Retrospective: Paris - After the mess was over

5.1 Francesco De la Cruz - After the party

Winter 1993, somewhere in Paris

Francesco tried once more to remember that new song that crossed his mind before he got distracted. It was just an improvement to that lame shit the DJ played, nothing special, but still he regretted he forgot to take the napkin with the notes he made. Now remembering was impossible, the melody had almost slipped out of his mind already. 

He gave up and wondered why it took so long for Mae to come out. She had been on the dance floor while he had stayed at the bar, and the bouncer didn't give him time to look for her before throwing him and the other guy out. At least he had promised to search for her himself and send her out so they could go home together. 

Which was basically the only reason Francesco came here after a long shift in the bar, instead of going straight to bed. After the incident, the strange man in the rotten apartment had assured him that him and Mae were safe now, but Francesco didn't want to rely on that. Mae agreed with him that they should be careful, but of course it didn't keep her from going out to party.

Francesco was almost convinced she went now more than before, almost every night.
She insisted that she had to enjoy her time at college as long as she could.
So he went after her after his shift to pick her drunk ass up, so she wouldn't tumble home alone – and maybe end up in the next trench, or, alternatively, in some criminal's apartment.

Needless to say he didn't trust her friends any more either. Mae argued that the chance that one of them would sell her out to a weapon trafficking gang was quite low, and even less that it'd happen twice. But he was rather worried that they'd be as careless as she was, and so he was double as cautious, to make up for her lack of it.

Maybe he'd be less concerned if Arthur Roux would still accompany her with Charlotte. But the officier had been sent away to take care of some family business in Norway.
At the best time possible.
About the same time, l'inspector pendejo got relocated to the other end of France. Francesco didn't miss him, though, on the contrary, he was glad the police left him alone for good now.
They even apologized officially and asked him if he wanted to take care of the "poor victim's" body because they hadn't found any relatives, but he refused as politely as he could.
Fuck him.
And also all his belongings, including that penthouse apartment.

After what felt like an eternity, Mae finally stumbled out.

"Ah, there you are!" She beamed when she noticed him.

She barely could stand straight, again.
And she wasn't alone.
"Luc is coming with us tonight," she declared excitedly.

Francesco suspiciously eyed the boy that she'd dragged along. Luc was at least as wasted as Mae, and also very touchy. At least he didn't seem dangerous. 

"Nope." Francesco said. 

Mae's face fell.
"But he's cute!" She objected.

He was, but not enough to change Francesco's decision.

"I have already enough work carrying you home," he complained.
And as skinny as Mae was, she definitely was not light as a feather.

Exactly in that moment Luc dropped on the floor with a heavy "plomp", as if he wanted to prove Francesco's point - and was fast asleep.

Overall, Francesco couldn't care less if Mae made out with other guys. They'd both agreed to better not stifle each other in a closed relationship, and he took his opportunities to see other people occasionally as much as Mae did. Their life together now was just temporary, so why even bother to get too used to each other? After all that'd happened, he wanted leave this shitty town more than ever.

But more and more, their life together grew onto him.
A simple, normal life, with all those tiny moments of intimate sincerity. It was a parallel world, where nothing bad had ever happened, no one ever had been hurt, and they were just together.

Sometimes it seemd that Mae didn't feel so different from him.

"What if we could be in love forever? Just us two..." she'd said just yesterday, and he'd held her a little bit tighter.

Apparently she didn't have a problem adding someone else into their private bubble wrapped fantasy, though. It stung, surprisingly more than he'd expected.

Francesco waved that awkward feeling away and put his arm tight around Mae's waist to secure her while they walked - or she rather stumbled - to the métro station.
Luc could sleep it off on the floor for all he cared about.

"Did you get – get thrown out again?" she asked, interrupted by a hiccup.

"There was this guy." Francesco went slower. "He put something in someone else's drink." Just the thought still made him mad. At Tony's they didn't care much about drugs or trouble, as long as it wasn't the kind of trouble that drew attention. Like someone breaking someone else's nose.

They'd politely asked Francesco to leave the establishment.

Francesco didn't mind to, as long as the guy with the broken nose left too, but that one certainly wasn't in mood for party anyway.

"Hm" she said, and squeezed his hand a little. Or maybe he just imagined.
He hoped she wouldn't think he lost it because of what Diego did to him. He wasn't sure himself if it was, but he didn't want to be pitied again, and definitely not by her.
Another hiccup.

Lately it had been really hard for him to stay calm. He always had a quick temper, but he never had been violent. Now it didn't take much to make him snap.
Small reminders of the violence he had experienced, small signals of danger, and his self-control was out of the window.
The tension that something still could happen, that the man lied, that there was still someone that would try to hurt him, or worse, Mae, still lingered.

All of a sudden, she screamed. 

Someone stood in front of them and something flashed silvery.

The figure said something, but the words blurred.
As did Francesco's awareness.

And so did his vision, his hearing and his mind.
What he still felt very clearly, was the sudden sharp pain in his knuckles.

It could only be a few seconds when the blurriness dissolved into Mae's voice.

"Franny, oh god stop!"

She looked terrified.

"- die and they'll really put you in prison!"
She breathed heavily.
No, the guy wasn't dead, Francesco heard him cough. "Please...", the man whimpered, "let me go, I won't do anything..."

"He'll be... okay...", Francesco said weakly.
Shit.

"Your hands are bloody", Mae said and handed him a tissue. To keep herself busy, so she wouldn't freak out. Francesco knew her already that well.

The shock had sobered her up immediately.
But he was shocked too about his loss of control. It never had been that bad before, and not twice in one evening. He had completely blanked out.
That guy's sudden appearance had reminded him too much of how Monsieur Armand was killed.
"He could have hurt you", he muttered. He needed to find an apology.

"He had a knife - what if he had hurt you?", she asked.
She cared only about that, and surprisingly not about his outbreak at all. But honestly, she had always worried more about him than herself.

"He didn't.", he said.
And honestly, that had been his last concern in that moment. He'd take that chance always over risking that anything would happen to her, and now even more after what did happen, after she almost -
It would be better if he left, so no one could hurt her because of him again. But if he left that also meant he wouldn't be there if someone tried anyway. Who knew if there really weren't any thugs left that were out for blood. And that scared him more.
So he stayed.