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He doesn't go looking for it, exactly. There's no carefully crafted search, nothing like the kind of investigation he might have done back home on topics far more different from this, but Darlington knows at the back of his mind that he is in pursuit of something. Answers, or proof, or maybe just an excuse. Something he can use. Anything.
His daily runs stray further and further into the seedier parts of town, past weed-choked lots and corner stores with bars in the window and cashiers behind bulletproof glass. It's an assumption, one he acknowledges is unfair in some distant corner of his thoughts, but he does it anyway. Of course, when he finds the club--all mirrored windows and neon, a bouncer in a leather jacket at the door--it's on some quieter stretch of Paper, not far from the train station. It's not a bad area, all things considered. He can, at least, concede that.
Back when he'd thought Alex was bartending, he'd learned the rhythms of her schedule, the late nights and weekend crowds. Though the job was a lie and had always been, she hadn't obscured the truth of that, at least. And so, when the next Friday rolls around and night falls, when Darlington has no reason to suspect Alex's shift hadn't started already, he goes back down to that quiet stretch of Paper. He could go any other night, he knows, but it feels important not to. He tells himself it's because the evidence, the proof he's seeking, wouldn't be the same if it's not her.
Another story, maybe, for Daniel Arlington to believe in with all his heart.
( cut for references to stripping and simulated violence )
His daily runs stray further and further into the seedier parts of town, past weed-choked lots and corner stores with bars in the window and cashiers behind bulletproof glass. It's an assumption, one he acknowledges is unfair in some distant corner of his thoughts, but he does it anyway. Of course, when he finds the club--all mirrored windows and neon, a bouncer in a leather jacket at the door--it's on some quieter stretch of Paper, not far from the train station. It's not a bad area, all things considered. He can, at least, concede that.
Back when he'd thought Alex was bartending, he'd learned the rhythms of her schedule, the late nights and weekend crowds. Though the job was a lie and had always been, she hadn't obscured the truth of that, at least. And so, when the next Friday rolls around and night falls, when Darlington has no reason to suspect Alex's shift hadn't started already, he goes back down to that quiet stretch of Paper. He could go any other night, he knows, but it feels important not to. He tells himself it's because the evidence, the proof he's seeking, wouldn't be the same if it's not her.
Another story, maybe, for Daniel Arlington to believe in with all his heart.
( cut for references to stripping and simulated violence )
