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It was karaoke night at Star's Bar on 10th Ave. Vanessa stood on a raised platform, flyaway curls as wild as a lion's mane, pretty face screwed into a mask of concentration as she rocked out to the song that Jack had dared her to sing. He sat in a booth with BJ and Ducky, grinning like the devil had congratulated him for a job well done.



Vanessa did not need liquor in her system to get up and sing in front of a crowd, but she had had several shots of tequila that night. Her lips were pleasantly numb. There was a buzz in her blood.



She had not dressed up for the occasion. Wore a simple pair of jeans and a little black t-shirt. Fingertips flirted along the hem, pulled it up, revealed caramel skin and a flash of navel ring. Jack whistled. Vanessa burst out laughing, let her shirt fall back into place, clutched the microphone in both hands.

Several beats passed before she picked up the song again.



She tried to strut across the platform. Caught her foot on an electrical cord. Burst out laughing again when she tripped and nearly face-planted into the floor. It could have been a disaster, but it wasn't. Because a moment later Vanessa was steady on her feet again, bright eyes back on the TV.

Vanessa took a bow when her song stopped, dipping at the waist and swinging her arms in an exagerated show of gratitude for the applause that she had earned herself. She was flushed in the face, from the exhiliration of singing as much as the drinks from earlier, but there was a smile on her face and a light in her eyes.

Her heart felt lighter than it had in years, resting as it was on the affection of a woman with blonde hair that exploded into colour at the ends. She checked her phone when she got off stage, responded to the text message that she found there with this:



So drunk that she'd forgotten where she'd left her drink.

Oh well. She had money in her pocket and a will to spend it all before the night was done.

"Barkeep," she said, gave the bar a good-natured slap to earn herself some attention, "I will have some vodka please."

Vanessa took a seat beside Fritz, leaned towards him with her elbow on the bar and her chin in her hands.

"My name is Vanessa," she smiled. "Who're you?"

"Thanks, Fritz," Vanessa said, grinning wide, heart glowing over his compliment. She liked him at once, and shook his hand with warmth. "You're sweet. That wasn't really singing, though. That was just fooling around. I sing in a band, though."

At least, she was pretty sure that she sang in a band. She and Hitch had yet to settle on a name for their group, and they had not played any gigs, but Vanessa thought that she could count on him to want all of it as much as she did.

The bartender stopped to ask, lips twitching, if Vanessa wanted something to drink with her vodka.

"Cranberry juice," Vanessa said, pressing the tips of her fingers to her mouth to hide a hiccup.

She tilted her head to the side, regarded Fritz with curiosity. He was a ginger -the same as she- but while her skin was the colour of soft caramel, he was as pale as ghost. With freckles. And a distinct accent.

"You know... you could be a Weasley," she grinned wide, and then traded the bartender a couple of bills for her drink with a chipper thanks.

'Delightful.' 'Marvelous.' 'Bloody terrible.'

The more Fritz spoke, the more Vanessa hoped he would never shut up. He was delightfully, marvellously British. Vanessa thought that it would have been bloody terrible if she'd left the bar that night without becoming his friend. She suspected that there was a degree of fate at work in her favour here-- somebody up high had thought it appropriate to give her her very own Weasley.

And he was so kind. Putting her drinks on his tab.

Sober, Vanessa did not have much sense for personal boundaries. Drunk, any sense that she did have was rendered pretty much obsolete by the blood alcohol concentration in her veins. She reached for Fritz' face with both hands, pressed delicately on both of his cheeks until his lips pursed.

"Thank you," she grinned, utterly charmed, letting go of his face when the bartender returned with her drink.

"I have been singing forever," she waved her hand at the air, as though it was nothing. And it was. Vanessa was not classically trained. She would never be Celine Dion or Lady Gaga, but she was fearless, and confident that the band would come together as long as she loved it enough. "Do you play any instruments or anything? We could use a British guy on the team. I am sure Hitch would agree."

She thought that he would agree, anyways. And if he didn't? Oh well.

In the space of time between her question and his answer, Vanessa had created a little fantasy for herself where she'd stuck Fritz in her band beside Hitch, dressed them all up in old suits with ties and everybody started talking like the Beatles. He was so magically British that it did dissapoint her when he confessed to having no musical talent. But it was okay. He could just watch them play some time.

Glowing a little because he'd called her beautiful, Vanessa leaned forwards with her chin in her hands.

"I just met my Hitch," she hiccuped. "He seems nice. A little quiet, maybe, but the drummer doesn't need to be loud with his voice. That's my job."

It came easy to her.

"What's yours like?"

"Big," came a male voice from somewhere behind Vanessa's shoulder. Jack settled himself onto the bar stool on the other side of Fritz, grinned wide at his roommate and her new friend. "Huge. Enormous-- wait, what are we talking about?"

Vanessa laughed so hard she spit some of her drink into her hand.

"Fritz," she said after she'd recovered, gesturing at Jack, "this is Jack. We live together. Jack, Fritz. He's British. For a second I thought he'd join my band and then we could be like the Beatles, but he does not music."

"Alas," Jack's lips twitched at the corners. He ordered himself a drink, a playful light in his eyes. "Hopefully there's more than One Direction for you two."

'We can't lower ourselves to such standards.'

"He's so delightfully British, Jack," Vanessa said, leaning into the bar and grinning past Fritz at her roommate. She rested her forehead on the count and laughed softly, sounding as though she could not believe that she'd been so lucky to have made a friend with an English accent.

It made her feel fancy. She hiccupped. Grinning at Fritz, Jack mimed the chugging of a beer and then gestured at Vanessa, making a face to suggest that she had a teensy bit of a drinking problem. It was a playful lie, meant in fun.

"Can't hold her liquor."

"I can too!" She said, too loudly, lifting her head to glower at him.

The bartender returned with drinks for both Jack and Fritz. Jack paid with a flourish of bills, and then fit the mouth of his beer to his lips.

Vanessa was all smiles for Fritz again. "Why are you here by yourself?"