Beginning of a New Friendship

Characters: Valerian Cassidy, Mathew Cassidy and Leigh Abrams
When: Two years before the families go to Azroth Manor
Where: Mint
Summary: Leigh Abrams had a tough day at work and so she goes to the Mint bar to drink the night away. At the bar she runs into Valerian Cassidy who she knew but never became close friends with but that’s all about to change when Valerian ends up saving her life. Mathew Cassidy is also there ready to pick up his brother from work.

Work as a traveling nurse can take a toll on some people, especially Leigh who didn’t have much time to keep in touch with her family thanks to her profession along with dealing with those many patients. She ordered a few drinks from the bar tender and quickly put them away. The glass clanked hard onto the bar and as she started to feel the alcohol take its effect. She wasn’t drunk yet but she was planning on getting there by the end of the night. Sighing, she looked down at the cup wishing that she stopped by at the house instead of coming to the bar first. Leigh loved her family but she also loved her profession even though at times it was difficult and took a toll on her. Caring for others came natural for her but in her line of work Leigh got to see many people in pain and at times she thought there was nothing she could do for them. Leigh knew things would get better as she continued working but at the moment she was turning to the one thing that would help her out, alcohol. Some days she thought it was easier to take on shadow kind than it was some unknown disease.

Leigh ordered a few more glasses and watched as they slowly piled in front of her, now the buzz was finally kicking in and she was having a good old time. More drinks followed and soon Leigh deemed herself drunk but she still wanted more. A man sat down beside her, as drunk as her and soon they started singing random Christmas songs even though it was the middle of summer. Leigh loved Christmas songs and soon her and the drunken man beside her voices carried out through the room. Others were staring but Leigh didn’t realize, she was having too good of a time sitting there at the bar and singing away the night with her drunken friend. However it got later and later and her phone was filled with text messages from both family and friends wondering where she was. Leigh ignored them and turned to the bar tender once more, unfocused and barely with reality.

“Get me and… my friend here… a-a-another drink.” Leigh said almost incoherently. The man beside her smiled a stupid little smile but Leigh waited for her drink not realizing the person in front of her was Valerian Cassidy.

Valerian hadn't worked at Mint for very long, but he was a hard worker and kept to himself. Places like bars and restaurants tended to fill with gossip and drama faster than any other place of employment. Especially considering that Mint, was the nightclub/bar to work at. It had so much appeal. The decor was amazing, with lights and glass walls. The music was always amazing, and the staff that worked at Mint always looked, for lack of a better word, tantalizing. There was no uniform per se, but it was a requirement that the women look "available" and the men just the same. Valerian did not have a problem with that. His body was small and tight, and he walked around showing as much skin as his boss would let him get away with. It was weird to him in retrospect that for someone as shy, dark, and brooding as he was (and still is) that he was comfortable dressing in such a manner that left nothing to the imagination. His boss liked it that way.

He stopped behind the bar as the bartender walked off and mumbled a "Watch the bar, and don't fuck up." As he walked away and went into the back to take a break. Technically he wasn't supposed to be behind the bar. He didn't have permission from his boss to be back there, but he really didn't mind. He played with his shirt, if you could call it that. It was a form fitting sleeveless fishnet shirt that stopped right at the ribs, which left his torso completely exposed. It allowed the eyes to wonder down below his thin waist where his leather pants sat almost vicariously. His adonis lines were the last bit of abdomen the eyes could see before the leather pants began. His appearance was more important to him than most of the other employees. He just cared more.

He looked up at her. Her face was very familiar. He studied her as he pulled a bottle out slowly and made them each a gin and tonic. He went light with the gin, because it didn't really look like she needed anything more to drink. Her or her friend. He looked at her again. "This one is on the house." He said nonchalantly as he turned around and began to reorganize the shelves of liquor behind him. The other bartenders took forever to make drinks because they never put the bottles back where they belonged. He thought about her face. Where did he know her from? Valerian turned back around and began cleaning the empty parts of the counter. A cocktail waitress walked up to the bar.

