#ch: johnny arcos

[bloodandpaintchips]

Bar & Murder Tips

Tagging→ Andrea Sheldon, Johnny Arcos Time Frame→ 11/29/2020 around midnight. Location→ Sangren, Colorado General Notes→ They’ll continue these conversation topics after the hangover.  

For a moment, Andrea was distracted with all the bottles lining Johnny’s counter, and their colors. He’d told her things here and there, tips on working behind the bar at TARTARUS but this was the first time he was showing her anything. She’d mentioned the need for a small purpose again, needing somewhere to be and a schedule before she lost her mind or herself again. She didn’t know what to expect, her palette for alcohol being very limited considering she didn’t start drinking beer until her mid-twenties and liquor, until after she “died.” She could be terrible at this, or she could be mildly competent; she had no way of knowing. “So...the sheer possibility of combinations here is kind of intimidating.”

"I find it odd that you still get intimidated," purred the witch as he set yet another bottle on the counter. Nothing too expensive, but definitely nothing he served the more... economical customers. The drinks he intended to make with Andy, no matter how terrible, would not be wasted. "Someone tells you what they have a taste for and you follow the notes of that taste to produce something they would like." With a wave of his hand, he willed the lights in the kitchen to dim and music to waft into the room like a breeze. "It does help, however, to know what the alcohol tastes like. Do you know what vermouth is, my Andy?"

Andrea snorted, turning her gaze away from the bottles to look at him. “You’d be surprised what things change and what things don’t.” She left it at that, drumming her fingers on the countertop and listened to his explanation. “Seems simple enough, except I don’t know what most of this tastes like. And no, I have no idea what vermouth is. Except I’ve heard the word. I know shots of whiskey and various beers. Please don’t be as judgemental during this as you are about my clothes,” she joked. There wasn’t much to make fun of at this moment; the great thing about training at home was the fact that she could learn this in the oversized tee she slept in, bare feet on the floor, barely feeling the cold.

"I will absolutely be as judgmental about this as I am about everything else. Your clothing is awful," he tacked on. He pulled a glass from the counter behind them, then reached for the bottle of Cocchi Vermouth di Torino. "We will drink." He poured her a glass and then himself. "Hold this. Smell it."

The only comeback she gave him was an eye roll before he moved on to grab a fancy bottle (they were honestly all fancy, nothing you’d find in the liquor store with the flickering OPEN light downtown). She could already smell it as he was pouring it, and she was intrigued, taking the glass from him and inhaling like he asked. “Wow. It’s like sweet and spicy. Really…” she raised her eyebrows a bit, holding the glass away a little. “Strong. I like it though. Makes me think of autumn.”

He sipped a bit at his glass, rolling the amber liquid along his tongue. "Vermouth comes in this sweet, red form, but also in a dry, white form - which is used for martinis. I prefer the sweet, but with the dry, I like to pair it with lemons. What do we think pairs well with our autumn taste?"

She listened, making a mental note. “In the past I may have hated the dry version, but lately I’ve been trying a lot of things I may have hated and liking them, so who knows. I like the sweet though. And I don’t know, maybe something like orange? Citrus seems like the way to go still. Do people ever pair things with juice?” She took a sip, surprised to find she really enjoyed it alone. She liked the spices and the warmth in her mouth. It made her throat prickle in a way she liked.

Nodding approvingly, he downed the rest of his drink, then poured another glass. "Everything can be paired with juice, but one must be aware of the full flavor of things. Red vermouth is sweet already, spicy... woodsy and herbal - orange is an excellent choice. Add gin and you have a cocktail." His freshly poured drink went back just as fast and he set his glass in the sink. "What is a taste that you like that isn't citrus?"

Andrea smirked, a little proud of herself like a good student when he said the word “excellent.” She watched him knock back the drinks, an eyebrow raising in curiosity. “I like cranberry. I like most berries actually. Chocolate...I’m not sure what the right answer is really.” She ran her fingers along her glass before pushing it towards him. “Do you get drunk easily? Like in terms of being human?”

"Oh, I get drunk very easily," he told her, even as he took her glass and pulled the bottle of cognac forward. Her used glass went into the sink and was replaced with a clean one, which he poured a taste into before giving it back. "Cognac can be spicy as well and has hints of fruit and chocolate. Hold it on your tongue a bit."

