no more night, blue skies forever • • a r i / l u c i

The Italian witch was surprised, which brought the nineteen-year-old a little bit of satisfaction in the context of this encounter but also a hint of concern. Ari had grown up revering Aurors, hearing stories of First Wizarding War heroism and joining the collective mourning for their murders at the hands of Death Eaters. Not everyone felt that way, though. She wondered what Prosper, so insulated from the war--so much so that Ari felt freer around him--thought of her profession. "Yes, very," she murmured simply, thinking of how nothing they'd seen in training yet compared to the Battle, even though all the new academic parts were occupying an outsized portion in her brain.

Prosper interjected on her behalf, and the nineteen-year-old was grateful that he'd noticed, retreating slightly to the background of the conversation as the other two traded charged words about the seemingly innocuous subject. She merely nodded in response to all of it, eyes moving back and forth between the two. There was a strong enough current of tension between them when speaking of Luciana's home city, and when discussing "anyone new," that Ari thought they must have been there together. Their interaction was so charged now that she had to wonder what they had seen in each other. The impressions she had of them were so different.

Ari was fervently grateful that London was such a big city. At this point, she could live without ever seeing this woman again. Thankfully, the intermission was finally over, and Ari's eyes were only too eager to break away from the scene in front of her to look up for the source of the sound. As Prosper pulled her away, she turned back to him. "It's okay," she said softly. Assuming they were heading back to the box, she noticed they weren't heading towards the stairs. "Oh," she said, surprised. Thinking about it, Ari thought she would be very happy to see more of the performances, but she had a feeling neither she nor Prosper would be able to concentrate after that. There had been flickers of something other than the charm she usually associated with him in that interaction. "Sure, yeah."

She waited a few beats before saying anything more, but she was still thinking about the encounter. She almost didn't want to know, but she couldn't help be struck by, even more than a difference between Prosper and Luciana, the gulf between Luciana and herself. She wasn't sure what type of person exactly could get along with both of them. "Um. Has she always been so..." What was the least offensive word she could think of? "...caustic? I mean," she added quickly, "I don't know if you want to talk about it, it's just I have a bit of a hard time imagining you two getting along well."

Luciana smiled contemptuously at Prosper. “Yes, lots of similar interests.” Not to mention that he had spoiled Luciana with gifts before he’d even met her, had only ever showered her with compliments, and had no baggage – that the Italian was aware of, at least. That was the trouble with writing to someone though wasn’t it? You could present your best self, and leave out all the negative things. She was currently living under the illusion that @Harvey Landsdowne was her fairytale prince come to save her, because despite her best efforts to act to the contrary, Luciana was a sucker for the romantic ideal.

They’d reached something of a stalemate in the conversation. Before Luciana could think of the next thing to say to put a spanner in the works of Prosper’s evening the intermission bell chimed softly and he’d excused himself (and Ariane) swiftly. The elemental scowled lightly, unhappy that she’d been unable to properly ruin the evening and/or steal Prosper away from his bland date. She turned with a slight huff and downed the rest of her champagne, thrusting the empty glass at a waiter as she made her way back to her cousins.

Prosper whisked Ariane away elegantly, manoeuvring the pair of them to walk alongside the ornate bar as the crowd moved past them in the opposite direction. "Perfect," he commented lightly. He didn't know what he'd have done if she hadn't agreed. The young man doubted that he'd be able to sit through the whole second half without secretly scanning the seats to see if he could find a particular brunette... "Caustic," Prosper repeated, tasting the word, his expression unreadable. "In some ways," he answered vaguely. The Frenchman nodded at her next words, but wasn't looking at her. Instead, Prosper cast a covert look over his shoulder at the theatre staff behind the bar. They seemed to be talking amongst themselves.

As he walked, Prosper deftly drew his wand and uttered an accio under his breath. Ahead of them, a bottle of champagne drifted up from the shelf behind the bar. Prosper plucked it out of the air in one smooth movement, facing ahead and clutching the bottle to his chest as they exited the place. "You're not going to arrest me are you?" Prosper teased, glancing her way as the pair stepped out into the cool night air. He withdrew his arm from hers to stick the bottle into the inside pocket of his jacket and return his wand to its place in another. A little of his former buzz had returned now that they were free of the place - one of its patrons in particular. He felt relieved.

