InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "I'm going with him!"

Stefan Hawke (learnttofly) wrote in utr_logs,
@ 2012-01-09 09:12:00

Entry tags:

dar prethan, stefan hawke

Who: Stefan Hawke and Dar Prethan
What: AN ACTUAL DATE, OHMAKER.
When: The day after this.
Warnings: You never know.

Stefan was still fairly sure this was one of those insane dreams that came of Melora whacking him in the head. Yes, he'd been going over what to say for a while now, but he'd expected himself to manage something a little more subtle than rambling.

Of all the things to inherit from Merrill, honestly.

They'd agreed to meet at a spot not all that far from the mansion, but far enough away that certain prying family members wouldn't see and ask questions that'd lead to yet more awkwardness. Considering this was only a first date, he hadn't gone for anything too fancy or too in-depth, just a sort of dinner date at a local restaurant.

Considering this was California, 'local' tended to mean 'pretty awesome'. There was a reason his parents had never bothered finding their own place.

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shiftlinggirl
2012-01-10 10:17 am UTC (link)

This was new.

Dar had been in love before, or at least she had thought she was at the time; she didn't know if it counted. She'd certainly had crushes on people, now and then. And she'd slept with people, though only two and both only on a very temporary basis. When you lived in hiding you tended to find delight where you could, and enjoy it to the hilt while you had the chance, and in her case it'd been as much research as anything else, another set of lessons. She'd always liked learning, no matter what the subject.

But she'd never been on a date, in Thedas or here. She switched between wondering how on earth to go about it, and remembering that this was Stefan, and she really didn't need to worry. They always enjoyed each other's company. Why should this set of circumstances change that?

Still, she was glad she'd gotten another set of lessons that afternoon, from Corinth: how to dress for a date. They'd kept things simple. She didn't want to mess with make-up, and heels were completely out of the question. But they'd found a nice light green dress and a silver pendant for her to wear. It was very strange to be dressing so people would pay attention to her instead of overlooking her, but, well, there wasn't any reason for to keep up the old habits here. And perhaps Stefan would like it.

She grinned when she saw him waiting, and walked faster.

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	learnttofly 2012-01-10 01:15 pm UTC (link)
	Seeing her admittedly made Stefan all the more convinced this was some sort of wonderful dream. Okay, first the actual date thing, now her like that? Be still his beating heart! He couldn't help but smile as she came close. This definitely was happening, wasn't it? "Hey... you look gorgeous." Oh, that was subtle. Still, might as well carry on with that trend. (Reply to this)

shiftlinggirl
2012-01-10 01:56 pm UTC (link)

Dar laughed. She'd have to tell Corinth that whatever effect he'd been striving for had clearly worked, given the way Stefan's face lit up upon seeing her. Surely it hadn't always done that and she just hadn't noticed, had it? "Thank you."

She brushed some hair behind her ear, still grinning. "I don't really know what to do, you know. I haven't been on a date before." She didn't sound nervous, however; she sounded curious. What else was new?

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learnttofly
2012-01-10 02:49 pm UTC (link)

Stefan had maybe just been the slightest bit more subtle in his affections towards her before the absolute failure of subtlety that was his admission of the crush. Now, though, what was the point in hiding it?

"It'll be a learning experience for both of us, won't it? I haven't been on a date since... well, since before the vortex took me and Melora back here," and that'd gone ridiculously badly, even by his standards. "And that was actually all down to her and her crazy ways..."

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shiftlinggirl
2012-01-10 04:20 pm UTC (link)

"Things that happen to you often seem to be Melora's fault." Dar liked Melora, very much, but there was no denying Stefan's sister had a knack for chaos. "What'd she do that time?"

She smiled up at him. "So far this is a lot like what we usually do, but with less flying and more compliments." He was taller than she was. Most people were. Being petite went with the elf territory, even though Stefan was half-elvhen himself. "You look good too. But then, you usually do." Well, it wasn't as though she hadn't noticed, even before now. It just hadn't occurred to her to do anything about it.

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learnttofly
2012-01-10 07:59 pm UTC (link)

"It was one of her 'you'd make pretty babies!' things... she set me up on a date without actually telling me it'd be a date, and without really letting me know the girl," in hindsight, at least she'd tried to set him up with a girl. He rubbed at the back of his neck, even the memory making him feel more than a little bit awkward. "I think that's the fastest I'd run for the hills in years."

And considering he'd been chased by a dragon a number of times, that was really saying something.

