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"A toyger," Jada explained, "is a breed that was bred to look like tigers in coloration and fluffiness, without the teeth and man-eating. They started breeding them back in the 80's, and are still a work in progress, according to all the research I've done on them." She'd done a lot of research after picking up the kitten, and had been stunned to see that such a hard-to-obtain cat had just been tossed out. She'd wanted to know about any peculiarities, health issues she would have to watch out for on her new baby. (So far, his only peculiarity was a fondness for playing with her toes.) "I thought he was a girl though, until the doctor told me otherwise. I am terrible at telling genders." she waved her hand, wrinkling her nose.

Oh, the irony.

She felt the other girl jump when she reached out for her, and her brow crinkled. "I'm sorry. I forgot." But Kirin didn't pull away so neither did Jada, tugboating the other woman along with a spring in her step that very few people could tell had become a habit more than a personality trait. "It never hurts to ask. The worst she can tell you is no, and I've found if you have a fuzzy little creature in hand when you are asking, they find it harder to say no. Maybe just have a friend lined up willing to take the kitten in if the landlord says no, and you can visit until you can find a place that will let you have them."

"Crystal canceled a lot of stuff, with all the people in comas last year. Like my graduation ceremony. I just kind of got promoted to DCU." They were hardly going to refuse her, after all. "I'm sorry to hear about your dress. Your date wouldn't take you out for a nice night on the town or anything?" What a jerk. She clucked her tongue at the other girl's grimace. "I can see why you were at the Singles Party then." she grinned, raised her eyebrow. "I wouldn't wish another year of being single on anyone."Much less herself. Her New Year's resolution had been to get a date without her mother's mischief involved. Just one. She knew some men she could ask to take her on a date, but that would just be awkward.

The heiress hummed, tilting her head up at the man who came to take their drink order. "Iced tea, lemon on the side. We'll have the fried calamari appetizer, and..." she glanced at Kirin, "What do you like? They have mushrooms and cheese sticks, if you like them?" The girl was apparently the take-charge sort! In fact, Jada already knew what she wanted, and her menu was closed, but she looked comfortable and patient. Not everyone knew what they wanted to eat before they came to a restaurant they had never been to before, after all. It would be easy enough to open it up and verify they had it. And every Italian place she'd been to lately had Calamari.

This one was no exception, from the way the waiter looked at Jada's 'date' appreciatively, head cocked to the side.

"Not a clue." she told him honestly. "A little lion would be adorable though." She looked worried when Kirin broke into a coughing fit, almost reaching across the table (as if she could pat her on the back from here! Well, she could, but it would be awkward to explain.) "He-" Jada's jaw dropped, and she hid a flustered smile. "I can see how that would be... well. Awkward is such a useful word sometimes."

That would be terrible. That would be just Jada's sort of luck. Really, she'd get interested in a guy just to find out that he was gay, or married, or (as had seemed to be the case, with the way things had progressed with Marlo, just not interested. Anyway, a guy as well-dressed as Marlo had to have something quirky about him he hadn't admitted to her anyway.) She scowled, taking a swallow of water. "Men are nothing but trouble anyway." she told the other woman, wrinkling her nose lightly. "You can never understand them." Most of the old guys- heck, even the younger guys- in her social strata were too busy being threatened by anything that wasn't plastic-chested and bleach-dyed blonde to... she set her glass down, not even making a thump on the table, no matter how visibly her annoyance at her train of thought had flashed across her face.

"If you're ready for the entree, Kirin?" Jada flipped open the menu, quickly locating her goal. And... ohhhh. That was positively sinful, and she could taste it on her tongue already. "I'll have the veal and lobster ravioli, please. Light on the sauce, Caesar Salad as the side." She was committing a dangerous sin against her diet-- Baby cow and cockroach of the sea.

It was worth it.

