[And there's nothing more comforting than being hair petted, it dissolves whatever remaining tension may have been hiding in her body. For a good moment or two she just sits there with him, and then she can seem to admit:] I overreacted. [Just a tad.] I want you two to get along, but I guess I can't just hide all the bad parts.
[Every family has their secrets, and they're generally always bad but the Lunaes just feel ... Incredibly gross and disconcerting, even to Nariko. Even when she loves them with all of her heart. There's a reason she lives on the other end of the world and doesn't visit them too often.]
[Did she overreact in his opinion? Well...yeah. But he doesn't really mind it--both of them are more on edge than they're used to being.]
How much I like your family is not a reflection on how I feel about you. But if you want my honest opinion, I think we'll get along--she just wanted to do the typical shocking old woman introduction.
[There's not a whole lot that would gross Boxer out, considering that the two of them do some stuff that others would think pretty gross!]
...although I suppose I'm still reeling about the idea of filling the generational gap in bed.
[Well, maybe, at least! Old women were a category unto themselves. She relaxes that much more when she takes in his thoughts. It's good that they'll get along since Maggie's probably going to be an involved grandmother. The kind that wants pictures every week, along with a phone call. And that last part ...
She leans to one side, looking up at her eventual husband from an angle.]
There's a list of relatives that are cleared for that business, and she's not on it.
[That there's a list to begin with is noteworthy, though.]
Sure! My standing theory is that at some point they got tired of being prim and proper ladies and decide to amuse themselves with shocking other people.
[You meet a lot of different archetypes of people when you work so closely to the tourism industry.]
[Wow, that actually makes sense! And considering how traditional things had been for her grandmother, the arranged marriage, being forced to stay home and be a housewife rather than having the choice ... Go figure. But, yeah, she figured the list would get a decent reaction out of him.]
There's a list, and there are men and women on it.
[That Boxer is an equal opportunity lover hasn't escaped her attention! This isn't a sign that she's here for polyamory, and of course she'd greatly prefer remaining Boxer's sun and moon, always there for him and pleasing him but ... They're getting married. As long as he doesn't try to turn it into a three way emotional setup, she can relax a bit, because there's a lot of power in knowing that she can take care of his needs just fine, and that adding anyone else in isn't a veiled act of making up for something she can't provide.
You've spent time deciding which of your family members you wouldn't mind having a threesome with.
[His tone sounds all Judgey Jason until he cracks a smile.]
Damn you're kinky. [And that tone reads "holy shit, you really are the woman of my dreams, I love you so much."
He's hoping a few of the people that caught his eye are on said list, though he's not entirely sure that he should get his hopes up about it. Then again, it'd have to be about now, right? Who knows when the next time they'll see her family is...]
I've been in enough awkwardly sexual situations with certain family members that a threesome wouldn't really be a big deal.
[So maybe it's not entirely fair to deem it as a kink, it's got a lot to do with being comfortable, and knowing exactly how to hunt down some of these fuckers if they get the wrong idea. But she'll take the apparent compliment just the same.]
Just stay away from Agni, okay? His brother, Ignis, is fine - they're twins - and I'm completely okay with him but the other one is just .. [That she's curling into him a little more, sort of hiding her face, is almost pointed.] He's just not good, and we all know it, but it's not like we can get rid of the guy.
[It's more complicated than just that but there's no use in laying out all the gross details.]
[Just because it's not her kink doesn't make the act of listing who you wouldn't mind in your family to be Player 3 any less kinky in and of itself!]
Uh...okay.
[It's not that he doesn't believe her, but he's not really used to twins. Not in a way that mattered.
Does sex really come up enough in this family for their sex skills to be common knowledge? ...does this mean that people are gonna end up learning what these two get up to when they're feeling really depraved?]
One is the second sweetest man to ever walk the Earth and he blushes if you say 'vagina' or even hit on him. The other's an overly loud asshole who'll probably grate on your nerves the second you meet him. He's an introvert's nightmare.
[Says the female extrovert, which might be a warning unto itself.]
Believe me, none of these assholes can manage to resemble each other in personality, it's just a matter of getting to know them.
[And Boxer's observant enough anyway.] Eunyce, Malia, Rami, Satem, and Dito are fine, too. [And those are just the ones she can remember off the top of her head. But Ignis is her favorite.]
