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The sensation seemed to drip down his nerves like warm, soothing water, relaxing muscles he hadn't even known were knotted. That stubborn voice in his head continued on with its litany of refusals- no, no, no, no...- but it had began to falter and dim in the face of such a calming touch. Chert gave a soft, unintelligible mutter as his shoulders slumped ever-so-slightly.

"I said, 'You tell anyone about this, and you're dead,'" Chert murmured, although originally he'd only sighed a fait "oh, hell" as he realized that his desire to boot her out of the door was outweighed by his desire to simply sit and have his scalp massaged.

"That's an excellent tactic," Chert said. "Asking the guarded person why he's guarded."

There was a faint sparkle of humor in his eyes, though. As he regarded her silently and pondered the question, the corner of his mouth gave a twitch to the side, not up and not down.

"It's easier," he said finally.

Chert thought back, and discovered that the stream of memories he had relating to that subject all ran together to form a muddy, uncertain mix. There was no large life event that had abruptly rendered him so. Just many years of small things accumulating- the pressure of his father's expectations, the slight but constant sting of never quite 'fitting in,' the insecurities that grew and festered in the privacy of his own head... He couldn't pinpoint them all and didn't desire to try, so he just said, "Pretty much. Have you always been so... you?" It wasn't meant as an insult, but he couldn't for the life of him come up with an suitable adjective to describe his impression of Antony.

Chert caught the unhappy look and raised his eyebrows slightly in question, but didn't go so far as to ask anything aloud. The silent inquiry was purposely made to be easily ignored- he generally despised people prying into personal matters, and made it a point not to do it to others.

Chert was still for several seconds, stunned into a passive silence by the kiss, but as the sensory information arriving from his lips finally penetrated his brain, his eyebrows began to climb up his forehead. He groped behind him with one hand as if searching for an explanation to this unexpected occurence, but found only the smooth surface of the wooden nightstand. A part of him recognized the kiss as pleasant (more specifically, those parts of him that lived below the waist-line). Mostly, though, he was just surprised. A stream of startled obscenities crept past his lips even before he began to pull backwards. They weren't angry, but they were constant, a little like the noise an alarmed bird makes when it's been caught off-guard.

The curses died out as soon as Antony started to speak, though Chert looked as if he was unaware of the vocalizations in the first place. "No," he admitted slowly. She wasn't- not by a long shot. But while his natural "density" allowed him to ignore most of what he didn't accidentally overlook, something as straightforward as a kiss raised concerns. 'Romance' was just another for 'complication,' after all. Not that Chert had anything but a vague, hazy concept of romance. Not that Antony seemed to be pursuing anything as soppy as romance. Still, he'd just barely gotten to the point where he could sit in her presence (or be sat on, as was more often the case) without wanting to slam down a gate between himself and everything else, when she tossed him another curveball. He was beginning to think there was no comfortable equilibrium to be had in her presence- she made even simple things like having a conversation incredibly complicated. She was complicated. But even though Chert normally enjoyed breaking down the components of the world into simple, easy-to-manage bits, he wasn't sure he minded the fact that Antony was an irreducible element.

It's just a kiss... The statement was slightly reassuring, whether it was intended to be or not. If it was just a kiss, there were fewer complications to worry about, and less reason to be defensive. At least, that's how Chert rationalized it as he met Antony's lips for the second time and somehow failed to pull away. One hand drifted downward to rest hesitantly on her hip, while the fingers of the other brushed gently against her jawline.