So, he's like being... social. It's not the norm. Word is he finishes a gig, handles the tear down and is usually accompanying the van to the hotel after having loaded the majority of the equipment while Sieg, Erik and Jared are off rubbing elbows and what-nots with the bar folk. But tonight, Erik volunteered to handle all of it himself and ... as far as the van goes... it's just better left unsaid.
So it's 2:00AM on this the nineteenth day of March and it's raining. Misting, really, but enough that his hair has started to curl up and his leather jacket with scrawled and painted symbols and jargon, spraypainted and airbrushed once upon a time, looks brand new. His Docs are untied and drenched, and when he steps onto dry concrete, which does exist under Pashmina's awning, it looks like he's being trailed by snakes.
He can be seen from Pashmina's windows, pausing outside the door, a hand on it as his other hand launches his last cigarette for the night. And he's looking past the glass to see if she showed up.
Getting used to the masquerade. It's going to be hard to give up. But who says I have to? I could roam around here for years, have a little life. Be a... regular guy...
If it weren't for the reverberations I cannot help. The rocking of a van, the young girl in the audience tonight who was screwed behind the bar. In watching them prostrate themselves unknowingly but willingly, legs spread wherever I turn.
God...
If you're listening...
It's gotten so fucking boring...
Drancy meanwhile is waiting under the awning, but outside of Pashmina's - just in case he couldn't spot it. Her usual method of transportation is her own two feet - that, and the tube. She could've nipped upstairs and changed, but what's the point really? Talk about sending the wrong message. So there she is, propping up the archway, crystal and glass and glitter shining in the reflected light from Pashmina's windows, her eye and her belly marked almost incandescently.
A lift of a hand, a quirk of a grin - Drancy's wary, still, and not just because of that strange energy she keeps picking up on. This sort of social's not a flavour she's used to.
"Hey there. Don't get tired o' life just yet - y'haven't had any o' their curry yet."
And weren't they surprised when she showed up and informed them to keep a table waiting because she's having dinner with a man. Jumped to all the wrong conclusions, they did. With a roll of her eyes, she just wandered back outside to wait, and sure enough...
What is it about that.... feeling.
Is it creepy how it warms, does it even register that it's pleasurable? Or is it just heated, like pinpricks against the skin till it becomes a shiver at the spine? For someone so ... subdued. Is it weird that it's coming from him? Relatively handsome, Nothing Special held in the carriage, but at odds with the warmth, with the easy strength about which he moves? What is it about that feeling and the one who carries it around with him like his guitar.
Well, usually like his guitar. He doesn't have it on him tonight...
He's wearing sunglasses at night, golden lenses, but that's not all that weird. Just turns night a different color. "Curry will suit me," he says, his voice is a bit worn from his performance. "And some tea." He smiles a little, maybe a little self-consciously. A glance given to the tattoos incandescent in the light. Platinum blonde -- by nature -- eyebrows lift a little as he looks to you. "It's damn close to the club. I keep forgetting..."
Drancy enters the curiously featureless Indian restaurant, with the casual indifference of someone well used to her surroundings. She holds up three fingers by way of salute and acknowledgement to whichever of the varied staff is on duty, then withdraws to a small table in the back. "A lot of the clubbers come here after," she says by way of explanation. "Figure after all that, last thing you really feel a need for is the circulation of grubby hands wanting autographs, conversation, and well, whatever else they'd try t'get from you."
She hurls herself with a casual lack of grace into the chair, the corners of her mouth pulling up in a half-reluctant grin. "So what'd I miss, before you went on, when I hit the lav? How'd you get rid of Dot?" She's very curious - knowing Dot, she'd normally have attached herself like a limpet, and somehow wormed her way into the restaurant as well.
She would have given it all to me. She was already breathless and I only barely touched her. She would have given it all away right there in the club. She'll give it away, she'll end up pawning it in the back of the club with someone Close Enough. There are inevitabilities. Her surrender is one of them. She'll be on her knees tonight if she isn't there already...
He doesn't say anything for a moment, but looks to you, then his chair as he pulls it out in a studious motion. A little quirk of his mouth. "I told her I had another interview. Maybe some other time. That she should ask Sieg," a drawl upon the name, as if to indicate -- the fucker who barely, barely made it on stage at all tonight, "... for my number. Tell him I told him so. I'm sure she'll hook up with someone in the band tonight." He shrugs. "I didn't want to be an asshole. She seemed nice enough. Just... not interested in fucking people over."
And, yes, he seems relieved to be out of the club, out of the cigarette smoke -- though he himself heavily contributed to that -- and out of the noise for a bit. Arms rest on the table and he stares somewhere between you and the space between you, sky blue eyes -- quite light you may now notice in the better light, very Scandanavian. "Other than that, nothing. What did you think of it." A pause and he grins. "Really."
