.
TWENTY-FIVE
Novac, motel room
July 4th
Morning
The first thing En felt when waking up was refreshment. Well, no, actually the headache was first, but that never really stopped, as if her head ached on during her sleep. Which it probably did.
She opened her eyes and saw the room was flooded with light, light that didn't do wonders for the painful pulsing in her head. A mop of blonde hair lay on the pillow next to her. Blonde hair, what the… Oh, right. Watkins. She'd apparently made En's room her own without asking. Well, no matter, better that than being woken up for the question.
She groaned and turned over, staring at the ceiling. Why was there a strange feeling of embarrassment in her belly? Oh right, the crying fit. Ewgh, it would be awkward to see Strauss again, yet she had to go there, to pick up smacked-around Melissa. Because regardless of what the doc had said, neither En nor Melissa (she supposed) was prepared to leave her behind. Because she had to face it, several times the group had survived purely on Melissa's badassitude. Besides, doctors were doctors, they always complained that patients needed rest or that they had to take it easy, just so they were certain they were on the safe side. She was certain Melissa would be perfectly fine. All they had to do was avoid any more pointless battles and explorations. Which meant, straight to Boulder City. No detours. And if they found what they were looking for there, they could all go their separate ways or do whatever they wanted. She hoped Sunny and Ringo could be persuaded to come back to New Arroyo with her, even though she was a bit annoyed with Sunny's constant needy clinginess. But they'd all been tired and irritable yesterday, so maybe she was just having a bad day.
Rubbing her hand across her face, she sat up in the bed and stared at the heavy leather pants Sunny had cajoled the Goodsprings store-owner out of. Shit, Sunny. She'd really forgotten how much Sunny had done for her, yesterday. Yeah, she was needy, but she was also someone who wouldn't hesitate to walk through fire for her. She'd been a bit of a little ingrate yesterday. Sigh, another embarrassing conversation to look forward to. She'd probably have to say sorry to Leza too. Stupid little thing hadn't really done anything wrong, well, not intentionally anyway.
She looked back at the heavy leather pants on the ground and contemplated putting on the denim skirt instead, but in the end, she reached down and grabbed the belt of the pants, putting them on.
Watkins let out an irritated groan.
"Morning."
The groan repeated itself.
En shrugged on the heavy reinforced leather jacket and zipped it up to her sternum. No need to turn it into an airtight leather pressure cooker if they weren't expecting trouble.
"What time is it?"
En took her Pip-boy from the night stand and read to her, "Just a little past ten." Hm, that was a nice hour. Almost twelve hours of sleep. No wonder she felt refreshed. Her head still ached, sure, but she had slowly started to accept that it would be part of her life from now on. Well, unless that doctor Usawhatever could help. Was worth a try.
"You need to go to the bathroom?"
"Uh…no, why?"
"Because I gotta?" Watkins lurched out of bed and waddled to the bathroom, her stylish haircut looking like a bale of straw caught in a hurricane. "Wouldn't go in there the next hour if I was you?"
"Uh… okay." It felt like a remark more fitted to Melissa than to her, but alright. Duly noted. Bathroom off limits for the next hour. Gotcha.
Watkins opened the door to the bathroom, but before she could go in, En stopped her, "Hey Leza?"
She turned her crumpled-up face towards En. "Yeah?"
Gah apologizing was hard! "About yesterday, umm…"
Thankfully, Watkins smiled. "That's cool, no need to apologize?"
Phew, that saved her a lot of uncomfortable umm-you-know'ing. "Alright thanks."
"Uh huh. But now I'm gonna…" she pointed at the bathroom.
"Yeah, right. Enjoy."
The sun already stood high in the sky when En trudged out of the motel room. Below her, in the courtyard, Meyers sat on a lounging chair he'd apparently dug up somewhere, reading a book. "Yo, sheriff Meyers."
"Ah," Meyers exclaimed, looking up from his book. "Mornin', little lady. Sleep well?"
"Had worse. You?"
"Short but sweet." He took off his sunglasses. "Ask you somethin' though?"
En leaned on the balcony with her elbows. "Sure."
"You've been callin' everyone by their first name now. So stop bein' stuffy with me, and just say Cliff, alright?"
"Uh… you got it… Cliff." It felt odd to address an old guy with his first name, but alright, if he wanted her to. It'd take some getting used to, but alright, alright. He'd said his first name only once, when they'd broken him out of the can, Melissa and her, and that reminded her of something. "Hey, I've wondered since we got here… what was in that packet you lugged around all the time?"
Meyers grinned broadly. "My most prized possessions, little lady!" He held up his book.
"What, books?"
"Damn straight." He tapped his hand on something En couldn't see behind the lounging chair. "When you're alone in some frontier town, you need things to keep your mind occupied." Sunny or Ringo were nowhere to be found, probably sleeping in, so she went down the stairs, the sun driving the sleepiness from her. As she walked towards Meyers, he lifted up the packet and held it out to her.
The books had titles she'd never seen before. "What is this?" she asked, reading the book titles out loud. "Crow Blood? Ou-Chou and the Scarlet Rabbit? The Lunatic of Pandora 1? The Adventures of Pahkis and Kid Tittle? The Mist Archon?" She'd never heard of those before. "I… can't say I recognize the titles."
"Hey, not many books around anymore," Meyers explained. "I learned a lot from those."
Ah, the next one was one she recognized. "The Count of Monte Cristo. Now that one I do know. Well, I've heard of it."
