Anything But Numb

[Harlequin]

"Oh, I meant just when you were a cat, but...you can\'t see red? Even in this form" She sounded genuinely horrified, and her eyes went wide "But red is–is blood, it\'sjoy, it\'s passion,!" she gestured grandly with her free hand as she said each of these things, punctuating each exclamation with her body. She\'d heard of red/green colorblindess; so perhaps it was better just to be cheated out of one color – but what a color to miss.

"Red is so – so essential," she concluded, "You can keep your nightvision," she said, "If it were a choice between being able to see in the dark, and red, I\'d take red, and pay the price in bumped shins a hundred times over. I\'d trade orange, though. Orange is kind of a throwaway color." Not to mention that it reminded her of the Marigolds her mother had surrounded her with on the day they\'d announced her engagement.

"But all the colors are important!" she contested fiercely, though her grin was devilish, and broad, "Can you imagine a world without color?" She simulated a conversation in deadened monotone, staring blankly ahead, as they walked, "What do you want to wear today? Gray. What do you want to wear tomorrow? Dark gray. What color is the sky? Gray. What kind of apples do you like? Gray." She shuddered at the thought, animating once again,"So boring!"

[Existentially Odd]

He watched her like she was television, eyes wide, grin broad and laughter unsuppressed.  She was, quite possibly the funniest, most talented and entertaining being he\'d ever met in his whole life and he couldn\'t take his eyes off her, fascinated with the character she adopted, the fabulous way she celebrated colour the... everything about her.  He was hooked.

"I don\'t think my eyes change, that is the problem.  They aren\'t supposed to still be blue, that should have faded when I was a cub, but something is different about me, because they never switched to brown and I have the same vision with four legs or two," he chuckled.  "Luckily, I don\'t know anything about red, so I do not miss it," he teased, squeezing her hand to drag her closer to him so that he might poke his face towards hers for a step, to make his superior-sounding point.

"And I can imagine a world without colour.  It is smell that I could not do without!" he crowed, finding her spirit and energy contagious.  His volume was creeping up on shouting in his enthusiasm.

[Harlequin]

She had been about to reply to the comments about his eyes, when suddenly he pulled her close, and leaned his face toward hers. Her first instinct was to snap her teeth wolfishly at him – eating those imperious words with a brief,f ferocious growl, even as the words continued and the singer\'s grin only grew – which was what she did. Her very second instinct had been something very different – which she did not do, as it would have occupied his mouth, and she greatly enjoyed this argument they were having. Truth be told, she liked almost everything he had to say – his enthusiasm for the simplest things was contagious. It made her feel like a child again, learning about the world all over again, by teaching it to someone else, who hadn\'t had time to become jaded and cynical.

"Smell!" she said, scoffing at the idea, "You\'ve obviously never been stuck in an elevator with four sweaty humans who haven\'t had a shower in four days." Her face twisted into a grimace – exaggerated for the benefit of her audience – as she recalled that lovely experience she\'d had one afternoon. In Tuscon. In mid-August.  "Sometimes I wish I couldn\'t smell. But I wouldn\'t give up hearing for anything in the whole wide world," her grin, if possible, broadened, "Speaking of – keep it down, bub, you\'ll wake the neighbors," she teased.

[Existentially Odd]

"All humans are smelly," he asserted pompously and then performed a very deft manouevre, lifting their joined hands over her head and stepping gracefully behind her before lowering it again.  Quite without warning, he was walking along behind her with his face pressed in against the right side of her neck and his arms around her, one across her body, as it was still joined with hers.

"You smell lovely, though.  And sweaty humans are my favourite, we cats like salt.  I would love to get you sweaty and lick you all over," he purred, nuzzling at her throat pointedly.  He knew that his actions were bold and he intended them to make her think twice, to start her thinking along lines of companionship that were a lot more intimate than just friends but which he\'d been thinking along for a while now.

He didn\'t intend to be lewd, however, and would be aghast at the fuller implications of his words, had he known.  He genuinely meant wrestling and licking up her arms or perhaps her neck (he predicted she\'d like that, his old boss certainly had, especially since he had a particularly rough tongue) to taste her salt; his actions though, would only back up his very untoward declaration and make him seem a whole lot more sophisticated than he was being.

"And I\'ll be quieter," he continued, his lips moving to nudge against the edge of her ear as he did, indeed, drop his volume to a whisper.  "I think the neighbours should hear you instead, you sound far prettier than me - though you are very greedy.  Sight and sound already you could never live without... next thing you\'ll tell me you can\'t do without touch," he teased, the hand not still linked with hers trailing across her stomach and whispering up and down her forearm pointedly.

His steps were faltering suddenly,his longs legs straddling hers so that his feet were walking on the outside, but for some reason, their combined stride was nowhere near as graceful as he\'d thought it would be.  He blamed her far shorter legs and began pondering simply picking her up and carrying her.

