(no subject)

[notamagician]

[OOM: Closing Shop]

One over-sized juggler in the bar today. He's a little tired from having just packed up an entire shop's worth of magic props into cardboard boxes, and then moving half of those boxes upstairs to room 21.

Right now, he's found the sofas by the fire place. He's absently messing around with a decently-sized knife with one hand while he simultaneously reads a skin magazine and listens to his Walkman.

He's probably botherable, if you can get his attention.

Fake Tags: Penn, Teller

Comments

[chronodisplaced.livejournal.com]

There's a young woman (older than twenty - no more than twenty-five) who is studying the absent flipping and fanning of the knife. It's fascinating. She's incredibly forthright about it: more staring than polite glancing.

(She's got her mother's artful eye and her father's talent for spotting a useful skill.)

Obviously, you just don't walk up to someone who is occupied while they're handling a sharp object and interrupt them.

So, she waits.

[notamagician]

Eventually, Penn does notice her and he stops, sliding his headphones off of his ears.

"You ever see one of these before?" he asks, holding up the knife. He sounds friendly enough.

[chronodisplaced.livejournal.com]

"It's called a balisong, which sounds so much nicer than calling it a butterfly knife, I think."

A beat. She brightens, and tilts her head slightly with a chuckle.

"Thank you, Encyclopedia Britannica."

[notamagician]

Penn chuckles in response. He could get to like her, he decides.

He closes his magazine, setting it aside. "You ever use one?" he asks. "Come over here; I'll show you."

He's taking up the entire sofa. He does move to make room for her, but not much.

[chronodisplaced.livejournal.com]

She leaves her seat at a table, tucks in the chair, and walks over. Smoothing her skirt down (charcoal grey with an array of pale yellow polka dots) as she perches on the edge of the sofa. She doesn't need to take up much space, where as Penn does and should.

"Use one? Not at all. Not for lack of wanting to. It was enough that I learn know to use a switchblade, a pocketknife, a utility knife. The flipping is a little too showy," with a laugh, "for parental approval."

"No time like the present to learn..."

[notamagician]

Penn moves himself so that he can reach up from behind her. He takes her hand in his, and hands her the knife.

"It's real easy," he says. "Just hold it like this, and flip your wrist."

He shows her, guiding her hand in the move.


Penn does not believe in traditional flirting.

[chronodisplaced.livejournal.com]

There are some traditional behaviors and expectations that Alba feels are complete nonsense.

She shifts a little to allow him to show her, hands on, and she does as she's told. After a couple of tries, she feels more confident.

"It is easier than I thought it was going to be," she grins. "It's a matter of practicing." She adds innocuously, "Not any harder than picking locks."

[notamagician]

"Oh, you pick locks?" Penn asks. And then he chuckles. "You know, I've got a pair of handcuffs, if you want to show me."

And wouldn't you know, there they are, hanging right off of his belt. He fishes his keys out from his pocket, because unlocking them to take them off is easier than taking of his belt.

[chronodisplaced.livejournal.com]

She laughs, utterly amused (and a little flattered) by the attention.

"You're so accommodating, sir. This is your normal method, isn't it? Picking up girls by having them pick your," bright eyes flicker down to the handcuffs, "lock."

She removes a pin from her hair and pulls it apart.

"All of this without an introduction. How fun." And she means it. "For the record, I'm Alba. You?"

[gorgonfondness]

It's Mia's day off today!

Which means she's not the least bit tired about doing the least bit of anything.

Okay, that's not true. She's still had Cepheus to watch and he's more physically demanding the more he can move around. It's still been a lazy enough day, though, and she felt like coming into Milliways and raiding the kitchen here instead of her own.

All is going well in her day as she goes over to the sofas herself, one arm around Cepheus as he's balanced on her hip and the other arm supporting a tray of some meal that smells hearty with a hint of garlic.

Penn's knife gets her attention first for two reasons but she knows in her mind that neither a man with a plot nor a Spy would just fling such a weapon around in the open. And then she notices the magazine he's reading.

And to put herself at ease about it, she asks, "That's not Hot Girl News, is it?"

