Weekend at Harry's (open)

[Melissa Gold]

The snow crunched under Mimi’s boots[/u] as she crossed the half-empty parking lot, making her path slippery and wet. The weather was cold against her legs, with nothing more then the protection of her tights to shield them from the icy winds, and she quickened her step in an effort to shorten the walk from the subway station to the bar she called home. She reached into her pocket, punching the button on her ipod in an effort to find a song more suited to her quick brisk walking style then the piano concerto that had been afternoon choice.

She was late to work. This wasn’t a new occurrence, or even one she was slightly bothered about. She was always late to work. Only a few weeks before she’d been told by her boss that in the four years she’d been working at the bar, she’d never managed to come in less then half an hour late. Her usual average was an hour and ten minutes. Most of the waitresses would be bothered by this slander against their character and work ethic, but Mimi went largely unbothered. She had simply given a short acceptance speech, thanking the New York subway system, her faulty alarm clock, the slow barrister at Mocha Joe’s, and her general inattention to detail for helping her in archiving this award, and promising to do her best to make sure that the record continued to be unbroken in hopes of one day achiving the all important “ten years without showing up on time” mile stone.

Her boss had been less then amused. But, luckily for Mimi, she was good at her job and well liked among the bar’s regulars, so she hadn’t been fired. She spent a few weeks working the “noon to 6 on week days” shifts, which were typically known for few customers and poor tips and which were typically given to the waitresses who were new, being punished, or just plain bad. But Mimi, thankfully, was too good at her job to languish in “noon-to-six hell”, so after a few weeks she was rescheduled back to her regular hours with one noticeable difference, she was now scheduled to start one hour earlier then she previously was.

Which is why she was currently an hour and forty-five minutes late.

Tossing her cigarette aside, she left it to burn out in the snow without stepping on it, and hurried up the steps to the bar. Pushing open the door to the bar, she let in a huge gust of wind that rattled around through the bar and dropped the temperature three degrees. Even though she shut the door as quickly as she could, leaving it open only long enough and wide enough for her slender body to slide in, she still earned a “close the door!” from the nearest table.

“Bite me.” She returned cheerfully, pulling the earbuds out of her ear and punching the off button to cancel the music, which was currently so loud that the base line could be heard several tables away. Rolling the earbuds up into a neat band around one hand, she tucked them in one pocket.

“Mimi, you’re late.” Loomis called from his usual position behind the bar, glaring at her with his one good eye. He was a large man, who Mimi always said reminded her of John Goodman, only older and with an eye patch and four extra arms. She swore up and down he was a sort of green tinge, especially around the eyes, but she had yet to find a customer who agreed with her on it. He’d been the bartender at Harry’s probably longer then she’d been alive and had taken on a role with her that might be considered fatherly, or uncle-ly rather. Maybe neighborly. A bit like the ex-boyfriend of your mother who was around a lot when you were in junior high but took off before you hit high school, but you still see him hanging around sometimes and he asks you how your mom is, let’s you pinch a few cigarettes, and see you around.


“Loomy, you’re ugly.” She retorted as she approached the bar, pulling off her purple mittens and tossed them onto the bar. (They were purple and appeared to have been made by a six year old with a glitter fettish). Putting her hands on the front of the bar she pushed herself up so she was leaning over it, her feet dangling off the end, and planted a large wet kiss on the bartender’s cheak. “But I love you anyway.”

“Dumb brat.” Loomis said gruffly, looking back to his work as Mimi dropped back to the ground, looking utterly pleased with herself. “What happened to your face?”

He was referring to the slight shadow of darkness under her right eye, barely visable under the thick make-up and purple, sparkling eyeshadow she was wearing. Reaching across the bar with his third hand, he pinched her chin, tilting her head towards the light to better study the bruise.

“Genetics.” Mimi said, pretending not to know what he was talking about as she pulled her face away from his hands and made a big deal of fixing the damage the wind had done to her mane of curly purple hair. “Got me some crazy, ugly parents, remember?”

“Sure.” Loomis said, frowning at her as he deposited the beers in front of the waiting customers and scooping up the money, all without looking at them. He made change and handed in back to them, all while watching her fix her hair in silence. “Want him killed?”