[It's the quiet ones you have to watch out for, isn't it? Boxer's such an example, even though he's a charismatic kind of quiet. So he's totally into Ignis's type, suffice to say.]
You might have to remind me which is which. [He's pretty good at learning peoples' names on a time, but there's an awful lot of names he just picked up. Plus they're names which he's never heard of before, so it's hard to associate a lot of them with their names.]
[She clearly has a thing for muscles, though it wasn't a fact she made any attempt to hide.] I'll be dancing with him soon, and that'll probably help.
[If there was ever a set of twins you could tell apart it would definitely be those two. And speaking of the dancing, there are sudden bursts of music, a palpable sense of anticipation. Nariko ignores it so that she can lean back a little and really look at her fiancee, as much as she can in the relative darkness, anyway.]
Thank you. [For being patient with her, mostly, but also for everything else.]
[He's all smiles when he looks at her, even though he knows in the depths of his hearts that he's going to be disappointed when she's dancing with Agnis. It's not a jealousy thing at all--in fact, he'll be glad that she's found someone to dance with and have fun.
He just wishes he could have an option too. He'll never know what it's like to dance with his fiance...what it's like to dance with his wife.
Even though they're completely exhausting, foreign, and ridiculous?
[Obviously, but she can't help teasing them and they're her relatives so she's allowed to make fun of them! And Boxer's allowed to hide things, even if it's unfair. She's seen him move with his tentacles so, honestly, she's not even aware of the problem itself. She just figures he can't do it for very long, but even if it's for a small bit that's enough for their first dance!]
Do you want to watch?
[It might not be a good idea to leave him all alone here - or even possible, since without her nearby someone would just come looking, but it's much more polite to turn it into an offer. He's never seen her dance, after all.]
[One more kiss, and then she crawls out of his lap to guide his chair again, but only somewhat. There's already a loose knight circle made around a sizable space, and even some of the tallest members of her family can't obstruct Boxer's view. She squeezes his shoulder and pushes through various relatives on her own, so he's got a clear opening.
Still, she isn't the first to go, Sabal and Tamir have that honor. They choose a traditional dance so more than a few people sing along, it gets a bit loud and excited, but there's something to be said for how they move together. They radiate happiness, and while the dance itself is quite traditional and therefore very well known, it always looks new to her. For Nariko it's impossible to quell her desire to move, by the time they finish she's practically hopping in place.
So when Ignis eases forward from the other side of their ring of family members Nariko about leaps forward, more than ready to take his hand before he's finished offering it. He's tall, with a deeper skin tone than Nariko, armed with a sharp jaw that wasn't entirely unlike Boxer's. Ignis and Nariko shared the same bright hazel eyes, verging on a muddled, dark gold, but where she grinned brightly enough to help light up the night Ignis was notably well tempered, grinning rather than smirking.
What they dance resembled a contemporary salsa, quick, skillful, and infinitely more sensual. If not for their incredible physical likeness they would look like any other couple, passionate and well balanced.]
[Almost done sounds great until he gets to watch the dancing. It means that eyes aren't on him anymore, and he can simply enjoy...existing, while watching Nariko's family have a grand time dancing together. It's nice that he gets a great seat to watch from, too. He's chuckling to himself as the anticipation grows inside of Nariko, glad that she finally gets a chance to burn it off.
Ignis, on the other hand, holds the unfortunate responsibility of being Boxer's stand-in, at least in his head. If he was human, yeah...he'd look like that, move like that, get to dance with Nariko like that. And for a long time, the fantasy stays alive and well...but not forever.
If she looks at him while they're dancing, he'll be smiling. When she finishes dancing, too, he's smiling, but there's something uncomfortable and sad about it in such a subtle way that only Nariko would be able to see, given their time spent together by now. Because in the end, he doesn't look like that, he doesn't move like that, and he certainly won't dance with Nariko like that.]
[It'd be poetic to say that she manages to keep her eyes on Boxer despite all the movement and coordination needed for this kind of activity. The truth is that she doesn't - can't, really - which makes it all the more painful when it's over with and she's grinning with excitement, and he looks as if he's been forced to swallow glass and smile through it.
"Are you alright?" Ignis gripped her arm, she'd tensed at some point or another and they were so close that it was no wonder her elder cousin noticed it right away.]
I'm fine.
