2020-01-22 - Closing Down

Easton has plans dammit. Don't these people know that he's meeting a girl after the bar closes? Granted he's not quite as anxious to meet up with Isabella for catching up as he was to book it out to meet up with Bennie the other night, but still. The raised hand just gets a "Nope!" response from the former Marine turned bar owner, Susie, the patron just looks confused as she puts her hand back down. "Bar's closing in ten! No more drinks. No more food! No more hope! Look on the time and despair." Easton is not drunk, but he's definitely feeling punchy.

He's behind the bar in his ever present bartending 'uniform' of a black dress shirt over jeans. He cashes out the last customer with a tab and pulls out his phone to fire off some texts while he waits for Isabella to show up, ignoring the patrons for now except to occasionally look up at them over the edge of his phone with a look that clearly states they've over stayed their welcome tonight.

When she arrives, it's with very little fanfare - but it must be a special occasion because Isabella Reede has come prepared to drink all the booze Easton can't drink. She is dressed in jeans and boots, as well as a baby tee under a leather jacket. Ultimately, however, it's the t-shirt that commemorates their reunion. Emblazoned across navy blue in white lettering is ALCOHOL: BECAUSE NO GREAT STORY STARTED BY EATING A SALAD.

"Easton Marshall!" she declares, pointing at him boldly from the doors. "I've come for my Glenlivet!" Ignoring the stares, she grins at the last of the reluctant regulars filing out, moving over towards the bar in quick steps. "And you, too, but I can't say that out loud and I'm too sober to start a proper scandal just yet." She sits down on a stool directly across from him, extending her arms out for an embrace. "Now hug me, damn it, and tell me how you've been!"

Easton Marshall

"Hot Scotch!" Easton calls back across the bar loudly, loud enough to startle the remaining customers. He shakes his head at them and says, "No. None for you." when Isabella declares her intentions on his scotch. He is pouring the scotch when Tina comes out of the kitchen with not, but two baskets of loaded tater tots. She sets them down on the bar and declares, "And I'm out!" Happy to deliver one last dish and leave the clean up to Easton who is actually sober enough that it might happen this time.

Easton slides the food aside to lean over the bar and hug her. "Hey! Glad you could make it."

"Wouldn't miss it." Isabella squeezes him as tightly as her comparably meager strength can allow, before easing away and taking an appreciative whiff of the loaded tater tots. "Oh, god. These are so bad for me. So...so...." She's already picking up a fork. "...so bad, but so good. I hate you, a little bit. Oh god..." And there it is, first bite of potato in years, right in her mouth. "And I say this out of tremendous affection. You're terrible for me. Something tells me you're a little proud of that though."

She settles further into the stool once the last have departed. "So how were the holidays? How's Bennie? Apparently she's staying with u-- in Alexander's house for a few days for detox?"

"Alright, you get to say that one more time and then you shut up and enjoy your tots." Easton did warn her that's a little grouchy and apparently he wasn't kidding, even if he's smiling when he tells her to shut up. He grabs a fork and digs into his with gusto, no reluctance what so ever, "If I can't drown myself in bourbon I'm gonna go with cheese, potato and bacon." He savors the first bite, even looking up to the ceiling in mock ecstasy.

"Bennie might relent on the alcohol thing if my abs get pudgy."

No that's not actually his plan, but he does realize she probably would cave.

"Holidays!" Easton looks weirdly unprepared for the question and gets a bit of a deer in the headlights look. "They.. went okay. I was away with Tom's widow and kid. It was ... nice." The fact that it was at times awkward and hard and had a big ol' Tom shaped hole in it is pretty easy to pick up on from his stuttering attempt at talking about it.

"Bennie is good. And ridiculously hot. And wait us? You shacking up with Clayton now?" He nods and says, "I heard about the detox plan. I think it might be best if I kept away during any particularly ugly parts least she tries and tear off any of my dangly bits."

"You never really told me about him," Isabella tells him as they proceed to dig into the basket of tots together. "Tom. I mean....I saw him at the funeral, but I didn't realize that you kept tabs with his family. They doing okay? I'm glad you got to see them and got the hell away from here for a while." Oh, god, potatoes and cheese and bacon. She seems to have completely forgotten about her reluctance to eat them when she's well on her way to polishing off her basket.

"Bennie is ridiculously hot, and it's just one of the reasons why I lost my shit when I thought Alexander was setting me up with a menage a trois with her," she grumbles but without heat. "A misunderstanding in the end, but come on! Anyway..." She coughs. "We're...not. Not really? It's largely out of necessity because he thinks that I'm not safe at my own place right now, and it makes him feel better to keep me close and so he can keep an eye on me. It's...sweet. And...I..." Where's her drink? She takes a good swallow of her scotch to lubricate the words. "...like it. Enjoy it? Coming back to him and watching him cook me dinner even if neither of us can cook. You know he made me a shipwreck ice sculpture while I was seeing doctors for my foot and ears? That man is out of control." She blusters, she grouses, but she's looking away awkwardly and swallowing scotch as fast as she can, unable to hide the clear color of pleasure on her features as she remembers.

