Re: Jack/Dahlia: quicklog at the gym
[Jack knew shades of anger. He didn't think cool and hot, the build-up like tar in lungs or tanin coating the inside of a mug versus the burn-off on liquid fire. He associated Dahlia's brand of anger with men who turned over tables or backhanded their wives, men who made people weep. He had his own history, christ yes - there had been a period where truly off his tits drunk he'd tossed furniture from windows. But Dahlia's anger, explosive and reactive and as sensitive as compressed gas: he didn't think fire and fire quelled much.]
I didn't mean it as a lie at the time. [Which was true. He had thought about it, he had wanted it, but the combination of a lack of bloody clothing and the fact that he was almost certain he'd ruin the careful healing of a week or three of the holes in his shoulder had knocked that on the head.] But do I clarify? I wanted to see you regardless and it isn't bloody fake, Dahlia. I don't want to fight, I'm extremely tired of fighting. How the hell does my stopping by wind you up further?
[He hated questions like that one. Open-ended, that could be shaped, manipulated no matter what was carefully tipped in to fill it, like an empty hourglass and sand uncapped. What do you want? Well, what the hell was still on the list. He couldn't sit but he wanted to and instead he nudged the filing cabinet with his shoulder-blades and leaned. Temporarily.]
I don't know. What the fuck do you want from me? [Less vituperative.] You took umbrage with me for nearly dying and becoming twenty in the process or so it felt like and whatever idiotic stance I took on things then, which given you were my solid constant at the time was pretty bloody lonely for three months, and since then? Since then I haven't managed to have a solid conversation with you about anything. This is shite. I don't want this.