"I'm not entirely sure, but - Mace mentioned 'teenage drama,' and I leaned into that when asking for time..."

"Mm. I imagine that your feelings for me might have been noticed before now, yes?"

"Yeah. It's pretty obvious to anyone who's ever been in a room with me when you're being mentioned, honestly..."

"I - was thinking I could let on about relationship stuff? At least a little? But - I'm not sure if that'd get you in trouble."

"From an outside perspective, that would be questionable, yes. Though the age of consent on Coruscant is seventeen. Perhaps you got a little drunker than you intended and worked yourself up into kissing me?"

Grin. "'Spontaneous confession' seems more in character for me, and wouldn't even require you handing me alcohol... I also lose physical coordination when I'm actually drunk way before I lose that much impulse control, so I'm not sure they'd believe I successfully kissed you while drunk."

"Spontaneous confession, then, which I did not necessarily accept, but neither did I decline. Perhaps the implication was you need only wait a year or two more."

Small shiver. "And I'm off course getting my hopes quite up... While also worrying about keeping your eyes on me."

"Do you think you can make that work?"

...Hum.

"I'm usually not very good at direct lies, is part of the problem here... Especially not against Lily."

"You could make your confession now."

Giggle. "I do very much like you."

"I do not think that carried quite the necessary spirit."

"Elesse - I think I have a crush? I really like you. I've liked you as long as I've known you, because you're smart and pretty and funny, and you have excellent ideas, and you're so amazingly competent, and I want to be around you, as much as you'll let me, I want to help you with all your goals, just please don't send me away."

Hmm.

"While I appreciate the sentiment, my dear, I sense that you are not quite ready to believe in this."

She quiets, clearly struggling, then, slowly: "...You know a lot more about lying and manipulating people than I do, especially since I really suck at it, but - "

"I really suck at it? I'm bad at saying even misleading but true things at all convincingly." Awkward shrug. "Also if I had just confessed to you, and you didn't accept but didn't push me away and implied I should wait, I would've gone straight to Lily to bounce about that? I wouldn't be hiding it from her, probably even if you'd implied I shouldn't gossip. Lily and Mace both know I'm considering leaving the Jedi, and... Leaving in a year or two, once I'm ready for my Trials and have thought this over, to be your guard or aide or something, would be a 'that's not their path but they're happy for me' type of situation?"

"I also wouldn't hide anything that'd get me in trouble, even if I did something extremely big. I trust them both and they know that, so - all of the stuff I'd lie to them about would be protecting someone else, and they know that, and that means I'd have to think the someone needed protection from them?"

She shifts. "And... Especially because I like them, I want to minimize how much I'm lying to them. I don't like lying, it feels bad..."

"But - the idea that still sounds best to me is telling them you kissed me, and I'm at least perceiving us to be in a relationship? It's true, and it's something I'd be reflexively hiding since it is extremely questionable and could be politically damaging if it got out - and 'the adults in my life might be mistakingly protective of me' is a... Sort of acceptable thing for me to be protective of someone else over, especially since they know I might get overly worried about it? Especially with how much I like you."

"The obvious side effects to me would be... Any politically damaging fall out, which I think I could at least steer those two away from causing, also if anything I'm doing or experiencing as your apprentice makes me stressed or unhappy, and then I'm evasive about that, they'd assume relationship issues, which - at least would give me an easy thing to let them assume without directly lying."

"I - don't know if there's any problems with that idea that I'm missing, though, or if the drawbacks I've seen would be bigger or more certain than I'm estimating."

"It would be more damaging to me if this story got out, yes. But I think that you are perhaps better positioned than I to predict your master's response to your specific actions here. If you think that you will be better able to quiet their suspicions with this, to ground or misdirect their investigations, then do so."

She nods. "Yeah, I think - given what I know, this results less in them poking in the worst directions?" A quiet moment, then: "I'm sorry I wasn't able to hide that something had changed better, or think up a better lie on my feet before it got obvious I was hiding something..."

"Reflect on this experience. And next time, do better."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Now come and kiss me, my dear. For luck."

Grin! She steps over to kiss her Mistress. Quite throughly; she needs a lot of luck. 

Her apprentice will have all the luck she desires.

Oh, good.

She'll be full up on luck by the end of her Mistress's lunch hour, hopefully, before she has to head back to the Jedi. 

"Do send a message if you need further assistance. Otherwise, I will see you at the week's end."

"Yes, ma'am." One last quick kiss.