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“Your Uncle is an alcoholic!” Weiss hisses at her the day Qrow turns up at Beacon. “A dirty, rotten, no-good drunk!”
Yang laughs it off, but she doesn't have a comeback.
The first time Yang had a sip of alcohol, she was nearly ten and Uncle Qrow gave whiskey to her from his flask when she asked for a taste. Yang ought to have known, Qrow had been wearing the same face he had made when Ruby smelt the vanilla extract when they had made cookies together just a month ago and wanted to taste it. Qrow had poured Ruby some in a shot glass and encouraged her sister to try it. Ruby had cried for almost a whole hour after.
Yang took a large gulp and immediately sputtered most of it down the front of her shirt. It was not the first time Yang had felt betrayed by someone she had trusted, but it was the first time they had done it on purpose and laughed in the aftermath. Yang never quite trusted Uncle after that – with her life and Ruby's perhaps, but not nothing less than that.
Still, what little whiskey Yang had managed to keep in her mouth, she forced herself to swallow. That had been her victory and she scowled triumphantly at Qrow who looked like the cat that ate the canary.
She puked later and she let Qrow hold her hair back for her at the toilet. His hand had rubbed soothingly on back. Qrow told her he was proud of her and maybe wait a couple years before she tried alcohol again.
Yang asked to try his scotch a week later.
Qrow said no and moved all his alcohol in the house somewhere else. Yang never figured out quite where and not because she didn't look or even not hard enough because she had looked very hard.
Still, Yang started drinking regularly by the time she was thirteen. She started out with beer, but that didn't taste all too great – like muddy pond water, mostly. Cocktails mixed with fruit juice or crème were her preference, especially sipped through a straw. Yang felt like they made her drunker and faster. Little umbrellas in her drinks were non-negotiable.
She liked being drunk, she felt warm and cozy in her own body and everything was more exciting. Everything bad got foggy and her friends told her she was a cheerful, fun drunk.
Yang had been pretty proud of herself – it wasn't all that hard to hide it from her dad and Ruby was too young but for the longest time she'd thought she'd even eluded Qrow. That was until one particularly bad hangover and her Uncle found her buried under blankets in room and gave her aspirin and advice.
“Yeah, your Aura might absorb any bruises or broken bones you get in a fight or help you from getting a cold, but you gotta reap what you sow with hangovers, Firecracker,” He laughed sardonically, continuing more subdued than Yang had and would ever see her Uncle, “You're going down a bad road right now, kiddo. Don't you be like me.”
Yang hadn't really gotten it then and she didn't really get it now. Not enough to stop herself, but she remembers it when Weiss tells her that her uncle is a drunk.
That night, she sneaks out of Beacon and slips into Junior's bar. She's been to plenty of other, more stylish, bars with more dancing that are more her scene in Vale since coming to Beacon, but Yang feels like poking a bear tonight. While she isn't greeted at gunpoint this time, Junior tries to corner her within moments of getting into the establishment.
“What do you want this time, Blondie?” He grumbles at her, trying to look intimidating to her.
“Just drinking and dancing today, Junior,” Yang grins and tries to pass him to get to the bar. He blocks her path, his arms crossed and glaring at her behind his silly red-lensed glasses.
“Oh, lets not fight, Junior. I'm just looking for a good time – and it looks like I'm going to have to make it a good time for everyone here,” she says with a glance around the mostly empty dance floor, with only a couple of lack-luster dancers. Junior doesn't look impressed and Yang is going to break a sweat tonight – whether she gets to do so dancing or fighting everyone in the whole damn bar is up to Junior. She'd really quite prefer the dancing though. Yang continues coyly, because flirting with Junior always bewildered him into letting her have her way before, “Aw, come on – don't be like that.” She flutters her eyelashes just a little.
It works this time too, his arms stay crossed but they are less tense and when she ducks around him, he lets her.
“Thanks – I'll even save a dance for you if you're good!” She laughs over her shoulder and his ears go pink. Yang grins and struts to the bar, the most powerful person in whole place.
The bartender warily raises his brow at her in question. Yang almost orders a Strawberry Sunrise – her favorite cocktail if only because its red and yellow like Ruby and her together – which she never got the last couple of times she ordered here, but then her eyes catch Firecracker on the menu and she orders that instead.
She drinks it quickly – she doesn't plan on buying any more of her own drinks tonight but she likes to have a little bit in her before she gets to dancing and flirting other people into buying her more. Yang pockets the umbrella – she has quite the collection of them, then she joins the lazy dancers.
Yang is the star of the dance floor, pulling nearly everyone into a dance with her. She is a supernova, burning brighter and brighter. Her body vibrates and everything makes her laugh, makes her feel good. Nothing matters, nothing hurts - not her drunk uncle or her absent father or dead mom or the fact that her drunk uncle won't talk to her about the mother that left her behind, nor getting her ass handed to her by Neo, or nearly being stabbed through the heart by Neo. Not even the town getting wrecked by Grimm just a little while ago. All that matters is everyone is watching her, wants to dance with her.
People are obviously calling others in, telling their friends that this place is actually hopping for once. More people join her on the dance floor and she doesn't have to pull people nursing beers at the bar to join her. She lies to one guy and tells him its her birthday and he buys her a drink that tastes like cake. Yang joins a bunch of giggling drunk girls for shots. Everyone vies for her attention, she is the life of the party, the room. Yang is life itself, she feels like.
Netiher Melanie or Miltia will dance with her when she tries, but she gives Junior his promised dance. When he tries to cop a feel, she shoves him hard to the floor and couple dancers trod on him before they realize he is there. Yang doesn't break his kneecaps like she would have any other time, but she's got the Vytal Tournament to think about and she isn't going to risk getting in trouble over a sleaze.
“Naughty boy, didn't I say you'd have to be good,” Yang says coquettishly and keeps dancing. Junior doesn't even retaliate, he just lumbers away and Yang forgets, just like she has forgotten everything that isn't with her here and now, everything that isn't the beat of the music throbbing inside of her and the room.
She climbs on top of the bar and screams for everyone to be sure to watch the Vytal finales, because she is a shoe-in to make it that far and then she'll win the whole damn thing. Everyone cheers. Yang is unstoppable, stronger than anything and everything and everyone loves her, supports her. Wants to see her win and she will.
Yang leaves the bar later than she intended but that ache inside sated for awhile. Just for a moment, she understands what her Uncle Qrow told her.