2020-07-26 - Rehearsal

One of the godsends about a new building like the casino is absolutely perfect air conditioning. It's neither bone-chillingly cold nor struggling to keep back the summer heat outside. That and the high, vast windows with their stunning view means it feels less like a waste to be inside.

That also means that Dante can be in his full suit indoors and not die - even though it is a chic off-white linen number with a brown leather belt and an oxblood pocket square.

He's seated at the baby grand, with sheet music in front of him. There's only two people seated at the bar and they're rather in to one another. The restaurant side is not yet open, though the staff are preparing for dinner service which is a few hours away still. "I still feel like I'm trying to chase after you like an overenthusiastic puppy when you go through this section here," he says, pointing to the music. "It's like my fingers can't quite move fast enough."

Since he's not performing nor a customer at the moment, Itzhak considers it fair game to wear his usual beaten-in tight jeans and a ribbed gray tank top. He looks like somebody security should chase off, except he's got a violin and he's talking and laughing and playing with the boss. Laughing at this very moment, he has his violin and bow in one hand, looong fingers holding both the neck of the instrument under the scroll and hooked through the frog of the bow. "Ehhh I love that part, I get excited, start rushing. It just feels so good to play, yannow?"

Alexander doesn't really belong here. He hasn't really gone into the casino much, and his dressing skills are...uncertain at the best of times. So when he slinks into the bar, it's with the air of someone who expects to be thrown out. And, to be honest, his scruffy t-shirt and jeans don't really fit in. But the sound of music, or proto-music, has drawn him, and when he sees Itzhak, he continues to slink towards the stage. Not saying anything, just watching the two, his hands in his pockets, a slight smile on his face. He does turn around and look behind him, like he expects someone to be there - but right now, he's alone. As far as he can see.

"It does, yes. But one of these days, we'll find you a competent pianist to accompany you and truly blow these folks away." Dante is a confident man in many respects, but not when it comes to his music. He shakes his head and squints at the notation.

Despite Sitka's upscale surroundings, they do try not to be snobbish, so there are no clothing police to escort Alexander out. In fact, a server comes by and asks him if he'd like a drink. That clues Dante in to his presence and he greets him with, "Ah, good afternoon Mr. Clayton. You've caught us in rehearsal."

Someone (by the name of Rosencrantz) might have gone and mentioned to Ruiz that he was rehearsing here tonight. And that, if the captain could make time in his otherwise jam packed schedule, he might stop by for a listen. So said captain's gone and shown up, and for once he actually doesn't look like a grungy cholo who's just dug himself out of a drug den. A crisp grey shirt is tucked into a pair of snug-fitting, belted black jeans, which are in turn shoved into expensive looking heeled boots. A black suit jacket's worn over top, and it's neither battered nor torn. Score.

He's scraping his fingers through his hair as he arrives, and casting his gaze over the place somewhat dubiously, like he half expects a repeat of the elevator full of dead fish fiasco from opening night. Spotting Itzhak and Dante over by the piano, he watches them for a few beats, then prowls on over to find himself something to drink.

Itzhak shoots Dante a mock stern look. "My old instructor would roll up sheet music and whap you with it for sayin' that. So don't test me, Taylor." He picks up his own drink--a tonic water, ginger and lime mocktail, what, he's not drinking? usually fiddling and drinking go together like peanut butter and chocolate for him--realizes Alexander has shown up, and yells, "Sandushkaaaaa-lexander! I meant Alexander!" And after Alexander, Ruiz, and Itzhak's eyebrows pop up seeing him so sleekly dressed. "Mmmm-mm-m," he murmurs into his drink, smiling lopsided. "Well hey there," he calls to him, "you're looking pretty fuckin' sharp!"

Alexander shies to the side when the server approaches, but when asked, stares suspiciously for a moment or two, then orders a soda. His eyes turn back to the stage. "Rehearsing? What piece?" A pause. "Probably not 'Welcome to My Nightmare'. Doesn't seem the right venue for it." He sounds a little wistful, though, and looks around. "Nice place." When Itzhak yells, he offers the musician a brief, warm smile. "Hey, Itzhak. You mentioned you were here." And when he calls to Ruiz, Alexander pivots to study the cop. He blinks a couple of times, then bobs his head at him. "Javier."

