Late as usual, and OMG we have another fill! Lesbian party, anyone?

*

Friday night and he's working again. Again! At least, that's what he says he's doing, as if I actually believed it. He treats me like a green girl, but I know what he's up to. And it's not fair. Why would he get tired- of me? What did I ever do wrong? How is she better than I am? Well, I won't stand for it. I won't! I'll- I'll go and find her, and I'll make her see that what she's doing is wrong. It's home wrecking, that's what it is. And I'll pay her if she wants! Pay her to stay away. She only cares about the money, she's a- no, I won't say it. She can't make me. I'll go find her, and I'll be the better woman, and when I'm done explaining how things are...then she'll understand. She'll stay away from my man, and we'll be happy again. I just want to be happy. That's all.

Two bottles of overpriced beer later (bottles! Not glasses, like any civilised bar would have offered, and they laughed at her when she asked for a straw) and Diane replays her own words in the quiet confines of her mind. She nods in satisfaction when the memorised recording ends. The moral high ground is all hers, and she'll make a sensible, coherent case to this whor- this woman, this Jasmine Jolene. If she can find her. If she doesn't end up running away.

Diane hunkers further down in her seat, wishing she'd thought to bring a hat of some kind. She chose a booth in the corner, well away from the stage and the lights and the dancers, but the rowdy men are everywhere, and she's nowhere near as invisible as she'd like to be. If only she had something to hide under, so strangers would stop sliding into the booth next to her, throwing an arm around her shoulders and trying to grope her-

She squeezes her eyes shut. In hindsight, it might have been a better idea to track Miss Jolene down at a different time. In a different place. Not her workplace, specifically. But Diane gets like this when she has an idea fixed in her mind; Ryan's always telling her how stubborn she can be, how wilful, how downright silly. She never thinks about things when her temper's up. Just barges in with her feathers all ruffled, making things worse than they need to be. She wishes she was anywhere but here. Wishes she'd stayed home.

"Well hey there, princess," says a voice like warm honey, like the liquid cherry centres of her favourite chocolates. Diane's eyes open wide, and she instinctively cringes back in her seat. It doesn't help matters much. There's a lady lying on her table. A lady she never even heard approaching, who sprawls side-on with one long, slender heel folding her leg into an elegant triangle. And it's an awful lot of leg; Diane is much too well bred to cover her eyes, but she can't seem to tear them away either. She can see this woman's thigh. Is she- is she even wearing undergarments?

"My eyes are over here," says the woman, laughter in her voice.

"Sorry," Diane says instinctively, and then she meets the woman's eyes and changes her mind. "Oh my god, are you her? You are! You're Miss Jolene!" She makes sure to only look at the woman's face, though there's a lot else that she's clearly being invited to admire, and the thigh is only the start. How can she bear it? How can she stand to expose herself like this, for all these horrible men to look at?

It suddenly occurs to Diane that Andrew Ryan has, on many occasions, been one of those very men. She swallows and tries to forget it.

Jasmine Jolene stretches slowly, then leans back to rest her weight on her elbows. She keeps her leg arched; it's a rather lovely pose, (Diane tries not to think it, but she's hardly blind) and it must require a fairly impressive amount of strength to maintain.

"You're looking a little lost, if you don't mind my say so," Jasmine says. She's not laughing anymore, but her voice retains a teasing note. Nothing nasty, not at all; it's actually pleasant, in an odd way, and Diane tries very hard not to warm to her. "Not that we don't get our fair share of ladies in here. But you're the cutest thing I've seen in a long time, and it's such a shame for you to hide in the shadows like this. Don't be shy. Nobody else ever is."

Jasmine- Diane tries steadfastly to think of her as a formal Miss Jolene, but it just won't stick- rolls gracefully onto her stomach, rests her chin on her hands and waves her feet in the air above her back. She actually manages to make it look dainty, though the whole bar must be able to see up her skirt, and Diane is treated to a not unimpressive view of her chest. And it's a lovely chest; nice, soft-looking skin, under a flimsy silk bodice that only just covers the rest of her. She smells like flowers. Diane hasn't ever been much good with flowers, but she suddenly knows without a shred of doubt that this scent is Jasmine's namesake. And it's almost unbearably intoxicating.

"Like what you see?" Jasmine says playfully, and Diane tears her eyes away from the other woman's...chest area. She's mortified. Blushing bright red, no doubt, and all the cool composure she meant to project seems to have deserted her completely.

