Back to Work (open)

She grinned.

"Nothing yet. Tree went up today. Yeah, he's pissy. First time out of the house after getting married and got myself stabbed. Probably not pissy at me, though. He's nice like that."

"Hardly your fault you got stabbed. It's a hazard of your job and being a Tremere I think. Erik is a good man, he'll be pissy at the stabby person."

He smiled softly and held up his hand to show his ring. "I came by to show you this, before you got stabbed by a crazy ghoul."

She blew a raspberry at Victor.

"I know that. Have to make kissy faces at him to make him less worried." She grinned. "I like that better. Usually get yelled at." She didn't actually mean yelled at by Erik, try to follow her drunk mind train.

Then she squinted. "You came to show me your bling? Why would I care if you have jewelry or not?"

"See" Victor smiled " you have a good relationship where people make umm kissy faces instead of yelling and being dysfunctional."

"And it's an engagement ring."

Her lips pursed again.

"Don't the girls usually wear the engagement...." Her eyes grew wide. "Omigosh, I didn't realize you were gay! Who is the lucky fellow?!" She was dead serious. She wasn't being an ass.

"I fudged a few traditions" Victor smiled. "There are some Japanese traditions where both parties have engagement rings. Anyway it's me and Miyu silly. Properly there is some sort of engagement ceremony between families. I bought these back in 1940, cut me some slack. That was a weird time all around."

Her eyes grew wide.

"Miyu is a boy?!"

Victor winced and finished his drink in a single shot.

"No. Miyu is female. Very much female. She's half Japanese, remember? I bought Japanese engagement rings. I proposed to her. She has one. I have one. I combined Western and traditional Japanese traditions to try and blend everything together. "

"Oh, good," she said, making a face. "Boys are stupid and Miyu's boobs are too pretty for them to be fake."

Yep. She's drunk.

Victor poured another shot and looked over his shoulder. This was usually when Miyu would be showing up, right when things were at their weirdest.

"Yes... they are pretty. As is all of her. And we are engaged to be married. I finally manned up and asked her."

She went around the bar and started rummaging for more alcohol. It was rather cute, since her tongue was sticking slightly through her lips as she concentratedid on finding - oh, look! Another bottle! She cried out in triumph and reached over, giving him a good, solid, slap right on the ass.

"Well! Good for you! Hot damn, I started a trend!"

Victor rolled his eyes and tried to dodge her slap.

"Yes... yes you did... Also you are drunk"

She was drunk but she was an expert fighter. She anticipated him trying to dodge. She was also not moving slower than normal. So, no, the Potence-fueled blow landed solidly on his rump.

"You are correct. I am very drunk. And I want kissy faces because lemme tell you something. Pretty as Angelo used to be, he was never as pretty as Erik. But, I'm not shallow, no sir. I don't want the kissy faces because he's pretty. No, no, no. I want the kissy faces because I have had a very rough day and kisses make it all better. And he says he loves me so I'm pretty lucky, yes indeed."

"You deserve kissy faces from the man you love. It will make everything better."

Idly Victor wondered how he got into some of these situations. Then he decided he was better off not knowing. It was bad enough that her father was drinking his blood, without adding drunken ass slapping to the mix.

She made another face.

"Do you have any idea what 'Oh' means?" She frowned. "Cuz when I told him who Angelo was to me, he just said 'oh'. I don't know if that's a good 'oh' or a bad 'oh'."

"I think 'Oh' means 'Oh yet another ghoul that she has to take care of, except this one wants to kill her, poses a liability to her, but if I kill him myself, then the woojie making self made vampire clan of ex mages will get mad and undo what small social advances between my woojie making people and her woojie making people have occurred because of our marriage, so now I have to try and keep my wife safe from this absurd obligation foisted on her by her clan."

"Does that make sense?"

She blinked and took a drink from her second bottle.

"No."

Victor smiled

"Oh means he's worried about you and just has to think about the situation."

She wrinkled her nose and giggled.

"Silly man. No reason to worry about me. I could have teleported away if I hadn't been so damn curious why he showed up at my door."

"I know that, you know that, he knows that. It didn't keep me from holding a gun on him the whole time though. It's ok for people to be concerned about you."

She waved a hand and blew another raspberry.

"Silly. All of you. I get that I look cute and harmless, but I can generally take care of myself."

"Griselda" he intoned in a dull, flat voice. "I have lived with one of God's agents for eighty years. She might not be as powerful as you, but I have some small experience with little cute women who can take care of themselves. That does not keep people from taking defensive measures. It simply gives them the luxury to sit back and watch a David and Goliath scenario unfold and step in for the odd moments Bad Things happen."

She pursed her lips again.

"Damn knife surprised me. Didn't expect him to have a blade. Angelo is a master with a whip." She giggled. "He thought he was saving me from a mugging the night we met. I was feeding. Jerk."

Victor chuckled at that

"I bet somewhere under all the pain and torment there is still a good man there to be found."

"I don't want to find him," she said firmly. "I don't even want to look. Because if by some miracle, someone can find Angelo under what Joseph did to him - and me - I don't know what would happen. Joseph took his love for me and twisted it into this weird, evil obsession. So if that changes and is what it used to be? He's going to love me again. He still does, even under all that venom and poison that Joseph fed him. I never stopped loving Angelo. I just gave up hope."

She took a deep breath and another drink. "And married a man who treated me like Angelo did and has a similar personality to the Angelo I fell in love with." There. She said it, okay?