Melisande's friend Aimee was totally on the money when she said that the redhead the girl had given her number to WOULD call. There was no way he wouldn't. He was just nervous about doing it. His usual experiences with women involved a quick night after a lot of drinking. This wasn't one of those, starting with the fact that he hadn't had much to drink at all.
Unlike Josh, who passed out within moments of getting settled into the passenger seat. Moron. Didn't he know that Drew wasn't to be trusted with this?
He probably did, but it was too late now. He'd said nothing involving dolls, and Drew had agreed. That didn't mean he wouldn't do ANYTHING, though. He proved that even as he drove, slowly picking up one pen at a time and easing them into Josh's mouth. He had to be slow about it, just in case the guy woke up, but after he got a few in there, he decided to count himself lucky and pull out his camera phone. A few shots later (just for fun and plenty to work with), he was satisfied, and continued to drive the last few minutes to Josh's place as he texted one of the pictures to Melisande. Good ice-breaker. That was when he flicked the radio on.
Full-blast.
It was so loud, he couldn't even tell what was playing, but that didn't matter. What mattered was waking Josh up, and having his cell in his pocket and out of sight (and Josh's reach, just in case).
Ah, blissful drunk sleep. It's the best kind of sleep there is, until, of course, one of your ASSHOLE FRIENDS decides to wake you up by doing one of three things: turning on the lights, slamming on the brakes and screaming, or making a lot of noise. Drew had gone for option c, and Josh awoke with a start, nearly swallowing about seven or eight pens that had been carefully placed in his mouth (and one shoved up his nose, for good measure). He actually bit one of them, and it had to be a Bic ballpoint, because blue ink dribbled down his mouth as he turned and just glared at Drew, the one pen still hanging from his nose.
"I fucking hate you."
---
Melisande walked slowly with Nikki to her apartment, enjoying the way he always put his arm around her protectively. "Do you think he'll call?" she asked, for about the fifty billionth time.
Nikolas glared at her for a moment. "Seriously, do you have cotton in those ears of yours, doll? He's going to call, don't worry about it. And if not," he said with a shrug, "I'll chew his leg off." He offered her a catty grin, and opened the door of her apartment building main entrance. "After you, my lady," he said with an overly-ornate sweeping bow.
---
Slam!
Josh didn't even hear Drew trying to gasp out 'See you tomorrow' between his hyena laughter. He wanted to kick a dent in his car, because the ink tasted nasty and it was all over his face. He looked like he'd attacked and eaten a colony of Smurfs, for fucksake. He stormed up to his apartment and slammed that door, too.
---
"Night," she called to Nikolas as he turned from her door. She shut it and locked all four locks, and then headed towards her bathroom for a quick shower. She was thankful that New York had banned smoking indoors; she hated coming home smelling like smoke. Now she just smelled like perfume - lots and lots of it. While she took a quick shower, she heard her phone making 'ding-dong' sounds, alerting her to text messages.
She toweled off and put on her lazy clothing (pink plaid boxer shorts and a matching pink t-shirt) and headed down the hall in giant pink bunny slippers, wet hair carefully brushed and in a braid behind her. She flipped open the phone as she flopped down on her bed, and burst out into laughter after the initial confusion of not knowing whose number it was.
The pen in Josh's nose had truly been the star on top of the tree, the icing on the cake, the pure genius of the whole experiment, though the pen Josh BIT DOWN ON AND EXPLODED was pretty damn awesome itself. When Josh looked at him, one pen hanging from his nose and other still in his mouth and dribbling ink down his chin like some smurfed out vampire, Drew LOST it.
He couldn't help himself. That was pure fucking GOLD, and he actually HAD to snatch his phone out and snap another quick picture before 'accidentally' dropping it on his left side, between the seat and the door. Josh wasn't getting it. He'd be lucky if the picture wasn't too blurry to see properly, what with the way he'd been laughing when he took it, but damn.
Smurfzilla!
"See you tomorrow!" he tried to gasp out between laughing, but he wasn't so sure that Josh even heard it. Oh, well. He'd get it, and be mad for awhile. Maybe he'd even pass out again due to drunkenness instead of washing his face. That'd be even better.
