The bar at Roscoe’s RV Park & Rodeo smells like sawdust, beer, and the faint sweetness of hay that’s been tracked in on boots. It’s loud enough to feel alive but not loud enough to drown out a person’s thoughts, which Zenobia is discovering might have been a tactical error. She sits at the edge of the counter with her coat still on like she might bolt any second, fingers wrapped around a glass of something she hasn’t actually touched. The music is country. Of course it is. Somewhere outside a horse snorts, metal clinks, someone laughs too hard. Her jaw tightens automatically. Too loud. Too close. Door behind you. Zenobia exhales slowly through her nose and presses her thumb against the rim of the glass until the cold bites back. Grounding. That’s what this is. Just grounding. Just being a person who goes out and sees her friends and does normal human things. Cassie is moving around the room like she owns gravity itself, bright and loud and unmistakably Cassie. The kind of presence that fills space instead of shrinking inside it. Zenobia watches her for a moment, something complicated flickering through her expression before she lifts a hand slightly. “Hey, cowgirl.” Her voice is steady. Too steady. When Cassie gets close enough, Zenobia offers a small smile that almost reaches her eyes. Almost. “Before you say anything—yes, I’m aware this looks suspiciously like me leaving my house voluntarily.” She nudges the untouched drink with one finger. “Don’t get used to it.” The joke lands a little crooked. She glances around the bar again, quick, instinctive, cataloguing exits before she stops herself. “I figured it was time I stopped acting like a cryptid,” she adds, lighter than she feels. “Everyone keeps telling me how great I’m doing, so… here I am. Being great.” A pause. Her fingers tighten around the glass again. Then she looks back at Cassie, eyes a little sharper now, like she’s bracing for impact but pretending she isn’t. “You gonna sit with me,” she asks quietly, “or are you working the room tonight?” @fikazephyr
