Blue Collars

Who: Brian and Ash
When: mid-eveningish
Where: randomish sports bar

The rains had stopped around dusk. They wouldn't have prevented Ash from going out, but it would be nicer to do it dryly than soaked to the skin. He'd stood for a long time with the bay door to the shop open, just leaning on the back bumper of a car, smoking, and watching the water pour down. He felt a little strange, had since he'd spent time with Eury, and he couldn't quite place why. The discussion had made him oddly introspective, something that was rarely a good thing, any way you sliced it. Not for him, anyway. So the plan tonight was to go out and get plastered. Somewhere that wasn't Babylon. Why was it that he was always more likely to get hit on by dudes in supernatural establishments? It was a strange phenomenon. Anyway.

Ash changed his shirt, pocketed some cash, locked up the shop, and headed down to a normal-looking sports bar that he'd found in his wanderings. He'd been there a few times, their chili cheese fries were good, and they preferred football over soccer, which was always a plus these days. He wandered in a little after dark, heading for an empty place at the bar and ordering a Killian's Red. It was a dark beer night.

Brian was already there, having been unable to make it all the way home in the rain before his courage ran out. He'd gotten the girl from the library home, but that'd been it. He'd been hopping shops, restaurants, and now bars ever since, working his way in the direction of home or work or both in small, generally two-minute increments. This idiotic fear of rain was probably the most inconvenient, annoying thing in the world, and if he'd had the willpower for it, he'd just get over the damn thing-- and yet, he'd been at it all day, every moment of determination pretty much squelched by the time he got to his truck again. Now that the rain had finally stopped, he just plain didn't have any reason to go home. He had work in a couple hours, he'd been munching all day at his various stop-offs so he wasn't hungry yet, and dammit, a beer sounded good. He deserved one.

Worst of all, though, Torziel still hadn't left. Most people were either ignoring him, overlooking him, or just plain unaware of him for some demon-familiar sort of reason that Brian wasn't privy to, but he was at Brian's feet nonetheless. And being remarkably unbothersome, actually, given his usual annoying tendencies.

Though the tattooed newcomer didn't sit down right next to Brian, but close enough for conversation. Better yet, he looked familiar, probably a diner customer or some other long-term resident. "I thought I was one of the only people who went out drinking on rainy Tuesday nights," he commented with an amiable smile.

The angel had just settled in with his beer when the guy a couple seats down spoke in his direction. He looked over, one eyebrow arched a bit. Then the words caught up to him and he chuckled, smiling a bit himself. "I've never seen a need to discriminate on days of the week," he said with a lopsided grin, lifting his bottle up in a small salute. "Or the weather, for that matter. Shit's always drinkable, right?" The guy looked kind of familiar, though Ash couldn't place from where just yet. Marquette was just a tiny-ass town, most likely.

"Not everyone feels the need to go out in the weather," Brian pointed out. He honestly would've preferred not, but here he was. "But hey, company is good." He returned the improptu, across-several-feet toast with his own drink. "I've seen you around before, I think," he said with a thoughtful frown. The tattoos everywhere were hard to forget, but the setting wasn't coming to him, either.

Torziel was his usual forward self and came padding over to sniff at the guy's toes.

"Yeah, kinda gettin' that feeling myself," Ash said, the sure tone of it sort of trailing off as he looked down to see a fluffy white cat saunter forward and start sniffing at his boots. That was ... a little odd. Sort of out of place for where they were, but ... hey. Who was he to question things, right? He looked back up at Brian and blinked, trying to refocus. "You got a car?" he asked, thinking maybe he'd seen the guy in his shop. "I run a mechanic shop a few blocks over."

The cat gave up on sniffing and started rubbing, flirting his tail up Ash's legs. Not purring, because he didn't know yet whether Ash was a cat person, but certainly being obnoxious. "Just kick him if he's being annoying," Brian said, glaring a little down at him. "Good to know a mechanic, since I've been told twice in the past week my truck's on it's last legs, but it hasn't gone down in flames yet. You ever eat at Mya's Diner?"

Ash sure as hell didn't know anybody who brought their cats into bars. Wasn't there a law against that or something? But this guy didn't seem like a bad sort at all, so he didn't complain. He was more of a big dog person, but he leaned down to scratch roughly at the cat's head anyway. "Yeah? I don't have much work coming in, if you ever wanted to bring it. Diagnostic's cheap," he said with a grin. "Yeah, I go there a lot, actually ..." He straightened up again and snapped his fingers, pointing at Brian when recognition kicked in. "You make the best goddamn hash browns, man."

