2021-02-12 - First Stop, Slushies

Though they were both born in Gray Harbor, it's been a very, very long time since either Casey or Wes has set foot in the little coastal town. And yet, it's on this chilly wintry and snowy day that the two find a parking spot outside the bar and stumble inside, returned to the town of their birth, what they can see of it, given the snow. "Remind me to bring back something for Tatti before we leave." Tatti had opted to stay at the motel where they were staying, exhausted and not in the mood for going out, at least not right away.

Casey makes his way up toward the bar and find them a seat. "Well, at least it's warm in here," he says to Wes with a little sidelong grin. "Are you already regretting doing this in the winter instead of waiting for the spring?"

Wes follows after Casey, a wide grin on his face as he looks around the bar curiously. "Heck no! We're here! Freedom!" He says cheerfully, following the other man and taking a seat after shrugging off a thick winter coat. "Winter is a great time of year to see a new place. No crowds. All the slushies you could ever want for free. You're not looking at the bright side here, Case."

There is a blonde behind the bar with a suspicious off-season tan wearing an oversized grey cable knit sweater that slips off one shoulder and a pair of black leggings that lace up the seams through star shaped grommets. A wavy lock is tucked behind one ear as Bennie beams a smile to the two men that find themselves a seat at the bar, wiping the counter in front of them with a clean towel. "What can I getcha? And say something easy otherwise I'll go cross eyed, and maybe cry and should I check your ID's or are you totally legal because wow, seriously young vibes."

A woman sitting at the bar, not far from Casey and Wes's spots, tilts her head thoughtfully as she looks at Wes for a moment, then to Bennie. "I hate to admit I overheard their conversation, AND that I'm wanting something potentially complex, but-- do you have any slushy drinks? Something nice and icy and slushy all at once? Don't be afraid to tell me no!" Diana grins to Bennie, then gives a polite (yet sheepish) wave to Wes and Casey. "When I hear a good idea, I just have to put it into action."

Casey laughs at Wes and makes a face as he sheds some of his heavier clothing and unwraps a scarf from around his neck, "Do /not/ lick the slush out there. That is nasty." Of course he's mostly just teasing as he bumps shoulders with Wes after settling into a seat next to him. Once he's gotten the layers off he's in a pair of comfortable jeans, hiking boots, and a dark blue henley that almost matches his eyes. He pulls out his wallet and sets his ID on the bar so that Bennie can check it out. "Definitely legal," he tells her before nodding to Diana and saying, "Hey, if it makes you happy.. but with that snow out there? I'm getting something /warm/. You guys can have all the slushies you want." He then turns back to Bennie and says, "Can I get a coffee with Bailey's?"

Wes throws a smile at Bennie and starts to answer in regards to a drink, but pauses when the woman down the bar speaks up. He looks at her, then points, "I mean, if she's already ordering a slushy drink, I'd go for one too, sans alcohol. Please?" He gives Bennie a hopeful look before glancing around for a menu. "You guys have food? I'm starving."

Bennie eye narrows with thought at Diana, "How about a..." Bottom lip gets a good gnaw for a second before a light bulb almost visibly turns on over her head. "Pina colada! I can do those!" Obviously she's not one of the usual bartenders even if she seems at home behind it. She picks up Casey's ID, squints at the date, decides to take his word for it instead of doing the math and gives the little plastic card her stamp of lip-glossed approval in a kiss mark before flicking it back. "Coffee and Bailey's works for me, it has the ingredients right in the order!" Scooping ice into a blender, she waits for the final go ahead on the pina coladas. "Oooh, you should try the loaded tots. They are addictive." She offers a menu that's just a single piece of paper with usual bar fare on it.

"Oh my gosh. I love those. You're a genius, ma'am! Certified." Belatedly, Diana gets out her wallet as well, but she's pretty clearly at least in her upper 20s. She pauses though, to ask, "...what's a loaded tot? Is it also slushy?" She looks to Casey, smiling, and says, "All the slushies I want? I'm afraid I'll have to hold you to that." Wes gets a thumbs-up for his slushy solidarity. She turns in her seat to face Wes and Casey more fully, and it becomes readily apparent (by the jingles if nothing else) that she's wearing an 'ugly Christmas sweater' with an alternating red and green diamond pattern, tinselry to mark space between them, and ... bells. All over. It's a thing, all right. She's wearing this with high-waisted beige pants, and though it's hard to make out anything beyond candy canes on her leggings peeking out beneath her high-waisted pants, they're a thing, too. "I'm Diana. Nice to meet you."

