Sweets For My Sweet

Melia has always kept a rather strict internal clock. She's not really had any other choice.

Tick, you'll be late for the audience. Tock, the First Consort is expecting you. Tick, there's no time to dally with Kallian in the atrium behind the throne room. Tock, Father is getting older and older every day.

The clock hasn't stopped since the Bionis fell into the sea. Quite literally, she doesn't know what's coming next, but that hasn't stopped them from pinning and needling their way always towards and then around it.

You know what they say: on and on and on and on.

So Melia is stood there, tick tock tick tock tick tock, in the foyer of the house she shares with Sharla, tock tick tock tick tock tick, waiting for Fiora, tick tock tick tock tick tock, to appear.

It had already been hours since they'd been up, brushing out their hair a hundred, thousand, million strokes until Sharla had peeked in, groggy-eyed fast turning to horrified, and exclaimed something generally about how she'd go bald if she didn't stop that, Sharla thought, how can a person have that much hair on their head, and Melia had pursed their lips, remembering insistently not to bite them, and pulled out the topmost layered braid to try again.

Yes, she's not used to losing the very same quantity by volume of hair as feathers she molts off every day, but if she's going to be doing her hair, then she's going to get it right, Bionis darn it.

For Fiora. If it were any other day - or even any other person, really - perhaps Melia wouldn't mind so much. And of course, intellectually, they know that there's literally no other person on not-Bionis who would care less about a sticky little bump in their braids, a slight imperfection or laziness in one of her trademark spiral curls...but no. This is Melia and Fiora we're talking about. So of course she has to get it absolutely right.

And she'd resolved to do the crown braids herself, too, instead of waiting for an eager attendant such as Sharla would surely act to help them. So it had taken many many tries, and seemed like such a laborious task even though they knew - they knew! - that they had done it countless times during the conflict, and certainly at least a few after, even if most days she'd cheated and done just the curls, because who was looking?

Why was today different? Somehow Melia just couldn't know. But, regardless, that had been over and done with, and then she'd worried about whether or not she'd need perfume dabbed behind her eyes and inside her wrists, or lip glosses on the places they specifically hadn't bitten, you know, or should they have done their nails, or been more careful about filling in her eyebrows, or, or, or !

So. So just as we said, Melia is standing right behind the door (manually adjusted, then, to be a another few paces farther and further back than that), not knowing what to do with her hands, because they had relented and let Sharla be the judge of the shape of the decently-sized bow cinching off the waist on her dress, and maybe this collar hadn't been such a good idea because the frill is just the slightest bit scratchy and how could Melia have forgotten that she hates the grisly little slip-slip-slip of tulle, even though this isn't quite that, and oh, there's a lock of their hair somehow loose behind their ear, and--

Ah. Rambling again. If there's one good thing about the clock, it's that Melia can always rely on it to tick-tock tock-tick her into a state of mostly head-emptiness, so she thinks about it now, hands clasped firmly over the skirt and nose pointed directly down between their shoes. Indeed, it is fairly useful, when it's not a distraction from something more important going on - either by way of being a stressor or simply by way of...

Oh? What were they thinking about?

No matter. There comes a knock at the door.

Schooling herself and attached thoughts or lack thereof one, two, three, tick, tock, tack, Melia steps forward, minding the creaky floorboard, and opens it.

"Melia!" Fiora exclaims, bringing one hand out from behind her back to her bangs to brush them aside and then not doing much of anything else.

"Fiora," Melia returns, more sweetly than flatly, to her credit, and they both stand there vaguely admiring either's assorted states of dress (Fiora in a blush pink puff-sleeve dress with embroidered strawberries dotted all over and a bow in the front, Melia in an even paler top layer studded with printed hearts with a bow in the back over a cream-colored lacy shirt) for just a few seconds too long.

Ah, so I needn't have worried, Melia thinks, she's no fancier than I am, so it's all okay. But meanwhile, oh gosh, they look so divine, Fiora thinks, I should have dressed up so much nicer - is this dress even appropriate for a date with a princess?

