Holidate (Private w/ Vera)

[Professor W B Copperfield]

He glanced up to her face, just once, and stayed silent. She wanted to have a nice date too? So it wasn't just him? Of course, you blockhead! He lightly punched himself in the head. He put his hands up as if to say something, let out a long breath through his nose, and opened his eyes towards her. He was going to have a nice date and she would think it a nice date too, damn it!

He reached out and took on of her hands in his and looked at her, eyes desperate. "You..." He looked up to her ears. "You're ears are really cute."

[Victor Valbrand]

That was not quite the recovery she expected but it worked nonetheless. Véra's ears perked up a little at that, a slight blush on her cheeks at the compliment. "Feeling better?" she asked, squeezing his hand with a gentle, motherly smile.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

He smiled and squeezed back. "Yeah, I feel a bit better now." He smiled a bit more. "And the way they twitch and turn, that's adorable." He looked at her for a bit. Just looked at her. Her smile was lovely. His thumb ran over her knuckles. She had warm hands.

Hemera was gone. Sad, tragic, but she was gone. Long gone. Years gone. But Vera was here and alive. He had to stay in the present, here, with her.

[Vera Noire]

Véra's ears perked up even more at that, back to their natural resting state. "You know they're sensitive to sound, that's why the twitch like that," she explained. "I can hear a great deal more than the average human. It's not always a good thing..."

[Professor W B Copperfield]

"Really?" He asked, shifting around in his seat to adopt a somewhat more casual posture while not letting go of her hand. "Do you hear anything right now you like that?"

[Vera Noire]

"Let's see, I hear the nervous heartbeat of someone looking at something far too cute for their ability to process it," Véra joked with a wink as she moved in her seat to ensure that his attention was fixated on her so that she was the focus of her joke, as if she didn't expect it to land perfectly. In the momentary silence that followed she ate some of her food while waiting for his reaction.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

Wow. She bounced back fast. He appreciated that in a woman. "And that's not a good thing?" He asked, feigning offense. "Oh wait, I just need to be able to process it. Hmm..." He narrowed his eyes and with his free hand, keeping his eyes on her, tried to scoop some noodles and meat into his mouth. He failed. The broth splooshed up on his face. He tried again. He only grabbed a single noodle this time. It too dropped back to the broth, his mouth left open and waiting. He tried again and this time, with his teeth, he was able to catch the noodles. He renarrowed his eyes and as slurped up the noodles. Once they were chewed and swallowed he straightened his back.

"Processing complete. You are certifiably adorable. But now..." He was moving to different angles, examining her face in each spot. "Now there's... hmm... the cuteness revealed a layer of beauty and that's a problem to process, stand by..."

[Vera Noire]

Véra giggled and blushed as she watched him struggle to eat his food as if he were on auto-pilot for a few moments. Once he finally accomplished the task and started talking again she struggled very visibly to suppress a laugh with her hand and all of her willpower. Her tail flicked back and forth and she had a grin on her face once she got herself under control. "Beauty, you say? Surely you aren't just trying to flatter me so that I'll pay for dessert?" she teased.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

Making an attractive girl laugh was one of the great joys in life. Seeing her hold back her laughter, the way her eyes danced... that was a whole other kind of beauty. And that smile once she was done... it had been years, quite a few, since he had the pull to kiss someone. He couldn't help a little of his own blush as he wished the table wasn't between them.

His eyebrows lifted up. "We're getting dessert? I wonder if this place has ice cream, I didn't see it on the menu."

[Vera Noire]

"There are other places we could go for dessert, you know," Véra pointed out with a wink. "There's actually a really good ice cream shop just down the street from here that's been around for years. I used to take Vee there as a reward whenever he'd get good grades at Signal." She started eating again, smiling at him between bites of food.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

At her wink Copperfield felt as red as the dust in his staff. He coughed and filled his face with food.

Once he got the breath back in him and swallowed his food he answered. "Ice cream, yeah I love ice cream." He cleared his throat. "I take you somewhere you take me somewhere, sounds fair." He was trying to cool himself down.

But that damned wink...

It had been a long while for Copperfield, since his last time. And Vera was pretty and cute and wore the heck out of that dress and he liked her, but... As much as his bottom half was screaming in joy, his brain didn't like the idea. Not yet, anyway. This was their first date, and sex was something far more than just two people pleasuring eachother. He wasn't the first date kind of guy. Or the second. Or the third, really.

So he made sure to eat and not stare and not do anything which might make her think that that was how he took it. Or he tried, anyway. Whitehorse Blackstone Copperfield was anything but subtle.

[Vera Noire]

Véra smirked when she noticed how red his face had gotten from that. Rather than assuming he took that in the least wholesome way possible, she instead assumed he was flustered because he thought she looked cute when she winked like that. It wouldn't be the first time a man had blushed from talking with her after all. She ate her noodles with a smug aura, content in the belief her date thought she was cute. Before long she was finished eating and waited for Copperfield to finish as well.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

It wasn't long until Copperfield was finished with his noodles, but he was not the kind to let food go to waste. He picked up the bowl and gulped down every drop of the broth. He set the bowl down with a satisfied sigh and licked his lips. "You ready to go?" He asked, getting up himself.

[Vera Noire]

"Yeah, let's pay and go get some ice cream," Véra agreed as she gathered her coat and her cane and stood up to go. Her tail was swishing behind her excitedly at the thought of getting ice cream with him. After more than a decade of being a single mother it was exciting to go on a date like this.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

He was smiling and his feet felt light as he paid for the food and moved down the sidewalk with her. It had been a long, long time since a date with a woman had gone this well for him. And now they were getting ice cream! He joked with her on the way to the ice cream shop. The worker there was an old balding man with a faded blue-green shirt. He had so many wrinkles that Copperfield couldn't see his eyes, but the man stood gave a child and his mother their ice cream with a smile on his face.

