2020-07-28 - Observation Mode

Thursday night. Most of the cops and assorted support staff who attend the semi-weekly happy hours at the Pourhouse have headed out. Seated at a smaller table -- the crowd usually pushes several tables together in a long line of dross seating -- Olivia is still dressed in her work attire: a taupe, pin-striped dress with a magenta cardigan, atop which a belt circles her waist. The heels tonight are a modest three inches in a similar, neutral taupe that matches the dress and leaves the illusion of even longer legs. Her blonde hair is parted on one side and loose about her face, curling loosely in its fall.

In front of Dr. Kincaid on the bar table with three other chairs are three things: a squat glass of what looks like scotch (neat), an open file folder containing multiple papers, and a fountain pen. Having just set the pen down from some marking on the papers in the open file, she takes a slow, deep breath, lifts her pale blue gaze to scan the room and stretches languidly. She slides her hand down to the leather satchel in the chair beside her to pull out her phone. From there she scans through some screens of info or texts, types a few things, then, still reading, reaches for her drink to take a slow swallow of the dark amber liquid.

Milo was still in his work attire as well, but wore it more leisurely now. His white button up shirt had the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. The blue vest was still worn over it, but the patterned tie that had been tucked under the material was now hanging over and loosened some. His tan slacks and brown shoes...well not much he could do to make those more comfortable so they stay the same. However, it was Friday which meant not only the patterned tie but also fun mismatched socks. Not that anybody could notice necessarily, but one sock was a loud neon pattern and the other was yellow polka dots on green socks. While he didn't go fully party mode in front of his new colleagues, it was also probably noticeable that the young intern was more comfortable with a drink than someone who had just started drinking.

He was 21 but he had also been to college and was part of the party scene in High School so of course he had drank before his 21st birthday...who hasn't really? Still, he kept it to a reasonable level tonight and gauged the environment. He was sociable without being offensively so. After he got a better idea of just how 'happy' the hours outside of work were he might adjust accordingly, but he really didn't see that happening with Olivia here. He respected her opinion of him too highly. As he sees her sitting at the bar, having said goodbye to a few new work friends, Milo walks over towards the table where the woman is seated. He has a 1/3 full beer in his hand, head tilting in observation "Mind some company?"

Despite part of her attention being on the papers in front of her and another part making conversation here and there with officers and detectives, Olivia managed to keep an eye on the newest intern as well: clashing socks, loose tie, gregarious affect, alcohol consumption. But for a man of his perception, it looks like she may just have played her own game of affable, social boys-club outsider, Doctor-with-real-clout, drinker, and all-around assessor of the group at large. More than once he'd have likely felt her attention turning his way. But each time, by the time he turned her way, she'd have been scribbling in that file or tossing playful banter around in another direction. As for how 'happy' these sorts of gatherings get? They get plenty rowdy.

Thus it is that the evening is dwindling more toward night, though mid summer night isn't particularly dark at this hour. Who really notices, though, with the few scattered windows on the far side of the bar? Olivia lifts her arctic-blue gaze from her phone to Milo as he moves closer and a slow smile curves on her lips. "Hartwell," she greets in a friendly tone. "No, I don't mind. Come sit down and tell me how your first week went. Any interesting cases yet?" She reaches over to a nearer chair to slide her cell phone back into an outer pocket and leans back in her own chair, looking the young man over from head to foot and back up again. "Living a bit wild tonight, I see," she observes, a teasing look briefly playing across her face.

Milo sits down once she says she doesn't mind, still keeping another seat between them though more to give her brain space to still work than anything. Or at least that's what he liked. Maybe she did too? "My first week went good! I didn't break anything. No fires. Survived all of the pranks," he grins. He shrugs at her other question, "Honestly all the cases are interesting to me. Nothing that stands out specifically though no. It has all been fascinating to learn." With the observation of his behavior and attire he chuckles, "I'll admit. I didn't know what to expect...this being my first office setting job and everything. It's good to see everybody being able to relax and have fun though. If for no other reason than they all deserve it for the hard work you all do. I hope I kept it at an appropriate level, Ma'...Olivia." He still had to catch himself with that sometimes!

