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The music was kicking and there were in all different manner of dress and costumes mutants dancing to music. Hell they pushed the meter on this one and offered no cover charge for ladies to help keep the place packed. It was one of Eight Ball's busier nights including one 4 legged woman dressed as a Mutant Marilyn Monroe with fake eyelashed on all six of her eyes. She wa son the pool table so it's a bit hard to miss but there she was doing trivia and handing out candy doing trick or treat. ome got candy, soe got a smooch and one asshat just got bit. It takes all kinds. Drinks were on premium with fun names for the event and everything. The Bloody Marys were a real scream!
Halgrim has dressed up in a classic priate captain get-up, black but for a white shirt and dark brown boots, complete with (fake) flintlock pistol and hat. He doffs the hat once he's inside, sweeping it under one arm and heading to the bar to get a drink; you can't walk around dressed like this without a mug of *something* in hand. He scans the crowd for anyone he might recognize, since he expects a few of them to be present.
Julie is still just perhaps mellowing out, a beer in hand and in some sort of ball-player uniform with her face made up with a button nose and some bat-wings splayed out from her cap. Seems she went for the pun costume. She raises a beer to the dancing lady doing Marilyn impersonations, laughing a bit at something said by an iguana-tailed fellow.
It had been a tough few months here in Mutant Town, for like… everyone. There had been fires and normies wrecking havoc, curses and and demons, everything, oh my! So, the idea of a fun party, themed costumes and drinks for the holiday, would drag anyone out. And Vitale has been looking forward to something easy and fun. All JP needed to do was tell Vitale it was happening and Vitale broke out his least pretty suit and some fake blood, and plastic vampire teeth that he had on hand for such an occasion. He flipped the collar up on his shirt and has decorated the white dress shirt with fake blood as well as his fake fangs. Yes, Vitale was wearing a very bad vampire get up, the kind that would certainly offend a certain living vampire that someone might know here. The suit he has picked is also, of course, one of his tightest. He opens the door with way more force than he needs to, drawing attention his way. The party has clearly arrived now.
He spots Halgrim and heads right for him. "Wow, Grim. Lookin' great!" He says, excited, brown eyes bright with excitement.
JP was so proud of Vitale! THough one might not at all recognize JP unless one went to court with him. never before on teh streets of New York City has JP Bonaventure been seen in a pressed shirt, a waistcoat, and pressed trousers and a tie. He had to borrow the cufflinks (likely from Vitale) and even stole- er…borrowed an overcoat frooooom someone in a restaurant who wouldn't miss it too much. If they could afford this one they could afford another right? Hell his hair was combed. Hell he felt pretty damn good abotu himself and the hat at an angle looked good on him too. A hand clapped Vitale on teh shoulder and three fingers splayed in front of him, "Remember if we can no walk home? We will hav e a hilarious time walkin."
"Vitale," Halgrim says, raising his mug in a greeting. "What a truly bloody vampire you make." He takes a healthy drink of his beer, something dark amber colored. "This is a wonderful holiday, I think we must export it to Europe immediately." He eyes JP's outfit, trying to decide what the theme is (aside, of course, from 'JP in a suit'—which it could easily be). "Of course I'm a bit old for gathering candy, but there are plenty of children in the neighborhood, so perhaps I'll hand some out."
Julie eventually gives a wave over toward the boys, and comes on up. "Ay, how you boys doin? Regular Munster Family reuinion or something here."
"You probably could have just stolen someone's kid to get candy. I sometimes do that with my nieces. I grab 'em from my sister and take a few candy bars as payment for the trouble." Vitale says, leaning against the bar, tapping his fingers on the counter for the bartender. "Gimme something with extra iron, I'm feeling very anemic." Definitely worth an eye roll, that joke but Vitale was still smiling.
