thecapitol | Today's log brought to you by the letter "C!" C, as in Closed!

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Today's log brought to you by the letter "C!" C, as in Closed!

WHO| Carlos, Cecil, and a ｃamera ｃrew
WHAT| A chat. Carlos has been given a break from working on the disease to see -- right, that guy he confessed love for in the Arena. Too bad it wasn't true.
WHEN| Late last week, before Carlos makes his discovery.
WHERE| In the Capitol! Outside the Speakeasy, then inside the Speakeasy.
WARNINGS| Huge, horrendous amounts of awkward. This is a painful truth. Also, the first part of this log IS televised. Feel free to assume your character has seen it.

Carlos stood, trying not to fidget, on the curb next to the Speakeasy. He had it on good authority that this was the one building in the Capitol where you could have a private talk -- a really private talk, without the Capitol listening in on you. Carlos needed a place like that. The deception he was about to discuss wasn't just for the Capitol's citizens. It was important that the administration swallow it, as well.

But oh, god, was he not looking forward to discussing it.

The camera crews didn't help. They knew exactly why Carlos had been allowed out of the lab and who this appointment was with, and were eagerly asking him question after question.

"Of course I'm looking forward to seeing him--"

"--no, I haven't seen him since before the Arena--"

"--yes, I really thought I was going to die--"

"--thank you--"

"--I'm sorry to hear that, I didn't mean to make anyone cry--"

"--excuse me, but I've been working on identifying a very important disease -- isn't anybody going to ask me about that?"

"--listen, thank you, but I'd really rather not answer any more questions. I'm just here to meet Cecil..."

Carlos couldn't hear anyone's approach, not over the clamor of the press, so he looked around for Cecil instead. With any luck, this place's bouncers would keep the reporters out. It was part of why Carlos had chosen it. Carlos knew he ought to look excited: after all, he was seeing the man he was purportedly in love with for the first time in over a month. Really, though, he just felt sick. Sick, and guilty.

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"...For the Love of God!" Cecil exclaimed. He was not, however, commenting on the skull, but on the small plaque hanging on the wall beside the display, on which was printed the name. He was not sure how the name related to the piece itself, unless it was supposed to reflect the viewer's intended reaction.

He sounded impressed, though, and he leaned to look at the skull from another angle, admiring the way the light played off of the diamonds. "I like it," he declared, as though the room had been waiting for his opinion. "It looks kind of like the shoulderpieces the stylists had designed for District Six in their last appearance before the Fifty-Fourth Hunger Games! ...Though those are in a different museum." One with whose contents he was, obviously, rather more familiar.

"Yes, that's it! Cecil, I know this piece!" Carlos looked very excited. "That means the cataclysm must have happened after the turn of the century!" He paused, rubbing his chin slowly. "It's odd, though. If I remember right, and of course I do, because I have an excellent memory for science, Pluto was declared a dwarf planet in 2006. I didn't see this artwork--" he gestures at the skull, "--until at least a year after that." The cataclysm couldn't happened before the Pluto planetarium tapes were updated but after the creation of this skull -- it seemed impossible.

Cecil frowned. That was a contradiction. ...And also a long time ago. Wow.

"Well," he said slowly, "Maybe... maybe the tapes were also from before the cataclysm! Or based, perhaps, on prior knowledge that people more interested in the topic than I am have, that I do not. Maybe they were on loan from this museum, even. Or..." He considered briefly. "Maybe... maybe our timelines are not exactly equivalent. Maybe there existed months or years here, which time in your own world is not able to account for."

He made a wiggling motion with one hand, to indicate uncertainty. "Measuring time before and immediately following the cataclysm is a little.... eeeehhh. You know?"

"Yeah, I know," said Carlos with a shrug. "It's kind of surreal, knowing that whatever happened to your version of Earth didn't occur that long after when I was alive on mine."

It was interesting to think about. And frightening, in a distant, chilling sort of way.