Olivia looks entirely comfortable with where Milo chose to sit. It's farther than they sat when they spoke in her office in those club chairs. There's not much about her that seems flappable. She almost mirrors Milo's mood, with just enough of her own personality for it not to seem brittle. "Careful about surviving pranks," she advises. "The more you survive, the worse they get. I say stumble a few times and let them have the easier triumphs. But --" She holds up her glass of scotch and her free hand in a don't-mind-me gesture. "-- you go with your own plays, Hartwell. Choosing an identity in a workplace like this is a pivotal move, best made sooner and with as much certainty as you can muster." She lowers the free hand and holds out her glass toward him in toast, "To being one of the guys." She'll clink her glass to his if he returns the toast, and then finish off her scotch. His stumble with her name teases a smile at the corners of those striking blue eyes. "Remind me: are you still doing coursework along with the internship, or is your focus entirely on the department?"

"I'll keep that in mind" Milo says with another chuckle. "Yeah...right now I'm still in observation mode." He knew that she would understand that. "Once I've established everybody else's boundaries and roles, I will find out how my identity best fits within that dynamic." He does raise his glass with a grin, clinking his glass with hers and taking a drink. Setting it back down on the table then he gives a small nod. "I'm taking a lighter course load to finish out my degrees, but it isn't enough to distract me from my work responsibilities."

He'll keep that in mind. Olivia spares a faint smile at that, the slightest shakes of her head. "Observation mode is important. Essential in some cases. But you still have to have an identity or they'll not only distrust you, they'll actively ostracize you. Trust me on this." That said, she continues, leaning in a bit, lightly closing the open file folder in front of her and placing the capped pen atop it. "That said, you have an energy about you, a hell-with-it-show-me kind of attitude that probably is doing the job." She arches a brow as if to give him an opportunity to argue her words, a bring-it of sorts. "The general identity tends to be bigger-badass-than-the-other guy, bullet-proof, smart-ass-with-a-short-fuse. It's what quite a few of them use to manage the unpredictability and danger. You? You strike me as complex in a different reference frame altogether." She taps a manicured fingertip lightly, thoughtfully against the rim of her empty glass. "Speaking of identities, what did you think of the captain?"

Milo laughs "Fair enough. I guess...sometimes it's just hard for me to get out of observation mode." He shakes his head "Most groups I was a part of in school were either the jocks or the geeks. The athletic physical focus or the knowledge intellect focus. Granted both groups had traits they shared with the other, but for the most part they were separate...so I was almost partially myself in each." He says it honestly, looking to the woman then. "It's hard now that I'm starting to try and be part of a work environment that seems to combine both of those. So it's a chance to be fully myself...but I am just not used to what that looks like yet completely."

Listening as she explains the personalities of the department versus her read of what his personality seems to be, he grins "I'm definitely not interested in being a bigger bad ass than the other guy. I'm a moderately sized tough butt at best." Tough when he needed to be, but for the most part liked to have fun. He definitely wasn't interested in 'winning' in the sense of pissing contests. Sports yes, personal alpha competitions no. "The Captain? I admire him now after meeting him even more than I did from the interviews I've read from him. You can feel his strength. Physical and mental that is."

Milo opens up and Olivia is both comfortable and seems to be genuinely interested in what he has to say. The scotch she just finished off -- depending on how closely he watched her -- was her first and only of the evening. "I think we have something in common there. Put me in a busy place and let me just soak in the players, the motives, the nuances, and the interchanges. That's a space I'll seek out like some people look for meditation." Another of her almost smiles that warms her eyes but doesn't quite reach her lips. She lifts a fingertip to tuck her blonde hair behind her ear. No earrings. "What an interesting stratification of friendships." Jocks and geeks. "So what would you say your personal flavors of jock and geek are?"

Milo is still searching for his identity. She nods. "Awareness isn't so common." That sounds like it could possibly be a compliment. "Have you made any conclusions about how you want to merge those 'flavors'?"