Perhaps unusually, all things considered, she doesn't smoke. She didn't in there, and she doesn't know, instead picking up one of the menus and dropping it across the table, in front of you. Again, she slouches down comfortably, jamming her shoulderblades against the back of the chair, as she opens her own menu. "Wot, you're asking me? I'm the critic, aren't I?" Her own changeable eyes are filled with half-savage amusement. "I thought everyone knew I've got a tin ear because of that."
Drancy runs a fingertip over the menu, though she doesn't need to, really - she eats her so often that she should have curry-coloured skin. Or curry flavour, at least. More seriously, she says, "You lot're good. Not polished around the edges, but... well, that's partly the point, innit. Can tell it's a bit of a strain, though not knowing if Sieg's goin' t'show up or not, until right before ..." She can tell these things, even if most people can't. Of course, she also had a catbird seat to watch it develop.
It's not his fault. It's mine...
"Yeah," the one word prolonged as Dei sits back in his chair, lifting the menu. "He's been doing that a lot lately. It keeps the edge on, I guess." He's not convinced. "I just don't want to see him crash, burnout or fuck himself into oblivion. I guess that makes me something of the lone punk optimist." He lowers the menu and lifts his eyes to you, smirking at himself, shrugging. "I probably wouldn't care, only I've known him for years. You know, small island, old friends. We're all fucking related, in a way. And I don't want to see him fuck it up. He's good. But you know... he's rock and roll," like he's quoting an old saying, "... and I'm not going to screw with his rock god vibe unless it screws with the band. I may be an optimist," he almost winces at the term, "but I'm also a pragmatist. But thanks. It's good to hear that we don't suck. I'm never satisfied..."
Never. Lust doesn't know what Satisfaction is...
He folds his arms against the table again, leaning in. He didn't need long to look over the menu either you notice. "How long have you been writing for zines?"
Drancy is being driven slowly mad by that curiosity, eating away at her, the niggling sense of 'there's something I should know' whenever her left eye focuses on you. It makes her slightly distracted, maybe even noticably so, though not evidently ill at ease.
After all, it's not like the shock of power from touching Davydd those first times.
"Ever since I got out of school. Kicked around across the channel for a while, mainly to get away from my parents," she's old enough now to admit that, even if not much else. "Needed money, and I was damned if I was going to ask them for any. I sort of... fell into it, you know?" She shakes her head, and promptly is irritated by the clinking, jingling of beads and bells. Impatiently, she shoves the hair back a bit.
"It's ... like an old pair of boots, by now. I've got a little niche which is about the size and shape of my arse, so I stay in it... 'sides, what else is there, really, to do? - And you? How long've you been playing?" This is supposedly an interview, not a date, right? Keep that in mind, girl.
Well, what's the difference really? Isn't a date a kind of interview? Maybe it's a little of both and maybe that's why the energy is as it is. Or maybe it's just him. Just him. He has a quiet exterior, not all that flashy apart from the hair. But whatever It is... he has it. Maybe it's charisma. An intensity beneath the surface. Like there's more. Like this isn't even really who he is at all.
Dei seems interested because he is, simply, interested. He glances over the menu one last time before setting it aside, and he nods. "I think it's a good niche. This city has a pretty wild and vibrant underground. It's the punk Mecca. Me... I've been playing since I was about 15. I guess for about twelve years now," that ages him, he's 27ish. "I met Sieg when I was 15. We started a bad called Njol's Saga with Jared. Moved out of our houses and into an abandoned fish warehouse by 18. Then Jared brings home this guy one night, find out he can fucking play the bass. I think it gives us an edge, our drummer and bassist being lovers. They're in synchronicity, big-time."
That makes him smile. And when he smiles the heat pricks again. He almost becomes handsome, really, instead of merely unique looking. "You get to be part of the whole thing -- bands and their writers. Like mad gypsies. Ever travel around with a group?"
Drancy laughs, quietly, a relaxed sound, and shakes her head a bit. "A couple of times, but not much, not really. I'm not all that sociable, as a rule, and I have a lot of ... strong opinions." Just a few.
"Besides," she adds, watchful for a moment, "there's a slight ... side effect ... of being female and travelling with a band, when most bands're all guys." And when I'm not interested in spreading my legs just like that.
"No city's quite like London," Drancy's in agreement about that. "Seen some of the weirdest shite here I've ever seen anywhere..." And that's just the shite I remember...
A sympathetic chuckle sounds, meant for all of it. Being a girl in a man's world and not being seen as a groupie, or being forced to be one. Having strong opinions. Living in The City. He takes off his sunglasses, setting them aside and he rubs his eyes. "Oh yeah, the groupie thing. I'm just not into the groupie thing." But they're all around. Sieg's never gotten laid so much as when he started hanging around Dei. And particularly since coming to London.
