2020-10-03 - Wellness Check

Easton's reappearance, bumpy as it was, has given way to a very slow recuperation period for him and Bennie. He's managed to at least get cleaned up a bit, his hair is cut back to something resembling a high and tight, his beard trimmed down to stubble. He hasn't gotten very far from the house, hovering around Bennie and recovering from getting shot in the leg plus his busted prosthetic leg all adds up to him basically housebound. And while that might normally be an issue for Easton, right now that suits him just fine. He has a fire going in the woodstove even though it's not really that cold out yet and is currently lounging on the couch reading news sites on his phone with Gunner laying his head on his stomach protectively. A bottle of Knob Creek sits on the coffee table with an old fashioned glass about half full next to it. The TV is also on, but it's more of a background thing, showing sports highlights but Easton's attention is fully on the phone.

The thumping on the door likely comes as no surprise, as de la Vega mentioned he'd be stopping by today to check on things. It's presaged by the familiar sound of his truck's engine in the drive, of course, and Easton might have caught a glimpse of the cop out the window; he's not trying to be stealthy. One doesn't attempt to sneak up on an ex-Marine.

Thump, thump, thump police-style with the side of his fist. "Open up, Marshall!" is the hoarse-voiced bark from outside.

Easton's on the couch, his leg is off, he has whiskey, there is no way in hell he's getting up to get the door. He flicks a hand at it and the door swings open. Bennie would likely scold him for being frivolous but what are they gonna do stick him the veil for a few months and torture him ... oh. Maybe. Easton drops the phone on his chest and leans his head back around the corner of the couch. "Gunny!" That bottle was likely full when Easton came back. It's riding about half right now. Gunner looks up at the knocking and barks once or twice before Easton calls out and he settles back down on the ground next to the couch.

The door swings open of its own accord, so Javier simply lets himself in after a moment's pause. He should've expected it, really. Hands stuffed into the pockets of his hoodie, he extracts one in order to shove the door shut, and adjusts his ballcap as he glances over the place. The layout's a little different from his, though the construction's similar. Smaller, but similar. Easton may or may not notice that the Mexican avoids looking him in the eye, and has since the night he turned up at the Twofer.

"Hey. Just stopped by for a few to, uh." He hitches his chin toward the stairs, and the bedroom where Bennie's presumably asleep. "You know." Give the blonde her dose of xanax, glimmer style. His hand's shoved back into the pocket of his hoodie, sleeves ruched up to his elbows so that his intricate ink is on display. "How's it going?" Keep things casual. No talking about fucking feelings.

With a good solid case of drunk head (where his head feels heavier than it should) causing him to lay his head on the arm of the couch and look at Javier half-upside-down Easton narrows his eyes. He nods and says, "Oh." as he tries to drunkenly process the lack of familiarity. The 'hows it going' question gets a grunt of "Good." As if Easton's reverting to Marine talk. He sits up then and turns to actually face Ruiz, some confusion clear on his face, "Thanks for helpin her out.." Easton can't figure out why Ruiz is being strange and why that's causing him to get all casual small-talky. For now it stays in the confusion phase, but knowing their history that's likely to progress to the yelling phase soon.

"Yeah," is the non-response to Easton's own grunt of oh, and his eyes flick to the television. Then the glass of liquor on the coffee table. Then the dog trying to resettle with his head in Easton's lap. He runs his tonguetip along a canine and eases out of the doorway, thumping off toward the stairs without addressing the comment about helping her out. Then up he goes, followed by the sound of him moving around up there for a few moments and settling into the chair beside the bed. Murmured words, get you a drink of water? and, yeah, he's just downstairs, no, I promise, he's not disappeared.

Easton watches Ruiz go upstairs without another word and he frowns deeply. He looks over at the crutches, which he despises deeply and sighs. He puts a cap on the bottle, gets himself up to standing and crutches his way to the kitchen to at least be able to get a better look at him on his way back through. He pops open a window, fishes a pack out from a drawer and lights a cigarette. They rarely smoke indoors but he's giving himself the out for now. Though he really shouldn't be smoking while his leg recovers, not to mention the fresh set of scars on his body. Most of them are hidden by his nearly worn through Cornell tee-shirt and warm-up pants that are pinned up on the left leg. And so he smokes and waits for Ruiz to come back down, as if pretending he's not waiting for Ruiz to come back down because he's being weird and it's making Easton weird which in turn makes him annoyed.