"Well, I found what I came here to see. We can go wherever you want now, Cecil. My scientific obligations are fulfilled." I'm yours for the rest of the day, was what that shrug and that smile meant.

And it was the entire rest of the day. They did as they had originally planned - they walked the museum for a few hours, they went out for a late lunch, they returned to Cecil's apartment to share a glass or two of wine, and then they separated only long enough to be zipped and buckled into less practical, but better-coordinated clothes before they met again to attend a party. It was Cecil's party - not one that he'd put on, but one to which many members of the press had been invited, and the invitation had made clear that his plus-one was expected.

In some ways, the party was the most private few hours they had all day. There were dim corners and loud music; places where one could stand and be sought, but not noticed; places where normal conversation was all but inaudible. Even in Cecil's apartment, they knew that they were watched, and could be overheard. Conversation there was bright, and pointless, and careful. It was convincing; it was not enjoyable.

It was easier to pretend in a crowd, somehow. It was easier when Cecil could play his affection for an audience-- could look at their expressions and listen to their voices and know how convincing he'd been, what little gestures they liked and which they might not quite believe. He didn't always have to look at Carlos, either. He could talk about Carlos, like he'd always done, and not have to deal with the additional difficulty of looking into his face and being painfully, immediately aware of how many layers deep this deception ran.

--But, well. Three or four drinks in, it also became much easier to be close to Carlos. It became easier to stand or sit with an arm around his waist or a hand resting on his knee. It became less important whether the smiles Cecil directed at him were real or not; it mattered less what motivated him to spend minutes at a time just looking at Carlos' profile against the light.

And so there was something more natural (if less coordinated) in the way Cecil approached Carlos toward the end of the evening, a drink in each hand, to sit down beside him on a couch not dissimilar in design from the abstract furniture they'd been browsing earlier in the day. He sat down and did bother putting any space between them; because they were together, and this was one of the many small things that togetherness entailed.

"Carlos," he said by way of greeting, proffering one of the drinks (which glowed only faintly, as they were some distance from the blacklight under which it was intended to be drunk). He said the name like he'd used to say it on the air, sometimes - though now, because they were together, he could leave the perfect implied.

Carlos, in more buckles than he's sure are entirely necessary, has been fielding uncomfortably personal questions all night. He's getting better at smiling through the informal interviews, and his replies come more naturally than they did, but if he has to explain one more time about how grateful he is to the Capitol for bringing him and Cecil together, he will have to conduct a scientific study on whether or not it is possible for the words coming out of a person's mouth to make him or her physically ill, because all he has so far is compelling but anecdotal evidence.

Being near Cecil is uncomfortable. Being apart from him is worse. At least he doesn't have to worry about fooling Cecil, and at least when Cecil is close by, fewer Capitolites approach. It is with a genuine but tired smile that Carlos greets Cecil, and Carlos accepts the drink gratefully. He hasn't had that much this evening, only the two or three he's been unable to refuse politely, so one more won't hurt, right? After all, it's nearly two. He can't have to do this for much longer. Right?

"Hello, Cecil," he says, just loud enough to be heard. "I'm really glad to see you. The other guests -- they won't leave me alone."

He frowns. It's not a serious frown. He's not actually unhappy. He's not feeling much like taking any in-depth survey of his emotions at the moment, but he's pretty sure he's not unhappy. Just expressing sympathy for Carlos' plight, with his face.

"That's terrible," he says. He's looking right into Carlos' face. This is a good way to keep people from approaching, usually. Only the determined and those with temporary artificial impairment to their ability to process social cues tend to interrupt people with so few inches between their faces.

"Maybe-- maybe you should stay over here," Cecil suggests. Not out of the way, exactly, but with several backs between them and the main clump of laughing, dancing people. To clarify: "With me, I mean." As added incentive, in a lower voice: "It'll look really normal."