He was, of course, referring to Current Boyfriend, the newest in a long string of useless men who paraded through Mimi’s life. She seem to have an unfailable talent to look through a room of decent, upstanding, hardworking men and take home the only one of them who was teetering on the verge of an jobless, abusive, alcoholic binge. They never said long, as she was luckily as much afraid of commitment as she was afraid of dating a normal, decent guy, but they made wonderful splashes in the waters of her life while they were there.

“Na.” She said, admiring her hair in the slightly discolored mirror behind the bar. “Harry’s pissed at me enough already thanks to the late thing, and the free drinks thing, and the broken pool table thing, and the calling him a tub of hairless wonder thing, and the getting his son drunk thing, and the letting Artie and Mac sleep in the bar without asking him because I didn’t realize they were going to steal the karaoke machine thing. If I get you arrested, he’s likely to actually fire me.”

“Besides, he’s gone already.” She added, running a finger over her lipstick to fix an imaginary smear. “You believe that man thought Wagner was a type of enhancement cream.”

“Sure.” Loomis didn’t sound to convinced, and he appeared to want to take the conversation further, but Mimi was already gone, flirting around the bar as she made her rounds, collecting drink orders, chatting with her friends, flirting with the men, and generally having a good time. She had a tendency to forget what she was doing if she ran into a interesting conversation or a fun group, and she would just sit down at the table and start chatting away with no regard to her duty. But she could usually be roused with a few shouts from the bar, and sent back about her business.

She was surprisingly good with the troublemakers, something that was fairly surprising given the fact that her powers were not particular suited to her current profession, unless you want the entire bar punished. But she had a memory for faces and was a genius with fake IDs (having spent most of her life selling and using them), and usually knew who was under age, who was there to make trouble, who needed to be given another drink or stopped from drinking all together, and who just needed to be taken out back and screamed at.

Plus, the whole subliminal “shut up and by more beer” thing was golden, and had gotten the bar out of much more tricky situations then she had gotten it into. Maybe. On some days. Actually, the "get the bar in trouble / get the bar out of trouble" scale was pretty much dead even.

“Hey Loomis, you got five hundred bucks I can borrow?” She said the next time she approached the bar, after she’d rattled off thirteen drink order from memory. “I bet the guy in the corner that the fire extinguisher wouldn't....."

[Wanda Maximoff]

The nice thing about Harry's was that it was close to the Institute. It was close enough that in many ways it had grown to feel like an extension of the institute to Wanda Maximoff, who during the last year had sought both privacy and companionship in the pub's interior. Tonight she was expecting companionship, which was why she did not bring her usual stack of books with her, it was also why she had bothered to dress up in something a little more than a hoodie and jeans. A light red blouse, and a skirt that came down just past her knees, was as fancy as she got but it was a change.

Hanging her coat by the door she headed towards the bar, hoping that the rest of the staff would be joining her soon. She had been the first one out the door, but most of the others had said that they would be coming. Wanda enjoyed it, how the staff was finally starting to come together and feel like a family, for too long she had felt like she was on the outside looking in.

"One Stella please," she asked said to the young woman as she slid up to the bar, adjusting her bra so the strap was not showing.

[Maria Callasantos]

“YOU SONOFABITCH!”

The night had started well. She was on a roll. Making ever shot. Having come down to Harry’s an hour ago for some pool, Maria had been having herself a pretty decent night out alone. But that was before some dumb-ass creep decided to cop a feel. Maria didn’t like it when people touched her. Especially strangers. And this stranger had touched too much. He had been eyeing her and catcalling her all night. Maria had ignored him. Too stupid to take this as a sign of her disinterest, the joker decided to walk by her and run his hand down her rump just as she was lining up her last shot… causing her to scratch… and fuck up the best came she’d ever played… So needless to say Maria didn’t react very well…

With a roar of outrage, Maria swung around and grabbed the sex offender by the neck. She was immediately proud of herself. First she didn’t retract her claws. Second she didn’t squeeze hard enough to break his neck. He was a very lucky person. In fact he should be grateful that she was holding back. If you could call what happened next holding back.

CRASH!

