[Blue isn't the only glad for the change of topic, and if nothing else, the Ball was at least some approximation of neutral. There'd been no awful expectations outside of talking to people, and even if there was an overture of trying to push people toward contracts, it hadn't been an obligation.]
All expensive suits and ridiculous dresses at some pointlessly lavish venue, of course. Here I didn't have any money, so I had to rent a suit by bartering three days working behind a register.
[Gansey had promptly decided never again. But he was hoping that his stumbling attempts at working through these things would provide her with at least a modicum of amusement. Something to focus on that wasn't the roles it put on people or the way that this place asked them to have sex with people; neatly asterisked with an or else in the footnote.
There's so much about this place that he doesn't want to talk about, the things he's still working through himself. So anything softer seems easy, even if it's at his own expense. This he can at least manage a slightly rueful smile about as he looks over at her.]
There were expensive fingerfoods and music I'm not convinced living people willingly listen to. The dancing was the only thing that made it worth it. [He laughs a little, humorless, because he's talking more about one of his parents' parties than prom, but in Duplicity the two seemed to be close enough.] But it wasn't that bad.
[Something sweet touches his expression, reflects in the edge of his voice. He thinks about dancing with Adam, the way the older teen's fingers slipped under his jacket and touched against the small of his back as they moved, and there's warmth to it before he catches it. But looking at her there's something uncertain and almost a little bit like guilt that flickers in his chest.
Gansey thinks she's seventeen and the same Blue that had told him about how she couldn't kiss her true love and followed that with Adam's name. Where he'd seen her holding hands with Adam in the back of a helicopter, that strange intimacy that slipped between the two of them. And here he's kissed Adam, even managed to stumble through some of the things he never thought he could say back home. Or at least, not without a fight, or making the worst sort of mess out of his intentions.
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All expensive suits and ridiculous dresses at some pointlessly lavish venue, of course. Here I didn't have any money, so I had to rent a suit by bartering three days working behind a register.
[Gansey had promptly decided never again. But he was hoping that his stumbling attempts at working through these things would provide her with at least a modicum of amusement. Something to focus on that wasn't the roles it put on people or the way that this place asked them to have sex with people; neatly asterisked with an or else in the footnote.
There's so much about this place that he doesn't want to talk about, the things he's still working through himself. So anything softer seems easy, even if it's at his own expense. This he can at least manage a slightly rueful smile about as he looks over at her.]
There were expensive fingerfoods and music I'm not convinced living people willingly listen to. The dancing was the only thing that made it worth it. [He laughs a little, humorless, because he's talking more about one of his parents' parties than prom, but in Duplicity the two seemed to be close enough.] But it wasn't that bad.
[Something sweet touches his expression, reflects in the edge of his voice. He thinks about dancing with Adam, the way the older teen's fingers slipped under his jacket and touched against the small of his back as they moved, and there's warmth to it before he catches it. But looking at her there's something uncertain and almost a little bit like guilt that flickers in his chest.
Gansey thinks she's seventeen and the same Blue that had told him about how she couldn't kiss her true love and followed that with Adam's name. Where he'd seen her holding hands with Adam in the back of a helicopter, that strange intimacy that slipped between the two of them. And here he's kissed Adam, even managed to stumble through some of the things he never thought he could say back home. Or at least, not without a fight, or making the worst sort of mess out of his intentions.
But he isn't the one she needs to talk to.]