[Les]

[seas_open]

They haven't really talked about it.

Between telling Corrine, whatever reaction she'd had -- April doesn't know, but she gets the feeling she should be glad she was out of the room at the time -- and Lara getting rid of those sirens who had been on her ass, it's been a rough week. Her apartment is still a disaster and she doesn't feel comfortable living there anymore anyway. She'll have to clean it up before she'll be able to sublet the place, but for the time being all she wants to do is forget it exists. She's quit the job at the lawyer's office, although she isn't entirely sure why. It could have been a distraction, but the time had come for her to go back and she just couldn't bring herself to do it. She's staying with Les for now, but she sincerely feels like she needs to find her own place soon and she isn't entirely sure why.

It's been a strange week and she and Les haven't talked much about what they're doing or what's been going on and she thinks they should, but at the same time she isn't really sure she wants to.

For now she's camped out on his couch in a pair of shorts and a t-shirt, a computer perched on her knees as she scrolls through apartment listings in town. She'd picked up the laptop after her place had been trashed, knowing she needed something to call her own, something more than just the things she had in her purse, knowing it would be necessary to find herself a new place to live.

So she's on his couch with the computer, looking at listings, but she's really not entirely paying attention. She's watching Les, too, and faint smile curving her lips as he moves around the place and she wants to tell him to relax, to come sit down with her, but at the same time she's enjoying just looking.

Comments

[lesparker]

Les isn't entirely sure what they're doing either, and every single time he tries to wrap his head around the mess he's in all he does is become hurt and confused and freaked out all over again. Much to his own dismay whatever he's doing with April has suddenly become something he's doing with Corry too, and he doesn't know how to untangle the two. He isn't even sure that's possible. Corry left, she actually left and he hasn't heard from her since then. She didn't tell him to stop seeing April, but he knows she probably wants him too. Les is in the kitchen assembling things in a black cast iron pot, grabbing things from the pantry. That list of items Clint Harken needed has suddenly become much more of a priority than before all this happened. Performing magic, using his hands, not thinking about Corry being pissed off that he's sleeping with her sister, goes a long way in remedying his headache.

Actually so does April. Even though she's tied up in all this mess with Corry, her presence makes him feel like he actually has someone around that cares about him. After that night with they all worked together to get rid of those sirens, he knows they are closer. Plus, she's staying with him for a few days. So they are literally closer too. It hasn't been awful (though he thinks that is mainly because April's been kind enough not to pester him with questions---he just wonders how long that will last). He has never lived with anyone, let alone anyone he's seeing, and no matter what they're calling it, he's seeing April. She's sleeping in his bed and....it's funny because a week or two ago, Les never even knew when he was going to run into her. Now here she is, all comfy on his couch, and not going anywhere.

He finishes what he's doing and puts it to boil on the stove, and he goes over to where she sits on the couch. "Any luck?" he asks sitting down in the space beside her. She's been pecking at this laptop for awhile now. Not that he knows the difference, but he isn't sure if she's finding what she's looking for or not.

[seas_open]

"Yeah," she says, scrolling absently through the listings as Les sits down beside her, not really paying much attention to them anymore. "I've seen a few places that look like that might be nice possibilities." They'll all serve her purpose anyway, she's never had a home, so as far as she's concerned, a nice place to put a bed for her to sleep in is really all she's looking for. Some of them aren't immediately available, which she's not sure about, because as much as she likes Les, she isn't sure how long he'll be comfortable with her staying here. She's never lived with anyone before and the only reason she's okay being here now is that she isn't thinking of it like that. She isn't letting herself. What she's doing right now is staying with someone. Someone she's sleeping with, granted, someone with whom she's actually had a conversation about their... whatever they're doing possibly being something more than just sex, but that's all. Thinking of this as living with Les freaks her out, so she doesn't let herself consider it that.

"I'll go look at some of them tomorrow," she says, closing the laptop and setting it down so she can turn toward Les on the couch, giving him a smile. She knows there's tension between him and Corrine now and there's a part of her that thinks she should ask about it or maybe worry a little more, but the truth is that she can't be bothered. With everything that's happened, she's too exhausted to think about much else and she's always been selfish. Her own feelings are really the only ones that have mattered for her entire life and she doesn't see any reason for that to change now.