Prosper sighed. "Luci and I dated in seventh year," he explained with a slight shrug, slowing his pace a little now that they were clear of the theatre. The streets outside were quieter and he could hear himself think more clearly out here. Prosper side-stepped a young couple walking in the opposite direction and walked in front of Ari for a few steps, turning to face her and walking backwards as he continued. His words were emphasised with hand motions. "She was always... I wouldn't say - what was the word? Caustic exactly, but definitely in control. And jealous." He shook his head, "Things didn't end well last time I saw her." Prosper scratched the back of his neck absentmindedly.

"Sorry again," he said genuinely, falling back into step beside her. The young man reached for her hand without really thinking about it, entwining his fingers with hers lightly. He wondered how much he should tell her, and what sort of impression Ari would have of him after that interaction. He didn't want her thinking that he went around breaking hearts and leaving behind a trail of beautiful, bitter exes - even if that sort of was true in this case. "Not exactly my idea of a great date scenario," he joked.

For a second Ari felt a little bit of frustration at him bubble up, where before it had been entirely restricted to Luciana and to the situation she had been awkwardly jammed into. So far she never really felt like Prosper wasn't listening to her. She hadn't conversely felt like she had immediately plumbed his depths--he hadn't felt accessible the way Kate had, like an old friend--but his vaguer answers thus far she'd attributed to the way at least part of his head lived somewhere in the clouds rather than any strong desire for secrecy. This time was a little different, as though she had run into a little shield. 'You hardly know me,' she'd said to him the last time, and she supposed that went the other way too. So she shouldn't expect him to trust her very much--not more than a woman he had history with--but Ari had never been good at getting close to people who weren't as straightforward as she was.

The feeling mostly dissipated when she realized he was distracted, and not just by thoughts of their encounter. Ari's eyes were wide as she watched him Summon the champagne, before she tried desperately to look normal to not rouse suspicion. So it was that his question elicited a choked laugh from the girl as they left the theater, her heart pulsing a little harder than normal but feeling oddly liberated by what he had done. "Don't worry, I don't have any jurisdiction here," she grinned. "As long as you stay away from my aunt Adeline." Her dad's sister was still in the British Ministry, technically, but IMC employees did tend to know a lot of DMLE employees. More than uncle Henri or Reine would.

She turned to look at him, her brown hair falling to the side of her face, as he started to explain his history with Luciana, with as much candor as she could expect. Ariana felt foolish for questioning him earlier the way she had as she absorbed his explanation. She opened her mouth to respond when suddenly she felt warm fingers slipping into her own, and looked down at them in surprise. Of all the hands that had grasped hers--Edmund when she was little; Kate when she was little; Freya's in friendship; Jeremy's when dancing, laughingly--was his the first to be, well, really romantic? And then he said 'date', like she could hear Kate and Freya's tones overlaid on one another in the background.

"It's okay," she said honestly, putting a little pressure on his fingers for a brief moment. It was like a completely different means of communication had opened, she thought, a little surprised. "It's not like you planned it," she laughed, a little more weakly than usual. "I guess you must have seen a different side of her. I never really talked to a lot of girls like her." A little like Lorin, maybe. Ari had mostly steered clear of the Slytherin girl. Despite trying to place Luciana in her head, Ari's statement was matter-of-fact but with a certain air of finality. She didn't want to dwell on it either, not when he was so...present? "So...what is your idea of a great date scenario?" she asked, returning the humor but flushing a little in the late twilight, still feeling his fingers against hers.

"Oh that's good to know," Prosper answered cheekily, a very mischievous glint in his eye. He'd always been one for a little well-natured rule breaking.

It's okay

Prosper gave her a well-natured smile. He squeezed her hand in response. "She's a different person one on one," he agreed with a nod, before adding, "I just don't think she liked seeing me with someone." Okay, so perhaps he was omitting the fact that he'd seen - and slept with - Luciana only a couple of months ago, but she didn't really need to know that, did she? Luci would have been bitter either way anyway. She'd always been jealous. A part of him did feel like he wanted to explain some more. Even though a part of him had wanted to roll his eyes into another dimension at some of Luciana's tactics tonight he really did remember all of the good things about her too. Defending his ex in a conversation with his new love interest wasn't really appropriate though, so Prosper left it at that.

