutters through a deeper breath.

"Weekends? Yeah." Blake tries to keep up the normalcy of their pacing, remaining conversational, but he sort of falls into a bit of quiet again until she takes the bait. "Seal." Did she tell him her name? Blake's eyes flit to the side as he tries to remember.

Neither of them offered a name, two strangers out on a date. How odd. "What kind of job do you do? Hope you make decent tips because I think you just threw about fifteen bucks to the wind for my food." Zoiya shifts her eyes toward the counter, she's keeping an eye on that waitress. She doesn't want a befouled milkshake. "You ever been in a strip joint?" She turns those bright hazel eyes back on her date, her fingers starting to drum out a beat on their table. "If the answer is no, wanna?"

The joke is answered and it takes a moment for her to get it, and when she does, she gets to her feet. She fings her arms out dramatically, singing slightly off key, "Baby, I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the grey. Ooh, the more I get of you, the stranger it feels, yeah." She pauses, glances around and then clears her throat as she retakes her seat. "Not a bad joke, little less angry about the waitress now."

"I don't make tips. I work on computer stuff." Blake might be learning how to stumble through these conversations finally, or he's given up. "I'm between jobs though. Fifteen bucks won't hurt me." He lets Zoiya keep an eye on their food making.

"No." Blake's brow creases at the question. Does she want to go back to work? "Sure." He starts to stare out the window as Zoiya tries to grasp the punchline. He must be used to things like this not taking off. He doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in his ability to entertain. The off singing brings him back down to earth. "Good. Are you going to take me to the strip club? Is that what we do? You take me to your work then I take you to mine?"

"Computer stuff." Zoiya looks interested, leaning against the table as Blake mentions he's in between jobs. "You sure? I made quite a lot in tips tonight, you'd be surprised how much people will pay you for shaking your ass in their face." She has a pocket full of various bills, it was a good night. She listens to his question, rests her elbows on the table, her chin on the back of her hand. "I'll take you to the strip club, if you want to go. Tomorrow night is gonna be busy, but I can get you in the VIP section where you can chill and get a good look at the action on stage." The waitress approaches with plates so she leans back, pulling her silverware toward her. "You're between jobs, so where would you take me?" She is genuinely curious about that, her eyes settling on his face to wait for a response.

Blake tilts his head a little. "Yeah. I'm sure. You helped me out. It's cool," he says with a slight up-nod. "I'm not really one for crowds. Will they let me listen to my own music?" He reaches down and lifts up a loose earbud, waggling it for emphasis.

"To the motel I'm staying at. I setup my desktop. I'm stealing power from the room next door. Probably only a little time before I get kicked out anyways, or they ask me for help. I can show you what I did to their internet."

"Crowds get to be a problem there, VIP room is usually quieter, you can hear the music from the main stage, but if you wanted to tune it out with your own.." Zoiya gestures to the earbuds, shrugging as a relaxed smile quirks her lips. The plates are sat down and Zoiya checks her hamburger, the lettuce, the fries and she eyes the milkshake. She seems satisfied with the scrutiny of her food, turning to Blake's. She picks up one of his fries, eyes the cheese, takes a bite and waves the waitress away. "You earned your tip tonight. Get lost."

Again, with the dismissal she's not going to pay anymore attention to the righteous indignation of the waitress, a bark of laughter escaping her lips. "There aren't many motels in this shithole town, we're probably at the same place. I've been looking for a place to stay. Haven't had much luck yet. You staying at the hotel for keeps?"

"Oh. Okay. Will getting me into the VIP get you in trouble?" Blake presses his lips together when the waitress sets down their food. He watches as Zoiya thoroughly inspects everything, and even becomes his temporary fry-taster. "Not poisoned?"

Blake waits, folding his arms and tilting his head a little as if waiting to see if she drops dead or buckles over in pain. "Don't plan to. I need a more secure place to work, with better internet. I haven't had luck either. I think I will just move into some place someone got murdered. I heard there were a few of those recently." He reaches out to snag two fries and drops them into his mouth, shoving in the remainder to make it all one bite. At least he isn't shoving in more than he can handle. It's more of a logistical fix than anything. It's the fries fault for being too long.

"Not in the least. Free lap dances might push it, so you might need to pay for those." Is Zoiya kidding, teasing? Probably, oh and she's also not dead. "Nope, not poisoned, it's safe for you to eat." She shakes out her napkin, putting it in her lap before she picks up a french fry to dip it into her milkshake. She takes a bite and nods, pleased, before she picks up a knife to cut into her burger.

"Dude." Her hamburger cutting is paused as he mentions moving into a place where people got murdered. "Okay, I need to unpack this. Are you talking about just moving in once the police are done until someone shows up to either sell the place or live in it. Or are you looking for a place for rent where someone died?" She narrows her eyes, shoving another one of her own french fries in her mouth as she waits to find out the juicy details.

"It is a business," Blake says with a shrug. "I'll come prepared...kind of. I'll...I'll bring money." Augh. Fries. Mouth. Right about now Blake's questioning why he isn't back in his motel room, clackety clacking the evening away.

"Is there a difference? Whatever is available first at the right price. No one comes round murder places. Suicides too I think, but murder places the landlords have to let you know someone died there." Blake shrugs. "Need to be creative when you're on a budget."

