Descent Into Vice
Otherwise known as the silly thing that birthed Julian Isaias in all his glory. Also, Nathan and Richter. But most importantly Julian.
I had written this way back in 2003 and to date it's one of my favorites. I don't know if I'll be able to finish this but at least enjoy the amounts of snark and the idiocy Richter displays at wanting to be Elitist.
===
The café was, to put into simple terms, terrible. Simple words, no matter how convenient, were not sufficient enough to use. The air was unpleasantly saturated with cigarette smoke, the dim lighting was sickening, the saxophonist was out of practice and the few individuals who had come in were bored. That was saying nothing of the food but when an atmosphere most unsavory was given, the food could go to hell.
Perhaps the most occupied table was the one in the farthest corner, where the light was the dimmest. It accommodated three young men, sitting in silence and averting each other’s eyes. No matter how one would look them over, they remained so different from each other so much so that it was far more simpler to believe that they were compelled to sit down together in fear of a horrible secret revealed.
One of them had his chair turned about so that he could use the back of it to rest his folded arms, slumping so that he covered the lower part of his face, leaving only his gray eyes revealed but even those were half-hidden behind wild chestnut hair falling in waves around his face and over his collar.
There was one who was seated across him, dressed in a designer suit, ironed crisply and to perfection. Dark auburn hair complemented blue eyes and a fair complexion, adding more to his stern face form. One arm pulled back and crooked, the hand of the other drumming the tabletop, he was the image of impatience, especially when his thin high brows were furrowed in a frown.
As tense as the two appeared, the third was languid. He was leaning father back from the light and therefore into the shadows, legs crossed, a hand folded across his stomach and the other stirring his untouched cappuccino with a spoon even if the sugar had long ago dissolved. Black became him, accentuated only with hints of silver in his chain bracelet, his choker and in mismatched earrings, a cross on his left and a rectangular one on his right, light bouncing off polished surfaces just like how it sang off the lens and frame of his glasses.
The silence was stretching on, congealing and threatening to choke the three of them. When the bell over the front door chimed someone’s entrance, they decided that was impetus enough.
The brunet started first, carefully chosen words intoned a bit too sharply. “Simply marvelous this place is.” He fixed stormy gray eyes warily on the auburn haired one, narrowing slightly. “Whatever made you pick it?”
The monotonous thrum halted abruptly for the icy reply. “The atmosphere, I’d like to think but if it doesn’t appease you, good sir, then I suggest you leave.”
“And do what? Die of ennui?” The more he spoke, the more his voice heated, sharpened and became brutal. “I’ve cancelled all my appointments for this-how did you call it again?-’dire tryst’?”
Fingers were curled into a fist and was brought down hard on the table. “I did not beg you to come, Nathan! You could have declined.”
“Oh do act your ages.” The spoon made a rather irritating sound when it was tapped against the rim of the cappuccino cup but it was quickly put down on the edge of the saucer underneath. The third one who hadn’t spoken a word until then sighed, shifting a bit to cross his arms. “Shouldn’t we get down to business, dear gentlemen, before I myself die of ennui? If you must know, your bickering isn’t any entertaining.”
It took a long moment for gray and blue eye to meet, to agree on a silent truce but neither had any plans on keeping it that way. A few seconds were let to pass to let the issue settle.
The man who was to blame for the horrid choice of rendezvous point cleared his throat. “I’ve called you here, gentlemen, for a long overdue reunion of Sub Rosa.”
The one in the shadows snorted.
The gray eyed brunet cocked a brow, grimacing in what seemed best to be described as disgust. “Reunion?” The word was drawn out, as if it was a new addition to his vocabulary.
“Yes,” answered the auburn haired one, “a reunion.”
“Of all the things, a reunion!”
“You make it seem as if it were so dreadful-”
The truce disintegrated into dust. “I should say so, Richter! A reunion on one of the busiest months yet-”
“I don’t need to hear your bloody whining.”
“Oh you’ll listen all right-”
“Eugents.” This second intervention from the silent one was less patient. Each syllable was enunciated firmly, to exercise a certain level of authority over the two. “If you must continue then do so in the men’s room; I do not want to be part of this lover’s quarrel nor do I wish to bear witness to it.”
