MHA #1, Thursday Evening, then a Quiet Secluded Table at Il Pollo, Later Thursday Night
Rikku
It was very, very hard for Rikku to think. Susso was here. In Fandom. Two steps away. She'd had to keep stopping every few steps, in town, to reach out and touch her so she wouldn't disappear.
She was functioning largely on auto-pilot. Back. Back to the apartment. His and sort-of-theirs. So she could meet Reno. And Petey. And everyone else. Was there room in the apartment? Should Susu stay with her? Did she have to go back tonight?
Her hands were shaking so badly that, at the front door to the apartment, she dropped her keys onto the ground.
Why was she holding her keys? She didn't have a key to Reno's apartment. The door probably wasn't locked. Should she knock, anyway? It was sort of theirs but mostly his and she didn't want to be rude and --
Vekka
Rikku was still shaking, staring at her keys on the ground, when her mother placed a hand on her shoulder.
"Ed ec zicd y tuun," she teased gently. It's just a door.
Reno
Reno had been just about to sit down to a long, arduous game of torment the hell out of Petey and Mako while the duck stares, but was kind of distracted at the sound of people just outside his door. Keys, mostly, and then a voice. Female, that was easy to tell, but the words weren't in English, they were in Al Bhed. And they weren't coming from Rikku.
It was with a raised eyebrow that he went to open the door, looking out into the hallway at... Rikku, looking shaken as all hell. And some woman, green swirls in her eyes giving away her heritage if the language hadn't.
He found himself reaching for Rikku's hand.
"Friend of yours?" A pause, and then a look at the woman that was with her. "Rammu, Rikku'c vneaht."
... His Al Bhed was a touch rusty, and so it was a touch simple, but at least it was coherent.
Vekka
"Oh, jano hela," the older woman purred appreciatively. She might be dead, but she had eyes, and clearly, so did her daughter.
Cid must have thrown a fit about this one. She wished she could have seen that.
She held out a hand. "Vekka. Can we come in? My girl needs a drink of something, probably a sit-down. She's had a shock."
Reno
"Uh... Reno." He was looking only a touch baffled as he reached to shake the offered hand. "And yeah? I mean... Yeah, yo. Of course she can. My place is her place, an' all that."
He was stepping back and holding the door open for the two ladies.
My girl?
"Careful for the dumb things runnin' around the floor."
Rikku
"Petey," Rikku said, looking up as if she had just remembered that she did, in fact, own a cat. "Petey's here. Susu, you have to meet Petey. He's my cat. And Mako, he's Reno's ferret. And Reno. He's. I should have said that, first."
Reno outranked Petey. Was he going to think he didn't? She didn't want him to think that. She should --
Vekka
"In," Vekka insisted, holding on to her daughter's arm and guiding her through the doorway. "You're gonna sit down and let your boyfriend pour you a drink of something. Then you can chatter until your lips fall off."
She turned to Reno. "Whiskey?"
He seemed like the kind of guy who'd have a decent stash.
Reno
"Whiskey," Reno agreed, turning on his heel to rummage around for just that.
He also had vodka, beer, three different kinds of rum...
"So." And that was one of those 'So's that could stand very well on its own, thank you, but he felt like it was necessary to expand on it anyhow while he pulled out a few glasses. Mismatched, all of them, but miraculously all clean. "Someone wanna tell me what's goin' on?"
Vekka
Rikku was at least sitting on the couch, now, but she still looked like she was going to faint. So Vekka decided to take point on this one.
"I'm dead," she said simply. "So she hasn't seen me in a while."
Unlike her daughter, Vekka could apparently summarize efficiently.
Reno
From the kitchen, that would be the sound of Reno-the-Unshockable.
Dropping a glass on the floor.
And that would be a string of curse words in every language that he knew curse words in, and that there, that would be a shock of red hair, followed by the rest of him, peering into the living room again, wide-eyed.
"Holy fuck."
