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She held her fingers up. Two more shots were placed behind her, several minutes later. "Getting drunk is a tiny bit harder for us." She told him, just buzzed enough to ignore the fact that they were in public. "Which just means spending more money to get the same effect. We're fighting against our you know whats, stubborn as they are." Her hand reached back, grabbing one of the shots and swigging it, before taking the other one and dropping it carefully in her drink.

"Don't worry. I never let him win. I always come out on top." Maebe had a sense for over-compensating; if Thaw was going to try and burn her buzz away, she was going to make it three times as hard for him. It always worked in her favor.

She eyed his rusty nail with a curious glance. "You sure do like Whiskey, don't you Sir Grace." Her hand rested on his chest, scratching against it lightly with her fingernails. "Puts that sexy hair on your chest."

An eyebrow arched slowly, caught in an expression that meant no good. A few seconds later, her fingers lifted - three this time. This was a bad sign.

"I'm a professional at fighting Thaw." She really wasn't; she'd overdone it every time she tried. "And I like my buzzes strong. None of the wishwash cutesy stuff. I want the world to bleed in colors." She finished off her sex and the beach with a noisy little sip. "We're getting there."

The three tequila shots dropped behind her, with a notice that she was already nearing exhaustion on her prepaid bar tab. She ignored it, and picked up one of the shots, knocking it back immediately. She moved the other two to the side, and placed her hands on the bar from behind.

"Alley-oop." Up she went, sitting on the counter with tightly crossed legs and bending to grab the last two shots. She held one in each hand, and reached the other out for him.

"For you." She offered, smiling a sweet, and slightly crooked smile. "Because I'd rather enjoy seeing Sir Grace a little angry."

He took the shot like a good boy, and her smile grew in inches.

It was a valid question, but Maebe sounded sure of her response. "I will tell you a trick about New York. Here, nobody looks at your face." Her hands reached up, resting first at her neck, and the small, lithe fingers began to trace each feature she described. "They might admire the taste of your neck, or the curve of your breasts. They might enjoy the feel of your waist as they wrap their dirty arms around it. They could take note of how soft your legs are, when their hands are sliding inches and inches up your skirt." She stopped there, careful of how skittish Dawson was about these things. "But my face is a drop of water in an ocean. Look around you right now. How many of these people are you going to remember tomorrow? We're all the same. These women might as well be all be one person to the men on the dance floor, because the morning sun bleaches away the memory of anything you could even begin to consider unique."

She reached out a hand to brush through the soft and bouncy lengths of hair of a blonde that stood a foot away from her, and the woman stopped dancing long enough to give her the same smile Maebe had perfected on her own face.

"There's nothing special about us." Maebe whispered, more to herself than to him. She lifted her glass to the girl in cheers, and watched her disappear into the crowd.

"Besides, the only people in New York that knew me by name don't have the money to come to this kind of place anymore, regardless. When I left, he was broke, and his alcohol came from cheap, store bought bottles with paper bags around them. He celebrated this new lifestyle by dumping me out of a second story window. I could have used Thaw back then."

It was that rare, fleeting moment when she was just drunk enough to be too revealing, too ready to just talk forever about her life as if they were stories of some really interesting book. She sipped her drink and watched the crowd with glittering, needy eyes.

With genuine confusion tinting her expression, Maebe put down her drink as well. She had no real idea what part of her story had him making that face. "What?" Did he not understand what she was trying to say about the nameless faces? Or was he asking her about the end of her New York relationship? They both seemed on equal footing to her, even though they really weren't.

"Which part of that confused you, babe?" She called out, swaying lightly when she leaned in to yell it loudly enough for him to hear. Her perch was precarious, and the alcohol had done it's job.

It made more sense, once he'd clarified. Of course Dawson would worry about that. She felt his hand steadying her, and used it to lean closer. She reached out and rubbed the ends of his ears between her thumbs and pointer fingers, tugging on them gently. "Yes. He threw me out of a second floor. I fell in the bushes and broke a few bones, but I obviously survived, like I always do, so we don't have to worry about that anymore, do we? It's not like he could take me now. I'd floor him."

She grinned, and a feral look began to bleed into her expression. "Maybe we should go find him then. See how well he handles getting thrown out of a window. Of a skyscraper." She giggled, and the giggle turned into a full on laugh, forcing her head to tilt back enough that she threatened to fall behind the bar. That just made her laugh more, and the cycle continued.

"Missing out on what." And with that slur in her voice, it was clear that she'd tipped over from buzzed, to well and truly intoxicated. She agreed to his offer, and slid off of the bar, landing unsteadily on her feet. She turned around to face the bartender and held her hand up, with all five of her fingers showing.

He shook his head.

She put down one finger, and he shook it again. This continued until she was holding up just two fingers and a very meaningful pout, before he finally gave in and slid down two more tequila shot for them. "Last one." He warned, both for the lack of payment, and for the way her eyes were all but glowing in the dark.

"Yes daddy." She murmured, taking her shot and Dawson's in order to hand it over to him. "Okay. Last shot of the night. I think we've done our job here." She took it, raised it to her lips, and waited for him to do the same before tipping it back. She couldn't even feel the burn anymore. She couldn't feel anything. Her eyes fluttered at the realization, and she let out a long, blissful sigh.

"This was such a good idea." Her worries and trepidation over bringing Dawson somewhere inappropriate were gone now, in the wake of how good everything felt. She took his hands, and wrapped them around her waist.

"Remember, babe. Don't think. Just feel."

If he'd spoken in perfect, un-accented speech, she still would have missed half of what he was saying. As it was, all she heard was the warm, formless sounds that made up the feeling of Dawson around her, more of an experience than actual conversation. He didn't need to make sense, when he started to dance. His words were in the movement, the stumble, the loose sway from side to side. She giggled and started to tug him away from the bar; their place was immediately stolen by a large, suit wearing man. There would be no more drinks tonight.

The music was thrumming with a techno beat, and his arms were around her waist, swaying her as if they were at a school dance. There was no room to be embarrassed when the population around them were caught in the throes of their own high, bouncing and swaying in movements that had no definition or function. No one had to make sense, in a club. No one had time to judge.

She placed her cheek on his chest, wrapped her arms around his neck, and danced a slow dance to a fast beat in the midst of the heat of a thousand other people, while the toxin worked it's way through her brain and clouded her free of one single thought.

She was happy, right now. Good and cleanly happy. Not aroused, or thrilled, or intoxicated (well, she was that, but regardless). This was happy. This was nice. And it was in the most unlikely of places to feel that way. She felt like the moment was exorcising the entirety of the clubbing experience for her. Because if it didn't feel like this anymore - if she didn't feel happy, and safe, and cared for, it was never going to be enough again.