"Mhmm, and something tells me you'd hit me with more force than your instructor," says Dante with a drawl to Itzhak's music-related threat. When Alexander asks the question, he looks from the music to the violinist. "What did you say this piece was called again?" Then his attention is drawn up to the cop-shaped visitor. "Afternoon. Or...early evening." He checks his watch. "I do hope you're not here because someone is shooting in the vicinity of my restaurant again."

A look's sent askance to Itzhak, and that little eyebrow pop is met with a brief smile, replete with crow's feet and a fleeting dimple. Then Ruiz is turning away to order that drink, tequila, por favor, and the fact that he's carrying is made ever so briefly visible when he reaches for his wallet. A couple of folded bills are dropped on the bartop, and there's a perceptible pause before he responds to the private investigator quietly, "Alexander." He doesn't look over. Instead, an exaggerated wink for Dante. "Espero que no también, por tu bien," he murmurs to the man.

"S'an arrangement of 'Maple Leaf Rag' for piano and violin duet," Itzhak says between drinks. "One a the original ragtime pieces, whole genre was practically invented by the composer, Scott Joplin. Too much fun to play." He colors some, when Ruiz smiles at him like that. Even briefly. Then he's looking between him and Alexander. Even Itzhak can tell they're not done being mad, but hey, Alexander called him Javier, that's a start. "How's by youse, guys?"

Alexander exchanges currency for goods - which is to say, he pays for a tumbler of soda and gives it a tentative sip, before smiling down at the glass. "Are we hitting people over music? I used to like moshing. Once upon a time." At the mention of gunshots, his shoulders twitch, and he looks behind him again, towards the door. It remains empty. He looks back. "I don't know that one," he admits to Itzhak, "but I'm sure it's beautiful. I'm okay." He moves so that he can keep all three men and the lovebirds at the bar in sight.

The server actually hands a small menu to Ruiz with a whole separate sub-heading for tequila, including some top-top shelf options and several cocktails with tequila as the main ingredient. Dante lifts his own glass of something dark with ice towards Ruiz. "I recommend the El Diablo. We've some talented mixologists behind the bar. And...despite spending a great deal of time with Cristobal, my Spanish does not exist beyond a rudimentary order-a-beer level, so I'm afraid I don't know what you've said." Then he smiles wryly, "Ah yes, my nickname for this piece is 'give Dante's fingers a bloody workout.'" If he notices any tension, it remains unremarked upon.

The menu of top-top shelf options gives de la Vega pause for a moment. Dark eyes tick from dapper Brit, to the listing of various ways he might take his tequila, and back to the Brit with a slanted, mildly assessing look. Two inked fingers are rapped against the menu thoughtfully, before it's nudged toward the 'tender. "Tequila," he repeats, this time with the slightest hint of a snarl, eyes still on Dante. "Clase Azul Reposado," is tumbled off after in that warm, smoke-roughened burr of his. No cocktails, no diluting it with ice or other varieties of liquor. But he will pick something as close to expensive as it gets.

Once he's taken a moment to push his fingers into Itzhak's hair, and draw him in close for a briefly lingering kiss, he drops back into a lean against the bar to wait for his drink to arrive. And notes to Dante idly, "So you mean to tell me you're fucking a Mexican and haven't learned any Spanish?" Is that his judgemental face? Yes. Yes, it is.

"So take five already, quitcha bitchin'," Itzhak tells Dante, elbowing him. No respect for the owner, this guy! Alexander mentions mosh pits and Itzhak gets a nostalgic look in those hazel eyes. "Oh man, the punk shows I've been to. The punk shows I've played! That was my last band in New York, Cajun folk punk. And the aftershows? Good. Fucking. TIMES."

He's grinning as Ruiz informs Dante of the only proper way to drink tequila--then he gets a kiss from his surly badass Mexican. Oh hey. He blushes right there in front of God and everybody, eyes drifting shut a moment, and when Ruiz lets him go, he's still red and he promptly tries to hide behind his drink. Must drink! Very thirsty!

"A good deal of time with--" Alexander pauses, blinks, takes a drink of his soda. "Oh. Hm. I see." He stares at Dante for a while, longer than is polite, before blinking and refocusing on the rest of the conversation. Ruiz's snarl gets a sidelong look, but his attention seems mostly caught by Itzhak. "Cajun...folk...punk?" A faint smile. "That sounds interesting." The kissing is just watched, without any particular reaction one way or the other. The investigator soon starts to prowl around the edges of the stage, though, peering at lighting and into dark corners that may appear, like a cat exploring a new room.