“For god’s sake.” It had been subdued to a whisper, even if the auburn haired man’s face was drawn taut in frustration. “The two of you, Nathan, Julian, I can’t believe this. Sub Rosa has been apart for five years.”
The brunet named Nathan would have retorted but the half hidden one leaned forward, against the table and bringing his face into the light. He was just as different, hair and eyes the color of pitch black while his skin was purely alabaster white. His voice, as low as it had been since he started speaking, was autocrative. “I hardly think it’s a reunion; Sub Rosa has four Eugents, there are only three.”
Richter flinched, hand reaching up to smooth a lock of auburn hair back an dout of his line of vision. “It was impossible-”
“Impossible, mm? To contact Vincent Louis Armarie?”
“Mister Armarie seemed to remain indisposed so I-”
Raven haired Julian snorted, opal eyes narrowing into a glare. “A man can only grieve forever, Prince Skeptic.” Met with a look of confusion, Julian continued, “Our Stained Gospel is up and about, even indulging himself in some rather costly trips to the Philippines.”
Nathan tossed back his hair, resting his chin on an up drawn hand. “Lucky bastard. But you know Rick, Cynic, he hates ‘im.”
Julian sneered. “I thought so. Such a pity.” He began to stand. “My presence is useless here.”
“What-what makes you think so?” Richter’s hand hovered in the air, as if he wanted to grasp Julian by the wrist, to keep him from going. “Cynic, won’t you stay? What wrong I’ve done against you, allow me to make up for it.”
“I don’t think you possibly could, Richter, not unless you could reach Vincent right now, apologize and invite him to join us.”
The grace which Richter had been carrying himself with all along faltered and the impatience in his features became anguish. “Jules…I…” His brows were furrowed first in desperation then in determination, steeling himself, most obviously. “You know as well as I do that Sub Rosa is simply made up of just the three of us. Stained Gospel --Vincent-- he is not a Eugent through and through.”
Nathan raised his eyebrows in a bit of surprise. One couldn’t tell if it was over the truth revealed or in the manner Richter chose.
“Oh?” Julian’s Greek accent was thick, as if it was made into vintage wine. “Then I’d like to presume you have an explanation for this? What makes our beloved Vincent so different? As to what makes us better?”
More of Richter’s composure crumbled and the hand he’d been reaching out to Julian with curled into a fist, dropping heavily at his’s side. Richter’s eyes were narrowed, glimmering with something --too indiscernible in the dim lighting and smoke-- and his lips parted as if to say something, to give voice to the maelstrom raging within. It seemed to be with great effort that he lifted his hand to run it through his hair.
Nathan and Julian had seen it more than once, Richter’s helplessness, so well backed up against a wall. But even if they could only count on their hands the number of times such a thing happened, they remembered well enough his manner of recovery.
It started with that, smoothing his already slicked back hair-- Nathan had a theory once, why he did that, something about childhood habit but Julian ignored him-- before he would lean further back into his chair, assuming an air of arrogant power, crossing his legs and raising his chin up by a fraction. He could have passed off as a modern Ramses the Great.
When Richter spoke, his tone matched the tautness of his face and the frank cruelty underneath. “Sit down, Mister Isaias, it’s most impolite to be standing so.”
Julian’s lips were pressed together to imprison a cutting remark as he obeyed but as he assumed his previous position of languidness, one could swear his lips moving into a slow wicked smirk.
Nathan sighed, righting himself back into something a bit more proper before Richter would decide to turn on his as well.
“It’s perfectly and painfully clear,” Richter said, as if the long recuperating pause never occurred, as if he had never faltered. “We three are graduates of Oxford, beyond a doubt, but what of Vincent? A young Parisian with brilliance of his own, yes, but not of our standard.”
“He’s a startlingly brilliant boy in his own university,” Julian said, “What does it matter that he’s not from Oxford?”
“Sub Rosa began in Oxford.”
Nathan cocked a brow, sneering a bit. “Must it end with Oxford?”
“Why ever not?” Richter brought out a cigarette case, flipped the top open and offered it to his circle. Nathan needed no pressing nor did he offer any thanks; Julian began to decline but given a thoughtful pause took one gingerly. Richter offered a light an then began savoring the smoke, looking over the café, a bit too full of himself. “Far pricier than what thus lot chooses.”
