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[Another Night at Another Bar - OTA]
She's got a decent set tonight for Diwata. Easy, midtempo songs with a couple bursts of speed, good fun stuff for the people who came in for a beer and some fries off the highway just a few miles outside of Siren Cove proper. At this point, they know themselves well enough to follow a list but to also mix it up and improvise.
"So glad you all made it tonight," she says into the microphone, voice soft and maybe a little seductive without quite Compelling. "This next song was written for a man--" she pauses, letting the people who are listening get their giggles in. "A man who...changed my life completely." When she's vague, it almost sounds romantic instead of actually being a song about catharsis, about trying to figure out why she'd slept with her professor and how it had sent her running.
"One track mind like a goldfish, stuck inside my petri dish..." It's almost upbeat and if they aren't listening, an audience doesn't realize the lost numbness of a disastrous first year of college and the sense of being so very lost.
But that's what music is for. She writes songs to let her own past go and let herself live with the few secrets she does keep.
And it pays. She gets free dinner and free beer, plus some pretty solid cash. The audience isn't half-bad either. By the time they wrap up, people are actually hollering for an encore, which makes them all grin and rack their brains for an easy, quick song. Audrey quickly strums her guitar, going to a song that's been on her mind since she sang it for Ed on the phone. "Gray, quiet and tired and mean, picking at a worried seam, I try to make you mad at me over the phone..."
[[Catch her during a lull in the show or afterward, while she eats.]]
"So glad you all made it tonight," she says into the microphone, voice soft and maybe a little seductive without quite Compelling. "This next song was written for a man--" she pauses, letting the people who are listening get their giggles in. "A man who...changed my life completely." When she's vague, it almost sounds romantic instead of actually being a song about catharsis, about trying to figure out why she'd slept with her professor and how it had sent her running.
"One track mind like a goldfish, stuck inside my petri dish..." It's almost upbeat and if they aren't listening, an audience doesn't realize the lost numbness of a disastrous first year of college and the sense of being so very lost.
But that's what music is for. She writes songs to let her own past go and let herself live with the few secrets she does keep.
And it pays. She gets free dinner and free beer, plus some pretty solid cash. The audience isn't half-bad either. By the time they wrap up, people are actually hollering for an encore, which makes them all grin and rack their brains for an easy, quick song. Audrey quickly strums her guitar, going to a song that's been on her mind since she sang it for Ed on the phone. "Gray, quiet and tired and mean, picking at a worried seam, I try to make you mad at me over the phone..."
[[Catch her during a lull in the show or afterward, while she eats.]]
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She sighs and orders a midori sour, in the mood for something that's both strong and fruity. "And all of that is more than I can say about the person I was in college. When I was on the 'respectable' path."
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Wren's pretty sure he has better absinthe at home than this particular bar is going to offer to spice up anything with, so he settles on a gin and tonic. "Sounds like a good life to me," he says with a smile. "The great people are the key," he grins, and nods a thanks to the bartender.
"Fuck respectable," he says bluntly and takes a drink. "I take it college wasn't the right choice."
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"Plus then I fucked up. Like really fucked up. And I didn't have the heart to stay."
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The bartender comes by then with their drinks, which gives Wren a second to reset when she says she fucked up.
He swirls the gin in the glass and takes a sip. "That's a feeling I've made friends with," he says, not pushing, just watching her.
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She sighs heavily and stalls, eating the cherry out of her drink before talking. She can't tell what's better, confessing her biggest fuck up to Wren Bellamy or maintaining the impression that she'd actually had some integrity.
"I let a professor fuck me for a grade."
Saying it bluntly, somehow, makes it easier.
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But he narrows his eyes instinctively at that - not at her, but at the professor willing to use their position to barter for sex. He tries to stay away from fans for the same reason - he wants sex to be fun, not for anyone to end up feeling used on either end. One of Wren's only rules about sex is that everyone should be having fun.
"That's a shitty situation." he says after a second. "I don't think that says anything about you? But I can see where it would fuck things up."
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She'd rather live hand to mouth and gig to gig than slink her way through life on poor decisions. For that, she lives out loud, forthright, and with her own integrity.
"I'd rather play bat mitzvahs and proms every night of my life and sleep with the people I want to because I want to. Not because I'm trying to save my ass."
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"I'll drink to that." He cheers the sentiment. "Though I doubt you'll be playing bar mitzvahs forever." Not with that voice.
"People will always be put off by you being honest and doing what you love without some," he gestures, "totally arbitrary architecture of success. Grades, income, record sales, white picket fence." He raises a scrutinizing eyebrow. "So terrify the status quo a little. Your obligation is to be happy, that's where it stops. And try not to break too many hearts doing it. Or your own."
