"Do you have any ideas at what I could do or give to Coriolanus for his birthday? Si just told me this mornin' that it's in three days." She asks Livia the second she walked through the front door.
"Given that you don't have a job and can't get one, you're essentially trapped in the house and don't have money that he can't track, I think it's a little silly to be worrying about that." Livia said, shaking the snow off her hair.
"So I can't give him anything?" She says distressed "He'd given me more in the last year than anyone else has in the rest of my entire life." 'and taken things like my freedom, but nevermind all that.' She thinks "I wanna be able to give him somethin' back, somethin' meaningful. I've already written him two songs, I don't wanna keep doin' the same thing over and over. It gets old."
She slaps her hands over Lucy Gray's shoulders playfully and says "Okay for one, reading about how much you feel about Coriolanus will never get old to Coriolanus, but I get what you mean. Come, let's drink some of his wine for once."
Her feet pad down on the floor since she's wearing snow boots as opposed to her normal heels. She hated to relent to the weather but it was either relent or lose her toes. Still, she's wearing the most stylish, chic, non-clunky boots she could find.
"Shouldn't you take your shoes off?" Lu asks "You're trackin' muddy sludge everywhere."
"Normally I would." She opens the door at the end of the long corridor she'd been leading Lucy Gray down
"But this time you figured you'd mix it up?"
"Yes, because fuck his floors." She adds bitterly. Just because she likes this part of their agreement, doesn't mean she's forgotten she's doing it with what's essentially a gun to her head.
"I mean he wouldn't be the one cleanin' them, Liv." She says, not wanting the staff more bothered.
"That's true. Could you tell the staff not to clean the floors until after he's arrived and seen the mess?" She asks in all seriousness
"Livia, that would only come down on them for not bein' prompt."
"Ugh, fine." She says taking off her shoes and throwing them next to the door then flipping the light switch inside the room she was going in
"Where are we goin'?" She asks Livia "I've never been to this part of the Penthouse, it looked too dark for me."
"Wine cellar. Some of the wine down here is older than you and me combined."
"That sounds expensive." Coriolanus had told her his family was close to homeless when they'd met, wouldn't they have sold all their valuables to keep their heads over the water?
"Yeah well, the Snows are old money. Really old." She says jotting down the steps into the musty room "Them having something like this isn't unusual."
She picks a bottle and dusts it off to reveal its label. "Fan of merlot?" She asks
"I suppose?" Lucy Gray responds, unsure what 'merlot' means.
They make their way upstairs, Livia making sure to make a show to Lucy Gray about throwing her shoes by the front door.
"You know Doll, if you really wanted to give him something no one could buy..." Livia said as she sat down on the bed
Lucy Gray looked at her expectantly for a moment before asking shrugging, confused.
"Well you could always...'throw him a bone' so to speak."
"What?"
"You could shake the sheets."
"Oh, Ms.Hayes and the other workers already make the bed for us everyday. No, I want something that he could see means a lot. To both of us." She sits next to Livia on the bed and puts her hands in prayer position over her lips
