For the prompt might I humbly request a house Gaggletack Slap Bracelets? Perhaps a double date of Stricklake and Lenmura or OR!!! omg - laser. tag.!!! O:
so despite trying to integrate all the elements of this it still feels like this is perhaps not exactly what you envisioned…?? they are, i swear, coming back from a double-date at laser tag ∠( ᐛ;; 」∠)_
491 words | local baby gay bullied gently mercilessly by little brother, film at 11
Nomura rounds on him. “You taught her nǒnat?!”
“She was curious,” he says, like that’s an explanation. Like it’s just some totally normal thing for a human to speak changeling, like he hasn’t broken about five thousand years of law just for his stupid, fleshbag crush. “And she’s not just any human, Nomura—”
“Yeah, because she’s the Trollhunter!”
“You’re just sore she beat us,” he says, because even in the human world, Stricklander is still the biggest brat in the Darklands. “You never think humans can do anything. So when you lost, at some normal human game—”
“She’s not a normal human,” Nomura huffs. “You just said so.”
“—when you lost,” he continues, “to a normal human, without the amulet or anything, you’ve always got to take your frustrations out on someone. And since it can’t be Lenora—”
“Oh, don’t you dare.”
He matches her eyes, like he’s going to try to stare her down. But after a moment, he just looks away.
“It’s not the worst thing, you know.” He switches back to English, then, like that’ll make this any easier to hear. “They’re not all as bad as they told us.”
“They’re humans.” She wants to believe him, but she knows, from experience, where Stricklander’s naiveté will get them. “One of them is the Trollhunter. You and I both know what they think of us.”
“They aren’t,” he insists. “At least—not all of them, anyway. And especially not Lenora, not when it comes to you.”
She snorts. “It’s a nice thought, adi. But you don’t know that—”
“Have you seen how she acts around you?”
She’s only spent most of the past few weeks thinking about it. The way Lenora laughs. Her skill in recitation. Her infuriating opinions on nineteenth-century drama. (As if A Doll’s House can hold a fucking candle to Gynt—!) Her excellent opinions on twentieth-century cinema. The way their hands have touched, or almost touched, exactly sixty-seven times.
Not that she’s counting, or anything.
“It’s still not an excuse to get cozy,” she says, as much to herself as to him. Then, with more emphasis: “Humans always act like that around their friends. Especially the girls.“
“Oh, Nomura.” He looks like he wants to laugh, then, which only makes it worse. “They definitely don’t.”
The heat that’s come over her cheeks is bordering on intolerable. Lenora’s hands are so soft, it’s not her fault she—she notices things. Collecting intel is her thing, it’s what changelings do. What they’re good at, what they’re made for.
So if the Lady didn’t want her to notice some fleshbag’s finer qualities, a very, very quiet part of her thinks, maybe She shouldn’t’ve made her so fucking good at it.
“Anyway,” she says. “It’s not important. I’m not—I’ve got responsibilities, adi.”
“I was just trying to help.” He shrugs, carefully nonchalant. “All I’m saying is, being her tutor makes a good excuse for lots of things. Coming over. Staying late.”
