Re: Log: The Cat - Cat/Matt
[He followed her roving eye.] Not many. [She, on the other hand, looked as good in her expensive causal clothes as she did in a rag or an evening dress. Or a tuxedo, for that matter. He kept looking at her scarlet boots. He felt like taking them off, imagined grasping the heel and sliding them away, leaving her white legs bare.
If he was honest, his own chances were 50/50 in that situation, freezing vs. tearing the room into pieces.] Ever see him again? [Casual.
He didn't sip. He had no respect for the purity of the spirit, the subtleties of the finest money could buy. He'd been raised without knowing what was good and bad. He didn't have any memories of prohibition, not really, he was only a kid then, but there was a smell that stuck in his mind - juniper berries and the harsh shriek of grain alcohol to a child's nose, brutally sharp. ]
I'd like that. [He said it with the warmth of not thinking about it very much, just stated something true. The moment she said it, he liked the image of them sitting in first class, travelling in luxury to destroy nightmares in Siberia. It was a crazy thought, nice but also sort of sickening, like the jolt of turbulence, a sickening drop. Good company and catharsis. How odd to plan it in advance.
As for doing good, he shook his head, looked at her over the top of the vodka glass. No words for that. No charities, no one else in that house. There were some things there was no good to do with. Thinking about it too much made his gaze go slightly distant, syrupy with lost memory, soporific. No.
He remembered the vodka in his hand again, downed it, refilled the glasses. He still didn't spill. The crush of sharp alcohol against the back of his throat brought him back to himself.] What kind of good you doing these days? [There must be something, if it was the first thing she thought of.
But Calvin, Calvin required putting his mind back there, if only briefly. He did, a touch uncertain. Short dips into the past weren't always dangerous.] His son. [He wasn't actually buzzed, but thinking about the dacha and the years before, they could make him feel as if he was. It had been a little like being drunk, sometimes, being that far outside yourself.] Remember him. [Someone by that description, at least. The name still didn't ring the bell.] Said something about his son, once. That he'd live. [He paused, the shot glass halfway to his mouth, and shook his head.] Or that he'd survive. Something like that. There weren't a lot like him.