۝ ۝ ۝

One and a half movement passed of secretly visiting Keith, and all the time the thought of his lips, barely considered a kiss on my wrist, poked at my sanity. My face was heated nonstop, and everybody kept thinking I was getting sick again. I had to come up with an even more flimsy pretext as to why I was constantly blushing, which ultimately came to:

"Oh, I just... met this really cute girl the other quintant, and she just did a very nice thing to me that's got me kinda flustered..."

"I KNEW IT!" Allura called out so suddenly and loudly that the whole table jumped. Hunk looked like he had just had his soul knocked out of him. My sister pointed at me, leaning over the long table and behaving in such a different way than her usual conduct that it somehow made the whole planet hold it's breath. "I knew that there was a reason for your sudden "skills in hide and seek"!" She made exaggerated quote signs around the last words, a wide grin displayed on her face. Her blue eyes twinkled - no, sparkled, in excitement. Like literally sparkled. Was that a normal thing?

"A girl, huh?" Pidge teased, nudging me in the side, making me flinch. "It's about time someone jumped for you, you lonely nincompoop."

I frowned down at her. "Wow, is it really that surprising that I finally get someone to like me?"

"Yeah", everybody said in unison.

Welp, couldn't argue with that, then.

"So she's the reason you've miraculously turned good at hide and seek?" Allura goaded, her finger still up my face, her body leaning over the table so much that she was almost lying on it. "Just admit it, you've been secretly seeing her, having the hide and seek as an excuse, right? Now it all makes so much sense!" She flicked her own head, in a duh-kind of way.

I tried not to make a face, already regretting what I had said, hating where this was hastily going.

"Right...?"

Allura squealed, making Hunk's soul - that he seemed to begin to get back - fly right out of the castle doors again. Whoosh, his soul went. "I knew it I knew it I KNEW IT!"

"Princess...", Hunk panted, probably terrified of my sister's behavior. His hand rested on top of his heart. "Please just... take a moment to calm down, you know..."

"What is she like? What's her name? Will we get to meet her? I promise, I won't tell mother and father of this discovery. Your love life is safe with us." She made thumbs up enthusiastically, baring her teeth in a wide smile. Hunk smiled at me helplessly, and Pidge pointed the middle finger at me with a bigger grin from beside me.

I gulped, screaming mentally. If only, I thought bitterly. If only my confession about seeing Keith could be this easy. If only Keith were that innocent girl.

When I didn't say anything, Allura snapped her fingers in front of me, trying to gain my attention. I flinched again.

"Name?" she repeated, turning very passioned about the subject, but also very urgent to get the answers out of me.

I hoped that I was only imagining the sweat running down my back, making my tunic stick to my skin uncomfortably. I pulled the collar of my vest away from my throat a couple of inches, only to let it slap back.

"Um... She...Ehm... Her name is... Nyma! Yeah, Nyma, that's her name!" Was my face sweating? It was sweating, wasn't it?

The delight on Allura's face ran off her face in a heartbeat, maybe even faster than that. The Altean trio were all looking at me now.

"Nyma?" she muttered, or more like spitting it out. She leaned back again, her hands firmly gripping the edge of the table. "That Nyma?"

"We talked it out!" I reassured quickly, trying to turn the judging stares on me to something good. "She explained throughly why she played me on the way she did the first time we met. I now understand her previous actions, and I'm mature enough to forgive her. So then we started talking from there, and... yeah..." I scratched the nape of my neck, feeling something warm and wet tickle my fingers, and I brought down my hand and discreetly wiped the sweat off on my tigh under the dining table.

Allura's eyes softened just slightly, but she didn't look entirely convinced. "You talked it over", she repeated bitingly, gritting her teeth. "What makes you so sure she won't repeat her dereliction?"

I tired for an ingenuous smile, feeling how my face cracked. "Gut feeling?"

Pidge snorted beside me, but thankfully didn't make the situation worse for me. From the corner of my eye, I could see how she were smirking.

"Fair enough", Allura said finality. "Bring her over tomorrow. I want to see myself if your gut feeling is correct."

