vanillajello | The Causeway, Sunday Evening

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The Causeway, Sunday Evening

Despite the progress she'd been making in a variety of things, walking around alone after sunset was still not something Kate was particularly fond of. She'd been pretty keen on spending time with Zach, though, so that meant it had already been dark when she'd made back east. And that... had quickly led to going through a mental list of options of what to do.

She'd picked calling Nathan before catching a cab back to the island. She had her reasons. And she also had a little brown bag of takeaway in hand when she stepped onto the causeway. Like she'd promised.

[ooc: For that one guy who could never ever protect her from an angry vampire or anything else, really.]

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She'd better be damn glad she had chicken nuggets because that was the only way Nathan was dragging his ass out into the cold when he could have been in his room, ogling his hot roommate.

A few minutes after she arrived, he showed up, hands tucked into his pockets and earbuds in his ears because he hadn't known how long he'd have to wait before she arrived.

"I'm seriously beginning to believe I'm your human version of a fucking night light," he said as he strolled up. "You just better be glad I'm not made of cheap plastic."

"And what exactly would change even if you were?" she wondered, smirking at him some because that covered up nicely how uncomfortable she'd been just waiting alone. "You'd fall apart halfway between here and the dorms?"

"I'd be completely unreliable, that's what I'd be," he said, stopping when he'd finally reached her. He took his hands out of his pockets and blew into them to warm them up. "Which could have meant I'd have ended up at the bar or in the park or even at the beach. And you would have been her all alone, without your night light because I was cheap and plastic and so mistreated and abused."

"Well, it's good you're none of those things, right?" she replied, then shook the paper bag at him. "Because if you were mistreated and abused, you probably wouldn't get these, and if you were plastic you wouldn't be interested in them anyway."

"Are they still warm?" Nathan asked, reaching to snatch the bag greedily. "You haven't promised me chicken nuggets and then dumped a box of the frozen shit in a bag, have you? That would be the end of our relationship."

"They're warm, at least they should be," Kate assured him, sticking her hands in her pockets now. She figured they had to be warm, since they'd been packed in one those little white cartons, and then the bag. "I think there might be one of those little packets of some dipping sauce there too."

She hadn't been paying that much attention.

"So our relationship should be safe for now."

"You got lucky," he said but didn't really sounded like he meant it. He opened the bag and then the box, snagging one of the nuggets expertly. "Why are you back so late anyway? Couldn't drag yourself out of your bed of love or something?"

Kate rolled her eyes. "Dinner kinda took longer than planned," she said. "Plus, it's an hour less back home."

Because somehow an hour's time difference was significant, or something.

"Aww, dating," Nathan said around a mouthful of nugget. He had no manners, what did she expect? "Please tell me you went and walked on the shores of some river you have there since the beach is out of the question. Please tell me you did something that cliche."

"We went to play tennis," Kate replied, and yes, she was pretty sure that would get comments from him. "I don't think there's anything cliche about that."

Unlike the walks in parks they'd done yesterday.

"Tennis?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "You went on a date to play...tennis? What, is this guy like fucking sixty and in diapers already?"

Kate snorted, and shook her head. "He's twenty...something." Look, she hadn't wanted to ask Zach for the specific number. No reason. "And sophisticated, so no wonder you don't get it."

"Sophisticated?" he repeated like that was a bad word. To him, it kind of was. Sophisticated meant boring. "Since when are you sophisticated? I have seen no evidence of that."

"Maybe I'm multifaceted," Kate suggested, smirking. "Maybe I show different sides of myself to different people. I'm capable of being sophisticated, but you don't inspire that in me."

"You're not sophisticated," Nathan said with some confidence. "Don;t be a great pretender, Kate. No one likes a faker. Leave the sophistication to those that drink wine instead of booze and eat caviar instead of sardines. We're bottom dwellers and we like it that way."

"Hey, speak for yourself," Kate replied, somewhere between amused and genuinely offended. "I drink wine on occasion. I'm not out of place at an art museum."

"So, you telling me you prefer looking at pictures of fucking farmhouses and milling around, eating cheese and crackers, rather than going to some club where you get sweaty and drunk and fucking wasted off the good shit?" Nathan asked skeptically.

Kate shrugged a shoulder. "Maybe sometimes I do. Except that I like modern art better. And I've never been much for the whole going to clubs thing. I'm from fucking Kansas, remember?"

Nathan just didn't believe it. He shook his head and ate another nugget in silence. "So what, you gonna start playing tennis and going to museums and maybe even a yacht club now? All because of this guy you're in love with now?"

"I'm not in love with him," she replied immediately, making a face, seeming pretty confident on that point. "But other than that... Why not? I mean, I've been involved in worse things."

"How does that even sound fun to you?" Nathan wondered, shaking his head. He didn't even want to think about wearing deck shoes and sitting on a boat in pristine white shorts while some dick named Harold and his jaunty scarf steered the ship.

Kate shrugged again. "Well, it sounds better than just sitting around moping in my room, waiting for the next time the island decides to hurl something horrible at me."

Maybe her standards had gone down at some point.

"Yeah, that's real healthy," Nathan said, rolling his eyes. "You do know that you can have fun here, don't you? The fact that you're not allowing yourself to is no one's fault but your own, Katie from the Midwest."

He had to have predicted her hand smacking his shoulder for that name, right?

"I do know fun is possible here," she said. "I used to have it, even. I think I've just... I don't know, lost my interest in it."

"Well, that's disappointing," Nathan said, making a face. "Why?"

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