Eventually, all of these pranks were going to result in someone getting hurt, but for now? It's all fun until someone loses and eye, or a tooth (in Wes' case), and then it's even more hilarious. Drew waited until he got to his own place to call Melisande, when his laughter had calmed down some. Now, he still felt nervous, but significantly loosened up. Amazing how laughing at someone else's expense could do that.
"Hey, Melisande? It's Drew," he told her when she answered, just in case she didn't recognize the number from the text.
She was trying to text him back a response to the photos when the phone rang, and she blinked rapidly a few times before she answered it. That always happened to her. Evidently she was too slow with her phone to get any text messages out in a timely fashion - Tawny could send her seven texts when she hadn't even replied to one yet, come to think of it. She supposed she just wasn't as good with her thumbs on the phone as she was on the controller.
"Oh, hey!" she said, standing to go get a bottle of water from her kitchen. She paused in front of an open and somewhat barren fridge before reaching passed the water to a Jones Orange Cream soda. She'd just have to brush her teeth again before she went to bed, which wouldn't be a big deal, since she wasn't tired anyways.
"I guess you got home okay?" she said unscrewing the bottle cap and taking a sip while he answered. "I didn't think you were going to call," she confessed with a laugh.
Drew actually wasn't much of a texter himself, so he wouldn't have had anything to say to Melisande about being slow, but it didn't come up, so he didn't even know she'd been planning on sending him a response. He assumed she'd either laughed or given the picture of Josh a funny look, and then gone on with her evening.
"Oh, yeah, got home fine. Thought Josh might kill me with the way he was glarin' when I woke him up with all those pens hanging outta his mouth an' nose, but I survived," he joked, laughing a little just from the image that inspired all over again.
He couldn't wait to show Wes. He was going to have to email the pictures to himself so he could print them out and hang them all over the office at work. "You shouldn'a been worryin'. 'Course I was plannin' on callin'! I can't say I don't do anythin' stupid, but I wasn't gonna blow you off."
"Yeah, that's what I heard," she laughed at his response. She realized she was going to sound like an idiot, but she continued. "My friend had to listen to me for the rest of the night - I kept asking her if she thought you were going to call. I meant it when I said I never do that. I don't know what made me decide too, though." She shrugged a little, frowning when she realized that he couldn't rightly see her, anyways.
"But, I'm glad you did. And I saw the photos!" she exclaimed, sitting down on the couch and pulling the pink blanket over her. "I'm pretty sure he's going to dislike you when he realizes you've probably been distributing them, but then again, something tells me this has happened before." She laughed a little again, wondering how it is that men had that psychic link to themselves.
"How far away do you live from the club, anyways? I'm within walking distance." She set her soda down on her coffee table and kicked her legs out, snuggling down on her ridiculously comfortable and large couch. It may as well have been a small bed for all intents and purposes.
It was actually somewhat flattering to hear that she was so worried about whether or not he would call, since he didn't exactly experience making women nervous when he talked to them. Really, he knew he wasn't fugly, but he wasn't one of those male models or anything. He'd been more worried about calling and getting the wrong number or something because she'd just wanted to get rid of him. That had happened before. Some women could be bitches.
"I'm glad you decided to," he told her honestly, snagging a beer from his fridge before plopping down on the couch and kicking his shoes off. There was a spot on his ceiling, perfect for staring at and pondering while leaning back and talking on the phone (not one of his more common past times), and that seemed like the best possible place to be right then. "We do that kind of shit all the time. Josh's afraid of dolls, an' another guy we work with hates the dentist. Josh an' I carried an old dentist chair into the SWAT office one mornin' for him to walk in on, an' Josh ends up with dolls in his locker all the time."
He deliberately didn't mention his fear of dogs. It was harder to get him on, but when it happened, they laughed their asses off at him. "It's like a fifteen minute drive, I guess, when I don't havta drop Josh's ass off first."
"Your friends sound very interesting. Maybe I can meet them, sometime." She laughed a little. "So what are you afraid of, then?" she inquired, twisting a strand of hair around on her finger a little, much like a teenage girl would. She sank back into the couch and closed her eyes a moment, listening to his silly laugh. It made her heart flutter a little, and she realized that she actually really liked him. It was almost a scary thought; Mel hadn't ever really liked someone before. She was always watching and waiting for something to happen that she'd never had time to sit and....socialize. Maybe she'd been waiting for him? But he was human; and he definitely didn't strike her as the figment in her dreams...