Julian took a long slow drag, eyes distant and fixed on the light shimmering in the cappuccino he still refused to touch. Exhaling in a sigh, he peered at the auburn haired man through his glasses. “Am I wrong to assume that you are intimidated by him? That his age is a factor to your rather fierce-if not repulsive-dislike of him?”
Richter considered this. “How many years? The age differences?”
Nathan shrugged. “A good four years.”
“And how long ago was it?”
“Good Lord, Rick, you’re acting as if you were so old-”
Julian, intervening: “It was before we graduated.”
“Five years ago then, thank you, Jules.” It was a bit of a mistake on Richter’s part. Simple mathematics told him thus: If the Eugents were all twenty four-so close were their birthdays-a four year gap would make Vincent either twenty or twenty one, what, with Nathan’s birthday so near. And if Vincent had joined Sub Rosa four years ago. Why, he’d be only-- “Don’t be preposterous!”
Careless shrug. “As if I had done anything to be claimed as such.” Glasses gleaming as they were adjusted. “I am right, aren’t I? That is why you hate him so?”
Richter muttered it again. “Don’t be preposterous.” He didn’t look so cross, merely impatient. “And must we dwell on him? I called a reunion, not a funereal reception.”
“Then get one with it!” Nathan was fast becoming impatient as well. “I don’t really see the point of this. Couldn’t a call be sufficient enough? An e-mail, all the better!”
Julian stared straight at Nathan, no humor in his face at all. “Shut up, Milord.”
Nathan obeyed, spite filled eyes glaring at the table.
Richter cleared his throat for the second time. “Yes, well, as I was supposed to say, our reunion, gentlemen, transcends merely being a gathering of old estranged friends to share good times. The reunion of Sub Rosa should redefine it, just as we’ve redefined all other mundane occasions.” He ignored the rolling of gray eyes. “It’s a gathering, yes, but not to give way to revelry. But to learn from the tragedies we’ve endured over our years of separation.”
The cigarette moved in between Nathan’s lips as he sneered, somewhat reminiscent of the mafia.
Julian was thoughtful, breathing in the smoke languidly. In the light, when he was so pensive, he looked kind. Putting out the cigarette on the provided ashtray, he murmured, “You speak as if you were in the wrong art.”
“But you understand?”
The raven-haired man smiled wryly, but his eyes were distant again for all the alertness in them. “How could anyone? But--” he lifted his eyebrows just as Richter began to protest, “--I do. For all the bad poetry in you, I do.” That certain dreaminess in him vanished completely and this time some hint of intellectual menace danced on his face. “It’s nothing so original, friends meeting to discuss losses. You didn’t need five years for such a fancy, dearest Prince.”
Amusing how they cast years of friendship to the winds for their roles as intellectuals, forgetting their delicacy and tact for their Eugent’s brutal honesty.
Lord Passive --Nathan-- spoke without a moment’s fear of a cutting remark. “What possible tragedies could we have? No family matters, I presume?”
“Certainly not!” Prince Skeptic was quite indignant. “I want things that concern the soul and mind.”
“As in decisions?”
“Oh but decisions are full of influence.”
“What then?”
“Perhaps confessions of the dreadfully sinful sort?” Blue eyes fell on the bit of gleaming silver cross dangling from the Winter Cynic’s ear.
A hand rose, as if to cover it. “You allude to the Seven Deadly Sins?”
“Yes,” Prince skeptic gestured, turning his hand out by the wrist, palm upward several times as if it aided his search for the right word. “Vices!” Let us talk of vices.”
“You speak so carelessly.” Lord Passive held up his cigarette. “This is a vice in itself.”
“Oh my dearest Lord Passive, can you not be an idiot?”
The cigarette was ground tip first into the table. “Only if you wouldn’t lead me.”
“I speak of true vices.” Prince Skeptic growled lowly. “Vices which hold a man’s soul on puppet strings. Things you simply cannot live without, things that hold your sanity.”
“Or whatever pieces are left of it.” The Winter Cynic turned his wrist towards him and frowned at the silver watched. He reached into his pocket, took out a cell phone and began pressing on the keypad. He spoke slowly, distracted. “You think we are all slaves to our vices, Prince?”
The auburn haired man nodded. “No man is free from it. Don’t contradict the truth; none are spared.”
