tramitem_log | this killing time

this killing time

who: Alec Crowley & you
what: meeting and greeting whoever wants to say hi. Well, meeting anyway.
when: 4/14 8pm
where: Mad Maggie's Bar, Queens
warnings: Scotsman in a dour mood?

Mad Maggie's bar is packed given it's a Monday night. Maybe because there's a game on or drinks are half price. Who knows. It's so packed almost every seat is filled up-- Except for the one next to him by the end of the bar that, for some reason, people seem to want to avoid.

For his own part, he sits there, fingers clasped around a whiskey sour and glaring hard at the bar as if it might provide the answers for whatever is in his mind.

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Yotsuyu fights her way to the bar. It doesn't matter a damn to her that the only seat available is next to the dour man--hells, it might help the sharks not act like she's the only bait in town.

"I'll take a Manhattan," Yotsuyu said, raising her voice to be heard above the din. Though the way her bar companion was glaring down at the wood, it made her wonder.

"Did it insult your mother? Or did it simply try to insult you?" Though her tone was a bit arch, it was more due to having to shout over the music, rather than anything else.

There is a beautiful woman sitting next to him for some reason and he can smell her perfume. Every cell in his body freezes at once and he couldn't flee even if he wanted as his legs seemed to have locked up at the knee. He's seen her around before here and there and knows she's someone important-- but there's a difference in seeing a woman from a distance and having her sitting right by you and addressing you for no reason.

"Little bit of both." Well that was a bloody stupid thing to say.

"I've seen you around." Did that sound like he was a stalker? Surely the woman had seen him in the same place, working. She must have. Still he could maybe round it out. "You do good work."

Did that make it better or worse? It was hard to tell.

"Really! Well, I cannot blame you for looking as if you'd like to stab it, then. Perhaps you'll give it character, if you do."

It's only slightly teasing, and much more good-natured--this man has earned himself points for his first words not being something either about how pretty she is, or what he'd like to do to her because of it.

Though his next ones both jog her memory, and make her brows arch for a moment. They do bring a smile, however. "I do what little I can--precious little, when most of it is simply throwing money at the problem. I care not at all for politics, and most people who do would not give a damn about what's between my ears, honestly." They'd care about what was much lower, and Yotsuyu did not have a shred of patience for such a thing. Nor what a campaign would make Elliott go through.

"I think you work harder than most of the people we both know, truthfully." She'd probably try to talk more, but she's not about to lose her voice to have a conversation.

That was a violent train of thought that he wasn't going to respond to. As if stabbing something gave anything any character at all. But it was just a conversation so he let it go. He understood all too well about politics and understood, intellectually anyway, a woman having to fight to get herself heard and respected. It was hard enough back home let alone in this cesspool of a country. He didn't envy her the fight.

"Money isn't simple. It's the most complicated thing. The most needed thing. If all you can do is throw money to people who can use it well, that's nothing to be ashamed of." And maybe she could do more, but maybe so could anyone. It was a help and she should realize that.

He makes a face at the mention of hard work and turns the tumbler a bit against the table.

"It's just what gets me out of the flat. Don't credit me with good motives." He hadn't meant it to sound like a criticism, but maybe it came off that way. It was what it was at the end of the day. It was something he could do and so he did it. But he didn't need any accolades for it.

"For those who lack it? Perhaps. For those who have an abundance of money, they seem to think little of it." It certainly was the way of things with her boss. Yotsuyu herself wasn't struggling to make ends meet, now, but she'd been there. Likely, that was what gave her sympathy for those who were even now finding themselves in such a plight.

Though she was well aware that had she not suffered so, she might not be so sympathetic. She frowned a bit at that.

"I have been where the poor and downtrodden are. Hubris I may have in spades, but I realize that my fates could turn as theirs may have had. So I refuse to scorn them, if only because I've been there. I will say I am glad I've the luxury to give money in my employer's name where I see fit." Because the truth was her boss wouldn't have a bloody clue. Give it to some sham outfit or the undeserving because they put a good spin on it...

"You could be laying in your flat and doing nothing," she noted dryly. "You aren't. Perhaps your motives are not entirely good, but getting off your arse is more than some do." Yotsuyu ended that comment with a long sip of her drink. It wasn't precisely an accolade; but she was making a point it, if nothing else. That it was done.

"Maybe so." He didn't know what to think of the rich, not having been near wealthy himself nor any of his family. But even then, he thought, money was a complicated thing. All investing and spending and not spending. Using it for good deeds or not, there was nothing that made money simple.

His frown grows a bit as she continued. He could see why she downplayed it, and why she did it, if she was being completely honest. He'd never been wanting in that area. He'd never been poverty stricken or having to live in a car or even a runaway teenager. He tipped back the whiskey sour and made a face as the alcohol flooded through him.

"Actually maybe the whole thing is just bunk. I mean, here we are, complimenting each other on our charity, but at the end of the day, we get to go home. And it's all over the place, you know. There are newspaper articles and news programmes that focus on who volunteered what and who did what where. Like people need to be encouraged to do the right thing.

But really the focus should be on the people that need help. Instead of saying, oh three people volunteered at such and such shelter, it should be, such and such shelter is home to fifty transients and could always use more workers to help them on their way. These are some of the people there and their stories. Put the focus on the people in need and not the people smiling for the camera happy to have given out a Turkey leg or two for Thanksgiving."

