slow down, you're doing fine
Flora beams at him with the kind of knowing smile that needs no embellishment, her head tipping in an easy nod. "However you do it," she says softly, certainty ringing clear, "it’s going to be perfect." A laugh slips out of her as droplets scatter down from his horns, and she wrinkles her nose in playful protest even as her eyes stay warm and fond.
She sinks a little deeper into the water, letting the quiet settle between them the way it only ever does with people who feel safe, the steam humming around her shoulders while the jets murmur their low song. When he asks about Kaisel’s birthday, her gaze slides toward him, catching the way his dark eyes remain just barely open, and she answers with a crooked grin that carries more than a little affection. "I was going to throw him a party when I reopened the bar," she admits, voice thoughtful now, fingers tracing idle shapes just beneath the surface. "But progress on that’s been...slow." Her lips twitch, the smile crumpling at the edges as something heavier nudges its way in. "And things are still kind of tense between him and Koa," she adds, trailing off deliberately as she glances up at Asta with one brow raised, silently gauging whether he already knows the shape of that particular storm.
She shrugs, a small, helpless lift of her shoulders before brightening again, because she refuses to let the weight linger too long. "We’d talked about flying over Halo to see the auroras," she says, the idea clearly dear to her. "It was something we planned back when we were still just...pretending we didn't have feelings for one another." Her smile softens, hopeful and gentle. "I thought maybe that could be nice, but I also don't want him to think I didn't put in the effort to throw him a party, you know?"
She sinks a little deeper into the water, letting the quiet settle between them the way it only ever does with people who feel safe, the steam humming around her shoulders while the jets murmur their low song. When he asks about Kaisel’s birthday, her gaze slides toward him, catching the way his dark eyes remain just barely open, and she answers with a crooked grin that carries more than a little affection. "I was going to throw him a party when I reopened the bar," she admits, voice thoughtful now, fingers tracing idle shapes just beneath the surface. "But progress on that’s been...slow." Her lips twitch, the smile crumpling at the edges as something heavier nudges its way in. "And things are still kind of tense between him and Koa," she adds, trailing off deliberately as she glances up at Asta with one brow raised, silently gauging whether he already knows the shape of that particular storm.
She shrugs, a small, helpless lift of her shoulders before brightening again, because she refuses to let the weight linger too long. "We’d talked about flying over Halo to see the auroras," she says, the idea clearly dear to her. "It was something we planned back when we were still just...pretending we didn't have feelings for one another." Her smile softens, hopeful and gentle. "I thought maybe that could be nice, but I also don't want him to think I didn't put in the effort to throw him a party, you know?"
Flora
you can't be everything you wanna be before your time
