Julius had spent most of his life without a plan. That sounded bad, but his general experience was that plans simply made it harder to adjust when things inevitably went wrong. Much better to simply adapt to circumstances and react accordingly. It had made him good at his job, because he’d so often been undercover as a man who didn’t do plans anyway. You never wanted to seem smarter than your legend.
But now, his lack of a plan seemed more … problematic. He’d joined the Sinclair family because they’d offered him the job, and he’d felt bound in some way to Paityn; if he saved her just to let her go and get killed again, what had been the point in doing it in the first place? But now Morgan was in prison, they were probably at war with the Costellos, and no one seemed to know who was actually going to be in charge. Chaos was hard to adapt to.
He couldn’t exactly get a different job, even if he’d wanted to, and Paityn still needed him, especially with her current ‘situation’ with Luca Costello, one he highly disapproved of but couldn’t warn her away from without coming off like an asshole. So for once he was trying to make a plan, entitled, “Operation Dump the Motherfucker Already”, in which he tried to subtly push Paityn towards a less unhealthy relationship without making her nose dive into depression again. He had no idea how to accomplish this, but at least it gave him something to do.
“If you had to break two people up, how would you go about it? Hypothetically?”
Zoey lifts the thick mass of curls resting atop her neck, fluffs them out with an impatient hand. She was used to waiting. This, however, was pushing it. Clients ran late all the time, disorganized artists and self-important geniuses who seemed to operate on their own schedule— never mind per-arranged meeting times. It wasn’t usually an issue, but the ice in her glass is long-past melted. She just hopes this client shows up soon. She wants to solidify the booking, move on to the next stages of exhibit planning.
But there’s no sign of him. The only interruption from her boredom is a question, that— hypothetical or no— makes her give a light snort.
Zoey shifts her head towards the man in earshot, folds her hands neatly over themselves.
“Depends on how fast you’d like them to break up...”
Her next words come out a little more cynical than she means; there’s no bitter taste in her mouth, but rather a sense of leaden inevitability. Most relationships, for one reason or another, end. She smiles lightly.
“Time usually takes care of it.”
Even so, Zoey could never be truly pessimistic about love.