It doesn't take long to give Bennie the little bump. A few words exchanged; she laughs at something he says and kisses his cheek, and it's done. He's not the sort of man to sit around and engage in idle chit chat, especially when keenly aware that he's in another man's house, playing nursemaid to another man's girlfriend.

A minute or two later, the cop's bulky frame re-emerges from the hazy shadows of the stairway, and he pauses at the sight of Easton standing there on his crutches, watching for him. Like he doesn't.. what, trust him? There's a little flicker of his upper lip as if he might snarl something at the younger man. Then nothing, as he steps past, headed for the door. "She's asleep," he rumbles, low. "This keeps up, you should take her to the doctor."

The cigarette does nothing to calm him down, if anything it makes him a little more agitated since it's been so long. Easton uncorks the bottle while he waits and doesn't bother with a glass now. It's too damn hard with crutches to maneuver around with one anyway. He watches Ruiz, unsure of what he expects but still finds his expectations not met. "Has she needed this a lot? Since.. I got Lost?" His tone is business like, as if he were talking to a medical professional who had just come to administer a treatment. It's clipped but not unfriendly. He's missed a lot and he's trying to get up to speed and there are things he can't ask Bennie yet. Things he can't tell her yet either. So for now he puts aside his personal anger and starts with her.

It's eyed for a moment, the cigarette. Like he's wondering if this whole smoking indoors is a new thing, or if it's an old habit he's unaware of. The awkwardness with the bottle makes him pause, and half-linger, awkwardly nearby, just in the off chance he's needed to help with something. "Has she needed.. what, me doping her up on the fucking regular?" Something flickers across his eyes, there and gone in a fraction of a second. "No, because you know what she's like. She stuffs it down, pretends like shit's fine. She only really started to fall apart the other night, when you showed up like that out of the goddamned blue."

It's definitely not normal to smoke indoors, but he's not really adjusted to what 'normal' even means in their new place that feels even more foreign now. He only was here a handful of nights before he disappeared. He grits his teeth when Ruiz puts so fine a point on the question but he is at least to relieved the hear this hasn't been her life or even a major part of it while he was gone. But then his face screws up at the last part. "What the fuck is your deal? Are you really fuckin' putting this on me?!" He points upstairs towards Bennie. "I don't need a fuckin' parade but you haven't said shit to me since I've been back and now what? Goodness, are you just pissed I took yer gun? I didn't even shoot /you/" Because the concept that Ruiz might be furious because Easton took his gun has definitely crossed his mind. That's a line a sane Easton wouldn't cross. But he's at a loss to explain the cool reception and not in anyway ready to deal with navigating complex emotional relationships ... not that he's ever good at that.

At the what the fuck is your deal, a sliver of tension cuts through the taller man, like a fault line through granite. His eyes finally seek out Easton's, dark and slightly narrowed, every inch his fourty-six years when he looks at people like that. "Am I.." And then his upper lip does pull back in a flicker of a snarl. "Am I pissed you took my gun? Are you fucking shitting me, Marshall? You really think that's what's bothering me here?" He takes a step in closer, gaze steady now under the brim of his cap. Then there's a sharp, nasty smile at his last. "Maybe next time, you fucking should." And he shoves past the other man on his way to the door.

There is a brief glimmer of hope when Easton actually gets Ruiz to look at him, realizing now that eye contact has been nearly non-existent since he's been back. But that relief doesn't last long, and yes when Ruiz says it back the taking his gun theory doesn't really hold up, but Easton's at a loss. "I don't know! Use your fuckin words. The English ones that I actually understand." Because if Ruiz explains things in Spanish Easton is going to really lose his shit right now. He gets shoved and manages to stay up on the crutches, though he bumps into some cabinets and groans. "Clayton mentioned memories getting re-written but I don't remember you being this much of an asshole." He spits it out, always quick with insults, especially when interactions he expects to go one way, needs to go that way, don't. He straightens up enough to cap that with, "Actually, I do remember you being this much of a prick. It's coming back." He scowls at the older man, frustrated for a thousand reasons that this how this situation is playing out, but unable to change much about it.

Using his words sort of implies that de la Vega has words to use that aren't simply strings of filthy expletives cobbled together nonsensically. He pivots halfway to the door, drags a hand out of the pocket of his hoodie and stabs an inked forefinger in Easton's direction. "I've only got two words for you, Marshall. Fuck." The middle finger comes up, too. "Off." He prowls a pace back, shoulders still laced with tension. "Right the hell back to the Veil, for all I fucking care. You think you show up at the Twofer in a grass skirt after however the hell many months it's been, and we're just going to pick up where we left off, huh? You think that's how it's going to go?"