"You don't sound that far from me. I've got about a thirty minute walk, but I don't have to stop for traffic lights, either," she said with a laugh.
Actually, he wasn't so sure he wanted her to meet Josh (in a more sober state) and Wes (in any state) anytime soon. He trusted Josh not to mess this up for him, but Wes had a habit of talking without thinking about what it might do, and frankly, Melisande was hot. If he continued to have any chance here, he wasn't doing anything to risk it.
"Maybe I can get promises of good behavior outta them after Josh is done bein' mad over those pictures," he told her, and he meant promises with threats of violence for breaking them.
Then, she had to ask what he was afraid of. Did she notice the hesitation? Everything he knew told him that you didn't tell anyone what you're afraid of, but he somehow doubted that this girl was going to start throwing dogs at him. It just seemed somehow...unlikely. "Uh, dogs kinda get to me. Big ones, when they're bein' all mean an' barkin' their heads off. A neighbor had a big doberman when I was a kid, an' I lost rock, paper scissors over gettin' our football from the yard," he explained. He hadn't been mauled or anything, but the damn animal had bit him and scared the hell out of him. He was officially not into dogs from that moment on.
Melisande couldn't fathom why his friends wouldn't behave, but then again, she knew the sort of mentality guys had, so she laughed a little at his response and gave him a definite, "Well, we'll see," to that one. On the subject of the dogs, however, she sat up a little bit. "Wow, that sucks. I think I remember having that happen in our neighborhood growing up, but for the most part, my life was pretty phobia-free." She chuckled again. "At least in New York the only thing anyone ever owns are like, poodles and chihuahuas. I guess as long as you aren't K-9 unit, you're okay."
She leaned back a little and sipped her soda again. "You know, I'm not tired at all, and I have off the next two days. We should do something. You want to come play Super Smash Brothers?" She nearly surprised herself with that request, and her hand shook a little as she switched the phone to her other ear. Did she really just invite him over?
If she couldn't fathom why they wouldn't behave, all she really would have needed to do was look at the picture he'd sent her. When they got up to THAT with each other, who could really be surprised if they had to promise not to be retards? Of course, knowing each others' fears didn't help, either. That only meant they could mess with each other worse, which dropped the level of maturity further.
"You'd think that, but it ain't the rich folks who require the SWAT team. It's the ones with German Shepherds an' Rottweilers who wanna bite my face off," he informed her, though he laughed over it. It was funny until he was staring at one of them. Then, it wasn't so funny anymore. "Phobia-free is a good thang, believe me."
Wait. Did he hear that right? He must not have, probably from thinking about all the dogs. Had he really just heard her invite him over? "You want me to come over?" he asked, sounding disbelieving and then realizing that wasn't a good thing. "I mean, sure! I'd jus' need directions."
Don't screw this up, don't screw this up, don'tscrewthisup...
"Sure!" she chirped before she lost her nerve. She quickly told him the directions, and then excused herself to 'clean up'. "See you in a bit!"
She threw the phone down at her feet, listening to the soft thud as it disappeared in the blanket. She sat silent for a moment, and then squealed at the top of her lungs, before jumping up and jumping up and down a few times. She then realized how trashed her apartment was (it wasn't, really, but when you have important company, nothing is in its place), and began cleaning it frantically, shoving random things in the closet. She folded the blanket neatly and laid it on top of the couch before running into her room to change into something more 'appropriate'.
Yoga pants and a hot pink tanktop - leisurely, but not really pajamas. She ran to the mirror and fussed with her makeup, before deciding that she'd just be better off without it. She didn't wear a lot anyways, but she swiped the mascara wand through her eyes a few times, for good measure. She grabbed her Bert's Beeswax and ran it across her lips, and then tossed the small tube onto her dresser and flew around the corner.
It didn't take long for her buzzer to ring, and Drew would hear the long chain of locks being opened before she swung the door open. Something about having a police officer there made her feel better, and the fact that it was Drew, well...
"Hey!" she breathed. She opened the door for him to come in. "Guess you found it okay?"
