Re: 418: Cat & Sasha
Oh, he has feelings. There's no doubt about that, but people can fall out of love, Sasha, and they can still worry and care about each other. Bruce is two decades and a child, and he'd do anything for me, and I'd do anything for him, but it's not love anymore. [Which was more candor than Cat, old and tired in her skin, would ever admit to, and she felt strangely old in her own young, not-tired skin.] And we're alright this way. [She meant it. Oh, that desperation that was drowning her before, it wasn't in attendance, and she was glad of it. All the hurt had seeped out of her.] Reece is a good friend and a roommate soon. Matt? Is the past. Robert, wherever he is, is gone. Steve? Is coming back to town, and I don't even mind it. [She laughed, and it was a good laugh.] It's nice, Sasha, not hurting inside because of rejection piled up from them, from family, even from Helena. I think it's easy, getting stuck a rut where everything is tarnished and terrible. It's almost addicting, in a way, feeling bad for oneself. I'd forgotten what it felt like to not feel bad. [Oh, Cat most certainly did not want to go back.]
I promise not to send a single warning to the gators. You can sneak up on them. Does it require camouflage? Is it like hunting, where you can't even chew gum because they'll smell you coming? [Cat had never been hunting, not beyond training exercises in the dacha, but she remembered the rule about the gum. No perfume, either, but perhaps the gators didn't have good noses.] I'm happy for you, Sasha. [She meant it, and her youthful face was all earnest truths laid out bare.] He better be good to you, or he'll have me to deal with. [Oh, she and Sasha tore each other to shreds, but that didn't mean anyone else was allowed to do it.]
You can talk to me about anything. [She waved a hand easily.] Oh, I know it wasn't easy before. Maybe it can be easier now. [She paused, curiosity emblazoned on her face.] Newt? Well, he seems to be terribly and terminally and pathologically nice. His brother and I are very good friends. Funny how that happens, isn't it? Suddenly, you turn around, and someone's a very good friend. He drove me here, Newt's brother, whose name is Jack. He's the newspaper editor in Repose, and I've known him for nearly two years now.
[She laughed, legs crossed at the knee now and comfortable in her chair amid the collection of sweet things the man from behind the counter set in front of them.] Sushi was an acquired taste too. Vodka. Sake. [She left the money on the table, and she wouldn't be collecting it at the end of this outing. She just nudged away coins and bills, and then she cut a little corner of the lemon coconut doughnut. She chewed with the elegance of someone who'd forced herself into the role so long ago that it had become habit, and she nearly purred at the conflicting sweetness of the combined flavors.] This is amazing.
[She said that with her mouth nearly full, and there was no better compliment than that.] What's your Abe look like? Regale me while I go into sugar shock. [She was already cutting off a corner of raspberry drizzle.]