Jada gave her new friend- Jada chose who was going to be her friend quickly and decisively, and Kirin looked like she could use a friend- a sad little smile. She was right, but there was nothing that the girl could say to it. Kirin was right, people stomped on each other's hopes and dreams all the time, and Jada was no exception. Like the homeless man, who had looked at her so hopefully, so briefly. And Jada, who had shied away because he smelled, and left him to eat out of the garbage can. Her suit and shoes cost more than some people could make in a month, and... If anything, she looked mildly ashamed of herself.

Violet eyes watched the other girl flip the reddish-gold hair over her shoulders. "Good choice," she told the other girl, and smiled at the waiter. He walked off with one last, hopeful look at the cute girl in the uniform. Jada might not want to be Kirin's friend after all. Damnit. What could she say to add anything to the conversation? "There are exceptions to any rule. I, unfortunately, am as base and self-absorbed as accused. When one has privilege, one would often go to extraordinary lengths to keep it." she reached up, stroking the bruise that streaked her cheek.

Jada would definitely not want to be Kirin's friend if she knew about his- her- metabolism. Jada ate everything, delighting in the tastes and textures that burst across her tongue. (As a child, she'd even sworn that she could taste colors. Her mother had been furious that the kindergarten teacher had let her eat enough crayons to poo rainbows for a week.) As she got older, it had been dubbed an 'oral fixation,' especially as she got a little tubbier, day by day. And it was never that she ate because she was hungry, but because she wanted to know what foods tasted like. Luckily her parents had discovered that she enjoyed exercise almost as much as food and encouraged her to do things like dancing, horseback riding and jogging. Now as Sailor Scylla, and a regular gym occupant, her body was as tight and toned as it had ever been. Six to eight miles a day of running definitely helped. All she had to do was remember to burn calories, and she could eat like a pig.

It also helped that she'd learned control since she was an eight year old porkchop, as her mother had called her.

Huh. Kirin looked mildly discomfited by the waiter. Jada had never minded being admired, it was hard to be self-conscious and want to be a fashion model at the same time. "We can always shoot each other an appropriately doe-eyed look the next time he comes to fill up my tea." Jada commented, finishing off the glass. She drank like a fish. If it was alcohol, she'd be plastered.

"I'm flattered you lumped me as an exception." Jada rested her chin on the back of one hand, blinking as the other girl commented on her facial decoration for the first time. "Unfortunately, I helped you for my own entirely selfish reasons." she tapped the other girl's foot lightly under the table. "I can't really take any credit for it. Though I will, since you insist." the heiress grinned, entirely unashamed of herself. "I wasn't taking it as a judgment, anyway. Let he- or she, in our cases- who is without sin cast the first stones, and I'm sure you've been a little selfish yourself at some point. What I meant is that I am, unfortunately, directly pegged by what you said." She'd been thinking about this a lot lately, while she tried to de-stress. "I've been listening to this New Age stuff, a little relaxation while I am in the car, and one of the techniques I am currently experimenting with is self-examination." Jada had to find her own faults, and pick at them like a pimple, though it wasn't their word for it. "I think maybe I should find those guys and make them examine their own mistakes."

Speaking of those guys. Damn. The door opened, and Jada reached across the table, brushing an invisible lock of hair away from Kirin's cheek. "Enter the trouble-making villagers, stage right." She leaned back in the booth, not bothering to try anything more intimate for their friends. "As for the things that... the people," she corrected quickly, "who gave me my stylish makeup, they learned that you get what you give." Multiplied by some, when there was a twelve-armed octopus at your disposal. "I'm not leaving because of the goons. I want to enjoy my meal. It isn't like they're going to come over here and barge in on us." Not if they knew what was good for them. "So you got the crab salad? You'll let me have a bite, right?"

"That's what they say." Jada's nose wrinkled, sharing what she felt about that theory. Other than the fact it was terribly true, the process of lying to oneself was also terribly overused. Especially by her, which made her much happier than the s**t she was listening to lately. "Actually," she confessed, "It came as a free CD along with one of the other things I bought, so I figured, why waste it?" (Free with the adorable little belly-dancing kit that she'd picked up at the bookstore. She'd gotten the little finger cymbals, and a cheap sash, and little body jewels... Audrey had made such a face when she'd seen Jada in her belly dancing getup. Szelem had looked even unhappier-- though admittedly that may have been because she hadn't known Jada had her belly pierced.) "Surprisingly, the self-help course is making me much more cynical about life. If I have to lie to make myself feel better, who doesn't?" It was a brutally egotistical shot, one that said a lot about how she saw her life.