She took the new drink from him, taking a sip and holding it in her mouth like he asked. “I can taste that...but the thing I think I taste the most is nuts. Maybe walnut? Kinda think this would taste good with blood.” She said the last part quietly, briefly thinking about how she had to take care of that soon. She’d succeeded in making it feel like a job. For a few seconds she felt like the lamest creature ever, but she pulled herself out of the distraction by downing some more of it. “What goes with this?”

"That is not the first time I have heard that; many of our... guests at the bar have asked for a bit of this with a few fingers of O-positive." Johnny watched her drink the mouthful with curious eyes, lingering over her expression to gauge a reaction. "Overall," he continued, "Cognac is very good - alone, mixed with ginger ale or lemonade, all kinds of ways really." He poured himself a taste and knocked it back, shaking his head as he began to feel the drink. "Tequila next, I think."

She raised an eyebrow at that, feeling strangely validated she wasn’t the only one who thought that about the flavor profile. “I need to get more comfortable saying things like that. I still talk about blood like it’s my dirty secret,” she said, laughing a little. “But lemonade seems like it’d be really good with this too, so I’ll also keep that in mind. “Tequila. Don’t people usually just take that in shots?”

"Tequila is really quite versatile - shots, sours, cocktails... margaritas!" He turned and reached for the blender beside the sink then, with a blink of empty, black eyes, the blender was filled with a light green mix of alcohol and ice, buzzing away until he stopped it.

Squinting her eyes at the witch, Andrea couldn’t help but smile as she noticed he was getting a little looser with every swallow. “You get a little swishy when you’ve had a couple drinks, Johnny,” she told him, smile getting wider as she admired him. An eyebrow raised when he materialized margarita mix and she simply helped herself. “I think you should know that I’m beginning to feel these and will probably pay less attention to how the drinks are made, so for now let’s just focus on how they taste,” she said, sipping. 

"You have to know how to taste... how the drinks taste when you are serving them," he agreed with a lofty nod, holding out a glass for her to pour his margarita into. He gulped a mouthful, scowling at the brain freeze, but soon he was moving his hips to the music playing and chuckling. "'Swishy' is a good word, my Andy. More tequila - a sunrise! Ironic."

Andrea laughed, rolling her eyes and taking another sip of her drink. “Ah yes, sunrises. Loved those.” She tried to make it sound like she said it in jest, but it likely just came out as bitter. “Hopefully the drink is pretty,” she added, smirking whenever she noticed him get a brain freeze. It made her very aware of her lack of one. The more she had to drink, the more she found herself getting lost in thought about those changes.

"Yes, a sunrise!" He reached for her hand then and rolled her cool fingers between his own. "I will give you sunrise," he said, then sealed the promise by lifting her fingers to his mouth for a kiss. He then reached for a new bottle of 1942 and the grenadine. "You will find, my Andy, that adding grenadine to just about any drink will please any sorority girls that wander into the bar." Once he was finished with the drink, he swiftly exchanged her margarita for it.

She let herself be distracted by his promising kiss to her knuckles, smiling and letting him take her glass. “For a moment I was worried you were going to give me a literal ball of fire, but this will do fine.” She chuckled at his advice, tucking it away for future reference, because if she remembered anything, she remembered the greek crowd. Sipping the new drink, her eyebrows went up and she downed it before setting the glass down. “I like that one.” She slid the empty vessel toward him so he could refill it. “Can I tell you something that I have to say out loud before I explode?”

He hummed inquisitively as he swallowed the last of his sunrise and waved his fingers so that the music changed to 'More Than A Woman' by Aaliyah.

She turned around and jumped up to sit on the counter as she waited for him to make their drinks again. Swinging her legs for a moment and listening to the song, she finally went on. “I think I burned the bridge with my dad. Like burned it, totally,” she said, holding out her palm in a leveling motion. “I went back there to fix things and made them worse. I should stop trying to fix things. Drink more tequila sunrises.”

This stalled his hand as it reached for the next bottle and he turned to look at her quizzically. "Fix things? ...Is he dead now?" Quick as he could, he tried to pull what he knew about necromancy into the forefront of his fuzzy mind, but even as his fingers wrote runes into the air between him, he just as quickly forgot what he had intended to do. "Is he dead?"