Why, Carlos thinks, as all the alcohol in his system makes a mad dash for his face, did Cecil have to take that tone with him? Staying over here isn't scientifically speaking a bad idea, but that tone makes it very difficult to maintain the level of emotional detachment that is appropriate when you are in close proximity to the man you are conducting a fake relationship with.

Very difficult.

"...you came over to me," he says, after a pause just a hair too long to be natural. "I was here first. So technically -- scientifically -- you would be the one staying here, with me."

He doesn't pull away. Maintaining physical distance is proving just as difficult as maintaining emotional distance. Actually, come to think of it, are there fewer inches between them now? Carlos thinks there are. Maybe he should have taken measurements, a moment ago.

Too late now.

Cecil has had a few drinks, it's true; but he feels that he has a pretty solid handle on his spatial relationship with the world right now. He feels assured that he is not imagining the nearer proximity of Carlos' face to his. He is fairly confident that this was intentional, on his part or Carlos', and that the meaning of distance or the size of the world in relation to them has not changed. (It is always important not to rule out other possibilities.)

He puts a hand up - the one not holding his drink, of course, that would be awkward and ridiculous - and puts it on the side of Carlos' face. It is an anchoring kind of gesture - Cecil, ensuring that his depth perception is not deceiving him, and the number of inches between their faces is as small as it appears to be.

(There are very, very few inches between them now. Carlos' skin is warm, and his hair curls around Cecil's fingertips.)

"...That's fine," Cecil says. More quietly than he says most things. It feels like there is not enough space between them even to contain the words he is saying. He keeps saying them anyway. "That's fine! I... I'll stay here. With you."

He swallows, and repeats, more quietly still. "...That's fine."

The universe moves according to patterns, Carlos knows; momentum, gravity, diffusion, inertia, all of them are the rails on which the universe runs. To take them off of those rails is nearly impossible, and only happens in places that are also impossible. The Capitol is not one of those places. Here, the universe is ordered. Here, it follows its own laws. And just as it is impossible to keep an object with mass from having gravity, it is impossible, after Cecil says that, after Cecil takes hold of his face, not to lean in and kiss him.

Carlos is still not quite used to touching Cecil. Everywhere he and Cecil are touching sends an electrical current through him. (Literally, because that's how the nervous system works.) It is a soft kiss but not a particularly short one.

He should be doing this for show. Carlos realizes that. He understands that this is supposed to be an act for him, and that he should make this look as convincing as possible while keeping it as impersonal as possible. He's been fairly okay at that, he thinks. According to their arrangement, he has to kiss Cecil but he can't want to, which is exactly the opposite of how his life has worked for the past year, but he's managed.

But he can't deny that he had leaned in to kiss Cecil because he had wanted to. Carlos wants to kiss Cecil. It is, objectively, a good idea to kiss Cecil. He is finding it very, very hard to keep those things separate right now.

So here, at this horrible party, in this horrible outfit, with a gently glowing drink forgotten in one hand, Carlos kisses Cecil, and can't stop himself from meaning it. If his mind were clearer and less full of Cecil's voice and Cecil's hand on his face and Cecil being really close to him and Cecil being flustered and telling him it's fine, maybe he would hope more that Cecil wouldn't notice.

They have done a lot of kissing, since that first kiss outside the Speakeasy. They have kissed in public, and gotten very good at catching in each other's glances when a kiss would be most appropriate. When it would look the best. They have kissed in private, as well, because it is important that their romance be as believable as possible; because if it should appear that Carlos the Scientist is not in love with Cecil Palmer, that his confession in the Arena was meaningless, then they may not bring him back the next time he dies. This is a price that Cecil is willing to pay to keep Carlos in the Capitol.

This kiss, however, does not feel like any kind of a price. It does not feel like an obligation. It does not feel planned, or decided upon. It-- it simply feels like it is happening.

Cecil is very, very happy that it is happening.