He pauses and makes at his own melodramatic advice. "Oh, there's that morose ex-frontman. I keep wondering who the hell the press is talking about."
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"But...yeah. I'd rather live this way than sleep my way through barely passing school." And her parents had been proud of her. Disappointed, yes, that she'd felt that cornered, but proud of her for deciding to do what was right in the end. Hell, they'd helped her with the down payment for the trailer.
"Am I allowed to ask if you're talking about me, now? Or you?" She'd seen the guy at the new music store and done some googling.
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"And yes, you're allowed to ask, this is a conversation, not an interview." He takes a drink and tilts his head at her. "You liked Enfants, what was your impression of us? This isn't avoiding the question, by the way. As people, or band members." He makes a vague hand gesture that's supposed to indicate that they're not quite the same thing but might as well be.
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"And rock stars are known for burning bright and burning out and taking the people they love with them."
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"Rock stars," he says with a wry smile. He'd never wanted stardom, per se, just an audience to play to and people to make music with. Not that he turned it down.
"Mm," he agrees wryly. "I don't think it's required, but it does seem to happen." He swirls the gin around his glass. "It was easy for me to define myself by what I wasn't. Not radio friendly, not one genre or another, not one sexuality or another, not some sweet dream for anybody. Because, fuck being pinned down, you know? Then you step back and you've spent so much time doing whatever you want that you don't have what you really want anymore."
He takes a sip. "I think I've ended up luckier than I could have, but not without hurting the closest people to me."
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"I have three different acts. I know plenty about crossing genres," she agrees. "And I know how that feels. I mean, on a smaller scale. Watching things blow up in your face." Another shrug.
"So I'm guessing that Rian O'Toole isn't here to talk a reunion tour?"
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"Rian O'Toole," he says, and takes a drink. "Hell if I know what put him here. I'm sure some little savage," as they've affectionately nicknamed their fans for a while now, "on Twitter and Tumblr or whatever else, is going to say something about fate if they haven't already, but I'm pretty sure 'on speaking terms' is the best we've got for now."
They should, talk. He's still a little annoyed about what he said about Hana, but nearly Eventually.
"Anyway," he adds in a lighter tone, "We can talk reunions until our tongues fall out, but there's no band without Lex signing on."
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Half her drink gone, Audrey runs a fingertip over the rim of the glass again, thinking about what's okay to ask as a fan or as a friend (acquaintance?). She can ask plenty of outright questions and be tactless to the extreme, but she can tell it won't get them very far.
Finally, she asks, "Is speaking terms an improvement?" He can answer it in one word or several easily enough.
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He glances over at her. He can tell she's a little tentative, and granted it's a sore spot, but the fact that she enjoys their music doesn't make things weird to him. He likes getting to know people, and Audrey's someone he seems to share opinions with.
"Speaking terms is...sometimes an improvement," he answers wryly. "To answer what you're asking, though, yes." He makes a face. "We're talking about fuckups and there are plenty there. We took each other for granted for way too long and neither of us fight fair. So yeah, speaking terms is an improvement. Maybe someday we'll be adults about it, even."
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"Being an adult sucks," Audrey says, without real feeling to it. Being An Adult and following A Plan can suck, but figuring out where you stand with people and figuring out how to go forward doesn't. It's rough and a giant pain in the ass and often emotionally squishy, but usually a good thing.
"To be fair, because I don't want to play favorites, I accidentally fangirled and agreed to baby-sit for him. I motor-mouthed and..." she waves a hand.
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"I think it's actually a myth," he says, with a raised eyebrow. In some ways, he'll always be the boy who refuses to grow up, but in other ways his 30s look like they might be the years that make sense. God, he hopes so. It's not about settling down, it's about learning from mistakes.
He smirks at the confession. "That's it, get out," he jokes sardonically. "You've got to swear allegiance here." He laughs. "I should warn you, that baby may look adorable but she's half-demon on the maternal line."
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"Not a fan of his...wife? Ex-wife? I take it?"
Rian had made no mention of any other parent and Audrey had been too busy gaping with her mouth open to really ask any questions at the time.
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"I guess I'll allow it," Wren laughs.
"Now, where would you get that idea?" His tone is dry. "Ex. As I hear this story she didn't even fight for the kid. Maybe that's a favor, I don't know."
"You smoke?" he asks, "or mind if I indulge the addiction for a second, anyway?"
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It's how she classifies most of the things in her life she has no idea how to address or explain.
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"Weird siren shit? This seems like something I managed to skip in the bloodlines," he says, with a curious eyebrow raise. Or maybe not, but nothing he's noticed yet.
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