It was only when the entry door swung open that Theora, distracted by the wonder of Dema’s presence, caught up to what was happening — she’d casually led Dema straight into a big and irredeemable mess.

It was much worse than Theora had even remembered. There was a sock on the shoe cabinet. How had that even gotten there? And there was dust in the corners, accrued into small bundles by the air Theora kept pushing past whenever she paced through her apartment. The only saving grace was the little spider who’d set up in the top left corner of the entryway, granting Dema at least something cute to look at in this horrifying place.

Theora shed her coat, using it to cover up the box of her teenage belongings as well as half its contents spilled beside it from when she’d fetched her bracelet. She slid into a pair of old slippers while Dema, without being asked, stepped into a pair of wooden clogs. They were far too large for her, so her steps made particularly loud clunking sounds as Theora held her by the arm to guide her to the kitchen table.

“You should sit down.”

“Eh?” Dema breathed, surprised, her heartbeats pulsing through the skin Theora touched. Dema didn’t even seem to notice. “Why?”

“You’re spent.”

Dema blinked, focused on calming her breaths, and then sheepishly looked to the side. “Damn, right.” She obediently sat down. “Walked a lot today.”

It was understandable; Dema had a thin and small body. Perhaps she wasn’t very strong?

After making sure Dema was sitting safe and sound and secure, Theora turned to fill the sink with warm water, and soaked the undone dishes.

Theora had to clean them to make space on the counter. She had to make space on the counter to prepare a meal. She had to prepare a meal because she’d promised.

She’d forgotten about the state of the kitchen at the time that promise was made.

Of course, any reasonable Theora would have avoided this situation from occurring, for example by keeping her home tidy in the first place, or by not imposing this space on a stranger she’d just met.

But the bare thought of separating from Dema turned her stomach. And while she could have just kept walking through town indefinitely, it was now the start of November, and Dema was barefoot, even barelegged, and the streets were cold. And even just climbing the stairs had broken Dema into sweat.

Besides, she had warned Dema, and Dema had said yes, and now Dema was here, so perhaps this was fine. Well, almost fine — Dema’s yearning expression made it seem like she really badly wanted to help out, but Theora would not show mercy. This was her mess, and she had to clean it up herself.

It didn’t take too long anyway because while Theora was lazy about doing the dishes, she was also lazy about eating, so there weren’t too many.

Then, she did what she could with the few ingredients left in storage, and soon pushed a plate of baked potatoes with kidney bean curry in front of Dema, who looked at it, and gulped.

Neither of them had said a word the entire time, but it felt alright. It felt like they’d been silent with each other for decades already, and it was comfortable.

At least, that’s how Theora decided to frame it — she definitely didn’t mind the silence, but it’s not like she could have possibly come up with anything to say. Whenever she tried; whenever she looked at those amber eyes shining in the barely-lit kitchen, her chest went up in flutters, and she abandoned the cause in favour of keeping herself collected.

Eventually, Dema said, “This tastes amazing!”

“Thank you,” Theora mumbled. She wished to go hide under five blankets. It was too dangerous for now to make any tea for Dema.

“You’ve got such a cosy home…” Dema nodded at a photograph on the fridge. It was a very old picture of Theora and Serim, when they were both about ten, standing in tall grass, laughing. Dema frowned, examining it very closely. “Who’s that?”

“Me and a childhood friend.” It was around the time when Serim had first seen Theora use Obliterate.

Dema continued to absorb every surrounding detail. That was almost as bad as being stared at directly.

“My flat’s kinda empty in comparison,” Dema mused, glancing over the vases with dried flower bouquets, the plants hanging on shelves and standing on counters and cupboards, or even the bigger ones in large pots on the ground. Her focus lingered on Theora’s bubbling jar of brown sourdough.

Finally, Dema looked through the door into the first part of the living room, to the small furnace in the centre of the apartment, and stayed on the chopped wood lying beside it.

Theora had forgotten to put on heating, despite warmth being the very reason she’d invited Dema here in the first place… At least cooking had heated up the kitchen. Her negligence when it came to keeping the apartment warm was part of the reason they typically met up at Serim’s place, not here — and that led to her rarely mustering the effort to properly clean and tidy up.

When both finished eating, Theora attempted to appear like a good girl, and did all the dishes immediately. Dema didn’t dare to interfere, but was now clacking around the room with her oversized clogs.

Until she found the bunny-ear circlet.

Then, without hesitation, Dema did the most adorable thing anyone had ever done — she put it on, and turned to Theora with a smile. The asymmetric horn poking up between her messy hair complimented the bunny ears incredibly well, with the flowery ribbons right at home.

“Please don’t ever take them off,” Theora heard herself say, and Dema giggled, nodding with ears bobbing.

Theora shook a few droplets from her hands and dried them with a towel — the rest of the dishes had to wait until later. She reached over to switch off the feeble light, but now the bracelet shrouded Dema in faint crimson.

Theora closed her eyes and fled into the living room, hearing the clatter of clogs follow close behind. She pushed a few pieces of wood into the furnace, but was probably already heating up the apartment sufficiently all on her own.