Sieg thinks it's the rockgod thing. He doesn't know it's all just ripple effect...
Dei glances up as a waitress finally shows up. "Oh...yellow curry with chicken, kabla naan and ...just regular naan. Oh, and a tea with milk and honey," he knows what he likes and he gets what he wants.
"I like London. The guys are starting to think they want to settle here..." That, he's not so sure about. It entails going against the gypsy grain...
"And the usual, miss?" the waitress just confirms. Who knows. She apparently has a date, maybe she wants to be a little more daring...
Drancy says "Mm, yeah. Vindaloo - extra mango on the side." More of a confirmation than a change in order. Three fingers waved again, in that odd semi-salute, and she sits up again in her chair so that she's actually at eye level, more or less.
"Groupies go with the territory, but I swear, don't understand at all why people are so bloody obsessed with sex. Makes me want to dig a hole and jump in it and see if it's at all the same - a whole lot of fuss and bother for nothing." Another strong opinion, laced with bitter humour. Lust? She's not immune, but she's kept herself off that chess board, thus far.
A sea-green glance, unadorned hands laced in front of her on the tabletop. "London's... it's a crossroads. Like that fountain off in Italy. Sit here long enough, you'll see everyone and anyone. What're you looking to get out of it?"
The waitress smiles and nods and takes a second look at the lavender tressed Dei. Not that he notices. Maybe she feels it too, the odd feeling that there is more there...
More. Always More...
Dei shrugs and half-frowns, half-grins -- a lopsided look. "I guess I shouldn't complain. If I want to get laid, I can get laid. I just find it ... boring. Easy," he corrects himself. "It doesn't mean anything. It's just another layer of superficiality," he sits back, fingers toying restlessly with the edge of the menu. "Sieg is superficial, so it works for him. Half the time, I just want to sleep. You know, it comes in handy when you get homesick, you find someone, you fuck them, and for a while it feels okay. But then..." he shrugs.
There's no escape. In a thousand guises, I insinuate myself into a thousand copulations. Dawn into dusk, dusk into dawn. Bed to bed, nation to nation. I forget by not having time to remember. But what happens when the solace becomes so used that it's hollow. Even the solace becomes part of the act. The endless fucking act...
He nods then, pausing as the tea arrives, and two glasses of water.
When the waitress leaves -- again, she looks, again -- Dei sits forward. "Out of being in London? I guess it's an opportunity. You meet a lot of people, lot of clubs, maybe you become part of a solid scene. Maybe even famous." He laughs. "Oh, that's right. I already said I didn't want to be famous..."
"Getting laid's easy," Drancy agrees. After all, hasn't she had offers? "It's why I don't. Do it, I mean. I'm not known for taking the easy way out." An unusual way of putting it, maybe. She picks up her knife and fork and starts building a tower with them and the napkin, experimentally.
"Mind you, I can't say as to homesickness - my methods of dealing with it involve either vodka or Cadbury's Flake." Liquor, or chocolate. Well... two out of three vices aren't bad... A quick, gamine grin is flashed to the waitress, and she pulls the napkin into her lap.
She adds sugar to her tea, barbarous toss that she is. Lots of sugar. No wonder she's got that hyper edge. "I like the feel of being part of something bigger than I am, but I don't like how much of me everyone expects me to give up. I won't do that. Sod 'em, I'd rather move into a tin-roofed shack and pick through rubbish bins for a living. Luxury's nice - until you consider how much you buy and sell to get it." A laugh, more mirthful this time. "As for fame - why would any'un in their right mind want it? It goes with the territory you're treading on, though."
"I'm more interested in a nice, solid career. I don't want to be packaged, marketed." Sod that demon anyway. Fuck him. He can't buy and sell me. He wouldn't have a kingdom at all if it weren't for me. "I just want to make a living, you know. Without having to work at Harrod's or McDonald's dishing out fries. Music is what I enjoy, it's what I'm good at. The only thing I'm good at," Dei corrects, "...and least likely to fuck up."
There's no sugar in his tea, but honey. Good for the throat. He sips it like he was taught manners, sudden burst of etiquette. "Vodka's the great equalizer," he murmurs. "And my vice of choice. Sieg prefers hash and coke. Erik and Jared prefer X, but they have that whole joint sexlife thing going. And a little luxury would be nice. I need a new van, could always use new sound equipment, new board, pickups," you get the feeling he could make quite a list. "So... you see... being famous might not be all that bad, if it could last maybe a month. Just long enough for me to get better equipment."