He has done his best not to be happy about anything that happens between himself and Carlos in recent days. He has done his best to relegate happiness to other things, because what they have - what they really have - is not something to be happy about. But right now-- with this kiss-- well. It's different. He's a little drunk; his heart is beating in his throat; Carlos' mouth is warm and soft on his; and it's just different.

It feels natural when it breaks, too. Not like they have decided that this is an adequate length of time for a kiss between two people who are in love to go on. Not like they are trying not to look like they are waiting for it to end. Just-- they come together, and Cecil's fingertips slide a little more into Carlos' hair, over his ear, and time moves on at its normal speed, and a good number of seconds elapse, and they come apart.

Cecil looks into Carlos' face, still only inches from his, and wonders-- and cannot ask-- if he was the only one to whom that did not feel sufficiently affected.

"I think," he says, "That-- that maybe, no one is going to bother us. For a little while." It comes out too soft and with insufficient flippancy and sounds not enough like what he intends it to be. It sounds like he doesn't care about what he's saying at all. It sounds like what he is saying and what he wants to be saying are two completely different things.

His fingers are still brushing Carlos' face. He hardly notices.

He should go, he thinks. He should stop this. He should run. Running is how he has always dealt with this: when things get too personal Carlos makes excuses, he backtracks, he leaves.

But what if he didn't? What if, this time, he stayed?

Carlos feels guilt curling in his stomach: he knows this has turned personal, and he knows that any argument against leaving is going to be rationalizing something he knows is a terrible idea. And yet -- with Cecil's hand in his hair and voice in his ears, with people around them just waiting to catch Carlos alone, with the whole pretense already in place -- it seems like there are so many reasons to stay.

His eyes drop to Cecil's mouth.

So many reasons.

If I leave now, I'll have to think of an excuse, he says to himself as he sets his drink down on the low table next to the couch, doing it without looking, not taking his eyes off of Cecil Palmer. It would have to be important enough to make leaving look believable, he thinks, as his hand slides to rest against Cecil's shoulder, low in front, almost his chest. It might look suspicious, crosses his mind as he leans in closer again, almost close enough for their foreheads to touch.

"I can't say for sure that they won't try anyway," he says quietly, under his breath. "That is, eventually. If we look like we're not busy." If his voice is too soft, it's because Cecil is too close to talk more loudly. If his pupils are dilated, it's because the room is dark. If his heart is racing, it's out of fear of discovery. And if he pushes Cecil back a few inches, slowly, with his hand and his forehead and his whole body, well --

-- okay, maybe he doesn't have an excuse for that.

It'll look really normal.

We should look like we're busy, Cecil concludes. Some part of him concludes that, anyway. There is definitely one part of his mind that is still capable of looking at this from the outside and thinking, If we are sufficiently close together, that will be construed as being too busy to talk to other people, and that is what we want to happen.

It is, however, not a prominent part of his mind thinking this, because most of him is considering with wonder how rapidly his heart is beating, and how he is not sure where his breaths begin and Carlos' end. More of him is concentrating on sliding his hand around to the back of Carlos' head, to rest at the back of his neck, to pull him still closer. He is wrapped up in sinking back against the couch, carefully, making sure that Carlos stays with him for every inch of this small distance.

He thinks he might reply. He considers it. In the end, though, he only nods once-- which Carlos must feel, because their foreheads are still touching. That nod moves smoothly into tipping his head to find Carlos' mouth, guided with the hand at the back of his neck, a kiss still soft-- but open-mouthed this time.

There is no space between them whatsoever. They are in public. Cecil's eyes have fallen closed, and he is not sure what surface his drink has ended up on; the hand not now winding into Carlos' hair is resting on his shoulder, and seeking purchase in his clothes.

This is a terrible idea, thinks absolutely no part of Cecil's conscious mind.

