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No Better Man (CA - Robin, Uno, Saber, & Tiffany)

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"What the--"

It charged down the road like a disaster waiting to happen.  Five dumb kids and a shiny new toy -- what could go wrong?  I let them pass me, starring at disgust as they rolled into El Blanco Lobo.  Kids. If there'd been anyone on the pavement, they'd had the good sense to clear out before getting flattened by the convertible.

I ground my teeth as I entered, parking my trusty steed far away from the convertible.  The last thing I needed was for my poor Honda Accord to get ideas on what a car ought to be.  I was still debating if I even wanted to go inside.  But... Robin would be expecting me, and I'd hate for her to worry if I was late.

I sighed, slowly moving my hand to the handle of the car.  It opened with a click and all the interior lights came on.  But I hesitated just a moment more in the safety of the car, watching in apprehension at the slow trickle of people.  What a lousy way to spend a birthday.

I had the drink in front of Tom in no time. I looked over his countenance - he looked about as tired as I felt.

"The man has spoken. No worries hon, they won't drink in this bar if I have my way." I shrugged, not caring if the young'ins heard me on their way over. Then I looked over to Jack, following his gaze to the windows - even with blinds we could still see headlights as they turned into our parking lot. The look on his face, coupled with the sound the tires had made pulling up, drew a sigh out of my mouth.

"Here we go." I muttered under my breath.  I could smell the type already. The young, the think they're hot stuff, the showoff to impress a girl you don't really care about- just going with to tell some other muscled up guy without much in the way of brains you went with her-that type of group.

It is what it is.

I looked past Tom at the rest of his group, "Can I get you guys anything? Some soda maybe?" I asked.

Saber made it to Tom first.

" Hey now, are you conspiring against me already?" He joked as he took a seat next to him. Tom was now taking his second gulp from his drink before placing it down.

" I don't want you puking everywhere making a huge scene again."

Saber rolled his eyes. " That wasn't even an allergic reaction, I just drank too much."

Tom held the drink up to his mouth and paused. " Yeah, cause your such a freaking lightweight," he muttered before taking another sip.

Saber was looking annoyed now.

In the midst of the budding conversation Riley and Alajandro found a seat next to their friends, but because of how fixed Saber's focus was on Tom,( And Tom's disinterest in his present company) they almost seemed like their own separate groups entirely. Riley easily perked up at Robin's question as Alajandro was watching his friends beginning feud.

" Ooo! I'd love some red bull if you have that." Riley said grinning happily as if he felt nothing of the clash next to him.

“Nothing wrong with that,” I chimed in on account of the second man, already taking a red bull out of the fridge. I popped it open and poured it into a glass, putting it down in front of the younger of the bunch.

“Are you all from around here?” I asked, glancing over the crew with a small smile ever present, waiting to see if the others would put in an order.

In the back of my mind, I wondered where Val was. He was running behind..

" Thank you!" Riley chirped as the drink was placed before him, eagerly taking ahold of it and taking a few hearty gulps.

Alajandro's brown eyes shifted over to look at Robin to answer, seeing as all his friends were distracted at the moment. " Yeah, though my family came from Mexico," Alajandro replied, his Hispanic accent very apparent.

Saber and Tom however were becoming engulfed in their own conversation so much so that they didn't seem to hear Robin's question, or see her expectant gaze.

" Come on Tom, you need a drinking buddy. You really want to be the only one who gets drunk tonight? I know my limits now, I won't go overboard this time." Saber spoke staring Tom down directly in the eyes. Tom just casted a apathetic glance back.

" Whatever, just don't ruin my night," was Tom's eventual reply.

Saber smirked, his eyes turning to Robin. " Nah, I'm sure our lovely bartender here is so good at cleaning the glasses that there should be no worries about any allergic reaction tonight, right?"

Tom looked at Saber, confused by his unusual casualness in his voice towards what looked to be a stranger to him. Alajandro looked toward Saber in a similar puzzled expression, but it dissolved quickly, deducing it was still in normal proximity to his friends usual behavior.

Before the vehicle arrived at its destination, the man who had waved off the slower car suddenly tumbled off the rear of the convertible! As he spiraled downward, he pushed off the trunk with his shoulder and landed square on the balls of his feet.
The brunette seated in the back yelled in a pitch that made either her laugh or scream indiscernible. The other man seated in the back hollered jovially, and vaulted himself over the side of the convertible when it came to a stop. He shouted two expletive words in conjunction with his friend's heritage, laughing somewhat between scorn and amusement. The man who had fallen from the back of the vehicle laughed, praising his own antics, and raised his arms to catch the rough banter of the other.

The driver and the woman accompanying him exited the vehicle on either side. The first came around the back of the vehicle to amuse himself with the exuberant demonstration, and the second came around the front, taking his arm in hers.

"Stop it! Stop it, you two!" The brunette screeched from the backseat of the car. The two men continued to tussle playfully, hardly put off by the command. The driver laughed, and the woman on his arm smirked, but neither of them appeared to care for the spectacle after a moment. The driver then turned away and led the woman into El Blanco Lobo while the two combatant's argument subsided shortly thereafter. The brunette scorned the two even as all three left the parking lot together.

******

The collared man and the wild haired woman entered the bar ahead of the others and docilely began looking for a booth at which to seat their company.

One, two, three, four, five...

I found myself still sitting in my car, mentally counting off the rowdy group of five in case they'd hidden one in the trunk somewhere like a freakish clown-car.  Not for the first time that night I thought about high-tailing it out of there, but the only thing I liked less about entering that bar was leaving Robin alone with them.  I knew she could handle herself and could eat live-coals with a smile if she had to, but I still didn't like it.

