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Dante wakes up because the sun is on his face and bleeding past his eyelids because no matter what he does with his stupid fucking blinds it’s never stays dark in the trailer.
He’s gotta fucking board up the windows.
Unless he’s super trashed, it's always the sun that gets him. Which, to be fair, he is super trashed a lot of the time. Probably why he keeps forgetting to put cardboard on his windows.
But last night his particular vice was a girl he brought home and not a shit ton of booze, so, there’s that. She’s probably long gone. They usually are by now. And she feels long gone, no dip in the bed, no one at his back.
His eyes creek open and he stares straight out, laying on his stomach and sprawled out with his head turned on his pillow. On his little crate side table he can see his wake up booze and it's probably blocking his cigs. He can't see the carton between the angle and his waking haze, but it has to be there. Briefly, he considers which he wants to start with. All the while his necklace digs into his chest from the awkward angle he’s gotten it pinned under. Just digging and digging and digging.
He needs to get up, that shit hurts.
But what really jolts him up is hearing the sound of someone knocking shit over in his trailer.
He bolts up, actually, wide awake immediately and mentally rifling through every possible place he could have left Ebony and Ivory before he got into bed with his fuck buddy last night (probably beside the bed, probably on the floor, probably only two seconds away), assessing the small space in a split second. Who’d even be here? What contact? What loose thread? He’d gone completely silent, completely off the grid, not a goddamn word to anyone, disappearing into the goddamn lake practically, no one should know he’s here-he’s going a mile a second, questions going through his mind and his best plan of action to get to his goddamn guns before someone pulls one on him.
Only to realize it’s…well…her. The girl he brought home, cursing to herself about what’s fallen to the floor. Until she turns and looks at him, eyes widening at whatever his expression looks like.
He can imagine he doesn’t look super friendly right now.
They stay like this for a moment, like fucking rabbits who just saw a predator, until Dante’s eyes flick to other parts of the trailer and his shoulders begin to relax.
There’s a lot less trash everywhere. Clothes have been picked up. The counters look wiped down. What the-
“Have you been cleaning my trailer?” He asks, baffled. His tone maybe is a bit harsh and she stands straight, crossing her arms.
“Yeah, did you see the place?” She asks in return.
He lived in it, of course he’d seen it. It was a shit pit when he bought it and shit pit it’ll probably remain, it’s not like he cares all that much.
What's her name?
He studies the girl, trying to dig through his memory. Something simple, something super normal. Went by something short-Liz. Elizabeth, Liz.
She’d gotten dressed while he was asleep, probably not wanting to keep her shit on his floor. And she definitely looks like she was probably at a club the night prior. Clothes tight, skirt short, make up still on. If it’s run over from last night or touched up in the morning, he can’t really tell because he doesn’t exactly remember what it looked like at the club. The lightings different, it doesn’t matter anyway. But she’s on the short side. Ok, maybe more average height but he’s too tall to really know what that means. She looks short to him.
He remembers seeing her the night prior and thinking how he liked her curves. Nice ass, thighs that looked like they might jiggle a bit, and with tits that’d definitely do the same. And he’s thinking that again but it’s definitely secondary to the confusion that this girl is one, still in his trailer after waking up and that two, she’s been cleaning it.
Like fucking Snow White.
She been singing to the seagulls outside to?
“A thank you would be appropriate here,” she tells him and his brain reenters the conversation. Right. Real conversion, real girl, really his trailer.
Definitely not singing to any sky rats.
“Why are you cleaning my trailer?” He asks instead and she cocks her head slightly.
“’Thank you, Liz-‘,” she starts and he sighs.
“Yeah, thank you, Liz. Why are you cleaning my trailer?”
“Because it looked so nice in here,” she replies.
Did they get along last night or is he just being a fucking asshole or something?
He’s probably just being an asshole, he remembers getting along just fine and everything. But he doesn’t understand why she doesn’t understand that this is fucking weird. Normally people are out of his house by now, sometimes leaving a little sharpie note on his arm he’ll forget about but be stuck with for days because the ink just doesn’t wash off good enough.
When they do stay, they want to cuddle and seem to think they’ve fucked him good enough that they’ll be able to get them into a relationship. Sometimes, he lets them try for a few weeks or a few months. Because, as established, he’s a bit of an asshole. And it's nice, sometimes, to have someone around who thinks they know him. Who thinks they care about him. Something warm. They don't really know him, of course. He never really lets them. But the illusions nice for a little while, a fleeting little sunrise.
Sometimes people just want morning seconds so they stick around to get some.
Never has anyone stayed to clean.