[Harlequin]

Well THAT came out of nowhere

The shortness of her legs  was less to blame for their ungainly walk -- which was growing moreso by the second  -- than the fact that his forward talk had caused her to stumble slightly, surprised. And it was hard to concentrate on walking when there were such lovely things happening to her neck, which she let him have better access to by tilting her head to the side, once she\'d gotten over the initial moment of \'hey where\'d he go?\'

His words caused her eyebrows to lift, however, as she was taken aback by their implications. All of which she was 100% okay with, but damn, if that hadn\'t come on fast, "you know," she said, even as her skin heated slightly beneath his stroking fingers, "That\'s not how friends talk to each other," It wasn\'t how friend\'s touched each other, either, but that wasn\'t necessary for him to know, right now. The playfulness -- slightly more devious now than before -- of her tone mostly belied her words, however; the singer didn\'t mind one teeny tiny little bit. There was warning there, however; if this went beyond flirting (as she really kind of hoped it would) their budding relationship would change -- but it seemed like that\'s what he was going for, and it wasn\'t hard for Morgaine to stop herself from thinking about exactly how that would turn out. The future was the future. Now was now.

"And of course I\'m not gonna give up touch. If I did that, I wouldn\'t be able to feel your...tongue." And the devilish grin was back, "But all either of us are gonna be feelin\' is pavement, soon, if we don\'t figure out some other way to move." More precisely, she felt like Tau was well on his way to running her over, despite her efforts to increase her stride -- which were comical, yes, but also wildly impractical.

[Existentially Odd]

He laughed and unwound himself from her with about as much grace as he\'d displayed in getting them into their awkward positioning.  "Better?" he queried, pausing before he began walking earnestly (but taking a few steps to test if she\'d be able to keep pace with him again).

Her jibe about how friends touched each other hadn\'t been lost on him, either, and he\'d figured that walking beside her again would relieve the pressure.  He knew that things like licking were intimate and would lead to a lot more than just hanging out, wrestling and listening to her sing, but what he didn\'t know was how she felt about that.  Nor himself, for that matter.  He would hate for their relationship to become only about sex, as his relationship with his boss had become.

No, Morgaine was a lot more fun and interesting as a friend than he believed she could be as a lover, so he decided he should back off the innuendo and intimacy tracks for now (no matter how good she smelled and how tasty he believed it would be to lick her all over and then be inside her).

[Harlequin]

Somehow, the singer found herself slightly disappointed when he untangeld himself from her, and she found herself walking by his side again (though she kept hold of his hand -- if only to make the untangling slightly more difficult; because goddammit, no one deserved to be that graceful. Of course it wasn\'t only that, but she boxed that away too.) Unsure of exactly why that was, she shrugged it off as best she could. After all, she had, told him it wasn\'t how friends talked. Apparently he\'d simply taken that to heart. Obviously (somehow? That had seemed damned forward. Whatever. Move on.) his talk -- and touch -- were only meant to be friendly; no matter how they affected her.
 
"I guess," she said in answer to the, question, shrugging as indifferently as she could, "Less chance of me falling on my face, anyway. That\'s never pretty. I probably deserve it, though." And the grin was back, full force, "How\'s your head, by the way? Still better? No dizziness? The world\'s still not tilting sideways or anything?"

[Existentially Odd]

He looked closely at her, watching that shrug with more than just his usual amount of curiosity because he found he was looking for a sign... a signal that his touch had had some sort of impact.  He was pretty sure he was seeing exactly that and he knew it when she changed the subject.  He smiled - it was quite a smug expression - and gave her hand a spontaneous squeeze (which might also have been interpreted as reassurance).

"It\'s fine," he said jovially, using his free hand to touch the spot.  He winced as he did, though, because there was still a sizeable amount of swelling there and he realised right then that his head was actually aching quite a bit.  It had been dulled by the food and the company but now that he\'d prodded himself in the most tender of spots, he realised that he wasn\'t entirely recovered, it had just been easy to ignore.

"Well, it\'s mending, anyway," he added sheepishly, dropping his free hand again.  "But no dizziness or world tilting or anything like that.  Only from being with you - because you fill my head with lots of wonderful things," he confided, wanting to explain so that she wasn\'t offended by him saying she made him dizzy.  If he\'d known the phrase \'head spin\' he might have used that to explain how Morgaine made his imagination whirl, but he could only say words that he knew, so he did.

[Harlequin]

She looked at him askance, unsure of how to take the dizziness comment until he tacked on the addendum, which caused her to laugh, "I get that a lot," she joked. Though, she usually only made heads spin in search of her – there and gone in the short hours between the rising and setting of the sun.

Her laughter died, however, as she caught sight of Tau\'s apartment building, and she sighed, "Hey, when do you work?" she asked, wanting to know if she\'d ahve to go home. She wasn\'t sure if the Oligarchy was entirely nocturnal (well, she didn\'t know anything about the Oligarchy aside from where it was, and that it was run by a complete asshole), Because if he worked during the day, it was probably getting close to his bedtime. Which, apparently, meant she would have to go home. Sigh.

