The Sum of All Happy Hours

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

Eddie comes in from the Staff Quarters with damp hair and his Ginslinger t-shirt, his gun and gunbelt already tucked into a neat roll that he sets under the bar. He sits on a stool for a while picking his Specials and writes them up on the chalkboard.

"Howdy, all you beautiful folken. Specials tonight are Love Potion #9, the After 18, and that old fav, the Manhattan. Come and get it!"

Comments

[chelleuncurled]

Michelle smiles, "What kind of Earth are you from?"

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"The almost-real kind," he says with a chuckle. "Do you know New York very well?"

[chelleuncurled]

Michelle shakes her head, "I was in DC and LA, never got to spend much time in New York."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

Eddie nods, and considers. "It'd be hard to explain, then. Let's just say that what magic there is in my world is hard to find and hard to see, and probably exists in yours, too."

[chelleuncurled]

"I don't think there's any magic in my world. At least I kind of hope there isn't."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

Eddie smiles. It's almost secretive. "There's magic everywhere."

[chelleuncurled]

"That kind of worries me."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"Yeah? Why?"

[chelleuncurled]

"Our world's dangerous enough without people being able to use magic or control the forces of the universe."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"You say true, I say thankya. Before this place, I never knew of any magic in human hands I could trust entirely. But that's not what I'm talking about."

[chelleuncurled]

"Do you mean a more spiritual magic?"

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"I suppose so. It's just... the magic that hides behind the everyday, that holds the worlds together. I don't know. It's hard to explain." Eddie smiles, and this time it is secretive. "There's a rose. And, uh, it changed my life."

[chelleuncurled]

"The magic is a rose?" Michelle can only think of one magical rose story at the moment and she somehow doubts that Eddie was a beast.

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"The rose is...everything," Eddie says firmly. "It's very strange, I know."

[chelleuncurled]

"I'm getting used to very strange," Michelle smiles a little. "I'm afraid my job doesn't leave me a lot of time to contemplate the nature of the world. Although, I have nothing but time here."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

Eddie laughs. "The nature of the world was my job in life. What's your job?"

[chelleuncurled]

"Counter-terrorism. I worked under the Department of Defense. If any of our enemies used magic, we would have really had problems."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"Yar." Eddie nods. "I can see that."

[chelleuncurled]

"Were you a bartender back home?" Michelle takes another sip of her drink.

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

Eddie laughs again. "I'm complicated. I was a part-time bartender for a few years before heroin addiction got to be a full-time job."

[chelleuncurled]

Michelle nods. "I used to work with...a friend of mine was addicted to heroin, it's a very dangerous substance."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"You say true. It's not a monkey on your back, it's a big fuckin baboon."

"It got my brother, but I got a second chance. In that life I was... well, a bit like you, I guess. I was in the saving the world business. Then I died and... here I am."

[chelleuncurled]

"Yeah, my friend was surprised when he got hooked, I think."

"I'm sorry," Michelle says, knowing quite a few dead people in the bar. "Are there other people from your place here?"

She smiles a little, "I don't know how much I was trying to save the world, more like LA."

[no-prisoner.livejournal.com]

"LA is part of the world. Marginally." Eddie smirks.

"Um. A few, yes, in a manner of speaking. People I know from my life after I left New York. My family, really. Anybody around besides your ex?"

[chelleuncurled]

"Somedays I wonder," Michelle smirks in return.

She nods, "Family is important, by blood or otherwise. Somehow, most of the people I worked with are here. I met my ex at work."