I bit down on my tongue to prevent myself from screaming out loud.

Oh man...

۝ ۝ ۝

"Please please please!" I wailed, ready to fall down to my knees in front of her. I clasped my hands together, begging. "I'll do anything! Just... Please pretend to me my girlfriend! For just a little while. And then I'll dump you, I promise!"

If she had eyebrows, I knew she would have raised one of them. Her pink lips turned up into a simper.

"You're not making the conviction any better", she giggled, turning around and rummaging through one of the tool boxes resting on top of a big rock beside her's and Rolo's shut down ship. An idea sparked in my head.

"I'll... I'll get your ship repaired!" Nyma stilled, her back towards me, and I could swear she was smirking. "If you... pretend to be my girlfriend."

A moment of silence passed, with the exception of the humming of the contraptions and electronic implements around us, to say.

Her snigger shouldn't have seemed unexpected, but still it did, and her sudden closeness shouldn't have either, but this was Nyma after all. Everything she did or said was impetuous and unforseen.

She snaked her hands around my neck, peering up at me through golden eyelashes, her purple eyes twinkling innocently, making me naive all over again, my heart thudding against my ribcage hard. Just this made me falter, and in this moment, I was too awestruck to do anything about it.

She leaned in, her mouth brushing the shell of my ear, so lightly it felt unreal.

"I'm a good actress", she whispered.

Oh, you sure are...

I felt the smile against my skin, and when she tilted her head back again, her smell overcame my senses, and I leaned in without really intending to.

But I alsmot fell face first when she pulled away, the warmth on my neck gone too soon.

I pouted up at her, and her angelical laugh rang in my ears. "I want the ship totally pristine and spic-and-span, understood, rascal boy? Don't make me disappointed."

My blood boiled, from either sheepishness, anger, or both. My status was nothing against her ruse, and she knew that. She must have known this entire time, from the first time I threw finger guns and adhered to her. She knew I wouldn't snitch on her and her wiles, and that probably egged her on.

"Of course", I muttered, defeated, and awfully susceptible.

Nyma seemed contented with my answer. "Lovely! When should I come over?" She gasped expectantly, her eyes gleaming. "Do I get to eat the fancy food that royalties eat? And wear a fancy dress?"

Wow, how shallow.

"In two quintants", I informed her grimly. "You just need to assure my sister that you're kind now, and you know... dating me."

"Seems easy enough", she stated, putting a hand on her hip, flashing me her signature smile. "I can be kind if I want to."

I crossed my arms with a heave. "Haven't experienced that yet."

Nyma laughed, and she turned around again, continuing her search in the tool box.

"See you in two quintants, rascal boy."

۝ ۝ ۝

When I returned from my little meeting with the devil in disguise, my face still held the shade of crimson, probably after Nyma's little stunt. Allura, of course, misunderstood it and took it for something completely else when I met her in the garden.

"I suppose we will be expecting her to come?" she guessed, grinning, and I couldn't figure out if it was out of amusement or mischievousness.

"Yeah", I grouched. "Yeah, of course."

۝ ۝ ۝ 

Allura grinned the next quintant too, when I appeared in her room, wondering why she was laying on her bed so comfortably with a book in her hands, looking far from ready to go up.

"Now that I know what you're doing while we "play hide and seek", I don't have to bother and play with, right? I know where you're going, so there's no point in me even going out", she explained. "So just scurry away, don't leave her waiting." Allura winked eminently.

"Wha..." I blinked furiously. "I... Just like that?"

"I'm offering you an exemption, for now, at least." She lowered her book her stomach, pointing watchfully at me. "But keep in mind, don't let this consume your daily commissions. Seeing her shouldn't confound you and mislead you from priorities. I trust you with your privilege. Don't waste my credence."

۝ ۝ ۝

Something lightly shoved my arm, and I winced, my muscles rigidified. 

"Hey...", Keith murmured, leaning towards me, but retracting his hand. "Are you okay? You've been aloof this whole time now. Is something wrong?" 

The disquietude in his voice was almost enough to just make me spill everything out, but I seized my rationality and pressed out a rigid smile, and I couldn't miss how the corners of Keith's eyes hardened. 

