Snippet #2551497

Well, this had turned into a regular little pow-wow, hadn't it?

It probably went without saying that Izzie was nowhere to be found in the vicinity-- probably back in her hotel room, doing something really exciting, like reading, or sleeping. But the rest of the gang was here, in spades: Craig and Kodie, Charlotte, a couple of her bandmates, the two guitarists from Legion... and of course, one Cormac Ryan McMurphy, currently mildly inebriated and rather enthralled with the conversation he was maintaining with the mute drummer from Legion.

"Wait, so..." Cormy gestured vividly with his hands in a general expression of bafflement and inability to understand, his face screwed up in a show of confusion. "Palm reading? You can tell peoples' fortunes just by feeling out their hands?"

Lestari nodded her head vivaciously in affirmation, adding by way of her notebook, It's an ancient and respected practice amongst my people, one that only a select few are permitted to study.

Well, his brain may well have been currently bathing in the finest booze Baltimore had to offer, but even so, this was pushing it a little bit for Cormac. His expression pulled taut into a certain sort of scepticism, and he tentatively ventured, "I dunno, I hear that sorta thing is kinda-- like, y'know..." He winced a little bit, before finishing, "... fake?" The profoundly insulted look that flitted across Lestari's features sufficed in leading Cormac to conclude he had been quite right to hesitate (though he didn't quite pick up on the hint of a smile Lestari was failing to suppress at that point), and it didn't hurt that she took it upon herself to indignantly scrawl upon her notebook and hold up her retort. It is a sacred art! Who do you think you are to disrespect my culture's traditions simply because you don't understand them?

"I'm sorry!" Cormac raised his hands as if in surrender. "It's just..." He struggled to figure out a tactful way to express his sentiments on the subject, before finally blurting out, "In this... uh, culture, people tend to think that kinda thing is, like, pseudoscie-- subosci--" He frowned as he found himself drunkenly stumbling upon the word, before finally managing to mumble, "Sumo-scientific."

Lestari merely shook her head vehemently. Look, she offered, showing him the single word before turning the notebook around to add, I'll even prove it to you. Give me your hand. She provided him all of about a half a second to read what she'd written before she set the notebook aside and reached over to grab his smaller hand in her own. Cormac found himself staring down as if stricken, holding his breath as he felt the rough skin of her fingers tracing along the contours of his palm, her eyes behind the aegis of her glasses inspecting the lines. They remained as such for about a minute, before two things happened: Lestari withdrew her hand, nodding sagely as though she'd come to a profound and indisputable understanding about the man before her, and Cormac finally let his breath loose, having been on the verge of going purple in the face.

"Well?" he ventured, once he was done wheezing and gasping for breath as though he'd just been saved from drowning. "What have you discerned of my destiny?"

Lestari raised her eyes to meet his, and he found an unusually grave expression about them, as though she wasn't sure how to tell him what she'd just discovered. "Go on," he urged, finding himself a little unsettled despite his professed scepticism. "Give it to me straight. I can take it." Lestari shook her head ruefully, and took up her notebook, before scrawling, Well, I dunno how to tell you this, but... you're Irish.

Cormac nearly fell over in his seat. "Impossible!" the dude with an Irish flag plastered across his back and the name 'Cormac Ryan McGoddamnMurphy' exclaimed in disbelief. "How can you tell something like that just from looking at my palm?" Realising he was making himself look like a fool in light of his prior doubt, however, the young drummer cleared his throat, and moulded his expression into one of suspicion. "I dunno," he declared in a decidedly dubious tone. "It still seems kinda shady if you ask me. Like, maybe you're just one of those people who can, like, look at somebody's face and tell where their great-great-great-great-great grandparents came from. I'm not convinced."

Lestari merely shrugged her broad shoulders. Oh ye of little faith, she couldn't help but jest, before adding, Perhaps something of a more personal nature will persuade you of my skills? Cormac mulled it over for a moment, tossing the question about in his inebriated little skull, before steeling his jaw and answering, "Alright then. Let's do it. Tell me something about myself-- my personality, something you can't tell by looking at me." He held his hand out to her, and she took it again, repeating the process. This time it was much quicker: it was only perhaps thirty seconds before Lestari set his hand down, grabbed her notebook, and wrote down, You're gullible.

