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 Posted: Thu May 11, 2023 8:34 am
Elka 1 "Kayde, what's this?"
The woman had just been lead outside, a light shawl wrapped around her shoulders from the chilly wind coming off the water, to an unexpected scene. An easy walk from the front door lay a blanket upon the sand surrounded by what looked like candles inside glass jars, one to each corner. Upon this blanket were plates of fruit and fancy looking sweets, besides which sat a small table with a bottle and two glasses. Above, the moon was bright, its reflection in the distance water sparkling like the stars that surrounded it. She turned her head this way and that, smiling at the effect. It was difficult to stop smiling at the surprise. Not known for being all that romantic, this was the last thing Elka had expected to see when she was pulled away from the warm comfort of the fire in the sitting room.
"This is most unlike you to prepare something like this. Not that I dislike it, of course."
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Posted: Sun May 21, 2023 6:44 pm
Kayde 1 The air had been perfect outside all day. Kayde had really been hoping it would remain that way so he could finally set up his surprise for his wife, to celebrate the start of them raising a family of their own together. For weeks, he had been preparing the jars with the candles, slowly buying each every time he went into town. Never too many at once so she wouldn't become suspicious that he was doing anything else with them. He even made sure to keep a few for their usual purpose to further pull the cloth over her eyes, regularly filling them with water or setting them up for light as they enjoyed each other's company after the last meal of the day, when the world prepares itself for sleep. The rest he intended for the picnic he stuffed so far into the closet, he hoped she would never accidentally find them. And it had worked. The look on her face as he pulled her outside and she finally saw all his hard work would be a moment forever etched into his memory.
"I thought it would be appropriate to celebrate our little achievement in style." Holding her small hand in his own, Kayde helped her lower herself to the blanket, waiting until she was comfortable before he joined her, sitting across from her.
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Posted: Thu Aug 17, 2023 4:22 pm
Elka 2 Elka held out her hand to be taken, knowing full well he would help her down to the ground whether he was prompted to or not. The weight of her body nowadays threw her balance off, the swelling of her stomach too fast for her to adjust to. The healers estimated her to be about halfway through her term, maybe a little bit more. She'd never paid attention to any pregnant family members when she still lived in Zena, so there was no one she could compare with or ask advice from. So far, she wasn't finding it too difficult. She hadn't been too sick nor her body too sore from the extra weight. Yet, anyway.
Landing heavily on the blanket, the Ice woman shifted her position to one of comfort, smoothing out her skirt around her. One blue leg was almost fully exposed from the slit up the side, but she didn't mind it. There was more he'd seen by now.
"I hope that's not wine," she commented, waving an elegant hand over at the bottle of unknown liquid that sat in a hole in the sand.
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Posted: Fri Aug 18, 2023 8:45 am
Kayde 2 The smile that was already plastered upon his face spread even wider as Kayde followed Elka's golden eyes over to the bottle, stuck into the sand closest to his reach. Without answering her, he picked it up and popped the top, grabbing one of the glasses nearby and filling it up halfway. "Of course not." He handed it over to her. "The finest fruit juice I could find for the occasion."
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Posted: Fri Aug 18, 2023 9:20 am
Elka 3 Elka watched silently as Kayde prepared her a drink. Of course she knew it wasn't actually wine. It had never once crossed her mind that he might knowingly feed her something that might hurt their child. But she could never stop herself from teasing him.
Taking the glass, she raised it to her lips, letting the strong taste of a sweet fruit roll down her tongue and throat. Delicious! One of her favorites. Quite hard to come by, lately. She hoped whoever made it wasn't going out of business. Not that she could understand why they would be. Who could resist this?
"Even better than wine. How long have you been hiding this bottle from me?"