Casey laughs a little at the kiss that his license gets, holding it against his heart dramatically before tucking it back into his wallet. "It does," he confirms, about his order having the ingredients clearly labeled as part of it. He then asks, "And a little side of extra creamer, please." Then he leans over to look at the menu that is set in front of Wesley, "Oh.. I want tater tots. We should bring those back for Tatti, too." He grins over at Diana and then tells Bennie "Her slushy's on me.. and a refill if she wants one." He then says, "Hey. I'm Casey. This is Wes. Nice to meet you, too."

"I... have no idea what's actually in a pina colada but sure! Sounds great. And loaded tots. Perfect. Thanks!" Wes says decisively. Then he gives Casey a smirk, "Aren't you excited? I'm excited. We diiiid it. Wooo! Celebration time. Decades of planning! Obstacles of horrific proportion!" Someone spent a little too much time cooped up in the car today. He peers down the bar at his slushy comrade again, "Hi Diana! Be honored, he doesn't buy drinks for everyone. So! What kind of fun things are there to do around here in Gray Harbor? We're new." In case that wasn't abundantly clear.

The blender whirrs to life with the appropriate ingredients added while Bennie pours a coffee, adds a shot of Bailey's and slides that and a little shot glass of extra creamer in front of Casey. "Bennie." She introduces herself with a little finger pointy waggle of her finger over her head. "Co-whatever of this very fine establishment. We don't live off labels." Two pina coladas (one sans alcohol) are served up with an added cherry on top, and she steps back to the middle island of the bar with the rest of the jar and slides up on the counter with her prize.

"And you!" Bennie points at Diana, "Look like you work at one of those year round Christmas places. And what ...did you boys exactly do that we are celebrating with spiked coffee and virgin tropical drinks?"

Diana blinks at Casey's words to Bennie, and then laughs, her bells jingling all the way. "You certainly didn't need to do that, but who am I to refuse free slushies? ...thank you." She smiles over at Casey before looking to Wes and replying, "Well, there's this place, there's this place, the zoo, a ton of fun or tasty-serving places along the boardwalk, there are boat tours... I spend a lot of time at the library, but I obviously don't know if that's your speed or not... and that's just the reputable places. There's haunted house tours as well, and they're usually pretty... eventful, if you ask me." She grins, then looks between the two of them curiously at mention of the 'obstacles of horrific proportion,' though her lips are curved into a smile nonetheless. She lights up even more as Bennie delivers her pina colada, and she says, "Thank you! The cherry on top makes it. Nice to meet you, Casey, Wes, and Bennie!" She has another laugh at Bennie's 'guess' about where she works, and she shakes her head. "Nope! Just a festive sort of person. I think it's a shame to only wear Christmas in December. I say it should last until the weather warms up too much for sweaters-- and so it does, for me."

"Yeah, definitely loaded tots," Casey confirms. "That needs to happen." He then laughs and says, "Youuuuu have had too much caffeine and /I/ drove. This is all the excitement you're getting until I have coffee and potato goodness." But he's grinning, even as he says it, and leans over to rest his chin on Wesley's shoulder, one arm sliding around him to give him a little squeeze, enjoying his enthusiasm, even if Casey's a little more subdued at the moment. He grins at Bennie as she points out Diana's sweater. He wasn't going to say anything. "We just drove here from out of town. We were born here. We're moving back. Wes, my sister Tattiana, and I. I think we're just celebrating being out of the car right now." He laughs. Then he grins a little crookedly at Diana's explanation of the sweater, "Hey, if it makes you happy, that's what matters. Zoo sounds like fun, but probably when it gets warmer."

Wesley 'oooohs' when the fancy drink is set in front of him. "Thank you very much, bartender Bennie. This looks very delicious. As for what we are celebrating, it is a long-awaited occasion of breaking away from our fettered hometown and-" He stops talking and looks over at Casey. "You really undersold that. And it was a very long time in the car." He just smirks and has a sip of the fruity cocktail. "Ooooh, I like this. Have you had one of these? This is good." He shares appreciatively, because more sugar is going to help with the high energy level Wes is already at. "Haunted houses? That sounds fun around Halloween. And I won't judge your sweater too much, Diana." He looks at Bennie, "Where would you send new people?"