With a mighty throw Maria launched the man into the air, Maria having used her every once of strength to toss him off her. Maria had intended to simply get him away from her. But she had misjudged herself. Maria wasn’t used to be so strong. Six months ago Maria had only been able to lift half a ton. Recently however Maria had been able lift double that. Now she could lift an entire ton. And she was still learning how far she could throw things. With a resounding crash the man slammed into a nearby table, the force of his impact causing it to crumble into a mass of wood and glass.

Silence. Maria stared. Uhoh.

“Dammit Maria!” cried out a voice from the bar. Crestfallen, Maria turned to the source. Loomis, the bar owner, all four arms set against his gut, his face puffed up like a toads, obviously pissed. Shit. “That is the third time this year!”

“Sorry… he felt me up…” Maria murmured apologetically, eyeing the damage, face red. “I’ll pay for it…”

“You fucking better! Greg! Get him out of here. And don’t forget to wipe him.” Loomis grumbled, gesturing to the towel boy, Greg, a young Jewish kid who worked there… and just happened to have a gift of erasing memories… Greg nodding before going over to the prone form of the unconscious man, Maria watching him drag they guy out. Okay. Maybe she got carried away.

Feeling awfully stupid now, Maria grumbled and glanced around, noting the looks she was getting. Feeling her face turn red, Maria murmured another apology before turning to stomp off to the jukebox (this one a newer model, newer then the one she destroyed five months ago,) Maria intent in drowning herself in some music, feeling awfully foolish.

OCC: Meh. Not one of my best, but should make for an interesting entrance.

[Melissa Gold]

“One Stella please.” Someone ordered from the bar, not noticing that Mimi was in deep negotiation with Loomis why she couldn’t set the fire extinguiser off in the parking lot in order to settle a bet.

“Sure thing.” Mimi shot out immediately, filing the order away in the back of her brain and continuing her argument with Loomis without moving to fill the order. “Come one Lowmy, I swear to god…”

“Back to work!” He ordered, in his gruff no-nonsense way. With an exaggerated sigh and roll of the eyes, Mimi grabbed a stein from the bar and filled it up in an exaggerated “look at me do my job” way.

“There ya go.” She said as she set the bear triumphantly in front of Wanda, her actions earning her nothing more then a disapproving sniff from her boss. It was then she recognized the women as one of her regulars. “That’s two and two quarters.”

It was then that she recognized the women as one of her bar regulars. She was usually hidden in a back booth, with a book and one of those “don’t bother me, I’m busy” look. Someone had told her the woman’s name was Wanda and that she was one of the (numerous) folks who came down from the Institute. Mimi had gotten so used to referring to the woman as Wanda in her head, that she completely forgot that they had never formally met.

“Oh hey Wanda, didn’t recognize you. Nice skirt.” She said. “You opening a tab or paying one by one?”

Before Wanda could respond, there was a cry of “Sonofabitch” from the far side of the room near the pool table, as Maria (another one of the institute folk) grabbed a man for apparently no reason and used him as a battering ram to beat down the table.


“What the hell’d the table ever do to you?” she called, teasing, but her voice was lost under Loomis’s shout of “Dammit Maria! That’s the third time this year!” echoed through the bar.

“Sorry… he felt me up…” Maria responded, looking honestly apologetic for the event. Mimi wasn't sure why, the Ben Keene was a full on jerk who'd been headed towards a head on collision since the day he'd hit puberty. Mimi had more then once considered taking him up on his offer to "make her scream", only with the results he expected. “I’ll pay for it…”

“You fucking better! Greg! Get him out of here. And don’t forget to wipe him.” Loomis fumed marshalling the towel boy into action. As the unconscious body disappeared, he turned on Mimi. “Why the hell am I paying you for if you can’t keep this ramble under control?”

“I’ve got a great ass and I know all the words to Hotel California?” Mimi offered helpfully. He glared at her and she knew she was pushing her luck. Loomis let her get away with a lot, but even the push over bartender had his limits. “Alright, alright. But I kept telling ya, if you let me scream at them instead of having Greg wipe them a new one, they’d be a lot better behaved when the came back in.”

“Yeah, I’d also be paying a fortune replacing the windows.” Loomis responded, having already tried Mimi’s form of dealing with the customers. She'd tried to explain to him that she was much better and more trained now and the glass shattering bit was just an opition not a requirement, but the memory of having every glass and window in his bar shatter had stuck with the old bartender. “Just get back to work and try to keep Maria from killing anyone.”

