She rose with him, finally, fingers still lingering, at impossible ease. Impossibly rested. At her best, despite how his words struck her.

“If you believe that, then you don’t listen to the world whose problems you hope to solve.” She snaked around him again, benevolent this time. “You have to believe that others care about their lives as much as you do.”

Lips lingered on a shoulder. “Can I ask you a question without you being all dodgy and weird?”

The end of adrenaline was calm, and, despite anxieties, the emotion of their romp had died down for her. She was buzzing on the energy he’d supplied. Anger had drawn out memories of Rinc, and memories of Fernando which she could not discern as real or figments of her imagination. However, these, too, had been smoothed over and set aside to pick apart later.

For now, his thoughts were on the table—a puzzle, and she moved around the pieces curiously.

Arms stayed wrapped around him, despite his tone, breathing in MISTY TERRAIN. It turned her into a different person. Someone who gave a damn. That’s what he wanted, right?

“What happened to make you put so much pressure on yourself?”

It wasn’t dodgy. It was a lot. Some of it, she’d heard before. It hadn’t been an entirely unique question to their interactions, but one which she’d hoped to pull more from this time. He spilled, but he still wouldn't give her sort of answer she'd hoped for.

He had been galvanized by all of these things, but not everyone was capable of being shocked into action. Most people rolled over in the face of such opposition. What had happened to him, way before he had lost his parents, and his colleagues, and his country? How had they built him into the man who would avenge them?

Who had been the one to fuck him up first?

Despite his nakedness, he continued to leave scars unseen. However, his final words entranced her in introspection. She didn’t pry further, effectively derailed.

Lulu hadn’t thought of avatarship in such a way. Still, she believed this was where technology would come in—as always, to save the day. This notion was kept to herself, as she crossed legs on the bed and idly held her toes.

What must I do? Save the world, too?

“I see.”

As he drew away, so did his influence. Stone returned to both of them—what she’d wanted. Not ‘I love you’s’. He had drawn these things out himself. Her concern for him was as manufactured as her affection.

“Sure.”

She waited on the bed, for a turn, and for a time to leave. I love you. Did she mean it? Could she? Was she even capable?

No.

But it didn’t matter. She lied, like him. He made her that way.

“Because I care.”

It would be difficult for one not to be the best at stroking when it was what they specialized in, all day every day.


Lulu sat, still, pensive.

When he reappeared, she shrugged. “I don't know. I don't think it does. I was just trying to be helpful.”

Was he being self-conscious again?

His motion to look for new clothes spurred her to retrieve her own from the bathroom. She disappeared into it as he left, and voices bounced off walls without eyes to read expressions. Away from him, she dressed back into his date from the night prior.

Not emerging yet, she spoke at glass, assessing her own transformation while finally leveling with him. “I mean you have a knack for doing things like answering a question with a question... or when you do actually answer, it's like you do it in the way you want people to be asking you. That make sense? You make people believe they’re asking you something else, so you never actually have to give people what they want, but you also never have to tell them to piss off.” she paused, wiping a thumb hard across her cheek. “I think that’s why you’re so good at what you do. How you stay popular, at the top.”

She turned to stand in the doorway. Overnight, she’d become corrupt. Tattoos exposed, dragon wrapped around her leg, mascara smudged. The trace of a tear had been warped and obscured, and drug across skin to the side, and with it, what remained of foundation—exposing the human flaws of her face. Scars. The beginnings of age. Pain which already wrinkled deeply.

“You hide. It’s smart.”