joy beats oppression but oppression will make you pay

[metamorphotic]

WHO: Nick, Hank, Squall
WHAT: Just some friendly talks!
WHERE: Rick's
WHEN: A couple weeks after the roboclone rising.
WARNINGS: Probably just Nick and Hank's respective pottymouths.

Nick has been notably absent from behind the bar at Rick's for the last two weeks, but she's back on duty tonight. Whatever's kept her from her normal routine seems to have taken a toll on her; she's slightly paler than normal, with darker circles shading beneath her usual vibrant blue yes. If anyone's asked about her up until now, they would've been told she was out sick for a while, and that's ... sort of true.

But enough about Nick - what about you? Nick greets you as you approach the bar with a smile - thin and weak, but a smile nonetheless.

"Hey - good to see you again. What can I get you?"

Comments

[silentnarration]

Squall doesn't come by all that often. He checks in a few times a week though when it's obvious Nick didn't take a day off, he starts to poke his head daily near the tail end of the two weeks she's gone.

There's a tangible sense of relief when he sees her again back at the bar as he slides into his usual seat, elbows on the bartop.

"The usual." Some kind of soda because he doesn't quite like the taste of most of them yet, except the cocktails. THose are pretty good...

He tilts his head as he regards her. "You look like crap."

[metamorphotic]

Well, she can't really argue with that, so she laughs quietly and nods. "I feel like crap, so at least there's a good reason for it." No offense taken, of course - she gets the feeling Squall isn't the best socialized person on the planet, and she gets that, because she used to be that way, too. In her case, though, it was intentional.

Nick busies herself with mixing up a Shirley Temple, slips a few extra cherries and a slim black straw into the drink, and slides the glass across the bar to Squall. "So ... how've you been? Gettin' to see anything interesting in the city?"

[silentnarration]

There's a flash of concern. Now he's really wondering what happened to her. He raises his eyebrows at the drink. That pink one again. What did she call it? It sounded like a woman's name. Shirley- something.

He plucks up a cherry and turns it between his fingers for a bit.

"Not really." He's had a lot more free time since he quit his job but it still feels like he's kept busy without making much headway. "What happened to you?"

[metamorphotic]

Not one to waste words, is he? Nick smiles thinly and picks up a rag to wipe at the surface of the bar - which may or may not have anything on it that needs wiping.

“What happened to make me look and feel like shit, y’mean?” She shrugs. “Been sick.” For weeks ... sure. “Better now though. Not contagious. How’s the drink?”

[silentnarration]

He frowns. The word sick immediately draws his thoughts to the plague. But that one is gradually fatal... and contagious. She's also not leaking black ooze. He tentatively relaxes and takes a sip of his drink and blinks, surprised by the sweet taste again. Just the right kind of sweet he enjoys in fact. Another sip...

"It's good," he admits. He gives her a look. "Guess you didn't get to go home." It's been a year for her, if he remembers right.

[metamorphotic]

He remembers exactly right. Nick opens her mouth, soundless for a moment, then laughs and shakes her head.

“Can’t put anything past you, huh? Nah, they ain’t come for me yet.” Squall can probably guess she doesn’t mean with an offer to send her elsewhere. Nick gives him a small, rueful smile. “Maybe they didn’t bother ‘cause they know I don’t really have a home to go back to.”

[silentnarration]

Squall tilts his head. "You don't?"

He wonders how many people are like that. No home... or no place to call home.

"Maybe we weren't supposed to go home at all," he's examining her again. "Did they make you sick?"

[metamorphotic]

"Not really," she says, with a shake of her head. "This place here ain't my first rodeo - I've been gettin' kicked around different places back and forth for a few years now. First time I got shoved back to where I was from, it was seven years later than when I left. Kinda hard to fit back in, y'know? I didn't have any family or any real friends before I left, either. So if I'm gonna start all over again, it may as well be somewhere with better weather."

She shrugs and wipes down part of the counter with a damp rag. Sometimes it bothers her more than others, having no real place to belong, but she didn't feel terribly connected to Chicago by the time she left the city and ended up in Vancouver, either. Different city, different planet, different universe, but none of those make much difference to Nick.

"That's ... definitely a theory. And you wouldn't be the first one to say so." She finishes with the wipe-down and looks back up at Squall, shaking her head. "Nah, only person who made me sick was me. I tried to do too much and it bit me in the ass. Lesson learned, I guess."