milliways_bar | (no subject)

So, there's this girl Riley might know.

Whether he recognizes her is another story. Her hair is a matted mess, her no-longer-convincingly-purple sweater is irredeemably spattered with the eviscera of her slain enemies, and she's clutching a bottle of shampoo in one hand.

She's also staring. Her eyes are fast approaching dinner plate proportions.

Ohhhh boy.

"A ....... va?"

Just to recap:

- Riley was eating cereal in his apartment at eight in the morning, avoiding Milliways, as usual;
- He stepped into his living room;
- Milliways showed up;
- It looks like it has been through an explosion or a tornado or possibly a hurricane;
- His ex-girlfriend looks like she got in a fight with a jar of raspberry preserves and lost miserably, and they are having a Mexican stare-off across the bar.

Riley is having a great day.

Add to the list:

Said ex-girlfriend now looks like she might be about to burst into a violent fit of tears. Emphasis on the violence.

"... Hi, Riley," she says, resigned.

"If you can get out I would get out. I still think this place might explode."

Edited 2012-02-26 03:21 (UTC)

Riley immediately looks from side to side, since that is clearly going to make any incoming explosions apparent.

When he doesn't see any cartoon packs of dynamite strapped together with a ticking clock attached, he slowly lowers his spoon and takes a few more steps into the bar.

"It kind of looks like it already did its exploding for the day," he says. He takes another look around the shattered bar. "Possibly the month."

"Can everybody stop being so complacent?!"

Okay, maybe that was unwarranted.

"We don't know if it's done exploding, nobody knows! Bar is, like, in a coma, and I am never going to get the guts out of this sweater."

"Okay," Riley says, "then I guess that isn't from an exploding jar of delicious jelly, and, come on; we should probably get out of here."

"We?"

"Well," Riley says, dropping his spoon into his bowl, "yeah; I mean, I know we broke up, but that doesn't mean I want you to explode, and I know you can't go back to where you're from, so you should come back with me and ... not ..... explode."

It sounded much more unquestionable and confident in his head.

Riley still thinks it makes perfect sense; it's just hard to get through it without stumbling with her staring at him like that.

Stop staring, Ava; there's apparently an explosion to escape from!!

Sorry, Riley. Ava's had a rough day!

... Day-ish period. Point is, she's still staring.

It's suuuuuch a bad idea. But Andrew's not around, and she's ... actually not sure where she dropped her headband, she should really check on that, and there's a part of her that really wants to go.

Bad. Idea.

"Okay," she decides with a nod, shampoo bottle dangling uselessly at her side.

"I'm, um. Kind of disgusting right now. But, yeah. Exploding is bad."

"Maybe not exploding first; worrying about hygiene later?" Riley says, taking two quick steps back and opening his door again. It looks in on his living room on a sunny DC morning, and on what may or may not be a blanket fort.

(It's a blanket fort.)

Okay. Don't overthink this.

Actually any thinking is too much, don't think think it. (Is that a blanket fort?)

Ava casts a glance back at the total mess of a bar-- she should probably say something loyal about sticking around, she should look for Hermione or check in at the library--

Look guys, she's tired and gross and she spent hours helping to save your collective ass from oblivion.

She steps through the door.

Riley follows, pulling the door shut as fast as humanly possible.

(What? He likes this condo; he doesn't want it blown up.)

They're standing in the open doorway between his kitchen and his living room. There's a light dusting of snow visible on the cars parked in the street outside, through the windows; the sun hasn't been weakly punching through the clouds for very long yet this morning.

"So," says Riley, after another distrustful glance back to make sure that there's absolutely no sign of a door or an explosion anywhere, "did you -- want to shower, maybe?"

Not that he's saying that she smells, but ... she smells.

Listen, IT'S VALID; she's carrying shampoo and she'd commented on feeling gross!

And there are guts or something, and Riley could really use five minutes to himself to freak out.

"Oh," Ava says ... holding up her shampoo.

"Yeah, actually, that'd be--"

Pause. She pats her pockets.

"I ... left my other clothes. In the bar. I can go back."