[She manages a smile but steps away.] Thanks. Looks like Adiba is next, though!
[It's a slick enough exit, but she'll probably end up delivering some form of explanation later on. It's fine, right now it just ... It kind of seems like they don't need to be here anymore, and whether that's just her protective streak rearing its very vicious head or not, it's what she's going to go with.]
Ready to go?
[And when they're alone she's going to ask. That went beyond a little introverted exhaustion, after all.]
[It does, but he hates to admit it. He wants to have fun, and for the most part, he is. But the fact that he's the only monster at a human party is becoming painfully obvious as the hours tick by. His grimace isn't that bad, is it? He hopes it's not. (It is.)
When she asks him if he's ready to go, he lets a little more of his real emotion show through.]
Yeah. We're not going to have to say farewell to everyone, right?
[Because he knows that will take at least an additional hour. Can they just leave in silence...?]
[But they can't leave in complete silence. They revisit Abbas near the exit and the kid's upset to hear that they're leaving and incredibly loud about it - which means that their exit will be broadcasted quickly. She waves, makes some fake apologies and they'll be out soon enough. In truth her grandma's probably going to be a little pissy about it, but Nariko will field that later. Right now she just wants Boxer to have room to breathe.]
Your place or mine?
[That's a stupid question since they usually go to his apartment, not hers. But if she can hear his voice she might be able to figure out if he's okay or not.]
[There's more reason to it than that, be he feels like that's the only one he really needs to give. He just really wants to get to his tank right now, and the buzzing that's starting to generate due to the chatter that they're leaving is making his anxiety peak very, very quickly.]
Nariko doesn't answer, she just leads them back to his building, which takes a good few minutes but nothing more. It's a comfortable, knowing silence on her end, an attempt to give him space even though there's only so much she can do, to begin with. It's probably been long enough that everyone in his building knows her, getting up and inside isn't too much of a problem.
And neither is going to his room. Go for the tank, Boxer, she isn't going to stop you.]
[She isn't at all tired so she might as well get something productive done while he rests - or tries to, at least. It wasn't as if the night was a waste by any means but she really hadn't wanted to upset him so badly, or have any hand in causing it. But there was nothing she could do but let him take care of himself.
Hopefully that'd be enough. If she apologized too much or fretted that'd only stress him out more.]
[He looks up at her from his chair. He's not actively trying to...but he's ended up giving her those begging doe-eyes, intricately curved pupils wide with hope.
Please don't leave him here alone, Nariko. Not after all of that.]
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Yes, I think it does.
[And there's nothing more comforting than being hair petted, it dissolves whatever remaining tension may have been hiding in her body. For a good moment or two she just sits there with him, and then she can seem to admit:] I overreacted. [Just a tad.] I want you two to get along, but I guess I can't just hide all the bad parts.
[Every family has their secrets, and they're generally always bad but the Lunaes just feel ... Incredibly gross and disconcerting, even to Nariko. Even when she loves them with all of her heart. There's a reason she lives on the other end of the world and doesn't visit them too often.]
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[Did she overreact in his opinion? Well...yeah. But he doesn't really mind it--both of them are more on edge than they're used to being.]
How much I like your family is not a reflection on how I feel about you. But if you want my honest opinion, I think we'll get along--she just wanted to do the typical shocking old woman introduction.
[There's not a whole lot that would gross Boxer out, considering that the two of them do some stuff that others would think pretty gross!]
...although I suppose I'm still reeling about the idea of filling the generational gap in bed.
[A carefully worded retort.]
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[Well, maybe, at least! Old women were a category unto themselves. She relaxes that much more when she takes in his thoughts. It's good that they'll get along since Maggie's probably going to be an involved grandmother. The kind that wants pictures every week, along with a phone call. And that last part ...
She leans to one side, looking up at her eventual husband from an angle.]
There's a list of relatives that are cleared for that business, and she's not on it.
[That there's a list to begin with is noteworthy, though.]
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[You meet a lot of different archetypes of people when you work so closely to the tourism industry.]
...there's a list?
[Will these two ever find their kink limit?]
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There's a list, and there are men and women on it.