Easton raises his hands off his crutches in a 'what' gesture at being told to fuck off. He places the cigarette into his mouth and nearly bites through the filter as he tries to take a drag. He exhales smoke with his words and says, "Oh yea, cause this is exactly what I wanted. I have no fuckin' clue what's going on with Bennie. I just shot Geoff and I lost nearly a fuckin year of my life." He crutches a hop towards Ruiz and says, "I don't know how any of this is going to go. I don't know what the fuck happened while I was gone. I don't know why the hell you're trying to piss me off. I don't. Goddamn. Know. Anything." He tries to punctuate that statement with a shove, but he's unsteady enough of the crutches and it's nearly impossible to get leverage.

Javier looks at Easton for a moment like he's grown a second head when he mentions Bennie. "How could you not know?" he all but snarls. "She figured you for fucking dead and gone. She'd finally taken your fucking missing poster down and started moving on with her life, and what do you do? You come back-" And then the fireplug of an ex-Marine rams into him, unsteady as he may be, and topples them both into the kitchen counter. And if Javier were a better man, a kinder man, a man who wasn't quite so fond of hurting people, maybe he wouldn't decide to plow his fist into his friend's cheekbone right about then.

But it turns out, he's just not that man. So he does.

There is fightin' needing doing before Easton can really get a word in about Bennie and his re-appearance. His shove topples him as well but before he can sort himself out between the one leg and the booze Ruiz isn't waiting. He gets clocked across the fact and is sent sprawling down to the ground the crutches clattering to the ground. He lets out a bark of a laugh. "Yup. That was my fuckin' plan, to ruin her life. I was really hopin' I could fuck this up just like every other relationship. Good call Gunny, you got me." He kicks a crutch towards Ruiz, not really intending to do any damage, more petulant at this point. "I gave up trying to get back months ago asshole. I-.." He wasn't looking for a door. He was looking for something else. Someone else. "And when the fuck did you become her protector? Are you fucking her?" Look when Easton goes all in on the verbal assault, he /really/ goes for it. But it might explain the over-protective mode Ruiz is in. That and it belies the underlying fear that actually Bennie's moved on and everyone's just too damn nice to tell him that.

This. This, de la Vega can get behind. Not sitting around, talking about their emotions. Discussing their feelings, doing whatever the fuck it is functioning human beings in functioning friendships do. But this. This. Beating the shit out of each other.

"That all you've got?" he snarls, throwing his arms out wide when the other man goes down in a sprawl of limbs and prosthesis and crutches. He ignores the one that's kicked toward him, steps right over it, and sinks down into a crouch as he reaches for Easton's shirt. A fistful of it's taken into his hand, twisted around and jerked hard to jostle his fellow former Marine. "You think if I wanted to fuck your girlfriend, I'd have bothered waiting for you to leave? You think I'd need to? Huh?" His eyes are slivered up and hungry, jaw hard, voice a guttural growl. "Make up your fucking mind what you want, Marshall."

It's been a while since Easton's had a proper drink and sadly the man just isn't holding it very well. He's sloppy. He aims a headbutt at Ruiz that goes so badly awry that Easton breaks his own nose in the attempt, smashing it into Ruiz's chin. "Shit." He pushes back at De La Vega but he's nowhere near fighting shape at the moment. "I think you'd break a damn hip, and the only way you'd get a shot is if she were sad and lonely. That's your favorite isn't it?." He growls something and tries to get out of the man's graps but really it's just a flailing at this point. "About what?! Somehow I've obviously disappointed you by fuckin' living, so why don't you break it down Barney style for me."

Maybe it's the crack about breaking a hip, or the low blow about sad and lonely. Which shouldn't sting as much as it does, because the ugly truth is, it's not that de la Vega's ever been in any short supply of hot tail; but the one that's been sad and lonely has been him. And so it's likely this that finally gets him to lay the fuck off, and release his friend with a shove, and climb to his feet slowly. Like a spell's been broken, he looks around with apparent confusion before glancing back at the man on the floor with the broken nose. And it occurs to him finally that he should probably go get him some ice and painkillers for that. Which he ambles off to do, wordlessly.

