When Markus finally finds Kasia, she's locked herself up onto the roof of the appartment building, watching over the hum of New York City buzz beneath her feet 21 stories below. She's sitting on the ledge of the building, a wide, 2 foot long platform that drops off for a foot for another small ledge before it catapults into the smooth brick layout that makes the front of the building.

As he he softly closes the metal door behind him, he's wise to remember to take the keys out from the other end, and he stuffs them into his jean pocket. He hears the faint clicking of metal and scuffling noises, and he can just imagine Kasia hunched over, futily trying to lite an old cigarette that was hidden in the back of her dresser.

Tucking his hands into the pocket in the front of his sweater, he takes a few steps forwards, before he calls out.

"Kasia."

If she heard him, she gave no noticible cue. As the cold summer wind picked up, her hair spun around her head like a distored halo, and her sweater flapped around her small body like a cape. Walking forward, Markus eased himself up onto the ledge, and he sat with his legs dangling over. Minutes passed as the pair sat silently, surrounded by the smell of nicotine and smoke as the honks and screams and bright lights of New York glittered.

Kasia sits silently, knees bent towards her chest with her ankles crossed. Her arms are crossed around her knees, left wrist being held in her right hand. In between two fingers is a long cigarette, one tip gently burning, barely visible smoke lifting from it.

"I'm sorry," Markus tries again, and he twists himself so his right leg is curled underneath his left and he's actually facing Kasia. He tries to seem sympathetic, but it's all futile in the end because Kasia never looks away from the city exploding beneath the soles of their shoes. "I... I didn't know that he would react like that, okay? I've been with him before -- he's a really good kid, honest. He's my -- he's my bro, a'right? I gotta look out for him, but sometimes I just, I just don't know what goes on in his head."

Markus runs a hand over his head, and his fingers intwine with the strip of hair that's only in the middle of his head. He glances away from Kasia, and leans over the edge slowly, staring down at the traffic below them, and the few stragglers still out this late.

"I, I didn't think this would happen tonight." Kasia starts, and her voice is drifted into the night sky on wisps of smoke that curl out from her mouth with every exhale. Markus is silent next to her, eyes drifting from the city below to the smoker next to him, mouth twisted into a thin line.

"It happened really suddenly. I don't even know what I think of it, to be honest," Kasia lets out a smooth chuckle, as she fumbles with the cigarette she has balanced inbetween her teeth. Her hands are busy in her pockets, pulling out another lighter and another cigarette.

"Hey now, it's no big deal. He was drunk and high. No one knew what he was gonna do. I'll talk to him and make sure he knows to stay away next time he's like that, mmm'kay?" Markus cocks a smile and he rests a hand on Kasia's shoulder, on the inside curve so his thumb is just barely touching the inside of her neck and he can feel the radiant warmth coming from her. Kasia doesn't move except to flick the cigarette in her mouth over the edge where the wind picks it up and blows it away to be lost forever in the city of urban sin.

As she brings another cigarette to her lips, she flips open the lighter and clicks away at it, Markus carefully watching, though for what he doesn't know. After a dozen or so agrivating clicks of the lighter, Kasia gives out a wail of anger and she slams the lighter into the ground next to her, and her fingers are suddenly tangled in her hair that's whipping around her again as the wind picks up. Her ankles unhook then rehook themselves as she struggles to compose herself again, gnawing on the unlit cigarette that's rolled between her teeth.

"It's, it's not that, Markus. It's just that, I, er, I, I've never, I mean, that was my first --," Her voice catches and she glances at Markus from the corner of her eyes, pleading for him to understand and at the same time to suddenly forget she ever spoke.

"What do you mean that was your first -- oh. oh."

"Yeah,"

"Well. Oh. Oh god. Shit. Fuck, uh. I don't, oh shit, I am so sorry," Markus laments awkwardly, the hand that was originally on her shoulder now trailing awkwardly down to her spine where he rubbed circles.

"Yeah," Kasia croaks out as her jacket is whipped out behind her again like a cape and Markus is taking his hand back and lifting away from her to look down onto the city below them, where the lights that are pointed down are shining up on them.