WHO: Isaiah Erikson and Halie Navarro WHEN: Evening of September 28 WHERE: Dunhaven Hotel SUMMARY: Isaiah and Halie meet up at prom and find that neither of them are wearing what they said they were going to. WARNINGS: None BINGO PROMPT: Sacred new beginnings Â
Halie wasn't entirely sure what finally compelled her to go to the Millennial Prom. When she'd first heard about it, she'd been hell-bent against it, if only because the idea of a prom reminded her too much of the person she used to be. Spending too long in the past never ended well for her psyche, whether that past belonged to her or the witch that lived in her dreams.
She was there, though, after having let Eve put her in a dress she'd never have picked for herself but somehow loved nonetheless. Her friend had picked out a pair of black pumps to go with it, but Halie had spotted a pair of red ones that she'd known she had to have. And while she didn't totally feel like herself, she felt…good.
A part of her had wondered if Isaiah would even show up and, if he did, if he would even talk to her when surrounded by his actual friends. But suddenly she was turning away from Eve after her friend had been distracted by Niall and she was finding herself staring straight at Isaiah. Who wasn't wearing jeans and a crop top. Who hadn't noticed her yet.
Who looked like maybe he'd taken spicy too literally.
She sucked in a breath, pressing back the unexpected and uninvited reaction she felt to seeing him and cleared her throat. "No crop top?" She mused.
Isaiah had, indeed, forgone the crop top. As funny as it would have been, it would have been way less funny if Halie hadn't shown up -- not that he would have really cared in the long run, but he really did like getting dressed up. He had been planning on going to this particular event with Sofia, so he'd already had his heart set on wearing the suit that hung out in the back of his closet. And while he and Sofia were no longer together, there was nothing keeping him from going on his own.
And while Isaiah hadn't noticed Halie at first, having been just distracted enough by the food, music, and various people he knew from school and work, he wasn't sure how he'd missed her at all when he turned at the clearing of her throat and laid eyes on her. She was always pretty, albeit in a slightly scary way, so that wasn't surprising, even with her clearly much more dressed up than he had ever seen her. The fact that she was approaching him, however, when Isaiah was never totally sure if he was annoying her or not, was.
His face split into his signature smile, all teeth and cheer. "It's crazy, but all of my crop tops were at the dry cleaner?" Isaiah gestured down toward her ensemble. "That could count as a crop top, though. I guess that means you win."
On any other day, Halie's instinct would be to cover herself up, to feel too exposed. But something about the outfit and the atmosphere of the night and the way all of it made her feel had her standing up a little straighter, meeting Isaiah's eye instead of averting her gaze. She shrugged, an amused smirk curving up at the corner of her mouth. "I'm very competitive," she replied. "I like to win."
She quickly glanced around them and took note of the fact that he didn't seem to be surrounded by other people he was there with, so maybe she had lucked out in finding him alone. Not that she'd been looking to get him alone, but it made talking to him easier. She hadn't been in the market for friends when he'd started talking to her forever ago, but now that she was finally warming up to him, she wasn't sure she wanted that to mean that he came as a package deal with another crowd of friends. Baby steps.
"I would have worn the aforementioned sneakers," she added, lifting the hem of her dress to expose the red heels she'd fallen so in love with, "but Abraxos mistook them for something from his Bark Box."
Isaiah took a slight step back to get a good view of the heels she had paired with her dress, then let his eyes dart back up to meet Halie's gaze. "You know," he started, feigning thoughtfulness, "have you ever considered that Abraxos is actually a fashionista and was trying to help you? Those kind of complete the whole look, so he may have been attempting to do you a favor."
It was a silly comment and the way the faux thoughtfulness fell away and was replaced with another smile made it obvious that Isaiah was well aware of it. He took a step back in, taking his place from before. Not actually with anyone in particular, he didn't look around the ballroom and instead gave her his full attention.
