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Chapter 4: Cats Always Land on Their Feet

Cat watched Spike eat ravenously. When he was through, she waited to see if he wanted more. He sat there, gazing at her, then lit a cigarette.

            "What?" She asked after he stared at her for a while.

            "Nothing," he replied casually. "Nothing at all."

            "Then why are you looking at me?"

            "I was trying to figure out if you have an ulterior motive to being here."

            "Ulterior like how? What would I possibly want from you?"

            "That's what I'm trying to figure out." Cat sighed and waved the waiter over.

            "Are you finished?" she asked Spike. He nodded and took a swig of his drink. "Check please." The waiter bowed then hurried off. A second later, their bill came up on the screen on the table. Cat raised an eyebrow with what she saw. 150 woolongs for lunch. She was going to spend all her savings on this man she hardly knew. First, that thousand his partner took, now this. Without a word, Cat scanned her card and the bill was paid.

            "How much?"

            "Why do you care?" He shrugged. "I hope you enjoyed it."

            "I did. Many thanks." Had it been anyone else, she would have been furious, but Cat found it hard to be mad at someone so calm. It seemed like a pointless act. It made more sense to get angry with someone who would actually react.

            Spike stood up and ambled out of the restaurant with Cat by his side. He smoked his cigarette as though he hadn't a care in the world, slowly and deliberately. Cat glanced at him out of the corner of her eye every so often, wondering what he was going to do next. She felt as though she had to be on her toes with him.

            "Cat," he muttered. "That's your name right?"

            "Yes."

            "How'd you ever get a name like that?"

            "How did you ever get a name like Spike?"

            "Are you going to take everything I ask you and turn it into your own question?" He snapped lightly. Cat hesitated. She hadn't realized that she was doing that. Thinking back to earlier conversations, she understood what he meant.

            "No, it's just that you ask questions that you could answer about yourself."

            "You don't answer mine."

            "Sorry," she said, voice dripping with sarcasm. "I'll try harder to answer your questions. My real name is Catalina. Cat is obviously just an nickname."

            "Catalina, huh?"

            "That's right."

            "I like it." This caught Cat off guard. She expected some biting comment that counteracted her sarcastic manner. When she looked at him, he simply smirked and took a drag from his stick of cancer in a box. It aggravated her to see him smoking. She could almost visualize the years being taken off of his life. Out of pure impulse, she snatched the cigarette from between his fingers and tossed it on the ground, stepping on it as she walked.

            Spike laughed. "If you wanted one, you could have just asked."

            "That's gonna kill you," she snapped.

            "I doubt it." Spike reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out another package with a grin. Cat sighed, shaking her head. "So where's this party heading?"

            "I don't know."

            They walked toward the ocean, ambling along the boardwalk until Cat stopped and stared out at the water. It was beautiful, she always found Mars to be that way. It was a little piece of paradise in the middle of a chaotic universe. Spike paced back and forth behind her, then finally he joined her, gazing distractedly at the rolling waves. They stood side by side in silence, neither knowing what to say next.

            "She was unattainable," Spike said suddenly, keeping his focus on the sea. Cat broke her hypnotized stare in order to look at him, possibly to read his unreadable face. For once, she actually wanted to look into his unusual eyes.

            "What?"

            "Julia. That's what made me need her more, the fact that I couldn't have her. She was like every other girl in every way except that she had an air about her that suggested that there had to be more. Like she was hiding something she was dying for you to find out. I felt like she knew things that I wanted to know, saw things I wanted to see, said things she wanted me to hear. All of that made her better, made everything about her better. Her voice was music to me. With every glance, I got lost in her blue eyes. And her hair," Spike gently touched a lock of Cat's long dark hair. "Pure gold. She's not perfect, never was, but with her, I longed to be. She made me want to be a different person, while at the same time accepting me for who I was. I understood what it felt like to be complete." Cat let his words sink in. She had her answer, yet she didn't know what to make of this new information.

As Spike looked sadly out at the water, Cat realized that he and Julia were perfect for each other. Alone, they were lost souls, living in dreams, dreaming to live, not knowing the difference between either one. Together, they were whole and reality made sense. Being alive for one meant nothing without the other. Cat was aware of all of this, yet she felt a sense of disappointment from his answer. She couldn't explain why she was let down, or what exactly she was expecting him to say. Maybe it was the fact that the answer was so typical, so commonplace, that it didn't seem to fit with neither Spike nor Julia's personalities. They were rebels. They stepped on the wrong side of the law countless times. However, when it came to love, they fit the mold flawlessly.

            Cat slowly turned away from the view. Spike's eyes drifted to meet hers. They locked gazes, her gray met his scarlet, and she could almost feel his sadness.

            "Are you leaving?" he asked casually. Cat nodded.

            "I found what I was looking for and got what I wanted." Spike didn't respond. He took a long drag from his cigarette, thinking thoughts that Cat believed to be beyond her knowledge. He too, turned away from the ocean.

            "It's like living in a dream I'll never wake up from," he muttered.

            "Who says you have to wake up?" Cat replied. Spike looked at her, as though that simple statement was the most profound thing he ever heard; maybe for him it was, and Cat was glad she said it.

            "I guess no one."

            Cat gave him a small smile then she started to walk away. A thought crossed her mind and she stopped.

            "She said she wanted to live again. She said she needed to find out if life was worth living anymore," Cat said, glancing back at Spike. His face was blank. "She's looking for you, Spike." He didn't say anything for a moment, then he laughed softly.

            "If that's the case, she'll find me. She always did."

            "I hope so." Cat left him standing there, staring out at the water on his home planet, thinking about Julia. She vaguely wondered if she would ever see him again and found herself praying that she did. She wasn't sure if only one meeting with the mismatched eyes was enough.

******

Whew, I wanted to get this one out, it's my favorite chapter in the whole story. Pardon the mistakes is there are any, I was a bit on the rushed side.

Plutonian