“Really? I mean, there’s really no one who made you so angry you wanted to hurt their feelings? There’s no one you could take a little fact about and turn it into something mean about them?” Jia Li was pretty surprised. She’d learned a lot of insults in the public school system, though. Maybe that was why Kaydence didn’t get it? Still, it seemed pretty fishy to be alive and never have the will to be mean. The dryad herself wasn’t some super-bitch or anything, but she had done her fair share of insulting. Could someone really be so composed that they never did it?
Jia Li just shrugged when Kaydence suggested she was underestimating herself. Four years of self-esteem and trust issues made it kind of hard to think of herself as anything other than how she saw herself: timid, just sort of okay looking, and not nearly as intelligence as a lot of people she respected.
She welcomed the change of direction in the conversation. “Yeah. I ate, but it was pretty light. I’ll probably be hungry again once my body winds down a little from running, and if you’re treating, I’m totally up for it.” Jia Li laughed lightly.
Her dad would probably be glad to see her laughing and making comments like this, like her old self. It was true that she usually didn’t display this much confidence, especially not in front of someone she’d just met. However, things had sort of being changing a little for her ever since her visit with her father. He’d never really sat her down and told her how he felt about how she’d become. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t tried; the dryad just hadn’t been ready to hear it, so she’d avoided that conversation just like she avoided making close friends, just like she avoided forming closer relationships with anyone.
Plus, it probably helped that the siren was pretty bubbly and easy with whom to speak.
“I don’t know… I mean, you can’t really underestimate a gay man looking for a cover, right? When I was in ninth grade, this girl I knew started dating this total pervert. He always had to find some excuse to touch a girl’s ass or her chest or something. In twelfth grade, we found out he was totally homosexual. He just couldn’t come out of the closet until after he graduated when he’d be free of his bigot of a father.” Jia Li explained.
“Well, maybe you’ll have to change your game plan to get him into bed with you? I’m sure next time you see him, you’ll know whether to be too forward or not quite as forward as you were. You’re a siren after all. You were born to seduce.” The dryad laughed at that, but a moment later she hoped she hadn’t gone too far. Kaydence made it pretty obvious she was sexually active and not ashamed of it, but stereotypes were a whole other thing.
“That’s too bad that your friendship was almost ruined. Were you able to patch it up at all?” Jia Li didn’t ask for details about what actions had been taken. There were things about which the dryad didn’t want to speak, so she respected when others didn’t want to do the same.
“I’m glad that you’re able to take steps with them. It means they care more about you than themselves, at least.” Parents were like regular people. They all had different ideals and thoughts and skills. No one or two were ever quite the same, but just like anyone else, there were general ideas that could group them. She was glad Kaydence’s were complete fascists. After all, it would have meant she never would have met the siren.
“I guess that’s really where we differ. I don’t really want to fall in love while I’m still working on my degree, but if it happens, I’m not opposed to it. I don’t avoid certain people just because it may happen.” At least, that’s what she told herself. In reality, maybe she ran from everyone because she was too afraid to have her feelings trampled again, too afraid to meet face to face with someone genuinely cruel again.