“Hmmm…” Prosper turned his eyes ahead for a moment, chewing the inside of his cheek as he considered her question. It was quite broad, he thought. There were a great number things that he might consider a “great date”. The Papillonlisse had always had a flair for the dramatic, so if he really considered what would make something great, there would probably be a lot of dramatic elements. Music, dancing, being up somewhere high with an exceptional view, for example. Eating delicious food. Making love by a fireplace somewhere cold or perhaps on a private beach? On the perfect date he’d have to remember the sand-repelling charms, though - not like last time he had sex on a beach - what a disaster... After a moment’s pause he stopped and turned to face her, reaching into his jacket pocket and retrieving his wand once more. "Trust me?" he asked, quirking one eyebrow.

Half a step to the side and Prosper felt himself folding in on himself under the uncomfortable effects of apparation. After a brief moment of feeling like he was being turned inside out, he and his companion reemerged somewhere new. He made sure to keep a hold of her hand in case she was unsteady. "Not exactly perfect by a long shot," he said, referring to their surroundings and feeling a familiar buzz in his chest, "but an improvement." He'd apparated them both onto a rooftop terrace with a view of the city and, of course, the Eiffel tower. The city's glittering lights and cool breeze made for quite an atmosphere. The rooftop itself was fairly plain, though several stories higher than surrounding buildings and adorned with a few leafy plants. There were couple of wooden seats and tables and one old couch clearly arranged by the residents of the building. Prosper flicked his wand at the melted unlit candles stuck to a small ceramic dish in the center of the wooden table nearest him to light them. He lit a few other candles on other tables too, surveying his work with interest.

"Probably something like this..." he said, withdrawing his hand from hers to conjure two champagne flutes neatly into his palm. He placed them on the table and withdrew the bottle he'd stolen, inspecting it for a moment before pouring. Naturally, Prosper had chosen the most expensive bottle there with a name he couldn't pronounce properly. "And this..." The man conjured a small radio, tapping it with his wand a couple of times to change the channel to something more orchestral and atmospheric. He put it on a table. "So I'd say this is a solid mid-tier date setting," he joked with a smile, turning back to her. He leaned against the table, picking up one of the glasses he'd poured. "Obviously loses points for inventiveness, but it's comfortable, intimate." It was pretty too, and he liked that. "I think to be better we'd have to be somewhere completely new, maybe doing something we hadn't done before." Prosper took a sip of his drink then placed it down on the table, moving back over to Ariane. He took her hand again and pulled her towards him with a casual sort of elegance, placing his other hand on her waist like they were about to start a waltz.

"Of course the most important element to a date is the company, wouldn't you agree?" Prosper moved gently, swaying to the soft music from the radio. He made it easy for her, leading with confidence. "What about you, how do you imagine a perfect date?"

Ari raised her eyebrows in response. It wasn't a question one responded to, but the English witch had a second to think about it as he stepped out in a classic Apparition pose. It had gotten harder to trust people during the war, but she hadn't felt the lasting effects until the dome. Prosper was from before then, but then he'd been some faraway sparkling thing. And he still was, but he was also something closer, and here. There were so many things that Prosper didn't know about her things without which he couldn't know her--what part of trusting was knowing? And yet, she was a little surprised to feel as she emerged on the other side of between, that she thought the answer might almost be yes. Her feet hit solid ground.

She blinked as she looked around, eyes adjusting to a darker vantage point from which the city's characteristic steel tower dominated the skyline. Paris was a flat city--Ari thought she'd heard a colleague mention a limit on building height--but there was a reason it was called the city of lights, and she could see it here. Ariana could feel a strange beating in her chest as Prosper started to light candles around them, pouring champagne into glasses he'd produced with fluid charmwork. It was so cliche--it was impossible to be nineteen years old and best friends with Freya Trickett and not know that--but try as she might Ariana Laurier could not be completely immune to a romance she'd so seldom been the target of. The flickering candlelight cast a warm glow up to meet the yellow lights of the city, and flickered against the silver on his robes as well. Did he know she liked silver?