As for the goons... "Only a little?" she asked, watching the hostess seat them with a stiff little smile on her face that said she wasn't happy to see them. "But no," she said absently, "This is actually probably one of the best." Jada didn't have many dates to base that off of, and was so focused on being nosy that the 'joking' the other woman was probably doing completely shot by her. Previous dates had included Douglas Carson, who had thought she was dressed like a slit because her skirt showed off her knees; Ebenezer Scringe had expected her to pay for the five-star restaurant her mother had insisted he take her to (Jada's mother found out later he was declaring bankruptcy, and that man was struck off the potential candidate list); Mike Dawson had picked his nose at the table. All of these men had gotten past her mother's screening. Jada had never gone on a date with someone she'd picked for herself. She still hadn't. And with her mother being back in town, and back to schmoozing all the unmarried men over the age of 40, the bad dates were likely about to start back up again, and Jada just didn't have time for all of that.

She turned her attention back to Kirin, opened her mouth, and had asked her about the salad. The response from the other girl, the lazy smirk and the casual coyness, made color flush to Jada's cheeks and her fingers rise to her lips as she ducked her head, just a little. She could have covered her face, but she'd been trained out of that as her embarrassed gesture some time ago. She still did cover her face, rarely, but not for an action which was just surprising more than a genuine embarrassment. The waiter was walking back their way, a new glass of tea in hand. "You couldn't think of a better nickname for me than babydoll?" she asked, watching as the glass was switched, ignoring the startled look they both got. "I mean, lunch is on me, so wouldn't I be sugarlump or some other appropriately masculine nickname?" the color was still high on her cheeks, and she was trying not to laugh at herself. (Did Jada know she was pouting?) Kirin's wink made her cluck her tongue, shaking her head. "I think you would need to be the doll today, not me."

Jada decided that she was stupid. Touching the other girl hadn't bothered her, but the mockingly flirty words had made her face color up? Her acting skills stank, she decided. Luckily she didn't pretend to be a lesbian often. Or ever, actually. There was a first for everything. The waiter walked away, and Jada's face was still cooling from the heat that had rushed into it. "But it is so good to know what's yours is mine, especially as I was preparing to fight you to the death for the bread, when it comes." her joke was easy, and she said it lightly, but the way she eyed the garlic rolls on the table nearest them, she might not be joking. Jada wasn't sure yet. They sure smelled fantastic anyway.

Her purse was buzzing again, and she pulled out her cell phone. Her lawyer, suggesting that she come back early from lunch if possible. Jada's fingers flew over the keyboard, and she threw the phone back in her purse. "Mothers are troublemakers." If it wasn't for Szelem, Jada could be doing any number of other things right now. Like going to class. Next semester was going to be so much lighter, though. Six classes was too much to keep good grades and stay on top of her senshi duties. Right now, she was running a high 'B' in her management course- unacceptable by Jada's standards. She'd try four next term, she had decided. It was already too late to drop a class without losing the money, but she'd been thinking about it. Still, she had no logical reason to do so this semester. She could always retake the 'B' course, anyway.

Jada smiled, her 'public' smile. The one that said, 'yes, I am competent, yes, I am strong.' Because face it- she was both of these things, a large percentage of the time. But life cracked down sometimes. She could have people to confide in, if she dared. She could talk to Ares, she could talk to Elke, but they had both found their niches. Ares-- and Fallon, too-- were content forgetting that Fallon had ever existed, focusing all their time and energy into being guardian of the world. Elke had found something that contented her, Jada could see it sometimes when she saw Virgo from a distance, even though she still hadn't spoken to her.

Jada was balanced on the edge of a knife, and if she wasn't careful, if she fell, it would cut her too deeply to repair.

