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The Statesman is a refined, subterranean cocktail lounge with an understated, somewhat unmarked entrance that leads down a staircase into a contemporary bar. While not exactly members-only, the lounge does not accept reservations; instead, the doorman 'takes a look' at prospective patrons before admitting them entrance. There are rumors as to what the exact criteria for admittance is, but no one really knows.
Alain is standing next to a booth table, making her final goodbyes to an associate or a colleague, blonde hair so light and colorless it's nearly silver. She falls back into her seat after the exchange and spares a look at the LED screen of her phone, swiping away something on the device and then turning her attention back to her cocktail, something clear, garnished with a lime, and scans her eyes around the upscale bar in casual curiosity.
Behind the bar is an Ogre in a three-piece; if only Lux could see our boy now. Gallowglass cleans up. He's in a three-piece tailored suit with a crisp linen shirt, his beard trimmed close and shaped. His hair is smoothed back into a tight and orderly queue knotted just above his crisp collar. The dimples are on full display, and his tip jar is crammed.
The building was old enough that she remembered it from when she'd been mortal. She didn't even realize it was exclusive. When she moved to step inside to see what was done with the place, the doorman held the door open for her and she made her entrance. Rosalyn wasn't dressed to the nines. She was, in fact, still wearing the well fitted jodhpurs from work along with a pair of boots and top she'd gotten from Atalo's thrift store. She wore it well though, and to those who could see beneath the mask, her rose-blooming hair glittered gold under the bars lighting. Even to mortal eyes she was perfect, like a model trying to go low key for the day but still having done her makeup to perfection.
Alain drains the remainders from her cocktail and starts to reach for the menu, but it's been taken, and so she glances towards the bar and notices Gallowglass; not for the obvious, but for the other obvious. Well. Obvious to Lost. Did she not notice him before? Her meeting wasn't that interesting. She pushes out of her booth and lingers towards the bar, settling down into a seat at the far corner and getting hold of one of those menus she was after, pale-colored eyes flickering in between the Ogre and the elegant menu card in her hands. "Do you recommend anything?" She has a voice like a bell, and just after voicing the question, she glances over her shoulder to notice Rosalyn, arching a dark blonde eyebrow and nodding her head sideways to indicate the row of seats near her.
Gallowglass begins speaking to Alain without looking up, engrossed in rubbing orange zest around the rim of a glass; when he does look up, the glass spills from his fingers and tumbles to the floor, shattering. He curses quietly, grabbing a towel to pick up and rub his hands clean. "....The Manhattan's pretty good," he manages, clearing his throat.
Ros drifted over, rather bemused by the drastic internal redecorating that had happened, and settled into the seat next to Alain in front of Gallowglass. "I'll have one of those then," she said with a glimmer of amusement. "Nice to meet you both."
Alain creases her features into a wince when the glass goes down. "Sorry..." she mutters apologetically. "Manhattan... sounds great?" she offers. "I'm Alain," she says to both of them.
"No, no," Gallowglass assures Alain, waving a hand. "Don't be, not a problem. Two Manhattans. Rye or Bourbon?" He glances between them, his mouth kicking up at one edge in a dimpled, coy sort of smile. "I think Bourbon. You try it, see what you think." He flips two old-fashioneds to get to work, smoothly working through the comforting routine of fixing good cocktails.
Renault enters the lounge in his usual all black suit, making his way to the bar and sitting. He smiles and nods to both women, and waits for the bartender to be finished making their drinks. “Hello,” he says, turning to the two. “I hope the evening finds you well?”
"Definitely prefer bourbon," she agreed, watching Gal's process for mixing the drinks rather intently. "I'm Rosalyn," she told the other changelings with a smile and a faint stirring of Autumn around her. She tilted her head to look over Renault when he arrives, then smiled politely. "Quite well, thank you." She had a posh, old fashioned trans-Atlantic accent, everything pronounced just so.
