2019-11-12 - The Coffee Confessional

Lilith loves the way coffee smells and she loves the way she's up and walking this morning and able to come get coffee with Isabella so they can play hug and catchup, especially now that she can use her arms again. Maybe it's cliche, and the brunette isn't one to take to whimsy and fancy over dumb things like coffee and danishes, but... well, maybe she is. It's funny how the small things get taken for granted when your life doesn't facilitate simplicity, so much, and how good normal comforts get to be when you're finally in a way to have them.

On arrival, the woman finds a table off in a corner out of the way, sets up with ordering in advance the fruit and cheese danish obligatories, and her own coffee, though she leaves the order for the other coffee at the liberty of Isabella when she arrives. Then she makes a mental note to pay attention to what the other woman orders to drink like one of those little passive, useless things of notating care you're suddenly curious about when someone's part of your circle. Future planning, right? And truth be told, for as much as Lilith sometimes shies away at the idea of people getting too close, lately, she's liking having people she can actually call friends.

With the table set, the brunette sips her coffee, then rises when she sees Isabella come in to meet her part of the way to the table with a rampant hug that's far from disabled, looking a world better than she was last seen by Isabella. After laying on the squeeze, she draws back to study the other female a little on the sly while talking and gesturing to the table picked and set to turn that way so they can settle up, sit down, and talk, "I planned ahead. And look at me, awake and using my arms for good lovin' instead of being crippled. It's a good day. Come sitsitsit, we're overdue, miss lady. Which reminds me, we have girl plans you don't know about yet."

When she arrives, Isabella looks both harried and eager, the chilly autumn wind blowing the loose tresses that have escaped her bind around her face and leaving a few strands sticking against the clear gloss applied to her lips. Dressed in her usual, casual threads of jeans, a feminine top, boots and a worn leather jacket that has seen quite a bit of action from the places she has been, the intention to work after she spends some much needed time with Lilith Winslow is apparent on her person; there's her satchel slung diagonally from her shoulder to hip, and a portfolio bursting with paper tucked on one arm. She makes a beeline for the counter, but her friend's arresting, near-violet eyes find her across the way and she's already prepared.

A dimpled grin manifests at the sight of their fruit-and-cheese danishes, and she moves so she could air-buss the other brunette's cheek, one arm banding around her in a returned hug. "Oh my god, I'm so glad to see you up," she tells her, though she does pull back so she could give Lilith a quick, but critical once over. "I never like seeing any of you in the hospital. How are you doing? How's Byron?" There's an open grimace there, reminded of seeing the state she was in on the bed, and looking like a million dollars soon after - if anything, she's grateful that it didn't take long at all. Tossing her things on a spare chair, she takes up the area across from her friend with her order - and she would find that she has similar tastes when it comes to her coffee. Black, with just a splash of cream to cut through the bitterness.

She blows steam off the top of the cup though mention of girl plans has those green-gold eyes lifting upwards. "Girl plans I don't know about yet?" she echoes, though there's a laugh that follows and a pull of black gold. Coffee, glorious coffee. "What's up? Because if this means piling in a car and taking a road trip to Cancun where it's infinitely warmer, I'm so in. And if not? Something we should definitely consider later."

"I'm glad I feel better too. Byron's been watching me like a hawk, not just because of the injuries, but because... well. I mean, most people don't really return after so long and sanity or trauma is a legitimate concern, I suppose. But honestly, as scary and disorienting as it was, I'm... I'm solid inside, I think. Good, maybe, even." Lilith considers this with a singular click of her tongue once her and Isabella are settled down and have coffee in hands, talking with spill. The woman isn't always talkative, but when she's comfortable and shooting off at the mouth, it sure flies out of her when she's built up an excess of things to think or answer or say, "Of course, other things probably have relation to the whole feeling good with my warm and fuzzy bits, lately. It's not a familiar state, so it's a little hard not to look at the sky and expect an anvil to take me down a peg today. But things will be what they will be, won't they?"