[That Boxer is an equal opportunity lover hasn't escaped her attention! This isn't a sign that she's here for polyamory, and of course she'd greatly prefer remaining Boxer's sun and moon, always there for him and pleasing him but ... They're getting married. As long as he doesn't try to turn it into a three way emotional setup, she can relax a bit, because there's a lot of power in knowing that she can take care of his needs just fine, and that adding anyone else in isn't a veiled act of making up for something she can't provide.
With confidence comes new avenues, apparently.]
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[His tone sounds all Judgey Jason until he cracks a smile.]
Damn you're kinky. [And that tone reads "holy shit, you really are the woman of my dreams, I love you so much."
He's hoping a few of the people that caught his eye are on said list, though he's not entirely sure that he should get his hopes up about it. Then again, it'd have to be about now, right? Who knows when the next time they'll see her family is...]
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[So maybe it's not entirely fair to deem it as a kink, it's got a lot to do with being comfortable, and knowing exactly how to hunt down some of these fuckers if they get the wrong idea. But she'll take the apparent compliment just the same.]
Just stay away from Agni, okay? His brother, Ignis, is fine - they're twins - and I'm completely okay with him but the other one is just .. [That she's curling into him a little more, sort of hiding her face, is almost pointed.] He's just not good, and we all know it, but it's not like we can get rid of the guy.
[It's more complicated than just that but there's no use in laying out all the gross details.]
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Uh...okay.
[It's not that he doesn't believe her, but he's not really used to twins. Not in a way that mattered.
Does sex really come up enough in this family for their sex skills to be common knowledge? ...does this mean that people are gonna end up learning what these two get up to when they're feeling really depraved?]
So how am I supposed to tell them apart?
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[Says the female extrovert, which might be a warning unto itself.]
Believe me, none of these assholes can manage to resemble each other in personality, it's just a matter of getting to know them.
[And Boxer's observant enough anyway.] Eunyce, Malia, Rami, Satem, and Dito are fine, too. [And those are just the ones she can remember off the top of her head. But Ignis is her favorite.]
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[It's the quiet ones you have to watch out for, isn't it? Boxer's such an example, even though he's a charismatic kind of quiet. So he's totally into Ignis's type, suffice to say.]
You might have to remind me which is which. [He's pretty good at learning peoples' names on a time, but there's an awful lot of names he just picked up. Plus they're names which he's never heard of before, so it's hard to associate a lot of them with their names.]
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[She clearly has a thing for muscles, though it wasn't a fact she made any attempt to hide.] I'll be dancing with him soon, and that'll probably help.
[If there was ever a set of twins you could tell apart it would definitely be those two. And speaking of the dancing, there are sudden bursts of music, a palpable sense of anticipation. Nariko ignores it so that she can lean back a little and really look at her fiancee, as much as she can in the relative darkness, anyway.]
Thank you. [For being patient with her, mostly, but also for everything else.]
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[He's all smiles when he looks at her, even though he knows in the depths of his hearts that he's going to be disappointed when she's dancing with Agnis. It's not a jealousy thing at all--in fact, he'll be glad that she's found someone to dance with and have fun.
He just wishes he could have an option too. He'll never know what it's like to dance with his fiance...what it's like to dance with his wife.
But he hides it well.]
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[Obviously, but she can't help teasing them and they're her relatives so she's allowed to make fun of them! And Boxer's allowed to hide things, even if it's unfair. She's seen him move with his tentacles so, honestly, she's not even aware of the problem itself. She just figures he can't do it for very long, but even if it's for a small bit that's enough for their first dance!]
Do you want to watch?
[It might not be a good idea to leave him all alone here - or even possible, since without her nearby someone would just come looking, but it's much more polite to turn it into an offer. He's never seen her dance, after all.]
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[Always the positive spin with him! They are a lot to chew on, but they taste just as sweet.
In response to her question, he nods.]
Yeah. Show me what you're made of out there.
[Honestly, he's too socialized-up to go and make a fool out of himself on the dance floor. Maybe some other day, when it's just the two of them.]
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Okay. We're almost done, handsome.
[One more kiss, and then she crawls out of his lap to guide his chair again, but only somewhat. There's already a loose knight circle made around a sizable space, and even some of the tallest members of her family can't obstruct Boxer's view. She squeezes his shoulder and pushes through various relatives on her own, so he's got a clear opening.
