Just the way she says his name is enough to make Jerry quit pretending, something in his gut twisting at the way she sounds. It really shouldn't matter, he thinks, and still believes that he should be able to shrug this off, but it's apparent enough that he can't. If he could, she wouldn't be so aware that something's wrong. Deep down, he thinks maybe that shouldn't even be so bad, but he hates that he's given her cause to worry, and he hates having to talk about any of it. Even real stories of his time overseas would be better than this having set him off, because it involves her, too. She's the one who told him it was a setup, the reason he was able to make any kind of difference at all. He should be grateful for that alone, he knows, and for the fact that it didn't go any worse. He should be able to prevent it from getting to him like this. The latter, though, is impossible to manage, and with that being the case, the former doesn't have as much weight as it ought to.

He keeps his gaze averted from her, keeping it turned out, unfocused, over the rest of the room, as he lights his cigarette and takes a long, slow drag. She doesn't have to have said anything more than that for him to know that there won't be any more dodging the subject, but he can't look at her and say any of it, either. "You know, they're doing something out in the park," he says, voice quiet, distant. "I guess some kind of... festival, or something. The whole place is done up — firecrackers going off, those red paper lanterns strung up."

It's too vague and he knows it, but he isn't sure what else to say. Anything outright mentioning Chinatown is too much for now, more than he can try to give voice to. He just hopes she gets it without him having to say so.