[Existentially Odd]

He shrugged and smiled sheepishly, for he hadn\'t paid a thought to work up until now. "Well, I usually go in soon... but then, I usually sleep in the afternoons so that I can be there as late as possible, and I didn\'t today.  Most of the business the Oligarchy does is with vampires, I don\'t usually have much to do but I like to be there in case something comes up.  When it does, they beep me.  The rest of the time I am usually in my office finishing paperwork or watching television," he admitted with a giggle.

"Sometimes I\'m requested to sit in as a witness to other proceedings but that does not happen very often," he explained, and then tilted his head as he looked down at her.  "You know, technically, I am at work, because I was investigating you to see how much you knew about Shifters and if you had any extra information that might benefit me.  I think you might still know something you haven\'t told me," he said slowly, nodding to himself and making a show of thinking that had him grasping his whiskery chin with his free hand.  "I think I should keep working at home, unless they beep me, tonight.  That will involve keeping you close by, of course," he told her with mock seriousness, looking down at her through thoughtful, narrowed eyes.

[Harlequin]

Morgaine nodded with mock seriousness, brow furrowed with the weight of her imaginary concern "Of course!" she agreed, "I\'m one of those shifty rock-and-roll types, y\'know. You can\'t trust as far as you can throw us. Uncooperative, too. I\'m sure I\'ll require lots of unconventional interrogation."

Secretly (or not so secretly, judging by the smile that broke out on her face once her charade was over), she was delighted by his desire that she stick around. "So what do you wanna do?"

[Existentially Odd]

"Listen to you sing," he answered without prevarication, his desires simple and obvious.  After a moment\'s consideration, he decided that he might need to give her an alternative to that... in case she was tired of singing to him.  "Or... whatever you would like to do.  We could watch television... or I could question you... with tickles!" he laughed delightedly, recalling that that had had negative ramifications last time, but determined he would do better this time.

Spontaneously, he reached down and scooped her up into his arms, carrying her bridal style up the steps of his building and inside it.  "I can\'t afford to let you get away," he told her sternly, climbing the stairs effortlessly and staring intently into her eyes with a crooked little grin lifting the corner of his mouth.  it seemed he did not to see the stairs he was ascending to know where he was going and that his grace in such matters was unquestionable.

[Harlequin]

Morgaine was in the midst of threatening him with tickle-related retaliation, when she was – no pun neccesarry – swept off her feet, uttering a very unladylike (unhumanlike, really) squawk of protest. She made a face up at him, but found it difficult to actually be annoyed with those big blue eyes looking deep into hers, "Yeah," she said, "\'Cause I\'m sure I could outrun you." Joe had often been know to resort to tactics such as these – though he employed the lift-and-carry only when she needed to be physically removed from a situation. Or from somewhere he wanted to be. Or to somewhere he thought she should be – okay, he more or less treated her like a doll. Suffice it to say, the singer was more or less used to it. She somehow minded less when Tau did it, though, and her annoyance was mostly for show.

She looked down, seeing stairs passing under his feet, and was dutifully impressed, once again, by his grace. Just when she\'d figured out exactly how to put this sentiment into words, they were at the door to his apartment, and she was being transferred to one arm as he unlocked said door, which admitted them into said apartment. "It\'s gonna be difficult to do any of the stuff you mentioned, like this," she pointed out, once inside.

[Existentially Odd]

"Not true!" he countered jovially and dropped his keys and wallet back on the stand beside the door where he kept them before heading to retrieve Morgaine\'s guitar.  On his way back to the loungeroom, he sniffed the air in the direction of Alacer\'s room and decided she wasn\'t home.

"Alec must be out," he announced and strolled casually back to the couch that faced the front door.  "That means we can be as loud as we like," he grinned cheekily, and plopped down onto said couch with a guitar in one hand and a lovely woman in the other.  She was sat squarely in his lap, his thighs parted to give her balance and his arm still at her back to hold her steady as he gave her a winning smile.

"Now what?" he prompted with a playful waggle of his eyebrows.  He figured the guitar - resting on the couch right in front of her, held up by his spare hand - was an apparent enough clue to tell her why he was giving her devious looks and he was, as per usual, ignorant to all other insinuations that might\'ve arisen due to his cheeky actions and very obvious announcement that they were alone in the apartment.

[Harlequin]

Morgaine squeaked as she was – once again – transferred to one arm, but she laughed when Tau picked up her guitar, and proved his point (though she was all sorts of confused when he first carried her into the bedroom; the laughter was caused mostly by surprise – and, perhaps, relief – that he wasn\'t actually looking for a reprise of their tickle match – or something entirely different, in light of his ever-so-apparent announcement regarding his roomate\'s absence.)

Once on the couch, however, she eyed her guitar dubiously, and then looked at him sidelong, "I dunno," she said, "Us rockstars are fragile. I might be too ruffled to play, after that indignancy." Once again, her voice was heavy with feigned concern.