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 Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 7:54 pm
Jaione couldn't help but laugh in return, smiling at that thought. "I guess so. I'm glad that I went, despite the solitary conditions. I learned a lot while I was out there, different magics and such. All but water magic, at least," she said, nodding a couple times and chuckling at herself a bit. "That'll work even better, then," she said with a bright smile. "You could teach me about cooking and Luke could teach me water magic. It'd be like a different kind of school, just... with less people and more friends-since-childhood." The cattaur girl laughed once more, if only because of that bubbly feeling that being back here brought to her stomach, as well as the rest of her.
She jumped slightly at the clattering of the plate that Luke dropped, lifting herself up on her front paws and glancing over curiously. "Luke? What happened?" she asked, completely clueless as to his current actions. She hadn't the slightest idea of the events about to unfold...
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Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 8:10 pm
Vesna nodded. "See? You did something different. And I'd love to teach you about cooking." She grabbed for Jaione's hands, so happy that she was back and excited about what would be coming. The plans for teaching Jai and maybe learning a bit in return flew through her mind.
The plate dropping made her jump up. "Luke?" A soft knock on the door made her ears twitch. She laughed. "You forgot you'd invited her over for dinner, didn't you Luke." She glanced at Jai. Despite her friend's crush on her father, she was sure Luke didn't return those feelings. She hoped Jai wouldn't make a fuss. "I can't wait for you to meet Mistaya. She moved here while you were away." She ran to the door and tugged it open.
Luke shook his head in embarassment. "Yeah. I forgot." He wouldn't look at Jaione as he headed to the door, shoulders hunched in an almost apologetic and defensive way.
Mistaya entered in, shaking her purple and yellow haunches free of the snow. "Brr! Chilly night. I hope you made something warm Vesna!" Mistaya wore a woolen scarf and knit cap. She pulled these off, giving her honey-blond hair a shake. She gave Vesna a warm hug, then headed straight for Luke. "Hey there babe." She said, giving his cheek a tender kiss and giggling as the color returned to the male's face in full force, his cheeks turning pink.
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Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 9:13 pm
Jaione's ears flicked toward the sound of the knocking at the door, and blinked a few times. "Invited who...?" she mumbled to herself, nowhere near loud enough for anyone to have heard. Of course, it was only a moment later that Vesna answered her question almost immediately afterward, making the girl blink harshly. Had moved here... what? What was going on here? For a moment, this was a happy reunion, so much rejoicing and reminiscing and now... there was a completely different person, unrelated to any part of her childhood suddenly bursting into it. That didn't feel right for some reason. She'd been gone for so long, it seemed that she had completely forgotten that everyone else had gone on with their lives, even while she hadn't...
Her head tilted curiously, a childlike habit she'd never quite rid herself of, as the woman entered. It was strange, she looked rather similar to Jaione, herself, if it weren't for a few little details. At the very least, they were both similar in colour and predominantly purple. She followed the cattaur with her eyes as she crossed the room, seeming to not notice Jaione in the least. For some reason, this intrusion made her feel as though she didn't even exist anymore. But the main blow was the affection suddenly showered upon her friend's father, making her blink slowly, the realization taking a moment to click into place.
So, that was just it, then? She knew that she hadn't had much of a chance to begin with, being so much younger than he was, but now there was no chance for her at all, was there? She coughed softly into one of her hands, looking away from the two and blinking her eyes rapidly, clearing any sign of tears before they could appear in the first place. Righting herself in no more than a moment's time, she replaced any form of surprise or hurt with a confident, seemingly sincere smile, that had no form of happiness holding it up. It would trick anyone except maybe Vesna or her father, but she wouldn't have had any reason to hide her emotions from him, anyway. She approached the other woman calmly and extended her hand, the smile never fading for a moment. "You're Mistaya, right?" she asked kindly. "I'm Jaione, one of Vesna's friends. It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss."
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Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 9:49 pm
"I'll have to make something up for you. Luke ate already it seems." Vesna watched Jai closely, knowing Mistaya would greet Luke as she always did as of late. As much as she wanted her father with someone else, a pang of guilt fluttered her heart at the look on her best friend's face. Watching her attempted smile made Vesna fight for her own. It was for the best anyway. Right?