"Then bourbon," Alain agrees, curving her pale, pink mouth into a less wincing and more gracious smile, if a small one. Just Snowskin things. She watches the Ogre for a second longer as he turns his focus to the drinks, and then slides her attention to Rosalyn. "Rosalyn. Pleasure," she inclines her head in a small nod, and then makes a similar one to Renault. "Productive. Yourself?"
Gallowglass sets out two napkins - cloth squares, of course - and sets down their cocktails, dropping a cherry in each before gesturing. "All yours, ladies." Large hands move to his hips to anticipate their first sips, gaze shifting between Rosalyn and Alain; his attention snags briefly on Alain, loitering there.
He watches the little tasting with interest, gaze flickering to the bartender and then to Rosalyn.
Ros took a sip and then gave the Summer a little salute. "Nicely done," she complemented. "Just the right proportions. Then she speared the cherry with her straw and ate it. "My favorite part," she told Gal with a grin.
Alain accepts the Manhattan gratefully and graciously from Gallowglass and raises the glass a few inches in his direction, and then towards Rosalyn and Renault as well. "May you live all the days of your life," she muses in a toast.
That same half-smile blossoms on his features; he lifts a glass of clear beverage, toasting, and takes a drink. "Glad you both approve. Ain't seen neither of you before, I don't think."
He clears his throat softly, glancing to the bartender before smiling to the two women. “And all the nights, too,” he says with a nod.
"That's funny," Alain says back to Gallowglass, a small grin tugging at the corners of her features. "I was going to say the same to you." She flickers her gaze to Renault, and shrugs her shoulders. "Ah, you'll have to take it up with Jon Swift with your edits. I admit the toast is not an Alain original," she winks.
"Always steal from the best. It shows excellent taste and wit." She laughed and winked to Alain. "No need to tell the entire world your secrets."
"I mean, I'm easy t'look over," he tells Alain, leaning on the bar; he gives her space, but his posture suggests he's confiding great secrets in her. "Short, meek. I get why you ain't seen me. Doesn't explain how I missed you." His lips tug to one side in a roguish sort of grin. "I'm just fillin' in here for th'night."
He chuckles. “I know Swift. The addition was a Renault original.” His accent is a rough Parisian one, his words all burred and slurred. He looks to Gallowglass. “May I order now, or are you only tending for them tonight?”
"If my secrets were so easily Googled, I'm sure I would have a host of other problems," Alain rejoins to Rosalyn from behind the rim of her glass with a congenial curl of the corners of her mouth that closely approximates a grin, which she then turns on Gallowglass, huffing a single, audible syllable that could be a laugh. "Yeah, I can see how your diminutive stature must work against you," she quips. "I work a lot," is all she offers in explanation.
Ros took another measured sip of the Manhattan and leaned back in her chair, ankles crossed quite properly. "As for myself, I just moved back to Philadelphia and decided to see what became of this old place. It's too bad for the establishment that you're only here as a temp." Ros nodded to is too jar. "You're clearly favored by the patrons."
"It's a good place," he tells the ladies, sketching a tiny half-bow. "Excuse me for a moment." With that, he flicks his attention to Renault. He is stiffly formal, regarding the man with a neutral expression. "Happy to serve you, sir. How can I help you?"
@Guy/Renault(DT-he/him) it's been 10 minutes, are you going to post?))
“Cognac Sazerac, please,” he says with a smile and nod to Gallowglass. Turning to Alain and Rosalyn, he taps his chin. “Is tonight business or leisure?”
Alain sets her drink down, idly drags a fingertip along the base of the perspiring glass. "Where were you before Philadelphia?" she wonders at Rosalyn. "It started out business, and I think it's starting to tend the other way," Alain returns to Renault. "Yourself? The latter, I assume?"
"Stuck out on a sleepy little estate," she said vaguely. "I'm an equestrian instructor and trainer, and came back here to work at one of the big stables in the city."
Gallowglass nods and reaches above the bar to pull down a balloon snifter, pouring the Cognac against the side of the glass to prevent any turbulence. He flips a napkin down in front of Renault before setting the glass out.