With the fireplace crackling, Theora stood up with a deep breath, still facing the wall, feeling Dema’s presence right behind.

“So what now?” Dema asked, and Theora kept staring at the flaking paint.

“The movie is—The TV is…” Theora hiccupped. “You can sit down on the couch, if you want to. You could also sit down on the chair, if you would like.”

“Where are you gonna sit?” Dema’s voice sounded like she was facing away, looking at the other end of the living room, at the couch, probably.

“The—The couch.”

Theora dared to turn, and saw Dema nod, then walk over and drop herself on that very couch. Theora had no choice but to follow suit.

The living room had a generous T-shape, and Theora’s unmade bed with half her clothing heaped in front of it was in the other alcove, while this side had the contents of the bookshelf spilled across the floor at their feet.

Dema’s legs were, to put it mildly, a distraction. Theora shut her eyes and pushed herself deep into the couch.

“Thanks for the meal,” Dema said. “Also… like, feel free to kick me out whenever you’ve got enough of me. No being polite!”

Dema had absolutely no clue how polite Theora was being. “You can stay, if you want to,” she managed to say.

“Fine, I will. Don’t think I won’t!”

“You should — if that’s fine with you.”This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“It is!”

That raspy voice was giving Theora shivers. She was in so much trouble.

Dema shuffled around. Clogs hit the ground after being shed. Theora heard, right next to her, a murmur: “So… You said something about a movie?”

Theora opened her eyes. Dema was crouching on the couch facing her.

“I—Yes.” Her glance went over a little shelf of VHS cassettes Serim’s parents had filled with movies for Theora when she was a child. She got up and teetered across the room, kneeling down to check the tapes, and found one with the neat handwriting denoting it as containing her favourite movie of all time. She picked it up. “This one is about very large bugs who are part of a fungus-heavy ecosystem that cleans away the toxic damages left behind by careless human devastation.”

“Let’s watch it!”

Theora fiddled with the old system to get it started. She hadn’t actually rewound the tape after last playing it — a frequent occurrence, and now she was awkwardly huddled in front of the TV, watching thin streaks of static hurry across the screen as the movie rushed itself back to the starting position. A few minutes later, she pressed ‘play’.

The TV itself wasn’t ancient, but that only managed to exacerbate the bad quality her tape had after being watched dozens of times over the years. Of course, she could get a new version of the movie; a DVD or something perhaps.

Somehow, this old tape felt cosier.

Even as the bugs began crawling and hovering across the screen, Theora glanced to her side far too often. Dema was watching the scenes wide-eyed, mouth standing slightly open. She’d changed position again; one leg pulled to her chest, the other angled around herself on the couch — and one hand to keep herself stable, dangerously close to Theora’s thigh.

Luckily, Theora knew the movie by heart. So, she closed her eyes in self-defence.

Dema was entirely engrossed. ‘She can FLY?’ — ‘Oh wow, look at that huge bugger. I’d be angry too if someone ruined my morning right after shedding.’ — ‘No! It crashed!’

Theora wished she could fly too. Or maybe she was already flying. Watching her favourite movie together with her favourite person? She would have never thought this to be possible.

When, after another exclamation, Dema’s hand landed yet a little closer to Theora, she gently pushed her thigh against it. Dema kept her hand right where it was.

It didn’t stop there. When Dema scooted a little closer after bobbing up and down, happy that the cute squirrel-like critter survived the last scene, Theora laughed, shifted and slid closer in turn. When Theora stretched to fetch the fluffy throw blanket from the ground and put it over her legs, Dema absent-mindedly dragged the other half over herself.

Whenever either of them dared an approach, the other would affirm it by escalation.

Theora never even needed that blanket. Fetching it was just an excuse.

Dema was half-sitting on Theora’s leg now, their upper arms were leaning against each other. They were leaning against each other.

They were practically cuddling.

“I—” Theora tried to say, during one of the movie’s quieter moments. “You don’t — mind? Mind if we touch, right?”

“No,” Dema said, and when she turned her head to face Theora, she expected a smile, but Dema looked… focussed? There was a bead of sweat on her forehead, and her pupils were so wide. “Do you?”

Theora shook her head, and somehow found the strength to convert that motion into leaning on Dema’s shoulder. Dema tilted her head against Theora’s, their hair entangling.

It was warm. So warm. So comfortable.

“I missed you so much,” Theora whispered.

Eventually, the saddest scene of the movie played, and Theora couldn’t help but cry over that poor little bug. She tried to hide it, of course. She didn’t sob; the tears just came out, and she pressed herself back into the couch again, so that Dema wouldn’t notice. She stealthily tried to wipe them away.

Not stealthy enough. When she put her hand under the blanket, Dema found and held it.

The two kept sitting there, halfway entangled, even long after the movie was over. It had gotten dark outside. The TV showed a black screen but was still shedding light into the room, somehow. A blue LED shone over the wood slab floor.

“I liked that movie,” Dema said, maybe for the second time. Theora wasn’t sure. Dema had gotten quieter during the latter half.