There is a glowing stain on the floor. Once, it had been Cecil's drink. Now, it isn't. Funny, how transformative time can be. This is probably the first time in the history of ever that there has been a glowing puddle that Carlos has not dropped everything to investigate.

Because dropping everything would mean taking his hands off of Cecil. It would mean stopping his arm from wrapping around Cecil's shoulders, and keeping his fingers from slipping under the collar of Cecil's shirt, and taking his mouth off of Cecil's instead of opening his mouth, too, to the sound of his own pounding heart.

Carlos does none of these things and all of them.

He doesn't normally do this in public. But he normally doesn't die in public, either, or wear these kinds of clothes in public. He also doesn't normally run his tongue along Cecil Palmer's mouth, or gently trace the side of Cecil Palmer's throat from ear to collarbone with his fingertips, or hold a kiss with Cecil Palmer until the last possible moment, when he needs to breathe or risk a worse dizziness than he already feels.

It's a weird night.

A break in the kiss, an indrawn breath, a moment where he could, theoretically, choose to stop (which hangs in the air long enough for him to breathe out and in again) and then he is kissing Cecil again, warmer, deeper. Thinking about this, Carlos has decided, will do absolutely nothing to help the situation, and as such, he has elected not to do it any more.

A lot of thinking goes into their relationship, in general. Making an intimate interaction look and feel convincing to an invisible audience must be done as thoughtfully as possible. They have sat together before, in places where crowds will drown out their whispers, and quietly planned out five minutes' worth of casual touching. They have scheduled dates based on how many people will likely be present to see them in the same place.

All this to say that it feels good-- it feels so good-- not to be thinking right now.

Cecil kisses a lot like he talks: earnestly, and without hesitation, and mostly by using his tongue. Carlos kisses like a movie star, and Cecil like a radio host, and it works. It works very well. He doesn't need to move his hand much at all to bury his fingers in Carlos' hair; he does this, and sighs, and it is a soft "Mmm" into Carlos' mouth.

Among the things he is not thinking about is their audience - the crowd of people, who may or may not have noticed them, who may or may not have tapped their friends' shoulders to point them out, who may or may not be smiling or frowning or shaking their heads at them. Cecil doesn't care what they're doing. Unless someone walks over here with the express purpose of pulling Carlos off of him, he will not care.

Of the two of them, it will not be Cecil who pulls away.

It works incredibly well. (Do you know the kinds of things he's thought about Cecil's mouth?) It falls into a loose rhythm: kiss, kiss, breathe. (Or Cecil's tongue, or his voice?) Hands run through hair, over skin, and tease at the edges of clothes. (It's harder than usual to deny those things now.) Breaths come in two forms: a sigh or a soft gasp, and Carlos feels his skin heating, his heart beating hard.

It is an indeterminate amount of time later when he pulls back -- it might have been a minute, it might have been five, it might have been a lifetime for all he knows -- when he pulls back, and looks at Cecil, and is flushed and short of breath and hazy-eyed.

"Cecil," he whispers, and is unsure of what he means by it. It could mean well, we've reached a break in making out -- do you want to stop? or there might be people watching already, we are in public, Cecil. But the tone of it isn't quite right for either of those things. Honestly, it sounds closer to kissing you is amazing and really I just want to say your name. It's not quite that. But almost.

Cecil has never seen Carlos like this before. Perfect is a word he's used to describe Carlos many times in the past, both on the air and in his own head; he has since amended it to a more realistic always slightly imperfect and sometimes more imperfect than at other times. He has even come, in his way, to love those imperfections of Carlos' that he has seen. It has taken some time, and several major national crises, for him to reach this point.

He must be regressing, or something, because he looks at Carlos - flushed and breathing hard and looking at Cecil like that, oh, oh wow - and has the thought, unbidden, that in this moment everything about Carlos is perfect.