The smile lightened at Kirin's surprise to her casually said comment. "I've never picked a date of my own." she said finally. Well, that wasn't true. She'd been interested in guys, but life had always stepped on her careful plans. "Most of my dates have been with men my mother chose for me. She seems to think my fiancee should come with a pre-made family for me. Maybe some stepchildren about my own age, if you catch the drift?" Jada paused, letting the waiter set their appetizers down between them before dipping a few pieces of the squid onto a plate for herself. When he walked away, she shrugged at last. "I don't really have a 'type' that I've noticed. Most of the crushes I've had have ended up pretty miserably on their own front. My mother doesn't approve of my taste in men. My father would support me if he had half a chance, but I think my family can intimidate anyone with a spine of less than titanium." More specifically, though she hated to say it, Szelem had managed to scare off all the guys Jada crushed on. Ever.

"I think, however," Jada said, her courteous little mask sliding into place, hand dropping back down to sit in her lap, "That I will call you..." she let the middle and ring fingers of her right hand tap lightly against the tablecloth, considering the other woman's face carefully. "Sugarlips." she took a neat little bite of her calamari, manners and sitting position while she ate positively impeccable.

"You know, most people say they don't have problems with their mothers." Jada said finally, bitterly. "But I'm sorry for making you listen to me rant. That was certainly not my original intent." she swallowed. "As much as I may complain about her, I'm sure she loves me." she looked down at her plate, poking around the fried foods. "I think." The last part was a whisper, barely audible over the clinks of china and glassware, the shuffling of feet on the carpet, and the loud noises coming from the table where their friends were sitting, avidly watching them.

The high opinion of her had to have come from the confident front she put up. Jada loved hearing that the other girl thought so much of her from such brief interaction. "I brought it up," she said finally, "So it became your business to say whatever you want." Once one opens their trap, it is open season on their words, after all. "You have very valid points. I could sneak out and have a date, now." she certainly had the sneaking out part down pat. "I live on my own now, it isn't even a question of sneaking." she puffed out her breath, and for a moment she seemed to deflate. Confidence, maturity, poise, she let it slip away for the duration of one breath, and for a moment she was just a tired teenage girl, with eyes older than her years. "I'm eighteen, Kirin, and I have no idea what I'd do with a boyfriend-- or, hell, a girlfriend!-- if I got one. Kiss them? Hold their hands? Let them take me out for cheesy dinners and moonlit walks on the beach like in my romance novels? I don't have time for it, now, for all of my griping." It galled her to admit it. "I go to school five days a week, and a lot of my evenings are caught up in... things. Studying. The gym. I spend so much time in the gym." She lifted her jacketed arm, patting it. "I've never really snuck around behind Mother's back." she said it finally, thoughtfully. "Not unless it was something Important." there was an audible capital I. "I finally told her to shove off about guys, and it actually lasted... oh, a good eight months." Jada actually sounded pleased about it. Of course, that was after she found out she was actually, apparently, in an arranged marriage to a man three times her age. That was actually the straw that had split her parents up for good.

Huh. And her mother hadn't learned?

She noticed something brittle in Kirin's face, and Jada's head tilted to the side, watching the other girl carefully. Even through the redhead's glee at Jada's nickname (her laughter was loud enough that Jada actually hid her face in her hands this time to hide her own giggles) the question remained as to why the look in the other girl's eyes? But unlike Jada, Kirin hadn't opened herself up for questioning. "Yes," Jada agreed with the other girl, brandishing her salad fork questioningly in the direction of Kirin's salad, "You will have to be original. Are you still sharing, snicker-doodle? That expression on your face looked positively delicious."

Kirin had a point, and that the point had been acknowledged was clearly written on Jada's face, along with a... regret. They could work it out, Jada supposed, but now the family lines were being divided down the middle. It was Michael vs Szelem in a lot of ways, and their kids were being tugged into the whirlpool that remained from the destruction of their love. She wasn't in the habit of airing all her dirty laundry to a stranger.