She still had her massively fuzzy slippers on.
Once he had directions and had hung up, Drew went off to do his own version of 'cleaning up', which basically meant that he brushed his teeth and put more deodorant on. He thought about changing his shirt, but why dirty another for just a few hours? He could go an extra day on that shirt if he didn't dirty it now. Considering how much he hated doing laundry, that mattered. Besides, she might notice if he changed clothes, and he didn't want to look like he was desperate or trying too hard. Sometimes, that blew up in a guy's face. Women could be funny that way.
So, within a moment or two, he'd grabbed his coat and keys, locked the door's one lock, and had started walking in the direction Melisande had told him. Normally, he might have driven, but she wasn't kidding when she said that her place wasn't far. Definitely close enough to walk, and it was a nice night.
He'd have had to admit that he was surprised to hear so many locks being opened when he reached the door, but he couldn't fault her for being cautious. Guys didn't get jumped or attacked as often as women did. That was why he didn't mind walking over. He'd have come pick her up rather than make her walk to his place.
"Looks that way," he answered simply, grinning as she let him in, then taking in his surroundings quickly. He tried to make it seem more curiosity than anything, since that was what most of it was. The rest was just a trained professional taking note of his surroundings, just in case. Then, he saw the slippers, and his grin widened. "I like your slippers. Classy."
"Huh? Er--- oh!" she exclaimed, turning red as she laughed loudly at his observation. "Yeah, sorry. I need to do laundry, so I'm lacking in socks - this was the next best thing. They are pretty classy, though," she said, turning to model them. She locked the door behind him, breathing a little happy sigh as she turned back around. "So, let me give you the tour."
It was a nice apartment - decently sized, but because she was the only person living there, it wasn't too large. Kitchen, living room, hall, one bathroom, bedroom, and another bathroom. She didn't really give him the grand tour of her bedroom, but she at least showed him where the hall bathroom was.
Once she'd brought him back around to the living room, she picked up a Wii controller and held it out menacingly. "Ready to get your ass kicked with Pikachu?" she asked, a deliciously evil smile on her cherubic face. Oh, yes. Melisande had been playing Pikachu since day one; she knew all the little secrets.
Personally, he thought she was incredibly cute when she blushed like that, but he didn't push it. Seconds later, it was obvious that he didn't have to, since she struck a few poses to show them off. He liked them, but he refrained from being too vocal about that, since he really didn't want to make her uncomfortable. He laughed and applauded her little show, and turned his attention to her locks, but didn't mention it. He'd ask later if she was just cautious, or if there was a reason for the locks.
It was true, the apartment was pretty nice. His was about the same size, maybe a little smaller, but hers was put together much better. Of course, that was the natural way of things. His was functional, hers was aesthetically pleasing. He wasn't all that surprised that she glossed over the bedroom, and took that bit in stride. He'd known better than to make assumptions.
She'd invited him over to get his ass kicked at Mario Kart. That's what he expected.
Actually, he knew it was going to happen. He'd never touched a Wii before, and just one look at her as she offered the controller to him made it clear to him that she knew what she was doing. She was smashing his ego into the ground, that's what. "Ready as I'm gonna be. Take it easy on me, it's my firs' time," he joked, pulling his coat off and draping it over the couch. This was going to be painful to his pride, so he might as well start with the jokes now.
Instead of Mario Kart, she went straight for Super Smash Brothers. She would definitely put Mario Kart in next, but she needed to beat him down a few times before she started losing horribly. She was good at Mario Kart, but she was in the habit of flinging her controllers at the TV if she got too many ass-whoopings, so she mainly targeted Nikki and Drake, who were awful at the game, to make herself feel better.
"We'll do Mario Kart in a second. First, I wanna try my luck with Smash Brothers," she announced, dropping down onto the couch. She quickly threw it into two player mode and selected Pikachu and Samus, waiting for him to make his own choices.
"So, do you guys do that stuff all the time? I mean, the pranks," she asked casually, looking over at him. She smiled a little; she couldn't imagine someone giving her that much crap. She couldn't say how she'd react until it happened, but as long as it didn't involve anything expensive or irreplaceable, she supposed she'd live.