Meyers' face lit up. "Without any question, my absolute favourite book!"
"Never read it, to be honest." En hadn't read a lot of books, probably because her parents had tried so hard to get her interested in them, which of course had had the reverse effect.
"Oh you should," Meyer said, enthusiastic. "It's a brilliant story of injustice, imprisonment and escape, and vengeance, and of how revenge can go too far and hurt the innocent along with the guilty."
"I see." She looked through the rest of the books. Some had titles she thought she recognized, others had titles completely unknown. One of the covers had a picture of a clown grinning needle-sharp teeth bare. Ugh, looked like the fear of clowns was something of all eras. "Hey, if you like books, I've got a copy of the story of how my city was founded with me?" Her parents always made her take one copy along, so she could drop it off in places where it might be useful. She never did.
"Sure, pass it to me sometime."
En's stomach abruptly growled. That's right, she hadn't even had dinner. The others had (presumably) had a nice juicy brahmin steak, but En had simply been too tired to stay awake long enough to wait for it.
"Some leftover steak in the fridge," Meyers said, his eyes again on his book. "Kitchen."
"Aces!"
Steak wasn't really a common breakfast, but hey, hunger was the best sauce, and even cold, the steak tasted delicious, especially with the jalapeño sauce Meyers had prepared with it. It was a bit spicy for the early hour, but En didn't mind. No matter the hour, if it tastes great, it tastes great.
She finished her breakfast and told Meyers she'd be at the doctor's. He hadn't even heard, completely absorbed in his book. She couldn't make out the title, but the cover was of a young man looking at a painting in horror. The man in the painting was old and worn, but clearly the same person as the one looking on. Hmhm.
She walked to the doctor's office, ignoring the strange old man standing in front of his hut of rags, belting out dire prophecies or whatever.
"Come?"
The doctor looked up as En opened the door. "Ah, our intrepid young andventurer. Feeling better?"
En nodded. "Yeah, thanks. This is for taking care of Melissa and Sunny." She passed her last hundred caps to the doctor, who threw the bag in an open safe without even counting it.
"Melissa is still asleep, but she should wake up any second now."
"Cool. Hey I've been thinking. Is there a reason we didn't just use the Auto-Doc for Melissa?"
Strauss sat down in her own waiting room and motioned for En to do the same. "There is, actually. The Auto-Doc requires fresh chems every time it's put to work, and I used my last pack when your friend needed healing. And to be honest, using the Auto-Doc for a broken eye socket is a bit drastic, no?"
En didn't understand that last bit. "Wait, but you said she was at the end of her strength?"
"She is," Strauss said fiercely, clearly not intent on giving En any reason to push Melissa back into action. "But it's from all the injuries combined, and those injuries are all treated. She needs to recover and rest, no Auto-Doc can do that for her. Besides," she added. "Using the Auto-Doc to treat a healing orbital fracture is like firing a cannon at a mosquito."
"So she's not in bad shape then?"
"I told you she needs rest." Strauss seemed adamant. "The healing burns are more of a concern. You need to give her time to recuperate."
"But she won't fall apart into pieces while a comedy xylophone tune plays?" En joked.
"It's a serious matter, miss."
En sighed. "Doctor, it's like this. I can't wait any longer to go find the man that did this", she pointed at her scar, "to me. And knowing Melissa, she wouldn't allow me to leave her behind even if I wanted to."
"No offense to your friend, but she doesn't seem like the type that would risk falling over dead for some sixteen-year-old."
"Yeah, well, she feels she has to come along."
Strauss' eyes narrowed. "Why?"
En doubted for a moment, but finally found it best to tell the truth. "Because she's also responsible."
"I… see."
"Yeah. Anyway, knowing her, she will come along no matter what, if only to rid herself of the guilt. And I'm pretty sure she won't listen to doctors telling her to lie down."
As if it was rehearsed, the patient room door opened and Melissa lurched out, the side of her face splinted with bright white bandage that contrasted starkly with her dark skin. Her double mohawks stood crooked from lying on them. She was only wearing her bra and leather pants, and En had to swallow when she saw her abs, which were perfectly hard (and tattooed) blocks of muscle. She dragged an infuse hanger behind her, the bag of clear liquid waddling as she moved. "We goin', jillaroo?"
En couldn't resist shooting a smirk at doctor Strauss, whose mouth narrowed to a stripe. "You're not going anywhere, Melissa. You need to rest or you'll keel over dead if you're not careful."
Melissa snorted. "Come off it. I'm feelin' ace."
"Of course you are," Strauss said, agitated and rising to her feet. "You're chock full of chems."
"I'm fine, doc. Thanks for all the patchin' up, you're a right cobber, but I got things to do."
Strauss turned to En. "Miss, I suggest you stop her."
Laughing, En said, "Look at her, doc. Now look at me. You think I have any chance of stopping her from doing anything?"
"Miss, I must insist that you – "
She was interrupted by Melissa abruptly pulling the baxter needle out of her arm and tossing the bag of liquid onto the table, uncaring about the blood that trickled from the crook of her elbow. "Doc, I'm sincerely chuffed that you worked your magic on me, but I got places to be."
Strauss wasn't giving up just yet. "Melissa, if you keep acting crazy, in this condition, you may very well fall over and die!"
Ignoring the doctor, Melissa stepped over to her, took her by the shoulder and gave her a hard, Italian-style kiss on both cheeks, wincing when she used her damaged side. "Thanks doc, I mean it." Then she clapped her hands together. "Let's shoot off, jillaroo."
