That soft chuckle was a good sound, and Troy was so glad that he'd been able to hear it. He wasn't sure he'd be able to, not today. But with Lux laughing like that, things would be okay eventually. Wouldn't they? They had to be, because Troy couldn't let himself be broken. Sure, he was bitten and cut up, scraped and bruised, but he would heal. His shoulder had been dislocated, for goodness sake, but he would be damned if he was going to let that break him completely. He had to hold himself together, or if he couldn't do that, he'd have to heal himself back together in a new way. A different way. Those words and that touch against his cheek had Troy smiling in earnest. He brushed a kiss against Lux's cheek, holding her close. "I'm so glad you feel that way, really." What else could he say? It was what he'd wanted for years and years now, and to finally hear Lux say it herself, without him asking her about it, was a relief and an excitement all rolled into one.
"Lux, you aren't a monster." Troy's words were firm, his voice a little bit louder than it was before. "And..she..didn't steal into the dojo. I met her a little while ago and she stopped by...and I let her in." His sentence ended with his teeth clenching down a little bit harder on the words. "I let her in and she...she tried..." Troy didn't want to say it. Not when Lux was looking at him like that, and talking about him being her boyfriend. He took a deep breath and cleared his throat, his gaze meeting Lux's eyes squarely. "She kissed me, Lux. And I pushed her away and...that's..that's when she attacked me." His face fell, just knowing that that had happened. Would Lux be angry with him? He dearly hoped she wouldn't be.
He slowly began to believe that he truly needed that sound, because it was such a nice thing to hear. It meant that Lux was happy, or at least close enough to it to laugh. He found his lips pulling up at the sound, but he couldn't quite laugh with her. "I'm glad I got through to you, at least a little bit." Because the both of them? Were damn stubborn. When she shook her head, Troy just smiled softly. One day, one day she would understand, but it wasn't today. He was okay with that only because she was here, and she was touching him, and it felt better than he'd felt all day. As he leaned up into the kiss, his lips moving against hers, he could feel Lux begin to open up to it. He parted his lips to taste her mouth, his breath coming a little ragged as he let go enough to groan softly against her lips. His hand went to her cheek, and he brushed his fingertips up into her hair, holding his hand there and pulling her slightly closer. He needed this, abandoning himself to the wildness of the kiss. Pretty soon he'd need to stop to breathe, but he didn't care to think of things like that.