Really, the game didn't matter, because he was pretty sure he was going to lose regardless of what they played. He might eventually get the hang of it, but she'd be getting a hell of an ego boost in the meantime. He could only hope that he'd fare better in her mind than Nikki and Drake did.
"Sweetheart, I don't think you're gonna be needin' luck on your side with this one. You gotta teach me how this thing works, first," he warned her.
Pranks, though. Pranks he could do, and he could explain. Those were more his style. "Yeah, Josh an' I have been doin' it since we met in the military. Used to pull the tails offa scorpions an' drop 'em on him, an' he musta filled my shoes an' clothes with sand so many times that I swear I still had sand comin' offa me in the shower a few months later. Wes joined in when he joined SWAT, an' we been messin' with each other since. Josh an' I flipped Wes' desk a few days ago," he finished, grinning. He was proud of the chaos they could cause between 'saving the world'.
Mel gave him a brief run-through of how the controller worked, and then just handed him hers, taking his. She selected two random characters and then set the second player controller down. "Just beat up on them for a few minutes until you figure out what you're doing," she advised. She was guilty of 'figuring out the moves' on her opponents, so she'd just let him screw with it without her interfering.
"Wow, you're a bunch of big kids. How come Wes wasn't with you guys tonight?" she asked, settling back on the couch to watch him try to destroy Mario and Luigi with Pikachu. "I don't understand -- you flipped his desk over? Like.. literally?"
He accepted the controller and did as he was told, trying to get the hang of beating up on Mario and Luigi while she asked about their 'antics'. The game really wasn't that hard, but he felt like an idiot doing it, so he probably wasn't doing so well. She was going to cream him.
"Pretty sure Wes was sleepin'. We tried callin' him, but Josh only got through once an' he seemed to think he'd woken 'im up. Man sleeps more than anyone I know," he remarked, shaking his head some. Pikachu was beating ass on the old school Nintendo characters, but Drew knew better. If Mario or Luigi had started moving, he'd have been toast. He liked his PS2 controller.
She didn't understand that they flipped his desk over? Oh, she hadn't seen pranking, obviously! "Yeah, tape up the drawers so they don't open, then flip it over. Sometimes, I even set everythang that was on the top up on the underside, then jus' leave it for someone to find. It always gets 'em," he explained. At least they hadn't gotten Wes' car, which would have been pretty shitty. He knew he'd have been mad if it was HIS car, but that was because he didn't want his paint all scratched up. Besides, that'd take more than just him and Josh.
Melisande raised her eyebrows again, watching him beat up feebly on the stand-still characters simultaneously while listening to him talk. "Why don't you just go glue some of his stuff to the ceiling in his apartment, or is that breaking some sort of code? And for the record, if I come home and anything of mine is on the ceiling, I'm going to shave off your eyebrows."
She smiled, but through that smile there was the definite promise of a threat. It was either that she'd shave them off, or she'd put toothpaste in them so the fluoride turned them blue. She wondered how the rest of his coworkers would feel about that.
"We don't really play practical jokes on eachother like that at work. We joke, but we can't really horse around. Outside of work, most of the girls have day jobs, except for a few. I hang out with Delilah when she's not busy; she's sort of like my big sister, I guess. But other than that, I'm fairly solitary." She smiled a little. "I'm sort of hoping I do get to meet some of your friends, provided that my job of choice isn't going to be a thorn in your side."
He stopped suddenly, listening to her list potential practical jokes, and looked over at her. Did he hear that right? Did she really just offer him up ideas like that? And she'd sounded so surprised when she'd said they flipped each other's desks!
Okay, so shaving off his eyebrows wasn't so bad. His brothers had done that plenty of times. They'd never glued things to the ceiling, though. "What kinda glue you sugges' for somethang like that?" he asked, honestly curious. You didn't run into glue that could handle something like that often. Gorilla Glue? God, whoever got that treatment was going to be pissed. Who deserved it more? Probably....Wes. He could get Josh to help.
They could glue a dentist's chair to Wes' ceiling, or at least, a huge picture of a dentist and the office.
"Well, it don't mess up our jobs if we look kinda funny from pranks. The girls you work with migh' not like it so much," he offered up, and it was a pretty good reason not to pull pranks there. "You could meet my friends. They ain't gonna say anythang, and besides, you're a waitress. Ain't a thang wrong with that." He meant it. Waiting tables at a strip joint didn't make you a stripper.