He sips the drink and nods to Gallowglass. “Excellent, thank you.” He makes a bit of an exaggerated thinking expression to Alain before saying, “Ah, I think my business for the the night is concluded. Leisure it is, yes. I find a drink before reading to be quite relaxing.”
"An equestrian instructor and trainer," Alain repeats, enthused by the prospect. "That's fascinating, so do you keep horses as well?" she wonders, a bit brighter at the mention of animals, her Mantle ripening the air to a crispness as she retrieves and sips again from her Manhattan, giving Gallowglass a smile from behind the rim of it, another approving gesture of his mixology skills. "And what's your business, then?" she wonders at Renault. "Or, more interestingly, your books?"
"I'll introduce you to Elio sometime," she promised Alain. "He's mine but I don't own any of the horses that board at Monastery. Honestly, the place costs an arm and a leg but it's a good place with access to the parks."
Gallowglass keeps working the bar; luckily, it's not that busy so that he can still socialize with the interesting people. He works his way back, giving Alain a quick smile and a wink as he unloads clean glassware into the rack.
"Oh, I would enjoy that immensely," Alain beams back at Rosalyn. "Horses are magnificent animals. It's been ages since I rode, but even their company is soothing," she muses, and before long, she's found the bottom of that Manhattan. "It looks like I must rely on you once again," she supposes in Gallowglass' direction.
“Ah, horses. Noble creatures, though I never had the pleasure of riding. Tis a shame, really.”
"You can always sign up for lessons. We offer both group and individual lessons." Ros was taking her drink slowly, barely half finished when Alain was asking for more. "What do the rest of you do? Even you, big guy, you mentioned you're just here filling in tonight?"
Gallowglass gives Alain that affable smirk, collecting her empty; he works at making a fresh cocktail for her, careful and deft in his routine. "Yeah. I pick up bartending jobs when I can. I'm a tattoo apprentice, do some odd jobs here and there. Whatever I can pick up, t'be honest."
"I work for a charity," Alain puts in. "And do some things with City Hall. It's mostly paperwork. I used to be a Foreign Service Officer, but, I decided I wanted to do something more local," she explains with a polite smile.
The good thing about the fact that the doorman isn't paying much attention at the moment means that Sturm is free to wander into the bar and de-class the place. 'Cause she absolutely isn't dressed for an outing to a fancy bar like this one.
The 6'11" Winter shuffles inside, and a brief moment of brisk cold hits the lungs of the patrons following her arrival. Wearing a black leather jacket atop faded/stressed jeans, and an old iron maiden shirt, she slides onto a stool at the bar near the group - regarding Alain with a cold side eye (probably on account of that Gentrified Bearing of hers) before producing a wallet from her front pocket and ordering a coke with a grumble.
Oh yeah, also. There's one piece of her appearance that really stands out from the rest of her street clothes: a sapphire necklace on a short, almost-choker length chain.
Renault snaps his fingers. “Ah! My apologies. Yes, my work is as a lay leader at Epic, the church. I do Bible and theological studies. As for books, tonight I was looking forward to ‘2666’.”
Ros glanced past Renault to see Sturm enter the place. She stood out so impressively that it was impossible to miss the Winter "What is a 2666?"
Alain seems relatively unfazed by Sturm's chilly look askance; more than likely, she's become a bit used to that reaction by now from other Lost, and one could perhaps deduce it's some explanation as to why she's not a more regular face around the Freehold. She meets it with an amiable, slight upturning of the corners of her mouth and a nod of her head, polite and unbothered. "Can't say I'm familiar with it either," she admits to Renault and Rosalyn.
Gallowglass glances to the door, and then again; if anything, he looks relieved at seeing someone taller. He pours a coke into a frosted glass, setting it out in front of the giantess.
He glances over his shoulder and, to his credit, only blinks once in surprise before turning back to the others. “Post-Modern novel set in Mexico. Really interesting stuff.”
Sturm withdraws a twenty dollar bill, and a photograph from her wallet. She stuffs the money into Gal's tip jar, and slides the other across the bar. "Do a lady a favor, if you would." Her voice is quiet. "This guy comes in - or goes out - you bring me another Coke no matter how full my glass is." The coolness of the frosty glass doesn't even seem faze her as she grabs it and takes a sip. Ahhh thank God for caffeine.
