Dated 9-28-2013

[eightypercentdevil]

She made a decision. If she was going to be stuck here, she needed a damn job. Something more than the temp cash-under-the-table deals she'd been taking so far. So she had an open paper, circling anything that called for a full-time mechanic. She was more than qualified and while she doesn't feel like being low man on the damn pole, she knew she'd take what she can get. At least for a little while. A regular job she could make contacts at. Suppliers. Customers. Then she could take a few few illicit jobs and hit the races to make some hard cash. Put them together and she should be able to open her own shop within a few months.

Hers. No one else's. All hers.

How long had it been since she had something that was truly hers? She woke up one day with nothing. No memory. No money. Nothing. So she attached herself to Owen. Trusted him, worked with... no, for him and for what? So he could serve her up to her ex when it became convenient? Then what did she do? She took off with Dom. She didn't regret it, not when she was honest with herself. There was something in her heart that missed him, needed him, had her almost out looking for that copy of him that she met when she arrived. But now that she'd had some distance she realized that she couldn't rely on that anymore. She needed to make her stand here, on her own, until she could find a way back. She wouldn't pine anymore and she'd drag herself out of the hole she'd let herself fall into.

You make your own fucking destiny, right?

Waving at the bartender for another beer, she flipped the news page and started scanning the next set of want ads. She had a plan now. She just had to hope nothing else was going to jump up to fuck her over.

Comments

[confidenceman]

He's had too much to drink. He can't remember which day this is — first, third, or some far-off number that he can't piece together in this state of inebriation — but all that matters is that the details around him are fuzzy, the imprint of the room blurred, things that will make everything easier to forget in the long run. Sometimes, Sawyer thinks that's easier. Sometimes, he thinks he can understand the reasons why Juliet thought that it'd be better never to meet him than to lose him

Though he still can't tell what he was worth, in the end, to her. Nothing but a twisted death sentence.

There's a familiar face at the bar, and even though Sawyer knows that it isn't the woman whose name immediately sinks into his gut, he still gives up his seat for another and plops down beside her. He could sober up, with another five minutes. Probably.

"You look like someone I knew before I got here," he confesses.

[eightypercentdevil]

"I think you might have mentioned that before." Or she had, didn't really matter. It was a thing that happened here, one of the crazier things, but she was starting to get to the point she could ignore it. She needed to focus on getting her feet under her.

Figuring what the hell, she looked up from her ads, "Need to talk about it?"

[confidenceman]

"But you don't understand," Sawyer says emphatically, raising a finger in protest. "I ain't just sayin' that your face kinda looks like hers, I'm saying, someone I knew. Really knew. Religiously, you could even say, and sometimes it just doesn't become any easier to see your face hanging around, 'cause I always think it's like she's done come back to life or something."

When the bartender passes, Sawyer raises his hand to flag her down.

"Whiskey," he requests with a flutter of his fingers. "It's just kinda weird, don't you think? People we know well, all packaged up and given someone else's story."

[eightypercentdevil]

"Come back to life?" Taking a pull of her beer, Letty found herself chuckling. She could tell him a few things about coming back from the dead. How you got no idea who's your friend and who's your enemy. How everyone has all the expectations for you. How there are times when you think, know what? Dead wasn't so bad after all.

A fucking mess, that was what coming back from the dead was. She loved being alive, but she felt like she was paying way more than her fair share of the dues.

"Listen, I get what you mean. The guy here, one that looks like my... my ex, I guess, now, Anyway. Looks aren't everything. I'm sorry I'm bringing up some bad memories for you, man, but I got plenty of problems of my own."

[confidenceman]

"I ain't here to give you any more problems," Sawyer breathed with a shake of his head and a slight growl under the exhale. "I'm just here to..." His voice trailed off with the realization that he didn't really have a point or purpose for being there. That there wasn't anything that he was seeking to get from her, or the bar, save for a pleasant burn settling warm in his stomach.

He already achieved that some time ago.

"...be a sad drunk," he concluded, kicking back the rest of his drink before leaning in, resting his temple heavily against his knuckles. "You been settlin' in okay?"

[eightypercentdevil]

"I've been settling in, wouldn't say it's been okay." Why the honesty? Letty really couldn't say, except she was too tired to lie. He was just as much in a rut as she was, maybe deeper 'cause she never drank like he was. Well, she tried not to. She needed her eyes and reflexes.

"Looking for a job. Something legit." For once.

[confidenceman]

Looking for something legitimate. Hell, that was something that even Sawyer hadn't decided to take up in Darrow just yet, believing as strongly as he did that this wasn't a place to settle, that there wasn't any reason for him as a person to dig his roots down anymore. It didn't help. It only made things worse when they got uprooted, made his trail all the more disastrous.

"Settlin' without wanting to. Sounds about right," he muttered, fingers tracing along the lip of his glass. "What kinda legit job we talkin' about? I might know some people."