She shrugged. "You could use... no. No, I'm not giving you any more ideas. You've got that gleam in your eye, and if that's anything like the gleam in the eyes of most other men I know, it's when you're brewing on an idea that's potentially horrible, so no." She frowned at him, though laughter hinted at the edge of every word she said.
She picked up the second player controller suddenly, and Mario sprang to life. Drew wouldn't last long.
"Well, maybe I can meet them soon. I need friends that aren't strippers," she said with a laugh. "Maybe other people on a normal daytime schedule, that would be nice. And, Drew, I know what you mean when you say that there isn't anything wrong with being a waitress, but you have to understand. Most of the people I talk to hear strip club and end up making it synonymous with prostitute. I've had jokes like that fall in my presence before, and they don't go over well. If your friends are anything like you, though, I think we'll be okay. I'm just saying... it's not always hugs and lollipops on this side of things."
Round over. Melisande set her controller down. "Mario Kart?"
"Aww, c'mon! I ain't gonna hit you with any of it, an' believe me, Josh an' Wes have earned anythang they get," he told her, interested in any ideas she had. He was always open to new ideas.
Then, she picked up the other controller, and Pikachu was getting its ass kicked. He cursed under his breath, focusing his attention back on the game for the time being, but it was a lost cause. He wasn't going to last long.
He could understand what she meant about the prostitute thing. Some men were just assholes. Hell, Drew didn't even think strippers were prostitutes necessarily, though he knew that a lot were. That didn't mean they all were, though. He'd give someone the benefit of the doubt wherever he could. "We'll be goin' out sometime this week, if you want, an' don'choo worry, they ain't gonna say anythang like that, I promise." First off, he knew they wouldn't because it wasn't how they were, and second, he'd beat some ass. The 'Wrath of Drew' wasn't common, so it wasn't usually feared, but he was a Marine with Marine-training. He could beat some ass if he wanted.
Wow. Round over. He sucked. "Yeah, new game sounds good," he agreed quickly, more than willing to put that defeat behind him.
Melisande went about selecting Bowser for her competitor, more or less because she liked how it looked like he was wearing his car. She waved the little wand around, waiting for Drew to pick his player, and leaned back into the couch for a moment. She stole a glance over at him, and smiled a little to herself. Maybe she'd made a good choice for once.
"So, what's your job like? I know this city can get pretty crazy, but do you guys have a lot of downtime, or is there always something happening? I guess all I really know about SWAT I learned from that movie. I have to admit, Hando was my favourite character. The sassy black man always gets my vote," she said with a little laugh.
Really, it didn't matter who he chose for his character, and he knew that. He was going to lose, he was going to lose badly, and so he chose the most ridiculous looking competitor possible. Why not look like a retard while he lost? Hey, he had a sense of humor. Besides, right then, all he cared about was making her laugh, since he couldn't be all that impressive with his video game skill.
Not like it would be gentlemanly to beat her ass in video games on the first date, anyway. His saving grace was that he wouldn't have to worry about the whole, 'you let me win' bit later, cause he really just sucked at the Wii. Get him on a Playstation 2, and he'd beat some ass, but the Wii was new trouble for him.
"My job? It ain't usually like the movies or anythang, but it has moments. We get lots of weird calls, bein' SWAT, an' some of 'em get pretty crazy, but it ain't the movies. We'd probably be in some serious shit if it was," he told her honestly. The movies were only about BIG, BAD situations, and really, Drew hoped never to be in a situation like that again. He had enough of that in the Sandbox, and really didn't need it in the city. That didn't mean he wouldn't jump right in, but he really didn't need a situation where he and his friends might die ever again. "Hando was pretty sweet in that flick, though. I liked Gamble, but I tend to like villains."
Funny, since he so wasn't a villain sort of guy himself.
"Gamble, yeah," she said with a laugh. "I thought he was cute, but he got his head knocked off by a train. That's not the most noble way to go - OH SHIT!" she yelled, cutting herself off as Bowser and his funny car took a header right off the side of the track. She sighed as the Lakitu dragged him back on, watching the screen as Drew's player whizzed feebly by her. "Bullshit!" she hissed. She waved the little controller furiously, trying to catch up.