Drancy snrks quietly, in the back of her throat, a smothered laugh. "Oh, yes, I'll have just a dash of fame, please. - Remember, fame and money're two diff things. They don't always go together, no matter how triff it'd be." She dashes the back of her hand against her mouth, then takes a sip of tea. Her own manners are passable - you're not dining with a dehydrated wolverine, at least. "Vodka beats everything, though, dunnit? Course, as Dot keeps reminding me, I don't know what I'm missing..."
That actually sets her off, laughing at her own joke, shaking her head. She sobers quickly, though. "Don't know what to tell you, other'n the usual 'be careful what you wish for'. Me, I've got a quiet little corner, but it's easy for me, because I don't want much, mainly because it's hard to know what to want." Something she's been giving increasing thought and frustration to, lately. Damn you, Davydd.
Wanting. That's always come easy for me. It's who I am. It's what I do. If I speak of not wanting, of having few desires, look at my mouth and watch my lips give the lie. I have no choice, you see. The choice was made for me.
"I guess that's true." He pauses for another sip of tea, a half-groan as a sore throat is eased. "I guess we'll be staying in London for a while. Though, I think I'm going to knock off here in a few weeks and go see a friend in Venice. Maybe ..." he smiles and nearly blushes, "...get a little sunshine. Probably won't see that here for a while, I don't guess."
Another sip, another swallow, and he looks at you. You make him smile. That's something. A real talent. He doesn't seem half so brooding now. "I don't think Dot misses much," he mutters.
Drancy sprawls back in her chair, lazily. It's late, after all, and she's been tired lately... though she has no idea why.
I don't know what I want. I don't know what's taken over my life, and here I sit, pretending to be normal, and it's so damn much effort. And Davydd, damn his bones, hasn't returned my calls - not that I can entirely blame him, but it just means when I do see him, I'm going to be even angrier, and well, so the cycle continues. What next? A tattoo on my arse?
Aloud, she says, "Never been to Venice, I admit, but then, I don't much try for tanning." She shifts, turning one hand over so the pale underside of her wrist shows. "Not that I'm against it, I just don't like getting up early enough in the day, even across the Continent, to actually bloody have to see the sun. Damned interloper, it is." Drancy grins. 'A friend', in the club circles, can only ever mean one of a limited number of things - especially when coupled with something akin to a blush.
"Dot doesn't miss anything if she can avoid it... but she's all for telling me about what I missed. Eh, that's all right. She's got her own issues, competitions and so forth. She likes hauling me around, because she's so... accessible. Contrast." Which makes her look better, in those circles, than does Drancy.
Actually, the blush was for admitting that he, the punk rocker, liked to lay out in the sun. It's not exactly edgy. Friend notwithstanding. "I like Italy. It's serene." He laughs. "It seems serene but it's fucking deadly. That whole venus flytrap thing." He finishes his tea with a sit and sits back.
The food's on its way and suddenly he's not hungry. A glance over to the waitress bearing the two plates and then he looks to you, smiling. "You can sin vicariously through her and she can get virtue vicariously through you? Sounds like a great friendship. I guess Sieg and I are similar. He sins for the both of us. I don't even need to bother. Like tonight. Five people, men and women, in the van. At least that's what Jared told me. Not sure whether to be pissed off or amazed." He shrugs, then shakes his head. "Five..."
An orgy. It was an ... announcement. I am gone but I am never far away...
"I like white skin," he says suddenly, quietly. "I like stark contrasts. Black and white. It's... Nordic. It's ... natural. So... just for the record, you can tell Dot she's not my type. I like pale, edgy, loud girls who don't take shit off of anyone and who follow their own path..."
She listens, in narrow-eyed amusement, to this analysis of herself and Dot. "Not exactly. See, I don't need to sin through her - I've got my own sins, they're just... sins of anger, not of ... excess." Trying to throw a punch at a hard man covered in dragons, as an example. Or intentionally pushing the edges in a car belonging to a man obviously rich enough and powerful enough to dump my corpse wherever he likes and not be troubled in his sleep.
Drancy sips at her tea, fidgeting a little as she tries to figure out how to explain. "I just ... never did it because it seemed like something, once you start, you just don't stop. Loneliness isn't something you chase away by being with people - that just postpones it, at best." A quick grin at the mention of the orgy. "Well... guess some people'll be sleeping better'n others when they get home. If they do."
The announcement, sudden and quiet as it is, makes her tilt her head in puzzlement, then flush, cheeks staining red for a moment, and she swallows the rest of her tea hastily, in an effort to cover it up. "Uh... right. I'll tell 'er that, if she asks. She'll kill me, mind." And then grill my corpse for details...
Posted by rowan at May 10, 2003 04:30 PM
