I, I can remember/ standing, by the wall/ And the guns, shot above our heads/ And we kissed, as though nothing could fall. - David Bowie, Heroes
"Shoot up baby doll, it's the only way you're gonna survive down here." The muddy haired dealer advises coarsely, a baggy jumper thrown over her skin and bones frame. She lights a cigarette. "What's a good looking girl like you doing 'round these parts anyway?" She cocks her head. "You're too pretty to be a hooker."
"I thought they were supposed to be lovely." Lizzy tries, looking out at the distance. Neon lights, hustlers on the streets, black asphalt and concrete sidewalks.
"Nah," the girl grins, "they ain't pretty—not like you anyway. You're…proper." She decides after a while, looking down at Lizzy with warm brown eyes. "And gals like you don't belong on streets like these." She gestures to the alleyway around them. A single florescent lightbulb from the nightclub's back entrance flickering overhead.
"I'm not a prostitute," Lizzy wonders if telling her anymore would be wise but there are butterflies in her stomach and she needs today something. "I—well, I was wondering if you could help me find someone."
"Find someone? Baby you've come to the right place," she laughs freely, the same way Lizzy used to before it all went to hell. "And since you're so pretty, I won't even ask for a fee." She blows out a plume of pale grey smoke, smile coy—almost flirtatious.
Lizzy blinks. Was she flirting with her?
Was this cocky, confident brunette drug dealer flirting with her? Something in Lizzy wants to ask because the gilt lined streets of Park Avenue don't leave room for questions like these but the scrap of paper in her left pocket burns.
So the too pretty blonde stands up and the sudden motion causes her to sway from left to right, and then—she's collapsed into the other girl's arms.
(She can practically hear Frances Midford screaming in her grave.) Mother, Lizzy squeezes her eyes shut, I'm sorry.
"You alright baby?" The dealer asks worriedly, dropping her half-finished Parliament to the ground. (And, Lizzy realizes, despite the girl's thin frame she's wiry and strong and smells like earth—sweet and good and honest.) "Hey now," one pale hand comes to tuck a lock of unruly blonde hair behind Lizzy's ear, "don't go fallin' on anybody else now, ya hear? I kinda like holding you."
Lizzy's face burns. "I'm sorry," she scrambles up, pressing her back to the alley's faded red brick.
"Don't worry about it," she pops a piece of gum into her mouth, "but ya gotta be careful. Not everyone 'round here's half so nice."
Lizzy frowns. "What do you mean?"
"I mean, honey, we're fucked up druggies and dealers and we don't really give a shit who ends up dead the next day. You got something to find? Well you find it and then you leave because girls like you…" she trails off, looking lost for half a second before her brown eyes find Lizzy's, as if mesmerized by the emerald green. But then she breaks away, brown bangs obscuring her face as she gives a soft—almost melancholic—chuckle. "Girls like you don't talk to people like me." She says gently, as if stating the most commonplace fact in all the world.
"Well, then, those girls are silly," Lizzy counters matter-of-factly, "they're silly and wrong because you're wonderful to talk to! And…well, I'm also very sorry for having caused such a scene back there," Lizzy blushes, still in a mild state of shock that anyone would dare try and grope the daughter of Frances Midford—though her response hadn't exactly been dignified.
The other girl laughs—a loud, raucous sound that's all at once uncouth and strangely comforting. "Fuck baby, I think I fell in love with you when you did that! You fucking knocked Kingpin Jack right on his prissy, bitchy ass! A society girl with a mean right hook—baby, you're a walking miracle."
"I could have carved him up if I had a sword." Lizzy mutters darkly, cheeks blazing crimson. Just because she was in a seedy part of town didn't mean she was a…a whore. Vile, hateful man, Lizzy looks away. How much for an hour? The man all but demanded, causing Lizzy to freeze up while reflex took over.
In the end, she didn't feel the man's nose break or the trickle of blood that had begun to flow from the split between her first two knuckles and if it hadn't been for the girl standing right in front of her, Lizzy is fairly sure she would've been thrown out of the club and banned from the red light district to boot. (Apparently, beating up mobsters and crime bosses didn't make for good "street cred.")
"Thank you, by the way." Lizzy murmurs, hoping her flushed face looked less red than it felt.
The girl shrugs. "Nah, you're making a mountain out of a molehill baby. I like holding you."
"Not that," Lizzy feels almost shy, one hand curling around the scrap of paper in her left pocket, "for earlier. In the club," she clarifies, "you didn't have to stick your neck out for me but you did. And if there's anything I can do to repay you—"
"I like dinner." In the blink of an eye Lizzy is wedged between the wiry, brown-haired girl and the faded redbrick alleyway wall.
And suddenly, all her bravado goes down the drain.
"Um, I—well, I'm glad you do, good nutrition is very important these days! People need more magnesium but lots of people don't like fish. Do you like fish? I'm a particular fan of salmon." Lizzy's eyes are looking everywhere except right in front of her and she knows she sounds like a proper idiot but—
"Baby."
Lizzy squeaks. "Yes?" Dear lord, either let me turn into an ostrich so I can bury my head in the sand or please let me wake up now. I'm done. It's decided—I can't brood. I'm not a good brooder. I'll let Ciel do all the brooding from now on, I promise.
"Have dinner with me." She traces one thin finger down Lizzy's cheek, half-smile on her lips and Lizzy feels a strange, fluttery sensation blossom in her stomach.
"When?" She dares whisper, suddenly feeling very naughty—as if this unconscious acceptance was something she wasn't supposed to have done.
