Grand Opening!

[trifurcate]

Characters: Bryn Zethir and EVERYONE!
Date: Friday Evening, September 13th
Location: Bryn's Unnamed Bar
Situation: It's time for a grand opening!
Warnings/Rating: None expected but label your own threads if necessary.

After weeks of scrimping and saving, planning, organizing, working every day to get everything just so, Bryn's tavern is finally ready to open. There were times she wasn't sure it was ever going to happen, because what did she know about running a business, having only been a customer all of her adult life? There was still a chance that this would spectacularly flop and she would be broke and back to square one again. But tonight isn't the night to worry about that. One thing Bryn does know how to do is throw a party.

So, the two story has been scrubbed and polished within an inch of its life. The lanterns inside and out are burning with fresh candles. The bar is fully stocked, the kitchen has been bustling all day with food preparations, and for tonight, the stage is occupied by some of Keeliai's finest and liveliest kedan musicians. At one corner corner of the first floor, a table with ten jars can be found. Before each jar is a suggested name for the new tavern, and baskets of smoothly polished pebbles to be used to cast votes. Each attendee is welcome to vote for the name of their choosing, and Bryn will call her tavern by whichever one is the most popular.

All that's missing are her guests, whom she hopes to keep as customers over the coming weeks, months, or however long Bryn's stay in the city is.

-=-=-=-=-

Poll #14201

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 27

View Respondents

Bryn's tavern needs a name, and the following options have been suggested! Every character attending gets a single vote and the one with the most votes will be the one picked!

View Answers

Bar In-Between
2 (7.4%)

The Brazen Pack-Beast
1 (3.7%)

The Brazen Turtle
10 (37.0%)

The Carapace
1 (3.7%)

Chelonauts
0 (0.0%)

The Frisky Swizard
8 (29.6%)

Iron Turtle
2 (7.4%)

Nowhere
2 (7.4%)

The Red Lion
1 (3.7%)

That Place
0 (0.0%)

Comments

[manofiron]

"I wouldn't know about public embarrassment. I'm kind of immune at this point." He's sure that he's felt it at least once in his life, though when is somewhat difficult to remember. Probably when he was still a kid and susceptible to other peoples' opinions.

"This no scoping thing, though, that's troubling. That worries me. Nothing happens unless you make it happen, which means you have to find a girl, talk to her, get to know her, invite her home, the whole nine yards." It's difficult to imagine not having the confidence to do exactly what he's saying, especially since Willow isn't an unattractive woman. "Or is that a thinly veiled I'm never getting laid with a guy lurking around making me look straight complaint? Because I can go pick up a guy and hang all over him, sort of dispel that concern right away."

[guiltapalooza]

"Oh no," she says quickly, eyes widening and hurriedly taking a sip of her drink to try to mask just how uncomfortable she is with this topic.

"Don't... drape yourself over someone on my account. I don't really want to-- do that. Get laid." She's an adult, she can say the words. Willow awkwardly shrugs. "It just doesn't seem worth it to me unless I care about them, and that's not going to happen overnight."

Plus they have a lot to live up to being compared to Tara, and Willow isn't sure she wants to lay that on anyone. Kennedy had been fun and encouraging, in her own way; somehow saved from being a rebound by her sheer determination in pursuing Willow. But that doesn't mean she's eager to repeat the attempt, and sex with strangers is something she can't even fathom for herself.

[manofiron]

Now there’s a concept that Tony finds alien: having sex with someone he cares about. Part of his skepticism about the notion is that he doesn’t typically care about people. Generally speaking, he cares, but it’s the vague, hands-off kind of distant caring that most humans reserve for things like the ozone layer. Yes, they care that the atmosphere isn’t depleted of the screen that prevents everyone from being burned to death by the sun, but no, they really can’t be bothered to stop buying their giant SUVs that emit harmful carbons into the air. The rest of it is simple experience. The few times he has slept with people he cared about, it has always ended badly. Usually either in the lobby of a mental hospital, a normal hospital, or a morgue.

“It’s actually easier if you don’t care,” he tells her helpfully. “All that drama and the inevitable explosive conclusion that occasionally ends up with a police report being filed doesn’t happen when you don’t care. You meet someone, you have some fun, then you go your separate ways and no one gets hurt or tries to murder you or steal your stuff.”

Maybe he’s made some poor relationship choices in the past. It’s possible. Very possible.

“But okay. We can take it slow. I haven’t been a wingman in years, I’m probably rusty anyway.”

[guiltapalooza]

Willow's face scrunches up in disagreement as he goes on. She can't totally deny the grain of truth there, that actual caring leads to a lot of drama, but he's painting totally the wrong picture, in her opinion. What it says about his relationship choices, she diplomatically doesn't dwell on.