"Uh, I don't think so," En said with a grin.
"Oh don't you start!"
Her grin widening, En said, "Put some clothes on first, Captain Brassiere."
Watkins had apparently finished her bathroom-business and taken some extra time to get her hair back into shape, and she was now leaning on the balcony railing, just like En had a while before, dressed in bluejeans and a tight-hugging black tank top. Her laser pistol hung from her hip, looking a bit out of place with her elegant clothing. Apart from that, she looked like one of those pre-War movie stars posters, looking into the distance, flaunting her goods. Because she had them, no question. The strange leather-and-metal armour she'd worn before didn't really emphasize her curves, but this outfit sure did. Sunny had felt insecure before, but wait 'til she saw that. It even made En feel a little inadequate.
"Look at that," Melissa said flatly. "Think she's deliberately showin' off the meat market, or just oblivious?"
"I don't know, Melissa."
"Sunny's gonna do 'er block if Ringo notices it a bit too obviously."
"I know."
"Gonna be a spectacle. You wanna get the popcorn, or should I?"
En frowned. "Not funny, Melissa."
"Yeah, you're right." A short pause. "It's Sunny, better get nachos instead."
"Melissa."
"Lighten up, jillaroo. We're in the Wastes, not in a bloody teenage drama. It's all kid's stuff to me, all that relationship wank. So what if your bloke looks at another girl's gazongas. Long as he ends up in bed with you, nuthin' to worry 'bout, yeah?"
"Well, if he ends up in bed with only you, yeah."
Melissa simply shrugged. "Even then. Nuthin' wrong with playin' on another tennis court. Humans aren't made to be monogamous. It's fightin' your programmin' for your entire life."
They'd reached the courtyard, Meyers' attention for his book significantly decreased since Leza Watkins had gotten in position on the balcony. The dirty old bastard. Well, as long as looking and making leering remarks was all he did, it was all good.
"Hey Melissa," Watkins greeted from the balcony. "Off to a masked ball?"
"That's right," Melissa called back. "Can I borrow that tacky wig of yours though?"
Watkins flashed a grin. "Watch it, you're on thin ice with those hair-remarks?"
"Well," Melissa quietly said to En, "she's a ditz, but at least she can take a joke."
"And pull one," En replied. "I'm pretty sure cellophane over the toilet isn't her only trick."
"So ladies," Meyers said, clapping his book closed. "What's on the to-do list today."
"Boulder City," En said. "But before we leave, I've got some uh… things to set straight. Sunny and Ringo not up yet?"
"Nope."
At that moment, Ringo opened the door of his motel room and found himself face-to-face with Watkins' ass. Face-to-ass, as it were. His eyes briefly widened in surprise, and then he remembered himself. "Morning. No better way to wake up than by an assortment of women shouting at each other instead of actually getting to speaking distance."
"It's almost eleven, lazy-ass," Watkins remarked cheerfully. "And I can see from here that Ennie's all excited about getting to Boulder City, wherever that is."
"Glad you're here to impart this information," Ringo grunted. "Miss En, Sunny's awake. It might be advantageous to go have a talk with her."
"Yeah, I was planning to."
The room was still dark, but Sunny was awake, En could see, her eyes open and staring at the ceiling. Cheyenne lay on the ground at the foot end of the bed, and only briefly gave En a look, before being assured it was safe and she could close her eyes again.
"Hey Sunny?"
"Oh, it's you. Thought it was Ringo."
"No, no," En said redundantly. "It's me." She sat down on the bed, on Ringo's side. "About yesterday…"
"What?" Not exactly a constructive start.
"I was real tired, Sunny, and I just didn't have the energy to deal with what was bothering you. I shouldn't have been so terse with you, but it's just… I was dead tired."
Sunny turned her face away. "It's alright."
Gah, come on, don't be that way! "Sunny, you're my friend and I didn't mean to make you think I don't care about you."
"Got a funny way of showing it."
Yeah, she definitely didn't intend on making this easy. But god dammit, there was a limit too. "Hey, Sunny, I'm trying to apologize here, but I can't if you keep shutting me out."
Sunny sighed and rolled her eyes in the darkness. "So say it then?"
"Say what?"
"That one thing you should say."
En knew what she meant, but she hated apologizing, always feeling as if it was a sign of weakness, feeling people lost respect for her if she said sorry. She knew Sunny needed to hear it, but that didn't make it easy. Maybe she could sleaze her way into a sort of apology. "Look, like I said, I shouldn't have lost patience."
"Don't make it sound like it' my fault," Sunny snapped. "Say it. Say that one thing you need to say."
Ugh, she really wasn't going to let her off easy, and even though En found it harder and harder to put up with Sunny's constant demanding behaviour, she still needed her, if only to reach their goal together and be able to go back to New Arroyo together or at least part ways as friends. God it was hard to say. "I'm… sorry, Sunny. Okay?"
Sunny was quiet for a moment, then nodded. "Alright. Let's leave it behind us then."
"Let's." And yet, in En's heart was a barely perceptible feeling of resentment, that she'd had to make such an admission just because Sunny had wanted to hear it. "Come on, time to head for Boulder City."
"Be right there."
Everyone had gotten themselves ready to travel, except sleepy-head Sunny, and they stood waiting in the courtyard, exchanging small talk, Melissa occasionally pointing to the splint on her face, which was probably the topic of conversation. Ringo didn't seem too focused on Watkins' assets. Good.
