Dylan, he didn't think M was dumb. He didn't think she was oblivious. She was a princess and Dylan tried real hard not to think about what that actually meant but he figured smart, the kind of smart that sifted out of reach from As in class and term papers which was unobtainable for Dyl even back when they'd been a feature of daily life. Yeah, work was avoidance or it was for Mary, who looked out over treetops and saw something that had borders, fences, order to martial. Dylan, he just had corridors and grunt duty.
"She can't cross over here," Dylan said with the kind of certainty that came with knowing with absolute fact that evil witches, magic or not, probably couldn't move as fast as juice left him capable, and they probably wouldn't withstand the throw-down from that morning. "You're OK. I know it's not the same as being back there. But you can think about other stuff."
He was oblivious to the second stressor. Yeah, Dylan thought about the date with the doc and he worried about what would happen next. But he figured this, this was normal enough. It had been months since Vegas, and before Vegas had faded like the fuzzy line you could draw in wet sand, swept out by surf. He laced her fingers into his, and he strolled on sneaks alongside the hot blue dress, and he was thrown by the question, because he stopped, brief.
He looked at her, a little searching and a little uncertain. "Because I wanted to see how this goes. When we're not kissing. You don't want to?"