A compliment was sorely needed, right then, and Brian grinned. "Well, thanks." And that jogged the memory in his head, too, as Torziel decided a purr and a headrub was in order. Rough petting was the best kind, and demonic or not, he was still a sucker for good petting. "BLTs all the time, always on rye bread. Right? Man, you eat more rye than any of our other regulars." Which wasn't exactly true, but since that was all he ordered his sandwiches on, it was certainly close enough for a friendly exaggeration.

Ash laughed. He stood up, careful not to step on the cat, and moved in so that there was only one barstool between the two of them. He may as well introduce himself and thank the man for his awesome food-making skills. He himself couldn't cook to save his life. He could heat up beans and hot dogs in the microwave, that was about it. "Ash," he said, sticking his right hand out to shake and grinning a bit. "Lover of rye, guilty as charged." He'd seen him around Mya's a bit, just in passing, but that was definitely where the dude's face was from.

"Brian. I'm pretty partial to sourdough, myself." Brian shook back with a smile, and Torziel trailed after him, deciding to sit at his feet instead of his willworker's. Well, Brian could handle that. "But differences make the world more interesting, right?" he finished.

He didn't mind the cat, in fact he reached down again to scratch behind one white ear after he'd shaken Brian's hand. "Especially bread differences," he agreed with a chuckle. "Real important, that. So how'd you fall into that, man? Was diner chef a long-time dream? I only ask 'cause I can't even boil water properly, you cook-skilled people fascinate me." He grinned easily and took a long pull from his beer.

"Stupidity on my part and good luck on the part of a friend's?" Brian chuckled. "I fucked up my knee, so couldn't do my old job anymore. Wound up unemployed, since the union didn't believe it was work-related, until Mya said we really ought to open a diner, now that I had all this time on my hands." He shrugged. "It was just a hobby before, but it makes a pretty decent job." Really, he loved his job, stupid as that might sound to most people. He wasn't the type who looked like he'd love cooking for people.

"Aw shitty," Ash said with a chuckle. "About the knee, at least. I talked to a woman once who fell off of her rig 'cause the stair on the side of the cab broke? Jacked up her knee and her hip, and they tried to pull the same bullshit. They'll dick you, man, any chance they get." He shook his head and took a long swallow. He could relate about injury at least; his real work had never been the same since his wing had gotten broken. That just wasn't a sharable story. "But hey, if it gets you through bills and you don't mind doin' it, there are worse fates."

"Yeah, I know," Brian sighed in agreement after a long pull of his drink. He'd seen a few people screwed over by unions and pension companies, though in this case, at least, he really couldn't blame them. No one could figure out what had happened to his knee, except those rare people in the know, and a couple of them had even told him point-blank that it was his own damn fault and he should've known better by then. Not a story he could really share, either. "It's a good job," he amended with a little smile. "Not just decent. So life's okay. How 'bout you? You have a gift for cars, or did you just kind of stumble into it, like I did?"

"Guess you could call it a gift," Ash said with a chuckle and a crooked grin. "They just all make sense to me, once you know where all the parts go and what fits where. Motors. And people always need their shit fixed, so I figured what the hell. Better than a desk job, right?" He looked amused and took another long drink from the bottle he had. That one happened to finish it off, so he put it to the side and motioned for another one. It would take a few.

Brian was nursing his. Work, and all. "Worlds better than a desk job. I might've wound up going that way, fixing things like cars or maybe plumbing, if it wasn't for Mya. It's pretty satisfying, seeing something like that finished and working, isn't it?" Even so, he was actually glad he didn't; he'd miss the people, though he'd never have realized it then. His old job had mostly been big team efforts, and being a mechanic or a plumber was pretty much a solo or small-team job, in his experience.

"It's a good racket, if you can do it," he said with a nod. While he waited on his beer, he fished out a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lit it up, blowing the first lungful away from Brian. "Pretty satisfying, yeah. Long as you have faith that the owner's gonna actually listen to you and take care of the car. Some of the abuse people put their vehicles through, man ..." he trailed off with a laugh and shook his head. "But usually? Somebody thinks you're shootin' straight with them, they'll listen. So then, yeah. Not a bad way to earn a roof. You lived here in town long?" His blue eyes settled on the man.

Wondering wryly what kind of torture Ash might think his poor, battered old truck had been through, Brian answered, "When you know a bit about cars, it's easier to tell who's doing the straight-shooting, too. A lot of people don't know shit, so they think everything you say is just a way to get more money." He shook his head, took another swallow of the ale and beer. "Been here almost four years, now, and some people still call me new, it's funny. You, though...." He eyed Ash curiously. "You're newer, am I right? I don't think I would've taken so long to place you if I'd seen you for longer."