As they noticed her, Ringo threw her a questioning glance, which she responded with a nod. He nodded back at her and turned back to the conversation.
Melissa seemed especially proud, it seemed as En joined the conversation, of her telling-off of Dr. Strauss, even though, she added, Strauss had been a 'right cobber' for patching her up. By the time En had charted the route on her Pip-boy, Sunny came down the stairs, without her crutches, walking on what looked to be sore but functional legs.
"Didn't realize it was casual Friday," she said sourly, looking at Watkins' outfit.
"Hey, I'm not dragging myself around in that smelly hot recon armour today?" Watkins shot back. "It's not that long a walk and I'm sure we'll be fine?"
For knowing nothing about the outside world, Watkins sure was pretty confident that nothing would happen. Meyers spoke En's thoughts out loud by saying, "Bet there's a bruise on your butt that says otherwise."
Watkins gave a sheepish grin and said, "That was just poor rock climbing skills?"
"Well," Meyers said, "Let's keep your butt free from bruises today, shall we?"
Watkins stuffed her hands in her pockets. "Mm. I'll put an ad out for butt-bodyguards?"
Sunny shot En an irritated look.
"C'mon, jillaroo, let's go find that mongrel in his checkered suit."
The walk was long, but rather uneventful. They'd left around noon, however, with all the preparations and things, and so by the time they reached an intersection, twilight had already set in. During the walk, Meyers had talked to En about books, and then to Sunny and Ringo, Sunny and Ringo had talked to each other and later Meyers, Melissa had been walking pretty much quietly, and Leza had been chattering to just about everyone, flitting from conversation to conversation. She wasn't completely oblivious, though, because she mostly steered clear of Sunny.
"Which way, jillaroo?" Melissa asked as they reached the intersection. The i88 expressway divided into two at this point, one end veering off to the East, the other taking a path between two mountains to the West, and disappearing into the darkening landscape.
"Uh… left, I think." Her pip-boy had been acting funny for the last hour, and then it had winked out entirely, probably one of the wires losing contact, or the battery dying. Pip-boys used regular old energy cells, so they were cheap and easy to replace. She could even leech one off Leza if she wanted to, but the poor thing probably wouldn't understand the logic behind it. She imagined her asking, confused, how it came that her pip-boy could work on ammunition. She knew a bit about programming, apparently, but that was most likely because it had been literally hammered into her head.
So she was operating on purely the memory of her pip-boy map, and she remembered it saying left at the intersection… right? Yeah, left, it had to have been left. Yep. Left. Definitely.
"You sure, jillaroo?" Melissa asked, looking back and forth between both sides of the highway with its shattered concrete and rusted car corpses. Melissa herself didn't look much more alive than the road, the left side of her face black and swollen, the bruise so big even the splint couldn't cover it. She looked worn and tired, but En reasoned that if she wanted to come along, it'd be wrong to stop her. "Last time I was here, I remember Boulder being more to the East."
"Mmno, no, I'm pretty sure it was left now."
Melissa smiled mysteriously despite her pain. "Alright, jillaroo, whatever you say."
They walked on, the night sky darkening even further, until the sun was completely gone and all they could see in the sky were the stars. Some of those stars, however, looked suspiciously close to the ground, a cluster of lights at the side of the road. See? En had been right, there was Boulder City. She didn't miss the chance to point it out. "Looks like I win, Melissa, look at that."
Melissa only said a sarcastic, "Ace, jillaroo." But was she being snide because she couldn't bear losing, or because she knew more than En did. Nah, she was probably just a sore loser.
"Good thing we made it," Watkins remarked. "My feet are aching?"
"I'm pretty sure", Sunny couldn't resist, "that you don't know real leg pain."
Watkins had nothing to say to that.
The lights came closer and became a small settlement. Maybe Boulder City was just a collection of shacks, but it still seemed awfully small to be called 'city'. The bunch of shacks was positioned right in front of a bridge that spanned over another highway. It was a small group of sad-looking fibre-cement plates, wooden walls hammered into rickety supports, and the occasional stripped caravan.
"Boulder City, right jillaroo?"
"Uh… yeah, I think so." She most certainly didn't think so.
"This is the 188 trading post, isn't it?" Sunny asked warily.
"Yep," Melissa proclaimed. "The same. Of course, jillaroo here knew better, right?"
En stopped and put her hands in her sides. "Hey, Melissa, I stood by what I thought instead of letting someone make me second-guess myself. You should be proud of me."
With a feeble smile, Melissa said, "I am, doll. Don't worry."
"Still," Meyers grunted. "You two ladies made us walk all the way to the wrong place just because you wanted to feel smug about yourselves. Good job."
"Yeah," Sunny agreed. "Thanks for that."
Ringo put his arm around her and said, "Well, we can take a breather at the trading post and then turn around. We've only lost half an hour or something. No disaster."
"Not if your legs are healthy."
Ringo only kissed her on the top of the head in response.
"Think they've got beer there?" Leza asked, sounding eager. "I'd really love to try some?"
"You've never had beer?" En and Ringo asked simultaneously.
"Well, no. Brotherhood isn't too keen on alcohol? Bunch of old bores." She kicked a pebble away to reinforce her point.
They'd reached the trading post, and one of the places clearly served as some sort of picnic place or open-air bar, or whatever-the-fuck, with tables and benches set in a small courtyard and a crooked shack that seemed to serve as a counter to order drinks. Two people sat at the counter, one with a leather jacket that had a back patch saying "GUN RUNNERS", and a bored-looking young woman with a face dirty with oil smears stood behind it, waiting for the two barflies to empty their glasses so she could refill them.
