"It's going fine," he says. "It's pretty much just staying in the habit of not looking too close, now. And it's actually kind of interesting, looking at this stuff just for what it's like and not for what it means."

"Like - when you're kinda dozing off and you can hear the sound of someone's voice but not the words?"

"That's a pretty good way to put it," he says, "yeah."

"Neat. I'm glad that's going well."

"Yeah," he says. "How about you, anything cool going on in your life?"

"Those elves are still following me. I'll probably need an escort to get off campus when I graduate, if they haven't given up yet."

"I'll do it," Celo says cheerfully. "I fucked 'em up once, I can do it again."

"Thanks," laughs Bella. "Now I'm imagining introducing you to my parents."

"I have no idea what your parents are like but I can't imagine that as anything other than hilarious," he says. "'Hi, this is Celo, my nymph buddy, I promise we haven't fucked'? Unless we get around to it in the next few years, I guess. Or would they even care? I'm kind of hazy on parents."

"My dad would absolutely care."

He snorts. "In a 'congratulations' way or in a 'going to knife me' way?"

"I would not expect either of us to be congratulated. He probably wouldn't knife you."

Celo giggles. "Okay, so what would he do?"

"Probably he wouldn't want to definitively know. If he suspected he'd make sure I had some ridiculous number of rings of protection and, I dunno, tell you to be nice to me."

"Yeah," says Celo, "funny thing, everybody's pretty sure I can't actually get anyone pregnant, but I carry rings anyway." He grins. "And I'm already nice to you. If we had sex I wouldn't suddenly stop."

"Noted."

He beams.

"Speaking of carrying things, how does that work? It's very nifty."

"How should I know?" he shrugs. "I just put stuff away, and then," a foil-wrapped ring appears between his fingers, "take it out again." He flips the ring back and forth a few times and disappears it back to wherever it came from. "It's great. There's nothing more fun than using sleight of hand to make it look like you're pulling something out of thin air when you're actually pulling it out of thin air."

"I'd like to be able to do that," says Bella. "It seems really handy. I suppose it's just a nymph thing?"

"Just a nymph thing," he confirms.

"Oh well."

"You could still learn the sleight of hand, though!" he says, grinning.

"I think I'd rather learn telekinesis. Less prep time, at least as practical," she winks. And she manages to nudge a pie onto her plate without touching it.

Celo applauds.

Bella grins. (She has to pick up the pie to eat it, though.)

"We've met, yeah," says Bella, "I don't think we have any classes together or anything."

"Subtle arts," agrees Bella, nodding. She is still nibbling on the second of her pies.

Aww.

"I don't make a lot of pies, no. I can cook some but I'm not as good at it or as serious about it as Celo. Mostly I learn about minds and how to poke them."

Corrine giggles. "It sounds really funny when you put it like that," she says. "Is it hard?"

"Some of it is. I'm not very good at telekinesis, for instance. Most of the rest of it is just like - learning to orient myself in an unfamiliar location, over and over until unfamiliar locations aren't."

"Oh," says Corrine. She doesn't seem like she understood that very well, but she also doesn't seem like she's bothered by it. She nibbles on her pie. Celo cuddles her.

Bella finishes her pie, decides against taking a third, and starts on a set of flashcards, glancing at the cuddling pair now and again.

The cuddling pair continue to cuddle! Celo has his eyes closed and a happy smile on his face. Corrine looks generally contented, especially once she starts on her second pie.

They don't seem to be absconding - or for that matter not absconding - to go have sex. Huh.

Eventually, Corinne finishes pie number two and flops her head onto Celo's shoulder, closing her eyes. He hugs her. She appears to nap.

She asleep?

Yeah, she does that, he says fondly.

Falls asleep on you? Routinely?

He nods, smiling.

That's really cute.

It iiiiis, he agrees. She's a sweetheart, I love her. 'Love' here apparently meaning 'want to snuggle with a lot'.

Aww.

Aww is right! Aww is the correct response here!

Bella finishes her deck of flashcards, and then peers at them again, and then departs the room to do some thinking.

Some time after she leaves, Corrine wakes up, and she and Celo clean up after the making of the pies. They leave the remaining pies out for other hallmates to eat, and go into Celo's room to have another cuddlenap.

Celo doesn't wave, because that might disturb his cuddle buddy.