closed; i have a girlfriend now

[sarcophage]

WHO: Sidony and Leander
WHAT: winding around a professional's legs while she's trying to accomplish real things. now with 200% more oversharing!
WHEN: a little before Divine hijinks we are moving this to the TRUTH BOMB event because time is immaterial
WHERE: the Infirmary
NOTES: will add as needed

For deliberate effect, Leander's voice half precedes his bodily appearance around the corner:

"Now, who thought giving knives to a kitten was a good idea?"

Never mind that Sidony may not literally have a sharp in her hand at this precise moment—although if she does, so much the better. Regardless: giving this mage permission to affix her with such a disgusting pet name was probably a mistake, but it's too late for her to change her mind. (It isn't really, but if she thinks it is, he's not about to correct her.)

"Are you nearly finished?" It's not quite that time—Lea has a way of casually learning people's habits, thus blending the line between observant and creepy nearly beyond recognition—but he's done this before, and she'll know by now that he is sometimes content to hang around while she works. Especially if there is, indeed, a sharp in her hand. "If not, I've come to distract you until you relent. I am in desperate need of your attention—in fact, I may die without it."

Comments

[indissection]

"And I shall." There's a touch of something irritated about her now, her eyes glancing up at him with fire rather than kindness, and she very deliberately faces forward, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing her anger, her frustration, the hurt that Ilias had left her with.

"A few years, perhaps. I have had more important things to do than count the time."

[sarcophage]

"Fair enough," he allows, while suspecting she knows exactly how long, down to the day.

A few years, but how many? Four? Two? The difference there is tremendous, life-changing, the particulars none of her particular business, and she might be inspired to ask why it matters so he mustn't press. It's less important to him that she knows than to know himself—he can ask Ilias himself another time.

(For the anger, the hurt, he would feel nothing at all but curiosity.)

"It's unhealthy to dwell, anyway. We can't let the distress of others move in with us, can we? Otherwise we'd never accomplish anything for ourselves."

[indissection]

It's best not to talk about it, she thinks; she'll just end up even more sour, as if the pinch in her nose wasn't enough to give that away entirely.

At least she is still handsome enough - at least she has her work, and her job, and her friends and allies, all things that her awkward relationship and tutoring with Ilias cannot take from her. She has grown into her own self-worth, no matter what anyone else might say, and she accepts that - because she knows what part she has to play now. She knows who she is and what she wants from her life; no one can change that.

Let Lea think about this in his own time. She's quite finished.

"Of course not," she hums. "It's better not to think about it at all."