FM June prompt: Art
It's just one of the questions they ask to get to know each other, father and daughter, complete strangers, in those days of travel that lead them first to China, then Siena.
"What's your favourite art?" Nadia asks. "Music? Painting? Sculpture? Dancing?"
Arvin looks at her, and wonders what she would want to hear. He's keenly aware that whoever she imagined her father to be during those years in Argentina, whatever she imagined him to be like, there was almost certainly no trait he would share with this fictional portrait. Of course, he could pretend to. That was, after all, their profession. His and hers both. If he could deduce what image she had in mind, he could create a persona to fit it, just for her. It wouldn't be the first time.
"Performance," he replies, and the rueful smile she gives him tells him she understands the joke. Perhaps they can continue like this; shared truths in the guise of jests.
Being someone else to get what they want: it's not the only thing they are both trained in. But he is very careful to think of the other art. It's the past; what done is done. He won't allow it to touch her again.
But it is true, nonetheless, that he always excelled at the art of killing.
"What's your favourite art?" Nadia asks. "Music? Painting? Sculpture? Dancing?"
Arvin looks at her, and wonders what she would want to hear. He's keenly aware that whoever she imagined her father to be during those years in Argentina, whatever she imagined him to be like, there was almost certainly no trait he would share with this fictional portrait. Of course, he could pretend to. That was, after all, their profession. His and hers both. If he could deduce what image she had in mind, he could create a persona to fit it, just for her. It wouldn't be the first time.
"Performance," he replies, and the rueful smile she gives him tells him she understands the joke. Perhaps they can continue like this; shared truths in the guise of jests.
Being someone else to get what they want: it's not the only thing they are both trained in. But he is very careful to think of the other art. It's the past; what done is done. He won't allow it to touch her again.
But it is true, nonetheless, that he always excelled at the art of killing.