#keyboardforged

And she doesn't answer his question. Not verbally, anyway, but the glare she gives tells him ENOUGH. It's not until her gaze falls on the canvas that her expression softens, and even then it's almost unnoticeable.

"What're you working on?" It's a trick question, of course.

         ‘it’s time we let this thing go.’ it was CRUEL of her to say this at the beginning of such a black tie event, knowing the kind of yearning anyone would feel watching her in her dress dripping with DIAMONDS for a whole night, but the restrained smile she gave as she held onto his wrist said she knew that very well. ‘it was a pretty good bad IDEA, wasn’t it though?’

“Okay so, my parents are in town for a visit and last night my dad started telling me in non-explicit terms how disappointed he is that he doesn’t have any grand babies yet and probably won’t get to see any before he dies because NO ONE seems to find his youngest daughter attractive enough to date---” She fidgets with her mug, spinning it around and around in it’s saucer, a testament to exactly how nervous she was at the moment. It had little to do with the fact that she’s constantly nervous in his presence, a factor that hasn’t faded the longer she knew him. "--- so I may have invented a boyfriend.”         A beat passes where she allows the information to sink into him first, taking a sip of the now-cold tea before she drops the next bomb on him. “So I kind of need you to pretend to be my boyfriend this month, at least until he leaves.”

          this all made her so nervous. she had been so busy TRAVELING between home and working on restoring folsense, that it felt weird to have her knees under a table in a place that didn’t smell like a mix of DUST and garlic. so she pursed her lips and stared down at her lap. ‘so... do you know my cousin? he’s very loud, works on my grand uncle’s TRAIN, has a hair metal band...’

“You can’t pretend you’re not at least sort of glad to see me.” The last time they’d seen each other they’d been at each other’s throats, disagreeing over one thing or another until she took off again. She tends to FORGET as soon as she leaves; it’s no use holding a grudge over something when there’s a chance that they’ll see each other again, when she WANTS to see him again every time she comes back.  She holds out the wine glass to him, an offering of peace, as if she hasn’t just broken into his place and raided his wine cabinet. “Come on, Neal.”