Andrea laughed dryly, watching him attempt something and quickly forget with a smile on her face. “No, he’s not dead. That probably would have been easier. I didn’t make it worse like that, I just got angry at him. More angry than I’ve ever gotten at someone in like, person. I wanted to talk, but he still thinks I’m a demon. And then I kind of acted like one.” She shook her head and downed another drink. “But fuck it.”

"Well... you are a demon, I think, so the behavior is expected." He frowned down at an empty glass on the counter, then licked a finger, rimmed the lip of the glass with it and willed another drink into it. After taking a sip, he lifted his gaze back to Andy and said, solemnly, "So what shall we do about this, my Raggedy One? It sounds as if your father doesn't understand what kind of town Sangren really is."

She set her glass down and folded her arms, scoffing a bit until it turned into a full blown laugh. “You know, I guess I am a demon. I wish that felt cool instead of just me feeling like my lame self, but meaner and more okay with murder,” she replied, shaking her head. Meeting his gaze, she shrugged. “I guess there’s nothing to do about it. I don’t wanna see him again. You know, he actually mentioned he had an idea of this town and just hoped we dodged it or something. Like he couldn’t save me from the town in the end.” She growled a little, rolling her eyes and sliding her glass toward him to ask for another. “Like he’s fuckin Super Frank and movie nights and Hungry Man dinners would shield his poor daughter from the hellmouth. Incredible.”

Johnny took the time to contemplate what a hungry-person meal could possibly entail by taking another long sip. By now, the fuzz was starting to warm him from the inside out and the need to reach out with his powers to support Andy's growing agitation was growing ever more tempting. "These are survival instincts - the need to shield a child from exposure to evils for your father and that feeling 'okay' with murder for you... all survival."

Andrea was quiet for a moment, sipping her newly filled glass. “Survival. Maybe that explains the why of it, but that didn’t really work out for him did it? The pretending. His wife walked right into it all and it claimed his daughter. His daughter, who is now a demon,” she said gesturing towards herself. “I guess it’s a form of survival but it didn’t do a lot of good for him did it? He still lost everything. Staying blind on purpose and turning me away....I guess I see how it’s a survival tactic but it also feels like it was easy for him to love me and that changed in an instant. He just seems like a coward to me.” She set her glass down after downing it and slid down against the cabinets to the floor. “I...also think it’s more than being okay with murder. Saying it like that just feels better.”

He waved his hand dismissively. "'Murder' is such an inconsequential term to creatures who are no longer mortal, my Raggedy One. It's a wonder you have any appetite at all - Magic requires sacrifice, no matter what form it comes in. You see it when I bleed myself. You see how strangely it burns through Gunnar. You see it in death here, especially. It calls for this death, these sacrifices - what are people placed in your path for if not to be sacrifices?" He finished his drink, then suddenly slouched against the counter. "I'm drunk."

She let his words sink in, staring down at the ground for a moment with her eyebrows furrowed. “Sacrifices,” she repeated. Something did burn through her, and surprisingly his drunken advice had given her a bit of clarity. Just a bit. When she thought about death and sacrifice and magic in the way he described it, it made a little more sense. “Guess I’m just getting used to the order of such things,” she said, reaching up to grip the side of the counter and stand. “You are. I am a little too. How about I walk you to your room? That seems like the best course of action now.” She laughed a little and moved towards him, gently slapping a hand on his back.

He had straightened, but found himself buckling a bit at her slap. "You forget yourself," he chided lightly, even as he recovered and stood ramrod straight to allow her to lead him to the staircase that led to his bedroom. "I wonder, how long it will take for you to realize that you are now an apex predator, my Andy?"

She ran a hand through her hair and winced. “Sorry, I actually swore I was being gentle,” she replied, rubbing the spot and taking him up to his room. Being ahead of him, she walked in and pulled his sheets and comforter back so he could just fall in. She hadn’t responded right away to what he said but once they were inside his bedroom, she responded. “Yeah. Me too.”

"Come sleep," he sighed, already burying his face into his pillow. "I could have sworn I was better at drinking. I haven't done it in so long."