Sunny let out a loud 'Oof' as she sat down and rubbed her legs, gently so as not to hurt them further, but hard enough to let the blood flow through. Cheyenne followed her movements with a curious look. Ringo sat down beside her, and Melissa next to him, touching her face and wincing. En, Leza and Meyers took the opposite bench. It was like a big family picnic.
"Oh boy," the young woman called, scooting out from behind the counter. "Am I glad to see some people here! What'll it be, boredom-relievers?"
"Beer, please!" Leza rapped, before anyone else could speak.
"Oh… kay," the bartender said, surprised but amused, jotting down the order on an old note pad.
Melissa raised a finger and said, "Yeah."
"Beer for me too," Ringo said, more calmly, with Sunny echoing, "Yep, me too. And can we get a bowl of water for the dog?"
"Absolutely."
"Got any scotch?" Meyers asked, clearly not expecting a positive response. And it was with a smile that the young woman proved him wrong, "Yes sir, second-rate rotgut, but better than nothing."
"Coke please," En asked, completing the drinks order. "And um… if you have anything to eat?"
The young woman with the faded red STP-baseball cap sucked on the end of her pencil and said, "Well, kitchen's not open after seven, but I can deep fry you some brahmin mincemeat sausages if you like?"
"Sure, yeah, anything that can fill our stomachs."
Still with the end of the pencil in her mouth, the bar tending girl smiled, said, "You got it," and whirled around, walking back to the bar.
"How's your face, Melissa?" Watkins asked.
"Eh," Melissa merely said, "I try not to think about it." But she still took the painkiller bottle out of her vest pocket and shook two into her hands. "That'll keep me for a bit." En thought briefly of asking Melissa for one too, to quiet her pounding head, but Melissa needed them harder than she did.
The bar tending girl came back with a platter set with four beers, a coke, a glass of scotch, and a ceramic bowl. "Beer, beer, beer, beer, a coke, and a scotch. Water for the dog."
"Thanks," All six of them said simultaneously.
"Can I use your bathroom?" Watkins asked.
"Uh, sure, if by bathroom you mean a nice spot of the Wastes."
Leza made a face, but got up and trudged out of the camp.
"Sausages will be around in a minute, fryer has to warm up." With that, she went back to the bar. At the same time, a female figure dressed in a robe, her head covered with a frayed dark green scarf, went to sit at the bar, motioning for the bar tending girl to bring her a drink.
En uncapped her coke bottle (she always saw it as the sign of a friendly bar when they let you uncap your own bottles instead of pocketing the cap themselves) and took a drink. Ooh, nice, refrigerated! She closed her eyes and let a quiet burp escape her throat.
Melissa's beer was drained in a series of quick gulps. She simply said, "More," and got up, walking to the bar to order a refill. As she asked for another beer, the woman in the robe and scarf turned to her and asked a question, Melissa replying with a smile, motioning at the splint on her face. The bartender set the beer on the counter, but Melissa didn't bring it back, staying at the counter instead.
"A moment of rest," Meyers mused, holding up his glass of scotch and swirling it in his glass, looking at the colour. Scotch had a beautiful colour and it looked incredibly tasteful, but En knew from smelling it that it tasted awful. Meyers didn't seem to think so, however, sipping the glass and closing his eyes. "Mm. Not bad."
Ringo held out his hand. "Can I?"
With a grin, Meyers handed him the glass. "Not too much, or you're ordering two new ones."
Ringo sampled the whiskey too, and nodded in approval. "I've had worse." Then he reached into his pack and took out his bag of weed. "Anyone want some?"
En passed, Meyers said he preferred good old alcohol, but Sunny shrugged and said, "Why not, help me unwind a bit."
Raising his voice, Ringo held up the weed bag and called, "Melissa?"
She'd been chatting away with the woman at the bar, but she turned her head and said, "Only if it's quality, bucko."
"It's that or nothing."
With a grin, Melissa said, "Alright, roll me one."
Hunched over the joint he was rolling, Ringo asked En, "Think Miss Like-oh-my-God will want some?"
En shrugged. "Ask her when she gets back."
"Mm." He finished rolling the first joint, mixing weed with tobacco as if he'd done it a thousand times before. "Melissa?"
En saw Melissa excuse herself to her chatting partner, and she came to the table to pick up her spliff. "Thanks mate." Then she went back to the bar.
Watkins came back and sat down at the bench, her back to the bar. "Melissa gone?"
As Ringo rolled the second joint, he said, "She's chatting at the bar. Want one?"
Watkins briefly turned her head, turned back to the others, then checked, and turned her head to the bar again. She sat briefly looking at the backs of Melissa and the other woman, and then said, "Hm," before focusing her attention back on her company, the lock of yellow hair in front of her eye whirling as she turned her head back to the others. "I'm sorry, what'd you say?"
"Want a joint?" Sunny asked curtly.
Leza hadn't noticed, or decided to ignore, Sunny's tone. "Ummmm… I've never tried one, so I'll just take a toke from one of you guys' if that's alright?"
Ringo shrugged. "Sure," passing the second to Sunny and proceeding to roll the third.
Sunny lit up, took a long drag, and went, "Ahhh, you know, I don't like this stuff, but it can feel damn good sometimes."
