It All Comes Out in the Wash (10%)

[Vanessa Miller]

Prompt List

• Drunk
• 3 AM
• Fight
• Give Up
• Lie
• Party
• Slap
• Dinner
• Glitter
• Dance

[Vanessa Miller]

Drunk

 Vanessa rolled away from her monstrous construct of LCD monitors as the Pakana tapped her on the shoulder.

"Hey, you ready? I told Andy we'd meet him at the Lounge." He jingled his keys in his hand like he was trying to entice her.

She arched a brow. "That only works on Nicole, you know," she remarked, but she stood anyways and reached over to grab her jacket from the back of her chair. "And don't ever let Andrew know you call him that behind his back. I won't be responsible for the damage." She smirked as he gestured for her to lead the way, and she walked with him in tow to the elevator. The high-rise ISIS owned was in the center of the city amidst all of the other office buildings, but they did much more dangerous work.

"Where's McWeston?" she asked, turning on her heel as she entered the metal cube.

"Meeting us there. He's already ahead of us, too. I suppose it's a good thing that Aristide has that Mojo Juice, or we'd never catch up," he said with a laugh.

Ten minutes later they were in the company Town Car. Since they were planning on drinking, neither of them had driven in that day. The benefits of ISIS were vast, and did include being picked up if an agent so required it, as long as they didn't live way the Christ out in the middle of nowhere.

As they walked into the Lounge, the seedy smoky atmosphere assaulted Vanessa's senses. "I wish Aristide wouldn't let people smoke in here," Vanessa said, wrinkling her nose a little. She brushed her brown hair, newly shortened to her shoulders, behind her ears. It was a flattering cut; it made her look more adult. Wes hated it also, which was always a bonus. Aimee had talked her into it, and she hadn't regretted it.

"He doesn't," Jason said. "They smoke in the back rooms, but we can smell it because we're all super-shifter-awesome."

"Right," she muttered.

"In an hour it won't even be an issue," he pointed out, and she found she had to agree. They found "McWeston" at the bar, chatting with Paris and four shot-glasses into his evening.

"MCWESTON!" she shouted, throwing her purse on the bar and pushing his chair to spin it around. She nearly knocked him out of it, and had to laugh a little at her own strength. She'd never get tired of making his eyes bug out of his head.

"HEY!" he yelled. He revealed a wet trail along his dark blue dress shirt from where she'd caused him to spill his would-be fifth shot.

"Serves you right for trying to get a leg up on us. Where's Andrew?" She sat down next to him while Jason went to the bathroom.

"Pissing," he said happily. "You guys were there an hour after you were supposed to be. He's already well off. And I mean well off. I've been toying around with having Laura come pick him up, because I know he can't drive." He offered her a smile that was all teeth, and it was clear he enjoyed the prospect of humiliating Andrew any chance he got. They all did it to eachother though, so it was in good fun.

"Here ya go, McLovin'," Paris said, presenting him with a fresh glass of whatever he was drinking. She turned to Vanessa. "Hey there pretty kitty, whatcha want?"

"The usual, and could you try not to get any glitter in my drink?" Vanessa asked with a teasing smile.

"I'll try," Paris said, "but I ain't promisin' you shit."

To her credit, Vanessa's drink only had three or four flecks of the gold glitter floating around in it.

The evening progressed on, and the four of them began to delve further and further into their glasses, until the moment came that Vanessa realized she was beyond her limit of consumption. Usually she was smart and cut herself off ahead of time, but she'd become engrossed in the drinking game they'd made. In retrospect, drinking every time one of them swore probably wasn't the best plan they'd ever conjured, but fuck it, what was, was.

Vanessa was fumbling with her Blackberry when Jason lifted the phone from her and shoved it into his pocket.

"No drunk texting!" he accused. He pointed at her with his glass, causing the contents to slosh onto the floor. "Whoops!" He drank it with a laugh and slid it down the bar at Paris. He did it with enough force that it rocketed down the slick wooden surface and would have crashed onto the floor had the blonde tender's beau-of-the-moment not caught it.

"Jason," Darren said with a knowing smile. "She will charge you for broken glasses," he warned.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" he exclaimed. His face turned bright red and he began pulling money out of his pockets and putting it onto the wet bartop, ones and fives wadded up.

"Good lord, were you at the strip club?" Darren asked, bright green eyes wide.

"No. Well, yes. Well, not tonight. But - I mean, everyone I know works there!" he protested. Andrew put a hand on his shoulder and pushed him back down into the seat. "And all of her friends do, and since Stella's visiting her family in Australia I've been hanging out with her and she keeps taking me to All Hallows and that Sugar chick is running some sort of scheme where she makes me give her money not to punch me..." he trailed off.

"You're just a wuss," Darren said with a broad smile. "I don't have any problems there at all."

"Fuck," Jason said.

"DRINK!" Malcolm commanded, rocking back in his chair with glee.

"Aw, shit!" Jason yelled, putting his face in his hands. He'd already had way beyond what he'd intended to and he knew he was going to pay for it.

"DRINK TWICE!" Andrew crowed, dissolving into laughter.

"I've never seen him so unwound," Darren mused, preparing their drinks on Paris' behalf. He handed them out and helped himself to one as well, clicking glasses together with the four. He turned back to Paris and raised his eyebrows, saying something to her that the four couldn't hear over themselves.

"Give me my phone back," Vanessa slurred. "Now!" She put a foot on Jason's chair and pushed, nearly toppling him over.

"No!" he protested. "You're just gonna drunk text Asshole!" He jumped up and ran around to the other side of Mal so that she couldn't antagonize him any further, because truth be told, if she wanted her phone back bad enough, she had every ability to overpower him and take it. He didn't want that to happen, because even though she was "'nessa", she was still a lion, and she still scared him just a tiny, tiny bit.

"DRINK!" Malcolm shouted.

"No, but that's his name!" Jason protested.

"It isn't his name!" Vanessa argued. "It's We-"

"IT'S ASSHOLE!" Jason declared over her. "You always talk shit about him and then when you get drunk it's all "Oooh Wesley I love you mwahmwahmwah," he accused, making exaggerated kissing noises at her, despite her dangerously narrowed eyes. That he had Mal between them made him feel slightly safer.

"DRINK THRICE!" Malcolm shouted. He thundered his hands on the bar to the beat of the song in the background.

A loud noise brought their yelling to a stop as Andrew slid out of his chair and hit the floor with a thud.

"I'll call Laura," Paris said. She had that girl's number on speed dial. Between Tyler, Trevor, and Lance, Laura had turned into a taxi service sometime in the last few months.

From the floor, they heard "Nononononononono....ffffuuuuuuck..."

"DRINK!" Malcolm shouted.