As for not being interested in matching up with the big guns in the precinct? "No. But you want to hold your own. If you don't give them an identity, they'll create one for you." She lowers that hand, splaying her fingers in the air demonstratively. "And maybe you're good with that. You didn't seem to be struggling tonight." And she was paying attention. The captain. "Yes. he's a very palpable leader. I would agree with you there."

It's been eleven days since Reyes's men found him. And it's been more hospital time. More care. But now he's out....and wanting a drink somewhere relatively anonymous, like a normal person. The sailor's much less of a regular here than he is at the Twofer....and thus it's much less likely that someone'll feel compelled to express concern or comment on the new scars. Pointedly not using the cane he was given, though Joe's limping as he heads to the bar.

Milo listens to her and nods, "Adults always seemed to have set expectations of me growing up...but my peers? I don't think they knew what to think...so I had more of a chance to set that expectation myself. Work is my new school and the coworkers are my new peers to an extent. I just have to choose what expectation to set for myself here. Like you said." Another drink from his glass as she speaks about the Captain. Then, once he's done with the drink, "So...if I can ask? You used different rank titles for him when you talked to me about him and then when you introduce him. Why?"

Olivia is sitting at a fourtop with Milo. Beside her in a chair is her satchel. Across from her is Milo. And on her right side is an empty chair. There is an empty, squat glass sitting beside a closed file folder on the table in front of her. A capped pen rests atop that. Dr. Kincaid dips her chin in response to what Milo is saying, demonstrating she is indeed listening. "Any thoughts on what characteristics are feeling like they best fit, yet?"

Milo continues their conversation about Ruiz, as it were. "Ah. His rank is captain. However, since the Chief of Police was murdered just a few weeks ago --" Executed. "-- he is now acting Chief of Police. Hence the rank and the title." She furrows her brows ever so slightly. "I thought I'd explained that." Tipping her head to one side, she affects a taste of tacit conviction that such explanation is now complete. "Have you crossed paths yet with Harvey? I have no doubt there are several scenes-worth of enough to study and measure and do your particular brand of magic with to keep both your geek and jock sensibilities quite --" That right there? That's when Olivia's attention lifts past Milo -- given her back is the one to the wall -- to follow Joseph's arrival. She watches him make his way toward the bar with no attempt at subtlely. "Cavanaugh," she lifts her voice just enough to be heard in the Thursday evening-crowd bar. "If you're not here to drink alone, bring all that broken-handsome over here and join us."

It's enough to get his his attention, even with his damaged hearing. Joe has a moment where he's clearly not sure where his name came from, but then that blue gaze settles on her. A blink, and then a slow smile, pulled crooked by that new scar. "I'm not so determined to drink alone I won't come when a lady calls me," he says, cheerfully enough, and veers his course away from the bar to their table. "I'm ashamed to say I'm blankin' on your name."

His accent's a lazy drawl, from somewhere in the southeast, languid but not breathy. Milo gets a bright-eyed look. "You I'm pretty sure I've not met at all."

Milo thinks for a moment "I'll let you know when I figure that out" he finally says with a grin. When she explains about the Captain he nods "Ah. Sorry. I'll make a note of that." He definitely did not want to have to ask that detail again. "He is doing a great job from what I can tell." When Joseph arrives, the young new intern looks over at the man and offers a kind smile. "You're correct, Sir. I'm Milo. It's nice to meet you."

Olivia isn't aware of the damaged hearing. In fact, there are scars aside from the obvious new (visible) ones she has no knowledge of. Joe's smile is returned with an uptipping of her brows and a glance flickered to the empty seat at the table in further invitation. "So noted," she replies to the sailor's suave return to her invitation. "No shame in it. We've only met the once. And I think you had more distractions than I did at the time." She pauses, glances to Milo and back to Joseph. "Olivia Kincaid," she leaves out the title. "-- Crim Psych at the precinct. I was catching up with my friend Beth Lawson at the coffee shop when we met. She's the woman to see when you decide to die in this strange little town. Or -- if you believe her -- everyone's a sailor." She paints a picture of the coffee-house acquaintance. "You were going to consider a weekend on Puget Sound, if I recall. I certainly hope I'm not seeing results of an ill-fated trip."