In the meantime, the bar tender had made the sausages, setting them down on the table with a quiet, "Enjoy."
Ringo licked the paper of the third joint to make it stick and said, "Don't I know it." He lit his joint and inhaled the smoke, the tip of the blunt lighting up as he sucked in air. The talking resumed, En just enjoying the voices, the sweet taste of the coke, and the cool night air.
En took a look back at the robed girl at the bar, and then saw Leza taking a swill of her beer and grimacing. "I'd imagined this to taste entirely differently?"
"Want some coke to chase it down?" En offered.
"No, I'm cool, thanks?" Then she held her hand out to Ringo and ask, "Can I have a try?"
Before Ringo could react, Sunny stuck out her joint and said, "Here."
Watkins had clearly misinterpreted Sunny's haste. "Thanks, Sunny! So I just inhale?"
Ringo nodded.
Predictably, Leza took a drag and burst into a coughing fit, flapping her free hand at her face. "Awgh, this isn't my thing." She handed the joint back to Ringo.
"Oi, jillaroo?" Melissa's quiet voice suddenly came from beside En. She'd briefly left the bar and had stuck her face next to En's, to talk in her ear.
"Mm?"
"Can we um… would it be too much to ask if we holed up here for the night?"
En turned to Melissa. "Uh… why?"
Melissa cleared her throat into her fist. "I'd be a bit sad if I had to go. Would like to get to know that girl better."
Errr, what? "Errr, what?"
"Yeah," Melissa said, almost sounding apologetic. "I know it'd be more lost time, but it's night, nothing to do in Boulder City yet anyway, and this girl and I are really hittin' it off, yeah?"
"Hitting it off?" Okay, this was confusing.
Melissa sighed and rolled her eyes. "Y'know, sparks leapin', eyes lockin', all that. We're really clickin'."
"Clicking, as in, wanting to get into each other's pants?"
Melissa briefly looked back at the girl at the bar. "Robe in her case, but yeah, I suppose why not?"
What the Hell? "But, but… I thought you said you weren't gay?"
"I'm not," Melissa retorted, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I just think gender's possibly the most irrelevant criterion when it comes to decidin' who you wanna root with."
En really needed a second to wrap her aching head around that one. "So you're not a lesbian, but you don't mind leaping into bed with a woman?"
Melissa shrugged. "Or a man. It's all about personality and having that undefined somethin' that makes me want to jump your bones. So, can we stay?" With a little grin, she said, "Remember all the ace things I've done for you."
It'd mean more wasted time, but as Melissa had said, there wasn't really much to see in Boulder City anyway, probably, and everyone was tired, and in some cases, stoned. Not like they'd make anymore meaningful progress that day. The prospect of having to wait 'til morning wasn't exactly pleasant, but as En looked at Melissa's eager face, half of it darkened by a dark purple bruise, and the burns in her neck still standing out in bright pink, she thought, what the Hell. "Alright, Melissa. We'll stay here."
Melissa punched her shoulder with a broad grin. "Beaut, jillaroo! Your blood's worth bottlin'. I'll hit the turps with my new mate now!"
"Enjoy hitting the… um, whatever turps are. Take a second to introduce your friend to us later, okay?"
Melissa flashed another grin and went back to the bar.
"We're stayin', aren't we?" Meyers asked En with a twinkle in his eyes.
En briefly looked back at Melissa and her new friend, and realized she didn't mind spending the evening here one bit. "Yeah, looks like we are."
"So our amazon's not averse to women, huh?" He downed the last of his scotch and clapped the glass on the table. "Guess that wasn't a surprise. I mean, lookin' at her and all."
En could only frown and say, "She confuses me sometimes."
"As do all people, little lady. And the ones that can confuse you the most are usually the ones you thought you knew best. I remember back up north, I'd found myself a nice lady, bright, cheery, well educated. Had a clean house, spoke with two words, well groomed and bathed, you know?"
En wasn't all that interested in the story, but she said, "M-hm" nonetheless.
"Really thought I'd hooked myself a right and proper missus. Turns out," Meyers leaned closer to her and said quietly, "the first time we did the horizontal tango, she was into this nasty kind of choking sex, where she wanted to get throttled to within an inch of her life and – "
"Alright, alright," En stopped him. "I get it."
Meyers lifted his glass and inspected it to see if maybe there wasn't a little bit left. "Just sayin', people can be unpredictable."
Melissa came to stand at the table, with her robed friend. The girl standing next to her was pretty, with a Hispanic look. The old frayed scarf she had on her head didn't do her much justice, but the bright, cheery, mischievous eyes under them made En realize immediately why Melissa had been so taken with her. "Since jillaroo here asked me, I'll just briefly introduce a new friend I just made."
"No need for introductions," Watkins said coldly. And then, with a tone that almost had icicles hanging from it, she said, "Hello, Veronica."
"Watkins?" The robed girl blinked nonplussed, and then asked Melissa, "You're travelling with Watkins?"
Melissa shrugged and said, "Well, yeah. Picked her up a few days ago."
"That's... a bit of a surprise."
Watkins scratched the wood of the picnic table with a bottle cap. "What's not a surprise is seeing you here on your own, looking like a vagabond?"
The woman called Veronica shrugged. "I was planning on keeping this civil, but as for vagabonds, I look like one, you have the manners of one."
"This gonna be good," Meyers said quietly, leaning over to En.
"So, Veronica, still have your licker's licence?" Watkins asked with a cruel edge.
