Seymour stumbled into the auditorium, barely able to see the aisle or surrounding seats through the sleep-deprived haze that clouded his vision. He had really not realized the full extent of how well Audrey's plan would go that fateful Wednesday afternoon… six… days ago? It was hard to figure out how many days were between Wednesday and Tuesday in this state, the state he had been put into by actually having to do his job at Mushnik's Skid Row Florists now that the shop was getting customers more than once in a blue moon. He couldn't settle down to study or do homework or prepare for the play for a moment until the shop had closed, and then he had to stay up forever to get it done… Audrey 2's constant unusual cravings for blood probably hadn't helped either… he wasn't really sure how good his work had been for the past few days, the quality was doubtful at this point. How was he going to analyze Tevye's character when he could barely walk in a straight line? Not that he had been the most coordinated even before getting sleep deprived… Seymour looked up at Orin as he realized he was there. How long he had been there, he didn't know or care, but he attempted to straighten out his posture, not wanting to look weak… weaker than he usually did, anyway… in front of him.
"...Seymour, are you feelin' okay?" Seymour managed to give him a shaky thumbs up, just as he had done the many times Audrey had asked him that same question. "Never been better…" And then the next thing he knew, he was lying on the ground in a small, cramped area he had never seen before, filled with what he realized several seconds later was paraphernalia for different plays and Orin's obnoxious presence. Orin held out a blurry looking container of orange juice from the cafeteria way too close to his face, and Seymour resentfully took it after a long moment, sitting up and checking to make sure that it was still sealed before opening it and drinking some. …That did help, he hated to admit… "So, good news. Mushnik told me to tell you you don't have to help him with the shop anymore." Seymour adjusted his glasses to a less awkward position. "...I don't?" Orin shook his head, sliding slightly closer to him on the ground. "Says your health is more important, and he can handle it himself." Seymour just knew that this version of Mr. Mushnik's message Orin was giving him was heavily censored to be less strict and probably to contain less curse words, and he attempted to brace himself for receiving the real version straight from the source later. "...How long have I been here? …And where is here?"
For some reason, Orin seemed to be even more off-puttingly enthused than usual by Seymour's second question. "To answer your first question: a few hours, the length of the rehearsal. To answer the second: the left wing." The left wing… did he mean… As if to answer the third question that was now racing through Seymour's mind, Orin abruptly stood up, striding over to a ladder that almost blended into the wall behind it with its black paint with that stupid annoying saunter before leaning against it proudly as if it was a car he had spent countless nights fixing up. "I just tie 'er up right here any time she forgets who she's talkin' to. You should see 'er, all scared, n'..." He laughed despicably, struggling to catch his breath and eventually wiping a tear away from his eye, and Seymour managed to get to his feet as well, intending that to be the first step in a process that would end in him losing his ability to breathe permanently but not being able to will himself to get to the second step or figure out what it would be. "n' beggin' me to stop… offerin' all kinds a crazy stuff in exchange for freedom that she would never be offerin' if she deserved it…"
He practically doubled over, unfortunately not keeling over all the way to the ground, before mostly recovering and standing up, not without a few residual chuckles. "You got a girl, Seymour?" Despite the uncomplicatedness of the answer to that question, Seymour struggled to respond. "No… no, I don't." After a pause, Orin made his way back to him… way too close to him… anywhere on Earth was way too close to him… "Hold on a second." He dug a phone out of his pocket… Seymour had no idea what kind it was except that it was clearly much nicer and newer than his… and messed around with it for a second before showing him a picture on it. Seymour resentfully looked at it, piecing together after a moment that it must be a picture of the cast of their production of Fiddler on the Roof on stage… all of them besides him, because he had been passed out in the place of Audrey's worst nightmares… at least Orin hadn't tried to Lucky Stiff him; he wouldn't have put that past him…
"You like any a them?" Somehow, he hadn't seen that purpose of this exercise coming. "...Uh… no…" Some of the girls and guys in the picture were attractive, it was just that he couldn't see himself pursuing anything with anyone who wasn't Audrey, even if he was far from being the pursuing kind of guy in the first place and she was all tied up… sometimes literally… with Orin… and she would never like him even if she wasn't… Orin looked at him contemplatively for a moment before continuing. "You like any a the guys?" As if fate was mocking Seymour specifically, the moment Orin asked him that question was the exact moment Mr. Mushnik happened to enter the left wing. Seymour tried and failed to meet his incredulous gaze for a long moment before looking back at Orin, shaking his head, and wordlessly moving to join him. "...Thanks for helping him, Orin, and…" His already tense tone of voice tightened further as if being nice to such a horrific person, or just being nice in general really, was physically hurting him. "...good job today." As Orin responded to this by puffing out his chest obnoxiously and breaking into an infuriatingly good rendition of the part of If I Were a Rich Man about Golde, Seymour wished that both he and him were dead.