Once Joseph reaches the table, Olivia lifts her left hand to gesture from Joseph to Milo and back again. "Cavanaugh, man who can probably cause pain with his little finger while captaining a ship -- don't question my intuition -- this is Hartwell, jock-geek, forensics specialist, new to the precinct. And yes, I do believe they are now hiring out of junior high." The teasing words are pillowed by a brief but sparkling smile. Back to Milo, because she didn't lose track of the conversation in all that, "He's doing a remarkable job, yes."

He pulls a chair out, settles down, managing to mostly restrain his relief. Feet and leg have mostly healed, but not yet all the way. "That's right, the coffee shop," he agrees, amiably. "Glad to see you again, Miss Kincaid." Her explanation of her job description makes him lift his brows, curiously. "Oh, still thinking of the trip, certainly," he agrees. "And no, not a trip." Though he doesn't seem compelled to explain further.

Milo gets an inked hand extended to him. "I c'n certainly cause pain in my own li'l finger, when I get it jammed in the wheel," he teases. "Pleased to meet you, Milo," he adds. A sardonic look for the comment about hiring straight out of junior high. They all look young to him, these days.

Milo holds up both hands with a grin "I believe it!" concerning Olivia's introduction of the man. Then, when she introduces him and says the part about junior high, the young man chuckles, "That's something to pitch to Captain. 21 Jump Street. Grey Harbor Division." Lifting his glass up he finished the rest of it before pulling a wallet out of his back pocket. Opening it and pulling out a bill to pay the tab, he looks to Olivia "Speaking of school. I should probably get home so I can finish a paper. I will see you tomorrow. Have a good night, Olivia." He then looks back to Joseph "Sir. I hope you have a good night as well. It was nice to meet you."

"Olivia, Kincaid, or -- if you want to irk me -- doctor, Cavanaugh," Olivia corrects with faint amusement. "Pardon my candor, but you look the worse for wear. I'd buy you a drink, but you beat me to it." The woman doesn't press about the cause of said injuries. She shifts backward in her chair to draw the file folder from the tabletop along with the pen, then she slides both into her leather satchel in the chair to her left.

Milo's reaction to her introduction earns the young intern a quiet bit of laughter from Olivia. "Be interesting, Milo," she returns in farewell. "Let's talk soon."

A latino with a churlish turn to his lips opens the door to the Pourhouse, lingering near the door for a moment as if checking out the occupants within eyesight before deciding to enter. He shoulders right through the middle of a couple leaving, uncaring that they have to break their handhold to let him past. Along with a black tank and jeans, he's wearing the bruises and scrapes of an apparent recent fight, the worst blooming black and blue on his left temple and cheek bone but oddly it looks like its been tempered with a touch of concealer where he'd normally boast those sorts of injuries.

It's an odd kind of relief to find that his story isn't common gossip. But then, Reyes made him the gauntlet cast down at Ruiz's feet, a momentary pawn in this game of brutality and pride....and serves the interim chief not at all to have it be known that his lover was taken and hurt. So the sailor gets an oddly temporizing look at that, even as he lifts his beer in apology. Not going for his usual bucket of bourbon, it seems.

A tattooed hand is lifted in farewell to Milo, only to hover absurdly as his gaze catches Cristobal's entry. A beat where he looks like one of those welcoming cat statues, and then he remembers to wave. "Cristobal," he says, beckoning. No verbal sympathy offered, no rising to fuss, but he's clearly chagrined by the other man's state.

Olivia's gaze follows Milo's path to the exit only to get an eyeful of a battered latino shouldering his way through the Thursday night crowd at the Pourhouse. In her peripheral vision she realizes that Joseph's hand remains raised and does a bit of a double take as she follows it to Cristobal, back to Joseph at his greeting of the man, and back once more to Cristobal. This should be interesting, frank blue eyes suggest. "Cristobal," she echoes, as if trying the syllables out on her tongue more than greeting the stranger who Joseph has invited over. "Take care, Cavanaugh, my sample set has you knowing everyone in town thusfar." The playful words are laced with a bit of measured fascination. "Is there a fight club in town that we don't talk about?" Wry.

