Yet Another Change Adjustment

Renard gave his patented dismissive shrug, subtly leaning closer to Emily as he spoke. "It's really nothing special," he responded. "I mean, it's just shadow manipulation. I can't really do anything too useful with it. And, the E..." He smiled a bit brighter, looking into her big, green eyes. "It just happens to be the first letter of the name of someone in this room." He laughed softly, poking her arm in a teasing manner.

A soft blush crept onto Emily's cheeks. She glanced away from Renard in an attempt to hide her face as she smiled. "Hm.." Emily mumbled, biting her lip as she looked back up at him. Trying to keep away from the topic of the letter, and the fact that he was suddenly closer, she smiled up at him. "Don't sell your power short. I'm pretty sure that, if you work on it more, you'll be able to do much more than just change its shape."

"Well, for now it really isn't much use for anything but fancy decoration," he laughed softly, looking over at her. He could feel her embarrassment, perhaps uncomfortableness as well. He wondered then if he caused her discomfort, and a slight frown twitched across his lips. He hadn't meant to make her feel uncomfortable in any way... Maybe he was just being too forward. With his social skills so sub-par, he didn't exactly know what was unacceptable or not. "Everything okay, Emily?" he asked her quietly.

"Mhm." Emily mumbled, nodding her head in response. She glanced back down at her hands; they were shaking. It's probably just from the usage of power... she told herself, pushing away every other cause. Emily wouldn't let herself accept that fact that she was shaking due to nerves, and the thought of Renard being so close to her. "So uhm.." she said softly, trying to dig up a topic, "Thank you, for taking me to the café that day. I meant a lot."

"Oh, it's no problem at all. It was my pleasure." Renard smiled, thinking back to their lunch at the café. It had been a great time, and he was glad that she felt the same way. Wow, was he really this close to her? Their arms were almost touching, and a mixture of nervousness and some strange excitement coursed through his body. This wasn't right... was it? "Uhm, yeah, we... we should go again sometime, right?" He had no idea why he asked her instead of passing it off as a suggestion. Perhaps his nerves were getting the best of him again.

A bright smile once again lit up Emily's face, her eyes shining. "I would love to." she said happily. She could think of no reason to not spend time with him; the thought brought a strange feeling of happiness to her. Then she hesitated, "I mean, if you'd want to. I don't want to be a burden."

"Of course you wouldn't be a burden," Renard laughed, smiling at her. "That's why I asked. I'm sure it'll be great." They sat in silence for a couple more minutes, Renard's eyes looking around the room as if something might change within it. "So, do you like the dorms so far?" he finally asked, not exactly sure if he'd already asked such a question.

Emily gave a small shrug, unconsciously moving closer to him. She didn't really plan on spending much time in the dorms, but she didn't want to tell him that. The place wasn't that bad anyways; maybe Emily would be able to force herself into sleeping here, but she doubted it. "It's....roomy." she finally replied, glancing around the big space, "I haven't been in my room yet, so I don't know how that looks like. This area isn't that bad though."

Their movements had pretty much brought them together at this point, Renard's arm pressed against hers. A slight blush crept onto his faced as he realized this fact, but he continued the conversation as if he hadn't. "Yeah, this place seems good enough," he added, shifting himself a tad, which only served to bring them closer together. "So, uh, maybe we could try a different restaurant next time we eat?"

"Hm..." Emily said, smirking slightly. She unconsciously leaned against him as she went through the eateries in her mind. "I don't know.. I mean, I only know of the café, and I think there's a different, more formal, restaurant near that, but I don't know of anywhere else. There's always the cafeteria though." Emily told him, giggling softly.

Renard shifted a bit, biting his lower lip as he felt Emily lean against him as she recounted the eateries available to them. "Well, the... cafeteria sounds fine to me," he replied, feeling odd with her against him. Not a bad odd, just... odd. What was he supposed to do? Gently, almost unconsciously, his hand went up and slowly stroked her hair, as if that would help anything.

Emily blushed slightly when she felt him touching her hair, but she didn't comment on it. She was enjoying being this close to him, and she didn't want to do anything in fear to ruin it. "I guess so.." Emily commented. She leaned her head back to look up at him, a shy smile playing on her lips when she realized exactly how close she was to him. Any closer and she'd basically be laying against him. "I guess we could go there when our classes start."

Renard nodded in response, having to keep himself from laying himself against Emily's warm body. It was certainly comfortable here, on this couch, with her... What in the world was he thinking? He looked down to see her looking at him, a smile playing on her lips. It was adorable, that was for sure... Was the room growing hotter, or was it just him? Wasn't this supposed to be the Winter dorms? "Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. Do you... uh, know..." The question died on his lips as he looked at her, getting lost in her luminously green eyes. They were talking about classes, right? His mind had pushed that extraneous information out, and he was left with nothing to think of but her being so dangerously close to him.

It happened so suddenly, he didn't have time to tell himself how stupid an idea it was, or how embarrassing it would look. Rather than heed those intelligent, well-reasoned thoughts, however, he blithely ignored them and laid a hand gently upon Emily's, leaning down and softly placing his lips on hers. What he was doing was obvious, but why he was doing it was truly beyond him. There was no doubt now that he crossed the line.

Emily froze at the touch of his lips on hers. Her mind filled with questions; why was he kissing her? Should she kiss him back? What did this mean for them? What if she did something wrong? What should she do? Emily forced these thoughts out of her mind, trying to focus only on him, and what she should do. After a short second of debating, Emily finally relaxed against him, kissing him back. Her touch was shy and tentative against his, in fear that she wasn't supposed to do this. She didn’t push much against him though, in fear that she’ll do something wrong and ruin what was happening.

Well, this was it: they were kissing. A sort of light-headed feeling overcame Renard as he kissed the beauty sitting next to him, not attempting to deepen the kiss for fear that Emily would recoil away from him. He had felt her tension, her surprise and hesitation, but it only took a second for her to kiss him back and relax, and a smile crossed his face as their lips touched. His arms moved until they were wrapped around her back, sitting up slightly and pulling her up with him. It couldn't have been more than a minute, but to Renard it felt like they sat there kissing for an eternity. Finally, reluctantly, he broke the kiss and looked at her, smiling sheepishly with flushed cheeks. He didn't know what to say at that point: Wow or I'm sorry seemed like the most prevalent ideas, but he didn't really want to say either, so instead he sat there silently, a warm feeling enveloping his entire body.