"You are bar-tending tonight, Valerian?" She said with a smile. "Keep up the good work kiddo." She said with a wink. He didn't respond. He just looked at her sheet of paper and began to make the drinks quickly. He had a knack for making the drinks. In a few minutes he had made them all. "You know, they really ought to keep you back there Val." She said with a smile as she walked away leaving Valerian at the bar alone, with the relatively familiar woman, and the stranger.

Leigh barely heard what the man said as she greedily took her cup and left the other glass for the man beside her. She tilted her head back and left the liquid flow down her throat and the man sitting beside her followed suit and did the same. The glass was half placed, half dropped onto the counter as she looked up at the bar tender who she thought looked familiar but maybe that was just the alcohol playing a trick with the light or something. Whatever it was Leigh didn’t think much more about it and started to fish through her purse for her phone. It was late and friends and family would be worrying about her absence. Shifting through the makeup, mirror, brush, money and other weird items thrown about her tiny bag Leigh soon came across her pink phone that was telling her there were fifteen messages. Leigh flipped open the phone only to drop it in her mess of a purse when she heard the name Valerian. Leigh knew that name but where she from she didn’t know. Looking to her side Leigh wanted to ask her drunken friend if he knew who the bar tender was. However she noticed that her he had left, probably wondered off somewhere else to get a free drink from another drunken stranger.

“You!” Leigh exclaimed pointing at Valerian. She jerked her hand upwards tipping over the glasses in front of her. They fell over, some off of the counter and crashed against the floor. Leigh didn’t seem to take any notice to the cups nor did she seem to realize she wasn’t pointing at Valerian. In reality she was pointing way too much to the left. “I know you from somewhere.” She slurred. She stared at Valerian trying to keep him in focus but no matter how many times she blinked her vision didn’t get any better. She thought hard but her thoughts were too fuzzy to think clearly and the only thing that seemed familiar of person standing in front of her was his name.

“Did I meet you at the hospital?” Leigh asked him. Most of the strangers that look familiar were usually the ones she took care of. Now that she thought about it he reminded her of some little boy who had a broken arm. He broke his arm after falling out of a tree she walked by recently very often to her new workplace. Just as Leigh was coming to the tree she heard a branch break and shortly after a boy fell out of the it landing hard on his side. Luckily it was only his arm that was broken and nothing else. He had a few scrapes and bumps but nothing that wouldn’t heal right away. The person standing in front of her seemed a little older than the boy she helped. Maybe Valerian wasn’t the little tree boy but Leigh knew him from somewhere.

He listened to her drunken rambling, half interested, and only so because he thought he knew her from somewhere. "You look really familiar, but I have not been to a hospital in years." He said as he looked at her even closer. "I do know your face." He admitted as he made her another drink, against his better judgement. This time, it was an Apple Martini. Heavy on the Sweet and Sour, lite on the Sour Apple Pucker, and lite on the Vodka. He had to be careful that she could make it home ok. "Are you driving home..." He stopped for a moment. "Leeeeeeigh?" He said as he pulled the hair from one of his eyes, so he could look at her with both of his brooding eyes. He wracked his brain. What was her last name?

It was that moment that his boss came around the corner. "What the hell are you doing behind the bar Cassidy?! If you are back here, who the hell is bringing drinks to the Red Room?!" He yelled at Valerian, and Valerian turned red momentarily. "You are right boss. I definitely should have stayed in the Red Room, and left the bar unattended while Nina went on break, that way nobody would get drinks. I'll go back to the red room and wait the rest of the twenty minutes of Nina's break in there." He said coolly as he flipped his hair back over one of his eyes. "Sorry boss...it won't..." He said before he was interrupted. "No Cassidy. You stay here. When Nina gets back, tell her she will be working the Red Room for the rest of the week." He said before he walked away. "Good call, kid."