Pulling up her legs, Bennie sits cross-legged on the back bar with her barrel sized jar of cherries in her lap and a little pair of silver tongs to fish them out instead of her bare hand. She's tired of getting frowned at for the bare hand thing. "A girl after m'own heart. Except for my joy is generally summer themed." She click clacks the tongs before diving after a red orb with the tips holding it aloft over her open mouth and dropping it in. "Ooo. Welcome back. Uh. Don't go near the Mill." She offers as sage words of advice for the newly returned Harborinians. "But Huckleberry throws some banging parties, we have a movie theater and some fun shops. And of course we have a SPECTACULAR casino just about a half hour away, and I don't say that because I'm biased or anything even though I am. You need a place to stay, there is the Formerly-murder hotel, the Casino has a hotel, uh. There are some cabins for rent, trailers at Huckleberry. Money lives at Bayside. Or some houses!"

There's a chuckle from Diana at Wes's words about her sweater. "So kind of you," she teases, and then tells the two of them, "Welcome back to Gray Harbor! It takes some getting used to, but I guess not for you two, having been here before." She pauses, looking thoughtful, but doesn't voice whatever she's braining about. "Summer themes are fun, too," she eventually replies to Bennie. "I'm a big fan of themes in general. It's just that spring and summer themes often overlap, but autumn and winter kind of do their own thing, and I respect that."

Casey laughs as Wes chastises him for underselling their grand adventure of driving cross-state from one small hometown to another small hometown. He grins at him and then lifts his chin off his shoulder to steal a sip of his pina colada, making a slightly squinched up face. "Wow, that's sweet," he says before cupping his warm cup of coffee gratefully and taking a sip from that instead. "We were pretty little when we left here. I don't really remember much about it, at all. Though he nods to Bennie and says, "I know about the casino. I'm planning on applying there. I've got a gaming license and am a croupier." He pauses, "Dealer," since some people aren't familiar with the term.

"I mean, I left when I was like.. six weeks old? Sooo.. it's all new to me." Wesley clarifies with a laugh. "But what's the deal with going to 'the Mill'? What is it? And did you say murder hotel? Are you messing with us?" He asks, amusement on his face. Diana's comment catches the man's attention. "Getting used to? Why is that?" He sucks at his drink in between questions and Casey stealing a sip. "Very sweet. Fantastic. More for me if you don't like it." He teases of the other mean. "And Case? I think we need to spent a night at the murder hotel. But, we can't tell Tatti first."

"Croupier, croupieeeeer..." Bennie repeats the word as if it's her new favorite bit of vocabulary ever. "Nice! I'd put in a good word on account of I'm sleeping with one of the investors, but it's really through a Trust thing so I'm not sure he has any sort of pull on the floor. And I don't know you from Adam, though I once knew an Adam in high school and we were pretty chummy, so by the law of generalization, all Adam's are pretty decent." She either rambles or has a gift for stringing abstract thoughts together. "The Mill will eat your soul." She says simply, "And I said former murder hotel. I don't think anyone has died there in, like, a while. They should put up one of those signs like a construction site. We are two hundred eighty seven days unexplainable death free!"

Hopping down from her perch, Bennie chirps, "Lemme go check on your tots!" Even though it'll be someone else who delivers them, as Bennie was just covering the bar while someone was on break.

"Ah, the man with the fast-moving hands. I'll make sure not to bet against you," Diana says to Casey, tone very amused. She points a finger to Bennie as 'murder hotel' is clarified, as though to say, 'EXACTLY!' "Those signs would really be handy," she says thoughtfully, and goes silent for a few moments, like maybe she's considering how to get that implemented. In the end, though, she shakes her head, has a sip of her pina colada, and looks to Wes. He's also eyed thoughtfully, and then she says, "Well... hm, how to explain. You're not going to believe me, but that's okay. No offense taken. Anyway: the answer is that-- well, I'll put it this way. My life's work is that I'm a Paranormal Investigator, and this place keeps me very busy. I'd heed what Ms. Bennie there said about the Mill, and don't be too surprised if you spot things out of the corner of your eyes. Cue disbelief."

"I hate to break it to you," Casey tells Wes, "But I'm pretty sure that we're already staying at the murder motel. There was only one that I could find." Which means that it's pretty certain that that's the case. He seems content to let Wes drink his too-sweet drink and stick to his coffee. He laughs when Bennie offers to put in a good word with the investor that she happens to be sleeping with. "I appreciate the thought," he tells her with a good-natured grin. Then he says to Diana, "The House always wins in the end." Casey can't help but grin a little crookedly at Diana's explanation. "Paranormal Investigator, huh. Do you have a show? Do you go around with an EMF reader taking like, electrical signals and stuff? Have you ever seen a ghost?" Apparently Wes isn't the only one who can ask a lot of questions.