"I didn't mean to look," she says, her voice almost a whisper.

"Sure you did, princess," says Jasmine. Diane looks up from her lap to find the other woman smiling at her, like she couldn't be happier to smile at anyone else. "And you could look again if you wanted. I know if I had you in front of me like this, I wouldn't be able to help myself. And I know I wouldn't stop at looking, either..."

"Stop calling me that," Diane says, fixing her eyes to the wall above Jasmine's head.

"You don't feel like a princess today? Honey, say the word and I'll call you anything you like. I just want to make sure you're having a good time. I want to make you happy. So tell me, beautiful. What can I call you that'll get me a smile, huh?"

"Diane. Diane McClintock."

She hears a sharp intake of breath, and forces herself not to seek out Jasmine's face. She's not sure she wants to know what expression she'd find there.

"Oh honey," Jasmine says. Her voice is gentle now, but it lacks the bitter dislike Diane had convinced herself to expect. "I can't say I'm all that surprised; I've been waiting for you to come find me for a long while now. Just didn't think you'd do it here. Not a nice, well bred lady like you. I thought you'd be too good for the likes of this place."

Too good for the likes of me goes unsaid, but Diane would swear she can hear it anyway. And it's- it's wrong, it's so wrong, that she tears her gaze away from the wall and looks Jasmine square in the eyes to tell her. "That's not true. It's not. I'm just- I just wanted to-" tell you to stop ruining my life is the truth of the matter, or rather the truth she believed up until a few minutes ago. But Diane looks back on her words, all her practiced speeches and nurtured superiority, and discovers that they seem very hollow indeed. She's not better than this woman. She's not her victim, and not her enemy. She's just out of her depth, and Jasmine's is the only kind face she's seen all evening.

"I wanted to meet you," she says, and Jasmine gives her another smile. Less dazzling, this time. Sadder. She reaches over and strokes Diane's cheek with one long-nailed hand.

"That's so brave of you," she says sincerely. "I know I wouldn't have had the guts to find you, in your place. But here you are. And it's real nice to meet you; you seem like a really sweet girl. But I'm not sure what you had in mind once you'd met me."

Brave, she said, and Diane tries to match her expectations. "I was going to pay you," she says. It sounds so very sordid when she actually tells another person, but she can't stop now. "I brought money, and I was going to give you it so you'd- so you wouldn't-" she swallows, and suddenly the words begin to spill out, like a fountain overflowing. "Ryan never comes home these days, and when he does it's like he barely even sees me. He touches me and it's- it's mechanical, I feel like I'm some sort of doll to him. Like a thing instead of a person. I hate it. I got myself all worked up and ready to hate you too, only it won't stick. Now I just feel like a fool."

"We all get that way sometimes," Jasmine says calmly. "And funnily enough, it's usually over some man or other; makes you wonder how much of it we actually mean, and how much we just play act because that's what they want from us."

Jasmine reaches for Diane's abandoned beer bottle. There's still an inch or so of liquid left; she tosses her head back and downs the lot. Diane watches her throat bob, shifting awkwardly in her seat. She doesn't know where she should be looking. She doesn't know what the rules are here.
"You would not believe how much I hate that stuff," Jasmine tells her, placing the empty bottle on the booth cushion opposite Diane.

"Then why drink it?"

"If you can keep the beer at Eve's down, there's nothing you can't swallow. And suddenly the world's your oyster." She laughs at the look on Diane's face. "It's a joke, sweetie, you're supposed to laugh! Can't go far in this business without a sense of humour."

So Diane laughs. It's stilted, a little uncertain, but she does it anyway because it seems to make Jasmine happy. And it never once occurs to her that this is odd, this is not the way she'd planned for things to be between them; she feels very much like a thread, wound around Jasmine's little finger, pulling taut when she tugs. Liking her would be the easiest thing in the world. And Diane very much wants to.

"I guess I should go now," she says, and hopes it isn't too much of an obvious plea to be told otherwise. She doesn't belong here, with the flickering lights and haze of unfamiliar smalls; cheap liquor, cheap perfume, sweat. And through it all, the scent of jasmine flowers. She doesn't belong. But she could try to, if she were invited.

"Or you could stay," Jasmine says, as if mindreading comes to her naturally. Though she might be Spliced for it; Diane struggles to keep up with all the new Plasmids being released these days, and she thinks to herself that in Jasmine's line of work, a little mindreading might make all the difference. Still, it's nicer to believe she just understands, so that's what Diane does.

