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Liz is used to people looking at her.
It used to bother her: the double take, varying degrees of subtlety to it, eyes lingering on her forehead or her hands or widening at the pitch of her voice. These days she’s used to it. It doesn’t bother her. The life she’s lived, the things she’s seen - what does she care if someone is disgusted or curious or confused by her?
She makes a game of it. How long will it take? What will the reaction be? She’s good at knowing who will be obvious, who will hide it, who genuinely won’t be thrown.
Tristan is different.
-
That boy is too self-involved , Liz thinks. He’s pretty and moody and dangerous. The perfect play thing for The Countess. He barely gives Liz a casual glance, more interested in the alcohol. He’s stewing, brooding.
Liz has seen this before and, she assumes, she’ll see it again. All these boys - The Countess chews them up and spits out the bones, and none of them know a damn thing about rejection.
Liz could tell them all about that. Instead, she just slides a shot of vodka across the bar to him and says, like she has so many times before, “It’s on the house, handsome. But just the one.”
If she gave free drinks to every lost, heartbroken young thing trying to find their way in the Hotel Cortez, they’d be running at even more of a loss.
When Tristan smiles, the rage fades just a little from his eyes, but he’s still not really looking.
-
Another night; some other fight. Tristan is at the bar, his fingernails still stained red, while The Countess is still lost to the night, and Tristan says in a voice rough with Liz doesn’t know what, “You know, your makeup is always on point, Liz.”
Liz rolls her eyes. “Oh, kiddo,” she says. “You can’t use me to make her jealous.” It wouldn’t work, for one, she doesn’t say. And she wouldn’t stand for it, she doesn’t bother adding. For all The Countess is, has become, she’s still the woman who gave Liz the key to a life of freedom.
Tristan scoffs. “No, look, I was a model. I know what works. You’re on fleek.”
Liz laughs in spite of herself. “I’ll take your word for it. You kids and your slang.”
“Oh come on.” Tristan grins. “You’re not that much older than me, I bet, not really.”
“There you go answering my question of how much you’ve had tonight. I think it’s time for you to drink up and go to bed,” Liz tells him, and he looks at her for a long moment before relenting.
Later, running a damp rag over the bar, not really cleaning it but going through the motions, Liz realises, recognises the look: he was checking her out. Not out of curiosity, not an I’ve heard stories kind of intrigue, but something realer. And maybe it is just a misguided, dangerous attempt to make The Countess jealous. He’s moody, the type who is prone to acting out. But there is still something genuine in there, and against her better judgement, Liz goes to be smiling to herself that night.
-
She knows where she lives, who she lives among. But Liz, at least, is only human, and nights at the Hotel Cortez are long and lonely.
She’s dicing with danger, even though she’s reasonably sure Tristan has been discarded. The Countess usually keeps her new toys for a lot longer, but she seems distracted, and now Tristan haunts the hotel hallways alone like the angry ghost he isn’t.
He looks. And he keeps looking.
And he keeps coming back to Liz.