Being half-elvhen didn't exactly count for as much as most people thought it did. Stefan's height came from his father, quite simply, the human side of his heritage being responsible for... well, pretty much everything about him. "Less flying, more compliments and... well, different places to go. There's this... really nice restaurant I thought we could go to, maybe?"

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shiftlinggirl
2012-01-11 02:32 pm UTC (link)

Dar couldn't help laughing. She did that a lot around Stefan; one reason she liked spending time with him. "Sounds awkward. At least she's been too busy to try it again, if it hasn't happened since." She found it hard to imagine Melora would've been discouraged by the result. Really, he should be grateful to Melora's boyfriend just for the distraction Aedan provided, dragon or no dragon.

"I'd like that." Dar beamed. She was trying to live as a person nowadays, but still ended up hunting or scavenging for meals in one of her animal forms as often as not. It wasn't something she talked about though, because it clearly made other people uncomfortable and worried. She was too used to it to think of it as strange, after years of running around Ferelden with no other ways to eat. "I've been trying to teach myself to cook," she confided. "But I can't manage much yet, and I keep burning things. Having someone else cook for me is always exciting."

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learnttofly
2012-01-12 10:52 pm UTC (link)

It really was the one thing Stefan would honestly admit he liked about Aedan: he took the full force of Melora's crazy off him, and actually didn't seem to mind it all that much. Love clearly made that craziness just that tiniest bit more tolerable.

And the whole dragon thing probably helped too.

"As long as you manage better than Mom. She's one of those 'I got distracted for five minutes and suddenly everything's on fire, what the hell' people." In fact, that seemed to be a family thing. Probably down to the massive impatience they all seemed to be prone to. "Guess that's why Varric keeps Esmerelda around. We'd be doomed without her."

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shiftlinggirl
2012-01-18 04:11 pm UTC (link)

"No, it's not getting distracted, I'm very good at not getting distracted." It came with the shapeshifting. Or rather, the other way around. Studying a creature long enough to learn how to turn into it entailed a lot of concentration and even more sitting around waiting for things to happen. Getting bored wasn't an option.

"More that I just don't have the instincts for it. I add things at the wrong time, or forget ingredients, or don't understand what it's talking about." Dar didn't sound too bothered, and wasn't. It was still fun to try, even if half the time she opted to abandon whatever she'd been trying to make and find some other food. "I think Esmerelda must have some sort of kitchen magic of her own, if that exists. She can do everything."

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learnttofly
2012-01-21 06:33 pm UTC (link)

Well, it'd certainly explain a lot if she did. Whenever something had seemed like it was about to go wrong, Esmerelda had this uncanny knack for appearing out of nowhere and fixing it, often muttering to herself in rapid Spanish that Stefan could only assume was something about 'strange people and their bad cooking'.

"Esmerelda's just magic in general. She got used to us jumping out of windows pretty quickly," it'd probably confused her to no end to see them do it, but then again, she'd been dealing with their parents and Varric for a while. "I think she's secretly some form of ancient magical force. It'd explain how she appears out of nowhere sometimes."

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shiftlinggirl
2012-01-30 12:11 am UTC (link)

"Jumping out of windows? Why were you jumping out of windows?" So far, going on a date with Stefan was just like spending time with Stefan. Which was easy and pleasing, certainly, but didn't seem like enough. Dar reached out and took his hand. He probably wouldn't mind that. "Does she really appear out of nowhere or are you exagerrating? Given what strange things some people here can do, I honestly can't tell!"

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learnttofly
2012-02-08 02:03 am UTC (link)

Stefan grinned a little sheepishly, gladly taking her hand and squeezing it lightly. "We, uh. Well, Melora's the crazy tree climber, and I... well, it gives me a bit of a boost if I shift when I'm already in midair, y'know?"

It was probably a bit unorthodox, but he'd hardly had a proper trainer when it came to shifting, which probably showed in almost everything he did whilst changed. "And yeah, she's just... not there one second, and you turn around and suddenly she's there."

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shiftlinggirl
2012-03-03 02:04 pm UTC (link)

"So you jumped out of windows to get the hang of flying? I'm surprised you've survived, between that and banging into trees at first." Dar grinned. "I did the same thing, really. Not jumping out of windows, I didn't have any windows to jump from. Usually I'd start in bird form and try to get in the air but only make it a few wingbeats before I'd end up back in the dirt, and then I'd go too high or too left. The only reason I didn't fly into more things is because there weren't things to fly into."

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