He’s never stayed anywhere to clean either so, it’s definitely weird.
A paranoid part in his brain wonders if there’s some other motive. If she’s looking for something, buying time, planning something. There’s plenty of people who want him dead, after all, and they probably know him well enough to send a pretty assassin. Maybe she’s even stashed something in here, to watch him or kill him or something. But given how she’s acting…he’s kind of liable to believe that she’s just…genuinely cleaning.
Not entirely, but kinda.
You know, he was right about one thing last night. She did jiggle and he did like it.
His eyes don’t leave her, he still doesn’t trust this, but he reaches past his morning bottle over to grab his Camels an-…his hand touches nothing but his side table. So he risks peaking at it again, confirming that she did indeed move all his shit, and then he looks back to Liz. Still standing right where he left her.
“What’d you do with my Camels?” He asks.
“The cigarettes?” She asks. No. The fucking live camels he keeps in his trailer.
“Yeah, my cigarettes.”
Wordlessly she walks off to his shitty little kitchen. She’s not wearing shoes. He didn’t notice that before. That’d probably be uncomfortable for cleaning, though. She’d been wearing heels.
That’s…probably why she looks so short. He saw her in heels all last night until he got her in bed. And at that point he wasn’t really thinking about how tall she was.
The whole get up isn’t exactly…geared towards cleaning, he supposes. Being a club outfit and all.
She pulls open his one good drawer and produces a pack of Camels and tosses them toward him. He catches them easily, pulling a cigarette out and sticking it between his lips before muffling, “lighter?”
That gets thrown towards him to, but he doesn’t catch it because he’s not looking.
It does fall pretty skillfully on his lap, though. Liz has good aim, he supposes.
“Thanks,” he says before going to light the cigarette.
“Why Camels?” She asks.
“I like things that feel like they could kill me,” he tells her and she snorts. He takes a drag then looks back at Liz, before offering out the cigarette, “you smoke?”
“Not your shitty Camels,” she replies and he chuckles, going to take another drag. “I’m trying to quit.” He raises a brow before letting out his smoke.
“You need me to stop?” He asks but she shakes her head. “So…you normally clean guys houses after you fuck or am I special?”
“Your trailer is disgusting,” she says. “Someone had to do something." For a second, a brief little second, she studies him. Trying to fit him into this space. Her eyes skim to the angel behind him, then back. She asks, "why’d you put the mattress out here when you have a bed in the back?”
“Tried to fuck back there, I kept banging my head on shit. And I’m too tall for the bed,” he says simply. “This was better…we playing 20 questions or something?”
“Do you want to be playing 20 questions?” She asks back.
Not really, no.
Shit gets too personal too goddamn quick. He flicks some of his cigarette ash into the shitty tray (newly clean thanks to Liz, though) on the side table.
“You didn’t have to do all this,” he says. “I appreciate it, but you didn’t have to clean my shit.”
“Well, you clearly weren’t going to,” she replies.
He owes her something for this. He doesn’t know what but…something. Food? Breakfast? Maybe? He snuffs the cigarette out in the ash tray and pulls himself out of bed. Running a hand through his hair, he glances around as his bare feet smack against the floor.
He could offer breakfast or something.
Walk her home maybe.
Not like he can get her a ride.
At the very least, more time with her gives him time to decide if he thinks she's plotting to kill him or not and react accordingly. Right now, he's thinking no, but you can never be too careful.
He’s going to go to the fridge and see what they have until he notices Liz looking at him. It’s not a bad look. But it definitely reminds him that he’s naked. Not something he minds but…
“Pants?” He asks. She gestures towards the cabinets beside the bed and under his flat screen and he heads there. “You want to eat or something?”
“You’re asking me out to breakfast now?” She asks and he shrugs.
“I mean, we could fuck again if you’d rather do that,” he says. “But if you want to do that, I’d rather know before I put on some pants.” She laughs a little but he doesn’t turn, fishing around all his cabinets for some jeans.
“Maybe I could do breakfast,” she says as he pulls out some pants. “You have somewhere in mind?”
Hmm…what time even is it? Ok, better question, what day of the fucking week even is it? He goes to pull on his jeans, only to stop when he hears some panic from Liz. He turns to her, confused, and she looks a bit disgusted.
“Put on some underwear,” she insists and he blinks. He drops his jeans before folding his arms over his chest and turning to her fully.
“Why are you demanding I put on underwear?” He asks.
“Do you want to chafe?” She asks. Not really, no, but he’ll live. He can heal, after all.
“I don’t want to look for underwear,” he replies and she groans.