“How laaame.” Mimi said, giving him a wink before spinning off to serve another customer. “Hey Maria!” she shouted across the bar. “If your feeding the machine, make it something we can dance too!.”

(occ: pretty colors)

[Wanda Maximoff]

“You opening a tab or paying one by one?”

Wanda fiddled with her shirt for a minute before pulling out a twenty dollar bill from her bra. The skirt meant that she had no jeans, which meant no pockets and so she had to improvise a place to put her money for the evening. The only remaining issue was that she could not take any change, since coins would be much more difficult to carry around in her shirt. For the evening then the normally frugal woman was going to be a bigger tipper than she normally was. She slid the twenty to the woman, "I think this should be enough to do me for the evening. Have you seen anyone else from..."

Her sentence was cut off from the noise generated by Maria. Flashing the girl a smile that said never mind, she took her beer and moved away from the bar and towards her friend. Clearly the other mutant had gotten here before Wanda. Wanda watched the events unfold with a amused expression on her face, and once the excitement seemed to be over she leaned against the jukebox that Maria was studying and raised an eyebrow.

"I thought the point was to get felt up?" she said teasing. Of the two Maria had the experience with men that Wanda lacked, as such she was Wanda's fount of information. The Scarlet Witch had lived a life that was distinctively nun like, either living alone with her adopted family, living under the care of her terrorist father or living alone in a cabin in the woods with a slowly dying old woman. At the Xavier Institute she felt like someone had hung a sign around her neck that said "Damaged Goods" and it was not like she had met anyone outside the Institute.

Glancing at her own outfit self consciously Wanda queried her friend, "Do I look okay? I feel maybe it is too much." The skirt was nothing that a church goer would not wear on Sunday and even the blouse only showed the slightest hint of cleavage. It was just she felt, exposed and tarted up. Part of it was the makeup, though subtle the first she had ever tried to wear, and the second was that as per Maria's advice she had spent time shaving bits of her body that European women do not shave. That was at least until she discovered that a hex bolt could do the same trick, faster and with less cuts.

"You look good," she added, "maybe you should go home so the boys pay attention to me?" Though not a celebrated model as some of Wanda's previous professors in style had been, Maria was the sort of person who Wanda felt plain just standing beside. Even now as she scanned the room Wanda could tell which of the two the men were stealing glances at, and it was not her. Wanda envied her friend, but she did not begrudge her.

[Maria Callasantos]

Tanned face red and amber eyes narrowed with anger, Maria stalked her way to the jukebox, intent on blasting the place with some hard rock tunes, Maria remembering that they had some Linkin Park on record. A heartfelt rock song about suffering and self-loathing? Yes. That was exact what she needed.

“Hey Maria!” a voice shouted across the bar, Maria recognizing it as Loomis’s bartender, Mimi. “If your feeding the machine, make it something we can dance too!”

Maria fought the urge to flip Mim’s the finger. The girl didn’t mean anything by her comment… but the last thing Maria felt like doing was assailing her ears to Aqua or Brittney Spears one more time. Loomis really had to update his jukebox selection. Grumbling under her breath in Spanish, Maria reached into her leather jacket pocket, pulled out a few quarters, popped them into the hungry machine and began scanning for Linkin Park’s “What I’ve Done.”

“I thought the point was to get felt up?”

Maria couldn’t help it. She jumped, caught of guard by the voice that had miraculously appeared behind her, Maria spinning around, feeling her amber eyes widen, surprised to see who was standing behind her. Wanda! When did she get here?! “Wanda! Jesus! Some feral I am! I didn’t notice you here!” Maria gasped, her hand reaching up to touch her chest, her pulse racing. Sucking in a long breath in order to still her beating heart, Maria glanced back a the door that Greg had dragged lover boy out of and scowled darkly, her voice deepening, turning thick and guttural. “And as for that guy… he’s lucky he still has a throat to swallow with.”

“Do I look okay? I feel maybe it is too much.”

Maria eyed Wanda, amber eyes quickly analyzing. “You look good. Skirt brings out your legs.” Maria replied simply, her tone honest. Maria never was the most fashion prone of people. She tended to stick to the same thing. Tops, jeans, leather jackets, and boots or heels. Very utilitarian and practical. That was Maria’s sense of style. If it were up to her everyone would just walk around butt naked. Pity civilized man didn’t agree with her views.