Theora lifted her head and smiled. “I’m glad. We could watch it again.”

Dema giggled. “What, right now? Damn, so greedy!”

“I can never quite get enough of it,” Theora admitted. “Although I probably should, if only for the sake of that poor tape. Some parts may have been difficult to follow, so let me know if you have any questions.”

Dema hummed. “Well, not sure if it’s a question question, but there was that scene where she dreamt?”

“Ah, yeah. I have watched that scene many times, so the tape is barely left. It showed her protecting a baby bug.”

Dema frowned. “Wait… So when the big one inspected her earlier…?”

Theora nodded. “The movie itself leaves out a detail, but in the story it was based on—” Theora glanced over to a well-read series of books lying on the ground. “—the bugs have a shared conscience. And when one of them saw that childhood memory, they all knew she’d always fought for them, and that’s how they trusted her enough to be swayed by her sacrifice at the end.”

“Damn! You know it all!”

“It’s my favourite,” Theora said. “I could talk about it for hours.”

Dema raised her eyebrows. “Not gonna lie, that’s pretty hot.”

That sudden sentence shut down any follow-up praise Theora was going to place on the movie. Instead, she tried to process the words.

Hot…?

If anything, Dema was the one who was hot. She was still wearing those bunny ears like the total criminal she was. Well, Theora had told her to keep them on, but still.

“I-In any case,” Theora said, slowly excavating herself from the cuddleball she’d formed with Dema. “It’s bedtime. I should get up early tomorrow.”

“Aw!” Dema let out. “Bummer.”

Theora tapped over the creaking floor boards, absentmindedly adding, “I’ll check if I have a spare toothbrush for you.” There might still be one left, Theora usually kept a few unused ones in a drawer because she disliked having to go shopping every few weeks. However, it was hard to tell, she might have also procrastinated on it so long that none were left.

As she was brushing her teeth, she did find one, and fetched a fresh towel. She found Dema still sitting where she left her, looking totally mystified.

Dema asked, “You mean — I can stay here?”

Theora tilted her head. “Oh, that’s right. I could drive you home, if you want.”

“No!” Dema yelped. “No, I wanna stay!”

Theora placed the towel and toothbrush on Dema’s lap, then went to look for pyjamas. Hers would probably be far too large for Dema.

When Dema returned from the bathroom about ten minutes later, she still looked confused, but damp hair and slightly flush face indicated she’d hopped under the shower for a moment. Theora pressed a star-patterned nightgown she’d been wearing as a teenager into Dema’s hands.

“This might fit,” Theora murmured.

Dema was already undressing while walking out of view, and barely managed to disappear behind the wall before giving Theora a shock. She returned a few moments later, looking gorgeous. The bunny ears had found their way back on Dema’s head, and somehow they managed to fit the lacey, deep-blue gown well.

“So,” Dema asked, “Where do I sleep?”

“Anywhere you want.” Theora gave a weak shrug. She was getting really sleepy. A yawn escaped her, and she stretched. When she opened her eyes again, she found Dema staring. “You could sleep on the couch. Or in the bed.”

Without the clogs, Dema’s feet tapped over the floor with quiet smacks, until she came to a halt in front of Theora, looking up. Theora inadvertently took a step back, which Dema immediately followed up on.

“Where are you gonna sleep?” Dema asked.

“In the bed.”

These last words may have been a mistake, because Dema’s eyes glinted in fury, and she pushed an accusatory finger gently against Theora’s collar bone. “You —” she started in mock-rage, making a step forward as Theora retreated — “Don’t—even—realise—what—you’re—doing, huh?!”

Theora found herself cornered against the wall. How was it possible that being stared up at was making her feel smaller?

“W-What?” Theora stammered. “I—Did I mess up? You mentioned your apartment was empty.”

“What?”

Theora blinked. “I… I may have messed up. I had a feeling, I don’t know why, that you perhaps don’t like being alone.” There was also the fact that Theora herself was feeling lonely too. “So when you said your apartment was empty, I figured I would offer you company.”

Dema was stunned. “That’s— nice,” she sputtered, after a moment. “But do you have to be so hot about it? That stretch! Gosh, I wanna—”

She stopped herself.

“You wanna…?”

“Kiss you so bad.”

This managed to end the feeble rest of Theora’s self restraint. She dove, giving Dema a short moment to retreat, and when she didn’t, pecked Dema’s cheek. Then, she kissed her again, and again, advancing until she hit the corner of Dema’s mouth.

Dema pulled through Theora’s hair, turning both their heads to make their lips find each other.

A boulder deeply embedded in lost memory loosened, revealing a faint glimpse at long-forgotten taste — the colourful salt and bite of Dema’s skin, as Theora had tasted it once, long before, when taking temperature with lips.

This was so much better, though the past resonated with the now into an unbelievable softness. Both were clumsy at first, teeth bouncing, but it was fine, because Dema’s tongue overwhelmed Theora’s mind with sulfuric spice.

They broke off. Theora cupped Dema’s cheek, staring.

“That was amazing,” she breathed.

Dema nodded, clenching Theora’s shirt.