Alain arches a curious brow at Sturm's quiet request to Gallowglass, but sips from her Manhattan, bobbing her head at Renault's brief explanation. Her phone starts to buzz, and she flips it over to eye the LED screen that uplights her bizarrely well-placed features. "Mm," is all she says, and her tone conveys even less. "It has been lovely to meet you all, but I'm afraid I'm in danger of keeping someone waiting." She closes her tab, doubling the bill for the tip, and makes a polite exit. ((thank you all for the RP! sorry to jet on you so quickly, Sturmy! :heart: gotta do the spoops!))
Gallowglass slides the photograph - and the twenty - off the bar and simply nods once to Sturm, as if that's all he needs to know. "You got it. Happy to do a favor for a lady," he murmurs, giving her a small, crooked smile.
Ros raised an eyebrow at the Winter, and tried to get a peek of the photo as Sturm passed it over to Gal, then gave Alain a friendly smile. "It was nice to meet you. I'm sure we'll see one another again soon."
He raises his glass to Alain. “May the night treat you well.” Looking to the large newcomer, he nods. “It is a pleasure. How are you this fine evening?”
"Appreciate it," the slips the photograph - it's of a semi-regular patron, a man with plain features and dark hair - back into her wallet once Gallowglass has had a moment to familiarize with it's likeness.
... and then - after a grumbled goodbye to the other snowskin - she slumps over the bar, leaning on her elbows. "Well. 's trying to kill me, so I'll live. How about you, Mr. Bible Study?" Beat. "Oh, hey Ros. I almost didn't recognize you without your friend."
"There are jokes about horses walking into bars, but people tend to frown on bringing them along in actuality," she said with a chuckle. "How are you doing? Beyond the lack of attempts on your life."
"That's fair. Been helping some friends remodel and expand their basement, so my downtime has become work." She offers a shrug, sipping at her drink. She, of course, doesn't say why she's helping these "friends" remodel their basement, but the corner of her frown wobbles slightly. Like maybe it was threatening to smirk. "You? How's... whatever you do treating you?"
Gallowglass keeps refilling glasses, working the bar, racking up those tips. He stops in front of Renault and Rosalyn, gesturing to their glasses with a raised brow. "Refills? Need somethin' different?" He tosses a cherry into Rosalyn's glass regardless, crooked smile in place.
“An Aviation, please,” he says to Gal as he finishes his drink, offering a polite nod. “I’m well, thank you,” he says to Sturm. “I’m just enjoying my evening, hoping to find good conversation.”
Ros winked at Gallowglass when he gave her another cherry and murmured, "I'm fine right now, thank you. And things in general are going fine right now too. I've settled in as well as can be, and have my feet again. How do the two of you know one another?"
"Just met," she grunts, turning up her palms and shrugging. "Which is to say that I know him the same way I know you."
"Well the best way to make friends is to actually meet them first," Rosalyn said optimistically. "As difficult as that can be at times."
Gallowglass nods to the pair; he collects the creme d'violette to make Renault's drink, swapping out his empty snifter for the martini glass.
He sips, grinning. “Thank you,” he says to Gal, then raising his glass to the others. “To meeting new people.”
Sturm's brow furrows at the toast, but she offers a perfunctory tilt of her mug. Y'know, toasting with your half-empty, frosty glass of cola. Like a real class act. She drains the rest of her drink, and taps the side of it with a fingernail. Clink clink clink. She nods at Gal behind the bar. "So, Roslyn. You met Sigrun, right?"
"I did have the pleasure just the other afternoon." Rosalyn nodded. "It was only briefly but I hope to make her further our acquaintance soon. Her horse was absolutely stunning, and Elio enjoyed her company in the paddock for a while."
Gallowglass definitely knows bartender sign language; he collects a fresh frosty mug for her pop and takes his time pouring, all to give her the best, full glass without a lot of foam.
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