The silence which was given for a counterattack was full of soft clicking sounds. Pause. The faint rumble of the cell phone vibrating. Click, click. A small smile graced the Cynic’s lips. Click, click. He returned it to his pocket. “Akin to that saying? ‘We all have our own bit of neurosis’?”
Thin brows lifted. “Is there really such a saying?” A thoughtful pause. “Well, I suppose so.”
“The addicts to their addictions.” Lord Passive was catching on, throwing back his chestnut hair from his shoulders. “Well, then. Who goes first, eh?”
Another pause. Opal and gray eyes met and turned to blue, which narrowed.
“Oh for the love of God…” Prince Skeptic sighed, shaking his head. “As if you were children-”
“Enough of your complaints.” The Winter Cynic raised a finger to his lips as if to indicate for complete silence instead of cooperation. “If you so want us here, speak.”
Another sigh. “All right…” A hand smoothing hair. “I think the Commandments say it, whichever order they came in, can’t remember for the life of me. Thou hall not commit adultery and Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife…”
“The Deadly Sin of Lust? Is that all?” Lord Passive smirked, just a bit disgusted with the simplicity of the vice.
“No, you dimwit. You slaughter dramatic pauses artlessly. Let me go on before you murder the evening further.” Ignoring the good Lord’s seething, Prince Skeptic continued. “It’s no surprise, yes, that men are enslaved by carnal pleasure. But I’d like to think that mine goes beyond that.”
“How so?”
Prince Skeptic tilted his head to the side, thoughtful. “Would you believe that I have not picked up a brush, much less prepared a canvass in a whole year?”
A void-like silence. The Winter Cynic raised his eyebrows; Lord Passive blinked.
“My art might as well slip from me, gentlemen. It is beginning to dawn on me that I am a rather splendid liar and a completely devilish individual.” No air of presumption; he was being poetically frank. “I should think that it is no difficult task for me, walking up to a woman, flashing a smile and seducing her. I just pull it off quite well, even if I don’t have your good looks, Cynic.”
The Winter Cynic ignored the would-be compliment. “So it’s a powerful distraction then? Your enslavement to sex with, shall I presume, random women?”
Prince Skeptic shook his head. “Not so random, sir. I choose who I want and they must be beautiful. You know the type, utterly ravishing and unsurpassingly charming.”
===
I had written this way back in 2003 and to date it's one of my favorites. I don't know if I'll be able to finish this but at least enjoy the amounts of snark and the idiocy Richter displays at wanting to be Elitist.
===
The café was, to put into simple terms, terrible. Simple words, no matter how convenient, were not sufficient enough to use. The air was unpleasantly saturated with cigarette smoke, the dim lighting was sickening, the saxophonist was out of practice and the few individuals who had come in were bored. That was saying nothing of the food but when an atmosphere most unsavory was given, the food could go to hell.
Perhaps the most occupied table was the one in the farthest corner, where the light was the dimmest. It accommodated three young men, sitting in silence and averting each other’s eyes. No matter how one would look them over, they remained so different from each other so much so that it was far more simpler to believe that they were compelled to sit down together in fear of a horrible secret revealed.
One of them had his chair turned about so that he could use the back of it to rest his folded arms, slumping so that he covered the lower part of his face, leaving only his gray eyes revealed but even those were half-hidden behind wild chestnut hair falling in waves around his face and over his collar.
There was one who was seated across him, dressed in a designer suit, ironed crisply and to perfection. Dark auburn hair complemented blue eyes and a fair complexion, adding more to his stern face form. One arm pulled back and crooked, the hand of the other drumming the tabletop, he was the image of impatience, especially when his thin high brows were furrowed in a frown.
As tense as the two appeared, the third was languid. He was leaning father back from the light and therefore into the shadows, legs crossed, a hand folded across his stomach and the other stirring his untouched cappuccino with a spoon even if the sugar had long ago dissolved. Black became him, accentuated only with hints of silver in his chain bracelet, his choker and in mismatched earrings, a cross on his left and a rectangular one on his right, light bouncing off polished surfaces just like how it sang off the lens and frame of his glasses.
The silence was stretching on, congealing and threatening to choke the three of them. When the bell over the front door chimed someone’s entrance, they decided that was impetus enough.
The brunet started first, carefully chosen words intoned a bit too sharply. “Simply marvelous this place is.” He fixed stormy gray eyes warily on the auburn haired one, narrowing slightly. “Whatever made you pick it?”
