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kim's kc shirt is thrifted, definitely has been around since before clinton was inducted, and she absolutely doesn't care for baseball.

blood in the water and they are in the company of sharks.   kim presses her lips together, palms gripping the back of the chair as she places it back.    with care.   with all the will anyone would summon in calling family they had not talked to in years.  when she does address matt, she is deliberate:   “that could work.”   men with small bikes and window blind smiles out of midwestern plains slammed the door in your face first.   there’s a sliver of a win, here.    if they would listen.   “plainly speaking,  this is your only chance.” / @devilletting

he isn’t cryptic.  he’s suave and dramatic, but not cryptic–  at least, not in this instance. kim is coiled caution and assurity at the heart of it, and she can feel an inkling of self-interest go ahead of her, sniffing like a bloodhound.  by the time she reels it back in, he must have read the signs:  a woman walks into a bar looking for something larger than her. no deals will be made.  you know how the rest goes–  “are you saying i should quit?” / @yeonban

“no, i get what you mean.”  does she?  kim is barely a fourth of her way into this tequila. this is the very beginning of an open mixer at a bar she barely knows, and she has a very not-a-lawyer for company, it seems.  “it’s corporate law-adjacent.”  boring to most, and she expects the conversation to stall. “nothing like the practice.” / @nursewashing

the mural on the farside of the hall is built to outlive the recession.  in it, she could trace the ugliness of the mid-eighties and the subduedness of the nineties.  if kim looked past it, she thinks she can see some obscure settlement in colorado and the shop that could have housed it.  but she’s neither here nor there and feels like anthony quayle in the wrong man–  insurance fraud, manslaughter, the spouse on the phone barely hanging on by a thread.  what she lacks is the heady rush.  restlessness seizes the tips of her dark heels, and they rattle against the floor.  she knows what he is, minus the badge and the obvious uniform:  there aren’t many men who walk with that pointed purpose.     her contempt isn’t universal, isn’t bright and hard, and isn’t poisonous.    she holds it in some reserve, presses it down under her feet.   “my job,”  she says, “is to give my clients the best possible representation they can get.  not act as a confidant. if you have his name, you should have his number or address.”  / @h4wlin

only a few men stay behind this late in the afternoon,  rearing for a day drink,  or a check that needs to be deposited.   she isn’t throwing caution to the wind,   but when the smoke of her coffee curls lazily in the dusty light,  kim feels her resolve give way.   these were things she did as a first-year associate in the copy machine heart of HHM,  and sitting for an otherwise public trial for –what, the first time in a few years?–  leaves her with the same feeling;  the thrill of certainty,  her future right under the callused heels of her palms.  so she links her ankles, tucks her legs under her seat, and remarks:   “close shave.”    /   @heartinhands

“it’s not really that serious of a charge.” she shifts her weight, as if to recenter herself. “i’m told the complaint came in from a residence.” she empties her voice of any amount of surprise; concerned mothers and scared girlfriends call her with the same question: this won’t mean anything like a life sentence, would it? the answer is always an assuring no. “if they can’t prove criminal intent, they can’t hold him for too long.” and they shouldn't. her eyebrows curve up. “what were you told?” / @cinderlynx