Caroline enjoyed the day with Lark–she really did. But for some reason the conversation they’d had that morning, with the uneaten pancakes, bothered her. She didn’t want to push her friend, especially when she was having a rough time fighting with her best friend. It was a long shot, but she could try and see if the other party in that particular conversation could shed some light. And so, she’d driven into town and found herself knocking on Steffi’s door. “Hey,” she smiled slightly. “Are you busy at the moment? I was wondering if I could talk to you.”

“Eh, probably not but I’ll try to avoid them.” November was pretty sure being Zeus’ daughter meant her luck with relationships was a mess. Not that she wasn’t good enough to get past most of it. “Steffi, nice to meet you.” She nodded, reaching for her drink. “I wouldn’t mind the company, I did say five minutes. Gotta get the full worth of my deal.” She winked. 

Steffi reached for her coffee and scone, taking a sip of her drink to make sure the barista had gotten it right. Satisfied with the results, she turned her attention back to November. “Can’t argue with that,” she agreed with a smirk. “Come on, then.” She made her way over to a table and gestured for November to sit - just because she’d agreed to spend five minutes with this woman didn’t mean she was willing to let November pick and risk ending up at a table that was subpar.

Steffi was in her living room, looking around for anything she might have forgotten to pack when she heard a knock on the door, pulling her out of her thoughts. She frowned, wondering who might be there - she certainly wasn’t expecting anyone, so the options that came to mind were mostly unpleasant. Sighing, she made her way over, walking around the luggage she’d neatly stacked by the door to take a look through the peephole. Caroline? That was a surprise. She opened the door, expression impassive - she didn’t know what had driven her ex to show up here unprompted, and she certainly wasn’t going to display any sort of emotion until she knew how she should be feeling about this development. “Can I help you?”

steffiisms​:

Steffi genuinely did not know what to make of this conversation - it was like someone had taken Lark and replaced her with an alien. Were there many demigods on the island who could shapeshift into other people? The notion that Lina or anyone else would bother to go to the trouble of shifting into Lark and saying all of this was patently absurd, but it also wasn’t that much stranger than what was actually happening. What could she even say to this? It wasn’t like she could accept these partial apologies. “Well, it sounds like you’ve made some progress at pulling your head out of your ass. If you ever finish the job let me know, hm?” And with that, she turned to walk away - the fact that she’d tacitly admitted to possibly being open to that full apology was more than enough sharing for now.

Lark watched Steffi go. It was anguish to let her best friend walk away when there was a chance that she could have made some sort of bullshit apology. Lark could have pretended that everything was fine like she usually did and put a bandage on the problem. Typically, she apologized just to apologize. Sometimes she apologized when she didn’t feel like she even needed to apologize because Steffi was never going to do it. This time, though… Lark knew that it was all on her to make a real apology. 

The most difficult part, though? Resisting the urge to say ‘okay’ or something. Lark had asked her question, and trying to get the last word in- trivial as that word would be- would not make anything better. This was her mess to sort through. She felt a little better after the brief conversation, at the very least. Once she had a real apology, she got the idea that Steffi would give her the time of day long enough to hear it. That’s all she needed.

Elsa was getting annoyed at the other’s presence. She wanted to be nice, but the other is a fucking bitch. ❛ Of course. Suck my dick. ❜ She showed her middle finger, she RARELY use this kind of language, for the fact she was annoyed she made the tree besides them burning with the big flame, before she went back on her tracks, she hadn’t realized her other hand, she held so clutched tighter her fist, that her own nails dugged her own skin

Steffi raised an eyebrow, surprised and mildly entertained by sudden turn this conversation had taken. It looked like someone had quite the temper. She opened her mouth to say as much, but what came out instead when the tree burst into flames was “What the fuck?” In her mind they hadn’t been having a particularly upsetting conversation, so it came as a total surprise that the woman had apparently felt the need to commit arson over it.

Blake beamed and handed Steff the bag. “Have a wonderful rest of your day.” She was interested to see what the woman ended up thinking about the books. Most people liked the books she recommended, but nothing was guaranteed. This woman seemed like she would have particular opinions.

“Thank you,” Steffi replied, taking the bag. “You too,” she added as an afterthought, deciding that this wasn’t the worst person to wish a good day to. If the books turned out to be terrible, she could always make up for the well wishes with some pointed comments later on. 

Lark shut her eyes tightly for a moment, repressed the urge to sob, and then opened her yes up again. “While I had an idea of what I need to apologize for, I need to do right by you and make sure I cover everything, Steffi. Even if you never forgive me- which I’m starting to understand may be possible and reasonable- I need to own up to everything. I’m not taking the easy way out.” Lark wondered if apologizing earlier for it all without taking the time to consider why she was doing it may have got her a friend back later. But no, she didn’t think she deserved a friend until she got a handle on why everything had been so wrong. Since a large part of her still wanted to argue about wanting the best for Steffi, Lark figured that she still needed to go back to the drawing board. Maybe the impulse would never go away to fight, but she had to at least understand what the right way to frame all of this would be. “You’re one of the two most important people to me in the world.” Lark’s grandma was the other. “You mean so much to me. I’m sorry that I’m making you wait so long, and I’m sorry that I’ve been a crappy friend, but I can’t give you a real apology for all of those things until I can stop hurting you so much.” She cut herself off before she could launch into a tangent about how much she hated herself. If she got too specific, then she might find herself saying things that could cause pain again.