The monotonous thrum halted abruptly for the icy reply. “The atmosphere, I’d like to think but if it doesn’t appease you, good sir, then I suggest you leave.”
“And do what? Die of ennui?” The more he spoke, the more his voice heated, sharpened and became brutal. “I’ve cancelled all my appointments for this-how did you call it again?-’dire tryst’?”
Fingers were curled into a fist and was brought down hard on the table. “I did not beg you to come, Nathan! You could have declined.”
“Oh do act your ages.” The spoon made a rather irritating sound when it was tapped against the rim of the cappuccino cup but it was quickly put down on the edge of the saucer underneath. The third one who hadn’t spoken a word until then sighed, shifting a bit to cross his arms. “Shouldn’t we get down to business, dear gentlemen, before I myself die of ennui? If you must know, your bickering isn’t any entertaining.”
It took a long moment for gray and blue eye to meet, to agree on a silent truce but neither had any plans on keeping it that way. A few seconds were let to pass to let the issue settle.
The man who was to blame for the horrid choice of rendezvous point cleared his throat. “I’ve called you here, gentlemen, for a long overdue reunion of Sub Rosa.”
The one in the shadows snorted.
The gray eyed brunet cocked a brow, grimacing in what seemed best to be described as disgust. “Reunion?” The word was drawn out, as if it was a new addition to his vocabulary.
“Yes,” answered the auburn haired one, “a reunion.”
“Of all the things, a reunion!”
“You make it seem as if it were so dreadful-”
The truce disintegrated into dust. “I should say so, Richter! A reunion on one of the busiest months yet-”
“I don’t need to hear your bloody whining.”
“Oh you’ll listen all right-”
“Eugents.” This second intervention from the silent one was less patient. Each syllable was enunciated firmly, to exercise a certain level of authority over the two. “If you must continue then do so in the men’s room; I do not want to be part of this lover’s quarrel nor do I wish to bear witness to it.”
“For god’s sake.” It had been subdued to a whisper, even if the auburn haired man’s face was drawn taut in frustration. “The two of you, Nathan, Julian, I can’t believe this. Sub Rosa has been apart for five years.”
The brunet named Nathan would have retorted but the half hidden one leaned forward, against the table and bringing his face into the light. He was just as different, hair and eyes the color of pitch black while his skin was purely alabaster white. His voice, as low as it had been since he started speaking, was autocrative. “I hardly think it’s a reunion; Sub Rosa has four Eugents, there are only three.”
Richter flinched, hand reaching up to smooth a lock of auburn hair back an dout of his line of vision. “It was impossible-”
“Impossible, mm? To contact Vincent Louis Armarie?”
“Mister Armarie seemed to remain indisposed so I-”
Raven haired Julian snorted, opal eyes narrowing into a glare. “A man can only grieve forever, Prince Skeptic.” Met with a look of confusion, Julian continued, “Our Stained Gospel is up and about, even indulging himself in some rather costly trips to the Philippines.”
Nathan tossed back his hair, resting his chin on an up drawn hand. “Lucky bastard. But you know Rick, Cynic, he hates ‘im.”
Julian sneered. “I thought so. Such a pity.” He began to stand. “My presence is useless here.”
“What-what makes you think so?” Richter’s hand hovered in the air, as if he wanted to grasp Julian by the wrist, to keep him from going. “Cynic, won’t you stay? What wrong I’ve done against you, allow me to make up for it.”
“I don’t think you possibly could, Richter, not unless you could reach Vincent right now, apologize and invite him to join us.”
The grace which Richter had been carrying himself with all along faltered and the impatience in his features became anguish. “Jules…I…” His brows were furrowed first in desperation then in determination, steeling himself, most obviously. “You know as well as I do that Sub Rosa is simply made up of just the three of us. Stained Gospel --Vincent-- he is not a Eugent through and through.”
Nathan raised his eyebrows in a bit of surprise. One couldn’t tell if it was over the truth revealed or in the manner Richter chose.
“Oh?” Julian’s Greek accent was thick, as if it was made into vintage wine. “Then I’d like to presume you have an explanation for this? What makes our beloved Vincent so different? As to what makes us better?”