Yes, this was totally adequate meeting-Rikku's-mother talk.
Rikku
"Reno?" Rikku said, looking up and finally managing a coherent thought. "This ... uh, this is ... my mother."
Because surely, he wouldn't have figured that out, yet. With all the "holy fuck"-ing and all.
It had yet to occur to her that he'd used that language in front of her mom. Or any language. She was catching up a bit slowly, today.
Reno
"Yeah," Reno agreed, wide-eyed. And then, as an afterthought. "Dropped your whiskey."
Because Rikku totally loved whiskey, right?
He chewed his lip for a moment, and then made his way across the room to sit down beside Rikku. Reached for her hand. "You okay?"
Her mom would probably be understanding, here, right?
Vekka
Vekka stood up, brushing one hand over her daughter's hair. "She'll be fine," she said gently. "My girl's tough like that. Mind if I ... ?"
She was going to gesture, vaguely, to the liquor cabinet. Everyone could use a drink, and possibly, Rikku needed a minute to catch her breath.
Rikku
Rikku nearly panicked at her mother walking away, but she was just over there and could come back easily. Wasn't going to disappear.
If she disappeared, Rikku was going to cry her eyes out. That was a given, right?
"I ..." She cleared her throat, looking up at Reno. Who was, for some reason, blurry. "She was. In the woods. And ... I thought you'd ... want to ... I mean, you do? Don't you? Is that ... I mean, I'm not ..."
Vekka's untimely death had apparently prevented her from teaching her daughter the art of summarizing. A shame.
Reno
"She's got a place here if she needs one," Reno said, nodding to Vekka. By all means, liquor it up. Watch the glass. That sort of thing. "I got sleepin' bags. Doji and Romeo'll be cool with it, yo."
Seriously. Dead mother. If Romeo and Doji weren't cool with it, he'd wonder who the hell they were and what they did with the other half of the posse.
And then, after a moment's pause, his voice a little lower as he slipped his arms around Rikku, "Thanks for bringin' her here, zoto."
Rikku
Rikku was just going to melt. Melt, and hold on to Reno and never let go. Maybe both.
"We should ... go out," she decided. "Somewhere. So we can all talk and get to know each other and -- I mean, so she can meet you? I know she just did but ... more formal-like. Since we're all ... you-know."
Vekka would probably facepalm at her daughter's love of euphemisms.
Reno
Not as much as Reno did. All. The. Time.
But the euphemisms were part of her charm!
"Swearing?" Reno was not so much for euphemisms, himself. "And I was kinda freakin' the shit out?"
Rikku
Rikku flushed, then leaned up to steal a very, very quick kiss. And hoped her mom wouldn't notice.
"No," she said. "Since we're all serious about each other, and kinda got fake-married and kept the rings."
Reno
Reno nearly laughed at how quickly that kiss came and went, and gave his head a small, bemused shake before leaning forward to kiss her again.
Look, her mother seemed like a cool lady. He didn't figure this would be a problem, considering she was the one digging through his booze stash right now, and all.
"That too," he agreed.
Vekka
Vekka wasn't going to faint from seeing her daughter get kissed. And she would have laughed at Cid's lectures on the subject, for that matter. How he said any of it with a straight face ...
"Whiskey," she said, setting down three glasses in front of the two of them. "What's this about rings?"
Rikku
"A long story," Rikku said, pulling away from Reno with a flush and hiding her hand a bit sheepishly. "Susu? We were wanting -- I mean -- I was just saying that we should go out to dinner. All three of us. So you can meet him and -- I mean, I know you just met him, but a nice sort of sitdown thing. Wouldn't that be good?"
Reno
Reno was still grinning as he turned around to face Vekka, nodding his thanks and reaching for the glass. He even took a moment to lift it in a toast, there.
"Better'n bein' ravaged by a cat and a weasel," he decided.
And also a duck. But it was less prone to ravaging and more prone to staring.