Looking up to see the flavors on a hanging sign, he gave out a happy sigh. "I am relieved to see that the names are just the flavors and nothing like "Brown Mud Chocolate". What do you normally get here?"

[Vera Noire]

"I've tried every flavor here, but I always end up coming back to good old vanilla," Véra said. "There's something about it that reminds me of my childhood." She greeted the shop owner who seemed to recognize her on sight and returned her greeting with a respectful nod. After all, she was a regular here.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

His eyebrow rose at that. "You're a vanilla kind of girl, huh? I like that." He wore a pleased smirk. "I'll get some. I stand by Vanilla and Chocolate being the best flavors out there." They were able to get their ice cream, Copperfield getting his in a cup rather than a cone and paying for both. He ate his with the small spoon they were given to taste test instead of the larger ones.

[Vera Noire]

Véra got her vanilla ice cream in a waffle cone. She sat down at one of the tables with Copper, licking her ice cream happily. She smiled when she saw how Copper was eating with a sample spoon. "Vee used to do the same thing when he was little," she said. "It's cute."

[Professor W B Copperfield]

"It allows me to have more bites." He justified, taking a bit. This vanilla was amazing! "Mmmm, makes this ice cream last longer." He took another bite. "Man this vanilla is great! I see why you come back to it. This is just, mmm!"

[Vera Noire]

Véra smiled and kept licking, eating her ice cream happily. "Best ice cream in the city," she agreed. She was glad he was enjoying it as well.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

He smiled at her as he ate his ice cream slowly. He kept glancing at her. She was so pretty tonight.

He cleared his throat a little. "We should probably walk back to the tram." He said about half way through his ice cream. "I'm going to freeze if I stand still and eat ice cream in this weather."

[Victor Valbrand]

"Maybe you should finish before we go then," Véra pointed out as she was half-way through with finishing her ice cream cone. "I'm sure we'll have plenty of time to make it before the next airship back to the school. We may as well enjoy ourselves while we're on a date."

[Professor W B Copperfield]

She wanted to stay out? In this cold weather eating ice cream? Well, more time to be with her, he wasn't going to argue about that! "Yeah, alright." He agreed and continued eating, a little slower than normal. He could drag this out too. "Lets take a walk though? See the lights?"

[Vera Noire]

At his suggestion they take a walk, Véra started eating her ice cream faster. In this weather she didn't want to be walking around eating ice cream. "Let me finish this, and we can go," she said, not wanting to waste her ice cream.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

White and multi-colored lights shone on rooftops and through store windows. It was the winter holiday, afterall. There wasn't any snow coming down but the winter chill was still present. If he closed his eyes, he felt like he was right back in Mantle. He did so, taking in a deep breath of cool winter air before letting it out again. He didn't miss mantle, not much was back there for him. But it was still where he grew up, still was home. Later he might go into the school gardens and pretend like he was on his uncles farm, laying out in the field and looking up at the stars, wondering where his life was heading, what path it would take.

He had traveled a lot of that road since he was a kid. Thought he had arrived at the end quite a few times. Somehow his feet always hit more asphalt. But what about a new road, a turning point, an intersection, where he joined with another road? He opened his eyes and turned to Vera, scarfing down her ice cream. Maybe... he was looking at it.

Using his tiny spoon like a pitchfork he shoved the rest of the ice cream into his mouth. It froze his gums and hurt, but in a few seconds it was gone and he finished his. He dumped the cup in a trashcan, keeping the spoon wrapped in a napkin in his pocket. He waited patiently for her to finish hers.

[Vera Noire]

Soon enough Véra finished both ice cream and waffle cone, throwing away the trash and taking her cane to stand up. "Ready to go?" she asked with a smile as she pulled her coat tight to brace herself against the inevitable cold outside. She offered him her free hand, a slight blush on her face.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

He blinked at her offered hand and stared for a moment. He slowly reached out his own, taking her hand in his. His fingers slid between hers and a small smile crept over his face. His small blush vanished. His eyes moved to hers, as multicolored as the lights outside and twice as pretty. "Ready."

[Vera Noire]

Véra smiled and interlaced her fingers with his as they started walking outside into the cold night air. The lights were definitely pretty. Her cane tapped softly against the sidewalk with every other step, echoing softly in the night.

[Professor W B Copperfield]

They moved on outside, hand in hand. The tapping of the cane... He suspected, pretty much confirmed really, that she didn't actually need it. It was more of a mental crutch than a physical one. However, he had been through his fair share of trauma to understand what it can do to a person, make them believe. His head was too thick to get messed with or trick itself, a blessing and a curse, but he knew not everyone was as stubborn as he was. A good thing too.

As she looked at the lights, he kept stealing glances at her eyes. The reflections there were far prettier than the real deal. He had thought her eyes pretty before but... not like this. He realized he had been staring and smiling a little too long so he covered his mouth, forced himself to look away and clear his throat. "Uh," Idiot, say something! "Man this is pretty tonight."

[Vera Noire]

Véra seemed completely ignorant to his prolonged staring, or if she had noticed she made no clear indication until he said something. "Y-yeah, it sure is," she responded with a cute blush as she squeezed his hand. She too had been stealing glances at him and had definitely noticed but was playing dumb, she just hoped he wouldn't figure that out. She had also noticed him watching her cane for a short time and felt embarrassed that she needed it to walk properly but it seemed like he didn't mind it so she pushed that thought aside.