milliways_bar | Happy Hour

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Happy Hour

It has become something of a habit - every evening she shows up at the bar to get vodka and pelmeni. Bar has, valiantly, tried to get her to eat something else - with all the cuisines available, it's something of a crime to stick so stubbornly to one meal.

Bar has ways of dealing with obstinent patrons. This evening when she comes down, Katya is not presented with food.

She is presented with a napkin.

"... Me? Really? You are sure about this?"

There's another napkin. Katya studies it thoughtfully.

"Still going to have the pelmeni. And I need a little bit to set up." This is, evidently, alright with the sentient furniture, because Katya nods and heads off towards the kitchens.

Half an hour later she has everything set up to her liking, and writes out the specials, letting Bar translate them from Cyrillic to the language of choice as she goes.

Happy Hour
Vodka
Cognac
Medovukha
Budweiser Budvar
Sbiten
Water if you annoy your bartender

That done, and the large copper samovar full of sbiten steaming away to itself on her side of the counter, she dusts off her hands and contemplates adding a 'make sure to buy one for your bartender' clause on there.

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William was last in the Bar for the day or two after Leah and Rachel had her calves, he's feeling worn out when he steps in.

When he spots Katya behind the Bar, he smiles though it doesn't quite reach his eyes as he walks up, "Can I try the stuff I don't know if I'm nice to you?"

"Silly boy." She huffs, pouring him a glass of amber alcohol from a heavy brown bottle, sliding it across to him.
"Of course you can. This is Medovukha. And if you do not talk I will give you vodka until you do." She threatens mildly, because she...

Well.

Because she's an overprotective little tigress.

"What should I talk about?"

He takes a careful sip of the drink and his smile gets truer, it tastes like a good summer.

She narrows her eyes at him, placing a bottle of vodka pointedly on the bar. Then she pours herself a glass of the Medovukha (the bottle's open now, why not?) and waits for inspiration to take him.

Once he's had another drink of the honey liquor, he pulls the scanner that Doctor Sandhu lent him out of his pocket and sits down before saying,

"This thing says Mark's got consumption. One of the doctor's here gave me some medicine that's supposed to help but its so easy to die of it,"

The scanner is... well, honestly? Confusing. Technology isn't her thing - she can usually reprogram phones, and work the radio, sort out some of the newer sorts of cars... but beyond that she tends to go find an analyst to sort it out and make it stop beeping at her.

"Consumption? Not one I have heard for a while - it used to be quite popular with the doctors."

William doesn't quite trust it but it showed him what he was afraid of,

"This said tuberculosis but its the same thing and either way'll kill him someday. Shouldn't be scared of knowin' what's wrong but ain't made it easier."

"Sometimes a proper name isn't very helpful." She agrees... but there's something sparked behind her eyes. It makes her fingers itch, because she might, just might, have something to do.
"It is too bad he does not come here - there are enough doctors here one trips over them."

"Yeah, but never seen him and he'd tell me if he did or someone'd mention seein' him. The docs have helped, I've got somethin' now just ain't sure if its enough,"

That's what he always runs up against, being able to enough to really take care of his family. His next sip is longer, the sweetness of the drink reminds him of the teas his mother makes sometimes.

"Well, it's heading in the right direction." She points out, refreshing his drink. "Who knows - there's always a chance of miracles, no?"

"Yeah, always is,"

He's never put much stock in them, because he's yet to see them work.

She stretches, grabbing a nut out of the barnut bowl... and pings it off his forehead.

"Cheer up, silly boy. Your brother is getting medicine! And you have tried a new alcohol, always good."

The nut surprises a grin out of him,

"I do, right. Just get so it feels like all I ever do is worry."

"This is because it is true." Her bangles clatter against the wood of the bar as she leans up against it. "You are going to give yourself a heart attack, one of these days."

"How would I manage that? Worst I'll do is overwork myself and maybe get sick again but ain't goin' to let that happen,"

He's not sure how he can stop it but he's stubborn so he probably can,

"What's in the pot?"

"Stress is bad for your heart." She preaches, knowing no such thing but having heard it quite a number of times. Carefully she snags a mug from under the bar and pours out a hefty dose of the sweet, steaming drink.

"It is sbiten - here, for you."

"What's stress?"

The drink smells good and sort of like a warmer version of the other on.

Katya fishes around under the bar again, and finds a pair of disposable chopsticks. She snaps one off and holds each end in one hand.

"This is you, see? And you worrying all the time, it is like this," She bends the chopstick, slowly, listening to the wood creak. "And you worry and worry and worry and..." There's a sharp snap, and now she has two halves.