JP warmed a grin to Julie with a wink and held both hands out like yeah, check this craziness out! "Eeeh I was told t'go as et imaginery creature so I thought I go as well adjusted responsible normie. Costume come with a job an' everythin." He grinned to Vitale and pointed, "The bloody mary fix you up or… Spidey-Marilyn. Allooooo lady." He waggled eyebrows to her and said, "Stella, you? Tres bon, belle." A hand was offered to Halgrin. "I dunno we met. JP."
Halgrim gives Julie an amused, sideways look at a personal, private joke, sips from his beer. "Indeed," he agrees. He tilts his head at Vitale, honestly surprised. "Hm…perhaps one of the neighbors wouldn't mind someone coming along with them as, ah, extra help handling the children." He scratches his beard, nods. "Thank you Vitale, that's an excellent idea."
He accepts JP's hand, his grip firm and friendly. It's a hand used to manual labor, creased and calloused from long years writing and digging and hauling. "No, I don't think we have. A pleasure to meet you," he says, with a dip of his head. It can't hurt to be formal with someone who's a little higher on the social ladder than you are, when all's said and done.
Julie raises her glass to Halgrim, who she's seen around here before "Some of these kids might be kinda hard to handle, come down to it."
JP warmed a grin, the consummate host almost. "Vitale and I been workin too damn hard. Julie dropped the flier off an it sounded like fun." He looked from the professor to Vitale. Squint. Yeah of course Vitale knew other smart-type people. Out of cautious respect for things possibly tied to V's family he didn't ask. "This' Julie. I make things run. She makes em custom. Best wrench in Brooklyn."
"Oh, so /that's/ your outfit. Dressing like a normie. Here I thought you was just tryin' to play the part of boss real well." Vitale says and then looks to Julie at last. "Well look at you! I think Marilyn looks better with extra eyes." He catches the strange look between JP and Halgrim and himself. "JP, this is Halgrim. Ain't you met him yet?"
Halgrim considers Julie, expression distant. "I know we've seen one another around here and in the neighborhood, but…" He frowns, shakers his head. "Perhaps that's all, though I feel like we've also met elsewhere, I just can't recall specifically."
He shrugs at Vitale. "Only tangentially, of course it's Elmo and yourself, ah, I've primarily interactive with." To JP, he adds, "So it's a fine thing to make your acquaintance in person. Halgrim Lindqvist, though if that's hard to pronounce, 'professor' or some form of my first name seems to work best for most people."
Julie laughs, a bit, indicating the bar, "Guess the costume's working better than I thought, maybe, I'm here a lot of Thursdays, seen you around." Well, the costume may not be much of a disguise, rather just a pun on 'Baseball Bat,' but …that's Diz for you, perhaps. Smirks to JP about the compliments.
JP preened a bit looking a bit proud at that, "Maybe I am, V. Maybe I am. Good think I know someone my size, non?" Because when JP breaks into someone's house he might steal a suit. Never mind it was Vitale's brother's place. Meeeeh. Whatever! THe smile hung lose and easy like most things said of him, "Not yeat. Hear you name once? Twice? Nice t' mee'chu." Both eyebrows arched up, "vous %<234>tes professeur? Of shwat?" He grinned back to Vitale and up to Marilyn with all the legs. "Eeeeeh ya know I think you could get her t'dance wit'chu, V. I don' think that counts against you agreement none." Enabler. He looked to Julie and flinched with a laugh, "A'ight an maybe half a Mutant Town. I give you half."
"How do you know I don't want to take the professor out for a spin on the dance floor instead? " Vitale teases, taking his Bloody Mary that the bartender has brought him with a roll of his eyes at the 'anemic' comment. He has to pull the plastic teeth out of his mouth to drink from it. He uses the fake teeth to pretend to bite at Julie's neck. "I vant to suck your blood." He's really having far too much fun with all of this. "Halgrim here is the professor of everythin' JP. He knows all of the things in the whole universe."