The fact that she knows her father's name doesn't make him any more interesting to her. As far as she's concerned, she's perfectly content to go on with her life as if nothing has changed.

"And now that I don't have to pay anyone off with the insurance money, I'm loaded," she adds with a teasing grin. "So I can get myself a nice place and still take you out for a fancy dinner before dragging you to my new home to have my way with you."

[lesparker]

Les settles further into the couch beside April letting his head rest on the cushion behind him smiling back at her. It really has been nice having her around. He's definitely not willing to say he wants to live with someone all the time, but it has been nice. Still, in the back of his mind, he can't help wonder about them, about what they're even doing. Because to Les it feels like one second they'd been in the office at Watersong finally admitting whatever's between them is more than just casual and the next second, it felt like wherever they were headed had completely changed. Les still doesn't know if they are just taking the long way around getting back there or if now they are hurling full speed towards something else, something that's going to crash and burn. He just doesn't know.

"Loaded?" He raises his eyebrows at her, teasingly, with a lazily smile. "I always wanted to be with a rich woman that would take care of me and treat me right. It's really nice of you to volunteer..." He knows she's only joking, but he is glad a good thing came out of scaring those sirens away. April gets to keep her mom's money, and everything that happened Les thinks April deserves that. Her mom, for someone who wasn't even alive, had really made a mess of April's life.

He reaches over for April's arm pulling her a closer to him, keeping his arm around her shoulders. Maybe he doesn't know the answers about where this is headed, and maybe it doesn't matter right this second. It's just them here now. "I'll go look at those apartments with you if you want. Though I don't know how much help I'll be. I don't plan on moving ever again," he jokes.

[seas_open]

"So you're saying I'm only treating you right if I'm paying for all your things?" she asks with an amused grin, tipping her head back against his arm. This is so dangerous and she knows it. A part of her wants to pretend nothing happened, but she's curious, too, and she wants to know what happened after she left that day. Corrine hadn't been happy, that much was obvious and although April had liked her just fine when they'd spoken, her concern is mostly for herself and for Les. Whatever issues Corrine has with having a half-sister are hers and she can do whatever she likes with them. As far as April is concerned, the man who had fathered her hadn't done anything more than donate some sperm and she has no interest in seeking him out or trying to share him with anyone. Corrine is welcome to him.

And she wants to say this. In another situation she might have already, but there's Les to consider. She cares about what he thinks and about his feelings, which only complicates matters somehow.

"I've moved more times than I can count," she says when he tells her he's never moving again. "That's why I don't own much of anything." She can always buy new furniture, though she prefers to rent places that are already furnished just so she can avoid having to do that. Material things don't really matter to her, though she knows the way she dresses and puts herself together makes it look like they do. "What's one more time, right?"

It's so stupid. She keeps talking about moving because she isn't sure how to bring up anything else, but it has to be done. She has to know.

[lesparker]

Something about the way she says it, shrugs off what she calls just one more time, Les realizes how much easier it would have been for April to pick up and skip town. That's one of the first things he ever knew about her. That she's a roamer. She had literally picked Siren Cove on a whim, not for any other reason. Between the hit-guys out for blood, a new father, new siblings, and a destroyed apartment, picking up and starting over somewhere new probably would have been easy for her. Too easy.  

Except she hadn't done it.

When she lays her head against his arm, Les rubs idly at her arm soothing her skin. Nothing April's said indicates she's sticking around Siren Cove for him, to be with him, but it has to be part of it, right? Something tells Les that April isn't staying put to get to know her dad or Corry. Knowing maybe she's sticking around for him, a few days ago would've made Les happy. Now it isn't that it makes him unhappy, but he feels unsure.

And it's him. It's his issues with Corry complicating everything. 

"I guess you're right," he admits with a shrug and a soft smile. He, too, can feel the unspoken questions left hanging between them, but he doesn't know where to even begin. "But if you decide you want some help I suppose it won't be that hard for you to find me..."