"Besides, I'm here to talk about you! So spill. What did you two decide? What's happening there? And what is up with this bizarre living situation?"

Easton's eyebrows raise slightly at the fact that he hadn't talked to her about Tom. On the one hand he's surprised because sometimes it feels like he never shuts up. On the other he realizes that he tends to talk about anything but the important stuff. He shoves a tot in his mouth before looking at her drink longingly and easing over to a small fridge to pull a light beer out. "This doesn't count." He informs her matter of factly as he opens it and takes a sip. "But yea, Jenny and I were always close. And Doug's .. a mini-Tom. He's great. And terrible." He gets a fond whistful tone in his voice talking about them before admitting, "Holidays are tough." He takes another sip of the beer, which doesn't in anyway hit the spot, "How were yours?"

The news of a possible threeway causes his eyebrows to raise fully up but he feels like he would have heard about this by now if that were a thing. "Why aren't you safe at your place?" He frowns, stabbing a tot with a little extra vigor in obvious displeasure at that news. Too many people he cares about in danger makes him even more grumpy. But munching the tots helps, as does her cutely admitting that she likes living with Alexander. He just 'mmmhmmms' her statement about Alexander being out of control. He doesn't feel the need to call her out on glowing under the attention yet.

"Ok. Us. We are dating. But she hates my place because of the memories of us fighting and ... other stuff? Not sure. So I'm going to find her a place. Once we get some other life shit straightened out for the two of us."

At his eyebrows lifting, Isabella lifts her hands up. "Nothing happened. She was staying there and Alexander just didn't tell me. After that entire incident he asked me to trust him not to be an asshole, so I am." She flashes him a sheepish look. "Not exactly an old hat with this, so when I flew off the handle, I was all instinct. It didn't help that she was wearing next to nothing, but this was literally the day after you guys broke up so she was destroyed and she told us and that's how I found out. I felt...horrible. Thinking the worst when she was just there because Alexander was her friend. And....he didn't do anything wrong, he just forgot to tell me because we were...uh. Canoodling."

Canoodling??

"Anyway, I made you a promise. No talking about dark, dangerous, supernatural stuff - we can talk about all of that later." She takes a sip of her scotch as she listens to the much needed update, a wince of sympathy visible regarding the living arrangements. "Make sense, so that's why the detoxing is happening, then. I mean...I don't know if I wouldn't have reacted the same," she confesses. "But honestly that's what confused me about the entire thing. Last time we talked about this at length? You were desperate to get back to her...so what happened? Why...?" She gestures to the side. "Why do? What happened between our confessional and at that point that you decided to....I mean, you don't have to tell me." The last said hurriedly. "I'm not going to be pushy about it. I'm...just trying to understand, I guess. Honestly? When I found out, I was ready to open up the Nine Circles on you because I remember the look on your face when you agonized about never being with her again. It just...felt like self-sabotage, and it makes me sad and mad when I see my friends destroy themselves or whatever happiness they can grab in this terribly short life. But....I'm not perfect, E." Her smile turns rueful. "I've fucked up since then, and I've learned that maybe...people don't like getting their mistakes rubbed in their faces when they know they fucked up, and are hurting enough. After that, I decided I'm going to ask instead, first, when it happens."

She leans forward, nudging the basket of tots towards him. "So, I'm asking," she tells him, simply.

"Canoodling?!" Easton looks askance at the phrase, almost offended. He looks at her and says, "Were you mid-fucking when she walked in?" Who says canoodling? Is that some like girl code for coitus? He is calmed by the talk of exactly when this happened, he further grimaces at Alexander's promise not to be an asshole. "I need to figure that one out still. The not being an asshole bit."

The conversation takes a turn and it quiets him. He lets her ask though and isn't mad about it or upset. He does poke at the tots a little bit though as if considering the questions. He half-shrugs at the talk of her coming to lay into him when she found out.

"Okay."