Ariana laughed, a delight springing entirely from the surprise and humor of the self-awareness of his comment. "Right, I bet you've done this a hundred times," she said, only slightly exaggerating. "This isn't your roof, is it..." She stared up into his eyes as he pulled her in, a difference of several inches despite her low heels. Her left hand found his shoulder. "I think we did this before too," she pointed out with a soft laugh as he started to lead in a dance. "Well, you're very nice company, Prosper," she murmured, glancing downward. Her brain caught the cheese in every line out of his mouth, but Ari was an honest person. "I don't know, I'd probably just tell you what my friends liked." Laughing at her ideas of Freya gave way to thinking about the places that made her feel at home. She shrugged as best she could in their dance. "Probably something lowkey, honestly. Outdoors, sitting on the grass on a hill, talking." Realizing that it was basically the complete opposite of what they were doing, in their dress robes at candlelight, she laughed. "This is pretty nice too, though," she said, her eyes flicking back upwards to his.

It was nice to see her laugh. Ariane had a beautiful laugh, he thought distantly. The timbre of her voice held a quality that seemed to spread all the way up to her eyes. He gave a relaxed smile in response, purposefully allowing her to continue speaking rather than answer. Prosper knew, he'd learned - from idiotic teen experiences, no less - that no girl enjoyed the idea of things like going on dates that other girls had been taken on. No one wanted to ask a question like have you brought other girls here and have the answer be "yes". No one wanted to be number one hundred in a long line. "It's a muggle building actually," he told her, "but the fire escape that leads up here from the top floor is broken." He knew because he and a few mates had accidentally broken it last week. "So until they fix it, it's inaccessible without magic." There was something kind of cool about that, he thought. They were here, literally dancing right on top of people who didn't know they existed. The clandestine nature of it made it more appealing to Prosper. More romantic, more sexy, more attractive.

"Likewise," he answered, smiling again, this time with no unevenness to his smile or a quirked eyebrow to suggest he was joking at all. Prosper felt like he'd made his opinion on the matter pretty clear - even when he'd seen her several months ago, when she'd told him about her upcoming date with another man he'd made sure she knew that he thought she was beautiful, and intelligent. He didn't need to lay it on thicker than the candlelight and the music were doing for him already. Instead, he just listened to her speak, moving them both around with easy steps. Prosper paid attention to the way she spoke about her friends. This wasn't the first time that she'd substituted her opinion with a mention of her friends' opinions. He took from this that she seemed to care about her friends a lot; that she relied on them in areas that she hadn't spent much time thinking about. He also listened closely to her next words, making a quick mental note to save for later. Prosper always fell into infatuation fairly quickly, and he was definitely interested in the girl in front of him. "Lucky for you, I'm well-acquainted with many hills all across Europe," Prosper joked quietly, the cheeky edge to his smile firmly back in place. Internally, his mind spun future date ideas for him to peruse with more care later.

As he steered them in slow, drifting circles, Prosper slid the hand at her waist to the small of her back, pulling her into his chest. He ran his fingers up her back, enjoying the feeling first of thin silk and then the feeling of soft skin. Some part of him noted that she wasn't wearing a bra - her dress clung so closely to her body that he was sure he'd feel it if she were. A stray thought wondered what other parts of her body might feel like through the thin silk of her dress. Over her shoulder, Prosper watched the candles flicker against a light breeze. He listened to the gentle music and the distant sounds of the streets below and the soft swish of their silk attire as they moved together. "This is nice," he said absentmindedly, tilting his head towards her a little, is cheek against her hair. Prosper had always been a tactile person, and it felt nice to have her so physically close to him. He imagined kissing her neck, running his hands through her hair or his fingertips over her waist. The young man had long forgotten the situation they'd been in not twenty minutes ago.

Ari's eyes went to the side of the building, looking for the broken fire escape he'd mentioned. Ariana was a more than competent witch, but knowing where alll the exits were made the young auror feel more secure, even if she didn't need them. There was always a chance that she could panic too much to Apparate, but a fire escape she could fix; or charm herself to slow her fall, or blast a hole in the ceiling beneath their feet. Ariana pressed her lips together, suddenly aware of the intrusive thoughts in her head. She shouldn't be worried about anything here--nobody even knew they were up here. Nobody even knew who they were. Prosper, who was here, leading her so securely, his hands on hers, was at least competent with a wand. And yet.