"Archaeology and Anthropology," Halgrim says. "Which are hardly everything. I'm at Columbia University. I mostly teach and write, so a good deal of my time is on campus or in the library." Another drink of his beer, which is easily two-thirds gone now. He bobs his eyebrows at Vitale. "Oh do you? I seem to recall you previously indiciated I'm far too old for your tastes. Something about…injuring me, perhaps." He gestures at Julie with his mug. "It's a fine costume, a good pun is always appeciated."
Julie smirks. "Well, awright, that ain'd bad coming from someone getting a start on being a professor of the Universe and everything." It's about then she starts sizing up drink glasses, "Looks like we're getting to needing another round. I'm not so sure about the punch bowl, but Bill said he had something kinda green whipped up for cocktails."
JP looked impressed at Vitale's summary of knows everything about everything. WHen it was Archaeology and Anthropology he said, "Oh like houses with bug problems? Had an issue with termites once. So if you can figure out how to built a termite proof house, prof? I'm a be you number un fan, oui? Oui." He nodded sagely aparently hearing that as 'architecture' and 'ant-expert'. He didn't know. Julie mentioned cocktails though and he informed her, "Tell em I try anyhtin twice incase first time a fluke."
Vitale grins when Halgrim brings up what he said at the university when he was fussing Halgrim into agreeing to let him save his life. He ducks his head, seemingly abashedly. "Well, it's rather attractive dust that you're leaving on the bartop here." Vitale says, pretending to dust off the counter around Halgrim's drink and purposely brushing his hand over Halgrim's own. This didn't go against his agreement. He and Severin both knew the other would never be able to stop flirting. "If I took you for a spin on the dance floor, we might be able to free you of all those cobwebs." Boy. You are asking for it.
Vitale chuckles at JP's question and pulls the yard boss Bonaventure in for a hug. God, V loved him. "Yes, JP. Specifically that." He assures him. "You're close. Anthropology is like, the study of cultures, and humans in like general, how they behave in society and stuff, I think."
Julie smiles to JP, "You're braver than I am when it comes to mixed drinks, but I'm pretty sure Bill ain't out to get anyone real loaded this early in the evening. Anyone got, ah, special tolerances or anything?" Knowing JP, of course, he might well want a stiffer one in general. She points to Vitale, on general correctness. "We could get ourselves anthropologized *tonight* if we ain't careful, come to think of it."
"Oh, that's easy—you use steel framing, and an alluminum roof. Of course," Halgrim winces, "that's quite expensive, which is why almost no one does it, even rich people. But it's the easiest way. If there's no wood for them to eat, they won't come into your home." He might not have degrees in architecture or entomology, but this was a topic he could speak to.
He shakes his head ar Vitale, laughs under his breath. "Mmmmm, maybe twenty years ago I'd have a different answer for you, but, I must decline. However," a small, costume-period-appropriate bow, "thank you for the compliment of your offer." He finishes his beer, signals a bartender for another. He pulls a face at Juliw's description. "Green? I'm skeptical—that sounds like it could be anything."
He nods a confirmation at Vitale's description. "And archaeology is the study of the historical record, physical and otherwise."
JP arched an eyebrow and considered this, "Yeha aluminium might work better n' tin. Where I come from rust gonna happen ya know. Huh. You do know e'rything don' ya?" He grinned to Julie making those BIG BIG eyes that said 'hook me up withthe good shit'. Vitale got a bearhug back with a laugh. when Halgrim mentioned historical records he lit up, "Oooh you like old music too? Sweet!"
"What I'm hearin' is in twenty years, you'll give me that dance. Just a raincheck then." He winks at Halgrim and orders himself another drink, having already went through the first one.
He gives Halgrim another lingering look before he smiles at JP as he pulls away from the hug at his understanding of historical records. Oh, JP. "No, not quite what he meant, historical records of the past… like… writings on what happened in ancient times and what not, art can be a record of the past too, so I think he just studies stuff that is a key to the past, you know?" He tries to explain it in a way that doesn't confuse the hell out of JP.