"Weird calls, huh? I don't think I want to know. This city has enough weirdos in it, let alone the ones who make it a habit of calling the cops every time something goes crazy. You know there was some guy in my old complex who used to call the cops over anything? He kept notes, like the old coot in Dexter. It was really unnerving. He knew everything about everyone. I guess that's what you do when you get old, though."
She threw her controller down when she went off the track the second time, just around the time Drew crossed the finish line. "Did I mention I'm a sore loser?" she asked sheepishly, looking at him with her big blue eyes and shrugging a little.
"Yeah, trains really ain't somethang to play around with," he agreed, just a little distractedly. She'd gone off the side of the track, and he'd actually almost followed. He really, really sucked at this game. Fortunately, he managed to keep it together with some concentration, and actually found that he was doing alright.
Imagine that.
"Dexter? You mean that tv show? Man, I don' watch anythang that has to do with police. Half of it is BS, an' the res' makes me wonder how many of the guys we deal with watched too much of it," he told her, shaking his head and trying to focus on the game again for a second. He might actually manage a win...
YES.
Not that he was going to brag or anything. He smiled at her and shrugged, setting the controller down. "Beginner's luck? That, or you're so distracted by my manly good looks that you threw the game? I'm down with either," he told her with a teasing wink.
Melisande smiled in that way she had, that way that made the dimples in her cheeks stand out. It was innocent and mischievous all at the same time - how did she do that, anyways? It was the way her face was shaped, mostly - heart-shaped, with chipmunk cheeks that just begged to be pinched by old ladies, which was the reason she waitressed at All Hallows and not O'Charley's or some other franchised piece of crap atmosphere.
She shrugged girlishly, light brown hair falling over one eye in that Jessica Rabbit sort of way that women's hair just did. "Maybe," she agreed, a hint of flirtatiousness on her voice. She lifted a hand and rested it lightly on his knee, sitting forward a little. "I mean, you are pretty good-looking. And I am easily distracted..." she trailed off, looking from the television and back to him, tilting her head.
Okay. What the hell was going on? This kind of thing never happened to him! Ever! These were the sort of stories that Josh and Wes told! It wasn't like Drew wasn't as good looking or charming as they were, or that he couldn't be, because he could. That didn't mean this kind of thing happened all that often, though. Seriously, he was actually trying to keep his mind out of the gutter, and he wasn't being an ass or pushing her limits because he actually liked her and didn't want to scare her off, but he did NOT expect her to come on to HIM like that.
Fucking win, that was what this was.
He was like a deer in headlights for that first instant, almost thinking it was too good to be true that she was looking at him like that and putting her hand on his knee and saying those things. She leaned forward, and he couldn't help himself. He mirrored the movement, the teasing smile that had faltered ever so slightly breaking into a full grin as she said she was easily distracted. "Guess that means I'm not as good at distractin' as I thought. Gonna hafta work on that," he told her, and he leaned in, hoping for a kiss. He'd try to play it off if she refused, but it was looking good and he just couldn't live with himself if he didn't try. It felt wrong not to.
Well, maybe Drew had beginner's luck after all - Melisande couldn't help but smile a little before she gave him the lightest of kisses - and she might have actually fallen in some sort of puppy love with him at that exact moment. She couldn't explain it - it was like a... a spark. Most men she'd kissed always tried to be too aggressive, too demanding, too.. manly. Even the way their lips felt - always too dry, too slobbery, too something.
Drew was like the third bed, the third bowl of porridge - juuuuuust right. And so she smiled, pressing her lips to his, finding them soft and warm - and she opened her mouth just a little, leaning further, situating herself so that she could be in a more comfortable position - really, she was suddenly doing a lot of leaning, and she wasn't the most graceful swan in the pond, so she'd probably end up flat on her face on the floor if she wasn't careful.
She pulled away after a moment, and smiled - no more flirtatious smiles, though, because now her cheeks were a little rosy, and she was bashful all over again. "I guess I got a little carried away," she said. She was practically on top of him - well, from where he was seated, she'd definitely put an arm passed him, centering at least her upper half even with his.