Still, she isn't the first to go, Sabal and Tamir have that honor. They choose a traditional dance so more than a few people sing along, it gets a bit loud and excited, but there's something to be said for how they move together. They radiate happiness, and while the dance itself is quite traditional and therefore very well known, it always looks new to her. For Nariko it's impossible to quell her desire to move, by the time they finish she's practically hopping in place.
So when Ignis eases forward from the other side of their ring of family members Nariko about leaps forward, more than ready to take his hand before he's finished offering it. He's tall, with a deeper skin tone than Nariko, armed with a sharp jaw that wasn't entirely unlike Boxer's. Ignis and Nariko shared the same bright hazel eyes, verging on a muddled, dark gold, but where she grinned brightly enough to help light up the night Ignis was notably well tempered, grinning rather than smirking.
What they dance resembled a contemporary salsa, quick, skillful, and infinitely more sensual. If not for their incredible physical likeness they would look like any other couple, passionate and well balanced.]
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Ignis, on the other hand, holds the unfortunate responsibility of being Boxer's stand-in, at least in his head. If he was human, yeah...he'd look like that, move like that, get to dance with Nariko like that. And for a long time, the fantasy stays alive and well...but not forever.
If she looks at him while they're dancing, he'll be smiling. When she finishes dancing, too, he's smiling, but there's something uncomfortable and sad about it in such a subtle way that only Nariko would be able to see, given their time spent together by now. Because in the end, he doesn't look like that, he doesn't move like that, and he certainly won't dance with Nariko like that.]
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"Are you alright?" Ignis gripped her arm, she'd tensed at some point or another and they were so close that it was no wonder her elder cousin noticed it right away.]
I'm fine.
[She manages a smile but steps away.] Thanks. Looks like Adiba is next, though!
[It's a slick enough exit, but she'll probably end up delivering some form of explanation later on. It's fine, right now it just ... It kind of seems like they don't need to be here anymore, and whether that's just her protective streak rearing its very vicious head or not, it's what she's going to go with.]
Ready to go?
[And when they're alone she's going to ask. That went beyond a little introverted exhaustion, after all.]
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When she asks him if he's ready to go, he lets a little more of his real emotion show through.]
Yeah. We're not going to have to say farewell to everyone, right?
[Because he knows that will take at least an additional hour. Can they just leave in silence...?]
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[But they can't leave in complete silence. They revisit Abbas near the exit and the kid's upset to hear that they're leaving and incredibly loud about it - which means that their exit will be broadcasted quickly. She waves, makes some fake apologies and they'll be out soon enough. In truth her grandma's probably going to be a little pissy about it, but Nariko will field that later. Right now she just wants Boxer to have room to breathe.]
Your place or mine?
[That's a stupid question since they usually go to his apartment, not hers. But if she can hear his voice she might be able to figure out if he's okay or not.]
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[There's more reason to it than that, be he feels like that's the only one he really needs to give. He just really wants to get to his tank right now, and the buzzing that's starting to generate due to the chatter that they're leaving is making his anxiety peak very, very quickly.]
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Nariko doesn't answer, she just leads them back to his building, which takes a good few minutes but nothing more. It's a comfortable, knowing silence on her end, an attempt to give him space even though there's only so much she can do, to begin with. It's probably been long enough that everyone in his building knows her, getting up and inside isn't too much of a problem.
And neither is going to his room. Go for the tank, Boxer, she isn't going to stop you.]
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And so he will be peeling his form-fitting polo off almost as soon as they get past his front door.]
Gonna go take a nap. [Whether or not he actually calms down enough to take a nap is up for debate, but he's gonna try to anyway.] What about you?
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[She isn't at all tired so she might as well get something productive done while he rests - or tries to, at least. It wasn't as if the night was a waste by any means but she really hadn't wanted to upset him so badly, or have any hand in causing it. But there was nothing she could do but let him take care of himself.
Hopefully that'd be enough. If she apologized too much or fretted that'd only stress him out more.]
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[He looks up at her from his chair. He's not actively trying to...but he's ended up giving her those begging doe-eyes, intricately curved pupils wide with hope.
Please don't leave him here alone, Nariko. Not after all of that.]
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[Half of her stuff is here anyway so it's not a big deal to stay, and the idea of leaving him hadn't even crossed her mind.]
I was going to set up in the living room, but the bed would work just fine.
[It's up to him, she'll sit there and work and be as close as possible if he wants, or she'll hang out in the living room.]
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