tinstar | Slingin' from the hip, never the heart.

"That's not your apartment."

She comes down the last two steps and starts to lose her balance, catching herself against the wall. She has to hold still a second for the dizziness to fade. ...Her name? "Willa."

Duh. "Dad, what's going on?"

What? What in the actual hell was going on here. Was this a scam? If so, it was a monumentally bad one. Mental patient? Possibly; he needed to be gentle.

"As it's where I'm stayin' that kinda means it is."

But then she says her name. Calls him Dad, and the confusion gets ten times deeper. He can't help but frown in his confusion.

"Dad?" He glances around like someone else might pop up out of no where and claim the title. "My daughter is about six months old, I don't-"

Her vision's clearing up at least. Still a little vertigo, but she's not as disoriented. Willa wrinkles her nose, finally realizing where exactly they are.

"Wait, is this a bar? Why are you sleeping above a bar?"

"Because I'm relivin' the hell of the collage experience as a 43 year old man-" Because some ugly shit had gone down at his motel and he thought he'd change it up. Maybe his luck would be better here.

Maybe there'd be less blood spilt here.

"-How are you Willa?" It was a strange question and even he didn't know what the answer was going to be but there was something here that felt... Outside, somehow. Outside the realm of his norm.

"What's your full name? Who's your mother? When you were born and where do I come from?" All easily found but again, starting small.

"Dad..." Her already pitchy voice goes softer. He's scaring her. This whole thing is scaring her. "Fifteen. Willa Frances Givens, Winona Hawkins, December 10th 2013, Harlan County?"

His eyes narrow. All of the answers were correct, but a clever soul that did their homework could find that information out. The only thing that didn't add up was the 'fifteen' part of the answer. He felt like he should ask her more. He didn't even know where to begin.

Raylan points to a seat at the bar.

"Come have a seat." He wasn't convinced. "If all this is true, how are you here. How are you fifteen when my daughter is only just 6 months." Make it make sense.

She doesn't quite slink over, but she is cowed enough to listen without arguing. Is this some kind of test? Well, obviously it's a test. He's asking questions. But she doesn't know why.

Until she's sitting on the stool he pointed at and he asks her that.

"...What?"

She stares at him, own brow pinching in confusion, looking briefly very like her father. "What are you talking about?"

His brow furrows in return, body turning half a step to face her in her new orientation.

"I'm talkin' about my daughter still bein' a baby and you very much not bein' one. So if you're Willa, how's this possible. How are you her?"

Some part of him screamed that she had their features, his and Winona's - he'd know those blue eyes anywhere - but the rest of him struggled against the change of reality.

"I don't know."

Her voice rises a little, and she tries for angry or defensive instead of 'more than a little freaked out.' "I was on a plane ten minutes ago."

Hang on. Wait. “Did you say you’re forty-three?”

Edited 2023-08-10 06:34 (UTC)

Raylan's jaw works oh so slightly as he studies her with a pressured gaze, looking for any sign that she was lying to him. Any sign that suggested a lean into the innocent waif feeling that Willa almost touched.

She didn't know. He could tell she wasn't lying to him. That made things more complicated that he was really ready for. There was this girl that he, of course, felt compelled to protect by virtue of her age alone, and he couldn't just. Turn her out. Not when it seemed like she really believed what she was saying.

He took and let a deep breath but as soon as he'd let it out, she added on her next question. He furrows his brow, head pulling back a little. "Yeah." He was sure that was the least important thing right now.

"Okay. Alright. We'll. .. We'll figure this out. Just-" He pinches his brow with his fingers. "Gimme a second." He had a few options. CPS, a DNA test, or two days to try to find something that wasn't getting the government involved. None of them were great.

“Well you weren’t forty-three yesterday, okay, you were fifty-eight.” At least she manages to sound aggressive that time. She’s hanging on to the top of the barstool, eyes huge, trying not to panic.

Is she high? Did something happen to the plane? Is this the weirdest, most vivid dream she’s ever had? What is going on.

“Where are we?”

He gives her an unimpressed look, lips thinning briefly. "The difference between forty three and fifty eight is shorter than the difference of six months to fifteen years."

And it was going to be weird for him to be walking around with a new teenager out of no where.

"It's a collage bar, in Lexington. I'm stayin' upstairs, where you came from, until my mansion gets finished. Look, I got work in a little bit, and I don't want you assuminin' nothin, so let's get this right outta the way. I'll take you with me, but you're stayin' at the court house if I have to leave. Until I can figure out what to do about this."

“I guess on a scale of old to really old.” She glares back at him, starting to remember now that she was mad.

…Except they’re in Lexington. They’re going to his office.

“Fine,” she says, trying to sound more annoyed than she actually is while she simultaneously plans to scour his desk for anything interesting she can find.

“Wait, what d’you mean what to do about this? About me?”

This fighting felt familiar somehow. Huh. He lets the comment pass - always pick your battles, especially when the other party is stomping their little foot about it.

The 'fine' pleases him well enough. At least that won't be a fight, but he knows that getting her to stay in one place very likely would be.

"I don't know. That's why I need to figure it out. I got no place that's set up right for housin' a little girl."

Eyebrows up. “Okay, first of all I’m not a little girl, second, you leave me in hotel rooms or at your office all the time. And like, I’m pretty sure that apartment isn’t set up right for anybody.”

It was striking how exactly him all that sounded. The tone, the hoisting of her eyebrows - he didn't know how any of this was possible but he was starting to maybe possibly consider thinking about thinking about believing it.