"I don't want it to be easier," she complains, toying with the little paper umbrella in her drink. It wasn't supposed to come with one; she'd just wanted it. "And, you know, sometimes it's really easy. It can be the easiest thing in the world. That's what makes all the hard parts worth it."

Realizing that she's waxing poetic akin to a romance novel, Willow lets out a gusty, mournful sigh. "Sorry. I'm pretty much guaranteed to mope on this subject. You might want to find someone else to play wingman to."

She's trying really, really hard not to mention Tara directly and get that mess everywhere. She's not sure she could contain her grieving, maintain the social distance she's supposed to, if it came up. It's been over a year, and that's still just not enough time.

[manofiron]

This is the problem with interacting with people in little increments here and there; once he has to do it for real, he doesn’t really know how to deal with them. Is the appropriate response to inquire about why she’s moping or ignore it? It’s not like math. There aren’t any rules, and just when he thinks he knows the right way to respond to someone in a given situation, he discovers that it’s the wrong one for reasons that are beyond him.

“Wingmen don’t go where they’re wanted,” he says sagely, opting for something somewhere between serious inquiry and completely joking. “They go where they’re needed.”

And as far as he’s concerned, he’s needed here. The moping comment alone is proof of that.

“So let’s start off with an easy question. What brought you here in the first place?”

[guiltapalooza]

Meanwhile, Willow has no such uncertainty about social rules. Sometimes she fumbles-- okay, frequently she fumbles-- but it's not from lack of understanding. It's simple awkwardness, self-consciousness that tends to leap up and take over her mouth before she realizes what's happening. Part of the embarrassment is that Willow always knows exactly how much of a misstep she's made.

So far, though, she doesn't think Tony's said anything egregiously wrong. He's a little distant, which is easily understandable given their age difference, but he's also oddly like one of her friends asking for gossip. It's comfortable.

"Boredom?" she suggests, like she's only just now thinking of it and isn't sure whether she's answering the question correctly. "Homesickness, I guess. The gang and I all used to go to this club called the Bronze... which is now also rubble in the sinkhole that was Sunnydale."

She tries to recover from the gradual slide into morose with a joke. "Wow, this trying not to be a sad destitute loner thing is really not working out." Everything about what had happened in the last battle with the First is hitting her in little flashes, now that she has the opportunity to sit and process in a way she hadn't back home.

[manofiron]

“It takes time. Sad destitute loneliness doesn’t go away. It needs to be overcome.” It’s still flippant, still said as though this is all a big joke, but there’s the truth of experience backing that particular word choice. He’s been fighting it all his life, and though he’s made some progress, the battle is far from won. “A drink and a random guy won’t do it. You need at least 10. Drinks and random girls.”

There is nothing that can’t in the moment be cured by sex and alcohol. Sure, in the morning there’s a hangover waiting, but that’s generally a small price to pay for hours of numbness.

“I can tell you that this isn’t any substitute for California. The food isn’t as good, the drinks aren’t as good, and I think it’s stuck in the Nineties. But it’s better than nothing. Look at it that way.” He nods toward the crowd. “And seriously, go chat up a chick. Even if you don’t take her home, it’ll make you feel better. The wallflower routine definitely won't.”

[guiltapalooza]

Willow doesn't think anything can be cured by sex or alcohol, and especially not in combination. Aside from when she's caught up in the grip of dark magic, she's almost frightfully responsible. She'd be horrified to hear that suggested to her. In fact, she is feeling some kneejerk scandalized refusal, much muted by her moping but too ingrained in her not to be present in some measure. Tony's not giving her what would be considered unusual advice for a 20-something woman, but Willow's never been all that usual.

"No thanks," she says fervently. "I'm not even really having a whole drink. This is like... half. I put extra juice in it. I'm kinda a staid homebody except for the apocalypse fighting lesbian witch thing. That was like a, a fluke." Willow's perception of herself has been slowly climbing these days, but still isn't all that flattering.

She has to agree that it's no substitute for California, but she's also much more inclined to talk to someone she already knows than a stranger. Even if they've only spoken once before, they at least have some things in common, and Willow feels slightly panicked at the idea of approaching a random girl and hitting on her. "I think I'll just say here with you," she says, somewhat earnestly, like she's trying to convince him. "You're making me feel better already. With the listening."

Never underestimate the value of getting to vent to a friendly ear.

[manofiron]

“Half a drink is your first mistake,” he says, pointing to the drink in question as though its existence is offensive. “You either need to go full drink or no drink. Half just confuses everybody.”

