#chat:kit

Rapunzel wasn’t sure what he was implying, between the layers of him not having his own happiness and somehow being able to help her find her own. How he could do that, she wasn’t entirely sure, and the thought that he was unhappy in his own near-engagement broke her heart a little. In his hurt, she saw the same expression that Ella had been holding in her own eyes. To think that they were heartbroken over one another and that Rapunzel couldn’t tell either of them that undeniable fact. Part of her wished that he was still hurting over her, but she couldn’t have him and the two people who she was torn between now. “You want me to get my happy ending?” she repeated, giving him a sad smile. “Remember when I thought that would be you?” 

She thought about Jim and Flynn, both of whom were important to her in different ways. “I could use your help, actually. I need to make a decision, and I’m going to wind up hurting someone either way.” Rapunzel bit her lip, hesitant to open up with him in a way that she hadn’t before. “There’s two people, and I have such a strong connection to both of them, just in a different way, and I don’t know what to do. You were the one who made the decision last time, and I’m just--I don’t know how to do this, how to hurt someone like this.”

where: kit's house

It was crazy to think that Atta had nearly been betrothed to the guy sitting next to her on his sofa, in their sweatpants. Since they'd been children, Atta and Kit had been best friends, finding each other at parties their parents had gone to. Their engagement had been a discussion way back when, but all the blonde could think now was that she was glad it hadn't happened, since the two had grown so close on a platonic level since then. Kit knew her soul on a level that only two other people had seen, including her sister and Flik. "Am I invited to this butler birthday of yours?" she asked, looking over to him with a grin. A Friday with Kit in their pajamas, glass of wine in hand, was the best kind of weekend she could spend. "I just want to have some wine and cheese without having to go to that restaurant. You know Hopper likes it over there," Atta reminded him, giving a roll of her eyes. "I could be your plus one! Or plus two, if you have one."

All Atta had ever known was duty to her family, and it seemed like the only thing that she and Kit Charming had in common was just that. Except, she would never go and be with someone else while engaged to a man her parents had arranged for her to be married to. The last thing she wanted was to wind up like Marie and on the outs of her own engagement. That was something she had to set clear with Kit, her supposed-to-be-almost-fiance. If there was any way that this arrangement was going to work for her, there had to be boundaries set. 

The only thing was that Atta was never one that was good at setting boundaries, at least not without being incredibly anxious that she was going to wind up hurting the other person in the process. This lunch was supposed to be all about doing just that, in the house that was supposed to be hers someday. “So ... Kit. Is that short for something? Doesn’t matter if it is or not. Anyway, I just wanted to discuss, um, what was going on with the things that were written about you? Sorry, I’m just kind of a cut-to-the-chase kinda girl, and I just ... wanted to get it out of the way, y’know?”

Now that's a great shirt

It wasn’t often that Rapunzel ran into someone like Kit Charming, especially not when she was in her haphazard disguises. She wasn’t sure he would recognize her with Eugene’s cap on her head and Cass’s sunglasses on her face. After searching her surroundings for her mother, she decided it was safe enough to take her poor disguise off and greet him. “I thought you had people to go out and run errands for you,” she teased, slipping her sunglasses into her jeans as Rapunzel greeted him with a smile. “Long time, no see. Have you not been throwing as many parties, or have I just not been invited?”

It wasn’t long after the blog post had dropped that Rapunzel had received a text from Kit, but she wasn’t even in the right space to read it. Then came another, and another, and before she knew it, it was later that night, and there was a voicemail on her phone. Peyton was sleeping over, though, and she didn’t want to ruin what was supposed to be a night of not thinking about Kit and what the blog post had said about him.

Peyton was asleep, though, and maybe she could get away with listening to the voicemail, just to hear his voice, to hear if there was anything in there that might redeem him. Instead, it was simple: he was on his way, and Rapunzel leapt out of her bed, threw on a sweatshirt, and headed to the front door as quietly as she possibly could. She’d always had Kit pick her up on her corner, so that he wouldn’t know which house was theirs, and when she reached the steps, she could already see his car in the distance.

Rapunzel locked the door behind her and saw Kit get out of his car to begin toward her. She took slow steps, scared. She wasn’t sure what he was going to say or if she’d even want to hear it, but the slower she walked, the longer she could postpone the inevitable. When she finally reached him, her arms were folded over her chest, and she gave him a small wave in greeting. 

“Hi,” she said simply, keeping a safe distance from Kit as they met on the corner. “You can’t, um, come inside ... everyone’s sleeping. I have a friend staying over. If you wanted to talk, we’d have to go somewhere. If that’s okay.”

It had been a few days since Rapunzel had gone on her date with Kit. It went surprisingly well, as well as she thought first dates might go. It was exciting to actually do something with her feelings for once, but tonight, she just wanted to keep the peace between the two most important men in her life. That was way more important than any feelings she had. “Are you sure this thing is stable?” she asked him as they waited in line for the ferris wheel. Rapunzel crooned her neck up to look toward the top; she wasn’t particularly afraid of heights after living her whole life in a tower of all places, but she was afraid that the circular metal structure would just roll onto the sand in a moment’s notice. “We’re not going to just roll into the ocean, right? This is totally safe?”

Kit seemed a bit frustrated beside her as he waited for Flynn, and though she was sure he was used to better service than the Duckling had to offer, he had to have known what he was getting into, coming here. At least she had his height to try and help to get her soda refilled. "Yeah, it's a busy one tonight. Why? I don't know. I think the second warm weather happens, people flock out of the house." That's how it seemed, anyway. Rapunzel could remember wanting to feel the warmth on her face when the sun shone through her windows when he was younger, too. Despite her differences with people who had been on the outside this whole time, there were still little things that made them all human.

"Rapunzel," she replied with a grin, raised on her toes in attempt to reach his height, taking his hand to shake. "Her name's Ella? Blonde, makes a fantastic batch of banana bread." Rapunzel could only hope that he knew who she was talking about, though she knew that he must have plenty of blonde girls working for him. "I met her at the bookstore, she's one of my best friends."