For her part today, Lilith is wearing an indigo cashmere v-neck sweater that cuts to cling and fit low on the hips over fitted black leggings, sleeves pushed up some as she nurses her coffee. It really highlights her eyes, especially when she goes all animated or contemplative. She has on ankle-buckled and silver-clasped calf-boots in black leather with a stylish low heel and her gray wrap coat is hung over the back of her chair with her artsy peacock-embroidered handbag. In addition to looking casual snazzy with mild accent cosmetics, she took the time to curl her hair into loose waves and ringlets today before pinning it in a few places away from her face to make a tumble fall of curls that meld with the back length layers and falls over the shoulders.

It has the distinct air of not being presentation pretty so much as an expression of mood when Lilith takes time on herself like this to doll up. She's apparently feeling lovely and confident and secure given the lively notes on her to play up the appearance factor, which is almost a downright miracle considering she was one of the Lost for a dangerously long chunk of time. A certain someone might be partially responsible for that. She continues on about Byron's welfare and then goes into updating about plans, "Byron is well too now, though. He wasn't keen on me having my hand at him when time would mend him fine, didn't want me drawing attention. But the thing I explained to him about that... there's risk in leaving him compromised too, when we never know what's around the corner living here. It's not just me being fussy and hating to see him in such ways."

If there's question about his mental state in that inquiry, Lilith isn't so much aware. She's not attuned to what all happened while she was gone beyond some broad, specific details given to her with other portions deliberately omitted to keep her calm while recovering. After sipping her black coffee down some more, she sets into pulling over and tearing a danish into pieces to eat while talking, lips flashing with small grin at Isabella, "Cancun? Jeez, why'd you have to one up me? Now I want to get white girl wasted somewhere warm and foreign. But in absentia of that..." Her hand comes away from double nursing hold at her cup for wrist rolling gesture between herself and company, then over at the air to indicate absent parties with counting tick off, "You, me, Erin, Sutton, ladies night with drinks, dancing at the club, picking on men, and drunk bathroom confessionals. We need to cut loose. When Erin came to tend to me yesterday, I took one look at her and decided it's a thing. We all need it."

Then after all that carry on, there's a tilt of Lilith's chin as she assesses Isabella with subtle concern across the table a beat, "... how are you, though? Really."

"Not a lot of people come back after they get lost for as long as you have," Isabella says and to her infinite credit, her voice is level and straightforward when she says it - it isn't just her brother, whenever she thinks about the idea of people vanishing in the darkness, but Tobin's mother as well, and the countless others that the town has consumed over the decades. Her hand reaches out, to squeeze Lilith's fingers if she'll let her, warm, yes, but tight also - a stand-in for the things that she is unable to express. "Which is just yet another reason why we're so glad you were retrieved. But honestly, in that case, you can't have a better crutch than Byron. He'll do anything to keep you safe, and make sure you're put back to rights."

The rest of her words draw a smile and an incline of her head, brows lifting, especially about the warm and fuzzy bits. "You know, I distinctly remember you telling me about how you've never had a man make love to you before....does that mean you've scratched that off the ol' bucket list?" Is she teasing her? Yes she is. She's shameless and unapologetic about it also, the devil's mischief dancing in those evergreen irises.

Lilith always looks lovely and sitting with her like this, she can't help but be cognizant of it - how the indigo of her sweater makes those eyes look all the more closer to that rare, Elizabeth Taylor-violet. There will always be envy, in the manner where women tend to compete in that arena subconsciously, no matter how friendly they are - but from the archaeologist, it's an amicable and almost wistful one, having long since accepted that she will never look the way the Winslow woman does, built as she is for other things. Other ways and purposes.

The fact that Byron is also well puts some much needed relief on her features at that, and she takes a quiet drink of her own coffee before replying to all of it. "I haven't talked to him since the festival planning really got underway," she tells him. "He and I are due for a catch-up, too. But considering the hits Bayside has taken with all of the intrigue, on top of the Festival, his calendar's probably full and with my thesis-writing and everything else, our schedules haven't managed to sync. Soon, though, definitely and preferably before Thanksgiving. As for not tending to him...it's sound, you know? After Halloween and Gohl, the people we know have been using more and more and it's bound to attract the Unwanted, and even before that, you already mentioned seeing shadows. I can't blame him for not wanting to risk it, especially when he just got you back, and I'm definitely in his corner, there, though I fully realize that there can be a balance struck, somewhere, but since we know so little about Them..."