Steffi genuinely did not know what to make of this conversation - it was like someone had taken Lark and replaced her with an alien. Were there many demigods on the island who could shapeshift into other people? The notion that Lina or anyone else would bother to go to the trouble of shifting into Lark and saying all of this was patently absurd, but it also wasn’t that much stranger than what was actually happening. What could she even say to this? It wasn’t like she could accept these partial apologies. “Well, it sounds like you’ve made some progress at pulling your head out of your ass. If you ever finish the job let me know, hm?” And with that, she turned to walk away - the fact that she’d tacitly admitted to possibly being open to that full apology was more than enough sharing for now.

Rue made her best attempt at listening to Steffi as she was handed the paper. She wasn’t historically great at it, but she did ask for the help. “Money won’t be an issue.” It’s not like their dad kept the credit card information locked up and in the end he wouldn’t do much if he found out what Rue did. He was a sucker. “Thanks for the help, I’ll pass it on to whoever needs it.” Probably Rye since she was the one that cared more. “You’re pretty smart, I’ll give you that. You said you’re not a lawyer here though?” Her eyebrow raised.

Steffi nodded in response to the thanks. “Not here, no - I consult for German clients,” she explained. “I hardly see how that’s relevant though. You have the information you wanted, no?” It wouldn’t be hard to explain that she was in the process of getting licensed to practice law here as well, but she didn’t particularly feel like it. “If you want to take up more of my time with inane questions, that’ll cost you extra.”

Lark sighed, and mulled over the couple of questions in her head that she considered asking. She actually had a few, but had thought it might go wrong to ask for more than one. Asking for just the one was risky as it was. She chose carefully- the one that would at least let her have to think about everything that happened. “That’s fine. You don’t owe me anything. Knowing that you’re not going to get an apology today because I want to really mean it, what do you think I should apologize to you for? Feel free to walk away right after.” Lark gave the last suggestion just so that Steffi knew that she could skip out on follow-up questions, which she was pretty sure the other woman hated.

Steffi frowned, equal parts frustrated and confused about the direction this conversation was taking. The fact that Lark apparently wasn’t apologizing today was very annoying, but there was something about the way she said it that seemed to indicate she knew an apology was needed. Or at least, that’s what it had seemed like - but if Lark was asking what it was she should be apologizing for in the first place, then maybe not. “You don’t know what you should be apologizing for?” Steffi asked, incredulous. For once she didn’t really feel like rehashing every little thing about a fight - at the same time though, she really couldn’t resist an invitation to let someone know all the things they were doing wrong. “Let’s see, how long do you have?” The list of wrongs wasn’t a short one, as far as she was concerned. “How about he fact that you’ve been complaining about me having more than one friend for years? It never matters who it is - if they’re not you, you’re pissed. And then you have the gall to act like it’s my fault for picking such bad friends, even though the worst traits you can think of to describe them are usually traits you have. Or maybe you could apologize for projecting your mundane romantic worldview onto me - it really does get quite tiring having you tell me that I can’t possibly be happy in my dating situation when the only person unhappy with it is clearly you. Not that an apology matters, if you’re just going to keep trying to control my life.”

“Oh, I’m really sorry for running into you,” Lark said tersely. She knew that she was not being self-absorbed for thinking that this was all her fault. It just… was. The one thing that did strike Lark as off was how different her feelings were for Steffi than they had been previously. She was having trouble putting a finger on what had changed, but it was still different. How long had it been since she had kept herself up disappointed but not upset that Steffi would never want her back in the same way? No, she had been keeping herself awake being upset that she would never get to go back to the way things really were before. “I don’t want to take up more of your time than I need to, but… there is something you could help me with. Am I allowed to ask an uncomfortable question before I go? I’ll understand you might want to walk away after what I… did.”

This was not at all the type of interaction Steffi had expected. Lark was always a little more hesitant around her after their fights, but nothing like this. This was almost... resigned? Which made a kind of sense considering how awful Lark had been, but it still betrayed a type of change in her (former?) friend that Steffi would not have previously considered possible. She hesitated, instinct to be as unhelpful as possible warring with morbid curiosity. “If you want to ask a question, I won’t stop you,” she finally decided with a sigh. “As long as you’re prepared to deal with the fact that I might not answer.”

It was a stupid mistake on Scout’s part to find herself distracted by the other woman enough to not finish recording her number down. When they went their separate ways that evening, Scout had planned on reaching back out to the other beauty, finding herself intrigued by the personality that seemed to be able to keep up with her. It wasn’t often that Scout found herself enchanted by another. The last time that had happened was with Noreen. Producing her phone out of her bag, Scout quickly unlocked it and handed it over to the woman. “There, now you will be able to expect a call soon. I will admit, I’m not shy when it comes to things I want.” Was she being forward? Absolutely. It wasn’t in her nature not to be. “Now pick your poison.”

Elsa rolled her eyes, not wanting to keep up a conversation with her. ❛ Your shirt… The tag is outside. ❜ She warns her but thinking she was wasting both times hers and the other. The younger blonde wasn’t so sure if she wanted to keep up chatting with someone so apparently rude.

          ELSA DIDN’T HAD to think twice. ❛ It’s seems like your problem with him. Not mine. I’m just happen to be here at wrong time.  ❜ She stated, trying to be rational at the situation, but her tone was soft, not rude. She didn’t watch the whole thing to begin with, so she does not feel in the position to judge.