Welcome to Gaia! ::

He grinned, leaning forward a bit as he took interest in what she was saying. Once again, she was proving that her life was much more interesting than his. Curses? Cures? It must have been hard getting bored.

"You're not rambling." he assured her, finding himself intrigued on the subject. "I think its great, actually. How long have you been studying to be one?"

Hearing her speak was like listening to a well-woven fairytale....though having seen what he'd seen of her and the places she'd shown him, Zhane knew it must very much be the truth.

His brow furrowed as she seemed to grow distressed at the recounting of what had happened and he fidgeted a bit where he sat.

When she'd finished speaking, a hand reached out to alight on her shoulder. "If you need any help....I mean, if you think I could do anything, I'd like to." he said. He didn't know what the curse was, and something told him it wasn't his place to ask about that in particular.

At her question, he shook his head, letting his fingers remain intertwined with her own.

"No. Not a clue." he told her. "My aunt kind of explained where my mom and dad came from, but it all sounds sort of....I dunno. Spontaneous. They didn't have parents or anything, they just appeared one night. From these little statue things."

He brought back to mind Karma's words when she'd explained the whole ordeal when he'd been younger. He'd found the whole idea overwhelming then, and age really hadn't made it any less so.

"I tried poking around some, but I couldn't find anything that would explain it. So I guess we're kind of led to believe they were some sort of freak accident."

Under the table, there was a faint and rhythmic thumping as the tip of his tail repeatedly swatted at the leg of his chair. "That's why it bugs me so much that they don't want to learn more about themselves or what those statues were...they have no idea if they're going to live a normal life or fall apart in a couple more years."

He quirked a brow at her at the sudden foreboding edge her voice had taken on at the last of the words, but at length, he nodded.

"It could be worth a look." he said at last, softening his expression back into a smile. "And if the answers I'm looking for are there, I'd love to have you there with me if I find them."

He felt like the current topic was dangerously close to teetering over the brink of "uncomfortable" and into "upsetting". And he was at a bit of a loss as to what to do to correct it.

Thankfully, he was saved as a cheerful-looking older woman approached their table.

"Hi there, my name is Karen and I'll be your server this evening. Could I start you folks off with something to drink?"

Dinner was quiet, and conversation was kept carefully in the realm of casual from that point on. They'd picked at each other over favorite colors, favorite animals, places they'd been, places they'd like to go, and various other small-talk topics.

By the time he paid the bill, Zhane felt like he'd gotten a much better scope of who Tinania was on the surface, and found he liked her even more for it. He hoped she felt the same of him as they walked, arm-in-arm back to the car and he let her in before climbing back into the driver's side.

"What do you think? Still up for coffee or want to head someplace else?" he asked her as he started the engine.

"Sounds like a plan to me. Long as you lead the way." He grinned, rolling them out of their parking spot carefully to avoid the other cars that had drifted in to fill the lot as they'd had dinner before they were on the road again, toward Barton Town.

As they stopped for a red, he stole another sidelong look at her, liking the way the lights of the busy street and the shop signs played through her hair and over her wings. It just went to show that she didn't need the benefit of a mermaid pool's shimmering light or the glow of the moon to look pretty. She just genuinely was.

It was one of the things he liked most about her -- the fact that she'd seemed nothing but genuine to him, faults and all. He'd never once felt that she was lying to him about anything, just that there were things she'd rather not speak of.

.....and it was those dark things lurking beneath her surface, regrettably, that concerned him. He had no idea how far down that particular rabbit hole went, but he promised himself that when the time came to drag those demons out into the open, he would face them with as open a mind as he was able.

As the silence spanned, he returned his eyes to the light, waiting for it to turn green, and vented a small sigh. It had no exasperation to it, it was just a sigh.

"Something on your mind?" he asked at length, watching the light change for the people waiting at the crosswalk as a few people scurried across the street.

He looked to her as she spoke, and then his eye fell to the gas tank needle, noting that it was still resting just below the F. Assuming they were going to get into this now, they could keep this drive going for quite awhile if need be...

"I know..." he agreed. "But..." he said, putting a hand lightly on her knee. "I don't need to hear it all at once, and I don't need to hear it right now if you'd rather wait."

Part of him wanted to wait, really....he didn't want a bad light potentially cast on the rest of their evening. But an equal part of him had felt that these things were going to keep rearing their head until they were out in the open and dealt with...