She rubbed elbows with them--being the employee of a somewhat important (if only self-important) real estate magnate gave her experience. It did not make Yotsuyu like any of them. She couldn't consider herself one, either.

"They do not care. Even I might not, had I not experienced it myself." She was candid enough to not lie to herself, or to him. "All the newspapers want is sensationalism. The beautiful people. To glorify them," she hissed. Because that part was not what Yotsuyu cared much about, if at all. "But you have the right of it. The focus should be on those who need help, but they'd have to be some sort of...bullshit feel-good story, where said homeless person pulled themselves up by their bootstraps. They don't want to expose the disgusting underbelly that everyone walks around, all the piss and the shit and the grovelling that those less fortunate have to endure every day. Their squalid existence."

The scowl on her face was anything but pretty, and she swallowed another sip of her drink. "Would you like another one of those?" she asked. Gods knew she could probably use another, herself.

"Right? And even the pulling up by the bootstraps is a myth. Don't want to actually help people. Don't want to give them money or healthcare or anything that'll make their lives a little easier because they're too afraid of bloody Communism."

Why was he here to begin with?

Oh, right. Anthony.

Bloody hell.

He rubbed a hand over his face.

"I'll have another I think, and get yours as well. If you want." The last part sounded as awkward as it felt and he moved on, covering it as best he could.

"Between that and this ridiculous 'Different' business, I don't know how long I want to stay in this city."

But he had to stay because if the Different bullocks was bad news, he couldn't let Anthony face it alone. Why was his cousin always in the thick of it?

"Or worse, Socialism," Yotsuyu said, lips curling in a bit of a sneer. "Gods forbid money rushes out of their pockets."

She knew she made good money, honestly. But she also knew that she'd been living hand to mouth in the past. Yotsuyu knew what it felt like, the struggle. So if there was extra, and she and her son did not have need? Oh, she put some away in case there were lean times, but she did her level best to give, if she had a surplus.

"If you'd like. I'm grateful." The words surprised her somewhat, even as they left her lips, but then as he spoke again, Yotsuyu nearly dropped her glass and what was left in it.

"Do not tell me you've suffered such a thing as well! I have not even seen you at a meeting!" Her startled shout could even be heard over the bar's din, and a curious glance or two was sent their way...

He winced a bit, partly at the noise but partly too about the attention sent their way. He hunched his shoulders a little. Then waved for the barman to refill their drinks.

"Haven't been to one yet, but yes. I've-- I'm apparently part of it." He gave her a look. "And you as well? For how long?"

"A month, or thereabouts...it began when I came back from a business trip to Los Angeles. I touched down in Queens and once I walked into the terminal..."

Yotsuyu scowled and shook her head at that, draining the last of her first drink, giving the barman a slight glare, though she did not raise her voice again.

"My son has been involved for longer, as well. I found him at the very first meeting I went to. I do not know how many others there are, though there are certainly a number of us who do go to the meetings..."

Unsettled now, Yotsuyu spun the glass' stem between her fingers, staring down at the garnish she'd left in it. Sweet tooth or no, not even the cherry could tempt her at the moment.

"It seems to go through families. My cousin too, before me even. And we hadn't had contact before then. Well not here anyway. And some of the fantasies are just bizarre. I don't understand the game. It's like we're all in one place, being herded together for one reason or another. It doesn't make much sense." He was so focused on his own glance he startled a little when the barman came to freshen his drink.

"What do you make of it?"

"Some sort of mass hallucination, at first, but now? I'm not certain." Yotsuyu could not help but scowl. "Elliott's gained some sort of marking on his hand. It is not a tattoo--while he might be the type to get one, it would not be somewhere so...prominent."

Nor would it be such a random design. Yotsuyu knew her son...at least she thought she had...

"If it is a game, it is not one I enjoy playing." She picked up the new drink as the bartender set it down, swiping the garnish from the old one and settling it in the new.

"I do not like the fact that it is running through families, either. I see no reason to involve my son. Elliott is no longer a child, but..." She bit her lip, but shook her head. She was not certain what else to say. Where would speculation get her, anyway?

"It's sick is what it is." He shook his head. "They're playing with us. Someone is playing with us. But in such a way we can't easily go tell anyone about it." It frustrated him. Was there a crime committed? Yes. But how do you explain to police memories you shouldn't have or marks where there hadn't been before ?

"I can't even see why-- Or the benefit of all this. Unless it's some kind of twisted psychological experiment. I feel like a rat in a bloody maze." But what could he do about it? That, he didn't know. There were so many questions raging around his head and far too few answers or means to get them.

"Oh, we could tell that Bureau or whatever it is, but what's to say they aren't up to their necks in this? Behind it? They say they have our best interests in mind, but..."

Yotsuyu had heard that song and dance before, from her own blood. And they had only had their own best interests at heart, and she could throw herself out with the rubbish, for all that her so-called 'family' had cared.

She let out a gusty sigh. "You are not the only one, so I can sympathize, at least. I fear I have no good advice for you, however."

Though she resolved to ask Elliott just what he'd been told, when he'd contacted the Bureau...if only to salve her own curiosity.

"Horse shit." They didn't have anyone's interests in mind but their own and very little could convince him otherwise. He waved a hand.

"Didn't expect good advice. What advice can anyone really give in a situation like this other than don't trust anyone. Anyone could be a spy for them, you know. Even you, even me. We might not even know it." He shook his head and took a drink.

"The world is a dangerous place."

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this killing time

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