milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Melou's been in the bar for a while now. Long enough to head up to Angela's room, grab his maps and head back downstairs.

They've been spread out on a table for a few minutes, but he has yet to begin working on them. For the moment, he seems content to study them while lounging in his chair, sipping a scotch.

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Angela...hasn't been in the bar all that long. And she hasn't seen him yet. Mostly because she's wrapped up in something else, and she just needed to get out of her room before she went nuts.

It's her first large project of the year, Stage one is due in a couple of days, and as usual, Angela's cramming fifty pounds of work into a ten pound schoolbag.

But once she gets into the bar, she just plonks herself down at a table and stares at her schoolbag, realizing that she really, really doesn't want to work here.

Melou is just as oblivious as her. He's too busy trying to decide if the dragon over Ireland needs to be erased, or added to with more detail.

Angela sighs irritably. "Fuck this," she mutters. All of a piece, she decides to stay a few days, and then kicks back and relaxes a bit.

And as soon as she does, she sees Melou. She eyes her bag. Yeah, he's definitely worth carrying the damn thing over to his table.

So she does, taking care not to startle him as she puts her bag down softly.

"Hey," she says, taking a seat across from him. She looks at the maps he's studying.

"Hey." He returns, looking up with a quick smile. "Get dragged away from your learning again?"

"No, I was working on something, decided I needed to work on it elsewhere, came here, and decided not to work anymore. It was driving me nuts, so I needed a break." She sounds tired, and truth be told, she's been pushing herself too hard lately.

But still, she smiles back at him when she looks up. "Still plotting and planning?"

"Yep, you did." He starts adding flames coming out of the dragon's mouth. "Sort of."

She watches him. "I draw when I'm thinking, sometimes," she says idly. She tilts her head over the back of the chair, slouching down, carding her fingers through her hair.

"How are things with you?"

"Pretty much the same." He shrugs. "I'm not that good at it. Mam's better."

Angela looks up at him. "Your mother draws?" She's not surprised, just...curious.

"She used to, when we were younger. Not so much anymore."

"Yeah...people get busy for stuff like that, I guess. I can't even give it the time I did over the summer."

Junior year is a lot more work than she had anticipated. Sheer force of will kept her going, and it was easier now that she had the escape of Milliways, but...

...it was still really hard.

"She kind of went the opposite way." He nudges the paper over her way. "You can have that end, if you want. This map is just for fiddling around with."

She grins, leans over the paper with the stub of a pencil (which, incidentally, was tucked behind her ear), and begins sketching something abstract and vaguely knotwork-y in the corner.

"The opposite way?" she asks curiously. She studies the map as she sketches.

Any notations on the map are in Latin, a slightly different script than she'd be used to, and it's mostly just place names and borders. A few have X's over them.

"She got less busy. Just kind of stopped doing anything, really."

Angela nods. That must be hard for him to see, but then, she reflects, he's probably used to that.

"Yeah. Sometimes that happens," she says softly.

It's happened to her own mother, more than once. But only for short spells.

"Yep." He agrees, peeking over at what she's drawing. "What's that supposed to be?"

Angela shrugs. "Just a design. Freeform. I could make a border around the edge, maybe."

She looks over at his drawing. "I've never tried drawing dragons before. I've done horses, though."

"Live in Wales, you're surrounded by dragons." He quirks a small smile. "Besides, horses can't get rid of a whole country."

She smiles back. "Have you ever seen one? I never have."

She figures that she's at a bar at the end of the Universe, anything is possible.

He laughs.

"No, it's the symbol of Wales. All over our banners and everything."

"It still is, you know. Even in my time, it still is."

She quickly sketches out the flag. "Looks kind of like this."

He glances it over. "Dragon needs to be red."

"It is, actually. I just don't have any red color with me. Unless you do. And the top of the flag is white, the bottom is green."

She's not sure why that is.

"Sounds about right. Ours are just usually on a white background."

"Guess that some things just don't change," she says, grinning at him.