When Ariadne says no, there is the force of hurricanes behind it. Arthur studies the floor, shame hot beneath his crisp collar as he waits in the eye of her storm. Her eyes are incredulous in ways they haven't been in two years. He can't calculate if it's because he arrived at her home unannounced or because Dom had the gall to send for her this way. "Why not speak for yourself, John?" He presses his lips together between his teeth.
"Do you have any idea how much therapy I've had to pay for after everything we went through?" she asks, pointing out, out to the bright, frigid November sky. "How many nights I've spent fighting off my subconscious? It knows how to kill me now!" Her voice strains like a tightrope as her words gallop across. "I taught it how to kill me."
Arthur raises himself from where he'd slumped in her sparse apartment.
"He thinks you're wasting yourself at the Sorbonne," he says low. It's lower than an insult. It's a miscalculation of the very fabric of her being.
Ariadne's expression reflects the absurd with a sharp clarity that makes him blush to even be the messenger, her hand frozen beside a vase of white gladiolus.
"Do you have any idea how hard—!" she can't even finish, her rage having reached it's peak.
She shakes her head, her red shawl shifting around her shoulders. He realizes he is gazing at her, her golden highlighted brown hair exposing his Achilles. He quickly bends to examine a scuff to his right shoe.
"Listen, Arthur," she says finally, taking in her living room as she walks closer to him. Satisfied with the feng shui, she stops in front of him, posture open, resolute. "I can't do this. As much as I love the ego trip that is working with the dream state, I can't afford – emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, financially – to let Cobb walk around in my brain again."
Arthur nods as she lists the things she wants to protect.
"You still see her, don't you," he deducts tacitly.
The way her eyes rush back to his tells him everything he needs to know.
"Last week," she affirms how recent. She touches her stomach and her wrist shakes. Her watch is gold. "Dom may have let her go, but I don't think she's having it. Miles says it doesn't work that way, but it's getting harder to believe him."
He understands.
"She's a hard shape to shake," Arthur offers.
Ariadne's hand still rests on her abdomen.
"She was intoxicating," she practically whispers.
A nearby church bell rings out 3:30 and Arthur shifts to don his overcoat.
"Listen, if you ever need any substance assistance, you know how to get in touch with me," he says, tilting his head toward the understated white card he left on her end table.
Her door is already open, and she offers only a shrug, eyes becoming absent. On impulse, he leans into her space and kisses her cheek, his hands complacent in his coat pockets.
"Thanks for letting me up," he says, smiling.
She rubs his arm.
"Thanks for letting me go." She lifts a brow, her grin wry, momentarily returning to the bold Ariadne he remembers in hails of gunfire.
On the way back to his vehicle, he calls Dom on a burner. Predictably, it goes to voicemail. Message delivered, he crushes the cell under his heel, and merges with the shadows in the parking garage.
