Chapter Text
This complex was one of those built in central NewYork for people with infinite numbers in their accounts, but never lived to expectations, since it was one of many, so many for America’s billioner per square meter, which left it almost abandoned. Falgo had bought three apartments there — for himself, for photo-studio and another, according to persistent rumour, for his private sex club. Andrew once said Falgo was actually keeping there his car, and Cale wasn’t sure which truth he preferred.
It was ten o’clock crisp. Andrew sent him in a Benz with some extremely muscled driver, apparently so he wouldn’t bolt before getting into Falgo’s grabby hands — not like he planned to.
He just have to dodge that motorcycle show.
Really.
Who wants to spend a day in a smog cloud with more people the whole Roan Capital holds?
“It’s not like we need more money now” The Glutton murmured, “We can buy the best food with what we have now… And live comfortably.”
There was something like hesitation from The Cheapskate, but he choose to stay silent.
“Do you remember those… Ah, biker… flocks?” The Crybaby said quietly, “In, where was that? Like, California-ish? They looked violent.”
“Bikers in New York are sexy,” The Sky Eating Water huffed, “I mean, those illiterate horsemen tribes always look like shit, but it’s another story if it’s a King’s guardsmen in uniform.”
There was a short laughter, united with Cale’s own huff.
Falgo’s home apartment was on thirty-second floor, and the only one that had a shoe mat — it was of bright green colour. Cale managed to ring a bell two times, before a woman he has met before — Falgo’s stylist of preference, aka his second ex-wife, — opened a door.
“Morning, Mr. Kim,” she smiled without showing her teeth. Her eyeballs were blood red, and eye bags black.
He has seen her working tirelessly yesterday. And the day before yesterday. If things continues the same way, tomorrow he would have to go see her to her funeral.
Cale should be grateful that his Heart was one of the few powers working in this world.
“Morning. Looks like you didn’t manage to sleep at all, Ms. Decker.”
“Well,” she giggled with closed mouth and let him inside, “Who has it easy these days?”
Apartment’s space was big the way only modern people can get thanks to all the steel and concrete, and with low ceilings only medieval noblemen like Cale could find offensive. If you poured that much money, shouldn’t you create a place where the head doesn’t touch the carbon dioxide?
“Let’s grab a bite while Falgini still messing with equip.”
“I was told Anderson makes feasts.”
“His dinner is around five… and few fruits won’t fill you, really.”
The kitchen was mainly white, but all the utensil were colourful and, from the look of it, brought from different sets. A young man and a woman in household uniform were slicing fruits and organising them on the plates.
“Anything you like?”
“Cale, berries, please.”
Cale took the plate that The Glutton had already mentally claimed. Nice ceramic tea-bowl coloured with wet blue brushstrokes, “Can I have a coffee as well?”
“Which do you prefer?” a man in uniform asked moving to the coffee machine.
“Eh, no, there is something wrong with the local milk.”
“Just plain black will be fine.”
“And latte for me, please,” said Ms. Deker while chewing red grapes one by one.
“Sure.”
“It’s Jardini,” Ms. Decker turned to Cale and shoved a peeled mandarin on his plate, “Like rocket fuel, so don’t drink it too much. Falgini has some good tea here too.”
“Maybe later, if you help me with the choice.”
Windows were from waist-high two the ceiling, letting all the orange morning light — not obstructed by other skyscrapers on this floor, — illuminate the living room. Falgo and his camera assistant — his first ex-wife, were adjusting light stands, moving around knees high-up above the coils of wires on the floor.
“If these two are here, the third must be too,” The Sky Eating Water murmured absentmindedly.
“Eh, that guy falls in love easier than he falls asleep,” grumbled The Cheapskate.
It was their favourite thought to roll around: were they working together because they’d once been married, or had they married because they worked so well together?
“Why your face is so fresh, Cale,” a Thai tan woman with long black hair greeted him with a husky voice. She was sloped in a chair by the back of the room, one leg tucked under the other, a half-eaten bright yellow pear in her hand and a stale mug of coffee on the glass table beside her.
Dafei was usually the woman with the highest legs to body ratio in the room, and that was the reason Cale had a high-boots photoshoot with her a while ago. He used to be — and he was delighted to learn it — solid second place between men, before the first one woke-up three weeks before the date and chose violence. Cale wasn’t sure what type, but that had sentenced him for ten years straight.
“Didn’t know I’ll meet you today.”
“I’ve learned just when I came here,” she smiled, “You speak French, right?”
Cale, in fact, did not.
“… Why?”
Dafei nodded to a corner with bookshelves, where a tall young woman was nervously looking at the book spines.
“That’s Jisel,” Ms. Decker told him, “We hoped you’d be able to talk with her.”
Jisel raised her head, hearing her name… and she, well. She looked like Holy Twins’ lost triplet. Taller than them, with short neat bob and even shorter bangs.
“I don’t speak any French. Why would… two of you even think so,”
Women looked at him with surprise.
“Ha? You actually sound so French!” Ms. Decker took a swing from her cup, “I thought your mother was, like… Cale is a French name, right?”
‘Cale’ is a male’s equivalent of ‘Clae’. Because he was named after his mother’s grandmother, native of the Caro Kingdom.
“Yeah, and you look…” Dafei scrutinised him with raised eyebrows, “Like one… too… a bit…” her face went through few complicated emotions, before she visually became embarrassed, “Yeah, sorry about that.”
Cale wasn’t sure how people classified accent of his English, learned with Korean textbooks through the prism of Roanian Northern dialect, and that didn’t really affect him before this moment.
“You two know I am Korean?”
Ms. Decker raised an eyebrow, “Your father’s side, right? You have Korean surname.”
“Wait…” Dafei stumbled on her words, “You… are, like, Korean-Korean. Like, legally.”
“Yeah—,” Cale inhaled deeply, “I— I very am…”
They spent a minute silently sipping their drinks, before Ms. Decker asked them to change into clothes.
“Check this out,” Dafei whispered him, “it'll wrinkle if I breathe.”
Robes meant for the shoot were… delicate. Embroidered with beaded flowers, with tiny golden beetles crawling around the neck. It looked expensive enough Ron would deemed it worthy to use as a pyjama and maybe, maybe he won’t even bitch about it’s transparency.
Halfway through shedding their pants, Falgo told them, it wasn’t necessary, but they might as well.
Jisel was shy. Like, shy-shy. When Ms. Decker was applying her makeup, girl’s back was as straight as a stick.
“Ok, so,” Falgo came to them without greetings, but with honest smile, “I want you three to climb on that windowsill and have fun. Perfect sun will be in few minutes”
The named windowsill was 20 centimetres wide and somewhere about a meter above the ground. Cale wasn’t surprised, Dafei wasn’t surprised, Jisel… she was shy, whatever.