Vekka
"Can't refuse an offer like that," Vekka said, lifting her own glass. "Right, then. Dinner, and I get to pretend to grill you about dating my daughter."
If she could keep a straight face. Which wasn't all that likely.
Rikku
"Dinner," Rikku said, lifting her glass and nodding. "I'll change into something nice and we can go."
Never mind that her mom probably didn't have a change of clothes handy. Maybe this was exactly the outfit she'd wanted to wear out to dinner.
Rikku smiled at both of them, feeling shivery and wanting to tear up, and then downed half of her glass of whiskey.
And, naturally, coughed like mad as it burned.
She just had to hope neither of them were laughing too hard, at that.
Vekka
Il Pollo was a nice place. Low lighting, fancy food, and a good selection of wines.
Not that Vekka was all that fussy about wine, to be honest.
There were dozens, hundreds of questions she wanted to ask, and no real idea where to start. Except for the obvious.
She gestured to Reno. "Does Cid know about this?"
Oh, the look on his face ...
Reno
Reno laughed, rolling his eyes toward the ceiling and shrugging. Lazily.
Even in the face of the sort-of-dead-mother-in-law-kinda, he could be lazy, thank you.
"You better believe it, yo," he replied. "Man, that guy comes up with new, excitin' death threats every time he sees me."
This was said kind of fondly, actually. Reno liked Cid.
"He wouldn't bump me off, anyhow. He likes havin' someone show up now an' then who can fix the airship."
Vekka
"That's because he knows exactly who you are," Vekka grinned. She turned to Rikku again. "Your bubbo once chased him all over the compound, waving a miter saw. He hid on the roof for two hours."
That was the day they had discovered her door lock was broken. Oops.
"So you know your way around an engine." Perfect. She'd hate to have a son-in-law that couldn't take off a lug nut without stripping the screws.
"Now -- who let your father have an airship?"
Like that was going to end well.
Rikku
"We found it," Rikku bounced, swelling a little with pride. "Brother had a crew in the Baaj ruins? We got the power switched on and dragged it back. We didn't think it'd even fly, but then when Home --"
She stopped abruptly. When Home burned to the ground. They had had no other way to escape, so they had fired up the airship and hoped for the best.
It had been the worst day of her whole life. Most of the Al Bhed there hadn't survived. And her mother didn't even ... know?
Stupid. She wouldn't have had a way of knowing, so why would she? Except Rikku had somehow ... imagined she would. Had wondered if maybe, Susu checked in on her from time to time. Silly, superstitious, Yevonite nonsense.
How did you break something like that to someone?
"I ... I guess you missed a lot," she said weakly.
Vekka
Vekka covered her daughter's hand with her own.
"Almost everything," she confirmed. She had had glimpses, here and there. Some of the major events. Home burning to the ground, that she had seen.
That was really not a conversation for right now.
"Damm sa mydan?"
Reno
"Mydan," Reno echoed, low and oddly tired, considering he'd never been there.
That was one conversation he really had no part in, so when Rikku's mom suggested they talk about it later, that was a suggestion he could really get on-board with.
"So, what you ladies want for dinner?"
Later, to Reno, meant that they had to merrily skip to a different topic right away, apparently.
Rikku
The chicken here is really good," Rikku chirped. It was a little forced, compared to her usual chirps, but it wasn't so bad for all that. "And the bread that comes with it, too. I know you're not supposed to fill up on bread, but sometimes I do without meaning to."
Vekka
"I won't tell your father," Vekka promised solemnly. "So how did you end up coming to school here? What is this place, anyway?"
(Preplayed with the amazing winsauce raspberryturk. Post will be continued in comments below once that mun has returned from the wilds of AFK-ness, which is to say, after the weekend, but we wanted to start this now anyway. Viva SP! withoutverona and dojima_hime (aka, the other half of the posse) modded out of Reno's apartment (just for the duration of the first half of this) with permission, and with my thanks. Broadcast totally okay, but NFI unless you are one of the peeps at Il Pollo!)