andhiswife | (no subject)

Greta isn't normally up this late, but she also isn't normally perfecting a recipe under severe time constraints. She's beginning to think this bloody contest will be the death of her. She's beginning to think she might win.

She doesn't want any fae help in that regard, so she's asked Sweeney not to apply his luck to her efforts in the tent. (Well, she'd asked after a few of the early episodes, after it occurred to her to wonder if other bakers' nervous mistakes and her own fortunate guesses were entirely coincidental.) But she's still leaving out offerings for him. She's not a fool. He might respectfully refrain from giving her good luck in the tent, but she suspects he'd apply bad luck wherever he pleased.

So there's a chocolate-dipped biscotti pinning a napkin to the windowsill. It's only open a few inches, dispelling the heat and moisture from both baking and scrubbing up. She's wiping down the counters when she sees a small, pale hand pluck the offering from its resting place, and she stiffens in surprise. Squinting past the kitchen's reflections, she sees a flash of red hair a good foot or so lower than she'd expect it to be, and a smirking, female face.

"Wh--!" She doesn't stop to consider that there might be two leprechauns in the city. All she can think is that someone who isn't Sweeney has just helped themselves to his offering, and her indignation has her flying out the back door with a broom in hand before common sense can catch up with her. "I beg your pardon!" she snaps, her tone suggesting she shouldn't be the one begging.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Christ, lass, mind the fuckin' broom!" Sweeney answers, half the biscotti already in his mouth when Greta comes flying out the back door. For a bit now, he's forgotten he's all wrong these past few days, he'd just gotten the sense that he ought to stop by Greta's and see what she's left behind for him and that'd been the end of that. Decision made without a second thought and he hadn't even bothered to let anyone know where he was going.

Not that he usually would. Things are just a bit... different these days, that's all.

Still, it doesn't occur to him that he's different until she comes storming out in a huff and then he's laughing and half choking on crumbs, holding up his hands, one still clutching the biscotti. Greta, he has no doubt, would whip someone halfway back to town if she thought they were taking his offerings and it's sweet, really, that she gives a shit at all. It's been a long time since he's had anything like that.

"It's Sweeney," he says. "Just a bit out altered this week is all."

"You're Sweeney?" The broom wavers, but Greta keeps brandishing it at... whoever this is. They do sound like Sweeney, sort of. But while she's seen the city play about with people's ages, this is the first she's heard of it giving them entirely new bodies.

And if there is another leprechaun in Darrow, she wouldn't expect them to give her an honest answer just because they've presumed to take one of her offerings.

"A bit short for it," she says, giving them a dubious once over. "Why should I believe you?"

"Christ's blood," he mutters, stuffing the rest of his biscotti into his mouth. A second later, his hand free, his coin appears in a flash of light and he makes it dance across his knuckles for a moment before tossing it into the air where it disappears again. "You live here with that black haired man who's handsome enough, but seems awful buttoned up, you ask me, lass. And Saoirse, who's a selkie and didn't used to talk all that much, given that someone had taken her bloody skin. You got a dog and you inherited this place from a friend who disappeared, that feisty red haired woman with skin like a bloody porcelain cup."

He knows far too much about the people who leave him offerings. For the most part, he doesn't talk about it all that much, knowing it's an uncomfortable thing, but it comes with the territory. A man can only give luck to situations he understands and he can only understand people by knowing about them.

"Proof enough or shall I go on?" he asks. "You want t'know about me, too? You helped me bury a goddamn body a few months back. Laura."

The broom's business end drops to the deck with a rustle. Sneaky as the fae might be, she doesn't expect a stranger could know all that. His little editorial remarks are also inescapably Sweeney-esque, and she scoffs, tempted to wallop him with the broom, anyway, albeit for a different reason than the original.

Instead, she holds up a hand to forestall any more choice remarks about her loved ones or her more questionable decisions. "All right, enough. For goodness' sake."

And she knows she shouldn't justify any of his opinions with a response, but she can't resist muttering, "'Buttoned up,'" shortly followed by an insistent, "I'm working on it." Progress might be a bit slower than she likes, but that doesn't mean it's not happening.