Cormac's expression wore the sort of shock that was normally reserved for people who have just been informed that they've won a hundred billion dollars and a date with the ghost of Chuck Schuldiner. "Dude," he breathed in awe. "Like... everybody who's known me for more than like a year tells me I'm gullible. Who-- how the hell'd you-- ?"

Seemed she had him convinced now-- and that meant it was time to break out the big guns, the entire point of this little charade she'd been leading the little Irish drummer on. It was time for her to exact her revenge. Actually, you know, she began scribbling away. I did feel something a lot deeper when I was delving into your... Uh. ... persona to find that last bit. Something maybe you don't even know.

Cormac's brow furrowed. "Something I don't know?" he replied-- but the doubt in his tone had been entirely dashed by what was clearly Lestari's clairvoyant powers. There was even something a little like anxiety to his words, as though he feared what he did not know about himself. Lestari's expression was grim, but she nodded, and Cormac bit his lip. "Well," he ventured reluctantly. "I guess I'd be remiss to neglect an opportunity to understand myself better." He made a show of sitting up straight in his chair and setting his jaw hard and rigid in a display of grit and willpower, not unlike a condemned individual staring death in the eyes, and finished, "Alright."

Lestari forced herself to choke down the triumphant smile threatening to pull taut the corners of her lips as she reached out one more time and took Cormac's hand in her own, inspecting it and coursing her fingertips along its creases. Her brow creased, and her lips went thin, as though she were conducting some strenuous labour, before she reached over to her notebook with the pencil in her hand and, without releasing Cormac's palm with her other hand, wrote and held up, You... there's somebody in your life...

"Somebody in my life?"

Yes... a woman. A woman that you... She paused writing briefly, her fingers digging into the skin of Cormac's palm, before she finished, A woman that you feel very strongly about. A woman that you love.

"I-- love?" Cormac squeaked. Lestari nodded her head solemnly, but pressed a finger to her lips; Cormac obediently kept his lips sealed as she continued to go about her work. After all, he didn't wanna distract her. This was clearly serious business-- serious enough that Lestari was even transcribing ellipses into the things she was writing as if to denote hesitation. That serious.

This woman... Lestari began to write almost absent-mindedly into her notebook as the fingertips of her other hand traced along Cormac's palm, reading into his destiny, into his very soul (or, more accurately, adding a little theatrical flair to her bullshit). She's... quite close to you. Somebody you've played music with, perhaps?

Played music with? Cormac immediately began mulling over the various female musicians he'd played with in recent history. Well, there was Charlotte, of course-- and, well, sure, he liked her, but he wasn't in love with her. As for Edei... well, much the same could be said, couldn't it? He wasn't sayin' he'd be runnin' for the hills if she expressed any romantic interest in him (you know, supposing she ever came back from whatever situation had necessitated her swift departure), but he certainly couldn't say he was deeply, passionately in love with her or anything. And as for Kodie-- shit, he'd only just met her a few days ago. Cormac had heard of 'love at first sight', sure, but he really didn't think 'the scruffy little drummer and the frosty black metal bassist' was the sort of thing that came to mind at that phrase.

So then... who could it be?

As if on cue, Lestari's notebook appeared held up before him once again. She's a rather tall woman, it seems, she had written. Quite well-built too, I think. Tall and well-built... and someone he'd played music with... Cormac's brow furrowed in puzzlement as he attempted to guess at the identity of his evident one true love. None of the three women who came to mind when he thought of people he'd played with in the recent past or was now playing with fit all those criteria: none of them were exactly bodybuilders, and though Kodie had a couple inches of height on him, she was also almost as lanky.

"I got nothin'," he admitted.

