Oh, you know, just around...

Drinking seemed to be everyone's best friend these days. Even Matt himself was guilty of having turned to the dark rum side. All the death and murder he had come across in the past year would be enough to drive anyone not used to it to suicide. It drove Matt to alcohol. Of course at first it didn't work out for him. It changed when he made his pit stop in Russia. An underground vodka operation had somehow managed to create a vodka so potent it actually got him drunk. Most test subjects had died drinking the forbidden drink, but not Matt. And so Matt was getting it shipped to him regularly from his new friend Vladimir in Russia. It was going to take a lot more than a couple drinks for Matt to work through his shit.

"I'll buy." he told her without hesitation. "It's the least I can do for you Jack. I've got a year to make up for." He knew no matter how much he said it over and over again Jack wouldn't get better. He had to dig deep down into himself and her to fix this. The tension in their relationship was uncomfortable for him; he was not used to it. Of course he'd had strenuous relationships before but not with Jack. It was going to be an exceedingly long time before they were normal likely combined with the entire contents of Matt's liquor cabinet.

"Seriously, I'm not taking no for an answer. You can get the most expensive thing in the whole bar." he looked down at her.

It was weird to think how time worked, and how it didn't work, and how things could change so quickly and unexpectedly. An hour ago, Matthew Lestrange had been gone and in her past. Now, he was alive, and here, and he was offering to buy her a drink. Her feet moved mechanically, taking them towards one of the tinier bars in Hogsmeade, crammed between a small market store and a specialty sock shop. The bar did not have a certain crowd like the Hog's Head or the Three Broomsticks, always just taking in the patrons they could get. Jack liked it when she felt like just... drinking. No company, no good time, just the alcohol.

And it had good alcohol.

"You're not going to get a no from me," she said, glancing towards him. Her hands fell into her pockets and she jerked her chin towards their destination, falling into silence. She cleared her throat. "This place, it's called Alleyway... They've got some good stuff. Good rum." She swallowed, having at least filled the silence. She blinked and reached the door of the bar, pulling it open to reveal the cramped space within the building. She held it open and then followed Matt inside.

As soon as she stepped inside the pub, she headed straight for the bar. She deposited herself onto a stool and the bartender held out a hand to her. "Just bring me something with rum in it, please. And by that I mean... rum with barely something else in it."

Matt watched as Jack's body language shifted slightly. A little more open yet still very reserved. It was progress. He followed her towards the bar door and thanked her when he walked in. And within seconds of entering Jack had already beaten Matt to the bar counter. He took a seat next to her just as she had finished ordering her drink and looked at her. He really hadn't noticed it before. How could he? He was far too excited to see her again. But Jack was in a deep dark place. A place that Matt had put her in. Well, he couldn't take all the credit. There were a series of things that pushed Jack over the edge. Perhaps it was a very good idea not to bring anything up about the past quite yet.

"Scotch and Soda, please." he said to the bartender.

He looked around the bar, it was a nice enough place. He needed a new bar to go to, maybe this was the winner. He was avoiding conversation with Jack now. Maybe things would get a bit easier if she got drunk. People were far more open when they were drunk. Matt had used alcohol many times on his journey to get past many an emotional barrier without having to take his pants off like previously requested. It was a looooong year.

He finally broke the silence.

"Last time I was in a bar next to a girl I had just slept with her and kidnapped her uncle." he said absentmindedly. "She had paid me of course." he added looking off into space. He looked down at Jack and realized how bad that sounded. "For kidnapping her uncle, I mean! Uhm, in case that wasn't....obvious..." he broke off with a small grin and chuckled.

Jack was sorting through this. She knew she should have been better at shaking this off. By now, she had learned that the unexpected was always right around the corner and everything that could go wrong, would go wrong. However, it had been so long since her past had physically manifested against her. Sure, it came to her often in her chronic nightmares, but it was so easy to write those visions and memories off as subconscious remnants of a time long gone. She had not seen anyone from her past, save for the recent run ins with Ariel Greyback and Oliver Connolly. Those encounters had thrown her for a loop and the stakes in those relationships had hardly been life or death.

Matt was a horrible reminder of Nemo Omara and Aaron Marcheti and Vito Dee Symons and Chase and Andrew and...

Jack did not like reminders.

Matt began speaking, as though frightened to fall into silence. She would have preferred neither of them spoke until she could reconcile his return to the country, his return to her life. She could not bring herself to smile at his anecdote, even though he answered her question before she could even ask. She knew that the story was born out of discomfort and she could not reward it with comfort. The bartender delivered their drinks and she gulped down half of it quickly. She could have done the whole thing but she did not need to come home to Max completely sloshed.

"I don't know what to say to you," Jack admitted, honesty being that curse of hers. "I don't want to talk about the future, but the past is even scarier sometimes. So..." She blinked, taking another drink.