Nobody
[Face-on! Unless it's not. Then we'll try again.]
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 6, 8, 9) ( success x 4 )
Nathan Marszalek
The end of the semester is upon them and Marszalek's editor has him covering a cop shooting that happened in his precinct when he wasn't even there because one of the other reporters is out on maternity leave. Like he doesn't have a paper to write so he can finish his class and move on with his life.
It's fine. It's fine. He told his editor he'd cover the story.
Unfortunately covering this particular story means he has to keep weirder hours than he already does and he got a lead that he could find a guy who might have some intel on the drug ring this cop had been investigating at the time of his death. Nate isn't particularly interested in consorting with drug dealers and suppliers but he also doesn't want to lose his job because he's only been back at work for about two weeks and his editor wasn't overly sympathetic about the whole I was in the hospital for almost two weeks after a car crash thing.
So: here we are at the piano bar where some guy who's out on probation after getting picked up for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute supposedly hangs out on the regular.
Nate is underdressed in khakis and a white button-down shirt with a diagonally-striped tie. He wears Doc Martens and a leather jacket because it's fucking freezing outside. When he comes through the front door he brings a cloud of cigarette smoke and seasonal affective disorder with him.
Nobody
[playing things.]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 6, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 6 )
Nobody
The piano bar isn't located on a corner. It's the kind of bar that's down a short alley, around a corner, with its main entrance a back entrance and a small spill of stairs serving to bar entry. It's the kind of bar with two levels, not particularly popular, not particularly struggling. The inside tries for an old school jazz feel, for a certain Gatsby fuck-off. There are some old photographs from Denver's Dry Spell back in the 20s and almost the first thing Nate sees are some comfortable nooks for sitting, for lounging, and a rickety wooden stair-case and some signs pointing down. If he doesn't want to go down yet, he can go past the stairs, past the banister that's got scars to show for its supposed years around, and look over the balcony he finds himself at to see what's what.
What's what is this. There is a long bar on the left hand corner of the main floor, which is, wouldn'tcha know it, down more godamned stairs because there are some buildings in Denver that take that Mile High City nickname to mean Fine We'll Go Down, Warmer Near Hell Anyway, Fuckers. There's a mirror behind that bar, but it's the kind that can't be used for anything except maybe catching a distorted glimpse of the bartender's ass, if you're diligent, if you look really hard and really carefully, because the mirror's mostly covered up by bottles upon bottles, by glasses upon glasses, so -- that's all right.
Sunday night is not a big night for the piano bar crowd. None of the slumming it folks are slumming it, still getting out their winter coats, so there are only a few people who don't work there right now and have any sense of being regulars. They're by the bar, with a small group of three hanging out at a table. The tables are scattered hither and thither and they aren't plentiful, like the first floor floor might actually be used as a dance floor some nights, and in the corner across from the bar there's the piano, big thing with strings older than most of the building, which had to get reconstructed after a fire back in the 60s. Like a lot of things do, it's lying about its age. There's a second piano facing the first but no one's playing that one.
They'd probably be intimidated to try. The guy at the piano is playing well enough, better than well enough, to make angels drop out of the firmament and come on close in order to hear what's up from the cheap seats, because everybody knows the cheap seats are where it's at. He's playing something with a lot of notes, but godamn, every note knows where it's supposed to be; it's a great performance. It's got verve. Energy. No reason to even look at the pianist,
unless of course you're coming in looking for some guy who's out on probation after getting picked up for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute and who usually hangs out here regular-like. Some guy whose name is, as far as Nathan knows, Max Mueller. Maybe Max Mueller knows how to pound the keys.
Nah, he doesn't. The pianist's name is Jack, Jack. He's pretty fucking ugly, but the music's mostly hiding that right now. Guy's got a gift. As soon as he stops playing, the awkward flop of hair, the somewhat asymmetrical and foxish features, the sad-eyed tilt of his eyes, the bags there-under that look like he could probably keep spare change there, becomes evident. He looks like somebody who has never eaten anything in his life but really shitty stake-out food.
