not very twinny

Dash reached for the bottle after she had poured a glass for herself so that he could do the same. Setting the bottle down on the nearest table, with now the recollection of everything that had happened the day before, he let out a light chuckle. Not that the moment was funny at all but the situation itself was something to laugh at. "I'll see them again at Christmas, I'm hoping it'll blow over by then but, yeah, I'm probably not gonna visit much until then." He took a sip out of his glass, finally tasting exactly what it was that had left Lil to be here of all places. It wasn't bad wine. "Obviously, in retrospect, I should've told them a lot sooner but it's a hard topic to bring up casually, believe it or not." His mouth tugged at the corner of his lip, finding the small admission nice to hear. He took another sip before his smile got any bigger. "Yeah, I didn't know you'd be here again after last time." It felt like a risky thing to be said but if he didn't mention it, there'd just be an elephant in the room the entire time she stayed.

It'd been maybe an hour now since Lil had arrived at his apartment, and any sort of anger she'd had toward him had somehow melted, dissipated with the more wine she drank. She was growing comfortable now, back in her old ways of being too secure with him before he had completely blinded her. The conversation had shifted from his marriage and telling his family, to her breakup with Kelsi, and now, it seemed, the two had gotten completely caught up: as though they'd never separated.

Having a mess of a time on Thanksgiving really made Dash appreciate the fact that he didn't live there anymore. Not that his family wasn't a great help during his recovery during the summer but there was obviously a need for a limit on how often he saw the rest of the Parrs. Although there was an offer to stay in his family's house through the weekend, he had to respectfully decline so that he could unwind from the drama he'd unexpectedly walked into. Dash thought he was going to make it through the weekend without any more surprises but a text from an unanticipated source surely kept his interest up. He didn't even see how quickly plans were made, they just sort of happened and suddenly he had Lillian Deville coming over in a matter of minutes.

Lil hummed in disapproval at his excuse, having nearly forgotten for a moment that he'd been struck so badly just a few months ago. She could only blame their reversion to being only coworkers for the fact that she'd tucked away the memory in the back of her brain, much like the rest of their relationship for a while. It had been better that way, except, all of a sudden, a few glasses of wine and heartbreak had gotten her to practically erase any progress she'd made since February on the Dash front. Strangely enough, now that she was here, she didn't regret the text and series of events that had led her here: if anything, it was nice, being able to return to what they once had.

-timeskip to mid-november-

Ever since Kelsi had admitted to going behind her back about finding out more about her and Dash, Lil had felt a shift in things between the two. She couldn't believe that she hadn't just asked her: Lil would've just told her about it, if she'd known her girlfriend really wanted to know, but she hadn't thought it'd make that big of a difference. Things between her and Dash were over, that was all Kelsi really needed to know. All of the internal rage she'd felt over the past few months had prompted her to join an intramural league to supplement her coaching, and honestly, it had been working. It would've been more effective had Kelsi stayed home, but she'd invited her before she'd known about her girlfriend going behind her back, and she'd kind of completely forgotten to uninvite her in how pissed off she'd been. Still, she took the water bottle from her with a small smile, knowing how little Kelsi probably enjoyed sitting there just watching. "Yeah, it was a good game," she replied simply. Though she didn't particularly feel like going to get food with Kelsi, she was starving. "Sure, yeah, we could get something. I wanted to, um, talk to you about something, anyway, so, we could do it over lunch, if you want."

dash: and you’re so good at it. no wonder you do it all the time

lil: it’s okay, some things aren’t meant to be

He couldn't help but lightly chuckle at the way that situation had played out, the irony on how easy it could be to label things wasn't lost on him. "You dropped it on her out of nowhere? Bold move, Deville, I have to respect it." He offered up the first genuine smile he'd given in a while, it was actually nice to hear that things were going good for her. He wished he could say the same or give any updates on his life but he hadn't made any for some hopes that had gone away at some point in this conversation. "I've heard some of Sharpay's songs, it sounds like Kelsi's doing a good job on them." The authentic grin he had before was less so now, not because he was necessarily lying about liking her girlfriend's work but he didn't realize how hard it would be to just go on talking about her new relationship. Still, he wanted to be supportive, so if he had to grin and bear it then so be it. "How long have you been seeing each other?"

Strangely, Dash actually seemed happy for her: a sentiment she wasn't expecting neither when she'd approached him, nor when she'd brought up Kelsi. Lil couldn't help but match his grin, the first she'd felt in a while around Dash. "Yeah, she's really talented. She writes songs in general, too, like, if anyone wanted to perform them, they could buy them from her. And, she's in the middle of writing a musical with Sharpay's brother." It was easy to gush about her girlfriend's accomplishments when Lil was genuinely impressed by and proud of her. In contrast, her own career path seemed so mundane when compared to someone working in a field so creative. "Since the end of the summer, I guess. Yeah, like, right before the school year started." It hadn't been as long as she and Dash had seen each other, but long enough that the subject was going to come up in conversation sooner or later. "I don't know if I'd call it bold so much as looking like an idiot when Phil caught onto my mistake. I'm just glad she went along with it, and said yes, because I'd probably never live it down, otherwise." Though Lil knew he couldn't say the same in his own romantic life, it still felt like they were doing an awful lot of talking about her without at least trying to return the favor. "I saw the boys won both their games this week, I've been meaning to say congrats. They looked really good at practice last week."