She tried to nod and smile instead, to take his words with the promise with which he'd said them: secrecy, privacy, even romance. What did it say about her that something that had been working so well just a moment ago had been so easily punctured by her own anxiety dragging her knees to the earth? And what would he think of her if he knew that was what she was thinking of? She took a deep breath, imagining the hill she had pictured when telling him that, late afternoon, a gentle slope falling away from a bench by the Muggle university, little white flowers. She laughed a little. "Are those where the traveling circus performed?" In the few times she'd seen him in the past couple of months they'd stuck to more cultural events. Ari still didn't know if Prosper had anything really casual about him, but she thought she wouldn't mind if he saw that about her.

Prosper pulled her in even closer and she could feel her pulse increasing. His very immediate presence was simultaneously calming and nervewracking, a thin thread of uncertain tension preventing her from melting fully into it. He was tall; her cheek rested against the silver threads on his robes, the thinnest of barriers between her face and the warmth of his chest. Closing her eyes for a brief moment, she realized she could feel his heartbeat, rhythmic and grounding. "Mm," she murmured softly, opening them again to the yellow glow of the tiny flames surround them, not sure if she was supposed to say something, not sure whether time was indeed passing or not at all.

Her hair smelled good, he thought. Prosper had always been a sensual person. Touch, smells, music and ambience all had a strong effect on him. He wondered if she felt it too, the same way that he did. Naturally, he assumed that she did. Prosper hadn't asked about the man she'd seen in between running into her at the book launch and seeing her again after. He knew things hadn't gone well enough that she wasn't in Paris with him now, dancing on a rooftop together. Had she kissed him, though? Or more? How long had they seen each other for? Prosper didn't care in the sense that the stranger's presence in her history bothered him, but he did wonder about the decided lack of history at all.

It was on his mind right now, as he put a few centimetres between them again. Her brown eyes met his grey ones, an inquisitive look about her expression. Anticipatory, like she was waiting for him to speak. He'd told her how beautiful she looked earlier in the night; his eyes had followed the path the dress cut across her body and he'd commented on the asymmetry. He thought she looked more beautiful now, though; her gaze was softer, more relaxed. There were elements of the way he felt echoed in her expression, and he enjoyed seeing them there. In a snap decision, Prosper decided to stop thinking so much. He leaned in and kissed her.

The man stopped moving them in lazy circles as he pressed his lips to hers. It was a gentle, a peck made more than just a peck by softened lips and closed eyes, and a sort of lingering moment at the end right before he kissed her again. He was a little less soft the second time. Prosper pulled her closer, angling more and parting his lips, deepening the kiss. He slid the hand on her back up to the back of her neck, his fingertips grazing her hairline. Almost like an afterthought, Prosper dropped the hand he'd been holding and placed his palm on her waist. This moment had been a long time coming - not just tonight, or the past couple of months. For Prosper it felt like some sort of inevitable thing that had been years in the making. He'd wanted to kiss her that very first time they'd met, almost four years ago. He supposed he should be grateful this was happening now, when he was so much better at the whole thing.

Prosper punctuated the longer kiss with a short one before pulling back a little. His arms were still wrapped around her body, one in her hair and the other at her waist. He didn't open his eyes for a brief moment, savouring the buzzing feeling he always felt in moments like this. Distantly, the music drifted around them. He almost hadn't heard it a second ago. Prosper blinked the dreaminess from his gaze. "I've wanted to do that for a long time," he confessed, a smile prominent in his tone if not his expression.