She sighs, then gestures to him. "So this is a thing the city's doing, now? How long have you been like this?"

"Few days now," he answers. "Don't think it's a new thing, though, Spike's heard of it happening to some folks over the years. He didn't seem all that surprised to wake up and find me like this."

Spike's not a topic he discusses much with other people. While Sweeney doesn't much care who knows what about his sex life, he's had to acknowledge to himself that things with Spike are different, for all he doesn't want them to be. For the first time in a very long time, besides Laura, he actually gives a shit. And he can't pretend Laura was anything but exactly what she was. Not a thing meant for a man like him, not even a black hearted woman like her.

But he mentions Spike now without thinking. Because Greta's different, too, in her way. Greta's been something different for him, someone he actually trusts, as much as he can.

"Oh." She'll have to ask Thomas if he's ever heard of such a thing, or seen it happen. Maybe it's even happened to him, and he hasn't thought to mention it.

It ought to be a more absorbing thought, but then Sweeney mentions a 'Spike,' and him waking up to find him like this, and her eyebrows tick up in irrepressible interest. She's not sure what exactly Sweeney gets up to in his wealth of free time, and if pressed to guess, she wouldn't get much more specific than 'trouble.' That might be less because her imagination fails her, and more because she's inclined to respect his privacy. Still, she wouldn't have thought he'd, er... settle with anyone enough to casually speak of waking up beside them.

But this sort of snooping seems unlikely to leave her with bullet wounds or a ruined dress. And if he really didn't want to talk about it, he wouldn't have said anything at all, surely. "I see," she says, the lilt in her voice and the smile playing about her lips suggesting, you sly dog. "Well, d'you want to come in? Have a drink?" It's a rather transparent ploy to lure him into a conversation about this Spike fellow, but she's not trying to be subtle; she knows she hasn't the knack for it. The worst he can do is refuse.

There are people in Darrow he's grown to like, much as he might deny it or wish it weren't the case, but it's happened all the same and Greta is certainly near the top of the list. It's not due to her offerings that he cares. He'd say it were, he'd blame it on the bread and the cakes and the fucking biscotti, but in truth, he likes her spirit. Respects the way she holds herself, her loyalty, the way she says what she means and still remains kind.

And he likes that kid she's taken in, too, also despite himself.

So she invites him in and even though he's seen the way her eyebrows lift, even though he hears her tone of voice and sees the smile she's wearing, he agrees without a thought. Because he likes being around her. Because the last time he had anything worth gossiping about, it had been so bloody long ago he can't remember.

"Can't say no to that, now can I, lass?" he asks in return, already coming closer to the house.

He could have, tempting as the offer might have been, so she has to bite back a giddy grin when he accepts. Just because she's curious doesn't mean she has to be annoying about it. "Come on, then," she says, waving him through the back door.

Sadie looks briefly nonplussed, muzzle puffed out with a wariness that isn't quite worth resolving into a bark. But after a moment of sniffing, her tail starts to wag, and she prances up to Sweeney as if his new body was no more off-putting than a new shirt. And maybe it's not, for a creature with a sharp enough nose. Maybe he smells exactly the same as he always has.

"I don't believe I've met this Spike of yours," she says as she pulls a couple of beers out of the fridge and sets a few more assorted baked goods on a plate, her tone deliberately casual. Subtlety is not her strong suit -- never really has been -- but she can be curious without being a pest, she thinks. Which she demonstrates by not making any obnoxious remarks about what a strange name Spike is. "Has he been here long?"

This Spike of yours.

Mad Sweeney doesn't like to think about how much he likes that. It sends a shiver of discomfort and pleasure both running down his spike and he tries to scowl at Greta, though she won't know why he's scowling or that he's doing it at all, given that he's looking down at Sadie and stroking her ears. He likes dogs and he likes Sadie, but he's mostly giving her a rub now so he can avoid meeting Greta's gaze.