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Posted: Fri Aug 18, 2023 12:02 pm
Kayde 3 "A while." Kayde finished filling a glass for himself, taking his own sip from the tasty drink before placing his glass onto a coaster he had set up just for that purpose. The sand was uneven underneath them, the efforts of trying to smooth it out going unnoticed. As if he hadn't spent so much of his time trying to perfect the scene. It wasn't often that he set up romantic dates like this. He was more the type to cook a good meal or buy a little something extra when he went into town on his own. Not go to so much trouble to hide bottles or sneak out and prepare while Elka was preoccupied. "I thought you'd find it so many times. I had to keep changing the hiding spot. You came so close to discovering it way too much."
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Posted: Fri Aug 18, 2023 1:14 pm
Elka 4 She'd almost found it a few times? Interesting. She'd been none the wiser about where it could have been, but it must have been somewhere she didn't look around much. Not something she cleaned often. Where could it have been?
Elka thought about it for a few seconds, and instantly gave up. Puzzles had never been her thing. She hated when she had to use her brain this much, to go over all the possible answers to a problem there might be. "Where was it?" she asked, curious, taking another long sip of her juice. It'd been so long since she'd had this flavor, she could have easily drank the whole bottle on her own. Hopefully Kayde had more than one.
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Posted: Sat Aug 19, 2023 3:39 pm
Kayde 4 A strong breeze blew across the area, sneaking into the bottles and making the flame of each candle flicker, casting different shadows across Elka's face. Kayde watched these for a moment, thinking of his answer. Keeping her in suspense. He could see her visibly growing more and more impatient for his answer, her curiosity so strong you could feel it pulse in the air.
"It was just in the closet underneath a blanket you rarely use at first," he finally answered, taking a pause to reach out and pick up a cut piece of fruit. Hel held it in his fingers, hovering before his mouth. "But than you suddenly wanted the blanket one day, so I had to move it before you got curious over the box." He popped the piece in his mouth, chewing slowly for a moment. More suspense. He swore her eyes were going to bulge out of her skull if he kept this up for much longer. A chuckle escaped his lips, watching her. "It was in the pantry with the other bottles, sitting behind two of the more common Matorian wines."
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Posted: Sat Aug 19, 2023 3:48 pm
Elka 5 Don't leave your mouth hanging wide open unless you wanted something to fly inside it. That was something her mother had said to her growing up. How appalled she would be to see her daughter now, mouth so agape and unladylike, she was sure even in the dim light one could see to the back of her throat.
"In the...So close under my own nose?" But of course. It was the perfect hiding spot, after all. He hadn't been planning this until she had told him about the baby. Since than, she hadn't touched a single drop of alcohol and certainly had never looked on that side of the pantry where the wines were kept. Not that they had such a large collection of wine. Mostly it was gifts from her brother, unopened leftovers from his meetings with clients. "I am ashamed I never spotted it. I looked in the pantry just yesterday and saw nothing out of the ordinary."
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Posted: Thu Aug 24, 2023 5:21 pm
Kayde 5 "Mmmm." Forgetting she couldn't see him too well in the low light, Kayde gave a coy smile, raising his eyebrows slightly. Also an action that went unnoticed in the shadows cast over his face by his hair, sticking up on one side of his head as it always did. He thought it was a pretty clever hiding spot. Much better than the first. Or any other spot he had found afterwards. Behind a cushion on the side of the couch he always sat on being the worse. Why did he think she wouldn't pick it up to clean? How many times before than had she come close to it that he had picked something so desperately to keep his secret? "I'm clever when I want to be."
A bowl sat near him, piled high with a pale colored kind of sweet that he had never tried before. Something he had found randomly one day from a wandering salesman from across the ocean. He couldn't remember where exactly. The seller hadn't been a race foreign to Tendaji, so it was impossible to remember where it had come from. He picked one up, turning it over in his fingers before holding it out to Elka to try. It smelled good. He assumed it must taste good, too.
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Posted: Thu Aug 24, 2023 7:20 pm
Elka 6 Continuing to drink between replies, Elka suddenly sucked on air. Already? Had she really downed her entire glass this quickly? It wasn't like Kayde had skimped on her glass or anything. He had given her almost a full wine glass of it while giving himself half, knowing full well how much she loved it.