The brief timeless moment that had been expanding suddenly contracted, accelerating into a singularity as Prosper leaned in to touch his lips to hers. Some whisper, all of the things anyone had ever told her about this, told her she was supposed to close her eyes, which only compressed it more; robbed of sight, there was only the wholly unfamiliar feeling of his lips and the still quite unfamiliar feeling of his hand on her back and his body against hers. Ari's eyes flickered open for a second, as if searching for some kind of visual confirmation of security, some undercurrent of panic brushing at the edges of her mind. Unfamiliarity meant danger, didn't it? Never enter a room without surveying it first; but then he leaned in again, and this time Ariana noticed that it was a pleasure to have his lips pressed to hers. Her chest caught as he moved his hand upwards, her hand falling from his arm to his back, her other hand reaching slowly for his shoulder a beat after he'd dropped it. Then there was stillness, a gentle balancing of pressure at all these points as her lips very hesitantly explored what it was to return a kiss.

Ari opened her eyes as he pulled back, although he hadn't yet, staring at the profile of his face above her in the kind of surprise that left her grasping at the reality of the situation while strings pulled in the background. Her mouth was slightly open, her breath shallow, watching as he blinked down at her. "I've never done that before," she replied, pointlessly, just to have something to say; he knew that, she thought. She tried to replay the last few minutes in her head, as if temporal distance would confirm its actuality. What she got instead was a handful of freeze frames; either just a minute's passing made her memory as porous as a sieve or these were the moments that had a gravity of their own.

She gave up trying to dissect it. Had she been this much in her head before everything? Ari hadn't grown up a heavy thinker. She hadn't needed to find meaning in everything until things that seemed so utterly meaningless had happened. Analysis was Edmund's job; she had been happy to just be there. She laughed a little. "It was nice," she smiled. It was generic but she said it softly; the meaning was in the simplicity, in the pleased surprise that she could say that and mean it. "Thank you," she said suddenly. "I mean, for all of this," she clarified, her head indicating the rooftop and implicitly the performance they had come from, before putting her left cheek into his chest, a faint tinge of embarrassment coloring her face. That contact felt surprisingly natural, too.

He smiled when she said she hadn't done that before. Suddenly, he was happy that he'd brought her up here, lit candles, danced. Happy that they were dressed so elegantly, and that the night was so clear. Prosper had always tended towards the dramatic side of things; he appreciated the idea of moments like this - firsts - being special. Memorable. "And how was it?" he asked, a little amused but in a well-natured sort of way. He was honoured that she'd shared it with him. He moved his hand from her hair, running his hands down her spine to settle on her lower back. "Nice for me too," he replied simply, a smile in his tone.

The thought passed through his mind that he should ask her if she wanted to come home with him. It was late enough that he was sure he could take her to his room without Zara seeing anything - and she was probably at Diederik's house anyway. He'd just bought a new plant (lavender) and tidied his room yesterday. His imagination wandered in this direction for a moment, the feeling of silk under his fingertips suddenly taking on a different light in the new, imaginary context. Then, of course, he made many mental notes about why that would be a bad idea - the fact that she was so inexperienced, probably didn't want to rush things. Et cetera. Most girls who had never kissed anyone in their lives - at her age - tended to not want to go back to a guy's place on their very first proper, proper date. Right? Hadn't he just been thinking about how firsts should be special? About how he, personally, enjoyed making them special?

Prosper didn't really know many (any?) girls who hadn't kissed anyone at nineteen. Most of his friends were more like him - dancers, actors, artists. More on the romantic side. Also more on the promiscuous side. Aside from that, the past few months before she had captured his focus must have distorted things, he thought. He'd slept with a lot of girls in that time. Some he knew, a lot he didn't. Almost none that he he'd seen since (Luciana came to mind), most that he wasn't planning on seeing again. Too many whose names he hadn't learned or no longer remembered. It had been a couple of months since then, which was relatively a long time for Prosper. He hoped that when - not if; if didn't even cross his mind - they did sleep together, she'd be wearing something that would be equally as satisfying to remove as he imagined the silk number adorning her body tonight would be. Prosper had always appreciated a woman in a ballgown.

Anyway.

At first he thought she was thanking him for kissing her. "Oh, that's fine," he said, genuinely a little surprised once he realised what she was talking about. He supposed that doing things like this was normal-ish for him. He liked the theatrics. He like the theatre. He liked beautiful girls and beautiful dates and naturally he wanted to impress her. England clearly hadn't treated her properly, and - he thought this with a rather smug edge - neither had the man who'd taken her out before him. He didn't mind not having anything to compete with - not that he was afraid of any kind of competition, of course. Point was, if she let him, he'd do all kinds of things for her. This was just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. It had been a while since someone had properly let him lavish them the way he liked to. Things with Ariane were fresh and new, and he wasn't going to jinx anything, but at this point, Prosper felt like it was sort of inevitable.