Laughing a little, she nodded and kicked off her jeans before jumping into the soft bed opposite of where he laid. Andrea relaxed against the pillow, smiling and turning her head to face him. “Personally I thought you were great at it.” She snuggled in, sighing and continuing to think about their earlier conversation until his words “sleep,” echoed in her head and she closed her eyes to let herself.

[bloodandpaintchips]

Scribbles.

Quote Captain Badass,

"I am setting your heart on fire So when you leave me I will burn on in your soul"

I still get flashbacks to the acid trip I haven’t told anyone about. I don’t know if I’m embarrassed by it, I just know I keep seeing the August of it all -- sitting there, holding his head and parroting all the stuff he used to tell me. Even though I know he’s dead - intimately - I was scared. It didn’t make any sense to be scared, if he were still alive I could kill him again. I know I could, and I would. Not because I just sit around fantasizing about doing it again, but just because of the red I see when I think about that time. I get so angry I can’t control it. My face burns, like the blood in my veins there are hot liquid iron at the mere thought of this man, and I don’t even know what to do with this kind of rage. I’ve never felt it before. I think the angriest I ever got as a human was having bar patrons talk down to me, and even then it was a mild irritation that could be staved off by cigarettes. I don’t know how to handle this. I’m afraid I won’t be able to when the time comes. And it happens every time I’m alone with my thoughts. Vampirism didn’t get rid of the flashbacks. Or the overthinking. I’m not sure what I thought would happen once my soul was gone, but it’s one of the things that makes me think there’s something in me. Even if it’s just a little bit of Andrea. It makes me think, in a weirdly optimistic way, that I’m not completely gone. I’ve been afraid of that for years, afraid to even think about it. How could I want to kill, like all the time, and still be me? Even when I don’t kill them, something in me screams that I should have. That I would have liked it. That I should let myself like it.

I still think about the night everything happened. How all I felt was rage and hunger and Johnny still looked me in the eyes and touched my hair and told me I was “still Andy.” I thought about that so much when I was gone, picturing his face looking at me when I needed grounding, when I wanted to stake myself. I think about how much it meant coming back and seeing him look at me the same way. My own father couldn’t even look at me and Johnny looked at me the same way. Maybe I was looking for love in the wrong places -- the old places. I know when I showed up to Gunnar’s he could see it. He knew I was different, and he invited me in. The blue tape was still there, for any number of reasons I’m sure, but it was the fact that he didn’t tear it down after the first year I was gone. I’m sure he forgot it was there most of the time, but in those moments he remembered, he didn’t tear it down. He hugged me back. Kissed me back. I don’t know, I just spent so much time seeking this energy I got from them in my mother. I wanted her to hug me and kiss my forehead and tell me I looked just like her daughter. But that wasn’t what happened, and there wasn’t some great purpose I was supposed to be granted as a vampire. I just am. I was looking in all the wrong places, and I should have been home. I should have leaned on the friends I had, and it was all because I didn’t want to be this. The fact that they understood and weren’t angry with me? I expected anger and got warmth. From two dudes I met working at that damn bar. For the first time in a while I don’t just feel rage and shame and confusion. I still feel all those things, but sometimes I feel something close to contentment as well -- something I never thought I’d feel again.

I’m still so...all over the place. It just feels better to feel this way and be cared about at the same time. I think the first thing I should do is try to get a job at the bar again. I need something to do now that the wall is finished. If I just sit around all night, I’ll definitely kill somebody. I need familiarity and something to occupy my hands with. Tartarus has plenty of that.

[bloodandpaintchips]

Home

Tagging→ Andrea Sheldon, Johnny Arcos Time Frame→ October 30th, 2020 Location→ Sangren, Colorado General Notes→ Some things to rely on.

Andrea sat outside of her father’s house for a while. Her entire mindset about coming home had surrounded him and again, in such a short time since meeting her mom, she had to rethink her moves entirely. She was getting sick of the rollercoaster, but something in her brain told her it was her own fault for avoiding things for so long. She could have been over this hump, continuing to think Audra was dead and having hobbies. Shaking her head, she put the car in drive and took off, her blue van bouncing down the residential street.