"It's got a bed and a functionin' bathroom and no stains on the floor." So. Just oh so slightly better then where he was staying before. Shit. He was going to have to go back. Lindsey sure as hell wasn't going to understand this and no 15 year old should be staying above a bar if he can help it.

He sighs again. "I'm supposed to be in, in two hours and I'm sure as hell not gettin' anythin' done with it. I hear the delivery truck pullin' in, so as soon as I'm done with that, we'll go."

"Those aren't high standards, Dad." Seriously, it's a little concerning. She can't help calling him dad, even if none of this makes any sense. The way he talks is too much her dad, the way he looks is too much her dad. He can't be anyone else.

Wait, deliveries?

"Do you work here?"

Raylan only grunts a note at her opinion of his standards. He wasn't exactly in the best place right now and he didn't want to open that can of worms.

"No. I'm helpin' out the owner of the bar. Part of the lease agreement." And that was a 6 month agreement, though Raylan had been told he could stay longer if he wanted to. He wasn't going to tell her that. Walking over to the door, he pushes it open and kicks down the rubber stopper. Just in time to greet the guy, Raylan steps back out of the way and takes the invoice handed to him on a clipboard. A pen out of his back pocket, and he starts ticking off the boxes being wheeled in.

"I also bounce for him at night when I get in." It would only take about fifteen minutes.

This is... so, so weird. Her dad, taking deliveries at a bar, where he bounces at night? Just telling her that, like it was nothing. Defending his above-a-bar apartment, taking her to work. She watches him in confusion and fascination, ticking off items on the inventory sheet, but can't help her attention getting drawn to the door when someone else walks in.

She sits up and clears her throat, trying to sound authoritative. "Um, sorry, we're closed. Come back later."

The stocky, massive man snorts. "Ain't you a little young to be watching the door?"

Raylan barely glances at the door when the guy walks in - Willa said exactly what he would, but the snort and the response told him plenty, earning the slide of his eyes up to the broad man.

"She's right. We're closed. Open at 4pm, you can come back then."

The guy sweeps his gaze over to Raylan, and lifts what little chin his thick neck allows him, gaze scrutinizing. "And who the hell are you?"

"The one takin' inventory, so if you'll be kind enough to let me get back to it-"

The guy walks forwards, towards and behind the bar. Raylan lets him, brow furrowing a little at the audacity of it all and he flicks his eyes over at Willa and jerks his head a little towards the stairs she'd come down from.

"Where's Lindsey?" Randall grabs a glass and starts pouring from the tap.

"Look, I can offer some coffee, if you're that hard up. Milk maybe. Hell, I'd say you can take that, if it weren't illegal to walk around with it. On the house. But you can't stay here. The bar opens at four." The tension could be cut with a knife and Raylan was in the position of protecting Lindsey from some thicknecked creep who had too much of a fancy on the local bartender.

Raylan understood that, but as he was currently seeing her in the loosest possible terms, he knew he had to be careful. Nothing antagonistic while not bending like a reed, calm and firm. He didn't want to play the Federal card if he didn't have to but he also wasn't going to cower or posture at someone who would probably cold clock him into the end of the week. Willa didn't need to see that either.

Real shame he didn't have his gun on him.

Her dad points her toward the stairs. She slides off the stool, but doesn’t go any farther.

The guy behind the bar looks at Raylan, then at Willa, then Takes a swig from the glass. “It take your daughter to work day?”

"It's none of your business." The word themselves were blunt, harsh even. But his tone made it sound like he was answering a trivia question that was more than easy. He even smiled a little. Affable and unflappable. He wasn't going to let go of that power.

"If you'd rather get an escort out, I'm happy to call the local cops."

The man sniffs and looks over Willa again, clearly deciding how far he wanted to take this. Raylan just tilts his head, expectantly.

"Hey," he says, snapping a few times until the guy's eyes swung back to him. Raylan lifts his eyebrows slightly in question. "How do you want this to go down? Because I promise it'll end with you bein' booked at the courthouse."

The guy considers it, considers it some more like taking up the silence that the Marshal so easily sat in, before draining his glass, aggressively not breaking eye contact with Raylan as his throat works and works to swallow it all. When he was done, he smacks his lips with a satisfied sigh and slams the glass back down on the bar top.

"Guess I'll come back at four then."

"That'd be a wise idea," Raylan drawls, cool as a jello salad, keeping his forced polite smile that fell as soon as the guy started to move away. Willa had spent her whole life with Raylan, no doubt she can pick up on the Ping of Something Dad Don't Like radar.

She certainly can. She’s never seen it quite so nakedly. It’s always been a dull glow, not an open blaze.

“Who’s Lindsey?”

"Bartender works part time here." His eyes haven't left the door yet and he looks like he's chewing on the inside of his cheek. "Pretty too, opens her up to all sorts of weirdos."

There was no hesitation in his lie, it came unbidden and well practiced - his business was his and his alone. Besides, no teenage girl wanted to know about their dad's love life. He was pretty sure that was standard issue with teenagers.

He takes a deep breath, eyes settling back on her.

"I'll make a call, let her know. And the owner too. We'll keep her safe." Don't worry.

There’s no hitch to the lie, it makes perfect sense, and she doesn’t have a reason to question it. She hasn’t actually seen him around this woman yet, and she has seen him around a lot of women who thought they were more subtle than gen z is worldly.

She climbs back onto the stool.

“I know you will,” she says softly. She can’t help remembering her own accusation and the look on his face right after she said it. If you wanted me here you’d find a way to keep me safe.

She’d meant it. She also just knew it would hurt.

“You always do.”

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