"Yeah," he says with a little shrug. "Long time from the sounds of it. Used to be he was married and had a kid, but she and the kid disappeared. And he's not my anything. Just... fuckin' Spike."

It's because he likes how it sounds so much that he has to specify at all. They're not a thing, they're just fucking, he needs to make that clear, because if it's not clear to other people, it's less than fucking clear to him, too. And he doesn't need that. At seven hundred goddamn years old, he doesn't need the stress of wondering what he is to someone. To anyone.

Greta lifts her head, a distant memory niggling at her -- something she might have forgotten entirely, if not for the singular cruelty of tearing a family in half like that being impossible to cast aside. "Oh--oh. I think I have heard of him, actually. I used to know someone who..." she trails off with a bewildered blink. God, here's a path she hadn't expected to wander down tonight. She doesn't much want the conversation to turn to more people who have been lost over the years, either; she didn't invite him in to commiserate.

Sweeney might try to steer things elsewhere -- 'just fuckin' Spike,' indeed -- but that doesn't mean she has to make it easy for him.

"Never mind," she says briskly. "I haven't met him, in any case." She gives Sweeney a thoughtful look, guessing how poorly a question like 'is he nice' would go over. Presuming Sweeney's even in the market for nice, which she doubts. "Sounds like he's a friend, at least," she ventures, setting snacks and beverages on the table. "Has he been leaving things out for you, too?" How else do leprechauns meet people, or decide people are worth noticing? Granted, Sweeney's spell of bad luck probably made for plenty of opportunities to catch someone's eye, just not in a very positive way, she should think.

She knows Spike's wife. Or knows someone who knows her. Knew her, whatever the fuck tense he's supposed to use for someone who has disappeared, but isn't dead. There's something there, something Greta isn't saying, and Sweeney knows he could be an asshole and press it, but ultimately he decides not to. Not yet anyway. He may still decide to follow that path if she decides to give him a hard time about other things.

He's not even sure he'd call Spike a friend. But then, he's not sure he'd call many people his friends, even the ones close to him. There's something inherently dangerous about being too friendly with a leprechaun and he might not be able to control it on their behalf, but at the very least, he can make sure not to use the wrong language that might end up invoking the anger of some ancient Irish god he's not even aware exists any longer.

"Christ, no," he says, shaking his head. "No, love, I avoid lettin' people get into that habit wherever possible. If anything, I'm the one giving offerings to him." That sounds fucking ridiculous the second it's out of his mouth and he shoves one of the snacks into his mouth so he can avoid putting his foot in there any further.

She takes his insistence that he'd rather people not leave him offerings with a substantial grain of salt. It's not that she thinks he's lying -- not with his luck so freshly turned -- but that she can well imagine how he might react if she just stopped putting out offerings for him, and with gratitude isn't it. Maybe he's not encouraging it, but she doesn't think he's discouraging it, either.

But the second bit surprises her. "O-oh." A few obvious and rather rude jokes present themselves, but before she can decide whether the indulgence is worth the risk, it occurs to her to wonder how literally he might mean it. And, in turn, whether she ought to be concerned with what sort of person (or perhaps being is the better term) a bloody leprechaun would see fit to placate.

Half a moment later, she elects not to trouble herself. If she really needed to be putting out extra biscotti for some sort of ultra-leprechaun, she'd like to think Sweeney would have tipped her off before now. Besides, the way he immediately crams a biscuit into his mouth, as if embarrassed, suggests it's nothing that serious.

She lifts her bottle, and with all the composure she can muster, she drawls, "Is that what they're calling it these days?" before taking a sip.

"No, lass, they still call that fucking," he replies, deadpan.

If only it were that simple, which might be evident in the flickering of his expression as he lifts his own bottle and takes a long drink. That's all it ought to be. Spike's not exactly the sort he's been known to fall for in the past and he's done it one too many times anyway, enough to know shit like that never ends well for fucking anyone, let alone someone like him. He's too fucking old and too fucking well lived to do anything as stupid as want to actually be with a bloody vampire.

And yet here he is.