"Oh, I've learned some," says Dante with a cheeky sort of look and a hints of his shark-smile, "...just not phrases one would repeat in polite company." That last bit is sort of mumbled into his drink before he sips it. And then, sort of as an aside, he says, "You haven't been to a proper punk show til you've been to one in London." Says the man in a perfectly tailored linen suit..

He lets Alexander do his prowling and his staring without remarking on it directly, except to say, "If you see any dustbunnies, let me know. I'll have a word with the cleaning staff."

Hey, Ruiz is very particular about his tequila, and how it should be imbibed. He does, finally, stop giving Dante those judgy looks though, once said drink arrives. And scoops up the glass, tipping it toward his mouth to scent it, then taste it carefully. Curious, perhaps, what this kind of money will buy. He allows the rest of the conversation to filter around him in the meantime, his expression going a little distant again as he watches Alexander wander off.

"I know you didn't just gatekeep punk," Itzhak says to Dante, rolling his eyes. Then, setting his drink down so he can point his bow at Alexander, "It's fantastic!" He swings his fiddle to his shoulder and launches into something with an old-timey, swinging beat. He plays several bars of that, rocking the hell out, infusing it with a punk sensibility despite how very old-fashioned swamp music it is. Then he pauses to sing, in slurry, gorgeous Cajun French. (Which he sings phonetically but nobody needs to know that.)

Les Mardi Gras sont dessus un grand voyage,
Tout alentour le tour du moyeu,
Ça passe une fois par an, demandé la charité,
Quand-même ça c'est une patate, une patate ou des gratons
Les Mardi Gras sont dessus un grand voyage!

"Why would London be better than anywhere else?" asks Alexander, head tilted to one side. He doesn't sound offended, just curious. Like it's entirely possible there's some secret hierarchy of punk mosh pits that he just doesn't know about. "And no, it seems clean," he adds, quite seriously. He turns, though, when the bow is thrust in his direction, and pauses to listen. He blinks. His head tilts to the other side, like a dog hearing a high pitched noise it doesn't quite know how to interpret. Then he grins. And, when it's over, applauds without reservation.

"Not gatekeeping, just...well, it's a different experience, innit?" Dante affects a bit of Estuary at the end of that. It's a weird thing given the Queen's English he normally speaks. To Alexander, he grins. "It's the birthplace of punk." Never mind that's up for debate.

As Itzhak sings, he tries to plunk along and find the melody, even though it's clear he doesn't know the song. "Ah, now French, I can parse a bit more in passing. I grew up far closer to it than to Spanish, after all." Well maybe not far. Actual Spain is not that far from London, after all.

Drink in hand, Ruiz settles in to listen to Itzhak play. It seems to ease something in him, that man's music. A tension he didn't know he was holding in his shoulders, perhaps. He sips, dark gaze riveted now on the movement of the lithe fiddler as he gets into his song. And tries, perhaps, to ignore whatever the fuck Alexander's skulking about doing over there.

Capitaine, capitaine, voyage ton flag,
Allons chez un autre voisin,
Demandé la charité pour les autres qui viennent nous rejoindre,
Les autres qui viennent nous rejoindre,
Ouais, au gombo ce soir!

Itzhak stamps out the beat while he sings, snapping his fingers for syncopation. Then for the sheer delight of it he fiddles out a lively improvised ending, smirking to himself because he's having so much fun. "Whoo, hell yeah!" Grinning, he sweeps a bow to Alexander's applause. "...yeah, so, I love that stuff." He shrugs like what can you do, he's way too into weird genres of folk music intersecting with punk. "Birthplace, he says," and Dante gets a poke with the tip of his bow for that one, but good natured.

Alexander isn't SKULKING. He's just walking...with his shoulders slumped, peering into corners, and looking like he might be casing the joint.

Fine, he's skulking. But it doesn't stop him from giving Dante a bit of a smile and saying, deadpan, "So...everywhere else improved on it from there?" He takes his skulking around the tables, looping about until he's approaching Ruiz from the cop's back. At least Alexander has, like, zero loom to him. Even though he's not particularly short, and well built, he completely lacks the sort of swagger or menace that is required to loom. Instead, he ends up rather looking like someone trying to sneak out of class behind a teacher's back. All he actually does is smile at Itzhak, though. "It's lovely. And you play it well."