Valerian nodded. "Thank you sir." He said without emotion as he went back to Leigh. He looked at her again and it hit him. "Leigh Abrams." That is who she was. "You are." He said. He took the drink back. "You've had enough." He said as he picked up one of the ice spheres that he had carved during prep time, before work, and placed it into a glass, followed by a bottle of water. "Here." He said as he placed it on the counter. He wouldn't be responsible for giving an Arcanist Alcohol Poisoning.

Leigh lowered her hand and rested it upon the counter disappointed to hear that he didn’t meet her in the hospital. She was certain that was where she met him. Perhaps she was just mistaken and didn’t know this Valerian at all. There could also be the possibility that she was mistaking him for someone she did know. Whichever the case was Leigh wanted to get a few more drinks before she headed home. She searched her purse for her car keys but in the mess she couldn’t find them. “Yup! I drive.” Leigh answered his question as she finally came across her keys not noticing that he said her name. She was too focused on trying to figure out which key belong to her car and not to the house but failing to do so. Everything was out of focus and Leigh couldn’t read the writing on the top. The keys seemed the same so Leigh decided she would just have to pick one and try.

There was a shout coming from behind Valerian and Leigh jumped only for her keys to fall out of her hands landing in the cup he had just given her. Looking up, Leigh could see it was coming from an older gentle who called this person Valerian Cassidy. Leigh froze, she knew that name for sure but during her drunken state her thought process was much slower than usual. Remaining quiet Leigh listened to their conversation as she picked up her cup, ready to take a sip until she realized her keys were in there. Shoving her hand in the cup, Leigh started to fish out keys while spilling the alcohol all over herself and the bar before finally rescuing them from the drink.

“Yea I’m Leigh Abrams.” She said putting the cup down. She didn’t want it after having her keys in there no matter how delicious the drink was. Valerian took the cup away only to replace it with another. Gulping it down Leigh quickly noticed it wasn’t alcohol but water. Looking disappointed she put the cup down knowing that the bar tender wasn’t going to give her more no matter how much she begged. This wasn’t the first time she was denied alcohol at this very bar. “How do you know me?” Leigh asked slowly as she tried to put the face with the name. Valerian Cassidy. Who did she know who was a Cassidy?

Looking over at the time, he cursed. It was getting later and later, which meant it was getting closer to the time he needed to go pick up his brother from work. Which unfortunately was a bit disappointing as he was in such a good part of the book he was reading. Sighing, he places the book down and got up, getting ready to go fetch his brother. Dressed in slacks, and a plain white t, Matt left the house and jumped into his car.

Pulling up to Mint, he jumped out of the car after turning it off. Walking inside he walked over to the bar and sat down close to where his brother, Valerian, was. The sight of his brother behind the bar was quite odd to him as he hasn’t heard of a promotion of any sort. “Hey Val, what you doing behind the bar? I thought you were a waiter.”, he said to his younger bro. Just then did he notice the woman that Val was talking to and seen that she was ultimately shit-faced.

The tone of Leigh’s voice sounded familiar and so did her looks, but where from or who she was, was so far a mystery to Matt. While trying to figure out the mysterious woman, he remembers to send a text to Eve, letting her know that he is with Val.

He watched as his older brother entered Mint and came up to the bar. He smiled weakly. A promotion was news to him as well. He simply shrugged. "Nina messed up." He said simply as he smiled on the inside at his good fortune. "She is working the Red Room for the next week." He added, informatively. He was excited and hopeful that this would be the chance he was looking for. A promotion would be nice.

He and his brother weren't a lot alike, but they had their similarities. Both of them enjoyed books. Valerian probably a little more so, but both were avid readers, or rather that was how he perceived Matt anyway. Val smiled as he made Matt a soda and placed it on the bar in front of him. "Just coke." He said as he looked at his brother. "She is Leigh Abrams." He said plainly as he walked to the end of the bar to start making drinks. "I still have about fifteen minutes before the end of my shift." He said before one of the bar patrons walked up to the bar and tried to reach across and touch Valerian's stomach. Valerian was used to the 'hands on' customers, but he wasn't sure his brother had seen them be 'hands on' before. Valerian pulled the man's groping hand off his stomach and went back to making drinks.