Cristobal's eye light on Joseph as the greeting is called, his pale blue eyes holding steady for a moment before they flick away to the woman who is conversing with him. Recognition lights there, before it's covered by a cloud of thought that makes those eyes look stormy. When he comes up to where the sailor sits, his paw of a hand reaches out to palm the back of the man's head. No words are spoken directly to him, but past as he requests, "Mezcal," from someone who actually works there before his gaze goes back to Olivia. And narrows. It's like he wants to say something but is biting back the words.

He looks the worse for wear, in his own way, if not as raw and recently as Cris does. Once Joe's satisfied that Cris is coming over, he looks back to her, shakes his head. "What? Me? Nah. Just a handful of folks, really. More of the regulars at the Twofer, truth be tol'," His voice is lazy, still, but there's that worry in the blue eyes. "An' not that I know, but then, I wouldn't know, considerin' I'm still a relatively recent arrival."

Wordlessly, he kicks out a chair for the newcomer....and then belatedly remembers his manners. "Ah, Olivia, may I present Cristobal Cruz. He defends the helpless maidens of the Platinum Club from those who'd harass them. Cristobal, this is Doctor Olivia Kincaid, criminal psych for the GHPD, if I 'member right." An amused duck of his head, but he doesn't try to get it out of the other man's hand.

Even if Cristobal's reaction to her weren't palpable, Olivia's attention would follow his approach, take in the way he greets Joseph with no effort at hiding the inquiry and assessment behind those ice-blue eyes. Recognition, narrowed eyes, and words from Cris that are so nearly spoken they might as well have an echo. Joseph slices into the thick of it with his introduction. For a stretching trio of moments, Olivia measures the newly arrived man after learning his name, a brief scan of his face, his shoulders, the bruising; then she tips forward in her chair and reaches a hand across the tabletop in offering. "Olivia." A beat. "I'm certain I'd remember if we'd have met, Cruz. But still ..." She lets the words trail and join the rest of the silent volley. "It takes a certain type of man to defend ..mmn.. helpless maidens." There a hint of a smile there, a crinkling at the corners of her eyes; it joins the subtle suggestion of a challenge. Nothing overt. Easy to explain away as something else entirely. "Do join us. A bar sometimes is the best hospital." Says the doctor?

"Don't confuse my poorly evidenced conclusions with facts, Cavanaugh," Olivia asides to him, teasing just so.

Cristobal's hand slides down the back of Joseph's hair as he ducks his head, giving the man's neck a light squeeze before his fingers slither away when he drops into a seat. "I know." Cruz says when Joseph introduces them. One leg kicks out as he sprawls in his chair languidly. His upper lip crests over a canine giving him a lopsided sneered smile. "Saw you at the funeral of the Chief, I mean. You weren't a part of the honor guard, so you haven't been with the force long." He picks up a cardboard coaster and starts toying with it, bouncing the edge on the table as he waits for his drink. "But don't let ole Joe here mislead you, most of the time I'm protecting the customers from the girls. They can be lethal with a pair of high heels. They're called stilettos for a reason."

"Sometimes you gotta protect the dragons from the princesses, it's true," Joe agrees, before taking a long pull from his beer. An attempt at normalcy, of some kind. A grin for that touch, amused. "Princesses can be deadly, especially in this part of the world." He does number himself among them, surely.

For all his easy posture, though his gaze keeps darting worriedly to Cristobal. Not disposed to pry, here in public. Not when there are so many layers of allegiance in play, especially where the police are concerned.

Olivia draws her ignored hand back and folds one leg over the other beneath the table, the wrist of that hand pressed just so to her upper knee. Cris' drink arrives and Olivia catches the server's eye and taps a fingertip of her other hand to the rim of her empty glass. "Single this time."