Her voice trails off, brows furrowing in thought, before she shakes her head once and reaches for one of the fruit and cheese danishes. "I love these," she says with a laugh. "These are tradition, now, I hope you know." And she tears off a piece to shove in her mouth.

"Well, now's definitely not the time to go with holidays upon us and everything," she says wistfully. "I mean, I don't know if Byron intends to spend any time with his mother, but I'm sure there's probably a date looming in the horizon with the two of you around that time." She winks at her cheekily at that. "As for girls' night? Sure. God, what's that even like? Do you even remember what that's like? I feel as if I haven't done that in months. Close to a year, maybe? And it's ridiculous that we haven't been, honestly. None of us are even thirty yet, there's no excuse not to go out and acquire ringside seats on atrocious decisions that happen outside of us every night in the Singles Meatmarket. That's practically the reason why I stop by Two If By Sea just before last call for a night cap almost every day."

Her expression sobers at the mention of Erin, reminded of the way she was acting in Halloween. "How is she doing?" she asks Lilith quietly. "Erin. When we got Byron back from what happened to him during opening ceremonies, she was acting...I don't know. I asked, but she wouldn't say. And the guy she was seeing that she was happy about when he asked her out? Didn't pan out. I ran into him just yesterday and he told me. Something's definitely going on there."

How are you, though?

There's a glance at her coffee cup, Isabella frowning visibly at the top of her beverage. "I've been keeping busy - my doctoral thesis requires eighty-thousand words and I think I might be sixty-thousand by now. And I think half of my day is constantly spent worrying about everyone else. Alexander, especially - I mean...in a way, it's good and bad? He's been getting more and more paying work, but that exposes him to a variety of other dangers too, and he's got it in his head that he might have to shake down some criminals for information and..." She lets out a groan. "Bad enough that the supernatural won't leave him alone, with more mundane ridiculousness piling on top of that growing shit-mountain."

After a pause, concerned eyes find hers again. "Sorry for the text message flood I sent your smartphone during Masquerade weekend." She looks sheepish there. "That's honestly when we started getting worried about you being missing, you didn't respond to any of my messages, or the ones that Byron sent after."

Lilith curls her fingers in kind around Isabella's squeezing fingers, and while she did have a sense of too much time passing in a worrying fashion while in the place she was while missing... time had no conceptual basis like actual ticking time, like it did for the others, Byron especially, sitting, searching, texting, wondering and waiting, "Blow up my phone all you want, especially if..." She pauses, then suddenly leans to get out her phone so she can look at Isabella's text message screen thoughtfully for a few moments, as if she's just reading the actual context clearly for the first time, even though she did check messages while in the hospital and addled and resting. There's a press of her lips in brief, but whatever she's just seized on to think on or wonder about, she doesn't address right now.

Her attention turns in full to the rest of what Isabella is saying with open interest, and when it's time to play fess up or blush at the teasing, Lilith abruptly laughs aloud with a puff of short air over her lips. Then she does that thing where she turns the mischief right back around with what's possibly TMI since the other woman's asking! "You know... I did. The first few times were almost that, but the actual time that makes me want to melt and shudder together, it was after we got to our room in Seattle. I made him hold me sitting on the super high hotel balcony rail and fuck me dangerously and it turned into the most amazing sex while playing exhibition trust fall games. I could feel the adoration and security of his hold rolling off of him in waves." She pauses, "Best fucking orgasm, dear god. Probably illegal and we had spectators, not to mention I could have died, I guess, in some freak fall, but you know. When you're almost dying all the time, maybe it just becomes part of getting the rocks off here and there."

Well then! Lilith certainly has put Isabella into the no-holds barred zone when it comes to divulging, congratulations. And apologies in advance, perhaps. She has a way of not being shy and a little intense sometimes, so have fun with that from now on when it comes to girl talk. Listening and talk about the holidays thankfully keeps her from giving out even more details, not to mention she has her own curiosities, "What do you do for Thanksgiving and Christmas? I've never had the go-get-a-tree and decorate and sit by a fire with stockings experience. I'm begging it out of Byron and there better be a damn dog sitting there if he hasn't gotten around to picking me one by then." People should really pick their own dogs, but for some reason, she's tasked him with it.