"Well, he is something of a diva," Halie admitted, unable to stop the smile that he drew out from her. "I wouldn't put it past him. Maybe that's why he chewed a hole straight through my favorite yoga pants so that I'd stop wearing them every time I went to the store to buy junk food." She let the hem fall back over her shoes and, before she gave herself the chance to think it through, she asked, "So do you think he did me a favor? Or should I have stuck with the jeans?"
At the question, Isaiah's smile faded from the usual cheer to something more akin to bashfulness. Doing his best to keep the creep levels at a minimum, he did glance down at her clothes for just a second. There was no denying that she cleaned up very well -- but he figured that he probably shouldn't put it that way.
"I think that you made a very good choice," Isaiah decided, shrugging one of her shoulders in a poor attempt at nonchalance. "Though I have no doubt that you'd have pulled off the jeans and chewed up sneakers just as well."
"The jeans will make a comeback soon," Halie assured him. "I let Eve pick out the dress, and she's picking out my outfit tomorrow, too, but Monday is all me. Look out, world." And then, reaching out to casually flick one of the buttons on Isaiah's jacket, she said, "But I think you made a good choice, too."
"You're just saying that because you didn't see me in my crop top," Isaiah teased, deflecting the compliment -- at least, he thought it was a compliment -- with a bit more finesse than he'd already displayed. Though, at the mention of tomorrow, he had to ask, "Are you going to another formal event tomorrow, too? I didn't know that Dunhaven could handle so many in one weekend."
Halie shrugged. "Then I'll just have to see you in a crop top and judge for myself. I don't take anyone's word for it," she replied, the smirk still firmly in place. It was the red shoes, it had to be. They were bringing out a confident, bold part of her that she hadn't known she possessed until now. She'd been feeling it all night from the moment she'd slipped them onto her feet.
Shaking her head, she said, "No, definitely not. This is my quota for fancy occasions for at least a month before Dunhaven throws another one at us. Tomorrow we're going to the Maryland Renaissance Faire to celebrate Eve's birthday. I told her she could dress me up again and it saves me from having to buy a birthday gift."
Isaiah's eyebrows rose in vague surprise, head tipping to the side. "I wouldn't peg you for a Renaissance Faire kind of person, but then again, I don't really know a whole lot about them in the first place, so maybe you're exactly that type of person," he said, smiling once more. Even with the Faire that took place in town, he didn't have much experience; he barely had time to breathe given his busy schedule of school, internship, and his work as a TA. Renaissance Faires didn't normally get scheduled into all that.
"Sounds like a good deal for you, though," he added. "Someone else picks your outfit, you get to do a bit of a road trip, and you don't even have to worry about a birthday present."
"To be fair," Halie said, "I don't know a lot about them, either, other than it's apparently what Eve wants for her birthday. I've been to exactly zero and I still told her she could put me in whatever as long as it has pants. I'm honestly such a good friend, and that's why I can't let myself have too many."
"That's very wise." Isaiah nodded sagely, though the effect was rather ruined with his generally peppy demeanor. "Think of all of the Renaissance Faires you'd have to go to if you had more friends. You'd have to live in your costume and get by at eating nothing but turkey legs and maybe joust sometimes?" He grinned, leaning in toward Halie as though he was sharing a secret with her. "And that's where my knowledge of Renaissance Faires end."
Crinkling her nose, Halie said, "First of all, I will never eat a turkey leg. I've seen pictures and they look disgusting. Second of all, I bet I could win a joust. I could absolutely pull off mounted combat. And third of all, I bet I'd look good in a wardrobe consisting entirely of something akin to witch leathers." She stopped abruptly, grimacing. "And I'm literally just standing here arguing for why I should have more friends. Ignore that. Pretend you never heard it, or I'll subject you to endless renaissance faires."
Isaiah laughed, though not in a mean sort of way. "Oh no, it's too late," he teased. "I'm going to have to go on Facebook tonight and let everyone know that you're in the market for friends."