She went to Johnny’s without even thinking about it. She hadn’t planned to show up unannounced on his doorstep asking for a place to live, but her options weren’t vast. Grabbing her duffle bag from behind the seat, Andy stopped the car and got out. She didn’t sit and think about it, she was tired of that and needed a best friend. When she got up to his door, she knocked three times and exhaled.

At the knocks, Johnny lifted his head from where he let it drop to the back of the couch so he could eye the door. Sprawled out in his living room in nothing but boxers and covered with the inked lines of tomorrow's spells, he had been feeling restless for the past few hours - something in his blood that he was not quite able to recognize, not quite anxiety, not quite the moon tugging up the tides... 

"Coming," he said to no one as he pushed himself to his feet. Once at the door, he cracked it opened and, with one eye, took in the sad sight of Andy, long-absent, very-missed, tired-eyed and still wearing those shoes. "My Raggedy One." He let the door fall open completely and beckoned her in with a wave of his hand. "How was your trip?"

Unable to stop her smile, Andy walked in at his invitation and set her bag down by the door. After what felt like a barrage of rejections it felt great to feel the familiarity of his energy and to be let in with no questions asked. That’s what she expected with him, but it was nice to have those expectations met. At his question she sighed and closed the space between them to hug, despite the marks all over him. “Kinda sucked, actually,” she replied, pulling away and shrugging. “I met a lot of assholes, pretended to be different people, was hungry a lot and also I met my mom. How was...home?”

The cool press of her against him was already familiar, he didn't miss any warmth at all, so he just hugged her back just as tightly and let her go when she was ready. "Assholes... Your mother... Have you eaten?" He walked to his forgotten bowl and box of cereal on the coffee table and beckoned at her again, the cat jumping up suddenly into the empty seat meant for Andy. "Home was nice. I did not see my grandmother. The forest misses her."

Andrea took that as a cue to greet the cat, wrapping the black mass into her arms and sitting down once she was holding her. She stroked her head and scratched her ears while she listened to him speak. “I ate enough,” she answered, letting the cat reposition in her lap. “That’s...good, right? I don’t miss the forest. I missed you. Missed Sangren in the fall. Missed my dad, which actually kinda brings me to something I wanted to ask. My dad doesn’t, um, want me home anymore. Well it’s not my home anymore I guess.” She rolled her eyes at herself and let the cat slip out of her lap. “I’m asking if I can move in?” A pleading smile was added for good measure.

Watching on fondly as the cat was coddled and cuddled, Johnny tried not to be too surprised by Andy's words. After all, he missed her, too, though she wasn't gone too long. Still... It took a moment still for her words to catch up to him and he frowned thoughtfully at her. "Of course. The second bedroom is yours - what happened to your father? He has not died, has he?"

Andy relaxed a little more in the seat, smiling at him and leaning on her knees. “Cool. Thanks. And no, he’s not dead. He looked at me like I was dead though,” she told him, followed by a hollow laugh. “Since I came home I thought I’d better just rip the band-aid off and tell him what I am. It was the only way we could move forward. At first he thought I needed psychological help by the look of his face, and then when I proved it to him, he…” She ran a hand through her hair and made eye-contact with Johnny, mustering a kind of pathetic smile. “He said I wasn’t Andy anymore. Asked me to leave.”

"Ah, păpuşă," he sighed, folding his hands together in his lap. She looked as young as she ever looked, as lost as she was ever lost and Johnny felt regret that he could offer her no more than his home and simple words. "This town... many are still in so much doubt about this town." He shook his head. Simple words. "But here, you are with me; we will fix things together. Now, tell me of your mother. What about her made you want to reveal so much to your father?"

Kicking her shoes off, she brought her legs up to cross them under her. “Yeah. He went from not believing me to knowing I wasn’t me anymore. Funny.” She shrugged, a smile creeping onto her face again at his words. “Okay. We’ll fix things together.” When he mentioned her mom, she huffed and let herself fall against the back of the couch, silent for a few moments while she figured out where to start. “I feel like there’s so much to say about her and yet not much at all. I don’t know. It took almost five years to find her and I don’t know what I was expecting but I wish I could take all that time back. She’s alive. Didn’t want to be found. She uh...kinda called me pathetic to my face. She called my dad boring and said she never wanted to have me.” Andrea felt her eyes welling and then a bit of anger at how the disappointment still affected her. “She’s a witch. She had enchanted windows and mirrors and the sun shone in this mansion and I could feel it on my skin. It was so magical to be such a symbol of her negligence. And she was so beautiful too. I could see myself in her features and I hated it.”