Then the brunette's head bobs with solid nod at the girl's night planning enthusiasm and agreement before she lapses into the subject of Erin, "You know. I think she's struggling, but I think she's starting to hit stride in that struggle too, like she's getting realizations that she might be better off and how cut free and single isn't a bad thing in the grand scheme of things. But she started talking about a baby too and I was like woah there independant missy, but didn't say that of course. She might have been joking anyway, I plan on making sure she's not going hasty batshit about droolbuckets when we go drinking because it seems a better way to do it. Because I'm kind of a jerk and sometimes people need a jerk to tell them to slow their roll, not a heart to heart."

Lilith looks like she wants to ask more and inquire about the state of Isabella herself, especially when she kind of deflects some by speaking about thesis and Alexander more than her actual state of self. But in the end, she wonders with additional curiosity, "Thesis about... what was it again? I don't recall if I asked, before."

There are certain doors that one shouldn't open; Isabella clearly doesn't mind opening this one, though, and at Lilith's description of her wild times in Seattle, she can't help but laugh - it sounds surprised, but pleased too over the idea that her friend has no shame and she owns it. "Holy shit!" She doesn't curse much, either, preferring a more polished vernacular in her every day, but she's unable to help it in this case. "I mean, I hear Trust Falls are a staple in every corporate icebreaking event, but if people started doing that maybe I was missing out on the faculty retreats that I constantly missed across the pond. God damn it. This is your fault. You. I blame you." She points out comically from where she sits. But this is punctuated with an open grin. "I'm glad the two of you had an incredible time in Seattle, though. Any trip that leaves you walking funny for those reasons the morning after? I'm all for." She lifts her cup in a toast.

When asked about her holidays, there's a small shrug. "I honestly don't know what's going to happen this year," she confesses. "I mean, this year hasn't exactly been...typical. Normally for the holidays, I never go home. I end up in New Orleans and the rest of the family just converges there while my Aunt Mary cooks because she always insists. But this year I am home, and my dad's staying with my aunt. I'm thinking of flying out there the week before and coming back, as for Thanksgiving..." There's a pause and a solid swallow of her coffee. "....Alexander asked me to spend it with him. And...meet his parents."

Her expression there is slightly dazed. Not just the fact that she's floored, but largely also because she's clearly never been in this situation before. "It's alien territory," she confesses. "I've never had an actual boyfriend before, let alone stayed with anyone long enough to meet their parents - serious enough about anyone to say yes as easily as I did while screaming and panicking inside later. And it's not like...I mean, I know his dad. As a kid! I called him Coach Clayton! And now he's bringing me over and telling them that we're involved and I'll have to sit there remembering him and his whistle and...I mean, I love it. I do. I love it, Lil. I love the fact that he asked. I was ridiculously happy that he asked, and I can't help but feel weird about it because it's not supposed to be a big deal, but it is. For me. Because I've never done anything like this before and I'm terrified despite the fact that it shouldn't be a big deal and-- "

She groans, and drops her forehead on the table. "....stop me before I hurt myself," she says, feebly.

"Anyway if you want a Christmas like that, we could. If Byron won't set it up, maybe I could. At my house...the family home. Except...it was a crime scene, and if you've never had a Christmas like that, I'd rather not put a dark note to it if I can help it."

She finally lifts her head after that, when Erin is brought up. "Better off away from her family or Geoff or?" she wonders, though when she mentions children, she gapes. "Wait...what? Really? I mean, yeah, for sure, I can see people wanting that in the far future, but Erin's young. Younger than us, I think. Plus she's gorgeous, I don't think she's going to have a problem finding a way to-- " She gestures sideways. "You know. But you're right, everyone needs that straight shooter in their lives." She winks at Lilith there - oh, she knows.

"My thesis is about how the latest findings in maritime archaeology support the existence of a newly discovered trade route through the Mediterranean in the time of the Ancient Romans, and which ancient cities were involved in facilitating that." There's a beaming smile, practically glowing as she speaks of it - it's not for everyone, but Isabella is forever a creature passionate about her work, and the life of exploration and discovery that she is determined to have. "I've been elbows-deep in books and paper since getting over half of it done and ugh, Lil, I can't even begin to describe to you how good that all feels. And it probably sounds ridiculous, not everyone is going to find it interesting, but I'm in it again and I can think about it so clearly...I feel like I'm back in the headspace where I should be, as far as the work is concerned."