He turns his hand upward, forefinger still extended, and raises the middle one too. “Your second mistake is using me as a security blanket. I’m the worst choice.” Dropping his hand back to his own glass, Tony shrugs. “Unless you mean security in a more literal sense, which if that’s the case, I need to go put the suit on. Puny humans aren’t really all that great at keeping people secure.”

It’s not like he needs the Hulk’s assessment to think poorly of himself. That happens on a daily basis. But it’s another voice joining the many already circulating in his mind – his father’s, his mother’s, Rhodey’s, Pepper’s, Jarvis’, Stane’s, Sunset’s – all too ready and willing to point out his flaws, and it just happens to be the most recent.

[guiltapalooza]

Maybe half a drink was a mistake, she muses to herself, but the thought is quickly derailed as she senses outright self-deprecating statements. Her instincts to be a supportive friend are well honed and often used, and she falls into the role automatically, despite how little they know each other.

Willow frowns disapprovingly at him. "Uh-uh. None of that, buster. You're doing just fine as a security blanket. I feel all-- all secure. Totally secure. And not literally because I pretty much have that covered these days with the magics, but-- less literally? Not doing so hot on.

"So," she finishes, "I appreciate it, you being here."

That's fairly forward, emotionally speaking, but Willow has never hesitated to be emotionally forward. She's already established that she's gay, so she doesn't need to worry about sending the wrong message, and that given, she sees no reason to be less than perfectly honest. She wants him to feel better. He seems like a nice guy, and absurdly smart, and he shouldn't have to be mopey like she is. Willow knows what it's like to need a confidence boost all too keenly, and if she can provide one then she will.

[manofiron]

He studies her for a moment, weighing the accuracy of her assessment. He doesn’t think she’s lying. What would be the point? She barely knew him. Lying would gain her nothing. That leaves sincerity, and while he doesn’t necessarily agree with it – he doesn’t do comforting all that well – he decides to let it stand without argument.

“All right. I’ll make you a deal.” He glances at her glass, nodding toward it too just in case she mistakes the first gesture. “I’ll hang around until you finish that. Drinking alone’s kind of lame.”

Tony ought to know, he does it all the time. But it’s not just that that prompts him to offer to stay. He isn’t doing anything. There’s nothing pressing hurrying him back to his suite. His work can wait, and JARVIS and Dummy can do all right on their own for a few hours.

[guiltapalooza]

Right now, Willow's standards of comfort are pretty low. Just having someone physically present willing to listen to her complain without discrediting her feelings is wonderful. Acknowledgement has, her entire life, been the foremost thing she's after, and that given it's relatively easy to please her.

When she's feeling better about herself, her expectations will rise. For now, she's desolate enough to be happy with what she can get, in terms of comfort.

"Thanks," she says with a relieved smile, taking another drink after she says it. Like a silent declaration that she won't abuse his good intentions and keep him too long. "What about you? How are you doing, I mean," she clarifies. "We don't have to just talk about me. Me is not a riveting topic."

Rather, it's too riveting. There's ten things off-hand that would make for exciting and dramatic storytelling, and that's just what Willow doesn't want to get into.

[manofiron]

Yeah, no, talking about his feelings is out of the question. Doing so means that he would have to examine them, which he doesn’t want to do. After that, he would have to give them more consideration by figuring out how to explain them. Then he would have to voluntarily share those feelings with someone else, and that requires not only vulnerability, but a level of articulation that he just doesn’t possess.

Hell, no, we’re not talking about me isn’t the least bit polite, he knows that much. So he just takes another sip and shrugs.

“I’m fine,” he lies, as blandly and disinterestedly as possible, like he really believes in the shit he’s trying to sell. “Couldn’t be better. What is a riveting subject? For you, I mean, if it isn’t actually you?”

Deflect and evade, an old Stark standard form of communication.

[guiltapalooza]

Willow is not a hard sell when she's not explicitly paying attention, and right now, she's wrapped up in her own problems enough to not think anything of his glossing over her question. She accepts it at face value-- and she's also just intrinsically self-involved enough to slide easily into talking about things relevant to her again.

"We were doing pretty good talking about the robots and stuff before," she answers with the tone of a suggestion. "Um, magic, too. School. My friends. Affecting social change." Willow shrugs slightly, as if to illustrate how normal it all seems to her.

[manofiron]

Accustomed to dealing with people who refuse to be put off, Willow’s easy acquiescence to his deflecting the conversation away from himself takes Tony by surprise. It’s a pleasant surprise, and one he wishes he could cultivate in others. He wants to think he’s gotten better at it, but he suspects that it probably has something to do with his status as a virtual unknown and whatever’s led Willow to be a celibate, mopey wallflower in this veritable smorgasbord of hot, potentially drunk women.

