No Need To Ask

Done

 Raven is so done with life. She has barely eaten all day because of "morning sickness", her studies were brutal, and her friends kept asking her if she needed help as if she was invalid. She was sick and tired of it. Most of all she was sick and tired of getting calls from Finn's lawyer asking to see her about the baby. It was her damned baby the moment he went and murdered somebody and proved that he was not fit to be a father.

That is why Raven Reyes finds herself pushing open the door to a dingy bar on the boardwalk at midnight and plopping herself down in front of the bar. She waves down a bartender and murmurs, "Whiskey on the rocks."

When the bartender doesn't answer, she looks up to see a tall wiry woman with a mane of curly hair. The eyebrow on her sculptured face is raised as she wipes down a glass, and just stared back at Raven, apparently unimpressed. Raven would probably have hit on her if it weren't for the fact that her stomach was starting to show underneath her bomber jacket. As it was, since she couldn't flirt, she chose instead to scowl, "What? You don't want to serve me? There's another bar two blocks down that'll serve me if you don't." As one can tell, Raven has an excellent balance in life.

The woman could probably tell as well, because she shakes her head with a small sigh before saying, "I'll get it." Raven sags in her seat. She didn't like exploding in people's faces like that. It's gotta be the pregnancy hormones right? There certainly isn't any other possible way to explain it, like maybe the fact that her temper was just as explosive to begin with.

As she looks around the bar is relatively quiet. It isn't surprising for a Wednesday night so late. There is a salty smell to the place mixed with the alcohol, and the wood panel walls are tastefully decorated with nautical themed elements. The lull of small talk in the background is soothing compared to the rush of Raven's entire day. Slowly her eyelids start to feel heavy.

She is started awake by an entire tray of ice cream. An entire tray of ice cream. Her immediate reaction is to do a Kirby and just inhale all of it, but she suppresses the urge. "This isn't what I ordered. I won't pay for it." Where the heck did she even get such a big tray of ice cream from at midnight? The ice cream store next door was closed.

The woman seems slightly amused by the quirk of her lips. She leans in so that her breath caresses Raven's ear as she speaks quietly. "It's on the house."

The woman leans back and steps away, moving on to another customer. You see, Raven would complain and make a big deal out of it, but she realizes that baby actually really craves mint chocolate chip ice cream. It is the only food item she has been able to look at all day without wanting to puke. So she picks up her spoon and starts eating the ice cream. It is quite the task because she is racing with time trying to scarf it all down before it melts.

By the end her stomach is full and she feels sleepy and laden. She lets her cheek rest on the counter for a bit, and the last thing she remembers is watching the woman who brought her the ice cream bustling behind the counter making another drink for a late night customer. Awake Raven would've smacked herself for even thinking about it, but in this moment, a sleepy and content Raven thinks she wouldn't mind if a woman like that brought her food for her crazy cravings once in a while.

-0-

Raven awakes content for the first time in a long time. She is soothed by the rhythm of the rocking, the sheets are warm and silky, and smell of... the sea?!?! She shoots up in the bed and pries her eyes open to find herself in a low ceilinged room. The sheets are a silky black and light comes in from windows that surround her on three sides. In front of her, they slant. The sea expands in front of her, neverending.

"Oh good. You're awake." The woman from the night before leans against the door frame casually.

"Where am I? Where have you taken me, you kidnapper?" Raven screeches. Maybe it had been a bad idea after all to go to a dingy bar during midnight hours. She scooches as far away as the woman as possible, which happens to apparently be the floor, because she scooches so far she ends up tumbling off the bed with an "oomph".

"You're the one who fell asleep in my bar. Excuse me if I didn't want you to get more of a backache,"the woman answers in a drawl. Despite the tone of her words, she walks around the bed and holds a hand out to Raven to help her up.

Now that Raven thinks about it, she doesn't remember ever leaving the bar after eating the tub of ice cream. Perhaps there had been sedatives in it? If there really were, then this was certainly an unconventional form of kidnapping. "What do you mean more of a backache?"

The woman peers at Raven. "You really don't recognize me, do you?"

Raven frowns. Is she supposed to be able to pinpoint this psycho? "No...?"

The corner of the woman's lips quirk upward. "I suppose you wouldn't. I'm not a very memorable person. I'm Luna Rivers, Lincoln and Lexa's cousin."

It all comes flooding back to Raven then. Last year, Lexa and Lincoln had brought their cousin to the annual Christmas party that the Griffins held. Albeit her hair had been tied back in braids, but it was the same thin woman with chiseled cheekbones and calming silence about her. At the time Raven had been so making out with Finn under the mistletoe that she hadn't really paid much attention. She shuts that thought down just as abruptly as the memory re-enters her mind because she cannot and will not think about that murderer.

So instead, Raven pushes herself up, purposely ignoring Luna's outstretched hand. She is capable of doing things by herself. There were worse things than dealing with a person who thought they knew how to treat your body better than you right?

Luna doesn't seem offended by the action and simply nods. "Right. Let's get to breakfast." She leads Raven through a series of corridors. Ever the gentlewoman, she indicates with a sweep of her hand a bow that Raven should go first, as if she is a butler or maid welcoming their mistress home to their mansion. Raven tries her best to suppress a smile at Luna's antics. Perhaps she wasn't as stuck up and flat in personality as Raven had initially thought.

Halfway up the narrow stairs, the smell of bacon, sausage, and eggs hits Raven. At the top of the stairs is a sitting area, double doors at the end open to the outdoor deck. A small table surrounded by a u-shaped bench is laden with all the breakfast foods a person could possibly want.

"I'll help myself", Raven announces as she grabs a plate and digs in. If there is one thing about Raven, it is that she is completely unapologetic about her actions.

Luna on the other hand, is much slower in her flowing grace. She folds herself into the bench and takes a plate, slowly cutting her sausage into bite sized pieces with her fork. She is about halfway done eating her second sausage when she realizes that the sounds of vigorous chewing have died down. She looks up to see Raven staring at her plate, even though she quickly looks away out the window to cover it up.

A survey of the table reveals that all the scrambled eggs on the table are mysteriously missing, and the portion on Luna's plate is the last bit left. Luna considers offering it to Raven, but judging by how fiercely independent she had acted earlier, anybody taking a wild swing could guess that Raven would refuse it.

Instead, Luna gets up and scrambles some eggs at the kitchenette on the opposite end of the room. When she returns, Raven is staring at her as if ready to put up a fight. Must she always be so ready to fight somebody? Luna rather thinks that sometimes things could be solved much more peacefully.

Raven's expression morphs to stunned when Luna simply places the plate of eggs in the middle of the table and returns to her food. She doesn't offer it to Raven, and in the end this way, the choice is Raven's whether or not to eat it. Otherwise it just sits there, tantalizingly close to Raven's nostrils, wafting the heavenly scent of scrambled eggs into her nose.

In the end, what do you know? Raven ends up eating the scrambled eggs.