[eightypercentdevil]

"Cars. Rebuilding, repair, restoration, you name it." She preferred classic cars to the plastic things people drove in today, but she'd take what she could get at this point. Anything to get herself a little experience, start to make a name for herself in this city. It was something else she missed about home, she could trade on her own name back there, even if it didn't mean anything to her. She had a reputation, she had Dom's reputation and that seemed to go a long way back in LA.

[confidenceman]

"Well, if you don't mind me pointin' it out, it's a pretty small city, all things considered. And it's so damned green that I see a lot more people takin' the subway or the buses than cars around this place, 'less they make enough to take a taxi," he said, turning back to his drink and kicking back another gulp. It wasn't that he wanted to discourage her, really, but the reality of Darrow had already sunken in quickly for Sawyer, and he couldn't see a reason not to point it out. "Who knows, though. Seems like this city quickly builds up opportunities for people who need it. Maybe there'll be a metal shop that pops up outta nowhere for you to run."

[eightypercentdevil]

"Yeah, wouldn't that be nice." Not that she'd take that kind of opportunity. The stranger things that happened here, she wanted no part of it. She had enough problems with just being here, she wasn't going to start counting on some magical hoo-doo to save her. If there was one thing she felt down in her bones it was that she made her own way, one way or another.

"What are you doing for cash, Sawyer?"

[confidenceman]

"Construction work," he replied without missing a beat, almost too practiced, which admittedly he'd made an effort of after arriving. Needed to get himself down as someone who was used to the city and welcome to everything it offered, if he wanted to win the hearts and minds of his fellow residents. "Mostly contract work, not a regular gig."

He stared at his glass, not yet taking another sip. "And I do a bit of huntin' on the side."

[eightypercentdevil]

"Huntin', huh? That sounds interesting." Abandoning her classifieds for a moment, she looked straight at him. Hunting could mean any number of things, she knew that, but none of the things that came to mind were legal. Unless he was taking bounties and that... hell, she had mixed feelings about that.

[confidenceman]

She made about as vague of a remark as someone could on the subject, and Sawyer wasn't inclined to cough up information just for that. Hell, if she wanted to ask about his job, she could, and he would make her get to that point if only because it was a certain level of respect, in its own way.

"Yeah," he said, deliberately obtuse. "It's definitely interesting."

[eightypercentdevil]

"What, exactly, are you hunting, 'cause I don't see a lot of deer around here." If he wanted to play coy, that was fine, she had no problems being blunt. Sometimes that's the only way to get things done and she was all about getting shit done. She hated unfinished business.

[confidenceman]

She had absolutely no sense of humor, by the looks of it, which was fine. Kind of reminded him even more of Ana Lucia, to be honest, though it was one of her generally less pleasant traits. Couldn't crack a joke to save her life.

"Thugs," he replied, arching a brow. "Not huntin' them down, but definitely haulin' them in. Hand them off to the cops whenever there's someone they need a little more help with. I'd go the high road, but I ain't the academy type."

[eightypercentdevil]

Funny, he didn't strike her as the law and order type, but from what she'd heard, she'd been wrong before. Some cops just don't read cop, but it reminded her to keep a little distance. A shame, he seemed nice, but she's a thief and racer at heart and that didn't always go over so well with the cops. "You a cop in your other life?"

[confidenceman]

"You're kiddin' me, right? Do I look like the cop type?" Sawyer asked, perplexed, before he took another swig of his drink, snorting at the mere thought. Maybe he'd gotten close on the island, close enough that he could claim some amount of experience in the business, but even then it'd been less about rules and more about keeping order.

Not exactly how this pseudo-utopia liked going about it.

"Been on the other side of the law more often. S'just that I got a clean slate here. Figured I'd take advantage."

[eightypercentdevil]

"Cops come in all kinds." She took another drink and smiled at his surprise. It was reassuring to know that her instincts hadn't been entirely off. So he was a bad guy trying to be a good guy. It was... endearing, was that the word?

It didn't mean she wouldn't tease him a little about it. She was trying to do a lot of things, but intentionally being an angel wasn't one of them. She was still racing, still not afraid to work with hot parts, just because she wasn't intentionally taking the shit out of the cops, didn't mean she was thinking twice about them. "I think it's sweet, you trying to stay on the good side. It's almost adorable."

[confidenceman]

Maybe it was just intended as jest. Sounded like it, anyway, with the smile practically in her voice and sounding so much like Ana Lucia that Sawyer wanted to pound something. But it rubbed him in just enough of the wrong way — because it wasn't adorable or sweet, any of it. Maybe he made a piss poor excuse for a law-abiding citizen, but it wasn't a joke. Not his efforts, nor what would happen if he slid back.

So he drained his drink, and started to move to leave. And that, if anything, made him feel a lot older than he was before he landed on the Island.

"Close my tab," he told the tender, waiting for his card back. "Guess I'll leave while I'm still ahead and sweet. Hope you find your job, though. Somethin' to keep you busy in the midst of all this hell."