"Oooh, ss, ouch and ouch," says Dante as he feigns injury both from the bow poke and Alexander's comment. "Itzhak has been giving me quite the musical education. I grew up playing jazz and classical. And a lot of standards, like Gershwin and Cole Porter. Ragtime and folk aren't styles my fingers have gotten accustomed to yet. Though I do have very adaptable hands," he drawls that last bit.

Itzhak's fiddling is a distracting enough target for Javier's attention that he doesn't quite manage to keep a bead on Alexander sidling up to his blind spot. So when the man suddenly speaks out of nowhere.. well, out of two feet behind him, and slightly to his left, the cop bristles and turns sharply, and the private investigator is lucky he doesn't get a glass full of tequila dumped on him. There is, instead, a slightly irritated-sounding huff from the cop, and he settles his back against the bar so as to keep Alexander in his periphery, before downing another sip of his drink. "How about something classical for us then?" he pitches toward Dante, trying to catch the Brit's gaze.

"That's what I heard," Itzhak says to Dante, teasing. 'Heard' comes out like 'hoid' in that New York accent of his. "Thank you, tati." That's to Alexander.

His attention snaps to Ruiz as the man moves fast, then hops to Alexander as the likely culprit, then scans around fast. Everything else seems okay. Okay. "Uhh, sure. You pick," he tells Dante, "pick somethin' you're confident with."

Alexander's smile grows fractionally wider at Dante's feigned injury and Itzhak's thanks. "I don't know much about any of those styles," he admits, a bit sheepishly--then freezes as Ruiz turns around to bristle at him. His hands come up, out of his pockets and empty, his head ducking apologetically. He slinks to a table in Ruiz's line of sight, and perches there, restlessly. "But I'm sure it would be nice to hear something?" he adds, looking curiously at Dante.

"Something I'm confident with? Well, it's going to be something rather predictable, then. Something I've been playing my whole bloody life." Dante chuckles. He sips from his drink, brows raising, then settles on a piece. He shifts his seat, pulls a piece of music from a book inside the bench, then sets the drink aside and then starts to play.

Unlike playing with Itzhak, where he's playing catch-up and his face is usually contorted in concentration as he stretches himself, this seems far more natural. His long, elegant fingers take up position on the keys and then start to dance softly across. It's the first movement of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. From the start, it's clear he's played this piece a hundred times or more. His posture straightens, and he finds the music in his head. There's a serenity that comes over him, and at one point he even closes his eyes as he comes to a section he knows well enough to not refer to the music, lips slightly parted. In the quiet restaurant with its finely-tuned grand piano and fine accoustics, it's a lovely sound. It's not perfect, but it is confident and more than competent - and there's heart to it.

The tune Dante picks? This is one that Javier seems to have at least some passing familiarity with. And, well, who doesn't? His glass finds his mouth again, dark eyes cutting back to Alexander and his gesture of surrender. And there's a moment, a terrible little moment there in those first few harrowing bars of the song; his tongue runs along his upper teeth, and he watches the other man. And then, finally, he turns away to listen.

Itzhak takes a break of his own, finishing his drink, setting instrument and bow loosely back in their case. He hooks his thumbs into his beltloops and listens, rocking gently back and forth, eyes mostly closed, focused only on music. And so he misses that awful way Ruiz watches Alexander entirely. "Hey good job," he murmurs when Dante is done, applauding him.

Alexander isn't someone who's had much exposure to classical music. The Moonlight Sonata is well enough known that it sounds familiar, on some level; that much is clear from his expression. But he's probably never sat down and listened to a full movement of it. Now he does. He watches Dante and he listens like he's going to be quizzed on the notes later. Even so, he doesn't miss the way Ruiz stares at him in those first view bars. He goes still and quiet, like a rabbit watching a hawk's shadow passing overhead. And then Ruiz's gaze passes on, and he relaxes. And listens to the end, and his applause joins Itzhak's. "What's that one?" he asks.