[seas_open]

"Nah, I know where you live now," she says with a smile, gently digging her elbow into his ribs before she lets her arm drop. "You know, even after I get a new place, I'd still intended on spending the night here now and then, and figured the arrangement would go both ways."

She's capable of so many things. She's been taking care of herself from the day she was legally allowed to leave the foster system, she hasn't spent a single day on the streets and maybe she's been getting a lot of her money in an illegal manner, but she's capable. For a very long time, April has believed there's nothing she can't do, but now, sitting here with Les she suddenly feels all her inexperience rushing back to her. She can fake her way through anything, she can lie and she can cheat and she can steal, but when it comes down to this, down to something real, she has nothing to fall back on.

"I know this makes things awkward," she says finally and it feels like her heart is pounding in her throat. "Everything that's happened. I don't know anything about Robert Flynn and to be perfectly honest, I have no interest in learning anything about him. Whatever he was like with Corrine, whatever issues they have... well, I'm sorry about that, but I'm not sorry about this." She tips her head back slightly. "I'm not sorry that I like you and if this is a problem for Corrine because she and I share some DNA along the way..." She trails off and shrugs. "I don't know. That really shouldn't be relevant, but I know it's not that simple."

[lesparker]

I'm not sorry for this. I'm not sorry for liking you. His jaw tightens when she mentions Corry, an automatic reaction at this point, proving his own turmoil over what is beginning to feel like a no-win situation. Listening to April, her assurances that she has no intentions to know Robert or take Corry's place it becomes obvious how awkward this is for her too. She doesn't want a new father or a new sister, and it should be enough. It should. 

And yet, it still isn't. Because April may not be sorry, but the other night Les was. He'd apologized and told Corry that it's her choice. That he'd stop seeing April if that's what it took for him and Corry to be okay again. It makes him feel guilty now, sitting here with her, as she talks about staying over at his apartment and vice-versa. "No, you're right. It....it shouldn't be," Les agrees in a slightly careful tone, and he is actually thinking to himself that April is completely right. 

It's the first time that Les has truly second-guessed Corry and her decision. It's not that he doesn't think she deserves her space, that she isn't justified in her anger about her father, but there's more to it. It feels like he took a sucker punch in all this mess. He lost his best friend for who knows how long and lost something with April too, he just doesn't know what yet. Besides all that---or maybe on top of it---it's troubling Les the most that something else between him and Corry has changed. He can't put it into words yet, but he feels it.

It wouldn't be a big deal, if not for April. If not for how he feels about her. How he still wants her. How in comparsion everything with Corry seems so much more complicated and confusing, and with April it's just this. Spending time together at Les' place or her place, and it's almost funny to think it, but things with her are so simple and good. They still feel good together is the problem. Because he knows they didn't do anything wrong here. They like each other, and that's hardly some great offense. 

He looks at her, the way she looks curled up against him, and he smiles again. It really has been such a long time since he's cared for a woman like this. It's selfish. He knows it. He just wants to keep her a while longer. "I'm sorry everything is weird," he finally continues with a sigh, knowing even as he says it he owes April more than that. "I don't know how to explain it. It's just, I used to be able to help her when Robert was an asshole 'cos trust me your new dad isn't a nice guy and he never has been. But with you and me, I think I can't...it makes it different. She just wants some space I guess," Les says with a faint smile and a shrug. After a second though, he reaches for her, gently catching her cheek with his other hand. "I like you, April. What should we do?" he asks then, because he isn't even sure if liking April is enough now. "If I'm honest I'm not good at labels." 

With everything that is happening is it even fair to put a label on it now?

[seas_open]

She knows it's selfish of her, but she wishes there was a way for them to figure this out without having to involve anyone else, but apparently it's just not that easy anymore. There's a part of her that knows she isn't being fair. She's never had a best friend before, she doesn't know what it's like to have someone care about her that much or to care that much in return. Her father might have been an asshole to his other children, April has no doubt of that, but it isn't as though she had been particularly well off, shuffled from home to home, only able to keep herself safe because she was a siren. She'd seen what happened to other kids, girls and boys alike, the abuse they suffered depending on the home they were in at the time. Some of the foster parents had been good, kind people.