He brings up a hand, to brush fingers against the side of Carlos' face, and does not take his eyes off of him. His expression is soft, and relaxed, and warm. "Yes, Carlos," he replies, only a little above the whisper, and it is also ambiguous - he might be saying I assume that you have something further to say to me and am making clear that you have my attention, or it might just be Yes, Carlos, everything that is happening right now is good and perfect, and I acknowledge that and hope to make clear that I don't want it to stop happening. It does not say Yes, Carlos, I want to stop.

He does take a brief second to glance over Carlos' shoulder at the crowd (smaller now than it was; people have slowly begun to take their leave of the party). There are no eyes on them that he can see, and he returns his attention to Carlos without a single shred of guilt.

It's the glance that is the moment's undoing.

The glance reminds Carlos that there are other people here, and that no matter how much it might feel otherwise, they are kissing for the benefit of the other people, and a glance of his own confirms that those people have begun to leave.

Cecil will see the moment Carlos begins to think again: thoughts appear behind his eyes like leviathans approaching the surface of unquiet water. First there is uncertainty, then discomfort, and the beginnings of self-doubt and self-consciousness. He can't keep kissing Cecil now. He shouldn't. The party is over. If he continues, he'll have to justify it -- to himself, or, perhaps, to Cecil.

No.

(His fingers linger in Cecil's hair, pulling away but slowly, fingertips just slightly calloused by years of handling Erlenmeyer flasks and test tubes and other scientific paraphernalia brushing over Cecil's jaw.)

"...we should probably go," he says, glancing out again at the emptying party. "It's getting late."

The expression of Cecil's face does several things in rapid succession. First, the vague, adoring smile disappears from it. Then it is surprised. And then it is confused. And then it is disappointed. "Oh," he says, as he makes a visible effort to think about something that is not Carlos' fingers in his hair, and the warmth of Carlos' skin under his hands, which... which are still on Carlos.

Uncertainly, he removes them.

"Back to... to my apartment?" he asks, and this is so hesitant that it has to be an honest question. Cecil has gotten good at asking this, and things like this, in a way that implies that anything is going to happen. Orchestrating the things that don't happen in a way that feels like they could is half of the act. If this evening had gone as planned, he would have been saying this with a grin, right into Carlos' ear, just loud enough for any nearby microphone to pick up, and preparing to feign disappointment when Carlos recited some rehearsed reason that he couldn't come.

But now, he sounds unsure. He feels like something has just ended, like he has just been told something he didn't want to hear, and with the alcohol still making his head feel lighter than usual (or is it the taste of Carlos' mouth still on his tongue?), he finds himself needing to ask for this clarification, even though it might come with consequences.

Was this a mistake? is what he is really asking. Do you think this is a mistake? Have I done something wrong? And-- yes, even, there is a part of the question that is really asking, that dares still to hope-- ...Do you want to come back to my apartment? Does this have to be over?

He glances at the party again, which is emptying out more quickly now, and there is a question in that glance, too. They will have to decide here and now whether or not they are going to be alone tonight.

Oh, no. Oh, no.

For a moment, Carlos looks at Cecil and realizes, I could go to his apartment. He could follow Cecil home, and they would put Khoshekh outside, and no one but them and the Peacekeepers on the other side of the cameras would know how they spent the rest of the night.

His mouth feels very, very dry.

But that, Carlos realizes, is a very bad idea. Colossally bad. They hadn't talked about this, and if he slept with Cecil now, they wouldn't be able to talk about it. Not honestly. Not without pretending feelings had been there all along.

He can't.

"...I shouldn't," Carlos says, also with more sincerity than is technically advisable in a heavily-surveilled police state. "You've had a few drinks, Cecil. I--I don't think it's a good idea." All three of these statements are true, and all are good reasons to not spend the night at Cecil's apartment.