"He's a vampire," he says. If that knowledge is meant to be a secret, no one should have told him. Sweeney's not the sort to go out of his way to break someone's confidence, but unless they tell him to keep it a secret, he doesn't think of it as anything but common knowledge. "Seems I taste a bit better than bagged shit from a butcher."

It's about as crude a response as she expected (or should have), and she snorts quietly into her bottle. Her amusement fades, though, at first in response to the troubled look that passes over Sweeney's face, and then because Spike is a vampire, and Sweeney's... feeding him, apparently.

"Oh," she says again, the vowel stretching to cover the bewilderment and disapproval and horror that she wants to express, but isn't quite sure she has a right to. If anyone can withstand that sort of treatment, she supposes a leprechaun could. And for all that she's diligent about leaving offerings, she doesn't really believe Sweeney could be coerced into doing something he didn't have a mind to.

But still. Caught between being too appalled to approve and too resigned to dissuade, she just ends up looking deeply perturbed. "Is that high praise?" she asks in a last-ditch effort to make light of the situation.

"Fucked if I could tell you," he answers. "He's the only vampire I've ever met. They don't exist in my world. No one believes in 'em enough. Met a man once who claimed he was a vampire, but that was just a lot of bullshit cult nonsense."

She's uncomfortable with the idea of it, which is a little funny to Sweeney, even though he should've seen that coming. For all she believes in things like him, for all the shit she's been through, in most ways she's still a normal woman. For as long as he can remember, he's been part of this magical, fucked up world, and letting a vampire feed on him isn't even the strangest thing he's ever done.

"Don't worry about me, darlin'," he says. "I'm doin' it because I want to."

Because he likes it. Because he likes Spike, as much as he doesn't want to admit it to anyone, including himself. But if it were just about feeling good and fucking, then he'd still be doing it, because it's distracting just how fucking good it is.

There are no stories of vampires back home. She's not sure why -- the lines between 'no one had ever seen one' and 'no one had ever imagined one' were blurrier there than here, making definitive answers difficult to come by. Maybe it was enough to have Wolves and Giants and Ogres and things, and a mere befanged person would have paled in comparison.

But she's heard about them since she came to Darrow; she knows what they eat, and how. Her gaze drops to Sweeney's neck, looking for any obvious signs of vampiric attention, before she makes herself look down at the table.

There's probably no tactful way to explain that she isn't worried for his safety as much as she just thinks it's a ghastly thing to allow.

Then again, who is she to criticize the unsavory concessions one might make for the sake of a lover?

"He'd better be going easy on you while you're short," she finally says, because she has to register some sort of displeasure, just on principle. She shoves the plate of snacks towards him for good measure.

"It's cute that you're worried, lass," he says and although there's a hint of sarcasm in his tone, there's a softness in his expression, a fondness he doesn't necessarily show to most people most of the time.

The truth is, when it comes to Spike, he doesn't think Greta has much of anything to worry about at all. Sweeney may not know his limits and may push them to an extreme just for the fucking buzz he gets from it, but Spike, despite the fact that he's a vampire, seems to be one of the more sensible people he's known. If there's anyone who'll fuck this arrangement up, it's him.

He takes a snack regardless and pauses for a moment, then says, "There comes a point in a long life, hundred fifty, two hundred years in, where you realize nothing is new anymore. The world changes and you learn new shit, but the range of human emotion, it's... well, we're not fuckin' capable as much as we'd like t'think. D'you know how fuckin' boring that is? How lonely?"

She levels an unimpressed look his way -- 'cute,' indeed -- but there's no real irritation behind it. The words might be dismissive, but the look on his face isn't. She knows what a rare treat it is to get a hint of softness from Sweeney, and it's enough to counterbalance the fact that he's also being a bit of an arse.

And then the conversation takes a turn she wasn't expecting. She blinks, brow furrowing, part of her wondering if he's having her on -- if her natural and inevitable incomprehension is meant to be a punchline. But he doesn't sound mocking, and that makes it all the stranger.

