girlsolo | [Oct. 13-20] full stops and exclamation marks

Kate's back to drinking tequila again. That's never a good sign. Tonight it's a sign she's bouncing between sexy check-in notes with Declan that make this island seem all right and people like Coraline screaming and crying over how much it fucking sucks.

The smart thing to do would be find Will or Magnus, talk some of this out. Even finding someone to spar with, that would work. Thing is, Kate's not that kind of smart. When it comes to helping Coraline? Sure. Yeah. She's been listening to Will do his shrink thing for years now. But when it comes to herself?

Fuck that noise. She'd still rather fuck and forget.

Kate leans her back against a post to watch the room, drinks another shot (hot wheels only, no training), and flirts at whatever makes eye contact. Whether she's Go or just Show, she hasn't decided yet. Mostly, she's trying not to look for anyone in particular. She's trying not to wish he'd come in and just...

Take her home.

[OOC: Find her at the Hub or the Winchester (let me know) any evening between now and the 20th. Available for all of your Freelander needs. If you need a specific date, email me, otherwise I'll work them out. For the record, Kate's very bi but a lot less available than she thinks she is.]

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"Superpowers?" I echoed, frowning in slight confusion. Had she not gone on to mention flying and magic, I might not have grasped what she meant by such a term. I gave a wry smile, unable to keep the smallest measure of bitterness from seeping into my tone. "No. What I get is to be a Prince of the Blood, third in line for the throne of Terre d'Ange. And had I not come here, a betrothal to the niece of the Cruarch of Alba."

"Was she cool, the niece of the...whatever? Did you like her?" Kate's got a real bug up her ass about arranged marriages. Some of the girls her mom wanted her to be friends with in Mumbai had them and they all acted like that was fine and normal. She shudders and sucks down a little too much of that beer she's been trying to slow down on.

"Cruarch," I repeated, my expression softening somewhat. Drustan was someone I respected; he was a good man, and as good a father as he could be to his two daughters though he must needs be elsewhere for much of their lives. "The ruler of the country of Alba, and the husband of Queen Ysandre. My marriage to Dorelei mab Breidaia was to strengthen the political alliance between our nations."

I paused, looking off into the middle distance for only a moment before my gaze sharpened and I turned it back to Kate. "And I like her well enough, but I don't know her. She seems...sweet. "

The way he says sweet almost makes her laugh. It's there in the curl of her lips and the spark in her eyes. Even if he's never been to her world, there's no mistaking Kate for sweet.

"And you wanted something a little less sweet?" she asks, watching him and trying to pick him apart. He's harder to read because his manners aren't familiar. "That must suck extra hard, married off to someone you don't know, who isn't your type, and everyone in the world watching so if you go looking for something you want more you're starting an international incident."

"In Terre d'Ange, it is a widely accepted practice for married couples to also have consorts, ones that are known and openly acknowledged," I explained. "But we would live in Alba, where such things are not looked upon favorably. I would be expected to be with her and her alone." Dorelei was sweet, I was not sweet at all, but somehow, if I was to agree to the marriage, I would have to find a way to find some gentleness within myself, for her.

Somehow Kate ends up staring bitterly into her beer glass that's mostly empty (she knows how). She drains it, then (stupidly, probably, but bad ideas are her specialty when she's drinking) orders another one with a tap on the counter. "Wish that were the norm here," she mutters, thinking of Declan. Why's he have to be so stubborn about her being with other people? It doesn't change how she feels about him.

She knows why that, too. It's not like she's all that keen on him climbing into bed with anyone else either.

"Perhaps I have not yet been here long enough to discern it," I ventured, "but it seems to me there is no such thing as one prevailing 'norm' here, save that no one do harm unto another." It seemed she was fixated on somewhat specific, perhaps that she did not wish sharing with a relative stranger, and understandably so. I could only give her my thoughts based on such things as I knew them to be.

"D'Angelines live by one precept, that of Blessed Elua, which says 'love as thou wilt'," I said. "To live thusly does not mean the same for everyone, nor could one possibly expect it to."

"Here on the island, yeah." Kate's noticed people don't seem too bent about what you do and who you do it with. There are a lot of openly gay couples, a lot more than at home, and if she's not exactly an activist, Kate still thinks you should fuck who you want to fuck and that's no one else's business.

"Where I come from, it's not like that, not like 'love as thou wilt'." It sounds familiar, but with as much alcohol as she has in her, she's having a hard time placing it. "It's more like your princess. A lot of us say we don't care who you're with and we don't. Pretty much right up until sex happens."

"I daresay love can be complicated regardless of where you come from," I observed, a bit wryly. Regardless of what we D'Angelines thought of love, and expressions of love, there were still emotions involved, still hearts that were meant to be handled with care or subjected to injury as the games of love and lust were played.

"I'll take your word for it. I'm not exactly an expert." Understatement of the century, unless they were sticking to family. That kind of love Kate knows how to do. It's just the mushy gooey seen-too-many romcom kind she's got no idea what to do with.

And that's kind of a problem, because she's pretty sure Declan at least thinks he loves her. Idiot.

"I don't claim to be one either," I replied with a shrug. "I'm simply learning as I go in the best way I know how, the same, I daresay, as anyone."

Kate nods and sips at her beer. She turns again and leans her elbows on the counter and shrugs down between her shoulders. "It's probably the accent. And the gorgeous. Good-looking French guys are like everyone's image of love experts in my world."

[Oct. 13-20] full stops and exclamation marks

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