Easton is unceremoniously dropped back but at least has enough reaction time to not let his head hit the wood floor. He looks even more confused though as Ruiz wanders off wordlessly. He looks around at the bottom of the cabinets as if they might hold an answer before sitting up and then pulling himself upright by the countertop. He leans against it breathing hard and then moves to the other side to get back to the bottle. Because drinking obviously is going to help this already messy situation. He takes a drink from the bottle and stares after Ruiz, some of the anger drained out of him by the man wandering off, which just leaves a hollow ache that is so much worse. But he doesn't have any words for this either, and it just makes him think of Tom and how perfectly they communicated without words and how often he's fucked up relationships, friendships and otherwise, looking for that again.

After some rifling about in the freezer, and then the bathroom, he produces both a bag of peas and what appears to be some ibuprofen. Then he thumps back over and sinks down beside Easton. The pills are held out first, in the palm of his hand. No water to wash them down; he can swallow them dry, right? Or is he going to be a bitch and complain about it? The 'ice pack' is next, folded over and pressed lightly to the bridge of Easton's nose. More silence, because he's real good at that, Javier is.

Easton looks at the pills and scoffs a little, unimpressed by the strength. "No percs?" He really shouldn't joke but somehow being back has reignited some things that were forced into dormancy when he was in survival mode. But he does take the pills and wash them down with a swig of booze. He accepts the ice pack and says, "I shouldna said that." What precisely because there was a lot in there. And it's a good thing it stopped there because if Ruiz kept harping on screwing Bennie, Easton would have broken out trying for a daddy-daughter achievement and might have done some actual damage to their relationship. Placing the peas over his nose for a moment he closes his eyes and lets it rest a minute before pulling them away.

"Can we try this again?"

There's an amused snort from the cop when the percocet's mentioned. He scrubs his fingers through his hair, and doesn't speak for a long while at the first remark. He doesn't ask which, because it's pretty much like shooting fish in a barrel at this point; when he and Easton fight, all sorts of nasty shit tends to come out of the woodwork. And if Finch ever entered the equation, it's a fair bet Easton would walk out of here with a hell of a lot more than a broken nose.

"I didn't think I was going to see you again," he murmurs. "Don't know what the fuck to do with.. with this." He hitches his chin to the other man, to indicate what he means. Him returning.

There is a long list of things you shouldn't say to your friends and somehow Ruiz and Easton manage to yell those things at each other on a regular basis it seems. Often while punching or threatening to punch one another. But for now at least it seems like they've settled into a lull in the hostility.

"I know"

If there's one thing Easton knows it's losing someone close. One of those things that many people in GH have in common. And he knows what he put people through.

"I don't know either."

His voice gets a little more throaty than he would like now. Stupid emotions and talking about them. But he tries to steady himself to press forward.

"I'm still worried it's not real. Or that I'm going to just blip back out in a minute and-"

And that's as far as he gets with the talking. So he stops. And takes a drink.

De la Vega's eyes tick to the stairway as he hears a sound. After a couple of beats, once he's convinced it isn't Bennie coming down to kick both their asses for their stupidity, he settles a little, and drops his head back against the cabinet.

"It's real," he assures the other man, voice a low, rough grumble that still holds plenty of agitation. He opens his hand for Easton's drink, waggles his fingers in a gimme. "Shit's been fucked up since you've been gone, Marshall. Really fucked up."

Easton's own eyes follow his as he looks to the stairs. He barely survived Ruiz, he doesn't like the idea of Bennie coming to beat his ass just now, deserved as it would be.

He takes another sip of the whiskey before handing it over. The fact that Ruiz isn't demanding tequila, which surely exists somewhere in the house (maybe? Easton's been gone a while) has him looking concerned. "I take it you mean beyond the base level of fucked up that is our lives here." Ruiz doesn't normally bat an eye at the strangeness of life here, and he's hardly one to exaggerate. "I'm sorry I wasn't here." To help. To shoot things. To take some of the load off other people having to deal with the shitstorms and their fallout.

Survived? Well, he hasn't necessarily made it out in one piece yet, has he. Better not count his chickens before they're hatched.

"I mean a different kind of fucked up," he murmurs, taking a swig of the whiskey, and dragging his knuckles across his mouth in the aftermath. "The kind I thought I'd left behind in Portland. In Mexico." Me-HEE-co, is how he pronounces it. The bottle's handed back, waggled between fingers that are inked with those ugly cartel symbols. Easton may, or he may not recognise them for what they are. "Well, you're here now. You might wish you weren't." He scruffs his fingers through his hair again with a weary sigh. "How's your nose?"