Nathan Marszalek
Muscle relaxants and alcohol don't mix. Neither of those things and driving mix. He did not ride his motorcycle today because it is hellishly cold and now that he is back at work and sitting most of the day his back bothers him and something that does not mix with his back bothering him is stairs.
This place has stairs. So many stairs.
His younger sister who is a freshman at UC Berkeley and thinks most people are idiots and ought to be ignored thinks that his editor is the biggest piece of shit this side of the Rocky Mountains and ought to have his tires slashed if nothing else. She would have gotten a bang out of this place. Not because she particularly likes bars or drinking but because it's full of people she could watch and mock.
She would have thought it was stupid that he was going into this place just to try and find a guy but that ties in with her hating his editor. He's here. He's trying to find a guy.
So Nate stands at the head of the second set of stairs and he looks down into the bar and listens to the pianist as he steels himself to go down another flight of stairs. From his perch up here he cannot see Max Mueller. If that is his real name.
This lighting does horrible things to Nate's complexion. His skin catches whatever color neon he happens to stand by. The red and the blue of the sign make him look purple for the moment it takes him to start descending.
Which he does. Nate wants to get this over with.
Nathan Marszalek
[perc + alert!]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (9, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )
Nobody
Unfortunately for Nathaniel, he doesn't bump immediately into a guy who says, Ugh, sorry, only to hurry up the stairs while somebody else says, Max! Yo, Mueller! You dropped your hat! Nope. Unfortunately for Nathaniel, or fortunately, because this way he doesn't need to go up the stairs again right-away, the pallid out-of-shape sucker. He gets to the bottom of the stairs, looks around, and he sees -- nobody that he hadn't seen from his perch above. There's a door past the bar that says gentlemen's room and another past that which says for the ladies. Just like that: for the ladies. There's some old-fashioned picture gleaming too dark to see at a distance but get closer or wonder what the Hell it is for a while and it becomes obvious that it's a powder puff, artistic rendition of. During Nathan's journey down the stairs, the pianist continues to turn the air into a thing of glory, to turn sound into that sense you don't want to lose, take sight, fuck that shit, but he winds up that second dizzying race-past-your-own-fingers break-the-sound-barrier piece of performance into something boozy, woozy, falling-asleep, old-timey to suit the atmosphere.
The bartender doesn't tell Nathan that he doesn't look good, though he gives Nathan a once-over. Asks him what he'll have, and doesn't look too offended if all Nathan says he'll be having is a club soda.
Nate's having a sharp night, so he notices the cat before the cat notices him. There's a cat in the bar, in defiance of health code. It's an orange cat, range-y tom cat thing, white booted tom cat thing, narrow hips and a tail lifting like smoke toward the sky. There's also a guy whose smoking in the corner, though he probably shouldn't be. One of the guys at the table gets up, and his friend switches their drinks when the first guy's back is turned. His friend had more left.
The cat saunters over to investigate Nate.
Nobody
ooc - pffft, make that: Unfortunately for Nathan who was a prophet to the torah but is just some steenking reporter here,
Nathan Marszalek
If he's going to see things he shouldn't be seeing anyway when he's going to at least order a drink. Some bartender at some club Shannon dragged him to months ago guessed a drink he'd like based on looking at him and he hadn't been entirely incorrect. Nate doesn't particularly like the taste of alcoholic beverages but he enjoys the anesthetic effect that alcohol grants him.
So he orders a Manhattan and he doesn't sit down because if he sits down his back is going to lock up on him and that would just be embarrassing.
At first Nate isn't sure the cat is actually there. He ignored it while he was talking to the bartender and taking his billfold out of his back pocket but then there comes a point where he can't ignore it anymore.
Nate glances down at the cat but doesn't address it. Maybe it's not actually here. Maybe he's moved on to seeing the ghosts of dead animals.