She looks back to Cristobal. "The funeral," she muses, her voice low. "You were bloody, too." It's a dance. But Olivia likes to dance. "Not one of the rank and file, really, no. Only six weeks here come Tuesday." Not that she's counting. But yes, she's also 'new' in one sense of the word.

"It's difficult," she confides mildly to Cris about being misled, "Cavanaugh has a certain air. Like a pied piper." Princesses and dragons? "It's absolutely a grey area, preferences being what they are."

Olivia follows more of those undercurrents between the two men as her fresh scotch arrives and the empty glass is taken away. She murmurs a 'thank you' and spins the glass lightly atop its coaster a quarter turn. "I'd ask what's new, but I have the distinct impression the topic isn't on the table. Did either of you give as good as you got, at least?"

"Ain't that the truth." Cruz rumbles a reply to the deadliness of princesses in these parts, his eyes shining with mirth that doesn't quite reach his mouth in earnest when he looks at Joseph. In kind, his eyes don't stray on the other man's face for long. Apparently they aren't going to bond publicly over asking about the other's injuries here.

"Yup." Cristobal pops his 'p' rather hard at that confirmation about being bloody at the funeral, taking out his money clip underneath the table to thumb out some bills from the others and tosses them on the waitress' tray for the drink on her trouble. His hand rakes up his tank, unabashedly showing tats, muscle, and some nice new scars thanks to that particular rainy day in the cemetery. "All better now, don't you worry your pretty little head." He takes hold of his glass between forefinger and thumb, the rest of his fingers curled to his palm as he downs half of it. Something about Olivia's final question has his tongue poking into the pocket of his cheek. "Oh, sweetheart. You have no idea."

"A pied piper...." The idea seems to tickle him, by the way his eyes brighten, momentarily, and there's even a little huff of laughter for it. Banished by the comment about the funeral, the thought of all that blood. "And you haven't thought better of coming here, yet?"

A shake of his head, for that question, and something moving behind his eyes. There and gone again, like the glint of scales in deep water. Then another flicker of his gaze to the skin exposed, before he drags it away to the label of his beer.

If there's one thing Olivia does, it's observe. As the two men talk she unapologetically watches the flow between them, balancing between neutral and easy, herself. "My little head is safe," she replies mildly. "You seem capable of taking care of yourself for the most part, Cruz." He pulls out sweetheart and Olivia actually laughs, a brief but warm sound that hardly escapes her throat. She nods slowly, lifts her glass and speaks over it, "Perhaps not." Agreeable. Seemingly.

"Me?" Joseph is asking Olivia if she hasn't thought better about coming to Gray Harbor? "I was born here, Cavanaugh. I'm home. The more things change, the more they stay the same."

There is a flick of the toe of Cristobal's boot, kicking Joseph in the shin. Like most of his actions in life, he doesn't pull a punch - or a kick in this case - so it might just be hard enough to smart. "Eyes up, Boatswain. You don't let the demons think they won." Surely metaphorical ones, but this is Grey Harbor, so who knows. He takes another drink of his Mezcal, letting the burn slide pleasantly down his throat. "So a criminal psychologist, huh? Bet that pays for shit in a town like this. Boring too. That why you're analyzing us right now?"

"Then you don't have any excuse for not knowing better," Joe points out, but his voice is only rueful. They all warn one another. They all stay. And him with that little boat moored at the dock, means of escape any time he can bring himself to break his heart to pieces and leave. "I mean, if you went and came back." He's got his hand loosely curled around the beer bottle, more disposed to nurse it, really.

The kick hits him right in the wounded calf, but the only sign of it is a blink and a tightening of his jaw. "What's the old saying - if you can't beat 'em, join 'em?" he wonders, lazily. But his gaze swings back to Olivia, curious.

"It might be that, in this case, I agree with Cruz. At least initially," Olivia adds slowly after her swallow of scotch in answer to what demons are allowed to think. Lowering her glass back to the coaster on the table, she places it just so in the center of the decorated cardboard, traces a symbol or glyph of some kind against the side of the glass after noting the faint jerk in the top half of Cristobal's body when he kicks Joseph under the table.

