Room 429, Sunday Afternoon

[raspberryturk]

Okay. Sunday afternoons were officially boring. The days of the week had classes and radio and reports to write for his job, and mornings and evenings meant that the ferret was awake and totally willing to be harassed, but Sunday afternoons?

Reno would like to vote that boring, lazy Sunday afternoons be stricken from the record.

He was in his room, sitting by the window and playing with his lighter. Fire go on. Fire blow out. Ooh. Exciting.

The door was open slightly in case something interesting happened to wander through the hallway, at least.

[Open, like the door~]

Comments

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

Really, this should be easier than the other two. She'd had two days practice, after all.

Setting her face in a smile, Yurika rapped on the doorframe. "Red, I am out of booze. Don't suppose I can borrow a bottle from you?" Time to see if he'd been listening to the damned radio squirrels. Or Romeo. Or Rikku.

[raspberryturk]

Reno had the good sense to listen to the radio, and smile and nod at it, and then continue to drink.

This did not mean he was fully aware of what was going on. But he did have a notion that something was amiss.

Fire blow out. Lighter go in pocket.

"I happen to have a coupl'a bottles to spare," he replied, turning around to glance at her. "But you gotta share it, yo. I'm rationing it."

No, he wasn't. But it seemed like a good thing to say at the time.

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Playing with fire? Are we five again?" she asked rhetorically, coming the rest of the way in. "And I think I can deal with rationing. Maybe it will inspire me to cut back on my other bad habits." No, it really wouldn't.

[raspberryturk]

"We're bored again," Reno replied. "Five was bad for my image, yo. And my job. And my relationship. I'm avoidin' five and maybe I'll burn the island down if it tries to push that shit on me again, yo."

Five itself had been fine. But it had made things... complicated.

He pushed himself to his feet and wandered over to raid the contents of his dresser. Warm booze was still booze, dammit.

"You prefer rum, tequila, or nice, boring, warm beer?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Tequila." Which would probably give him a decent indicator of her mental state, since she tended to avoid large amounts of it since Mexico.

Although she should, in fairness, say something before she borrowed the booze. So he wasn't tempted to throw the bottle. "Lots of things are bad for your image or for relationships. Like being a lying bitch." Yurika raised one hand bitterly. "Hi, my name is Yurika, and I'm a raging hypocrite. Booze please?"

[raspberryturk]

"Ah." Reno scrounged about for a bit in a futile search for a paper cup before just shrugging and handing the bottle over to her. "Neither of us are diseased, right? We're good to pass it back and forth."

Divvying up the booze was important, too.

"You know, there's a certain sorta art behind bein' a lyin' bitch," he mused. "And a ragin' hypocrite. I think there's a club or somethin'. If there ain't, there should be. What's goin' on?"

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"No, Red, I don't have cooties. Drinking from the bottle is fine."

"Club? I'm in." She bit her lip for a moment, then shrugged. "Cliff notes? I might have neglected to tell my boyfriend a few key facts. Like the fact I work for SOLOMON, and I have since before I came here. He's not too thrilled with me right now."

[raspberryturk]

"SOLOMON." Reno raised an eyebrow and leaned back against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest. Expression neutral. Thoughtful, but neutral. "Not somethin' you could just talk about, I'm gonna guess."

Seriously, there should have been a club.

"Is there where I chuck a thesaurus at your head or whatever? Turnabout bein' fair play and all that? Or do you need some badly-made ramen, instead?"

Believe it or not, this was Reno being supportive. He hadn't started name-calling, after all.

[dojima-hime.livejournal.com]

"Got it in one. I compromise the cover, things get unpleasant very quickly." Yurika was pretty sure Reno could fill-in the blanks. "Lucky for me, the bastard who holds my leash left me a loophole on Friday, and I took advantage of it to spill my guts. It probably wasn't my best idea, but it's too late now."

If there was a club, she'd help collect dues. They could meet at Caritas every Thursday night.

"So please, throw things," she replied, taking a nice long drink from the bottle. "It'll be a nice change of pace."

[shyest-eyes.livejournal.com]

Hinata had really ought to know by now that even leaving the door open for more a ten seconds was an invitation for Yei to sneak out of the room and investigate down the hall.

There was a small white kitten poking its head around the door and mewing inquiringly. Hihihi?

[raspberryturk]

Mew?

Reno blinked over at the kitten in the doorway.

"You a pet or a student?" He made a reach for the ferret treats as he made his way over to greet the white puffy critter with a wary pat on the head. Ferret treats were meaty munchy things, right? Totally fine for cats too, he was sure. "You look lost either way, Stinker."

He meant 'Stinker,' of course, as a sort of affectionate nickname. At least it wasn't 'Dumbass,' like the ferret that was drowsily picking itself up to peer over at the kitten.

[shyest-eyes.livejournal.com]

She was not lost! She was on an adventure and Mommy didn't know about it. But he'd petted her on the head and that earned him cheerful purring which was totally a plead for more. And what was he holding? Was it exciting?