“You look good,” Wanda added, smiling teasingly. “Maybe you should go home so the boys pay attention to me?”

“Or I can just do this…” Maria said, and with that turned towards the men that Wanda had noticed, Maria’s amber eyes meeting their eyes, catching them in the act of eyeing her ass, and felt her face darken, becoming something cold and menacing to see, her eyes taking on a animal-like glow, Maria’s lips curling into a terrible snarl, exposing her teeth, and growled, the sound coming deep from her throat. Very quickly the men turned away, now having better things to do then check her out. Good thing too. Maria was about to make her point by grabbing the jukebox and throwing it at them. And she was pretty sure that was something that Loomis would certainly not appreciate.

Turning away from the assholes who were now struggling to not tremble, Maria faced Wanda and smiled sweetly. “There. All yours.”

[Ororo Munroe]

It was not often that Ororo Munroe ventured into bars.

However, having spent the first week since her return ensuring that all of her affairs were in order and preparing herself to dive back into the glorious world of teaching, she felt that she needed a break. Logan was a frequent visitor to Harry's Hideaway, and its proximity to the Institute was convenient for the Weather Witch; not to mention that it would be a welcome change of pace and scenery after seven days of paperwork and administrative duties. After a brief journey, Ororo strode into the Hideaway, not knowing what kind of a world she was opening herself up to.

Immediately, she was set apart by the grace and elegance with which she carried herself; her almost regal air felt out of place there. She attempted to relax a little, allowing her shoulders and poise to droop into a slouch; this, though, was unbearably odd to her, and so returned to her ordinary posture before moving towards the bartender. She drew several lingering stares, ones that made her almost compelled to add an extra layer of clothing. Sardonically wondering if it was a mutant ability to mentally undress an unsuspecting female, Ororo slumped onto a somewhat questionable bar stool and rested her chocolate-hued fingers along the edge of the bar.

"Can I help you?" the bartender - one Roger Loomis, if her memory served her correctly - enquired.

Ororo noted that he seemed polite enough, despite the feeling of exasperation that was emanating from him in waves. "I suppose I'll stick with a lemonade, please."

Loomis snickered wryly as he emptied as translucent yellow liquid into a tall glass and thrust it into her grasp. "You from Xavier's place?"

"How did you know?" Ororo retorted, her silky tones laced with slight amusement at his irked expression.

"No one comes in here and orders lemonade. That's weird. If you're weird and you're in here, chances are you're from Xavier's," Loomis responded simply.

Ororo quirked her silvery eyebrows. "You should be a detective." At Loomis' shrug, she continued, "So you get a lot of customers from the Institute in here?"

Loomis nodded vigorously. "Matter of fact, there's c ouple over by the jukebox there. You know 'em?"

Ororo followed the direction his his chubby digit to a pair of women stood beside the jukebox. One of them was Maria Callasantos, the so-called Feral with the skills to enforce that particular codename. At her side was Wanda Maximoff, the daughter of Magneto and now a dedicated X-Man. Ororo had conversed with both of them upon her return, and had not done so since...despite implicit self-instructions to spend more time with the pair, Wanda especially. Inclining her head in a small nod to Loomis, Ororo rose to her feet and gulped down some of her lemonade before assuming a position between the two femme fatales.

"Maria, Wanda," she greeted warmly. "Would you mind if I joined you?"

[Melissa Gold]

Maria did not seem to be too interested in Mimi’s request for dancing music, instead pulling out one of those heavy, depressing, guitar-heavy numbers that mutants usually favored. If she had been more academically inclined, she might have done a study into the connection between the gene for mutant abilities and the gene for depression.

But if Maria had been looking to annoy Mimi with her purposeful selection of non-dance worthy music, she was mistaken. Mimi had a true musicians ear and as such had yet to run into a music style she didn’t immediately like.

Dancing along with the song, despite Maria’s assumption of it’s un-dance-ability, Mimi began updating Wanda’s tab on the cash register: 20 bucks in, two dollar drink out. Which is why she missed Maria’s feral rejection of the men at table two.

