. international baby

[dolly weathers]

"Rude!" her candy tinted lips pout as he steals away her candy and her arms fold like a cross child. He falls onto the plastic floor and she bounces around him and over him. Her legs suddenly feel like springs - so full of energy. "Oh you know," she pants, "just my ABCs." She lands on the floor beside him and props herself against his chest to take back her candy. "Did you save any lives?"

[theo lovett]

He laughs as she bounces around him, half afraid she'll fall on him, half afraid she won't. "No, come on, give me a taster. I've never dated a super smart girl, I want to be able to flex by sharing knowledge you've shared with me," he says, "though don't tell my exes I said that." He lets her swipe the candy back, slipping an arm around her and giving her another squeeze. He shrugs. "Who knows, maybe. I'm a glorified Uber driver."

[dolly weathers]

She shakes her head and chews at the lollypop, "sounds like a date three kind of thing." Winded from her bouncing, she pants in his embrace, "see, that's not fair. If I don't get any, you don't get any." Hyper from the candy and booze, Dolly sucks on the cherry pop and fidgets. She pulls herself up to reposition herself, this time sitting on his waist. "I read an Oxford study that says falling in love costs you two friends, which you can see, can't you? It's so self-involved."

[theo lovett]

"How about we call this date one, smashing the pinata date two, then calling it a day and going to bed date three? I think that's three separate things." He pays attention as her breathing slows from a pant to a normal pace, his own heart beating wildly in his chest and making him feel short of breath. He hoped she couldn't hear it through his chest. A slow smile spreads across his face as she goes to sit on his waist, his hands resting on her thighs. "No, don't say that! I love my friends," he says, pouting again. "Oh well. I guess I can stand to lose Kat and maybe Jack. Never liked those guys anyway."

[dolly weathers]

She smirks and bends down to kiss him deeply, "don't be greedy, you're the one that set the rules." The lollipop it less than half it's initial size and she crumbles it open with her teeth. His hands are warm against her thighs and she feels as her heart begins to slow with a deep comfort and buzz. "Yeah, fuck Kat and Jack," she tosses the lolly stick outside and makes a mental note to pick it up later. "I also read that there's three types of people when it comes to relationships. A secure - which is the most common. Then anxious, then avoidant."

[theo lovett]

Being an EMT, Theo knew that life was fragile. One day you could be on top of the world, an unstoppable force, and the very next you could be in the emergency room, bargaining it all away as you pray that your loved one pulls through. So he was grateful for the good times, and this was very much a good time. He kissed Dolly back, taking a moment to absorb everything about the right now; the smell of plastic, the taste of cherry, the sound of the fan. "That's college talk, Weathers," he smirked, pulling her down to kiss him again. "Which one are you?"

[dolly weathers]

Her lips settle on his and it feels so natural. Her hands press into his chest and float up to grasp his shoulders for a moment. Right now she feels like she could pour all her love into him. Her honey coloured eyes look into his and she smiles, "I'm anxious. You'll do something little, I'll find it offensive to us and then I'll protest," her nose wrinkles at the thought and she shakes her head, "which do you think you are?"

[theo lovett]

He raises an eyebrow at her response. There was nothing about her that seemed anxious to him, but it felt too presumptuous of him to say as much, since he couldn't possibly know her as well as she knew herself. Really, he hardly knew her at all, though he felt so comfortable it was as though he had known her all his life. "Secure," he says, with no hesitation. "I read once that there was this experiment that worked out if two strangers asked each other this specific list of questions and answered each other honestly, they'd fall in love. Just like that."

[dolly weathers]

Her smile widens and she nods, "you are so clearly a secure." When she'd read the study, she'd analyzed all the people in her life and which category they'd fit into. While Dolly craved affection, Damien's avoidance saw it as weakness. Though she'd hardly admit it, she craved reassurance. "Just like that? Was the question 'what do you want for dinner?' My answer is always Mexican."

[theo lovett]

"Told you I was boring." He studies her face, taking in all the little details that were harder to pin down on Google. It still didn't feel real, though her weight on him and the feel of her thighs under his hands reassured him that it was. "I think it was like, questions about their parents and stuff. I wouldn't get very far," he grins, before propping himself up to kiss her again.

[dolly weathers]

She kisses him back and lets her arms snake around his neck. He smells like cologne and tastes like sugar, it makes her heart squeeze. She leans back and studies him, her chin nods reassuringly, "I could fall in love with you, but I'm just an anxious." She kisses his pillowy lips, "do you think what happened to your parents fucked you up?"

[theo lovett]

Her body is pressed against his for the briefest of moments, before she's sat back and he's craving her again. "I think you could too. I'll get you some anti anxiety meds," he says, pretending that his heart isn't going a million miles an hour with all this love talk. He shakes his head. "Do I seem fucked up? If anything it made me get my act together. I paid more attention in school, I was nicer to my girlfriend..." His mind wanders to Oliver and instantly he feels sick, the deep well of anxiety he was working so hard to smother rearing up. "It changed my relationship with my brother for the worse, though."

[dolly weathers]

She feels her heart swell and she squeezes her thighs around him, "nope! I'm good." Her forehead crinkles as he defends himself. He didn't seem fucked up, but if she knew anything it was that there was always a mess beneath the surface. At least in her own case. "It sounds like you were trying to make things easier." She feels the shift in mood and scratches at the fluffy hair on the nape of his neck. He seemed to do a good job acting like everything was fine but it didn't feel quite like relief to know that it wasn't. "What were you like before?"

[theo lovett]

He felt like he was in freefall. Theo kept a tight lid on that particular box, and now that it had opened a crack, the feelings inside burst forward and he was struggling to stuff them back in there. He wanted to forget all about it, but he felt guilty, guilty for his inability to handle it, guilty for letting himself lose his grip right here, right now, ruining what was such a great day. He had gone very still, and he forced himself to smile, to shake his head, to kiss her again. "You don't want to hear about my brother," he says, speaking more to himself than her. "Let's smash that pinata. I think we need more candy, don't you?"

[dolly weathers]

Navigating grief wasn't something Dolly had ever experienced. When she'd lost her grandmother, she was only fourteen and she felt funny about it - mostly because she hadn't felt very close to her mom's mother and felt because of such, it would be fake to feel grief. When Theo shifts Dolly narrows her eyes to read him. She wonders if that grief was too personal for her to help. She kisses him back, a little frown still wrinkled. "I do if you want to talk about it. I feel you do a lot of helping without much help from others," she shrugs, "but sure. We can smash that thing."