"Huh? I'm totally fine! Yeah, finer than ever! Nothing, and I mean nothing, is wrong with me!" My eyes twitched, my smile wavering. Smiling, that was usually so straightforward for me, wasn't anymore. Keith must have noticed all of this, because he scowled.

"I'm pretty sure everything I said came in here", he pointed at my ear facing him, "and came out there." Now he gestured for my other ear.

I didn't say anything.

"Look", he continued. "If something is bothering you, which clearly is the case, I don't expect you to come here just to say nothing at all to me. Next time, try to clear you head before visiting, if you've planned to not tell me anything, which is totally fine if you don't want to. You're not compelled to do it."

I blinked, my mind desperately wanting to steer away in the wrong direction, and I gawked at Keith, trying to recall what he was saying just now. I tried to dig deep inside my head, but always bumped in to those dire thoughts. I saw how he waited for me to respond, and I tried to swallow down my culpability, but it always stuck in the middle.

"Say that again...?"

Keith's eyes darkened, and I hated it. Hated it so much I wanted to throw myself against the cave wall just to not witness the glow dampen like that. He leaned back, his lips a thin line, his gaze solid.

"That delineates it, then", he muttered. "It's been fourteen doboshes. Might as well leave four doboshes earlier. Your head is clearly brimming with thoughts, so I suggest you returning home and thinking them through." 

I made a wry face, trying again to swallow the guilt, but it just went higher up. He was right, I knew that, and I also knew that it was best not to add insult to injury, because if I stayed, my mind would still wander off to different places, which could aggravate him more. Better to just depart when Keith's irritation was at its lowest.

Obstinately, I stood up, searching for his gaze, but he had already looked away, down at the fire again, not planning to look me in the eye anymore this quintant.

"I suppose you'll visit tomorrow, too?" he said in a low voice.

I was tics away from barfing out my guilt all over him; it hurt to push it down my throat. "Um... No, actually?"

Keith still didn't look at me, which made it so much worse but also so much easier. "No?"

Well then, here goes nothing. "I... Ehm... I kind of have... a... like, um... a date?" 

This made him look up, his face unreadable, his eyes set hard. The light from the fire made his features look knife sharp, and I could feel my eyes sting from just looking at him. I glanced down at his hand, the one that had almost healed by now, and how he was clenching his fist hard, so hard it looked like he would just burst open the wound again.

"You have a date?" His eyes were challenging, but still callous. Maybe it would be best if he just stabbed my eyes with his dagger than to look at me.

"It's not a date that I want to have!" I hurried to say, my shrieky seem gly provoking even to myself. "My sister and my friends were getting suspicious, so I had to come up with a lie! Which eventually led to me secretly seeing... a girl..." 

I was careful not to mention the whole truth, to change the story up a bit; excluding the blushing part. Keith would wonder why I was blushing so much, and I couldn't bare to lie any more than I already did. 

His face, though, stayed undecipherable. I couldn't read anything scribbled behind the layers of impediment, which was highly frustrating.

I felt like my explanation wasn't enough, so I added: "So I had to come up with a name for this girl, and I panicked, so I mentioned this girl that had once played me on and very much rejected me after, but now I bargained with her and managed to make her pretend to be my... girlfriend." It tasted bitterly and disgusting on my tongue, and it sounded even more ludicrous saying it out loud.

Nothing on his face moved, but he lowered his gaze, to the fire again, and I could now gulp openly. He still didn't say anything, though, which made me stampede. If he was going to remain silent like this, I would for sure lose it.

"Are you going to say anything?" I shrilled, sweating something fierce.

Maybe this was pointless, maybe I just needed to turn around and leave, to let him be. Maybe he wasn't ever going to speak, and he had decided to go mute on me.

But then, ticks later, he lifted his head, looked me straight in the eye, his face crabbed, and said:

"Have fun."

۝ ۝ ۝

Raise your hand if Nyma is a thot that should begone

🙋🏻‍♀️ 🙋🏻‍♀️ 🙋🏻‍♀️