Who: Riley & Spike {M} What: Riley needs to talk When: Week Four, Day Two Where: the bar of Riley's hotel
Riley was sitting in the furthest booth from the front door. He'd picked up a new phone that morning--same model as his old one, just without the tracer, the GPS, or the military bugs in his old one. He'd switched out the SIM card, kept all his numbers, and had chucked all his khaki and most of his greens out in the Pod's garbage incinerator.
Under his shirt he still had his dog tags, but those were a more sentimental keepsake than anything else, because he was fairly certain he couldn't be tracked down by two little thin pieces of metal on a ball chain. He had left messages in several places for Spike to come and find him, but he was fairly certain he actually had a better chance of Spike randomly waltzing in than checking his messages and actively going out for a meeting.
But, that was okay with Riley, because that'd give him awhile to get nice and toasted before he actually had to start putting words to the troubling and yet oddly relieving thoughts that were kicking around in his brain. What he'd done, why he'd done it, why he was having trouble understanding himself when it seemed like Spike could see through him like a pane of glass.
That thought required a little more booze, and when the curvy blonde waitress came back, he switched to tequila shots instead of the on-tap swill.