Her cheek was rested on his chest again now and Prosper swayed them gently to the music, not speaking for a while. He hummed a little, familiar with the orchestral piece playing. He'd learned how to play the melody on clarinet when he was younger. His thoughts moved from one thing to another, most of them revolving or relating to the girl in his arms, a few to the girl in his apartment, one or two about the girl they'd run into earlier tonight. "Here," he said after a while, stepping back and leading her to the old couch facing the city lights. He picked up the champagne glasses on the way and took a seat, offering her hers. Deliberately, he laid an arm out across the back of the couch so that when she sat, he could draw small circles on her opposite shoulder.

Prosper elegantly took a sip of his champagne, then held his glass loftily to one side. "If you like this, our next date is going to blow your mind," Prosper said absentmindedly, his grey eyes unfocussed in the direction of the city lights. He smiled, drifting back to the present as he looked at her. He hadn't planned it properly yet - something with hills apparently? But it would have to be better, he thought. His gaze flicked down to her lips again - close enough to kiss, he thought - and he shook his head slowly. "I wanted to kiss you that night we met," he said, his thoughts coming back to the I've wanted to do that for a long time thing he'd said a moment ago. It felt important, now, to say it. "I don't know why I didn't," he added, "I was very bold at sixteen. More than now, maybe."

There was a part of Ariana that thought she ought to try to be, well, cooler. Less awkward, more like the girls he was used to being with. She'd tried that at Tactile, a little, but things had been different then; another accidental run-in that might not be repeated. In that situation, she had space to temporarily be whoever she wanted to be. But Prosper had just kissed her, had implied that he would like to keep seeing her; it wasn't just one night where she could pretend to be someone she wasn't. Ari didn't like having to hide who she was--it reminded her of trying to pretend that everything was all right when the Carrows had free reign in Hogwarts--but what it really meant was that she wanted Prosper to like her, and that she didn't know if he would if he really knew her. That sounded like a proverbial red flag; she tried to push the impulse away. She'd already acted like herself in what was arguably the most potentially embarrassing part of the night.

Prosper led her to a couch she hadn't really paid attention to before. She'd be in trouble for that with Yates; situational awareness was an important skill. Taking the glass, Ari sat down, smoothing her dress, and took a sip of the bubbly liquid. It was good champagne. "You stole some high-quality stuff," she teased. 'Our next date, he said, like it was inevitable. Well, maybe it was, if he wanted it. Ari wasn't going to turn him down. Mustering up her real self, she replied, "I guess I'll look forward to that, then. It doesn't need to be...bigger, though, you know," she added. "I'm not...complicated." she said. Maybe it was a form of self-sabotage, to have thoughts like she'd just had about how she wanted to be and then to act completely differently. Maybe it was just an entreaty for him to see what he thought of the real Ariana Laurier--before she got too invested.

A flush lit her cheeks. "Maybe you just picked up on how awkward I was," she laughed. "Have I changed much?"

Prosper smiled as he looked at her. Couldn't really not smile when he looked at her. He'd always been so easily carried away by these kinds of feelings; the kissing and the ballgown and the rooftop all made for nice touches on top of an - almost - flawless night. He didn't get flustered like she did, or like most people did in moments like this, but that didn't mean he wasn't buzzing. Earlier tonight she'd called it all a little window into him and she'd been correct. These feelings - the culmination of months - were part of it all too. "Okay," He said, holding his glass up in retreat, "something relaxed, then." Relaxed wasn't exactly his style, but if it was what she was interested in, then he'd try it for her. He wanted to learn more about her; everything they'd done together had been more geared towards his interests, and their shared interests and not really anything that offered much of a window into her.