“Stay,” she says, firm. He watches as she pushes past him, to the cabinets he was just in, before she shoves a pair of boxer briefs at him. “Put these on.”
Ok…she’s…particular.
He puts on the underwear.
“You didn’t actually answer about breakfast,” he says.
She is cute.
She’s definitely touched up her make up since she got out of his bed. He remembers better now. Of course, she seems like the sort of girl who has the kind of make up were it'd survive being sprayed by a fire hose for twenty minutes. But that sort of thing still usually fades and gets a little fucked up if you sleep in it.
And she definitely slept in it. A lot of the shimmer has died overnight, leaving the look a bit less club even if its a bit heavy for casual girls in the morning.
But it definitely looks clean. Even down to the lips, repainted and crisp.
She looks at him, a little confused. He’s probably staring too hard. He goes to pull on his jeans.
“Some places on the pier might be open, there’s a diner across the street to,” he says.
When he looks at her again, she’s still looking at him.
She’s really fucking cute.
He kinda wants to see if she wants a second round instead. Wants to toss her on the bed, give his poor, ailing, trailer park neighbors something to be annoyed about at…whatever goddamn time it is. Definitely not too early but he definitely lives around a bunch of particular carnies on a fucking tourist trap pier so…
But her lips are so fucking pretty.
He wants to say he knows where they’d look extra pretty but he won’t.
Breakfast, they're going to breakfast. He's getting dressed for breakfast. He’s trying to be nice, not go for seconds right now. She hasn't even really said yes to fucking breakfast, let alone to anything else.
Still, though...she tries to tell him something while he’s staring at those lips and he’s not paying attention. He reaches for her chin instead, shutting her up quickly as he tilts back her head slightly, eyes still on her mouth. He really, really wants her to say yes to breakfast.
“You know,” he says, voice low, “this is a pretty color on you.” He thumbs her bottom lip for emphasis and she doesn’t say anything for a moment. A long moment.
Like he thought to, fire hose proof. The lipstick doesn’t even smudge on his skin.
She swallows and tells him, low herself, “you do probably owe me food for all the time I spent cleaning your counters.” He smirks, dropping her chin, and returning to dig around in the clothes she put away for a shirt. “The diner probably will be better.”
“The piers got decent shit it’s just way over priced and sometimes half grease,” he says.
“So, like I said, diner will be better.”
“Diner will be better, yeah,” he concedes.
“We can go there,” she says. “After you get a shirt.”
“After I get a shirt,” he agrees.
He doesn’t think much about what shirt. When he finds one that he figures is good enough, he tugs it on.
What’s the weather supposed to be like this week? Should he offer her a jacket or something? Not like she’s wearing much. Turning to her as he adjusts the hem of his shirt (doesn’t quite get to the waistline of his pants), Dante glances over her again.
She’s probably going to get cold like that.
“Do you want to borrow a jacket?” He asks. “I have a shit ton.” He watches her glance towards the back room where he keeps the jackets. They’re back past the bathroom and in the actual ‘suite’ of the trailer. It still has a mattress, the one that came with the trailer. And all his jackets, some more blankets for the winter, some clothes he doesn’t fit out front. And a little box tube TV that’s a hold over from before he got the flat screen.
He’s got a collection of VHS tapes he can stick in there. Mostly old slashers. Floyd, his best friend who he’s now entirely cut off, used to tell him he was ‘nostalgic’.
Probably why he’s got the game cabinet in the living room that he stole a while back.
But Dante just thinks it’s nice to have somewhere closed off where he can just lay around with some movie made before he was born and pretend his life is a bit less of a shit show. He goes back there all the time because of that.
“T-shirt?” He offers instead. Liz hums, then looks at him again, focused on his chest. Sizing him up to her.
“Alright,” she says.
He goes to the back, then, and grabs one of the clean ones off the back room bed. Liz catches it when he tosses it to her and studies the graphic on the front for a moment.
It’s alright, it seems.
She puts on the shirt.
He’s going to need to check his stash boxes later. He’s got his emergency fund cut up in several hiding places around the trailer, any of which Liz could have gotten into and pocketed. Not…not that she really has any pockets. He decides he likes her, doesn’t mean he trusts her though. Not that much.
Later, though. He’s going to do that later.
He grabs his wallet before sliding into his boots and opens the door up wide for her.
“Ladies first,” he says. Liz gives him a cute little look before slipping out and as he watches her down the stairs, into the lazy off season pier, he thinks that at least lunch should be nice.
He’s probably not going to see her again.
But lunch…lunch will be nice.