"Five months, on the outside," he admitted with a nod. "Town this size, a guy like me sticks out, y'know?" His fresh beer arrived, and he cracked it open, wondering in a vague way that he ignored whether or not this guy knew Eury. Since she was just the only person he'd really connected with so far, and not at all for any other reason that had to do with how much he'd thought about her and what they'd talked about all night. Noooo, not at all. "It ain't a bad place, think I could stick around a while. Where'd you hail from?" So he was interested in people, so what? Brian seemed like a good enough sort.

"Texas," Brian said. "The accent's faded a bit, but for the first half of my life I sounded like a bona-fide cowboy." He remembered when people just guessed where he was from after this long in conversation. That was years ago, though he wouldn't be surprised if his month home hadn't revived it a little. "Spent fifteen years doing a lot of traveling before winding up here, that kind of killed it. How 'bout you?"

Ahhh Texas. A place that Ash was oddly comfortable in in some spots, and hated in others. He'd never really been able to say why. "Born in Chicago, kinda raised all over. Lost my mom when I was a kid, and my dad was a trucker," he said. It was his usual lie, one that was close enough to the truth to sound plausible to most people. He just conveniently left out the parts that involved floods and earthquakes and cholera outbreaks. He sucked down some beer. "Funny how many nomads end up here, huh," he mused, glancing sideways at Brian. Just chatting with people? He'd found that there was something magnetic about Marquette that wasn't just him.

"Y'know, it is a bit funny," Brian agreed. "You'd be amazed how many drifters we get in the diner, folks that stay for a month or two and then are gone again. A lot of small-town diners might be like that, I don't know, but I've certainly noticed it." He shrugged, pausing for another sip, then added, "And then some of us wind up putting down roots. I can't really imagine leaving, now, myself."

The angel of Karma had never had roots. Ever. He'd stayed in a few places for a few years at a time -- even gone back to them -- but he'd never felt as though he'd settled down somewhere. But then, his nature didn't really allow much room for that kind of thing. No wives, no kids, no white picket fences. Not that any woman could stand him for that long, and at least he didn't think he had any kids. None that he'd ever been tracked down about, anyway. He chuckled and nodded, however, for the sake of conversation. "Well, it's not exactly a place that's situated to be passed-through. I think people just come and then go again, for whatever reason. But I've seen plenty of worse places to stay for a while."

"You planning on making it a while, then?" Brian asked curiously. He liked having regulars at the diner, people who's faces and stories he knew, and from what all he remembered about Ash and from this conversation, he seemed like an okay guy.

"Who knows?" Ash answered, and it was the most honest one he could give. He didn't know what the next day held, let alone the distant in-a-few-months future. He might be dead by then. He might be moving on, he might be staying. He might have Fallen. ... though that was an awful thought and one that he tried his damndest not to dwell on for more than a couple of seconds. He gave Brian a half-grin. "Depends on the shop, I guess." Which wasn't true. He swallowed down some more beer.

"Still feeling drifter-y, huh?" Brian said sympathetically. "Well, I know how that goes." He eyed him briefly, glanced down at the cat who was dozing at Ash's feet now, or at least pretending to doze, then offered, "Well, maybe I will bring my truck down one of these days. Two people in a week can't be wrong, after all, right?" Of course they could, but hey, he'd offer patronage and see whether Ash agreed that just because a truck was old and beat up didn't mean it wasn't serviceable. It'd be ammo for the next time Manhattan-- or... shit, or not Manhattan-- complained about it, having an actual mechanic say it was all right.

It wasn't so much that, but Ash wasn't going to elaborate. Still feeling drifter-y was a good enough excuse, he supposed. "Two people in a week?" he asked and an amused arch of his eyebrow. He wasn't about to turn down any business, a guy had to eat, after all.

"It's kind of a regular thing, honestly," Brian grinned. "Mya's been after me to get a new truck for years, and Manhattan just likes to be annoying." Among other things. Ugh, he still needed to call her, he just had no idea what to say. Sure, Man', I totally forgive you for killing people like me for a living. Oh, that was gonna happen. He didn't even want to think about that conversation yet. He shook his head and put the smile back on. Conversation, Brian. Keep it up. "I just love the old scrap heap, so I'd also love some professional opinions that it's still decent."

He laughed a bit, amused. "Man, you have no idea how often I get asked that," Ash said with a broad grin. "'Tell my wife it's still okay to drive and we don't need a new one.' ... not that Mya's, y'know ... your old lady or anything, but still." He chuckled as he took another long drink. He wasn't feeling it yet, it would take another couple of bottles. But he wasn't minding just sitting around and bullshitting. "Sure, I don't mind justifying attachment to your truck at all. It's a man's perogative."