She's asking

He looks down at his beer and picks it up for a swig. "Yea. So the whole funeral thing. I sacrificed Tom's ghost, because I thought I needed to move on. I thought it might help me in some ways, even if it hurt." He gives her a small smile and says, "I'm not dodging the question, I promise." He breathes out hard and says, "Tom wasn't just my best friend. We were more than that." He gives her a look, one that's obviously clear what he means. "And when I let him go.. again... it was a lot more than I thought." He eats a tot, though with considerably less gusto than before. "When Bennie and I got back together after the funeral she was skittish. We talked about it. You know. The handcuffs, the flinching it..." He realizes he's doing a shit job of trying to connect these thoughts. "Iz. I just needed to not feel like a fucking terrible person. And I get the irony in being an asshole to do that. But I couldn't handle her flinching when I kissed her suddenly or touched her without warning. I thought... I thought that was going to be our relationship for ever."

He takes another drink.

"I know that it doesn't excuse it. But ... I never got to fucking bury Tom. They buried him while I was in the hospital, I hadn't even regained conscientiousness yet. And I thought letting go of his ghost would help." He takes one more drink of the beer and quietly admits, "It didn't fuckin' help."

"Well...we were definitely getting there " Isabella says, clearly growing more awkward as she relives the moment of the not-threesome. "The shirt was off and...anyway, like I said, canoodling!" She releases a breathless laugh, and tosses a crusty bit at him from her side of the bar. "Shut up and leave me to my euphemisms like a respectable young woman of good breeding, god fucking damn it!"

She must be getting into the scotch, and quickly, swirling the rich amber liquid around her glass. "He tries. He doesn't always succeed in not being an asshole, but he doesn't want to hurt me...has said it repeatedly, even though we both acknowledge that he probably will, and I'll probably hurt him also. But..." She exhales a breath. "I love him, and I'm crazy about him, and I figured since I feel all these things, I owe it to him to believe him when he says that. Maybe it's because I'm new at this, and I'm young enough and inexperienced enough to be naive about it...but I'm willing to put some faith in what we have."

She watches him carefully when he looks down at his beer, listening quietly. Unlike other Mentalists and emotionally-developed acquaintances, Empathy does not come easily to her due to age and the simple fact that she's terrible with feelings, with her tendency to default to what's familiar no matter how ill-fit it is to the situation. But she is clearly making an effort to understand for the sake of a friend, to catch up on years of growth that travel and ambition have coaxed her to ignore.

"I didn't know that," she says after a long moment of silence. "About Tom. And...no, it doesn't excuse it at all." She is straightforward when she says it, meeting his darker eyes. "But after hearing it I'm not so sure if that's not wholly understandable, either. When Alexander was at his worst with me...with his phobia, I forced it a lot. Made jokes about it. I tried to find whatever excuse I could just to get him to touch me, without having any context for the root of it at all and...I was largely motivated because it was personal. To me. I took it personally because I liked him and was intensely, inexplicably attracted to him and if he couldn't stand touching me, it must mean there was something wrong with me. I know...how awful that makes a person feel."

She takes a solid swallow of her drink. "I'm usually fine with rejection. The prospect of it never scared me, it's that...sense...that you're somehow deplorable and irredeemable in some fashion that gets you. I'm...sorry, E. It's awful that you felt that way, and that at the time it felt so heavy that the only way to get out from underneath is to vent it out, no matter what form it took. Feeling trapped sucks. Did...you tell Bennie all of that? When you talked?"

Easton grins as she admits further at what point the two of them were interrupted. "Niiice. I am absolutely picturing Bennie walking in on you shirtless grinding on him by the way. Just in case that wasn't clear." He laughs even harder when she tries to protest about wanting to be respectable.

"Alexander's a good dude." Easton knows that she knows this. Obviously. "When we first met I couldn't get over how much he reminded me of guys I've met since I got out of the corps though. Same look in his eyes, same twitchiness, some of 'em even with the avoiding physical touch." He has always thought of Alexander as a veteran of a different type of combat. "But, I don't think you're making a mistake in trusting someone you love, who loves you."

Easton still sucks at any of the emotional tricks of the trade with Glimmer. He's rarely successful in putting a finger on his own emotions, it's usually either lock down mode or drown it with booze mode. It doesn't give him a lot of time for introspection, and that's the way he's preferred it. That hasn't lent itself well to identifying the emotions of other people with any accuracy.

"It's one of the things I loved about Bennie, how she just took over my space. She didn't give me any room to breath, just pushed herself right in resolutely claimed every part for herself. It was amazing and it woke me up and then .. the Gohl shit and it was gone. And it hurt." He growls out a frustrated breath and then finishes off the last of his tots. "But I think you get what I'm saying. It started to fuck with my head. And in the past, I woulda had Tom." He looks at her with a dark smirk and says, "Too fuckin' bad Geoff's straight. Woulda made all this a lot easier. Bennie and I both agreed Turner's our hallpass."

"But yea. We talked about all this. And she's.." He looks a little hesitant to admit, "We're trying something a little different. A little more open. At least in the uh.." He stops trying to explain and lights a cigarette. Yes, in the bar where it's not allowed. No he doesn't care.