"Away from her grandmother and them, yes. Doing her own thing her way. I can't imagine that old battleaxe was heavy with the affections to begin with, anyway. But hell, my family experience isn't typical or wonderful either, so I get the hurt of being disowned just for doing what you thought was the right thing to do." Lilith clarifies and commentaries while watching Isabella and listening to the woman speak. And the more emotional or animated she gets about subject matter, depending, Lilith takes those as good signs by proxy when related to how the other woman is coping with her own disappearance terror situation. Sometimes it's better to read between the lines, perhaps, because there aren't always words for what they go through or how 'okay' their state of 'okay' really is.

After draining her coffee cup, the brunette reaches up to adjust a hair pin with crack of grin at Isabella's surprise and humored encouragement of wild getaway extracurriculars, then wiggles in her chair a little suggestively, as if saying she's bound to spring something on him again in the near future without quite saying that. Then she breathes out a laugh before considering the offer about Christmas setups, though she takes some time to make a fond face for company's general distress (the good kind) over Alexander's Thanksgiving meeting invitation, which she backtracks to after touching on decoration planning.

"I don't think Byron would be opposed to the full Christmas setup, at any rate, but if he Grinches me, I'll let you know. Thanksgiving, I'm not sure what to do. His mother doesn't much care for me, but then, she doesn't care for most things where she should. Maybe we'll cook together and just have her over briefly for mealtime, then make an excuse to shoo her out. And I'll try very hard not to set her on fire because tis the season, mm?" Someone doesn't think much of Byron's mother and her tone conveys that better than her carefully chosen phrasing in regards to the woman's demeanor. After a tiny pause, she carries on, "You shouldn't worry about meeting his parents, they are going to be FASCINATED with you. You realize this, yes? You're disarmingly pretty, charming, witty, and you have a fascinating profession, and that's just the first impression before they get to know you at all. Those are some nicely tilted scales, you know. But I get what you mean. My whole situation is new too. It's a good scary."

After poking in another bite of danish to polish it off too, she also tacks on, "And I get what you mean about the work. My job is kind of not glamorous or exciting, but I'm good at it, it's something to immerse in to stay busy, and it's kind of interesting here and there, I guess. Anyway, after the month with the ring issues, after Hank died and the cleanup, those first few days back to doing just normal, boring catchup work were some of the most therapeutic times for after."

As far as traumatic disappearances are concerned, the young woman seems fine, but that, too, is fortunate - she had been unconscious for almost all of it.

"The Grande Dame is too old for change, and is definitely set in her ways there," Isabella drawls quietly after shoving another piece of danish in her mouth. "And the kool-aid that runs through the veins of the Addington household is very much a vile and potent thing. I still remember what she said about my mother's family - Alexander's family. As if whatever happened back in the horse-and-buggy days, whatever sins they shared there, are being carried out actively by the current generations. Between you and me, I'm glad Erin made a stand, and that she made a choice, and that the choice was hers and she got to own it."

The relationship between Byron and his mother is also something she only knows the vague shape of. "I know it's tense between him and his mother," the archaeologist says quietly in contemplation. "But never the details. My parents let him freely in our home, whenever he needed it, and Sid was just happy to have him around, you know? He can talk about..." She taps her temple faintly, suggestive of what she means. Their gifts. "That all day, and Byron's shine was enough to get him interested in the first place, and his charm and cleverness pretty much sealed the deal between those two, but he never asked us to come over in his old house on Oak, to play or hang out or anything. I mean, looking back on it now, it was strange, but it's only after I heard the rumors after his father died that made it clear as to why. " Lilith's disapproval is palpable regarding Mrs. Thorne, however. She doesn't press, but she does look curious. "Has it improved at all after he went away and came back? Their relationship?" By the look on the other woman's face, though, chances are it has not.