"I ain't that bad and that's just what I have to do,"

Its what he saw his father do and he's trying to do a better job.

"Are so." She laughs, reaching over the bar to trace where the worry lines appear on his brow. "Silly boy, you will look like an old man before you can find some pretty girl to woo."

He looks down and blushes, he's not sure he did that good of a job wooing Thalia,

"Wouldn't want that."

"Exactly." She pours herself another glass of cognac... it wouldn't do to leave the bottle open too long, after all. "So we must have less worry, no?"

"I'll try. This stuff helps, tastes good and warm. And one thing's workin', the two-headed cow here had her calf just fine,"

Maybe someday he'll figure out how to go about properly wooing someone.

"Two-headed... both on the same side, I assume." She replies, after a moment of boggling. Her first mental image involved a cow with a head at each end, which she could believe here... but such a creature would not be likely to reproduce.

"Yeah, just like his Ma, they're out in the stables if you ever want to see him. I should check up on them since I'm here."

"A city girl like me? I would probably scare them." She laughs, though that's not strictly true, as the time she left would translate it. She grew up with horses being as common, if not more so, than cars.

She's not so familiar with cows.

"Sure you wouldn't. I'll show you them if you'd like."

"Certainly - so long as you aren't worrying about them! I will have to dump you in the lake."

The muttered 'silly boy' is mostly swallowed up as she sips her cognac.

"I won't, they got enough folks looking after them,"

He takes a long drink of the nice warm honey one and asks with another blush,

"Do you think I should be thinkin' about lookin' for someone to woo?"

"Why not? You have a farm - this is a good draw." True love whut? Well, yes, that's good, but let's be practical here. You can't list 'likely to be your true love' on the list of assets.

"I guess, yeah,"

Though other folks have more and aren't always on the edge of debt.

"It is better than what some others have." She tsks - she saw the collapse of the Soviet system first-hand. "Pair that with a good family and a pretty face? No problem."

"It is, yeah,"

He grins, maybe he should try talking to Thalia again. The last time was after the ride which was strange but good.

"Oooh, look, a smile. And you ask me if you should - silly boy, who is she?" Look, she won't get to tease Yulia about her first crush, so William is more than fair game.

The logic, such as it is, makes sense in her head.

"She's someone I met here, not sure if she likes me or not. She's sort of prickly but brave and pretty named Thalia."

"Ah, then you are fine." She hops up onto the bar, sitting cross-legged on the hard wood. "Perhaps you should pull her braids. It is a time-honored method."

"Ain't seen her in braids and think she might hit me if I did that. Yelled at me cause I thought I was someone she knew when I was sick,"

He laughs as she gets up on the counter.

"She yelled at you because you weren't who she thought you were?" She asks, sounding befuddled. "Does she also fight monsters? You would think she would be more interested in someone who doesn't - no worries about safety and such."

"She does but she thought I was lyin' when with my fever I just was sure I was someone I wasn't. It was strange."

"I cannot say I think much of this person she knows that looks like you - that she would so easily believe he would do something like that says much." She muses, helping herself to a nearby bowl of bar nuts.

"No, another girl here knows him and says he's nice. Its just Milliways bein' odd. I took Thalia for a horseback ride and she liked that."

"What, did your tab get such, they had to put you to work?"

The sorceress settles into a bar stool, resting her elbows on the bar and giving the younger woman a wry little smirk.

"Perhaps I should not have had caviar for three weeks." Katya snarks back, and just for that she pours Olga cognac in a teacup, the fine bone china rattling as she sets cup and saucer in front of Olga. "But it was so good."

Her hands go the through the motions of lighting up as the cup is poured, taking a long drag on the Turkish cigarette.

Olga sniffs the cup, and makes a face. But she drinks it anyway.

"Caviar, hmm?"

"Very fine on toasted bread." She replies, innocently. "It is better than the food in the infirmary."

Because she'd ever stop eating pelmeni. Right.

"Must I annoy you to receive water? It seems a rather steep price," Legolas says mournfully as he sits on a stool at the Bar, feet set firmly on the ground.

"You may have it if you order it, but alcohol is on a likability basis only." She explains, grinning. "Come now, surely something up there tempts you."

So weird, the people in this place.

"I know none of it," Legolas admits, cheerfully, "so I am at your mercy. Is there one you would suggest?"

"Here." She pulls down a small wine glass, and fills it with cognac, the dark fortified wine stark against the cut crystal. "There is no such thing as a bad cognac."

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Happy Hour

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