“Girl needs to relax a bit.” Loomis said quietly to her. Mimi looked up and traced his gaze to the aggressively present Maria. “Before she scares off most of my customers.”

“Maria is who she is Loomy.” Mimi shrugged noncommittally, known that Loomis was thinking of her ability to alter moods and attitudes. It was one of her lesser known abilities, and one that Loomis often took full advantage of us. “Girl like that won’t change just because we put the right song on. Besides, the boys need someone to stand up to them, been pinch little black bruises all over my butt all day.”

With that she headed over to collect more orders, and little black bruises, from her the tables. Despite her complaints, Mimi thrived on the attention given to her by her customers, good or bad, and felt lost and ignored if not given it. She was so wrapped up in her work that she completely had missed the entrance of Orroro Monroe, and had to have Loomis point her out to her when she returned to the bar.

“Know that one?” He asked, nodding his head towards the tall African women standing with Maria and Wanda at the jukebox. Mimi did of course, as she knew almost everyone in the New York mutant scene.

“Yeah, one of the X-teacher.” She said, shrugging lightly. Since Orroro was not one the bar’s more frequent X-guests, she had very little information to impart. “Weather power, has some weather related code name. Thunder, Tsunami, Drizzle, Cloudy. Something silly.”

“Says the girl name Screamin’ Mimi?” Loomis said, almost teasing her, as she cleaned a few bat glasses.

“Yeah well, I don’t go about introducing myself as that do I?” Mimi defended herself against the unwanted code name. “It doesn’t count if other people go around calling you something stupid.”

“Lot of X-folks in tonight.” Loomis said warily, knowing the X-men’s habbit of attracting trouble. “Think we’re in for a wild one?”

“Doubt it.” Mimi shrugged as she updated the cash register again, before shouldering her tray of drinks and heading back out. “Wanda’s a push over, Cloudy’s drinking lemonade, and Maria’s got everyone cowering in fear over that pool table stunt. Only think exciting in my future tonight is the dishwasher.”

“Hm.” Loomis said dismissively, and Mimi headed back out. No, the X-men were not nearly as exciting, or as interested in Mimi, as they’d been when she first started working for them. Apparently whoever they’d gotten up there to replace Xavier was now sleeping anti-psychotics in their koolaid, that or instituting a better screening policy. It made her life a whole lot more boring.

[Wanda Maximoff]

“There. All yours.”

Wanda's red lips turned up at the corners in a smile, and she glanced at her friend, it had not exactly been the sort of display she was hoping for but it was something. Not that these men were the sort that Wanda was interested in, the truth was that those men tended to all be back home at the mansion. These men, while some of them were cute enough... well explaining to people that she did not know how to drive, work a microwave and also her father was the feared mutant terrorist Magneto tended to be the sorts of things that made getting a second date tricky. "I appreciate it, but I was perhaps meaning more at the Institute. How am I supposed to compete in a mansion filled with supermodels, beauties like you and..." Wanda's voice trailed off as she spotted someone at the bar heading their way, "her."

She had nothing against Storm, otherwise known as Ororo Monroe. In fact it was during Monroe's time as Headmistress that Wanda had joined the Xavier Institute and their working relationship had been better than Wanda's was with Emma Frost. Monroe had given her a chance when there was no reason to suspect that Wanda was anything more than a traitor and a villain. The only problem was that as was becoming fairly standard for Wanda, a man she had developed feelings for had been carrying a flame for Storm. Still that was not a reason to dislike the woman, though knowing logically that she should put any ill will aside and actually being able to do it were two different things.

Even without the Kurt Wagner thing, Storm was still a stranger. Maria had become a close and trusted friend and Wanda felt almost as comfortable around her as she did with her twin brother Pietro. Wanda felt she could say all the stupid, slightly insane things that popped into her head around Maria but Ororo whether she held the title or not was still "the boss." Besides she had wanted to interrogate Maria about where she had been these past few months, and this seemed like a good time.

"Would you mind if I joined you?"

Wanda smiled and nodded, responding as if there was no question about how delighted she would be to have Storm join them, "Of course. Maria is planning on chasing all the men out of the bar so that only she can choose which popular music songs she picks on the music box."

Nervously she began to pick at the label on her bottle of beer, peeling it off bit by bit and discarding the waste on a nearby table.