"I'm Doll." The girl interrupts, leaning a little closer and allowing Lizzy to see that no, her eyes aren't brown.
They're honey gold.
"Oh."
"How's bout it baby? Dinner?"
"…Alright." Lizzy answers faintly, feeling half high as she says so. "I like dinner."
Doll grins. "Thought so." She laughs, pressing a swift kiss to the top of Lizzy's head. "C'mon," she intertwines their fingers together, "let's get going baby."
They wind up getting pizza at a diner that looks like it'd been teleported straight from 1952—a wide matchbox with windows wrapped all around and a large blazing neon sign that read Buck's Pizzeria. (And after Lizzy showed some hesitation about entering into an establishment that had never even seen a food critic, Doll had cajoled her with kisses and laughs and promises of honest to goodness full fat malt shakes—a haphazard dairy drink that Lizzy thought tasted better than Moet champagne.)
Plus, upon entering the derelict pizza parlor with its red and white tiled walls, linoleum floors, and faux leather booth sets, Lizzy decided that the vintage posters of old movie stars and fake record plaques more than made up for the questionable venue choice.
"So who you lookin' for, sugar?" Doll asks. Together they share a large deluxe pepperoni pizza that had been brought over by a tanned employee with black sideburns and a scar over his right eye.
For a minute, Lizzy almost forgets what Doll is talking about until that note begins to burn in her left pocket. "Oh." She swallows. "That."
"Yeah," Doll takes up her third slice of pizza, "the thing that brought you down here and gave us bottom-feeders the best entertainment we've seen in years. Say, you ever consider doing that to Druitt? He's a right fucking prick and I'm pretty sure you could command a six figure sum for knocking that fucker down on his keister."
"I'm not going to beat up people for no good reason!" Lizzy hisses, looking absolutely scandalized. "Besides," she glances down briefly, "I'm here to find someone."
"Sure." Doll slurps at her Coca-Cola. "Who?"
"The Undertaker."
Doll's uncovered eye widens. "Shit baby, you don't do anything by halves huh? Most pretty little things come down here lookin' for a bit of danger cause they're bored with their designer lives but you baby," Doll shakes her head, "you really lookin' to get fucked up, huh?"
"I'm not looking for anything like that!" Lizzy's cheeks burn. "He's my—he's my grandfather." She admits haltingly, twisting a napkin between her lithe fingers. "And I need his help."
Doll looks at her for a full minute and Lizzy can imagine a hundred scenarios that involve her—Elizabeth Midford—seventeen and blonde and dead in the back of someone's trunk. The way Doll's looking at her isn't helping—and it's a strange expression. Half-amused, somewhat curious, a whole lot impressed, and…
"Baby he's got a reputation that's a little bit unbelievable and more secrets than Da Vinci." She puts a forth slice on her plate. "And most people who walk into his place of business don't come out alive. They're carried out, baby—in fucking customized coffins."
So mother wasn't exaggerating. Lizzy takes a long drink from her chocolate malt shake. "I don't want anything," she bites her lower lip, eyes wandering to the inky blue skyline dotted with skyscrapers and half-emptied warehouses. Undertaker, her mother had managed to gasp out even with seven bullets etched in her back, go to the Undertaker—he'll protect you.
And with her mother's words ringing in her ears, Lizzy straightens, head held high because she's the daughter of Alexis Leon Midford and she will not submit meekly to anyone—even if that person is an internationally wanted underworld crime lord who had a strong penchant for the strange and macabre. He was still her grandfather—the same man who'd allowed Lizzy to braid daises and pink ribbons into his long silver hair and gave her piggyback rides around Midford Manor while her mother and brother watched, one exasperated and the other cheerfully amused. And Lizzy is sure, absolutely sure, that he'll know the person who dared place a hit on her mother and father—an order of execution that ended her brave father's life and landed Frances Midford in the ICU, trapped in a coma, those fucking bastards—
"Baby?" Doll's voice is soft, as are her hands that come to wipe away Lizzy's silent tears. "Hey, baby, I'm sorry—"
"No, it's not you." Lizzy chokes out between soft cries, "it's—you're wonderful," she amends with a cracked voice and fractured smile and waterlily eyes.
Doll smiles. "Shit, if me being wonderful is causing you to cry then I'll head right in the other direction." She jokes but Lizzy flinches.
"Please don't," she places one hand over Doll's, unconsciously leaning into the warmth of the other girl's hand, "I just—I need to find Undertaker. He's my last chance and I don't know what I'll do if he's not around to help me because—because," Lizzy feels like there's a noose around her neck, smothering her shallow breathing and suddenly, the world around her is a blur of light and color—
"I'll take you to him." Doll's voice—firm and honest and good—breaks through.
"You will?" Lizzy tries to breathe in again, trying to force air into her lungs while trying to hide her blotchy cheeks and red eyes and fuck, she probably looks awful—
Doll runs one hand through her messy brown hair, allowing Lizzy to see the barest hints of a scar behind her hazelnut bangs. She holds Lizzy's hand just a bit tighter, their pieces of pizza forgotten, while the essence of the night seeps through their bones. "I'll take you to him," Doll reiterates, "I promise."
"Yeah?"
Doll grins. "Yeah."
A/N: Partially inspired by David Bowie's song 'Heroes'. (Tbh I just love seeing Lizzy in modern AU's)
(And yes, I purposely had Doll call Lizzy 'baby' in reference to 1983's 'Scarface' XD)
Review? Please?