Wesley tilts his head at Diana as she explains her profession. Then he lifts a hand and scratches at his scruffy chin, obviously trying to figure out if he believes the woman is serious or not. He laughs before commenting to Casey. "Excellent. That is something I can text my mom about later. She'll love it. That and the random texts I got earlier in the car. Murder hotel, random texts." He snickers, then looks back at Diana. "Are you on YouTube?"

Diana only smiles at Casey's questions, not seeming the least bit surprised-- though Wesley's startles a small chuckle out of her. She checks off on her fingers: "No show. No EMF reader. Have seen a ghost. More than once, of course. ...and not on YouTube. Though you know, it's worth thinking about." She frowns slightly, saying mostly to herself as an aside, "Though it's unlikely it would stay up." Then she looks back to the two of them. She seems serious, though she's smiling in a friendly enough manner while saying, "I wrote a book about haunted places in North America, and places where the boundary between this world and ... something else, is thinner. This place gets a lot of action, honestly, so I'm working on the second book now." Her smile turns warmer. "With a co-author, this time. He's got more of the writing chops-- I'm more on the research end of things."

"I'm sure she will. Tell her hi for me, and your new text girlfriend," Casey says with a sidelong grin. Then he turns his attention back to Diana as the questions turn toward her profession and whether she's on YouTube or not. He seems intrigued, interested in what she does, whether he believes in ghosts or not. "That's pretty cool. How did the book do? And what's it called?" He pulls out his phone so that he can try to find it, "I'd totally read it." And he really would. "How's the second book coming?"

"Really? You've seen ghosts? Where? What were they doing? Did they talk or just like, howl ominously?" Wesley also has questions, but he laughs when Casey mentions his girlfriend. To Diana he explains, "Not really my girlfriend. Someone got a wrong number and started texting me about covering her shift as an exotic dancer. It was fun. Casey helped me with some of the responses."

"Oh, um. The book did... sort of well, but not great. Critic-review-wise, I got a lot of skeptics, but the royalties have been okay. I promise I'm not trying to promote the book. It's called 'Parting the Veil' though, with the subheading of 'Haunted Places In North America.' Some combination of those keywords usually gets people there. Please don't feel obligated, by any means-- you did already buy me a slushy, after all." Diana grins and takes a drink of her pina colada, nodding her approval. "The second book is... coming. My co-author's been rather busy and whatnot, and the task feels pretty enormous at times. I keep trying to map the edges, and that... is not panning out well at all. But I've been conducting interviews with people around town, and that at least has been fabulous." She then looks to Wes, shaking her head gently. "Not as much ominous howling as weeping, gnashing of teeth, and generally trying to get people's attention. One in particular that I didn't see first-hand, was killing people in town... but that's sorted now." She tilts her head to the side at the mention of the text-girlfriend-not-girlfriend. "I take it you didn't agree to cover her shift? I really don't know how you can let someone down like that." She says it with a severe expression, but then her lips curl up at the edges despite her best efforts.

Casey tap taps into his phone trying to pull the book up on Amazon so he can throw it into his cart. "Not often that I meet an actual published author. I'll check it out." He grins over at her then laughs as Wes explains his text-not-girlfriend, and Diana's response. He says, "The only person my boyfriend is stripping for is me," in his best possessive boyfriend voice, complete with faux-jealous scowl at Wes. "Not some wrong-number-having hussy." He's /very clearly/ joking. Then he turns back to Diana and says, "Wait wait.. there was a ghost /killing/ people in town?" This is where his suspension of disbelief starts to fail. "Uh.."

Wes just snickers and leans over to give Casey a kiss on the cheek. "Don't worry about it. I'm gonna call my mom before it gets later and she starts having my dad check the police scanner to make sure we're not in a ditch somewhere. Save me some of the tots." He gives Diana a grin, "And no, I will not be covering her shift. Cool job, be right back." The man will step away to wander to a quiet corner of the bar so he can make the call.

"Well, to be fair, anyone can be a published author these days. Just means uploading your manuscript to Amazon, and BAM. You, too, can sell your book for $2.99 a pop! ...and thank you, for the interest. I hope you enjoy it! I've been told it's a little dry, but... co-author for the second book, so." She grins at the possessive boyfriend act, shaking her head. "Wrong-number-having hussies are the WORST," she agrees with a chuckle. As Wes prepares to leave, she gives him a wave and teases, "Say hi to your mom for me! I'm a right-number-having hussy!" Her expression grows more serious at Casey's question, and she nods her head. "It was... definitely a thing. There was possession, people feeling like their insides were burning up-- and of course the murders. Billy the Ghoul... that's the one responsible. He'd been dead quite a long time, too. Tragic."