"Oi!" Melissa interrupted the exchange. "Blondie, that your way of treatin' people I introduce? Whatever beef you've got, stow it, yeah?"
Watkins crossed her arms and glared. "She started it."
"Leza," En reprimanded. "Come on. I don't know where you know each other from, but we can have a civilized discussion, at least?"
"Civilized might be a bit much to ask," Sunny said raucously.
"Hey!"
"Whoa," Ringo said, blowing out a cloud of blue smoke. "That was uncalled for, Sunny. Chill."
Sunny seemed content with looking out at the trading post and feeling victorious.
"Uh, guys," the girl Melissa had hooked up with said, "I didn't come here to cause trouble. Watkins and I... well, we have a history, but she's part of your group and I don't want to drive a wedge between anyone."
"Not your fault, Veronica," Melissa said, with a glare at the sulking Watkins. "Come on, let's just have a drink. Jillaroo, care to join us for a sec?"
"Yeah, sure," En said, and saw the opportunity to brighten the atmosphere a little. "But only if you promise I won't get sandwiched between you two in a sweaty lesbian sex fest."
Completely sincerely, Melissa said, "Guaranteed, jillaroo."
"I'll be right back," she told the others, nabbing her mincemeat sausage. Only Ringo and Meyers responded with a nod.
"Coke?" Veronica asked. "It's on me."
"Sure."
"Michelle? A coke for my friend, please?"
The young woman behind the bar nodded and put a coke on the bar, sliding it down the counter where the robed woman caught it. "Thanks, sweetie." Veronica passed En the coke and sat down on a bar stool. "Hey, I don't mean to talk behind people's backs, but you might be wise not to travel with Watkins anymore."
"If you don't mean to talk behind people's backs," En said gently. "Don't." People who said that usually meant well, but they always ended up doing exactly what they said they weren't going to do.
She spread her hands. "Fair enough. So, Melissa told me a bit about why you're all on the road. Who the Hell would shoot a nice girl like you?"
"I know, right? I'm thinking it was because of the package I carried, but why shoot me when he's already got it?"
"Mm." the woman frowned in thought, and as she did so, a short lock of dark brown hair peeked out from underneath her hood. "That is strange. No witnesses, probably."
"That would make sense, if I'd seen him before he shot me. But they jumped me from behind, threw a bag over my head, stole my package, and then took the bag off to shoot me."
Veronica cocked her head. "Maybe they thought you'd seen them?"
"No," Melissa said curtly. "They didn't."
En decided not to tell the woman about Melissa's involvement. She'd paid for it, and hey, she deserved a little friendship after all she'd done. "Yeah, I told Melissa already. I didn't see them."
"Very strange. Well, I hope you find what you're looking for. And if you do, call me if you need someone to beat the stuffing out of him. I'm good at punching people."
En chuckled. "I will. So what brings you here?"
"Adventure? Excitement?" Melissa added to the question.
"A Scribe craves not these things," the girl said. "But yeah, I guess that's about it. I can't help myself. So many great things in the world to discover. The Brotherhood could learn a lot from the outside world if only they came out of their bunkers."
"Ah," En realized. "You're Brotherhood. That's where..." she gestured toward the table.
"Where I know tits-and-no-brains from, yeah."
En realized she had intended not to give the woman the occasion to talk behind Melissa's back, no matter how nice she was, but curiosity baited the cat. "She seems nice enough though?"
Veronica shrugged. "Oh, she is. To your face." She sighed and said, "Look, I'm not going to badmouth her, but just be careful, okay? Don't let her get too close too soon."
En didn't know why, but she felt like this woman was sincere and not just trying to make Watkins look bad. "Alright. I'll be careful."
"Enough gossip, yeah?" Melissa interrupted, slightly irritated. "She's a bit of an airhead, but she hasn't done us any wrong yet. Until she does, no point assumin' she will."
"Fair enough," the hooded woman said. "So anyway, yeah, I'm just looking for adventure... and excitement." She exchanged a brief, telling glance with Melissa, who returned it just as mischievously. "And I'm kinda waiting for someone to come get me out of here."
Before En could react, Melissa said, "Can travel with us?"
Veronica smiled and looked down. "Thanks, but... not with her. Not to be a baby, but putting the two of us together could only mean trouble."
Again, Melissa was faster than En, probably intentionally. "I'm sure we could make it work?"
She shook her head, and a deep sadness came over her. "I'm sorry, but I'll never forgive her for what she did. And that's all I want to say about it," she added gently, making it clear she didn't want to explain.
"Well," Melissa said, leaning forward on her bar stool, "when I'm done helpin' jillaroo here, I'll come find you."
"We'll see. For now, let's just have a fun evening together."
That was En's cue to leave. She got up from her bar stool. "Pleasure meeting you, miss Veronica, take care of Melissa here, she's a bit beat up."
"Awww," the other said. "Don't worry, I'll be good."
En left them to talk, and flirt probably, and went back to sit with the others.
"So?" Watkins asked, looking slightly unstable in her seat. "Bet she told you all sorts of nastiness about me huh?"
En shrugged. "Nothing, really. Just that you don't get along."
"Tch," Leza blew, downing the shot of whiskey she'd apparently ordered while En was gone. Two more empty glasses stood beside it. "She just hates me because I'm not as stuck-up as she is." There was a bit of a slur in her speech.
"How much has she had?" En asked, directing her question to Ringo right away, still seeing him as the most responsible one.