All the stories she's ever been told have suggested that it would be the height of presumption to expect empathy from one of the fair folk. That at heart, they're something alien, capricious and unknowable. Sweeney was human once, yes, but that was a very long time ago. They get on well enough, but deep down, she doesn't expect him to humor her pettiest, most mortal issues. And she had assumed he wouldn't expect her to sympathize with his own fae concerns, that whatever scraps of empathy she tried to offer would be more symbolic and less substantial than a biscuit left on the windowsill.

She could be wrong. But it's hard to say for certain, in this particular moment, whether he's paying her an odd sort of compliment or if it's meant to be an odd sort of insult.

Well, if it is an insult, the best way to lessen the sting is probably to just lean into it. "Of course not," she evenly replies. "How could I?"

Edited Date: 2018-12-15 04:51 am (UTC)

One slim shoulder lifts and his head dips to the side, as if agreeing with her question without having to say the words. Of course she can't understand that, she can't know the loneliness that comes with seven centuries of watching every last person you love get old and die, and it'd been a stupid question, perhaps. But the words had tumbled out and the second she'd answered, he'd been forced to realize what he's thought to himself more than a few times already.

Spike's one of the few people he's ever met who can understand. Probably the only he's met who isn't also a god and Sweeney has fucked a few gods in his time, but he's known better than to get attached like he's done now. Gods are far too fucked for that.

"You get somethin' new, lass, even if it ends up just being a drop in the bucket, you take advantage," he says. He isn't even entirely sure what he's trying to say, what he's communicating. Spike matters, as much as Sweeney wants to pretend otherwise, and he thinks he's trying to make excuses for that. "It eases that. If only a little."

And that's true, but it's also bullshit. Spike's more to him than a fucking balm.

That little concession is both touching and mortifying. She got it wrong (his intentions, if not her answer), and it's hard not to feel as if she's just slammed a door in his face. Surely she can sympathize, even if she can't claim any true shared experience. Darrow sometimes provides a little too much in the way of novelty for her liking, but it certainly knows how to acquaint people with loss, if nothing else. And it doesn't take that much imagination to guess how much being stuck here might chafe someone who isn't used to a life where the next village over is about as far as anyone's wandering takes them.

"To novelty, then," she says, lifting her bottle a few inches in an apologetic toast. After a beat, and a searching look, she adds, "Though I should hope there's a little more to it than that."

She could be presuming, but she doesn't think so. Because she certainly gave him the opportunity to dismiss her -- to brush off this entire conversation -- and he hasn't taken it. He doesn't look scornful, he looks moody. It's not a look she's seen him wear much, especially since his luck turned.

"If it is, we such as fuck ain't talkin' about it," he answers, although it's not clear if he means the two of them now, or him and Spike. It's not entirely a dismissal, but he doesn't really know if he wants to think about the ways in which it might be something more. He's lost too many people to let himself do anything as goddamn stupid as fall in love again.

And if he was going to, it wouldn't be a smirking, swaggering vampire.

"Wasn't supposed to be anything more than that," he says and he really thinks he needs to learn how to keep his goddamn mouth shut. This is Greta, probably one of the people he likes best, but he still shouldn't say this shit.

Now it's her turn to cant her head in acknowledgment. She presumes he means himself and this Spike fellow, and to be fair, it's hard to imagine Sweeney making any grand, romantic proclamations. (Nor, for that matter, does it seem likely that a vampire named Spike would be the sort to compose exalting poetry or anything along those lines.) That she's got as much out of him as she has already might qualify as some sort of minor miracle.

If it does, then it must be a night for minor miracles. Wasn't supposed to be, he says, which is as good as saying it is -- even if he's not entirely pleased about it. And for all her presumptions about a leprechaun's unknowability, she thinks she can understand that sort of reservation perfectly. The thought of Thomas getting down on one knee makes her heart pound, not out of excitement alone, but also because it's impossible not to remember the unnatural stillness of Sam Flynn's empty apartment, or wonder if the loss of one husband is as much as she can bear. And all her losses must be nothing at all compared to Sweeney's. He's had so much more time to lose people in.

