Yaris 79, 2720 - Evening
"No," she agreed, a little too breathless, "not something I'm used to." The drink, of course. She meant the stout. Not the way the purple-haired wick shifted to increase the contact between the two of them under the table. Not the invisible contact of the mona that hung around them both, either, for all that was true. Instead of thinking about contact of any kind, she focused on the cigarette case he fished from his vest. Unexpectedly ornate, but not, at least by her estimation, unsuited. The etched flowers were a flamboyant flourish, and they seemed to fit the image of Emiel in front of her quite well indeed. She studied that instead of Emiel's handsome freckled face for a moment, taking in the narrow whippet shapes of miraan before she looked back up.
It was his fault she asked such a dumberse question. His fault entirely. How was she supposed to ask a sensible, normal, decent question when he was doing that? Humming and lingering in rolling his cigarette. Which she was trying not to pay too much attention to, but it must have been a futile effort because why else would she have asked that of all things?
Still. The question had been foolish, but she laughed at that "old enough". Followed by a real answer, but it still made her smile. Old enough--for what? To know better, she wanted to say, but she was plenty old enough to know better too. And anyway, she had been right. Twenty, approaching twenty-one--if he'd been a student, a galdor, he'd have graduated by now. But only just. Was that too much? For what? Book club didn't have an age limit, but that was clearly not what this was about anymore. Unless book club meetings were far different from her imaginings. So what was it, precisely, that she was wondering if that four year gap was too much for? Cerise didn't have the answer.
(Did she put away that little slide of "Dentis" somewhere in her mind? Maybe. She didn't think this--book club, anything else--would carry on to Dentis. So the information was useless, just taking up space in her mind where something more important could go. She slotted it in anyway.)
Smoke obscured his face, but not his voice. She caught every bit of that drawn-out answer, given to her like some kind of dare. She wondered if he would ask her the same. She wondered if that would be the end of the night, and if that would be disappointing or a relief. That would be one way to stop her from being this foolish--he could certainly put an end to it himself if he wanted to.
"That is the deal," she agreed with an incline of her dark head. She paused, watching him as intently as he'd looked at her when he asked the question. Watched him smoke, thinking of the alley. A terrible habit, smoking. She liked seeing him do it. Cerise was surprised when he held the cigarette out to her, surprised and pleased by the action. Her pale fingers reached to take it from him, and they lingered in the touch between the two of them. Brazen and shameless.
She brought it to her mouth and took a slow drag with the imitation of practiced ease. She had seen other girls on the team do it often enough, and it wasn't like she had never tried. Just--not that often. The exhale was slow, just as deliberate as he had been earlier; Cerise smiled.
"Seventh," she answered slowly. Her hand stretched back out between them to give it back. "And my birthday is in Vortas. If you were curious." Let him do the math, if he wanted to. Cerise let her eyes catch and hold his--gold, bright as the rings in his ears and his face--as she waited for a reaction.
Not too long, though. Just in case it would have been the waiting that decided, and not the math of it. "Another question, then. What else do you like to do with your time--other than pick fights with young women in bookstores?" Cerise grinned sharply, fully aware it had been her who had picked the fight. Details, she thought. She was still curious.