"It's just really amazing that things can be this good? Maybe I'll be less... Silly, when I'm a bit more used to it."

"I feel pretty lucky too, really."

That deserves another kiss! Because he can just do that and it's fine and good!

...Eventually he'll notice that he's pretty thirsty and maybe go for the neglected drink, though.

Well now she's giggling a little.

"Oops! Totally forgot about the drinks." She takes a sip of her lemonade. "Mmm..pretty good. Not as good as you though."

"...Maybe I'm still backlashed because my first response was 'nah, that's obviously wrong'."

"Well I don't think you are. Maybe you're just modest. We could kiss again to be sure though."

She's a little shyer about this suggestion while not backlashed.

Well, let's think of it this way...

Is there any reason not to? Is he going to insult Meghan by thinking she's lying or wrong?

"...Okay." Kiss.

"Mm... I really like that you're... Understanding? Letting me be nervous and get over it instead of being weird about me being nervous?"

"I think it's just basic decency so  I'm not sure how much credit I deserve for that...but thanks."

"My brother always said being nervous is un-manly. Nobody likes someone who hesitates too much."

"Well that's sure an opinion to have." Snuggles?

Yeah...

"I don't- Would it be bothering you to talk a little bit about family bullshit? I've thought about it for a while and kind of - come to terms, but..."

?Nah, that's fine if you feel like talking about it. I want to get to know you better."

"...So. My father is a lawyer, and my mother is some kind of middle manager, and they both love showing off how successful they are. Very extroverted, lots of house parties, lots of people from their work or whatever around a lot. We had a fancy house and big cars and they would drag us to go skiing or on a speedboat on a lake on vacation every year. Which, like, it was fun I guess. Just not really my thing as much. And, um, my big brother was... Everything they wanted. He's tall, buff, handsome, keeps himself neat, talks about finance and investments a lot, has a girlfriend and now wife who had the same kind of american dream attitude, he's gregarious and kind of a jock and - fits that influencer lifestyle in a way that I just... Really do not. At all. And there were a thousand tiny things, not one big huge moment, but they just, fit with him better than me. Things like joking about me, like, being a blind bat in a computer cave. Or bugging me about reading a book instead of enjoying the location of wherever this year's vacation was. It wasn't... Meant to be mean, mostly, I think. At first. But... Yeah. Stuff like that. So I just... Drifted away pretty quick when I got my old IT job, and they just kinda let me. I go back for Christmas, Easter, and Thanksgiving, and the annual summer family vacation."

"Doesn't really matter too much if they meant to be mean, I think? Also multiple cars, really? My parents are very...normal middle class so I'm definitely not used to that sort of thing. I could afford a big house now, I guess.but like, why? My parents' house is plenty big enough especially with my brother getting his master's degree in Winnipeg. Environmental science."

"Four cars- One for each of us, not all as nice as each others' though. Yeah, I um. I managed to make it clear with implication I'm not just going to give them infinite esper money. Luckily they're prideful enough to not have actually asked. So it's a comfortable enough balance. I'll pay for vacations now, that's reasonable enough, you know? I don't actually dislike them. It's just so..." Shrug.

"Complicated? It's nice of you to pay for their vacations. I'd pay for my parents to go on vacation together someplace nice if they wanted but most of our vacation are just visiting family. My parents both came from pretty big families so there's lots of people to to visit. We were actually lucky the confluence before last cause we were visiting small town relatives at the time it started so we could just...extend our vacation and spend basically the whole summer out there."

"-Oh, I could go to all sorts of museums in Europe and stuff without worrying about the cost! Well, maybe once the, um, confluence that's about to happen is over. Something to look forward to. I like museums, I think I've mentioned."

"Museums are definitely interesting, and Europe has lots of like, old ones.... but yeah, the confluence will happen...anytime now. I've heard people saying it could be a bad one because it's been so long since the last one."

"Insufficient data. I have... Sort of resigned myself to it... I've been doing a lot of thinking about how to think around my backlash, and the most effective thing is sort of - I have a job to do? And my job description includes 'stay healthy and sane'. Like one of the little guys from my game. In this one game you can randomly have people become espers and then order them around but they do better when high on sleep and food meters and low on the stress meter... Like, they could freak out and go on a rampage and get less healthy over time. So like, my stress is in the yellow! It is now a rule that I don't do another dungeon and go play video games instead! This is not something to be guilty over, it is literally what you're supposed to do!"

"Yeah, I think that's a good way to think about it. They say 'it's a marathon not a sprint', so you have to pace yourself or else you'll collapse and not be any use to anyone. Also being tired makes you worse at everything."

Sigh...

"I hope I've got a good running partner to keep both our pace down, then..."

...Kiss?

"I will try. For both our sakes."

Kiss!

Then, after a moment, "Actually, do you want to make it official? An official partnership on the record I mean. For the databases, so people know who to call if we're not in the same dungeon and one of us gets into a bad situation, backlash wise."

"Me too... That seems wise. Let's do it."

"Great! Do you need help with the system or anything?"

"I think I can figure it out..."

And he does, after a minute of poking around on his phone.

"There! All nice and official."