Chapter two - my crap attempt at humour. xD Enjoy! Thank you to SuicidalBeyblader and Lamanth for reviewing!
Love
"I really don't get it, Kai." Tala took another long gulp of whiskey and waved his hands around in an expressive gesture that nearly toppled him off his chair. Kai watched him solemnly as he grabbed for the table edge
"Get what?" he asked at last. Tala stifled a yawn behind one hand before continuing,
"I don't get what you see in her. I mean, she's good-looking enough, I suppose, but …" He shrugged.
"You'd never've dared ask me that if I could stand up."
They burst out laughing, stopping only when tears came to their eyes and the already precarious world threatened to upend itself totally.
"I still don't get it." Tala prompted mulishly. "Why her?"
"Why not her?" Kai countered, absurdly proud of his speedy reply that left Tala fumbling for coherence.
"Because she's a bit … well … pathetic." Tala didn't quite dare to look at Kai, who simply said,
"Is she? Not to me." Kai stared at his empty glass and the misery that the sight produced made him wax philosophical. "It all depends, doesn't it? Beauty's in the eye of the beholder and all that. How I see Salima … different from how you see her. I could say things about Julia you wouldn't like, too. And I'd be telling the truth – or," he added quickly as Tala scowled, "my interpretation of the truth. My truth, yeah? So, I have my truth, that being that Sal's mine, and she's great and … stuff. And you have your truth, that she's … whatever you said."
"Pathetic?" Tala offered, with the foolhardy air of someone who'd escaped mere seconds before putting their head back into the lion's mouth. Kai nodded and yawned loudly.
"That." They sat in silence for another round. Still curious, Tala wondered hazily how much he could get away with asking.
"Do you love her?" He rested his head on his folded arms and looked blearily at his friend, who was ordering another round with a fair approximation of sobriety. When Kai didn't answer, his attention drifted and he followed people around the room with his eyes and wished for Julia. Eventually, he blinked several times, remembering his last question, and attempted to flick a packet of salt at Kai.
Not only did he miss Kai, he missed the salt. Damn.
"Kai?"
"Mm?" Kai replied, struggling to lift his full glass.
Deaf bastard. "Do you love her?"
"Who?"
"Salima!" Tala almost shouted.
"Seema?" Kai mocked Tala's slur with a grin. "Don't know a Seema."
"Kai!"
"Uh?"
"Do you love her?"
"Prob'ly."
As much as Tala tried, he could get no other answer out of Kai; in fact, no other words other than something that sounded vaguely like; "I'm so drunk, Tala," just before he gave up on defying gravity and curled up happily on the wooden floor, dark hair askew, deaf to Tala's hysterical laughter and the flashes as people took pictures.
You've never refused to answer me before, Kai, Tala thought as his head dropped again to his folded arms and his eyes slid shut.
(rants about how she can't write people who are drunk)
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