Vasilia swam through an ocean of polite fondness. To each who had faced her in the sparring ring, she offers not the same quip twice. A chance to start our record fresh, eh? But of course, I will be happy to beat the forms into you a second time. Darling, of course you need no such excuse to spend an afternoon together. And the ocean ends where the ocean must, on shores stained pink. 

The hum of the party fills the room, even if the party doesn’t. The ocean of fellowship ends where it must, on shores stained pink. No one is in a rush to get closer. There is no rush, to get closer. It will reach them, in time. All they have to do is wait. It is here, alone on the shores, where Vasilia leans against he railing, glass in hand, and stares long into the hole in the sky. She’d thought it might be like a yawning pit, solid color ready to swallow them up in a featureless abyss. The Rift is bright, searingly bright, but the Rift is a hole, and the Rift is a river, and she watches the flow of nothingness swirl and play in the wrongness.

“Drifting through; impossible.” 

Iskarot slumps into the space beside her. He holds his glass in a paw uncloaked. And Vasilia does not [i]stare.[/i] Staring is uncouth, ill-mannered, and horrifically droll. She lays eyes on him. Runs her gaze softly through the fur kept fastidiously trimmed, when no one but Hermes should have ever seen it. The Coherent design their bodies for aesthetics. The Hermetics for brutal convenience. She does not shy away from the joints and tubes. She blinks, once. Slowly. “Lucky that none of us are drifting, then?” 

He snorts. “Obviously. Your track record of willing mediocrity and dedication to self-preservation would not abide such an abrupt change of course.” With his free hand, he pulls a blunt from some secret pocket. Perfectly clean, and well-kept. The sort of thing one saves for a final journey. “Why are you even here?”

From the depths of a faded coat, she produces a battered lighter. The sort of thing one carries in hope of a friend’s need. She holds it steady, as Iskarot lights up. Keeps herself still, and patient. “I’ve rather had enough of being dead.” The light flickers in her eyes. A tiny, faithful spark of red against the drowning pink. “It’s high time I lived, for a change.”

Either the answer was satisfactory, the blunt a marvelous one, or this hour’s allotment of words depleted. It is enough. They stand, watching, long enough for the space between them to shrink, and their shoulders to brush together. Not quite long enough to risk a sip of the wine [i]she[/i] served her. But long enough for her other side to feel rather empty.

She casts a glance back, and at once she finds the splash of soft, creamy white amidst the crowd. Dolce has stopped beside Jil, who is animatedly trying to show him a word or two in the Lantern’s tongue of touch. A difficult task, when your student is ninety percent airy wool by volume, and petting his arm more insistently only gets you a soft, silly smile. It’s hard for him not to wander, poor thing. Doesn’t know how to handle a party he’s not working at. Four times he has made valiant forays into the thick of it. Four times, he has found more friends to speak to. Three times, his orbit has returned to her side. All she has to do is wait.

Her hand clutches at empty space.

She downs a glass of courage. Pauses. Scowls, sharply. ”[i]Dammit.[/i]” she mutters. “The absolute [i]gall[/i] of her…” She does not recognize the vintage, the type, and the pink makes it difficult to discern color, so she cannot say for [i]certain[/i] that it’s her favorite, so this is a perfectly fair amount of credit to give. And she walks through the crowd, wading into a sea of fondness. Here and there, a face from the sparring ring halts her, and again fresh charm springs to her tongue. A chance to start our record fresh, eh? But of course, I will be happy to beat the forms into you a second time. Darling, of course you need no such excuse to spend an afternoon together. And somewhere, her orbit reaches its conclusion, and she clasps Dolce’s little hand in hers. 

Somewhere, the line exists between love and like. And she will never find it, if all she does is wait.