Halie narrowed her eyes, but not from taking any real offense. "You're the worst. You know that, don't you? I'm not entirely sure why I like you. Not that I do like you, but if I did, it would be inexplicable."
This time when Isaiah grinned, it was entirely too pleased. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew that perhaps smiling and laughing with her might not have looked too great, given that he was only a handful of weeks single after a many months long relationship with another woman. But right alongside that thought lived the fact that he half believed Halie; she had to like him at least a little bit to let him keep coming around to talk to her, but there was a fairly wide gap between "at least a little bit" and, well -- he didn't know what else.
Besides, things had ended fine with Sofia and he was allowed to have friends. Halie was a friend, maybe. And with that thought in mind, he placed a hand on his heart, as though truly touched, before saying, "I do believe that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me."
Sometimes, Isaiah reminded her of who Halie used to be with his big smiles and easygoing charm. Maybe that was why, after nearly two years of him persistently trying to get under her skin, she'd let him. And maybe that was why she found that she liked who he was becoming in her life, whatever he was to her. A friend? Something else? She didn't know. All she knew was that, the more she saw that smile on his face and knew that it was directed toward her, the more she wanted to keep that smile in her life. It was a bright star against a night sky that had been dark for a very long time.
Sighing, she said, "You're also impossible. You might have to go tomorrow, too, so that no one gets any ideas that I need to collect more friends. I have my hands full enough with you."
"You know, I already did my dog petting today, so that leaves my Sunday wide open," Isaiah considered. He wasn't sure if the invitation was in jest, but he also didn't think that Halie was the sort to say something like that unless she actually meant it. "So if you need someone to protect you from the friendliness that might be thrown your way, I'd be happy to be that shield. As long as it's okay for me to crash your friend's birthday celebration."
Halie wasn't even sure if she'd actually meant to invite Isaiah to Eve's birthday shenanigans, but she suddenly found herself looking forward to going more than she had been at the prospect that maybe he'd actually come. She shrugged. "I think Eve's of the ‘more the merrier' mindset. I think your brother's probably coming, too, since Eve's friends with Alee, so there's that." Not that she needed to give him more reasons to come. She shouldn't have been giving him any reasons to come, at all. But she wanted him to. She really wanted him to.
"Anyway, it's up to you," she said, feigning nonchalance in an attempt to convince herself that she didn't care what plans he made. "I'm not trying to monopolize your Sunday. Or even your Saturday night, for that matter. I'm sure you have better things to be doing here than letting me hold you up."
This time when Isaiah smiled -- because he did, of course, smile -- it was a bit slower than his normally quick and blinding grin. He did have some reading that he'd been planning on doing on Sunday, but it wasn't anything he couldn't reschedule. That particular class wasn't until Thursday and he had plenty of free evenings between now and then to get it done. So, he nodded. "All right, well. I'll see if I can pencil it in and catch a ride with Zeke if it works out."
As for her monopolizing his Saturday, he took a look around them, then shrugged as his attention fell on Halie again. "I can safely say that you're not holding me up from anything." He let an eyebrow raise. "Unless I'm holding you up from one of your friends you try not have?"
That smile, Halie decided then, was going to be her undoing. It was inevitable. She sighed in resignation of her fate and shook her head. "No," she replied. "I'm where I want to be." But as much as she wanted to stand here and talk to Isaiah, it felt like she should be doing something other than taking up space where other people were trying to walk. "Were you headed to the hors d'oeuvres table? Or do you want to grab a table, or go for a walk, or something?" Or, she supposed, dancing was an option. She wouldn't suggest it, though.
Isaiah considered their options for a moment, then suggested, "Let's check out the food, because it looked pretty damn good when I was staring longingly at it before. Then let's find a table to eat whatever food we end up foraging. And then," he paused, nodding his head once toward the dance floor where a few people were taking advantage of the soundtrack for the night, "maybe I can talk you into dancing with me."
Halie tried not to smile too brightly when she replied, "I guess there's only one way to find out how well that will work out for you." And, with that, she lead the way toward the food.