"Maybe," he replied mysteriously, smiling at the blush in her cheeks. Prosper considered it for a moment, probably taking the question a touch more seriously than she'd meant it. Had she changed much? "Yes," he said, whimsically swapping to english. Of course, he didn't know her well back then; it was hard to say which parts of her in particular had changed, grown, disappeared. But he himself was a completely different person to the boy he'd been at sixteen. It was impossible to stay the same. "You are more and less serious in different ways," he said honestly, "more like uh..." Prosper hesitated for a moment, the fingers drawing circles on her shoulder pausing for a moment too. He searched through his english vocabulary. "Like you spend more time inside of your head." Sometimes he caught her frowning at nothing and he wondered what she was thinking. He glanced her way.

"Less like, you're not so much scared of me anymore." This one he said with more lighthearted smile. Since they'd started spending time together recently, she'd been open about things like the fact that she'd never been with a man before, wasn't heavily pursued in high school etc. She was awkward still, especially when he laid it on thick with her, but she seemed more at ease in the feeling than she used to. Or maybe he just used to make people more uncomfortable than he did these days. "What about me?" he asked curiously, resuming the circle-drawing on her shoulder. "I can grow a beard now, you know," he joked.

"Okay." Ariana smiled at him, a kind of hopeful softness about her gaze. Ari had never liked change. Most of the big changes in her life had felt like they'd taken place out of her control, starting with when her brother had left for Hogwarts. The dome had been the final straw, when all grasp on even the passage of time had been wrenched away from them. All of this had never happened to her before, but despite an undercurrent of anxiety, she found herself hoping that this would be something good.

Ari blinked as he switched to English, her brain both responding to her native language but briefly confused by the switch, then grinned. The way he pronounced things was kind of cute. She leaned back into the couch, her brow furrowing as he replied. 'Like you spend more time inside of your head.' Prosper hadn't really missed much, she thought. What, really? The plague and the dome? They'd met after the war--but then, the same way adrenaline took away the pain, she thought her greater youth had armored her. Had she seen the dome in fourth year, she doubted it would have sent her into the same tailspin. Yes, Prosper had missed the plague, and the dome, and he had missed 'his biggest fear was never hitting five foot four'. "I've got more to think about now, I guess," she said vaguely. Something told her that unloading all of that was something for another day.

She blushed a little but laughed. "I guess you were scarier than Death Eaters," she joked. "How does that make you feel?" Prosper didn't really know the extent of what she'd done then; for all he knew she just meant the general threat of the war. She tilted her eyes up to look at his chin. "Could have fooled me. I don't see any proof," she smiled mischeivously. She thought for a moment. "You're...mellower, maybe? Kind of like you fill up your skin more, but project less." Maybe it was just because she had seen him one on one recently, inistead of with his friends like at his birthday party, but even though Prosper was still kind of extravagant, maybe even more comfortable and cognizant of his tendencies to grand gestures, it was less like he was playing something up.

Her sentence was delivered with a soft, distracted sort of tone that he filed away for later. Like all people, she was more complicated than first impressions might imply. There was more going on under the surface that he was curious to explore. But he wasn't keen to explore it now. The mood of the night so far had not really left a lot of space for deep and meaningful conversations. He got the impression that she wasn't too interested in going to that sort of place right now. "Don't we all?" Prosper said, the question clearly rhetorical as he leaned back in his seat a little.

Prosper's lips quirked a bit at the next comment. Scarier than Death Eaters? With his arm around her shoulders as it was, they were sitting pretty close to one another. He could feel her body up against his. He stroked a line up her arm, followed the curve of her shoulder, lingered along the lines of her collarbone. He liked the teasing, wanted to tease her back. "Not too bad," he said, a bit of smugness in his tone. He quirked an eyebrow as she went on, entirely pleased with the way this conversation was playing out.

"I'll show you in a couple of weeks," Prosper said, feigning a defensive brand of self-consciousness as he brushed the skin along his jawline with the back of one knuckle. He smiled soon after he spoke though; he couldn't help himself. He'd taken the opportunity to assert that he'd be seeing her again soon, but it was done with a well-natured self awareness that warranted a proper smile.

Fill up your skin more, project less. Prosper took a second to mull that over, and then decided that he liked it. "I lost a bit of my young-teen idiocy," he conceded, glancing her way. It wasn't really a question, but he was checking if that was what she'd meant. The teenager took a sip from his glass, finishing the liquid inside then holding it casually to one side.