"Well." She lifts her bottle again, this time to gesture around them, at everything, this carefully tended life that might come down around her ears at any moment (and that's only if she isn't the one being dismissed, though she can at least hope that when that day comes, the departure will be quicker than the fall, too swift for her to notice). "None of this is wise, is it? But that doesn't mean it can be helped."

What he wants to do is scowl at her and tell her to fuck off with her logic and pointing out the reality of their situation. He knows where they are, how things are in this place, what it all amounts to at the end of the day, each of them clamouring for something that can never last. It's the same for all of them here, no matter how long they've been alive, and he knows it isn't any more wise for her than it is for him.

But he can't say shit like that to Greta. It'd be far more bloody rude than she deserves, for one, and he's sure she knows it all, too. She's not a stupid woman and she sure as hell isn't a fool.

"No," he agrees. "Suppose that shit's the fuckin' truth, ain't it?"

She mulls that over in silence for a few moments, then huffs once, humorlessly. "I didn't mean for this to get so dour. I just wanted to gossip." There's probably blame enough to share on that front. Sweeney may have been atypically forthcoming -- or too invested in this ostensible fling to hide his feelings all that well -- but it's not as if she endeavored to change the subject or otherwise let him off the hook. She might not be as socially polished as Thomas, but she's not an idiot. She could have been a more gracious (if not less curious) host.

Well, she can make up for it by changing the subject now. "How's this been treating you?" she asks, twirling a finger at his new body. "In general," she adds, wanting to clarify that she doesn't intend this one to be personal.

"I usually am good for a bit of gossip," he says with a crooked grin and it's the truth. People might not think it of him, a giant leprechaun with an alcohol problem and a penchant for fighting, but it's one of those things everyone does, whether they admit to it or not. Sweeney just admits it.

"This shit is... well, it's a fuckin' trip," he settles on saying before taking a long swallow from his drink. "Centre of gravity's all thrown off, I took better in a dress than I used to, but none of my bloody clothes fit anymore."

He's wearing Spike's jeans, which he's sort of glad he hasn't said aloud. The sweater and jacket, at least, he'd gotten from a store instead of just taking them from Spike, too.

It probably says something about her that she finds that fact easier to believe coming from this body than she would his usual one, but she echoes his smile, anyway. Maybe it shouldn't surprise her, regardless; immortality would probably feel a lot longer if one was above idle gossip. There's only so much philosophy anyone can stand.

And if time works different for the fair folk when they're in whatever fae in-between realm in which they spend their downtime, well. There's no fairy fort for Sweeney to bide in, here. He's as much a subject to linear time as anyone else.

"Well, it's a trip you shouldn't have to suffer for too long," she says. Darrow mischief usually doesn't last much longer than a carton of milk. "I'd offer to let you borrow something, but I don't think any of my things are quite your size. Or style." Style is probably the bigger issue. She can't imagine Sweeney going about in skirts no matter what body he's in.

"No offence, lass, but you're a little too fond of skirts for my liking," Sweeney answers. "How the fuck would I cave someone's skull while dressed like that?"

Not that he does a lot of skull caving anymore. It's a bit of an exaggeration and he thinks Greta will know it without him needing to specify. He hasn't outright killed anyone in a long time, at least since before his arrival here in Darrow, even if there are people who deserve it. His point remains. He loves the fight more than just about anything else and he can't see himself doing it the way Greta dresses.

It might be fun, though, for a bit of a laugh. Just to see what it's like, going around in a dress. There's not much else he hasn't experienced about this body.

"As I said," she replies, her tone far more prim than the subsequent pull she takes from her bottle. Trousers are one concession to modernity that she hasn't quite brought herself to make. She's well past the point of finding them scandalous, it's more that they just look so... tight. How do people wear something so clingy without feeling as if they'd just gone wading through a waist-deep bog?

Giving Sweeney a considering look, she continues, "Then again, you might find skirts a bit less confining, depending on what you're up to. Not that I can speak to caving in skulls, but..." She hitches one shoulder in a shrug. "If you're not wearing a suit of armor, I'm not sure what difference the material covering your legs would make."

