Re: [Jester's Court: Cat & Jack]
It wasn't a court system, or at least, not within the confines of Jack's head. Justice and verdicts made it linear, instead of what looked like an infernal merry-go-round that whirled and whirled when you thought it had slowed to at least a crawl, if not a stop. All right, so he'd known the adult Cat, the woman who he'd nearly propositioned in the back-room of her own club, and he'd known the shiver-and-you'll-miss-it moment when she'd played with youth in the underbelly of the market. Knowledge had wound on, like a ball of wool slowly ravelled back in again and he knew now better than he had then, the merry 'so fuck it, then' of that expedition. Was it a surprise Cat was determined to sprawl in and settle in defiance of having her body taken and fucked with? No, not really. Was it a surprise sheer bloody force of will could not compel an orderly acceptance of the circumstances? Fuck off.
So you know, a mess. Jack didn't proscribe Cat's confessional up there with a qualitative assessment of the distinction between male and female, he wasn't enlightened enough to do so nor misogynistic enough to do so from the other way. It was one thing to acquire youth in reverse order, a proposition meant to be attractive. To be tossed wholesale into a mindfuck was another, even if it was just a second step in a series. He listened to instruction on a device that took all the dirt and crumbling, ashy paper out of getting stoned, but could probably be sexed up - a color, diamond encrusted, that kind of thing - where an ordinary bloody blunt couldn't. It wasn't his thing: Jack liked the filth of living, he liked dirt and that was engrained and ran close to the bone.
"But if you've all got stuff and everyone's stuff has to be dealt with, how the fuck do you deal with it? Do people make room, or is it an ongoing spiral of somebody else's stuff taking up all the oxygen?" But madness, and that was presumably why Eddie had bowed out, tapped the floor, dropped the mike, said 'I'm done for now'. Jack had barely any perspective on the shit-show that was the Family Bruce Constructed but he loathed the patriarch, so that was always a fun end to start from.
"Did Bruce actually listen or is this whirlagig of misery where no one actually gives you breathing room to you know, deal with the fact you've had what passes for autonomy in this town yanked out from underneath you, pissed on and set on fire, entirely usual in Jersey? Kids are supposed to exist in a state of I don't know, blunted edges on the sharp parts of the world. Nudged out of the nest rather than thrown." Blink and you miss it, and Jack didn't regret the modbox disappearing, but he might if the buzz wore off.
But okay. The funhouse. It was creepy in an entirely ordinarily unpleasant way that was design, and in an unsettling state that sat at the back of Jack's neck if he let it that had little to do with the funhouse by design and more to do with the fact they were in the fucking seventies. "I've known many people who love an asshole, but no one who loves clowns. Creepy buggers, the lot of them."
But all right, no hope, all was despair and Jack cocked a look sideways at Cat. "Nihilism. It goes with the cardigan, but god it's depressing. So none of you will change, none of you will recognize you're awful, and how does that work exactly, when you're not exactly bloody static these days? And you know, you recognize you're awful, typically," Jack added, a beat later. "Send cats, metaphorically burn down businesses. Do you want to be accepted for what you are, or do you want to be accepted with room to change?"
A smile, wry. "Fuck off. I know it's everyone. You've killed off my business, we're still friends, we've discussed wanking, there's not a lot of room left to accept. That you're fucked right now and don't know how you are? Yes, gathered thanks. What do you need, though?" Lazily, and he dug the flask out and swigged, and passed it over, even if it looked a little - all right, a lot dodgy - in the line for the funhouse.
"Am I going to regret this? I have no form with clowns."