More of Richter’s composure crumbled and the hand he’d been reaching out to Julian with curled into a fist, dropping heavily at his’s side. Richter’s eyes were narrowed, glimmering with something --too indiscernible in the dim lighting and smoke-- and his lips parted as if to say something, to give voice to the maelstrom raging within. It seemed to be with great effort that he lifted his hand to run it through his hair.
Nathan and Julian had seen it more than once, Richter’s helplessness, so well backed up against a wall. But even if they could only count on their hands the number of times such a thing happened, they remembered well enough his manner of recovery.
It started with that, smoothing his already slicked back hair-- Nathan had a theory once, why he did that, something about childhood habit but Julian ignored him-- before he would lean further back into his chair, assuming an air of arrogant power, crossing his legs and raising his chin up by a fraction. He could have passed off as a modern Ramses the Great.
When Richter spoke, his tone matched the tautness of his face and the frank cruelty underneath. “Sit down, Mister Isaias, it’s most impolite to be standing so.”
Julian’s lips were pressed together to imprison a cutting remark as he obeyed but as he assumed his previous position of languidness, one could swear his lips moving into a slow wicked smirk.
Nathan sighed, righting himself back into something a bit more proper before Richter would decide to turn on his as well.
“It’s perfectly and painfully clear,” Richter said, as if the long recuperating pause never occurred, as if he had never faltered. “We three are graduates of Oxford, beyond a doubt, but what of Vincent? A young Parisian with brilliance of his own, yes, but not of our standard.”
“He’s a startlingly brilliant boy in his own university,” Julian said, “What does it matter that he’s not from Oxford?”
“Sub Rosa began in Oxford.”
Nathan cocked a brow, sneering a bit. “Must it end with Oxford?”
“Why ever not?” Richter brought out a cigarette case, flipped the top open and offered it to his circle. Nathan needed no pressing nor did he offer any thanks; Julian began to decline but given a thoughtful pause took one gingerly. Richter offered a light an then began savoring the smoke, looking over the café, a bit too full of himself. “Far pricier than what thus lot chooses.”
Julian took a long slow drag, eyes distant and fixed on the light shimmering in the cappuccino he still refused to touch. Exhaling in a sigh, he peered at the auburn haired man through his glasses. “Am I wrong to assume that you are intimidated by him? That his age is a factor to your rather fierce-if not repulsive-dislike of him?”
Richter considered this. “How many years? The age differences?”
Nathan shrugged. “A good four years.”
“And how long ago was it?”
“Good Lord, Rick, you’re acting as if you were so old-”
Julian, intervening: “It was before we graduated.”
“Five years ago then, thank you, Jules.” It was a bit of a mistake on Richter’s part. Simple mathematics told him thus: If the Eugents were all twenty four-so close were their birthdays-a four year gap would make Vincent either twenty or twenty one, what, with Nathan’s birthday so near. And if Vincent had joined Sub Rosa four years ago. Why, he’d be only-- “Don’t be preposterous!”
Careless shrug. “As if I had done anything to be claimed as such.” Glasses gleaming as they were adjusted. “I am right, aren’t I? That is why you hate him so?”
Richter muttered it again. “Don’t be preposterous.” He didn’t look so cross, merely impatient. “And must we dwell on him? I called a reunion, not a funereal reception.”
“Then get one with it!” Nathan was fast becoming impatient as well. “I don’t really see the point of this. Couldn’t a call be sufficient enough? An e-mail, all the better!”
Julian stared straight at Nathan, no humor in his face at all. “Shut up, Milord.”
Nathan obeyed, spite filled eyes glaring at the table.
Richter cleared his throat for the second time. “Yes, well, as I was supposed to say, our reunion, gentlemen, transcends merely being a gathering of old estranged friends to share good times. The reunion of Sub Rosa should redefine it, just as we’ve redefined all other mundane occasions.” He ignored the rolling of gray eyes. “It’s a gathering, yes, but not to give way to revelry. But to learn from the tragedies we’ve endured over our years of separation.”
The cigarette moved in between Nathan’s lips as he sneered, somewhat reminiscent of the mafia.
Julian was thoughtful, breathing in the smoke languidly. In the light, when he was so pensive, he looked kind. Putting out the cigarette on the provided ashtray, he murmured, “You speak as if you were in the wrong art.”
“But you understand?”