"Depending on what I'm up to," he echoes with a smirk and he doesn't know if she's being lewd, but with a man like him, she ought to know better. Of course he's going to take that to the dirtiest place it can go and he has to admit, a full skirt would have certain advantages. When it comes to a fight, he really does think all that material would just get in the way, but in terms of easy access, skirts really have nothing working against them.

"Well then, that's somethin' to take into consideration," he continues before he finishes off his drink and sets the bottle down. "Even if that's not quite what you meant."

But maybe she had. Maybe she just knows him well enough to be able to follow the places his brain tends to go.

Greta levels as unimpressed a look his way as she can muster. She wasn't exactly being crude on purpose, but she should have chosen her words more carefully, given current company. "You know it wasn't," she insists, her lofty air holding for a moment or two before she tips her head and, against her better judgment, adds: "though you're not wrong."

Figuring that if she is going to go this route, she might as well go with gusto, she grins outright. "Let me know if you want to go skirt shopping. We could find something that would turn Spike's head, I'm sure."

"Ha fuckin' ha," he answers with a snort and a roll of his eyes. It's his own bloody fault she's gone that way, he'd practically opened the door and invited her through, but sometimes when he gets it into his head that he's going to give someone a hard time, he never quite anticipates that they might do it in return. He ought to know better. Especially with Greta. A woman like her hasn't been through all she has just to take his shit lying down.

"Lucky for us all, this is only supposed to last a week or so," he says. "Might be pointless, goin' all out when none of it is gonna fit when the week's through. Unless you're lookin' for hand me downs once it's all done. To turn someone else's head."

Something he's sure she doesn't really need any help with. Greta may not be quite his usual type in a few ways -- he tends to like them meaner than she seems capable of -- but he's got eyes.

His sarcastic laugh is met with a much more genuine, unrepentant snicker from her. If he's going to start down that particular path, she's not going to dig in her heels and haul him back. If Saoirse or Thomas were down here, it might be a different story, but she's not especially worried about lowering Sweeney's opinion of her. Or, if she is, she doesn't think innuendo would be the thing that did it.

"No more pointless than dressing up for New Year's," she counters. Ideally, one would make it through the evening unscathed, but it's not the sort of thing anyone ought to count on. That being the case, she's not sure there's much of a difference between buying a skirt for your brief spell in a woman's body, and buying a skirt for an occasion as likely as not to end in some sort of skirt-ruining mayhem.

She grins in spite of herself at Sweeney's suggestion. It's almost sweet, as offers go, but there's still a probable style clash to contend with. Besides: "If I really wanted to turn Thomas's head, I'd buy trousers," she says, before she can think better of it. No skirt could compete with the novelty of that.

Edited Date: 2019-01-08 03:37 am (UTC)

"Wouldn't do that either, lass," he points out. "Not much of one for a suit and tie."

That would turn more than a few heads and he damn well knows it. It's easier in the past sixty or so years, dressing to fit in with the time without making himself uncomfortable. Time was he couldn't go anywhere without a jacket and tie, something he'd never much liked.

Greta mentions trousers and Sweeney's eyes narrow, looking at her for a long moment before he decides, "Maybe that'd be the thing, then. A suit and tie for you. That'd make a hell of an impression." And she'd suit it, too, he can see it.

"More's the pity," she says, though her smile is more fond than suggestive. He'd look quite striking in a suit, and she can imagine he'd clean up nicely. But cleaning up doesn't really seem like Sweeney's idea of a good time, and it's hard to picture him both in a suit and enjoying himself. There wouldn't be much point to the former without the latter.

It's far more difficult to imagine herself in a suit, and she has to clap a hand over her mouth to smother an incredulous guffaw. He doesn't look as if he's having her on, though, and she lowers her hand, cheeks flushing, both mortified and -- if she's being entirely honest with herself -- a little intrigued. "You're not serious."

