they called her silence

[Sleven]

It was late Sunday evening at Phillies Bar and the customers had all come and gone. Only the night hawks remained. Peering inwards past the transparisteel glass one's eyes might find a familiar canvas among the canopy of Coruscant's skyward towers:

A lone bartender served the remaining three patrons diligently, reinvigorated by the knowledge that the night would soon come to a close--even for these dedicated few. A young woman sat at the end of the bar closest to the gate, face obfuscated by an irregularly large pair of sunglasses. Her lithe frame clung tightly to itself as she cradled a pulpy red drink in a long glass. Shoulders slouched and a sigh weighing heavily upon her breath she looked only downwards at her glass. The red liquid reflected her tussled hair, tied loosely into a bun. Her garb fit much the same: a black top draped itself in layers of folds before falling into the waist of a stripped calf-length skirt that flared with colors, her slender thighs protruding from the side slits.

Thoughts were almost palpable on her brow and if her clothing hadn't given her away, the smudged markings on her wrist spoke to a night on the town. Shifting her forearm slightly she gazed into each of them as foci for her musings before teetering her glass to her lips in an endless processional of sips.

 

[Toska]

Closing time time came again and found Ambrose sitting on a stool, hunched over his drink and dragging at the chewed off end of a long dead cigarette. His eyes were worn, purpled and deprived of sleep that left him haggard in dreamscape wakes; he snuffed the last night's tab, ordered a whisky sour to chase away his forgotten chit. Stiff, no ice, a heaping of lemon lifting him to a crooning shake of the head.

With nub hitting the bar, his gaze caught in lolling drags that followed the bartender's methodical cleaning, he parsed himself a pat on the back. Stiffened up his collar, shirt wrinkled and loosened at the top two buttons. Conversations were held in raised voices prior, shifting with the mesmerizing tide of goings on and meandering to state worth and worthwhile rote. Charming, even as it leadened his lids.

A sidelong nod kept him in placid waters. Face molded in flat lines and careening brows, he snuck a sip. Fished out a look to the woman nearest by: Glasses in dark ambiance. Hair nestled above the neck. Long in the tooth of a night still young, far off from the closing tabs and silent brows of last call that resigned to stay until dawn kissed through the tinted windows.

"That's Madder's," he said, shifting shoulders to focus his voice on her, "quite the place, but a ghosttown before nine."

 

[Sleven]

Despite his proximity the man's words echoed to her ears as if carried from a great distance. Their abject quality lingered on the periphery of her consciousness. Her head stirred--a slight cock to the side--and there it froze, in tandem with her last thought.

"Madder's," she addressed the man before looking down at the markings on her wrist. "I wouldn't know. Can't say I've been to any of them before eleven."

 

[Toska]

Cock of a grin met her turning head; Ambrose offered up a shrug for the drowned remains of his cup. The dash of lemon left rinds in the bottom, ground up and curdled at the end of his drink. Last call, and he called for another glass. Little else to do. He slumped over the bar. Cedar to elbow, brass to heel, he rocked on the stool with his coat flared out at the tail.

"A real night owl," came his reply, dry at the lips and licked with a kiss of whisky. "What, here to enjoy the dawn?"

 

[Sleven]

When last call came she shook a few credits from a pouch in her skirt and placed them haphazardly on the bar counter.

"Just remedying a day-long hangover and a night of unwanted advances," she said with a revealing tilt of her glass. "What about you, here to play the sloven drunk?"