"One of my friends? Mistaya. This is my best friend ever. We've known each other since we were babies. She's come back from school and will live here with me and Luke." She said proudly.
Luke's eyes were downcast. He couldn't look at anyone. Why was he so embarassed? He had every right to be courting Mistaya! But even trying to glance at young Jaione seemed to send daggers into his mind.
"Sorry Mistaya. I made some soup for Jaione when she got here earlier. Seeing an old friend kinda pushed everything else from my mind."
Mistaya pouted, poking the blue cattaur's nose. "Aww Luke. You promised to cook for me tonight." But when Jaione introduced herself, with Vesna and Luke filling in the blanks, she brightened up from her suprise, not used to finding someone else here. "Oh, that's perfectly all right. We must take care of our friends. And you have such a pretty face. Oh my, now I feel like I'm intruding. You must have so much catching up to do! We can do this some other time if-" She was cut off by Vesna's protests, and sat down at her insistence, pulling the still red-faced Luke along to sit with her.
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Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 10:21 pm
Jaione laughed at her best friend's defense of their friendship, despite the bizarre clashing of opposing emotions that brought up. This was a weird feeling, some odd kind of jealously completely devoid of any kind of anger, along with the happiness of seeing all her friends again. After all, she had no reason to be mad at Luke; he had a right to be affectionate with other people. And Mistaya seemed like a sweet person, anyway, so she should be happy for them. She would get used to it eventually, right?
Jaione smiled and laughed genuinely, though it was a soft laugh, and she glanced over to Vesna. Perhaps she would need help in the kitchen...? One could only hope. She chuckled a bit at the woman's reply, but waved it off a bit. "Actually, there's not a whole lot of catching up left. I didn't do a lot while I was at school, and all. But it does seem that there were some things that Luke forgot to tell me about," she said teasingly, sticking her tongue out at the cattaur playfully. As far as acting was concerned, it seemed she'd gotten good at playing her parts. "It'd be fun to talk with you over dinner, though. Of course, I should probably go help Vesna in the kitchen..." the last part was mumbled slightly, and she started toward said room, at the very least to get away from a tension that she probably wasn't the only one feeling.
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Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 10:36 pm
Vensa smiled, relieved that Jaione was holding herself together. But she was curious about Luke's red face. What had happened when they were alone before she got there? She blinked at Jai and nodded. "Yeah. I can start showing you how to cook. It shouldn't take too long Mistaya."
She trotted into the kitchen and shut the door, needing a moment before turning to her friend. "I'm sorry you had to find out that way. Your return... I was just too excited to remember to tell you." She rubbed her arm awkwardly. "Are you terribly upset?"
Luke sat next to Mistaya, a weak chuckle at Jaione's 'teasing' squeaking through. "Slipped my mind." He muttered. Then he shook his head. Yes, he was okay courting Mistaya. She was here, and Jai hadn't been. Pulling himself up, he lifted his arm and wrapped it around the blond cattaur's shoulders affectionatly. It still felt odd, acting like this in front of his daughter's friend... But he was happy dating her.
Mistaya nodded. "All right. I'll be excited to see what you two cook up." Her tail twitched as she snuggled into Luke's side, a comfortable purr resonating from her chest, reaching up and resting her hand on his chest. She felt something odd in the air. One of her abilities was working with the spiritual air of others. But she thought it rude to pry without permission, so she tried to let it go; relaxing into the handsome male she felt so lucky to have found.
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Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 10:52 pm
Alright, now everyone seemed to be acting strange, even the perfectly-chipper blue cattaur she'd been so excited to see upon her return. Something wasn't right; had it really been that obvious that her teenage fantasies had just blown up in her face? She shook her head softly, following her friend into the kitchen with no more than a gentle wave back to the woman who was left alone with Luke. As soon as the door was shut, she leaned heavily against the counter, letting out a heavy sigh from the strain it had taken her to keep up her own happy visage.