[notamagician]

He's not intentionally ignoring her. Renaldo and the Loaf are just taking up most of his attention right now.

Eventually, he does spot her, and he realises that she's been talking to him, and takes off his headphones.

"I'm sorry. I didn't hear you, there," he says. "What was that?"

[gorgonfondness]

Oh, headphones! So easy to overlook. Though it does give her a great idea for later.

"I was asking if you were looking at Hot Girl News."

She doesn't care if he wants to read skin magazines but that's one she doesn't want anyone to read.

And since everything's kind of heavy in her arms, the tray goes down on a nearby coffee table. Only she takes her arm out from under it before it lands.

[notamagician]

He closes the magazine so that she can see the cover.

"Haven't heard of that one," he says. "Who's in it this month? I might check it out."

[gorgonfondness]

She sighs a little.

"With any luck, they're still out of business from when my husband flooded their offices. But I won't even care if they come back just as long as they leave my family alone."

Mia makes sure the tray is all the way down on the table and bounces Cepheus on her hip a little.

"I don't know about Playboy but Hot Girl News does have an article or two that gets read."

[notamagician]

Penn does not hide the fact that he's checking her out right now.

What? He can read between the lines. He may not be reading between the right lines, but he knows what he wants her to mean right now, so that's what she means.

"Flooded their office?" he asks. "That's a new one. I'll have to remember that."

For what, who knows?

[gorgonfondness]

She doesn't mind it as much while she's fully dressed. It's those Hot Girl News reporters who sneak into her bathroom to get nude pictures without her permission that she minds.

All that said, she's not bad even post-pregnancy. She didn't lose all of her pregnancy weight but, considering she was underweight up until before her pregnancy, being healthy looks very good on her. Her clothes aren't completely form fitting but her shape can be seen.

"Oh, knock it off," she says, rolling her eyes. "His dad-" she indicates Cepheus, "-is very jealous."

"Dadedadedah!" the baby says, wanting to join the conversation.

"And I'd be careful flooding anything. He could have gotten into a lot of trouble with that."

[notamagician]

"Sorry," Penn says. He doesn't sound it, though.

He does avert his eyes, though. After all, he's got plenty of exposed skin to look at in his magazine.

"The trouble's half the fun, though," he says. "We've never flooded anything. Not yet anyway. Just some minor drowning."

[notaphony.livejournal.com]

A young, relatively fresh-faced (though not entirely naive) Joan walks into the bar - and promptly stops dead in her tracks.

She's not sure which she's more unnerved by, the fact that this isn't where she planned on being (because, at this point, she's never been here before) or the rather tall man spinning a knife in the corner.

Reflexively, she tenses, but resorts to merely examining her surroundings before making any sudden movements.

[notamagician]

It does not take Penn long at all to notice her over his magazine. He's been there recently, himself -- walking through a door and winding up here. So he knows exactly what not to do when in this position.

"Watch your ass, you're right in the doorway," he warns. "You wouldn't want someone my size to come busting through and run you down."

[notaphony.livejournal.com]

She nods quickly, glancing back over her shoulder - and tightens her newly acquired fur coat around her shoulders.

"Does that happen here?" Joan softly asks, stepping to the side with a corresponding click of her high heels on the floor.

[notamagician]

"Beats me," Penn says honestly. "I'm only here because I got weaselled into helping someone move a bunch of stuff upstairs."

Okay, so most of the stuff he was helping to move was his, but that's not the point.

[notaphony.livejournal.com]

"Then what's the knife for?"

Never let it be said that Joan Holloway is anything but direct.

[notamagician]

"Fun?"

To demonstrate this, Penn tosses it lightly in the air (with the blade still extended), and catches it. By the handle.

He does this a few times, before finally putting it away.

[notaphony.livejournal.com]

She watches him with a mixture of surprise and nervousness, fearing that one time - and it really would only take one time, wouldn't it - that the knife would fall the wrong way.

But when he puts it away, she breathes a small sigh of relief.

[notamagician]

She probably can't see it from her distance, but his hands have got several odd scars on the palms from exactly such accidents.

"What, you never seen a juggler before?" he asks.