"Sure I am," he answers, tilting his head as if to appraise her. It occurs to him that the look might make her a little uncomfortable, both because of who he is in the first place and what he looks like right now, but that doesn't stop him. If he let shit like that dictate what he did in life, he'd never do anything fun.

"Somethin' slim and dark," he says. "Skinny tie. That shit'd look fantastic on you. You'd look better in a suit than your man does, I reckon."

Not that her man doesn't have his own appeal, but Sweeney's not sure Greta wants to hear something like that from him either.

Being assessed by Sweeney is a new experience, and one she would probably have less patience for under different circumstances. If he was in his usual body; if she was entirely sober; if he wasn't imagining her in menswear (which, despite all evidence supporting the normalcy of such things Darrow provides, still strikes her as something akin to playing dress-up as a child when applied to herself -- a silly lark, not something to be taken seriously, or presumed attractive); if he was outright leering at her; if she wasn't too busy being surprised by her own burgeoning interest to resent him for planting the idea in her head in the first place.

As it is, she just blinks owlishly at him as he starts going into bloody detail. A small part of her logs the specifics away as dutifully as if they were ingredients to a magic potion; the rest of her reels uncertainly between feeling flattered and feeling deeply embarrassed. She sits back in her chair, shaking her head in what could be denial or could just as easily be wonder.

"I've never... I mean, I've never," she says, gesturing pointedly to herself. In a dress, as she has been her whole life (setting aside that one instance in which dire straits had forced her into borrowing something from Sam, but that was once, over a year ago, and it was hardly on purpose).

"Yeah, well, bet you never figured you'd end up in a place like this, adopting a selkie and livin' with cars and leprechauns and fuckin' yetis up at the lodge, did you?" he counters. "Shit changes, darlin', don't pretend it don't."

He grins then, wide and sudden. It looks different on this face than it usually does, but to him, it feels the same. And Greta knows him well enough by now to know a genuine smile from him when it happens.

"One day you're just gonna do it," he says. "Rise to the challenge. Shock the hell outta all of us."

That is entirely too fair a point, and Greta squints at him, as if awaiting a punchline. There's no punchline forthcoming, though; she knows that, and it's... sort of thrilling, actually. That he thinks she could pull off such a thing, and do it well. She likes to think she's too practical for outright vanity, but when someone tells her she'd look good dressed a certain way, it's hard not to at least give the idea due consideration.

Then, of course, he does the worst possible thing: flashes a genuine smile, and then frames it as a challenge. She buries her face in her hands with a groan, hoping it will be enough to hide her own ridiculous grin, knowing it probably isn't. "Oh, shut up," she grumbles through her fingers. Then, with a bit more volume, "And then you'd take all the credit, and be completely insufferable about it."

"Abso-fuckin-lutely, lass," he agrees with another smile that says he already knows that she knows him well enough to understand exactly how he'll react to certain situations. When she shows up in a suit at some party, and now he's sure she will, he's going to be a complete prick about it.

And he also knows he's going to be right. She'll look goddamn stunning.

"But then you're gonna know I was right about it, too, and what the fuck else matters than that?" he asks. "I might be an insufferable prick, but I'm gonna be an insufferable prick about something no matter what. Now I can be an insufferable prick and you can reap the benefits."

Oh, god. She lets herself slump forward onto the table, her head buried in her arms, and just giggles helplessly for a moment or two. The prospect of Sweeney gloating over her should probably put her off more than it does, but she gets the sense -- whether it's earned or just the tipsy, wishful thinking of someone who has allowed herself to get a little too fond of one of the fair folk -- that he'd keep it merely annoying and stop well short of ruining her evening. 'Insufferable prick' he may be, but she doesn't think he'd aim to upset her.

Besides, if she does try out a suit, and decide she likes it, whether she actually wears one out will depend more on Thomas's opinion than anyone else's. If he likes it, she thinks she could withstand some obnoxious ribbing from the giant bloody leprechaun who started it all.

She lifts her head and squints at him, not wanting to make any promises, but also knowing the hook has been well and truly baited. "I'll think about it," she finally says, before pointing sternly at him. "And don't you dare mention it to anyone else."