Lestari gawked at the dude as though unable to believe anybody could be so inconceivably thick, before suppressing the urge to roll her eyes and continuing, figuring if it got to the point where she'd set everything right in front of him and he still couldn't work it out she'd just tell him the damn name herself. She's a guitarist and a vocalist, she added slowly. Of... hmm. Hispanic descent, I think?

"Tall, well-built, guitarist, vocalist, Hispanic..." Cormac's voice trailed off as he listed the various things he now knew about his mystery beau. He had to admit, she was sounding more and more like Ricky Ricardo with every word-- hell, if the next words Lestari wrote down were 'she also plays the conga drum, is prone to bouts of harried Spanish ranting, and is married to an ambitious redhead', he'd probably have to dye his hair and start calling himself Lucy. But-- naw, really though. Who had he worked with who fit all those criteria? He was drawin' a blank here. Had he even ever played with a Hispanic woman before? Hell, now that he thought of it, he--

... oh. Oh.

"Oh!" Cormac damn near hurled up off of his seat with an exclamation that, he felt, aptly conveyed the amalgamation of shock, bafflement, horror, and astonishment he was feeling at that point. A quick glance around him revealed he'd managed to attract the attention of half the bar in his awe, and so he forced himself to speak in hushed tones as he whispered, "Izzie? I'm in love with Izzie?"

Lestari nodded silently. The palm doesn't lie, the motion seemed to say.

"But-- but that doesn't... that doesn't make sense--" Cormac sputtered for a moment, before he began to recover his senses and he began to realise... really, what about it didn't make sense? She was a talented musician, she was scary smart, there was no question of whether or not she was strong, and... and hell, she was even somewhat not-an-asshole sometimes! She could be domineering, sure, but... uh... well, obviously that was just because she cared about the music! He could respect that. Passion for music was a good thing. Hell, framed in that light, he actually couldn't think of any reason not to be in love with her. I mean, really, it all made sense.

"Oh my god," Cormac whispered as though he'd just come to the most earth-shattering epiphany of his entire existence. I'm in love with Izzie Martinez.

"Bartender," he called out. "I'm gonna need more beer. Lots more."






"... so anyway, that was right about the time Liam here jumped into the van and drove off to get Chris to the exorcist while Lestari 'n I stayed behind to hold off the demonic hordes."

Alex paused her little tale to take another quick sip of water-- no booze for her tonight, she wasn't gonna risk the temptation. Chris had, perhaps wisely, seen fit to opt out of the festivities tonight, considering his experiences with alcohol the past few times they'd gone out to bars across the course of this tour. Honestly, she'd considered doing the same-- but hey, people from three different bands were gonna be drinking here, and that meant something funny, amusing, and/or embarrassing was probably gonna happen at some point tonight. And damned if Alex Rykov wasn't gonna be there to watch it happen.

She was about to finish up her story when out of nowhere, like a shambling, decrepit zombie risen from the crypt, Cormac came shuffling by... and then right past them. Then he turned around again, and did the same thing. He walked by the little group about a half a dozen times before, on the last pass, he stopped, blinked, looked at them, and then recoiled as if in horror. "Shit! There you guys are!"

Alex raised an eyebrow, but he was already headed for his own bandmates. "Hey. D-- dude, dude." Cormy reached a hand out to pat Craig on the shoulder-- or was that Kodie? Actually, that might've been Kodie. He really wasn't sure. They both had long hair, after all. And pale, Scandinavian skin. And a really nice pair of--

He frowned. Actually, he was pretty sure this wasn't Craig.

Either way. "Dude, hold my drink, will ya," he mumbled, before dropping one of those little cocktail umbrellas you get with real highfalutin drinks into said individual's lap. "I gotta... gotta go confess my love to Izzie... tell 'er that I 'ppreciate 'er, 'n... 'n like, love 'er, 'n... " Before anybody of a mind to respond could do so, he suddenly bellowed, "NO, man. I'm COOL. I'm FINE. I GOT this. I-- I..."

And just like that, Cormac McMurphy forgot how to stand, and straight down to the floor he went.

"Why is this always happening," he sighed from down on the floor.