Effortless, notes the one. Gorgeous, notes the other. And oh, would you look at that, she's here to see me - ME!

Oh, they can practically hear Sharla stifling a shout to get on with it, already.

Eventually, Melia taps a nervous beat on the floor, perhaps without even thinking. "Oh, right!" Now her guest brandishes the hidden hand, and the main attraction is quite definitely meant to be the bouquet of lively blooms she's holding, but Melia ends up focused on the chained circles of flowers dangling off Fiora's wrist instead.

"I brought you these," says Fiora, thrusting them out in sync with Melia's raise of a questioning splay of fingers. "Oh, yes, and these are for our hair! I thought we could put them on together. See-" she makes sure Melia takes the nosegay with all trepidation before seizing one of the circlets and plopping it gaily atop the crown of her head "-just like that!"

"Just like that," Melia repeats in a bare murmur, of a sudden not knowing what to do with the bouquet if she's meant to do the same, because they are quite unconfident that they'll be able to perform this maneuver one-handed.

Apparently, however, she needn't have worried, because Fiora soon steps forward to get 'er done herself. "Now you can have two crowns," she giggles, and Melia is very conflicted at that, why she'd thought at first that they should hide their smile. Not that Fiora's looking in the least, but you know.

She tiptoes up to get the best angle, begins to settle the circlet down atop, and then... "Oh. I feel silly - this'll never fit quite the same, because of your wings."

Because of your wings. Melia had indeed had quite a few "never"s associated with causal-not-casual things owing to her wings. But, she certainly isn't about to let this one stop them.

"You can pull them through, I don't mind - you will be gentle, won't you?"

"Like a baby bird," Fiora promises. It takes everything Melia has not to jump a little at the sudden touch, but Fiora is indeed ginger as she makes sure to bend the base and ruffle the feathers the absolute least amount possible, just dipping one side of the circle down and then the other.

"There." She steps back, and Melia feels tentatively at their new crown. Not too off-kilter, but if it is, well, maybe that's just how she can share in Fiora's charm.

And what does the unusual girl herself think? "Oh, Melia, you look beautiful. I almost wish I had brought you sweets instead, because the flowers don't even look half as gorgeous as you do right now, and they'll only wilt, but you never will, I don't think."

"Sweets?" Melia queries. "Why ever for?"

(Because Melia knows, privately, that Fiora is an enjoyer of white chocolate, and not just as an entirely separate confection from the usual milk-dark family but as a legitimate chocolate in its own right, and so perhaps they're glad of the opportunity not to have to partake, because it certainly wouldn't be an indulgence. What? She can pick her battles, can't she?)

"Oh, well, you know..." Fiora all but kicks one foot back and forth, bashful with fingers knotted behind her waist again. "Like the song, sweets for my sweet?"

"I hadn't heard it," Melia replies softly. "It sounds lovely."

Fiora nods, not so firm as goofy. "I think it's very nice - and it matches us, too!"

"Oh? Tell me."

"Silly Melia," Fiora singsongs, but starts in humming anyway. She seems to count bars and rhythm in on her fingers for a bit before supplying her all-important evidence: "Well, they say 'your first sweet kiss thrilled me so', and I certainly think that's true."

Oh. Well. That's...good to know, I suppose. Melia blushes and averts her eyes nonetheless.

"Oh, I don't know, they talk about smiles and dreams and stars in the sky, and they say...oh, yes."

"Yes?"

"They say that I'll never ever let you go."

The time had just about flown, once Fiora had arrived, and indeed the clock keeps ticking, a needly little reminder that they're meant to go up to Outlook Park right about now, and leave the house to Sharla for whatever date with Vanea or Linada or whoever she's been cooking up, but...

Melia is just then very staunch, even effortless, in their unilemmaed choice not to mind it, clasping Fiora's left hand with her own left wrapped around the other girl's waist, bouquet yet lingering, and just staring, staring, staring into her gorgeous green eyes for what feels like forever.