Julie laughs a bit, "It's probably got creme de menthe and something stronger in it, on the green part. She gestures toward the aforementioned bartender. ordering some of the green concoctions for those who dare.
Halgrim sighs. "If only I did know everything," he says, and seems to have a few key things in mind. "And I suppose to me old music is a *relative* term," shrugs and smiles at JP. He takes a drink of his new beer, which is a pale ale of some sort or another. He gestures with the mug at Vitale. "Preciselyart, buildings, even people's everyday items like clothing, tools, cookwarebefore writing could be reliably stored, history was passed down in stories, which means it loses a great deal each time it's told. So we search for the things our ancestors left behind to better comprehend their lives."
He gives Vitale a sidelong glance, considers that. "Well then I'll be 62—you could very well injure me in a dance then." He sounds like he's teasing, though. Mostly. He narrows his eyes. "I'm unsure what a rain check, is."
"Mmmm, creme de menthe could be acceptable, depending on the rest…" He seems curious enough to try a taste, at any rate. One never knows what gets dreamed up in a bar in Mutant Town on Halloween.
JP arched an eyebrow and took in the matter of old craft nad art and historical pieces for posterity. He summed up, "Sooo like old music…and stuff. Oui. I can get in on that." V knew how to speak to his brain. there we go. Halgrim paused stumbling and he looked to Julie and Vitale and back to Grim, "Eeeh me either but it means take care of it later for reason I do no know. Seriously I dunno why thye say this but raincheck is ask again later like, hmmm, magic 8 ball."
Julie laughs, a little, holding out her arms due to the costume she happens to have. "A raincheck's really what you get when you buy a ticket to a ballgame, …if the game gets rained out, you don't have to pay again when they reschedule it for another day." She smirks as Bill's Frankencreme drinks show up, steaming with a bit of dry ice in each, looking rather like White Russians with creme de menthe and floating pieces of candy.
"Rain check, it's like a coupon a store gives you when they ain't got something you wanted, so you can bring it in later, get that thing when they do have it." Vitale explains, shocked a little that there is something that he knows that Halgrim doesn't. "Or yeah, what Julie said. That too. Basically, it's just somethin' you save for later when you can't have what you want when you want it." Is that another lingering look he gives Halgrim while he takes a long drink from his glass. Maybe.
"What you want to drink, JP?" He asks his boss, nodding to the bartender, whatever he wants, V's got it. "We can't have fun walkin' home unless you start drinking."
Halgrim's face clears with understanding. "Ah, I see—a, receipt, for another time." He nods, committing that idiom to memory. "It makes sense, considering," he gestues at Julie's outfit with his beer. "I suppose then that it simply entered the national vocabulary since baseball's so popular…very interesting."
And armed with this knowledge, he shrugs at Vitale. "Come and find me in twenty years, wherever I might be. You never know—perhaps I'll still have my hair." He even manages a laugh, mostly because he's utterly refusing to imagine what his life might be like in twenty years, considering the present circumstances. This is a night for fun, not brooding.
He squints at the drink, draws back. "Not sure the dry ice is really to my liking," he says. "I'll stick to my beer and await your reports."
JP flashed a grin to Vitale, "Some'in strong enough t'peel the paint off a barn." Which is a Southern expression for 'I don't want to feel my feet two days from now'. "oooh we should absolutely do this, an' ride the subway home." Never mind they would be starting at the final detination. JP just wanted to ride the damn subway. It would never not entertain him and something about a mobile base? Who really knew. The professor got a laugh in good nature, "I dunno what dry ice is either but hey, it looks neat. Julie, this was a great idea."
Julie laughs, a bit, and clicks a lap timer on a racing watch on her wrist, looking to JP, "I guess we gotta be daring." She does let the green drink steam a bit, though, before raising it. "Salute,'