Before I even knew what I was doing, I was scouting the building for exits.  I was halfway to coming up with the most efficient escape strategy (it involved climbing through the window to the parking lot) before I stopped myself.  Sometimes a bunch of dumb kids were just a bunch of dumb kids.  Sometimes a 21st birthday party at a bar with your friend was just a gentle ribbing at the expense of your liver.  And sometimes you deserved to live a little, even for a night.

I turned the ignition to my car, exited, and locked it.  I started up the parkinglot and grit my teeth as I pushed open the door, purposefully keeping my attention away from the crew ahead of me.  I beelined for the bar, catching sight of Robin almost immediately.

"Barkeep," I said with a serious kind of nod.  I settled myself at a barstool, as if this was a usual occurrence and not a foreign affair whatsoever.

"Sure. Cleanest glasses in town hon." I pulled a glass off the shelf, giving it a rinse under the sink and finding a clean towel to dry it off with. "S'long as you don't intend to be getting sick all over my shiny floors, I suppose you can have a drink. What'll it be?"

Even as I spoke to him, my gaze fell past him to the door, watching the couple who entered. Something just wasn't so about them. They were strangely quite, composed, but not in a refined manner of way. More like the calm before the storm. Most of all, I didn't like the look of him. I didn't realize I was staring- dazed off, even-so much so that Jack had to come up beside me and take the young mans order.

Barkeep,

I shifted my gaze finally, broke out of my spell to see Val approaching. He was acting casual, so casual that when I got back into my head I couldn't help but smirk at him. I looked at Jack and apologized under my breath, but he raised a hand dismissively and looked expectantly to Leather Jacket with a smile.

"Sir," I began with my voice raised somewhat, leaning on the counter and throwing a less than amused glance at the one eyed, sketchy fellow across from me.

"I'm gonna need to see some ID."

I stifled a chuckle under my breath, but maintained perfectly neutrality to my expression.

"That so?" I kept my eye firmly fixated on hers, as if I was staring down a cobra, "Would you believe it if I said I left my ID in my other pants?"

Still, I couldn't help but follow the initial object of Robin's gaze. I felt my jaw clench a little.  I wasn't sure whether or not to be relieved or more worried that she also didn't like the look of them either.  In another blink, I banished the next sequence to the thought.  It was like a child afraid of the dark; tell them there was nothing to fear enough times, and the started to believe it.

I returned to the task at hand.  I hummed lowly, patting down the pockets in my jeans. I shook my head with a dejected sigh, while my other hand hid the perfectly valid ID from her view.  I wouldn't call myself a proper magician, but I would say I'd been bored long enough to pick up some useless skills.

"See, nothin'. Guess you'll have to throw me out".

After taking a sweeping look around the room, the two guests found a booth and were joined shortly thereafter by their three friends. They each settled into a seat in a comfortable manner. The brunette took a seat across from the collared man and wild haired woman, one man took the outside of the table beside her, and the last jumped up on the back of the booth, stretching his legs out across the headrest. His manner irritated the other two seated at the same chair, and the man seated below slapped the foot of the former. Unpeturbed, the former laughed and began tapping his foot against the latter's head.

"Hey!" The latter jumped up from his seat. "That's enough. Get down!"

"What?" The former replied, looking innocent of his prior offense.

Both were cut short when the collared man scoffed.
"Hey, David," he said. "Why don't you go let Larry out of the car?"

David, the man seated on the back of the booth, opened his mouth to speak but caught the keys that were tossed in his direction instead. Though he scored the catch with his hands, the abrupt toss put him off his guard, and subsequently his balance. The third man standing at the table seized the opportunity to bat his friend a rough blow on the leg which sent him tumbling to the ground. As aforetime, David twirled himself halfway through his descent and landed on his feet.

"Hey!" He said, his smile gone. The other two men leveled their eyes at him, each bearing a smile, and David left the bar without another word.

*******

Outside, David went back to the convertible and regained his sense of humor.
With a smirk that found its way to his face almost instantly, he jumped up on the back of the convertible, tossed his hair and crossed his legs across the trunk. Then, he rapped three hard knocks on it and said, rather smugly, "Oh, Larry? Larryboy, you in there?"

He was answered with a bang from beneath his seat and he laughed whole heartedly. "What's wrong, Larry? Can't you get out?" He laughed mockingly, but was answered nothing. Then he jumped off the back of the car and opened the trunk. The rather tightly folded man within unfurled himself as he got out and ran his fingers coarsely through his hair, ruffling every thread.
David straightened his own face with a look of sympathy and asked with his brows peaked, and a smile just out of view, "Comfortable?"

The peach-blond man who came out of the trunk looked down at David with a placidly unamused expression. Then he said in a dry tone, "Laurence." And he went inside.

*****

While the others waited for David to return, the collared man stretched his arms over the back of his seat and folded one around the shoulders of the woman seated next to him. The woman's dirty blond curls layered over his arm as she rested her head back. She leaned against him and sighed softly. The other man seated himself again, and propped his own arm up behind the brunette, who quickly slapped him away.

"Don't you get cuddly with me, Candace." Said the brunette.

The man beside her rolled his eyes and turned his attention to the room. Then he looked at the brunette again. "That's alright, honey," he said, "I think I'll find some other girl to flirt with tonight." He began pulling away, but his hand was immediately caught by the brunette. The man stopped. She kissed his black knuckles and turned a face.
"Don't have too much fun now, you hear?" She said, smiling. "You and I are still going to spend some time together later."

"With him?" David interjected, entering now behind Laurence. "You've got to be kidding me. - And WHEW-WEE! - Does it stink in here!"
He shouted loud enough for the whole bar to hear him, and looked directly across the room at Val seated at the bar. Laurence and the brunette laughed. The others smiled.

The collared man had slipped a silver dollar out of his pocket earlier while the brunette spoke, and was now idly flipping it over the table with his thumb.

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