Most had just been looking to make some government cash, so taking in fucked up kids had seemed like the easiest way to do it. And she hadn't had anyone looking out for her then. She hadn't had someone like Les to help her when people were assholes and she wants to say that, but it isn't fair. It isn't his fault and it isn't Corrine's fault and she knows she isn't a good person most of the time, but trying to compare the situations just feels pointless. Their lives were different, miles apart, despite the father they share. It isn't her fault this has happened, but she supposes it isn't Corrine's fault either for the way she's dealing with it. Whoever their father is, at this point April feels pretty lucky to have never known him.

"I know he isn't a good man," she says simply. "He left my mother with two kids and a pill addiction so deep she spent her whole life lost in it. He let social services take me and my sister and from the way you talk about him, that was probably for the best, but the thing is, I don't know him. I've never known him. I don't want to know him and the idea that he somehow gets to sneak back into my life without even being here and fuck things up..." She trails off and shakes her head. If she had more energy to spare, she thinks she might be more angry, but as it is, she's just tired.

"Does it have to have a label?" she asks and she shifts on the couch, swinging her leg over him so she can straddle his hips and face him. "I like you. I'm not sleeping with anyone else. Can that be enough?" Trying to put names to things when she's never been in a relationship before makes her nervous and she thinks she owes him that much of an explanation, but even trying to say that, even trying to be that honest makes her stomach tighten and her throat feel dry.

"Remember when I told you the last person who had seen me in the water had run off?" she asks, resting her hands against his chest. "That's... that's the closest I've ever been to a relationship. Ever. And it didn't go very well, so it makes me nervous, trying to put labels on things because in my experience, as soon as you do that, things kind of fall apart."

[lesparker]

Les listens to her, nodding back almost automatic, feeling bad once more that it feels like it's Corry and him trapping her between them. He knows she isn't out looking to be Robert's daughter or find siblings. If there's anything he knows for sure it's that. He believes April when she says she wants nothing to do with any of it, with their father. She would just as soon forget about him. Deep down he thinks Corry may know that too, or she would if she'd asked or tried to talk to April. Yet, the bulk of her anger hadn't even been about that, about April.

It was directed at Les, and he isn't sure if that's something he should say. Hell, he doesn't even know where to begin on that.

When she climbs over him, his hands naturally fall to her hips and he looks at her. He tries to forget all that because she's saying things he thinks he still wants to hear. "I'm okay with this. Just this," he tells her. "I don't know what to call this, but I'm not with anyone else. Just you." He's barely been with anyone else since they first got together either way, but he doesn't want anyone else but her. "That's enough for me."

He hopes that's enough for her. Making other promises or calling himself a boyfriend---despite if he wants it---would just feel wrong somehow, would be like telling her he's certain about them when he's not. He needs more time to work out his feelings. If April is okay with it, with keeping things how they are, then so is he.

[seas_open]

"That's enough for me, too," she agrees and she's oddly relieved. It shouldn't be such a scary thing, trying to define something like this, but it is, it terrifies her and if Les is happy like this, if he's willing to let this be exactly what it is without having to put specific words to it, then April is comfortable with that. And maybe that's because she's a little bit of a coward, maybe they both are in that case, but she just doesn't want to spend all this time worrying about it when they could just be enjoying themselves. There's still a part of her worried that it's all going to blow up in their faces, that this newfound information is going to pull them all down, but for now she can ignore it.

Leaning in, she smiles and presses a kiss against his mouth before she leans back a little in his lap and tips her head to the side. "Everyone's always so worried about putting a name on things, but to be perfectly honest, this makes me less stressed," she says and it rings a little false, but not entirely. It does stress her out less, just knowing where they are without having to make anything serious or official, but she knows the reason it stresses her out less is that she's scared.

April doesn't like being scared. She's never liked it, she avoids it as often as possible, but here she is, sitting in the lap of the one person who has scared her more than anyone else has in a very long time. And so far she hasn't made any real attempt at getting away from him and he hasn't tried to get rid of her, which she thinks bodes well for the future.