The thought is almost enough to make him laugh but looking the way he looks he really does not need to start laughing at nothing in the middle of a bar on a Sunday night. He waits till the bartender comes back and then asks him if he's seen Max around lately. You know. Dark hair, heavyset guy, friends with the guys who run the art gallery across the street, just got outta the clink.
Nobody
D'you know what cats love? People who don't coddle them. Or seem to want them. Or who like dogs better. The cat watches Nathan in that disconcerting way that cats have of watching people. It's a friendly cat, that's all. Looks like it was feral at one point, has been in more than a few fights, but its fur is pretty glossy. The cat puts a paw delicately on Nate's shoe when Nate looks away the first time. Then takes it delicately off when Nate glances down and stifles laughter. Blinks away as if it were never staring at Nate. Stretches back, putting its hindquarters in the air, yawning its mouth tongue curling up, then it sits daintily again and looks up at Nate. Up at Nate. Up at Nate. Over at the stool beside Nate. Up at Nate. Rubs against Nate's pants, leaving behind orange fur. There's probably already orange fur on Nate's plants from Lucy. The cat sniffs delicately at Nate, then hunches down. Wiggles its butt. Stops. Wiggles its butt sommore. Stops when the bartender comes over, answers Nate's question with a frown and a hmm.
"He in some kind of trouble?" is what the bartender asks. The bartender's an older guy, one of those pointed little beards that always somehow looks wet. He seems like he doesn't particularly want to get anybody in trouble. "And uh, define lately."
This is when the cat jumps up onto the stool. It spins, because cat'weight. The cat digs its claws into the faux-leather, ears slicking back and eyes going hunter-dark black and wild and a thrum in the back of its throat until the stool stops spinning. Then it pokes its head up, hunches down once it sees the bartender's still there. Like it doesn't want to be seen.
"Damn it, Boots," the bartender mutters, although it's probably telling that he doesn't reach over to push the cat back down.
Nathan Marszalek
Relief. Great big flood of oh-thank-god relief that looks like the guy is startled or just doesn't like cats when Boots jumps up onto the stool next to him and the bartender curses him.
The guy sticks to business though. Antes up what he owes for the drink in cash and stirs the ice in the highball glass by taking the cherries by their stems and swirling them around.
"'Lately' like--"
Better stop talking like a reporter and start talking like a crook. Which he does not look like. Crooks don't wear khakis and ties unless they're meeting with their parole officers. Maybe he had to go to a wedding today. Whatever. He doesn't come straight out with I'm with the goddamn Denver Post.
He frowns like the implication that Mueller could be in trouble is worrisome for him and decides proper grammar isn't going to be his friend tonight.
"--'since that cop got tagged over on 16th' lately. You heard about that, right?" A beat. "Wait wait wait, hold up, you don't think Max had somethin' to do with that, do you? Why'd he be in trouble?"
Nobody
The cat takes the bartender's muttering plus his interest in Nathan as a sign that it's time for the cat to get up on the barcounter. He does this while Nathan and the bartender are talking, of course. Does it while Nathan says wait wait wait, hold up, and there's a flash of wary amusement coupled with wary weariness in the bartender's eyes for whatever Nathan's making him think. Maybe that's just an effect Max Mueller has on people who recognize his name and hear it coupled with why'd he be in trouble. The bartender does whistle through his teeth -- doesn't even push Boots down from the countertop yet, though he's got a dishrag he wipes after the cat, who's flirting his tail in front of Nathan's nose, doing his best to lean off and sniff at Nate's jacket. Other Cat Smell -- when Nathan says something about that cop.
"Well son," he says, though the bartender's one of those guys who sounds like he calls everybody son semi-ironically, so it's not as patronizing as 'honey' or 'dollface,' "Let's just say that people don't ask for Max unless they're pissed at him. Figured he might've been with your sister or something. I've been taking off for the holiday," which means he's Jewish, or celebrates Thanksgiving for a long time, "but uh. Might've seen him talking to Jack there on Friday night. Paycheck." He shrugs, nods toward the piano player, then slides a little ways down the bar, less as a signal that hey yo we're done here and more to get to the water nozzle which he uses to wet the dish-rag.