The errant cigarette from before is pulled up to Easton's lips from some unknown location. He should probably make sure he didn't just leave a burn mark somewhere. He takes a drag and then attempts to trade it for the bottle, a hold over from another time and different Marines that he didn't think about.

The tattoos on Ruiz's knuckles don't mean anything specific to Easton, other than a general sense of 'rough background' that he has never asked about. The thought of wishing to be anything else gets a 'look' from Easton, "I highly doubt that." He makes a twitch of his lip that starts to look like a scrunch of his nose but quickly stops. He gingerly touches it and sighs, "Broken." He finally comes back around to the trouble that Ruiz was alluding to, "You gonna let anyone help with that different kind of fucked up? Or you gonna be a stubborn ass about it?" Even the fact that he's bringing it up is progress, but Easton's always one to push.

The cigarette's accepted in exchange, and the fact that they're smoking indoors isn't questioned. He'll let Bennie sort that one out with Easton later. Not his fucking problem. A drag, and his eyes close on the exhale as his head drops back against the cabinet, rolls slowly from left to right, left to right. "I'm working for someone worse than Felix fucking Monaghan, Marshall." He makes a sound in his throat, takes another drag off the cigarette, and then holds it out. "I don't think I'm the one to talk to about helping. That'd be Joey Kelly."

Wow, that is a lot more direct than Ruiz has ever been. Easton lets one eyebrow slide up at the admission. He skips this round on the bottle, still drunk enough from earlier and not really wanting to move his face much. "Reyes." The name comes back quickly from what Alexander shared with him yesterday. There's no judgement about the fact that Ruiz readily admits to working for him. "I owe Kelly a visit anyway. Need to make sure I'm up on the state of things." Has Ruiz already put together why Vic is at the bar, probably. There was no need to say things outloud before but now they are apparently doing just that. Between the casino and Vic working at the Two if by Sea, it doesn't take a detective with underworld ties to assume Easton's at least associated if not more with Monaghan. "How bad is it?"

Surely Easton's smart enough to put things together without Javier spelling it out for him. The murders, the attempted kidnappings, the corrupt cops, the squeezing of local businesses and gradual takeover of the drug trade through Gray Harbour that's all being facilitated, at least in part, by the police department being under Reyes's thumb.

"He beat Cavanaugh to within an inch of his life, and he threatened Finch." That alone should explain why he had to do what he did, much as it weighs him down to his very soul. He drags his fingers through his hair, over his face, then starts to stand. "I should get going, you going to be okay? Might want to, uh, see a doctor about that nose. Get it set."

There are things where you just don't look. Easton's fine with not looking. He doesn't have that need to pick and dig that Isabella or Alexander might. He's fine with saying things aren't his problem. Until someone he cares about is affected, and then he'll look. And as soon as Ruiz is flat out telling him what position he's in, the other stuff doesn't take terribly long to fall into place.

"Joe's okay?" An inch of his life, well hopefully it was a good inch. And Easton doesn't say anything about Finch. He knows what lengths he would go to for people in his life, and there's no words needed.

When Ruiz starts to stand, Easton gives him a look for just a moment, that he's dropping that news and leaving, but it makes sense. There's probably only so many details Easton wants to know about, and he knows his next steps already. "Yea, I'll see a Bennie when she gets around to it." No doctors. No hospitals. And no people he's not absolutely sure of right now. "Yea, next time maybe we can just hug it out until I'm back on two legs?" It's not like there won't be more punching in the future, one of these times Easton might even be sober for it. Maybe. Probably not.

"He'll be okay," is murmured low as the cop gets to his feet, a slight wince as some old injury or another is aggravated with the motion. "The guys that did this to him.. mm." His eyes slant up. "Maybe less so." And that's an admission he hasn't made to anyone else. But he trusts this man with it, the one who's been through the crucible as well.

"Keep her close. Don't let them get to her, yeah? You promise me you'll keep her safe?" His hands are jammed into his pockets, dark eyes seeking out Easton's as he heads for the door and pauses there.

"Of course."

And Easton's just going to ignore that huge lump in his throat that swells at the thought of how little control he has over that. He can do everything within his power, all the prep, all the planning, all the training and they can just decide 'fuck this guy' and throw him in the veil whenever they feel like it. The doubt of that is probably written across his face. The fact that he wasn't there for her and it's just dumb luck, her own resolve and the help of others that she was there to return to.

But he doesn't open that up tonight. Just neatly shoves that back down and looks at Ruiz at the door with a nod.

"Thanks for stopping by Gunny."

The busted nose and sore jaw feel about right. Almost comfortable.