Like that big red security guard. She’s hot. Maybe he could hook Willow up with her. Or take her home himself if she’s into men. Mental note. Attempt hooking Willow up with Big Red. Possibly get her number for self if not gay.

…What are they talking about?

“Magic,” he says, picking the first word he can remember hearing her say. “Tell me about that. I’m curious.” And that, at least, is the truth.

[guiltapalooza]

His suspicions are correct, but Willow is also just generally agreeable. She likes to see people happy and has an intrinsic allergy to conflict in her normal interactions, so if he doesn't want to talk about something, Willow won't make him. That's not in line with being a supportive friend at all, and with none of her actual friends around to be supportive at, she's making do with him.

It makes her feel better, okay.

"Kinda a broad topic," she says thoughtfully, deciding how she wants to approach it. Maybe some background. "I grew up in normal ol' small town California, no clue it existed, and then I got dragged into demon fighting in high school and it was like... People were dying and my friends were in danger, and I'm good at it." Her voice is sobering, remembering the mentality that had lead into her addiction. The self-justification that Willow had used to conscience resurrecting Buffy.

She forces her thoughts away from anything that serious. "I wanted to help. You do the superheroing, you get it," she points out. "I'm more of a sidekick-y type, but same thing."

[manofiron]

“Much as the world wants to tell you how bad it is, there’s nothing wrong with doing what you’re good at.”

That’s a broad generalization, and not an entirely accurate one. He’s very good at making things that blow up, but just because he can doesn’t mean that he should. Not when those bombs are being used to kill innocent people. He understands that. He believes that. But he also knows that simply because the tool is dangerous, it doesn’t mean that what lies beneath it is.

“Because you’re right. I do get it. Not many do. And that kind of tends to invalidate their opinion. So does stupidity. Then it’s a double whammy.” Regrettably, Tony knows a lot of idiots. Thankfully, horrible decisions to the contrary, he doesn’t count himself among them.

“So what’s a sidekick witch do, anyway? Old school D and D type stuff? Cast protective spells? Status effects? Uncurse people? Kill Beholders? What?”

[guiltapalooza]

Geez, he talks almost as much as Xander. Or Willow herself. Willow isn't used to being in the position of having to get a word in edgewise-- she waits him out and just responds to the last bit, deciding she doesn't want to go into the whole but sometimes when you ignore other peoples' opinions it leads to badness and addiction.

"I can do combat magic, but it's-- rough. Let's go with rough." A little rapidly becomes a lot once she starts dipping her fingers into the black magic bag of potato chips. "Mostly I do research. Look up the demon of the week, find its weak point, devise a way to hit it. I've done protective stuff and uncursing and, um, actual cursing. Sunlight spells, basic telepathy... All sorts."

Her real full repertoire is slightly scary to list out, and Willow doesn't want to give anyone else ideas. Otherwise they'll start expecting her to do some of those things like memory modification, or worse, expect her to do it and judge her for it. She'd rather remove the temptation entirely.

[manofiron]

It sounds a little like what he does, at least in the research department. He has a problem, he figures out a way to solve the problem by creating the tools he doesn’t have, and then he uses that solution to blow things up or save the planet. Of course, that’s where the mediocre similarity ends. He can’t do any of the rest of that stuff, wouldn’t even know how to go about trying.

Curses? Uncursing? Sunlight spells? It’s like Dungeons and Dragons gibberish to him, but it’s still got the power to make him think uneasily of New York. The less thought about that, the better.

“Demon of the week,” he echoes, grabbing onto the first phrase that stuck out. “How’s that work? Just like it sounds or is there some kind of metaphorical bent to the whole thing I’m missing?”

[guiltapalooza]

"No, it's very not metaphorical," she says easily, settling into the topic comfortably and without any apparent regard for the strangeness of it. Willow takes another pull of her drink now that she's relaxing more. This sounds like shop talk to her, and it's nicely impersonal.

"I think I told you I live on the Hellmouth? Lived, I guess, cause... sinkhole. Anyway, my friends and I keep an eye out for supernatural things causing murder and mayhem, and we put a stop to it. Demons are really different, though. There's a lot of variety. Hence the research."

[manofiron]

He knows he's going to regret asking this. It opens up a whole world of stuff he doesn't want to consider or deal with, but he can't resist. Not when she's already mentioned it. Not when he's never been able to ignore his curiosity.

"Okay, I'll bite. These demons. What's the variety? Wings and tails? Forked tongues and scales?" His knowledge of demons is woefully limited and all he can come up with in example is the sort of image that gets stylized in TV shows and movies. "Or is it something subtler than that?"