It made sense that her mother was a witch; if not dead, then yes, a witch sounds correct. His brethren were often flighty. He couldn't help but think of his own mother, but dashed the thought from his mind. He reached a hand out and twirled his fingers over and over, pulling neon strings of sugar from nothing until he could hand over a fluff of cotton candy to her, a reminder of a lighter time. "She sounds clever. And selfish. Did you talk long?"

“Yeah, she’s both those things I guess.” She fiddled with one of her bracelets and shook her head. “That night she went missing, she turned. She saw it as an out, so she let us believe she was dead. Those childhood memories I have of her that were so sweet...they’re just buried under the narrative that she was merely ‘trying out’ motherhood. When she got tired of it, she didn’t even hesitate because of me. With my dad I get it, romantic love can be fleeting I guess. But nothing kept her here. If anything I made her want to leave more.” She smirked at the cotton candy, bringing it to her lips and letting some of the sugar melt on her tongue. “We talked long enough. My questions were answered. It sucked but they were answered.”

Johnny furrowed his brow in confusion, stuck on one part of her statements. "Turned? One cannot be turned into a witch."

Andrea laughed, throwing her head back and turning to Johnny with a smile. “My bad, she is also a vampire. She’s both. Can you imagine?”

"Ah." He deliberately smoothed his features and leaned back. He tried to wrap his mind around it - he hadn't met many like Andy's mother, the first coming to mind was the owner of Tartarus, Helena... Old and frightening as she was, he still couldn't fully imagine. "I cannot speak on children nor will I give excuses for the way she has treated you, but none of this is surprising, given the nature of my kind. It pains me that it pains you." He held his hand out to her.

She finished off the cotton candy, pursing her lips as he spoke. “Yeah, I don’t know. I truly thought pushing a kid out of your vaginal opening would mean you have some love for them but people have killed their kids so I guess I should have known that doesn’t automatically come with it.” She gladly took his hand in both of hers, focusing on its skin while she gathered her thoughts again. “I know it’s my fault. I built her up. I thought she was a missing ingredient in my life for so long and I had no idea she was any kind other than human. It was blindsiding. But also I kind of think she was just rude. Maybe she couldn’t understand me, but she didn’t have to be a bitch about it,” she said, laughing a little. Her laughter about all this was so dry and a little sad. It was all funny to re-tell, but in a self-depreciating and ironic way. A waste of five years for a rude conversation.

"I do not understand how you're at fault for loving your mother, Andy. Everyone grows up with heroes, everyone idolizes their good memories. You did nothing but be her daughter and she was nothing but a failure," Johnny reasoned, stroking his thumb back and forth across her fingers. "But yes, I agree that the rudeness is a step too much."

Andrea simply looked at him, smile still in place. “You know, I think I really needed to hear that. I think I just really need to be here right now.” She finally let go of his hand, slapping her own on her thighs and looking around. “Your place looks gorgeous. Can you show me my room?”

He looked back at her, mirroring her smile with a slight curling of his lips. "Of course. I forget when I changed things around, but you'll like it." He stood and padded into the open space between the kitchen and the dining table. He didn't wait for her to follow, merely moved through a doorway that led to a small office space. "For what ever reason, the room decided to curve, so I let it. We'll need blackout curtains or..." He lifted a hand and the wide window over the desk thinned some. "And around this corner, the bed." He led her along the curving wall until they stood in the middle of the bedroom.

The luxurious floorplan was nothing like she was used to, her and her father’s cluttered Victorian flashing in her mind. It really felt different, in an exciting way. She was hurt, but as Johnny fussed about the room and updates he would make, this felt like a new chapter that she was curious about. “I like the curve. A lot,” she responded, taking in the bedroom once they were completely in it. “Your space is so beautiful. This is like the Ritz-Carlton to me right now. Should be interesting for it to become home.”

He glanced at her carefully, wanting her reaction to the space. She looked interested and said as much, but he couldn't help but want to give her - promise her more. "Do whatever you like with it, my Raggedy One. There's always a place for you here."