The raven-haired man smiled wryly, but his eyes were distant again for all the alertness in them. “How could anyone? But--” he lifted his eyebrows just as Richter began to protest, “--I do. For all the bad poetry in you, I do.” That certain dreaminess in him vanished completely and this time some hint of intellectual menace danced on his face. “It’s nothing so original, friends meeting to discuss losses. You didn’t need five years for such a fancy, dearest Prince.”
Amusing how they cast years of friendship to the winds for their roles as intellectuals, forgetting their delicacy and tact for their Eugent’s brutal honesty.
Lord Passive --Nathan-- spoke without a moment’s fear of a cutting remark. “What possible tragedies could we have? No family matters, I presume?”
“Certainly not!” Prince Skeptic was quite indignant. “I want things that concern the soul and mind.”
“As in decisions?”
“Oh but decisions are full of influence.”
“What then?”
“Perhaps confessions of the dreadfully sinful sort?” Blue eyes fell on the bit of gleaming silver cross dangling from the Winter Cynic’s ear.
A hand rose, as if to cover it. “You allude to the Seven Deadly Sins?”
“Yes,” Prince skeptic gestured, turning his hand out by the wrist, palm upward several times as if it aided his search for the right word. “Vices!” Let us talk of vices.”
“You speak so carelessly.” Lord Passive held up his cigarette. “This is a vice in itself.”
“Oh my dearest Lord Passive, can you not be an idiot?”
The cigarette was ground tip first into the table. “Only if you wouldn’t lead me.”
“I speak of true vices.” Prince Skeptic growled lowly. “Vices which hold a man’s soul on puppet strings. Things you simply cannot live without, things that hold your sanity.”
“Or whatever pieces are left of it.” The Winter Cynic turned his wrist towards him and frowned at the silver watched. He reached into his pocket, took out a cell phone and began pressing on the keypad. He spoke slowly, distracted. “You think we are all slaves to our vices, Prince?”
The auburn haired man nodded. “No man is free from it. Don’t contradict the truth; none are spared.”
The silence which was given for a counterattack was full of soft clicking sounds. Pause. The faint rumble of the cell phone vibrating. Click, click. A small smile graced the Cynic’s lips. Click, click. He returned it to his pocket. “Akin to that saying? ‘We all have our own bit of neurosis’?”
Thin brows lifted. “Is there really such a saying?” A thoughtful pause. “Well, I suppose so.”
“The addicts to their addictions.” Lord Passive was catching on, throwing back his chestnut hair from his shoulders. “Well, then. Who goes first, eh?”
Another pause. Opal and gray eyes met and turned to blue, which narrowed.
“Oh for the love of God…” Prince Skeptic sighed, shaking his head. “As if you were children-”
“Enough of your complaints.” The Winter Cynic raised a finger to his lips as if to indicate for complete silence instead of cooperation. “If you so want us here, speak.”
Another sigh. “All right…” A hand smoothing hair. “I think the Commandments say it, whichever order they came in, can’t remember for the life of me. Thou hall not commit adultery and Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife…”
“The Deadly Sin of Lust? Is that all?” Lord Passive smirked, just a bit disgusted with the simplicity of the vice.
“No, you dimwit. You slaughter dramatic pauses artlessly. Let me go on before you murder the evening further.” Ignoring the good Lord’s seething, Prince Skeptic continued. “It’s no surprise, yes, that men are enslaved by carnal pleasure. But I’d like to think that mine goes beyond that.”
“How so?”
Prince Skeptic tilted his head to the side, thoughtful. “Would you believe that I have not picked up a brush, much less prepared a canvass in a whole year?”
A void-like silence. The Winter Cynic raised his eyebrows; Lord Passive blinked.
“My art might as well slip from me, gentlemen. It is beginning to dawn on me that I am a rather splendid liar and a completely devilish individual.” No air of presumption; he was being poetically frank. “I should think that it is no difficult task for me, walking up to a woman, flashing a smile and seducing her. I just pull it off quite well, even if I don’t have your good looks, Cynic.”
The Winter Cynic ignored the would-be compliment. “So it’s a powerful distraction then? Your enslavement to sex with, shall I presume, random women?”
Prince Skeptic shook his head. “Not so random, sir. I choose who I want and they must be beautiful. You know the type, utterly ravishing and unsurpassingly charming.”
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