She chuckled weakly at her friend's questions, and she shook her head. "I'll live. After all, she seems like a nice person. It's not like I had any chance either way, right?" the last part of this was obviously just her trying to convince herself that it was inevitable, her voice breaking partway through and tears glittering in her lilac eyes. She rubbed the tears away and sighed gently again. Despite the idea that it would always happen, that didn't stop so many of the choices she'd made in her life being influenced by Luke. Going to school and putting as much effort into learning as possible, to be able to show how much she'd learned and impress him when she got back. Even coming back; without Luke or Vesna, she probably wouldn't have had much reason to come back. Syem had understood her leaving and taken it as a mark of her adulthood; he hadn't expected her to come back, yet here she was.
"It'll take a while to get used to," she muttered, loud enough for her friend to hear, but not enough for her voice to crack. "But I guess I'll... just have to, huh? At least she's nice, though..." She smiled softly at Vesna, though it was sad, as she had no reason to not let her best friend see her emotions. "What about you? What do you think about her...?"
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Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2009 11:31 am
Vensa nodded. "She is nice..." She almost felt a guilt at letting Mistaya and Luke date each other now. Back then it had seemed a great idea. But she kept repeating to herself that it was for the best.
"She's a good person Jai. Smart, thoughtful, crafty. She dotes on Luke. She moved to the area a while ago. Luke met her in the market, and they hit it off right away." She scratched her neck and sighed. "Luke isn't usually so bashful when she's around." Her eyes opened inquisitivly and she walked over to Jaione. "Did... something happen before I got home with you two?"
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Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2009 1:53 pm
Jaione nodded a couple times at the agreement that she was nice. The cattaur laughed softly, putting on a smile that was muddled with some mass of emotions, nodding a little bit at the explanation. "I'm glad, then. At the very least, he can be happy with her if she's so sweet to him and all," she said, trying to get used to her 'no chance' idea by shifting to the more optimistic view, that this way Luke would be happy and she could go and find someone who would make her happy. In all honesty, the logic seemed simple enough, if it weren't for her emotions getting in the way to such an extreme.
At the question, Jaione's eyes widened a bit, face flushing slightly at the thought that Vesna would even suspect that anything happened. "No, nothing happened!" she replied, already settling back to her old self, if only for the moment. "We just talked for a while about stuff, and showed each other some of the magic we'd learned while I was gone." She spoke rather rapidly, as though trying to get the full summary out before Vesna had a chance to doubt that. "I mean, like, we were close and all, but nothing... happened-happened."
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Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2009 4:49 pm
Vesna lowered her gaze. "Then why did he look so uncomfortable? It was too much to simply be embarrased for forgeting the dinner. He had an excuse." She talked outloud to herself, pondering.
"I'm sorry. I had hope your feelings would have lessened over time. I should have said something to him. I should..." She sighed and hugged herself. She wanted Luke with Mistaya, but she was torn seeing her best friend in pain. She knew every twitch and crease upon the cattaur's face, and saw everything.
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Posted: Wed Jan 28, 2009 2:25 pm
"I'm not sure," Jaione replied with a bit of a shrug, despite it being a rhetorical question. Already, her mind was fuzzing over both her feelings for Luke, as well as the idea that he was currently seeing someone else. Perhaps it wouldn't take too long to convince herself that he'd been seeing the other cattaur for longer than she'd been away, but she'd simply never run into the woman? Oh, either way, it was something that she would learn to deal with whether she liked it or not. That shouldn't be too hard, right? Though, it would have been easier if this had happened while she was a child...
"Maybe it was because he never mentioned her to me?" she suggested. It seemed possible, after all; it would be quite embarrassing to completely forget to introduce a girlfriend to an old friend, especially if said girlfriend was going to be around later in the day. She sighed a bit when her friend hugged herself, and took a few steps forward to give Vesna a hug as well. "It's alright. After all, it would have been a bit awkward to have come home with him knowing that all of a sudden," she assured her friend, petting her hair just a bit. "And anyway, he might not be with Mistaya if you'd told him that. And she's so nice and sweet to him, that would have been a shame, don't you think...?" despite the fact of this being a positive statement, Jai couldn't keep the hint of sadness from her voice. She just had to keep telling herself that, at the very least, Mistaya was a good person.
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Posted: Wed Jan 28, 2009 2:55 pm
Vesna sighed as she hugged Jaione back. "Hey, shouldn't this be the other way around?" She smirked, standing taller to tuck Jai's head comfortingly under her chin. "Yes. She is very nice and sweet to him." She echoed back. She was going to say more when Mistaya knocked and walked in.