With a shrug, Ringo said, "Three, plus Meyers'. He'll be quite peeved when he comes back from the sanitary installations." By that he meant any rock to hide behind.
"And you didn't stop her?"
"She's old enough, miss En."
Leza stood up and waddled towards the bar, holding up two fingers. Melissa and Veronica had apparently taken a walk or whatever it was they had gone off to do. With a grin, the girl with the cap poured two more shots, Leza knocking one back straight away and taking the other back to the table. "Rin-gohhhhhh," she called. "Lemme have a toke?"
Unconcerned, Ringo held out the last remains of his joint. "Take it easy, blondie."
Watkins took the joint, put it in her mouth and inhaled deep, bursting into a coughing fit so hard it made the spliff fly from her mouth, the red glowing tip making a bright arc against the night sky and landing on the table, right in front of a sour-faced Sunny. Oblivious, Watkins knocked back the other shot, then took Ringo's beer and gulped down half of it, Ringo simply not giving a shit.
"Hey, Leza," En said. "Don't you think it's time to switch to soda?"
Watkins frowned and jabbed a finger at her. "You're awesome, Ennie, but," a surprise burp, "you're younger than me an' I know what I'm doin'." She sat down, wobbled back and forth, then shouted, "VE-RON-I-CAAAAH! … dives for CLAMS... at," burp, "ME-LIS-SA BAYYYYY!"
Despite the awful scene she was making, and the immense embarrassment she was being, En couldn't suppress a grin. "Leza, come on, sit down." She took Watkins by the hem of her jeans and pulled her back down.
When Watkins turned to her, even though she couldn't see her other eye, hidden behind the yellow lock of hair, but En knew she was looking completely cross-eyed. "EN-NIE is my FRIEND! And SUN-NIE and RIN-GO!" She let out another burp, surprised with what apparently came up with it and required a swallow to get back down. "And the uh... old guy who STARES at my TITS!" She was shouting at an uncomfortable volume now, the girl behind the bar grinning and shaking her head and the few remaining travellers at the trading post looking annoyed at the loud drunk chick. Only Cheyenne didn't care, lying at Sunny's feet with her eyes closed.
Watkins leaned over the table, and with a cross-eyed frown, said, "You're my friend, right Sunny?"
"Uh..."
With a finger pointed at Sunny, she slurred, "You don't think I wanna steal your guy, do you?"
Sunny was unimpressed. "Do you?"
"No," Watkins called, sweeping her arm, as if Sunny had just said the stupidest thing in the world. "You're my friend, Sunny! You're all my friends!"
In response, Sunny simply extended her hand and pulled up the neck of Watkins' shirt. "Your cleavage needs some modesty."
"Thanks Sunny," Watkins slurred. "You're a true friend." Then she crossed her arms on the table, lowered her head, and closed her eyes.
Ringo lit a cigarette, a normal one this time, and shook his head. "Talk about finding your own limit."
En sat looking concerned at the comatose Watkins. "Think she'll be alright?"
"She'll be fine," Sunny said. "Just carry her to one of these shacks, chuck her in and let her sleep it off. I can't carry her though, with my legs. And no, Ringo, you don't get to help."
Ringo spread his hands as if to say, I didn't say anything.
"Yeah, I'm not letting Meyers get his hands on her while she's in this state either," En said, standing up and hooking her hands under Watkins' armpits. "Let's just call it a night."
At that moment, speak of the Devil, Meyers came back, buckling his belt. "Now that was a mean one. Sorry it took so long." Then his eyes fell on Watkins. "Oh my, looks like she's down for the count."
"Uh huh." En gritted her teeth and lifted Watkins up. Thankfully, she was still coherent enough to provide some assistance, though her knees buckled every two seconds. "Come on, Leza, time for bed." Still holding the half-conscious Watkins up under her armpits, En called to the bartender, "How much for a room?"
The girl with the cap made a throw-away gesture. "For all the caps you spent on booze, they're free. Plenty of empty shacks here anyway. Just chuck her into one."
"Yeah, that's what I intended," En said with a grunt as she struggled to keep her balance, with the limp Watkins hanging from her shoulder. She staggered over to the first shack she saw, kicked the door open and was greeted by two voices, a male and a female, in the darkness shouting, "HEY!"
"Oops, sorry." She pulled the door closed again, Watkins only doing a minimum effort to support herself. Damn, she was heavy. And En's head ached. "Come on, Leza work with me here."
Watkins made a token effort, resulting only in a tear in her jeans at the thigh where the fabric hooked onto the screwdriver hanging from En's tool belt. "I'm… guh… gonna be sick."
"Aw, shit," En hissed, turning Watkins away from her and toward the shack wall just in time to avoid the spray of projectile vomit that flew from her mouth, spattering against the wall in a cone of browns and yellows. "Leza."
"It just… was there, all of a sudden," Watkins croaked, her head hanging forward. None of the puke had gotten in her hair, thankfully. En found herself having more and more trouble being patient with this half-comatose idiot. She was the youngest of the lot and felt like she was the one doing the damn babysitting. Grunting again, she dragged Watkins to the next shack and kicked the door open as she'd done last time. She half-dreaded to stumble upon Melissa and that Veronica chick, their limbs tangled in the throes of ecstasy or whatever the fuck, but this one was empty. Breathing a laboured sigh of relief, she let Watkins fall on the closest mattress she saw, sending her down like a sack of grain. "There, now sleep."
Watkins only responded with an inarticulate groan before En closed the door on her and went to find herself a shack.