"She says she's okay if I need to go fuck a dude or two. I don't know how that works and frankly I'm not all that interested right now. But.." He lets out a long exhale, "She's the fuckin' best that she's gonna at least try to be okay with it."

"Easton Marshall, I simply don't think I'm drunk enough for this sort of talk!" Isabella says, putting on the best Downton Abbey tone and facade she can muster, turning her nose up and looking down at him along the bridge. But when mirth cracks his facade, she grins broadly at him and wiggles her fork before stabbing it right back into the tots. "You're impossible."

His reassurances are taken in stride, swallowing her scotch as she looks up at him, there's a quiet smile when he reiterates what everyone already knows: Alexander Clayton is a good man - flawed, but overall, inherently good, and there's a part of her that will always continue to hope that he'll believe that himself one day. But she says nothing else along that vein. Instead:

"I'm not going to lie to you, E," she tells him after a pause. "I'm young, and really new at this stuff, but I know enough about myself to know that's not going to fly with me. I'm too jealous. I was pretty clear with Alexander about that, before, and I told him flat out that if that ever changes...if I'm ever not enough for him anymore, he'll let me know before anything else happens. I'm definitely not saying go back to the way you were, because that clearly didn't work, and I definitely believe you when you say that you're not all that interested at the moment because you're determined not to ruin your third chance with someone whose love you clearly value, and the prospect of a life together with her. But I think...definitely not focus on that and concentrate on being together first. And..."

She lifts her brows at him. "...is she going to do the same? Be with girls if she wants? I mean, Bennie's her own woman, and she definitely loves you enough to try, but...I don't know. I mean, are you absolutely sure that she's telling you that because she wants to try being okay with it, or because she thinks you need it so much that she would rather nurse whatever hurts she's not communicating to you just so you'd be happy?"

As if in answer to Isabella not being drunk enough Easton pours her another round. He sticks to his one light beer and cigarette for now though. Being good. Kind of. Less bad maybe?

"I'm incorrigible, it's different." He protests.

Easton nods as she expresses many of the thoughts he's had about the whole thing. And while he seems to have a lot of people around him in more open relationships or casual things he isn't exactly all on board with anything just yet. "I know." He nods and says, "I don't know why she's offering. I don't know if she feels bad about it? Or just wants to try and be supportive or... fuck, I don't know. I'm worried she's just scared to lose me so she's going to sacrifice this just so I'll stay?" He takes a drag and leans his head back to exhale straight up, "She's lost everything. I don't want to hurt her." And yet?

"If she wanted to pick up lady friends though, I'd be totally down with that outcome. So long as it was just hot woman on woman action that was occasionally photographed or witnessed?" He means it when he says it. And he hopes that's how she feels about him possibly sleeping with other guys. But it's a fraught topic and not one he feels prepared to really dig into just now.

"I want her to be happy Iz. Like. Genuinely, fucking happy."

It's different.

"Sure it is," Isabella says, with all the sage, drawling gravitas of someone who clearly does not believe it. But she does wink at him, and takes a solid swallow of her glass.

Propping her chin on one hand, and giving the empty basket of tots on her side of the countertop with a wary eye - she's probably groaning inwardly at all the running she's going to try and do if her ribs cooperate, she watches the bartender directly across from her, expression thoughtful and pensive. He can practically see her turning the situation in her head, approaching it like her myriad of impossible problems, as if it had originated from a completely different planet. She does nod at what he says, because she would be having those same thoughts also.

In the end, it's the last that's the clincher, to her. She smiles at him, half of it hidden against the heel of her palm.

"Then I think you should keep fighting for what you want, and what you want to have," she tells him quietly. "Don't even worry about other bodies right now, because the only thing you're really certain about is that you love her, and you want her, and want to be with her - it won't fix everything, mind, but it's a very solid start, and it's not insignificant." She gestures to him at that. "And who knows? Once you guys get through the rough patches of restarting, you might find that you might not even need her offer, or even remember it or care about it or want it."

"I know."

He knows that he's getting tripped up on her offer. It's different and it's unexpected and it's a lot to consider but it's also kind of besides the point.

"I want to be with her." He reiterates this both to himself and to Isabella. He nods at her and says, "That's some solid advice there Miss. Reede." He nods at her appreciatively. The light beer is finished, but he doesn't crack another so that's good.

"I started trying to talk to a therapist again. I think..." He sighs and says, "I need to sort out this Tom shit before it drowns me." The fact that his issues would 'drown' him is an interesting choice of words on his part. Partially connecting them to his drinking that he's obviously trying to work on. A little hint of thoughts of self-harm in there too though.

"And you're fuckin' welcome. For making you try the tots."