Mistaya felt heart heavy, shoulders and tail drooped slightly as she entered the kitchen. She placed her hand on Vesna's shoulder. "Don't worry. I'm still your friend. and Luke's." Then her fingers brushed Jai's cheek lightly, her speech soft. "And I'd like to be yours. You're very, very lucky. Hopefully, I'll get to see you around." Smiling sweetly, she turned and headed back out. Then the outside door could clearly be heard opening and closing as she left, leaving a very confused cervi in the kitchen, and a redfaced but oddly calm cattaur on the couch.
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Posted: Wed Jan 28, 2009 3:43 pm
Jaione chuckled a bit as Vesna rearranged their hug and leaned against her cervi friend a bit, hugging her around the waist instead. She nodded a bit at the few statements of the girl, before blinking rather abruptly at the announced intrusion. She straightened herself a bit, looking at Mistaya curiously. She blinked a few times, her tail flicking a bit at the tip. She smiled faintly, and nodded just a bit. "I'd like to be your friend, too," she commented, though she wasn't completely sure what the cattaur meant when she said that Jai was lucky. In fact, she had no idea what the other meant by that. Sure, she was lucky with her friends and schooling and such, but Mistaya didn't know about all of that stuff, did she?
Jaione's ears tipped backward and she looked at Vesna with confused violet eyes. However, it seemed that her friend was just as confused as she was. She frowned a bit, before she padded into the living room, standing beside the couch and looking at the door that had just been closed, before looking back down at Luke. "What just happened...?"
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Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2009 10:34 am
"Mistaya?" Vesna frowned deeply. "I don't know. That was odd. I didn't like how that sounded." Shaking her head she followed after Jaione to the living room. "Luke? Where's she going?"
Luke sat on the couch with his arms crossed over his chest. He knew the girls would be there soon to ask him about Mistaya. He sighed, gazing mildly into the fireplace. "Vesna. I'd like to speak to Jaione alone please." He held up a hand to muffle her protest, waiting for her to go back into the kitchen. Then he stood and paced a little.
"Mistaya is a powerful spiritual cattaur. She can see the feelings of others even when they can't see it themselves. And... she saw my feelings. I asked her to look." He shook his head. "I cared for Mistaya. Really. But... it didn't compare to how I feel about you." His eyes flicked up to meet Jaione's. "When you arrived, my entire mind changed on me. Helping you grow, seeing the adult you've become... She couldn't compare to that. And she understood." He scratched the back of his neck and looked at the floor.
"She broke it off. I was willing to try, but she knew. I suspect she told you girls not to worry when she went in there. She's right. She'll find someone who will put her on her own pedestal. But right now," He walked over and took her hands, his ice blue eyes gazing into her lavender gems. "-I have a pedestal waiting for you to sit on. If you'll take it, that is."
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Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2009 3:04 pm
Jai was probably just as confused as her friend was at this point, following the other girl with her eyes as she left, before looking at Luke, perplexed as to what he needed to talk to her alone about. Her ears twitched a bit as Luke stood and started pacing, her claws extending to gently scratch across the floor, though they didn't make any marks. She couldn't help feeling that she'd done something wrong or... something like that. She nodded in time with his speech, until it came to the part about his feelings for her. She felt her fingertips tingle slightly, flashes of electricity darting through her hair awkwardly. This was crazy; she was dreaming, right? ...right?! There was no way that Luke returned her feelings, right?
She bridled her electricity when Luke took her hands, watching their hands for only a moment before looking back up at the other cattaur. By the time he finished his speech, she felt tears prickling at her eyes, an irrepressible smile growing on her face. She bit gently at her lip, as the wider the smile got, the closer she came to crying, though these tears were quite the opposite of the ones she'd shed prior. She pulled her hands from Luke's and tossed her arms around his neck, burying her face in his shoulder and releasing a sound that was some bizarre mix of sobbing and laughing. "Of course I'll take it!" she said happily, tail swaying back and forth as she held Luke tightly. She chuckled softly, a gentle purr starting in her chest. "Luke? I'm not dreaming, right?"
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