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With Lou, everything’s pretty much on the table. Of course she knows how to lie, scheme, fly under the radar, exist on the low. But for those who know her, truly and deeply, she is anything but low. She’s loud and big and her personality gets in your face as if to say, “take it or leave it, baby.” And with that, comes an incorrigible sense of playfulness. She can be goofy, she laughs easily, doesn’t take herself too seriously when the moment is right. And all of that increases tenfold when she’s with the people she trusts the most, when she’s at her most relaxed. Or stoned.
Debbie Ocean isn’t all that funny. She’s got wit, that’s for sure. It’s part of the job. And she can have a sharp tongue that more or less leads to a few laughs for the people around her, but intentionally funny? She doesn’t waste her energy. Especially as a boss. She doesn’t think it’d be fair to expect 7 girls to respect you, to completely trust your heist logic, with your mouth in a set line and your eyes focused, if just an hour earlier you had a Lou style napkin hat atop your head. So yeah, Debbie Ocean isn’t the type you’d associate with the ridiculous.
But what Lou knows, that the others don’t, is that when she simply exists- not in a heist, not deep within the planning of a new scheme, or plotting this thing or that- Debbie’s pretty fucking fun. And when she feels like having a lot of fun, coupled with a lotta drinks, it’s not that hard to pull her into the ridiculous. Lou’s not sure if that’s really a side that only she is privy too, but she likes to think so. She likes to watch Deb command a team, intimidate a man, charge through a crowd and remember, she knows a completely different side of that same woman.
And when they’re in moments like this, enjoying a casual drink in a crowded bar with a man trying to get his arm around Debbie- Lou thinks that maybe she focuses just a little too hard on that side of her partner. Finds herself desperately trying to let go of the idea that Debbie is in some way hers. Tries to just let the moment happen, allow the brunette to do what she wants- as she has every right to. As Lou has no right to say shit about. They haven’t been like that in over 5 years she reminds herself, gritting her teeth, watching Debbie smile, actually smile at this fucking guy.
She swivels away from them on her stool and orders another. She can’t watch this shit. She tries to scan the crowd for a woman to distract herself with and perhaps make Debbie just a little uncomfortable. When it comes to their work, there’s a lot of games that Lou doesn’t mind playing. But if there’s one thing she’s always taken pride in, it’s being completely straight up in her relationships. No bullshit. She likes to be respectful, considerate, even if she doesn’t say it. But if Debbie wants to play games then fuck, she’ll go up to bat. And if there’s one thing Lou knows she’ll always win at, it’s making her partner jealous.
Just as she spots someone, a young, jet black haired thing moving her body to the rhythm in all the right ways, Debbie clears her throat. Lou snaps back at attention where Debbie is looking at her, one delicate eyebrow raised. The guy is just looking between the two of them, slack jawed and confused. He’s handsome, Lou thinks, but there’s really not a man out there that’s half as smart as either of them and dumb gets boring real quick.
“Yes?” Lou asks, a cocky grin playing at her lips. She knows she's been caught with a wandering eye.
Debbie nearly shrugs, trying not to give herself away, “Just need to excuse myself for a second. Can you get me another if they come back while I’m gone?”
“I’m sure he’d be happy to!” Lou knows Debbie is asking her but she still nods her head in the pretty boy’s direction. He doesn’t say anything, just looks a bit more lost.
Debbie steps off her stool and barely pats the guy on the chest, saying something along the lines of “I’ll be right back.” Suddenly it’s just the two of them and Lou finds that he is doing everything in his power not to meet her intimidating, smoky, if not slightly bored gaze.
Lou snaps her gum and he finally looks to her, “Good luck with her,” she says, “she’s kind of a man eater.” She winks.
He swallows hard, he’s feigning cool interest but she sees right through to the terror “oh really?”
“Yeah. But it’s all worth it for a night.”
“I don’t think I understand what you mean.”
“Oh,” she grins, “You will. Hope you don’t mind whips.”
She can just barely contain a laugh as his eyes widen. Suddenly she recalls a night, years and years ago. Feels like a lifetime. Where she’d felt the overwhelming need to fuck with a guy like this. They’d been having what Lou considered one of the great nights of their lives when a man had stumbled in and right into Debbie. There’d been enough champagne and shots of vodka for her to mildly entertain him while Lou watched the promise of their evening slip away. They’d just finally made that transition from friends, to friends who sometimes fuck. Well. Not sometimes. Often and vigorously. But the lines of it all, if there were any, were blurred. She had no right to tell Debbie that she couldn’t flirt shamelessly with this sandy haired fuck and pull him off the yacht to enjoy the rest of the evening with him and him alone. So she did what she did best. She made it into a job.
“Wager a bet.” Lou had said, all those years ago, sidling up to Debbie where she was ordering another drink. She’d nearly touched a tongue to the brunette’s ear as she spoke and she felt a shiver run down the other woman’s spine.
“I thought we were taking a night off?”
“Let’s keep things interesting. Shall we?”
“We shall.”
“Blondie-“
“The guy I’ve been talking to?”
“Yes. Blondie.”
“Sure.”
“If I can clear his bank account before the end of the night, you tattoo my name,” she ran a finger over the silky fabric that lay over Debbie’s backside, “on your ass.”
Never one to show her hand, Debbie merely quirked an eyebrow, “and what if I beat you to it?”
“Ladies choice.”
“A life stuck with you on my ass? Hardly seems like a fair bet.”
“Baby,” Lou’s lips just brushed over her pulse point, “you don’t need a tattoo to be stuck with me.”
Only 3 hours later, as Debbie was lying on her stomach, dress pulled over her waist, scowl on her face, Lou had to wonder if she even tried that hard. And as she used some sandy haired strangers money to pay for her name tattooed across her partners skin, the both of them extremely drunk and maybe just maybe, kind of in love in a twisted sort of way, a sense of pride rolled through her. Wherever she went, whoever she was with, everyone would know that to Debbie, Lou was someone. Someone enough to live on her body forever. These were the things, the moments that got Lou through life. These moments of pure ridiculous with Debbie Ocean that no one, no one else would ever experience.
A week later, when it was a little more healed and Debbie would finally let her see it, Lou had run her lips, her tongue over her own name on someone else’s body. She allowed herself, for a moment, to pretend it had been more than just a drunken bet that on any other night, under any other circumstances probably never would've happened. And from there, it was just a joke. The one thing about Debbie Ocean that could always, without fail, make her laugh. She had an ass tattoo. And it was her name.
She was brought out of her memories, her own thoughts of a decade ago, by the sight of Debbie walking back toward them and she quickly leaned in to what was now Debbie’s uneasy drinking partner, “oh and if you should be so lucky, make sure to really commit that ass to memory, it’ll get you through some bad days. Really, look at it long and hard.”
He just nodded. Eyes wide, confused, a little scared, perhaps a lot turned on. “Oh, and I’m Lou by the way.”