From behind her once again Leigh heard the familiar’s stranger’s name. Turning around she started to see double, more like triple figures of another person. Leigh finally knew she had too much to drink when her stomach started to feel uneasy. Her surroundings started to sway and everything was going downhill. She was drunk and now feeling the worse of the effects. Not having time to rush to the restrooms Leigh threw up all over the floor. Wiping her mouth she looked up and saw a few disgusted faces but just like her there were many others in the bar who were too drunk to realize what she did. Now that she felt nauseous Leigh decided it was time to go home. She was finished with drinking and needed to sleep away the worse of what was to come.


She picked up her purse from the bar and started to once again shift through the contents. A few times she picked up her lip stick thinking it was her key only to realize a few seconds later that she had been deceived. After the fifth time of picking up her lipstick Leigh grew angered and threw it on the bar. Finally she came across what she was looking for, her keys. The only problem was she didn’t know which key to use. Becoming frustrated Leigh threw her keys back into her purse. She was going to deal with the whole key situation when she got to her car.

Getting up, Leigh knocked over the stool she was sitting on, a few nearby chairs and walked into a guy. Saying her sorrys she slowly stumbled over to the door finally glad that she would be heading to her safe, comfy home. Leigh pushed open the door and losing her footing she fell flat on her face. Getting up Leigh noticed she had a few bumps and scrapes on her elbows but nothing bad. They would heal quickly enough. Heading to her car, Leigh bumped up against a lamppost quickly saying sorry before heading her way.

Nods to Val as he explains the reason to him being behind the bar. Then he hears the woman’s name. Leigh Abrams. The name clicking in his head he looks at the girl. She seemed to be looking for something in here purse and found it. Matt was glade she did as he looked totally lost. Looking back at the bar, he looked down at the soda his brother gave him and sipped a little. Ewww, Coke. WTH? Setting the glass down and looks at Leigh. But she was gone.

Looking around, he seen her exit and the slight glint of shine in her hand. Oh dear god. She’s going to drive. Quickly getting up, he doesn’t notice Leigh’s throw up and starts to walk after her. Stopping at the door he calls back to Val. “Val, I’ll be outside with Leigh.” Stepping out onto the sidewalk, he seen the poor girl run into a street lamb and actually tell it that she was sorry.

Hurrying up to her he caught her arm. “Leigh, let me drive you home when I take Val home. Please? I couldn’t let you go home like this.”

Leigh wondered down the alleyway but stopped half way. There was a tug on her arm and turning around she noticed it was the same guy who was in the bar. He wanted to take her home along with that other kid who was named Val. Just then it hit Leigh as to who these people were and why Valerian Cassidy sounded like such a familiar name. Valerian Cassidy was Eve’s little brother. The man standing before her had to be Eve’s other brother Mathew. She spoke very little to Eve and hardly ever spoke to Mathew or Valerian which explained why she didn’t recognize them right away. Leigh swayed on the spot as she tried to focus the man moving around in front of her.

“I know you!” Leigh exclaimed. “You’re that Mathew kid.” She grinned sheepishly debating whether or not she should let Mathew take her home. She was in no state to drive and would most likely end up in a car accident and she had seen enough people in car accidents that she would hate to be one of those people. “Sure. You can take me home. But first! I need ta get sumthan outta me car.” Leigh said as she turned around to continue on down the alleyway to the parking lot where her car was at but quickly ran into what appeared to be a small little man.

Leigh looked at the man wondering why he was just standing there in the alleyway. Surely he was heading for the bar but yet they continued to stand there staring at each other. Leigh looked closely and saw what appeared to be a red hat sitting right on top of his head. Even in her drunken state the hat stood out like a sore thumb. Leigh turned to Mathew knowing full well they were in trouble. “Mathew.” Leigh whispered hoping that the man behind her couldn’t hear. He was still pretty far down the alleyway. “I think it’s a redcap.”