Re: Bench near the pool table: Michael C & Reece E
Michael, Reece was just now figuring out, was short-sighted. Ridiculously short-sighted. The fact that any of this was surprising in any way, when all the tells were there, not just in person, but all over the internet, everywhere, was just proof that the man was so caught up in himself that he hadn't bothered to look at anyone else, and that was always stupid, and that was always dangerous. You could be as selfish and self-centered as you wanted, but you had to be aware of what was moving outside of you—and who. When his colleague croaked out his first insistence that this was insane, Reece frowned at him. It was even more short-sighted to think Clementine was being threatened for a single spat. The scientist had married her—that was the mistake. In this world, that was the mistake.
"As long as you steer clear of each other in public—and, well, and probably in private, since who knows who's reading what—she'll be fine, Michael. I'm... actually... really--I'm really worried that this is surprising to you. You signed all those documents, NDA, your contract, and I'm going to guess you didn't read the fine print." His beer forgotten, Reece was leaning in toward Michael, elbows on his thighs, trying to understand this man who had more degrees to his name than Reece had... well, pretty much anything. The fact that he'd been reduced to a total of four words in a matter of minutes? Concerning. "Just--Just--Look, all you have to do is deliver the data. That's it. Then no one will care what you do or who you do it with. You have to look at the big picture here—" Reece shook his head. "It's not about you."
He wasn't sure he could explain it any better than that, but he was certainly trying—trying to make himself understood over rapidly warming beer. He tapped the other man on the knee with metal, reticulating fingers in his best approximation at comfort.