Words, it turns out, mean very little just on their own. The words that Carlos is saying, taken for exactly what they are, each mean only one thing at a time. I shouldn't, for example means that Carlos recognizes the existence of at least one compelling reason not to go back to Cecil's apartment with him. I don't think it's a good idea means that Carlos, in this moment, has used his powers of judgment to come to a conclusion about his next course of action, but does not wish to be so rudely direct as to say that he thinks going home with Cecil would be a bad idea. On the surface, their meaning is no more complex than this.

However: Just as important, in Cecil's experience (as someone who knows a lot about saying words), is what words do not mean. For example: An interesting thing about I shouldn't is that it does not necessarily mean I don't want to. An interesting thing about I don't think it's a good idea is that it does not necessarily mean This will never be a good idea.

He still feels the ghost of Carlos' fingers on his jaw, and knows when next he looks into a mirror his hair will be mussed on one side where Carlos' hand ran through it. He is not going to argue with Carlos about the meaning of his words now, because the fact that Carlos does not want to come back with him is enough. But he is going to wonder about the meaning later, he thinks, when he is alone again; he is going to spend a long time turning Carlos' words over in his mind.

Even as he feels disappointment fall like a heaviness in his limbs (somehow a downward sensation despite the fact that emotions do not respond to the earth's gravitational pull), Cecil concedes the discussion with a slow nod, and sits back.

"Right," he says. "Of course."

He hesitates, and then a smile pulls at the corners of his mouth. It is one he put there, and not one that came as a result of any real happiness on his part. It does not look anything like the smile that he wore a few minutes ago, when Carlos pulled back to look at him.

"Wow," he says. Brighter, and louder. "What a great party! I don't think I've enjoyed myself so much since the fifth Arena Crowning-- though, admittedly, my memory of the fifth Arena Crowning is not a vivid one, and has mostly been replaced in my subconscious mind with a probably-fictional series of events, because the power to persuade oneself to remember a more interesting life than one actually has is an important part of being human."

He is not really looking at Carlos while he says this, but in a direction that is sort of over Carlos' shoulder. The intent is clear: It might be better if this night is not allowed to become, or even to appear to be, a vivid memory for either of them.

Cecil's words wash over him, as they do, sometimes -- sometimes, Cecil just says so much, and there is so much on his mind already, that there's not room for everything Cecil has to say. There is certainly a lot on his mind right now, like how it's easier to pull away now than it was thirty seconds ago. It's easier to stand, and remember where he is, and to decide firmly that going home with Cecil is such a supermassively bad idea that it is completely out of the question.

"Yeah," is all he can really say, and the upward movement of the corners of his mouth is almost, almost convincing. "I'll get a ride back to the Tribute Center myself. You'll make it home okay, right?" Because Cecil has been drinking.

"Of course I will." Cecil makes a dismissive hand gesture, one that says I have been drinking at Capitol parties longer than you have, Carlos, and I am the sole arbiter of where I will wake up tomorrow, whether I know it now or not.

He stands as well, and wavers only a little bit. He makes a token attempt at putting his hair back in order, but must accept that this is not going to happen. He glances down at his communicator, and pulls up the contact number for the taxi service he normally uses after hours.

"...I'll see you soon, Carlos," he says, glancing up. And he should lean in for a good-bye kiss. He really should. This is what he would do in any other situation, any other prolonged social contact between them.

...but tonight, he finds that he can't. He leans in, as though he means to-- and then he only looks down at Carlos' hand, and takes it, and squeezes it briefly, as though that was what he'd intended to do the whole time.

"Good night," he says, and that's it, that's really it-- he will duck his head to look at his communicator, and call for a car as he moves away.

The squeeze back is reflexive; there's no thought in it. Carlos's thought is busy elsewhere, in a whirling mess of what-ifs and look-normals and did-I-make-the-right-call-heres.

He thinks he did, but he'll pick it over in his brain more later.

"Good night," he calls back, quietly.

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Today's log brought to you by the letter "C!" C, as in Closed!

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ZOOMS THROUGH ANOTHER TRANSITION

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cool to end it here if you are!

yep totes!