What was that sleepy animal thing? Hi!

[raspberryturk]

Reno totally didn't just melt a little of cute cat-thing. Shut up.

He was going to pet the kitty some more and offer her the ferret treat- an action that earned a bit of a honk of protest from Mako- and then maybe he'd reach down to scoop her up as he peered into the hallway for whoever might have lost her.

"You got anybody out there lookin' for you?"

[shyest-eyes.livejournal.com]

All of that earned more purring and the treat got a curious sniffle of it before she decided that well and good, it wouldn't hurt her and it was very nice of him to give it to her.

Picking her up was okay too, she liked that, and she'd try and rub her head against his chin and purr even louder.

The hallway was empty so far, and Yei didn't mind. Mommy would be by soon, she was sure. Mommy always was.

[raspberryturk]

Cute cat. Purring and doing that nuzzly thing with a soft little face against his chin, and oh shit, Reno was going to duck back into his room a little before someone actually caught him snuggling the random cat.

The freaking cute random cat and damn it, he wasn't a cat person anyhow.

Okay. Okay. Reno seemed to have been invaded by a cute thing. This was alright. He was going to just give it little scratches behind its ears and let it snuggle at him however it wanted, while Mako bounced around in his cage trying to figure out what the heck was going on out there. And that would leave Reno able to figure out how to get the cat back to wherever it belonged. Theoretically.

Thinking was difficult when one was being purred at and headbumped.

So he would take a seat on his bed. Like so. And maybe put the kitten down on his bed. Like so. And wiggle his fingers at it. To help the thinking process, of course.

[shyest-eyes.livejournal.com]

More headbumping and purring and half-shut eyes of pure kitten glee because of the ear scritches and he was currently her most favourite person ever.

It should be noted that Yei’s favourite person depended heavily on who was petting her at the moment.

Thinking was okay, if you had to do it, but really fingers were much more exciting and she pounced enthusiastically, if not altogether accurately at them. Was that helping him think? She could be helpful! Watch her pounce again!

[raspberryturk]

"Oh my shit, Stinker, you're killin' me, here."

No, really, she wasn't. Which was why Reno was able to continue wiggling his fingers at her. Cat. Being cute. It was mandatory.

Mako was getting excited over in his cage, now, honking and bouncing. There was playing happening up there, wasn't there? He could hear it. Hey! Hey! What was going oooon?

So much cute in one room was probably going to end up making Reno rupture something. Which was, of course, why he had to encourage it by pulling out the ferret and setting it on the bed so he could see what was going on.

Hiiiiiiiiii!

[withoutverona]

Church was relaxing but didn't help Romeo decide anything, and, perversely, he decided maybe he needed advice from someone who had been on the other side. And if Reno didn't have advice, he at least might have booze.

So there was a Romeo, tapping on Reno's door.

[raspberryturk]

Boring Sunday afternoons had a funny way of becoming busy Sunday afternoons, sometimes.

Reno didn't mind a bit.

"Door's open," he called, craning his neck some to see who was in the doorway. "Romeo, my man! C'mon in?"

He was already making his way to the booze, actually. There wasn't much left but beer and rum, but at least he was going to offer. He had the feeling it would be needed.

[withoutverona]

"Of course," Romeo said, coming in and settling on the floor. "Have you talked to either of the girls lately?"

The question could be entirely innocent. Really.

[raspberryturk]

Reno was going to be honest, here. Vague, but honest.

"Doji stopped in, a little earlier," he answered. Casually. He wasn't going to push the topic if Romeo wasn't touching on it just yet, anyhow. "Had some tequila, shot the shit. How you doin'? Want somethin'? Beer, rum? Don't got much variety today."

[withoutverona]

"Beer," Romeo said absently. "Did she lie to you? Or should I just assume every word from her mouth is a lie?"

[raspberryturk]

Reno pulled out a beer for Romeo and one for himself, walking over to give it to him.

"She didn't really lie to me. Kinda omitted a lotta truths, maybe." He held out the beer, trying not to shift awkwardly from one foot to the other. "I know about it now, anyhow. Kinda... sticky stuff, maybe."

His tone was as carefully neutral as Reno could manage to keep it.

[withoutverona]

Romeo snorted, but accepted the beer. "Sticky is a kind word for an unkind thing," he said. "And omission for so long is a lie. She deliberately mislead me about who she is, Reno. What else should I call it?"

[raspberryturk]

Reno sighed and cracked open his own beer, taking a swig before talking.

Today was a good day for drinking.

"Lying," he agreed, giving a little shake of his head. "I ain't gonna sugar-coat it if you don't want me to. What she did was lying, yeah. Situation seems kinda familiar, is all. Didn't think I'd be on this side of it, but that don't make it any less a lie."

Killers. Liars. Open their traps too early, say too much, and somebody could get hurt. So lie. Yeah. Like there was anyone in the world who hadn't lied before.

Never did seem to make things better, now that Reno had seen it sit up and bite twice.