Zoiya takes a bite of her hamburger as Blake explains exactly what he means about murder and suicide rentals. She doesn't comment, because it's just a little bit creepy. She digs into her food like she's starved or hasn't eaten all day. She picks up some fries, dips them, eats them. Takes another bite of hamburger, sips at her milkshake. She shifts her eyes over at Blake every so often to make sure he's okay, and then once the hamburger is half gone, she takes a long pull from her milkshake and sits back. "If you find anything, let me know. I need out of that hotel, too noisy." She doesn't comment on his being prepared, he sounds nervous, best not to aggravate that any more than she already has.

"I mean, I'd go low rent but there are too many families. Too many kids and shit you know?" Blake can notice when someone talkative stops talking. When he might have triggered something in them. The variables change as if everything is just a little bit off kilter.

"Did I freak you out?" Blake asks with a worried press of his lips. "What...What sort of place are you looking for? Looking to split the rent or live on your own or...?"

Zoiya shudders visibly at the mention of kids, making a face like someone stepped in shit. She picks up her milkshake, sips hard on the straw before she answers him. "Yeah. I'm not a fan of kids. At all." She leans in, sets down her milkshake and shakes her head. "You didn't freak me out, you're fine." She crosses her legs, running an inked hand down over her stomach, considering. "I'm looking for a place I won't break the bank living at, cleanish, and if there is noise there needs to be a party going on that I can join in on. I'd prefer to split the rent, because I forget shit if I'm on my own, and I don't want to lose an arm and a leg paying full out for everything. Gets dicey."

"It's not their fault they are annoying. It's a serious affliction," Blake says in deadpan. "You think it'd be moving too fast for us to move in after our first date?" he teases with light inflection as if considering what the seventh place of pi would be, cracking a grin just barely a moment later.

"I will keep an eye out for you. You forget shit? Like what kinds of shit?"

"I firmly believe that the little shits don't have a soul until they're at least six, and even then their grip on sanity has to be tenuous." Zoiya regards Blake seriously, staring at him as she considers his words. She picks up her milkshake, keeping the light scrutiny on him until she sets down the shake, glances around to see if anyone is lingering again to listen to their conversation. "Fuck me. What even is your name?" She starts to laugh, almost knocking over her milkshake as she realizes that they've almost had an entire meal, talked about some weird shit, and never introduced themselves. "Uh, like.. sometimes I get high and forget that food is a thing I need. Bills are always due, and I never remember the fucking dates. Just me being a flake when it comes to life, if I don't have a keeper the electricity is turned off and then I'm lost on how to fix it."

"That might be a dangerous viewpoint. They could gang up on you. You know those wild packs of kids can be brutal." In the lull, as Zoiya scrutinizes him, Blake reaches out to pull his shake in closer and uses the straw like a spoon as the thick liquid sticks to the sides. "Oh yeah. That happens. I just set up everything on autopay. What's your poison?" he asks curiously before trying to transfer more shake into his mouth. "I cook sometimes. I can make pancakes and stuff."

"I'll get arrested then for kicking a kid's ass, or punting them." Zoiya considers his question and then after a few minutes, and a few fries later, she answers. "I like chili. Haven't had it in forever. Probably should have ordered some tonight." She leans forward, holding out her hand. "Mae. What's your name, and if you don't tell me, I'm gonna make one up." The look on her face, she might not make it a nice name. "Also, put your number down here, because I need to go sleep here soon, and my luck -- I'll never see your ass again." She slides a napkin toward him, setting down an eyebrow pencil next to it.

"What would you call me?" It's pure curiosity. Blake looks down a the hand and then reaches out to take it, putting his free hand on top to enclose her's for a moment. "Blake." Then he releases her hand. He looks down and takes the pencil. Knowing it's not going to work, he simply tears off a part of the paper placemat and scribbles down his number, signed '-Blake Seal Bears'. Is he really making a joke or is he just trying to remind her of where she met him? He slides it back. "Just. Remind me where I met you. Send me a text before you forget me. I probably won't remember your name." Her? Yes. Who knows, they could be ending up in the same place tonight, already neighbors, but Blake doesn't press to walk her anywhere. He pulls out his wallet and drops the money on the table. "I may forget to answer though. I'll see it eventually."

"Boyfriend." Zoiya responds, taking the piece of paper, tucking it into her bra. She listens to his instructions, motioning for a container to pack her leftovers, including her untouched pie. "No problem. I'll text you tomorrow, see if you're still up for the strip club, if you're not, I'll understand." She plucks a large stack of bills from her back pocket, adds five to the pile for the bitch of a waitress, getting to her feet. The money is tucked away, one hand on the table as she leans in. "Thanks for dinner. I'll be in touch."

The nickname earns a soft chuckle that reaches Blake's eyes more than his throat. "Kay." Then he smirks at the 5 added to the pot and slip his wallet back into his pocket. "She got lucky." He seems nonplussed by the stack of bills. Strippers deal in cash. He looks up as she leans in. "Be safe. Sleep well Mae." He remembered her name this time and maybe using it will help him remember when he gets some seemingly random text tomorrow. He'll wait and watch her as she's walking away outside, then grab his backpack to start getting on his way too. He pokes at his phone as he walks. 'Mae. New friend? She helped me not get kicked out of that bear place. Tattoos. Stripper. Invite to her club tomorrow.' Remember. Keep remembering. Remember. As he walks he slips into a much more relaxed gate and begins to look up at the stars.