As for her financial situation? "I suppose it's all relative. How does protecting dragons pay?" Boring? Olivia shakes her head slowly, once to the left, back to the right. "Boring isn't a word I'd use, no." He asks about analysis, then comes the smile. It starts in those glacier-blue eyes and spreads to the curve of her lips. "It's a hazard of the job, you might say. Or," She holds both hands out, palm up as if measuring two objects in comparison. "-- it might be a compulsion. Particularly when the company is unexpected and intriguing."

She drops her hands, rolls an elegant shrug and settles back against her chair, somehow still poised without perfect posture. To Joseph, "I think more of us who leave come back than those who don't. But I don't have any empirical data to back that up. Just a theory. Perhaps it's just the masochists and fatalists." There's a hint of a curve to her lips at that once again.

"Yeah, you might wanna be real careful about that, sweetheart." Cruz says to the compulsion of analyzing people, letting his Tejano drawl seep right into his words like that'll make them more palatable and obscure the offense a little. "Because this town has its share of sadists too. Who don't like to be studied like a lab rat while they have their evening wind down." He leans over to Joseph then, a hand going to the man's outer thigh near his hip as if purposefully giving Olivia something else to chew on visually. "You good?"

That reply of hers brings a sort of arch curve to his brows, the hint of a smile to his lips - something much dryer than his usual lazy grin. But then, the demons tend to win where he's concerned; those victories writ on him permanently, small and large alike. He gives an indeterminate little tilt to his head, brows lofting a little higher. "I've noticed something of a war zone mentality in more than one here," he allows, finally.

Then Cris has his hand on him, finding that older wound unerringly beneath the denim of his jeans. He doesn't flinch, but his blink is a few beats too long, as is the pause before he responds. "Me? Yeah, I'm doin' okay," he asserts, but his voice is low.

"Sweetheart or no, I intend to continue to keep interesting company and to think. Dangerous as it might be." The accent isn't at all bothersome, or at least Olivia watches and listens with much the same affect. "Sadists seem interesting. They do. But unless they tangle the proclivity up with a few others, they're really one-trick ponies." In no hurry, Olivia trails her gaze from Cristobal to Joseph for the contrastingly seemingly-gentle check in.

What Joseph has noticed. "It wouldn't be unexpected," she agrees in her own way when it comes to war zone mentality. How is Joseph doing? There are all sorts of answers to that question hiding in the nuances of the odd conversation. She doesn't interrupt the silence; there's too much there.

And now Olivia, like her handshake before, is completely ignored as she expounds on her theory of Sadists, Cris' eyes turning up earnestly to Joseph as he leans just a hint closer and lowers his voice. It stands to reason he switches to Spanish because the words are meant for the sailor's ears only, even if publicly spoken. "He rezado una oración a la Madre por ti y he clavado un Milagro en tu cruz en tu nombre. Siempre estaré contigo, incluso si es solo mi espíritu."

"This place seems to....warrant it," Joe's voice is still a little hesitant. Almost uncertain. He's holding himself with a kind of listening poise. Cris's statement has him nodding, head bent as if he needed to be sure of what he's heard. But then he's getting up - not hastily, not clumsy enough to send him stumbling - and muttering about how he needs to head out. Taking care of tab and tip with his usual generosity, offering farewells, and then turning for the door.

It doesn't appear that Olivia takes insult to being ignored, nor is she impatient. She reaches for her glass, swirls the scotch slowly in it and observes the two men and their interaction. The Spanish? She listens to that, too, glancing to Joseph after Cris finishes what he has to say. "Good evening, Cavanaugh," the doctor says clearly and quietly.

"I'll walk you out." Olivia may read that as protective or possessive, but Cristobal is standing up in tandem with Joseph, a hand going to stray towards the man's back but not quite make contact there. It's like he's suddenly kicked into bodyguard mode and is making sure a celebrity can make it to the exit without being mobbed by paparazzi.