"And here I thought I was being different," Brian chuckled. The very idea of Mya as anyone's "old lady" struck him as funny, actually. Mya would never get old, as far as he knew. "And best friends are just as bad as wives, when it comes to the little things, I figure." He shrugged and finished the last of his drink. "So in a couple days I'll be by, or should I make an actual app-- appit-- shit. That's not even a hard one," he grumbled, then tried again. "Should I call ahead?"

"Appointment?" Ash suggested with a little arch to his eyebrow. It could possibly be seen as rude, but he looked interested to find that Brian had tripped over the word. Stuff like that about people just sort of made him curious. "No, not really necessary. Just walk it on in, unless I'm swamped -- which really hasn't happened yet, believe you me -- I can just drop whatever to take a look." He had a very cavalier work policy, but hey. There were more important things in life.

"Yeah, that's the one. All right. Couple days, then." He grinned a little sheepishly at Ash. "I've got a speech... thing. You know, you'd think they'd make the name of the condition easier to say so people who had it could explain better? I used to stutter, but now I've gone up in the world to just having trouble with long words and strange names."

"I never thought of it, but you're right, that is pretty fucked," he agreed with a faint chuckle. The angel took another pull off of his beer and shook his head. He glanced down himself at the puffy white cat, again wondering what a down-to-earth kind of Texan guy was doing with a feline in a bar. It was interesting. "This is your's right?" he asked, since he was curious, glancing back up at Brian.

"Unfortunately," Brian said, frowning down at Torziel. "Inherited him and now he won't leave me alone. Always manages to get out of wherever I've locked him up. And since he snuck his way into the truck this morning, and I haven't been home since, he's followed me all day."

"Huh," Ash mused, looking down at the cat. He toed it lightly with his boot, just in a stroky sort of way. Maybe he should get a dog while he was living here. He hadn't had a dog in years. And they were always better company than cats. He thought so anyway. Ash wondered in a completely random way what Eury preferred, and then dismissed it. He'd been mentally chewing on her all day already, Jesus. "You'd make a nice hat," he told Torziel with a faint smile.

The cat looked up at him with a lazy blink at the touch, then without any warning at all-- not even enough warning for Brian to do something about it, and he usually saw it coming-- went from limp and fluffy and harmless to pointed at five of his six ends and latching onto Ash's leg with all five of them.

He didn't really see it coming, but it didn't seem to phase the angel much either. Ash laughed, even as little pinpricks of pain shot up his leg. He'd had much worse, and the timing was just perfect. "Keep those sharp, don't you?" he asked the cat with a grin. At least he had jeans on, that was something.

"Shit," Brian growled, and he slid off his barstool, winced at his goddamn knee, and stuck a foot between Torziel's belly and Ash's leg. A little twist of will got him lose without causing more damage, and the foot knocked him away. Before he could lunge back in, Brian grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and heaved him off his feet. "You are such a heavy son of a bitch, you know that?" he told the little beast of a demon as he squirmed half-heartedly. "Sorry about that, man... he's a little spastic."

Ash chuckled and shook his head, watching as the man schooled his pet. Yeah, he definitely needed a dog. "Eh, they're testy animals on their best days," he said, sounding amused. Not at all peeved or even really like he cared. "It's all good. I'd probably be pissy too, if I was a cat with this kind of weather going on." He finished off his current bottle of Killian's with a contented exhale and set the bottle down.

"You can take being attacked by a twenty-pound cat and still smile," Brian marveled. "All right, I officially like you, man." He swung Torziel up under one arm, gave his paws a good thirty-degree dip in temperature to get him to stop squirming and start licking them in distress, and pulled his wallet out to pay for his beer, and he added a few extra bucks, telling the bartender coming by to pick it up, "His next round's on me."

That had him laughing again. "I been attacked by worse, sorry to say," he said with a cheek-bunching grin. Ash stood up as it looked like Brian was about to head out, and gave him a grateful nod. "I appreciate it, buddy," he told him, and stuck out a hand to shake Brian's free one in parting. "Look forward to seein' you and your bucket of bolts."

Brian grinned back and shook; he had a strong shake, if a bit over-warm. "Look forward to hearing you tell me it's in good shape for being twenty years old," he answered. "Good night, Ash. I'm taking this beast home." He hefted Torziel again, gave him feeling in his paws back, and headed out into the thankfully now-rain-less streets.