you can call me honey if you want
Flora's nose scrunches as she nods in mock solemnity, the expression dissolving fast into a grin. "Okay, but what if there’s, like, an obstacle course? You’ve got to be in your swimmies, obviously. Running down the beach, looking good and making regional decisions and fending off a monster attack." She gives a smug little shrug as if she’s just invented the next evolution of governance. "Legit, that’s happened to me before."
The absurdity of it lingers between them like salt spray, only deepening when he offers up cats as the official anti-rain-makeout demographic. Her snicker is sharp and unrepentant, but her expression quickly shifts into something wide-eyed and falsely affronted as he teases her about excuses. "Never," she gasps with a hand to her chest, "I love that little curl."
But it’s his laughter that cracks her wide open again, that golden, rolling sound that doesn’t just fill the space—it lifts it. Flora dissolves into giggles so sudden and bright she can barely breathe, hiccuping into her arm as tears prick at the corners of her eyes, and soon it doesn’t even matter what the joke was. It’s just him. The air around him is always brighter. His laughter doesn’t just echo; it exclaims. Kai! Like he's a punctuation mark in her world, turning the ordinary into the impossible and delightful.
Even once the mirth ebbs, her cheeks still ache from smiling, her body loose and humming with the warmth of him. She huffs softly, nudging his shoulder with the tip of her elbow, her voice still laced with glee. "Hey. That fall wasn’t that far." She grins, tilting her head toward him. "There’s a very fine line between love and hate, right? So you didn’t fall—you just wombled around the border a bit." Her words are feather-light, but the glow behind her gaze is anything but.
Because his eyes—gods, his eyes—have her completely undone. That soft, melted amber could pour straight into her bones and still not fill all the places he’s touched. There’s something about the way he looks at her that feels like being pulled into the centre of gravity, like all the butterflies in her stomach just decided to take flight at once and beat their wings against the cage of her ribs.
Beaming at him, her voice turns soft, slightly breathless from everything he makes her feel. "No one’s ever like-liked me the way you do." She leans forward as if to share some delicate secret, expression turning sweet, lashes low, every detail poised for tenderness, only for her to murmur with exaggerated solemnity, "But also...the way this mud has dried on my ass?" Her mouth quirks, then trembles with contained laughter. "It feels like the worst wedgie ever." A wheeze of laughter escapes her as she bites her lower lip to hold back more. "Is it time to go wash it off yet or am I supposed to marinate longer?"
The absurdity of it lingers between them like salt spray, only deepening when he offers up cats as the official anti-rain-makeout demographic. Her snicker is sharp and unrepentant, but her expression quickly shifts into something wide-eyed and falsely affronted as he teases her about excuses. "Never," she gasps with a hand to her chest, "I love that little curl."
But it’s his laughter that cracks her wide open again, that golden, rolling sound that doesn’t just fill the space—it lifts it. Flora dissolves into giggles so sudden and bright she can barely breathe, hiccuping into her arm as tears prick at the corners of her eyes, and soon it doesn’t even matter what the joke was. It’s just him. The air around him is always brighter. His laughter doesn’t just echo; it exclaims. Kai! Like he's a punctuation mark in her world, turning the ordinary into the impossible and delightful.
Even once the mirth ebbs, her cheeks still ache from smiling, her body loose and humming with the warmth of him. She huffs softly, nudging his shoulder with the tip of her elbow, her voice still laced with glee. "Hey. That fall wasn’t that far." She grins, tilting her head toward him. "There’s a very fine line between love and hate, right? So you didn’t fall—you just wombled around the border a bit." Her words are feather-light, but the glow behind her gaze is anything but.
Because his eyes—gods, his eyes—have her completely undone. That soft, melted amber could pour straight into her bones and still not fill all the places he’s touched. There’s something about the way he looks at her that feels like being pulled into the centre of gravity, like all the butterflies in her stomach just decided to take flight at once and beat their wings against the cage of her ribs.
Beaming at him, her voice turns soft, slightly breathless from everything he makes her feel. "No one’s ever like-liked me the way you do." She leans forward as if to share some delicate secret, expression turning sweet, lashes low, every detail poised for tenderness, only for her to murmur with exaggerated solemnity, "But also...the way this mud has dried on my ass?" Her mouth quirks, then trembles with contained laughter. "It feels like the worst wedgie ever." A wheeze of laughter escapes her as she bites her lower lip to hold back more. "Is it time to go wash it off yet or am I supposed to marinate longer?"