"You are. I'll give you that." She looked down in her glass as she spoke, pretending to swirl around nothing so maybe he wouldn't notice how empty the glass was. At the same time, she wanted him to see. He had the bottle over by him. This giant belly was getting more and more in the way lately. Before pregnancy, she would have easily gotten up on her hands and knees and leaned over for the bottle herself. Now she had trouble leaning forward. Which of course was what he now wanted her to do. Putting down her glass and placing the palm of one hand against the blanket, the other on her stomach as if she expected it to shift as she moved, Elka leaned forward as much as she could, almost taking herself completely off the blanket. Kayde leaned forward to meet her halfway, placing the candy delicately into her open mouth. She sat back down with a heavy sigh, taking a bite. An explosion of taste filled her mouth and she gave a little startled gasp at it. "What is this? This is different."
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Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2023 5:06 pm
Kayde 6 He had expected her to take the candy with her own fingers, not lean over as far as she could to avoid using her hands. Or at the very least, take it from his outstretched hand with her lips. Instead, she had sat there with her mouth opening, waiting. Since she had committed to it, he went along with it, putting it on her tongue and retracting his fingers before she closed her mouth. Little too intimate of an action for a woman with child, in his opinion. And it looked uncomfortable, to boot, leaning over her stomach as she was. He had had to resist the urge to get up and rush over to her side, make sure she didn't fall over into the fruit bowl.
Once she was sat back down and chewing on the piece of rubbery candy, he shook his head. Not an invitation for anything. Just a random tease. Of which he would not take the bait of.
"From a new seller in town. A passing merchant specializing in sweets from all over." Kayde picked up the bottle of fruit juice, glancing at her glass sitting on the blanket, now being completely ignored. Probably empty. He gestured toward it with the bottle, waving it back and forth slowly, chuckling at her eyes watching it. "I did buy this for you, you know."
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Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2023 6:52 pm
Elka 7 Elka licked a bit of the sugar off the side of her mouth, using the tip of one finger to brush it off afterwards. Tasty. "Pulling out all the stops tonight, aren't you?" she teased, pulling at her skirt where it tucked at her thighs. "I can't remember the last time I was treated so well." Looking up through her eyelashes coyly, her hands stilled on her thighs, ignoring for now the sound of the liquid sloshing about in the bottle. Tempting her with its aroma. "Perhaps we should be sure to have a big family so I can experience this more often." Giggling at herself, the woman picked up the glass and held it out finally.
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Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2023 7:00 pm
Kayde 7 "Of course." Pointing with the bottle at her stomach, clearly visible in the flickering light of the candles, Kayde shook the bottle a little harder, the sounds of the juice hitting the sides of the bottle louder than before. His arm was getting tired while she continued to throw teases at him. Still, he wasn't annoyed. This was hardly enough to annoy him. Besides, if she didn't want anymore after all, he'd just put down the bottle. No big deal.
Until she finally picked up her glass and held it out. Once more, he ignored her less subtle hints at flirting, merely smiling wider at her across the small bowls of random food.
"Lets not get ahead of ourselves," he warned, filling her glass and taking the bottle back to his side of the blanket, dipping it once more towards her. "I wouldn't want you to get too spoiled by the attention."
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Posted: Sun Aug 27, 2023 11:17 am
Elka 8 Oh, by no means was she thinking about moving ahead of their present situation any time soon. She wasn't one of those crazy women who wanted to be pregnant all the time. Nor did she have to. Her mother had had five of her own, but than there was the added pressure of being a rich man's wife. It was her duty to provide as many heirs as she could or bargaining chips in the form of daughters. Elka had the leisure of having kids for the simple sake of it. And slowly.
She gave Kayde a coy smile in response, bringing the glass up to her lips and looking at him over it, raising her eyebrows slightly as if in question. "I could never be spoiled by your attention."
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