#nic01

Playing nice was never something Julian believed he was good at. He could only hang around for so long until he considered throwing himself in Lake Michigan. Though there were ways to quell the irritation that bubbled under his skin. Alcohol was one, and it did make the evening ever hazier with each glass poured. Still, it wasn’t enough. What he found himself itching for, the creeping demon sitting on his shoulder, was something a little stronger. Something that made the heart race and worries melt away. The lines on the bathroom counter were just the trick, hellish and disorienting but at least they fed that nagging need he’d developed. It was one quick sweep, gums promptly coated when he heard a knock on the door. “Busy.” Just as he was about to take another hit, the knock came again. “Jesus- busy.”

The powder burned, the sensation becoming almost a welcomed thing until thud! Bold of anyone to interrupt something so sacred as doing blow in a bathroom. Gathering whatever remained into his dime bag, an insult was already brewing on his lips as he opened the door. “I don’t know how to explain to you the concept of busy but-” There it was- voice caught in the back of his throat as none other than Monica Pelletier came into vision. The last they’d seen of each other was when bridges were burned, bodies left in the wake and Nic... Nic was abandoned to suffer consequences alone. 

It was instinct: close the gap, marvel at the woman who’d given you a chance when you were a broken thing, erase the surprise of the inevitable... “Nic.”

To the general public, the Kovalis were a mystery - they were wealthy, they were powerful, they were successful...one of them had just been released from prison, but surely that was a fluke. How could a young man from such an upstanding family possibly have done what the papers and courts had claimed? Cassidy, however, knew them better than almost anyone else. She knew first-hand the atrocities that they were capable of committing, she knew just how evil each and every one of them could be. She was proof of that. Still, when she saw Rafal’s fingertips graze a city councilman’s wife’s bicep, she couldn’t help but smirk as she took yet another sip of her champagne. “I’m going to be so fucking hungover tomorrow.”

Up a narrow staircase towards the back of the theater, and down a thin, dimly lit hallway, through the last door was Sidney’s office. It was a rare space where he was normally alone. A sanctuary to retreat into when he was otherwise overwhelmed or had work that needed to be finished. The door was almost never shut, but only a handful of people in the city knew it was a place to find him, when he was otherwise missing.

Sid had shoved a large wooden desk inside his office, and a long black couch, and lined the back wall with bookshelves, so there was wasn’t much floor left open. With nearly every surface also covered in papers, knick knacks and memorabilia from movies and plays that had passed through the theater, his office had a tendency to be described by others as ‘cluttered’. 

The echo of footsteps told him someone was approaching long before he saw a figure, and blinking in surprise, Sid sat up straight in his chair, stretching his arms up over his head. He was expecting to see one of his staff appear at the door, but instead it was Nicolette who stepped into view. 

“You’re here early,” he laughed, then glancing down at the time on his laptop, realized he was deeply mistaken. Sid frowned, and closed it with a clack. “Nevermind. Didn’t keep you waiting too long, did I?” He stepped around the desk towards her, with only mild difficulty navigating the tight space. “I lost track of the time.”