"Ah, thank you. Cheers," Dante says a bit sheepishly. Focused as he was on his playing, he too missed the exchange between Ruiz and Alexander. "Like I said, predictable. Jazz is really where I'm most comfortable. More upbeat." Classy, but not stuffy. That's what he endeavours to be. He stands up from the piano. "Can I get you gentleman anything? A drink? A few bites? The kitchen is quite excellent." To Alexander, he says, "Ah, Beethoven. Moonlight Sonata."

The cop offers up applause as well, though it doesn't add much noise to the mix with his fingers tapped against his wrist and his glass still held in his right hand. He does, however, look both pleased and mildly impressed. So there's that. "I'm fine, thanks," he tells Dante with a glance at his watch, and a tip of his glass to finish off its contents. "I should get the fuck out of here, anyway." Before he takes a bite out of Alexander, maybe. The empty glass is left on the bar, and he pushes off to go speak a few quiet words with Itzhak on his way by, catching at the fiddler's arm if he can.

"Beethoven, yeah. Look, who cares who'd call it predictable, it's beautiful and you played it beautifully. That's all that matters." Itzhak looks at Ruiz and Alexander, expecting agreement, and instead catches....something? He missed the really good part, but there's some resonance going on that makes him narrow his eyes at Ruiz when he comes to trade a few words with him. Whatever he's told makes him smirk, give Ruiz a flash of a dirty look, and bump his shoulder against him before the other man is off.

"I wouldn't mind something to eat," he says to Dante, then, clearly trying to shove away whatever it was, raking his fingers though his hair. "I'm always hungry." He really is!

Alexander shakes his head. "I'm fine. I have soda." Which he finishes off, as he's reminded on it. He watches Ruiz get up, and head over to Itzhak, staring at them for a moment before refocusing on Dante. "It's lovely. I don't know if I'd call it predictable, but maybe...if it's Beethoven, it probably inspired many other works, so it might sound familiar even if it started it." A pause. "I think there's a Japanese band that does a decent cover of it. Gyze? I'll have to listen to it, now."

It's only then, now that Dante isn't playing, that he picks up a lingering odd energy in the room. He moves to the bar, where one of his staff has already anticipated his next drink need and served it up. It's this drink he lifts in a salute to Ruiz as he starts to make his leave. "Thanks for coming by." And then, to the server, "Angela, can we please have the charcuterie board, the cauliflower and the smoked salmon pate? Cheers." He settles at one of the high top tables with four seats and inclines his head to Alexander. "It's sort of a cliche. When someone mentions classical music, they think of that piece. But it's still quite beautiful, if overexposed."

Energy schmenergy. Ruiz has places to go and people to arrest, and surely doesn't know anything about no odd energy in the room. He doesn't give the others so much as a backwards glance, once he's released Itzhak's arm. Just a wolfish smile for the fiddler, and his phone dug out of a pocket of his jeans as he prowls for the elevators and out of sight.

Itzhak's eyes trail Ruiz as he leaves. Speaking of odd energy, he's got a ton of it for that man. He stares after him like he's thinking pretty damn seriously of chasing him down and instigating something. Then he tosses back his hair and swags over to join Dante at the table. "Yeah, it's totally overexposed, it wasn't written in a time that was a thing. But it's still beautiful. What else you got in ya pocket?"

"It is. Beautiful, I mean," Alexander says, after a moment. "And I haven't heard it before. I mean. I have, but not all the way through. So it got a little more exposed, but that's not necessarily a bad thing." He smiles at them both, but starts to rise from the chair, himself. "I should probably go, too. You're practicing. This is a nice place, though." A bob of his head at Dante. "Itzhak, it was good to see you. Don't die." And then he starts slinking his way out towards the door, although he doesn't seem to be following the cop.

Dante knows all about odd energy with a swaggering Mexican, so he's not one to judge. He just grins a little as he watches the interaction. "I don't really have any hidden gems or lesser known pieces in my classical repertoire so it's likely to be the cliche ones when I play. I started playing primarily jazz as soon as I got away from my ancient piano instructor and on to a younger one." There's something slightly lascivious about the way he says that. As Alexander goes to leave, he raises his glass in salute to him as well. "You're welcome anytime, Mister Clayton. Don't be a stranger."

He better not be following the cop, says the look on Itzhak's face. Sometimes he's not too discriminating with exactly who he'll take his temper out on, and he's considering the benefits of getting good and pissed. He mutters something in Yiddish and turns his attention back to Dante, because he's gotta hear about this younger piano instructor. "Younger one, huh? So dish."