Nathan Marszalek
Nate snorts instead of outright laughing at the idea of this guy being with his sister but he catches it at the last sentence and projects an air of yeah fuckin' right like his sister's got too much sense to wind up with a guy like Max Mueller. Or she's a lesbian or something. He doesn't interrupt.
Standing there not drinking his drink while he's talking looks suspicious though. He takes a stiff swallow of the drink as the bartender with the slick facial hair goes on to quantify that he saw him talking to Jack on Friday night and he looks over at the pianist.
He doesn't eat things while he's in the middle of talking to informants. The cherries are giving him something to do with his hands. Nate rattles the ice a few more times as he considers this new information and then takes another swallow.
"What, the guy playin' the piano?"
Trying to figure out who's working for whom and how the paycheck comes into it without using proper Oxford English grammatical structure. Interrogative possessive pronouns and shit. That's usually a pretty good sign you aren't involved in the same shady shit the guys you're asking about are.
Nate eats the cherries just to get it over with and leaves the stems on the napkin.
Nobody
[myst. roll.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 3, 4, 7) ( success x 1 )
Nobody
"That's the one," he says. The water nozzle has left the dish-rag dripping, as wet as that guy's beard looks (even though it's not). He moves closer to Nathan, staying about an arm's length away, and holds the dish-rag over the tomcat.
The tomcat doesn't like this.
The tomcat pretty much looks shocked and dumbfounded and goes clawing/swarming off of the bar's counter with a loud and throbbing yooowwwllllll, and disappears under the table. The table with people.
Nathan Marszalek
He's going to have to try that trick on Lucy the next time she thinks getting up on the counter is a brilliant idea.
"Alright, man. Thanks."
Which is how Nate came to sit at the corner of the bar drinking Manhattans for an unspecified period of time on a Sunday night waiting for a piano player with bad hair and a worse face to stop dazzling his inattentive audience with a gift that doesn't belong in this basement bar.
Music and melancholy don't go together any better than muscle relaxants and anything else but Nate sits and listens to him play even if no one else does.
Nobody
The pianist seems like one of those guys who's going to keep playing until his fingers've been worn to the bone. Literally bone-worn. Flesh shredded-off, blood leaving stain, rivulets of red. The pianist doesn't get a chance to play as much as he'd like. He doesn't have one of these suckers at home and there're too many places where there's a mirror right next to the piano and his superstitious soul goes ker-thud ker-wallop the way a heart might in a dark alley or maybe the numbers are just off. The fact that there're two pianos here bugs him sometimes, a pair instead of an odd number, that's bad luck, after all, that means strange things, but the number of times the pianos are duplicated in posters and pictures around the bar, that makes it better. He knows because he's counted, and he always stops on an even number when he can. Otherwise, it haunts him. Otherwise, he thinks about it when his mind's gone elsewhere and he's nothing but darkness and timelessness, waiting out the sun, in the sunlight's thrall. He doesn't look like a vampire but that's because vampires look like people.
All this to say, the guy is going to keep playing forever while Nathan waits patiently at the end of the bar. Or at least that's what it looks like, until the bartender helpfully says, "Yo, Jack. Courtesy here'd like a word," and Jack stops playing, or at least lets his fingers wander into something quiet and uncomplicated, something that's melody and that's it, frowning over at the bartender until his gaze lights on Nathan.
Which is how Nobody particularly special, although the Muse of Music sure seems to think so, the way she purrs under his fingertips and performs magical tricks, calls a guy who's closer to the dark world -- falling into it, whether he wants to or not; walking both Day-and-Dark, while the shadows lap at his feet -- over to his piano for a tete-a-tete, and nobody the wiser.
"Evening," he says, and the what can i do for you question is buried in the tone of the word. Evening.
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