[lesparker]

Immediately, Les is relieved too. He didn't realize just how much he needed to hear this from her, even if they aren't putting a label on things, if they aren't willing to say they are dating, or in a relationship, or whatever. He needed to know that April is comfortable with that, and that it's enough. That what he can offer her at the moment isn't being unfair. There's a part of him that still thinks no matter what they decide there isn't a way to keep things from crashing. Maybe their inability to define things is an admission of that. But it's an easier voice to quell when he knows both of them are okay with keeping things where they're at now.

When she kisses him, he leans into her wanting the comfort from her after these hard few days. No matter where things stand, there's still a comfortable ease in being around April that hasn't gone away. She makes him feel good, and he hopes he does the same for her. That it's the reason why she hasn't bailed on him yet, despite his obvious confusion and the fact that his issues with his best friend run deep (deeper even than he knew). Maybe he hasn't been searching for a serious relationship, but the fact that April has stuck around does mean something to him. He doesn't know if it's enough to keep everything together, but it means something.

"As long as we're okay, I don't need it to have a name. I just want to be with you," he says, moving his hands up to clutch her face, pulling her into a deeper kiss, letting his lips linger for a moment. He pulls away just a little. "After things are settled I still owe you that date one day. I don't want you to think you've gotten off the hook," he says, managing a small smile.

[seas_open]

"I don't think I'd be the one getting off the hook," she says with a laugh, but she loops her arms around his shoulders, content in this position for the time being, feeling far more relaxed than she had earlier. "I've already paid for you, remember? My money is gone. So it's you we can't let off the hook."

Just as long as it doesn't end like their previous attempt, with Les bruised and bloodied, April terrified and furious. There's a part of her that's so angry with her family for having done what they've done. They're not even a part of her, she's never spent any significant time with them. Her parents hadn't raise her, they hadn't hold her when she scraped her knee as a child or when she had cried. They're not allowed to be part of her and yet they've come here in their own way, trying to ruin everything.

She kisses Les again, a little harder this time, her arms tighter around him. For the first time in her life, she doesn't want something to fall apart, she doesn't want it to be ruined and she doesn't know how to prevent that.

[lesparker]

Les lets her pull him into a tight squeeze, her arms shifting around his shoulders until their bodies are pressed together, and he does the same, lifting his arms to hold her back. After everything that's happened, it's nice just to hold her and know that she's safe again. She kisses him hard, and he just kisses her back eyes shut tight. Their words are a relief as much as they are a concern. Just like April, he doesn't want things between them to fall apart. He wants to be able to like her and to go on their date. She did pay after all.

A tiny voice in the back of his head though is telling him that it's not going to be their choice. That no matter how hard they hold on to one another, it might not be enough to keep. He just holds onto her closer, shoving away those thoughts with everything he can. All that matters is the here and now. They said what they needed to say, and he's comforted by it.

He pulls away after a second giving her a soft smile, cupping her face in his hands. "I definitely don't want off the hook with you. We'll go," he assures her.

[seas_open]

"Alright," she says and maybe she shouldn't believe him, maybe she should have learned her lesson the last time she trusted someone and he more or less pulled the rug right out from under her, but she does believe him. She does trust him. And there's a small part of her that thinks that might get her hurt, that's trying desperately to warn her, but April ignores it and pushes it down as she gives Les a smile.

Leaning back a little, her arms still around him, she asks, "So what should we do on this date? Do I get to be the boss because I'm the one who bought you?" She's fairly certain that they'll have a good time, no matter what they do, but it's been a very long time since she's been on anything resembling a real date and she doesn't want to admit that she's nervous, but she is a little. Things with Les are different, they have been right from the start, but that leaves her feeling unsettled a lot of the time.

[lesparker]

"I dunno," Les says smirking back at her, feeling it a little more now as he pushes away the last uncertain feelings. He isn't very good at planning much of anything let alone a date when he's low-key more than a romantic. He likes just hanging out with her in general, but there is something appealing about the idea of seeing her all dressed up to meet him somewhere. Eating a nice meal and going back to his or her place. There's something very appealing about it that he wants to try. He wanted to try that night he was attacked too.

He plays with her hair in his fingers smiling still. "If you wanna be the boss, I am easily persuaded and I want you to be satisfied with your purchase," he tells her. "Dinner is good isn't it? But you're the boss..."