A different place.

Salome took me out today.
It was a different thing to my usual training.
I was with her, I wasn't scared like back home.
The first thing she told me was to act naturally.


It was then that I saw them.
People.
Crowds.


The noise overwhelmed me.
We walked into a city center.
We sat down together.


We drank coffee together in a shop.
A cafe.
She said "Tell me who that man in the corner is."
I didn't know.


She was referring to a businessman,
he was on a phone.
Deep in conversation.


Glasses rested on his nose and he was staring at papers.
They looked official.
Deep in conversation.


I was distracted.
Too much noise.
The sound of the coffee machine.
The sound of talking.


It had been so long since I'd heard talking.
I forgot what it sounded like.


I said. "A businessman, negotiating a deal?"
She smiled a little and shook her head.
"Look closer."
I looked again, just glancing.


Noise just fades away.


I saw a red mark on his ring finger, but no ring.
He's middle aged, he seemed withdrawn.
A broken man.
I felt a relation to it.


"He is divorcing. The papers are the ones he's been served with."
She smiled. "Almost correct. His ex wife is suing him. He is in a conversation with his lawyer."
"I saw the papers when I was getting the coffee." She leaned back in her seat.
I frowned. "Why did you tell me this?"


She smirked. "Because you now know how he will react when you see what I do."
I stopped for a moment and just looked at her. "What?"
The man stands up, tidying away the papers into his briefcase and looking over his shoulder at us.


"When I pull a gun upon him." She smiled.


There was something predatory in her gaze.


"Go back to the office. I shall meet you there."


I do as I am ordered.


He looked like the kind of man to use shortcuts.
Alleyways that allowed him to cut off a couple of minutes with work.
If she pulled a gun on him, he would panic.
Freeze up.
He would offer her money.
He would then run.


I am in the office again,
I don't know what to think.
Are the papers that important that she would draw a weapon on him?


I don't know.
But the city was a welcome break from training.


I am writing this up and then I am doing more shooting.
I always need to do more shooting.
I need to get better.
I don't want to die.