"I could," she agrees."I mean, we've only just met, and I hardly even know you. We could- we could-"

"Sure we could," Jasmine says, and her smile is as brilliant as the twinkling gemstones in her ears. "It's not fair, how Mister Ryan's been treating you, and I'm real sorry. I like you. I'd like to make it up to you. So how about, you and me," she reaches over to hook a finger in the collar of Diane's blouse, undoing the top button with an effortless movement, "Go find ourselves somewhere a little more private? Huh? Who says Ryan should have all the fun anyway?"

"Can we do that? I mean," and Diane feels heat rising in her cheeks. Not because of the suggestion, oddly enough; she's silly, not completely naive. She understands the nature of the transactions that occur in this place, and she understands that Jasmine is working right now. Maybe spending a little time with Diane is more pleasant for her than getting back up on the stage to be pawed at, but it's still business. Diane understands business. And Ryan's always telling her that nothing in life comes free.

She is ashamed to have to ask, though. Reducing the value of Jasmine's time to something like paper banknotes feels...wrong. "I'm sorry," Diane says. "I know you're working, but I don't know how much- I mean- Oh hell, I'm making such a mess of this." She fiddles with the clasp on her purse, where it sits in her lap. Thinks to herself, how funny this is. I came here to pay her so she'd stay out of my life. And now all I want is for her to come closer.

"Nothing to be ashamed of," Jasmine tells her gently. "It's not like I've got a handy price tag around my neck now, is it?" It's a horrifying idea as far as Diane's concerned, but Jasmine seems to find the thought hilarious. And she seems so at ease with the situation. Easy enough that Diane guiltily opens her purse and shows her.

"I was going to bribe you," she says in a humiliated stutter.

Jasmine just plucks a few notes out from the bundle and offers them to Diane. "That'll do nicely. Want to tuck them into my underwear?" And then, as Diane's eyes widen, "I'm teasing you, silly, you don't have to do that at all! Not if you don't want to."

Diane can't help but feel that Jasmine is rather enjoying the oddness of the situation. And when she thinks about it, she can see why. How...ridiculous the whole thing is. It's like something out of a play. A comedy. A farce. Cheated woman goes to find her man's favourite whore, armed with wads of cash in her neat little handbag, in the hopes that she can just buy her happiness back. She meets the woman...and changes her mind. There's a connection between them. It's not sympathy, or pity, or even shared jealousy. They seem to very genuinely like each other. And just like that, the man is forgotten.

Who says Ryan should have all the fun, anyway?

She takes Jasmine's hand and lets herself be led through a side door in the wall that cuts off the noise the moment it closes behind her. The sudden silence is a comfort; Diane squeezes Jasmine's hand in gratitude.

They stop in the doorway to a bedroom. Opulent, smothered in silk and velvet. Nicer than Diane's, even. She takes in the delicate screens and red curtains, the record player singing a soft love song in the corner. Ryan's been here, she knows with sudden certainty. And now I'm in his place. And she rather thinks it suits her better.

"Get yourself comfortable," Jasmine whispers in her ear. "I don't normally take clients this early in the evening, but you're something special, so I don't mind. Just let me square it with my manager, and then I'm all yours. Can I get you a drink? We can do so much better than that cheap beer. I won't have you thinking I'm a poor hostess."

She leans in to kiss Diane's cheek, and her scent lingers long after her lips are gone. It's everywhere in this room; not overpowering, but a ghost-like presence in the air that promises she'll be back soon. Diane sits on the bed and breathes. Left on her own, she finds she's no longer quite as sure of what she's doing. She hasn't ever- this isn't something she does. She's always been a good girl. Always obedient.

How silly she must look, almost sliding off the edge of the bed because she doesn't dare do anything else- when Jasmine told her to get comfortable.

Diane slips out of her shoes in defiance of the voice that tells her she shouldn't be here. She pushes herself back onto the mattress, affecting her best imitation of Jasmine's casual sprawl, and runs her hands over the bedspread.

"You like it?" Jasmine asks, and Diane sits up in time to receive the glass of wine she's brought with her. She sits at Diane's side and smiles at her.

"I do," Diane admits. "In fact, I think I might be a little jealous."

"Don't be. You don't want to be paying the same price I do for all this luxury. It's just not worth it."