Her reassurances has her smiling faintly down at her coffee cup. "I'm talking to a terribly biased audience though," she teases, winking at Lilith and her near-violet eyes. "I don't know, it feels like the moment I walk into that door, I'll suddenly fall apart and everything that Alexander even sees in me will vanish in the ether." She snaps her fingers in emphasis. "Like that. Which I know is absolutely ridiculous but foreign territory, right? Anything can happen, so why not that? Thanks for the vote of confidence, though, I'm definitely going to need it." She props her chin on one hand to regard her friend across the way with that diamond-focused attentiveness. "When you say your situation is new, what do you mean? Never been in love before, or reclaiming something important that you've lost that you didn't think you'd find again...?"

She does look relieved, when Lilith can relate to what she says about work - because it can sound ridiculous in her own head, but having someone else confirm that it does help mollifies whatever doubts she has in that arena. "Byron told me that you're especially good at that. Tinkering with things and fixing things. It didn't really surprise me since you told me that you wanted to go to school for engineering, but he did mention that you always were talented at it even when you were young. Me, I just usually broke things." She laughs. "Not fix things. Because I couldn't sit still and I was always moving, always haring off to do something."

"I'm glad Erin did too." Lilith confirms to Isabella with a solid nod of her dark head, brows knit a touch as she takes in the bits about the old bloods still kind of carrying pitchforks, so to speak, from the past. After a click of her tongue with tutting, the woman pulls some hair curls over a shoulder to play with between fingertips while seated and conversing there in their divulging and caffeinated catch up corner. And there's a small shift of legs to recross at opposite side when she mutters 'doubtful' about Byron and his mother's relationship changing given time apart for a spell.

But she does confess, then, in the name of being begrudgingly fair, "I haven't seen her in years, honestly, and it's not like the man sits around trash talking his mother, but I know what I know and have had a lot of years to form an opinion. Could be they're better, maybe she's not still made of ice and void, but it doesn't matter much either way. He'd still take care of her dutifully, like he does, even though I think it's more than she deserves. But he thought the same way about me cleaning up after and taking care of Hank all of forever. Especially since he was the one literally feeding me and picking up the slack as a boy." She pauses, considering with resignation, "It's just... something you do, I guess, even when you resent a lot." Another pause, "So yeah. I won't catch her on fire."

After drawing in a breath, Lilith switches subjects back to Isabella and Alexander's Thanksgiving lot, head shaking some when her lips take up with mild smile that's tinged with humor and fondness alike, "So biased. Soooo biased. But I'm still right. And he'll just love you more after seeing you in parental action. Mark that." There's a quick few bats of her mascara-thickened lashes at the other woman after pointing out what she feels is the obvious. And right. Totally right. "Also it should be noted that I broke a whole lot of things by taking them apart and not knowing how to put them back together again. You should have SEEN the boys the day I tried to take apart a video game system to see the insides over at Kevin's house. It was like someone blowing a panic whistle and all I heard was a lot of stop, no, don't."

She might have been deliberately avoiding Isabella's direct inquiry about love, as she kind of beats around the bush with the prior commentary topics addressed like sidebar distraction. But after a quiet laugh to herself, remembering that day back when with the boys, Lilith sighs to herself a bit wistfully, then looks at the other brunette directly, "No. I've never loved another man. Maybe I could have, but I wouldn't let anyone close enough to much love me either." A pause, "I didn't know Vivian moved out until Seattle, and it was just mentioned I was chosen, more or less, for me to catch onto that tidbit, we haven't really talked about it. Or what the hell we're doing in any official capacity. But..."

There's a twitch of the woman's mouth into a smile as she pauses, and the affection exuding while she talks is clear, and in a sense, she seems fascinated with it, herself, "I know neither of us want to stop. When I first came back, I think I felt it, but I didn't know what it was, or didn't think... I mean, we were young. But he was such a formative piece of my life because of the way our lives were, and I know what it was like before I shut it down with terror. The tingles and flutters were still there. Now after all we've been through, that's turned into... I don't even know how to explain, Isabella. It's like loving someone twice-over, the way I love him for then, the way I love him for now. Then there's the part where it all overlaps and becomes need and necessity, then it's all swaddled up with everything I don't know about the man he is because of our time apart-- I still get the novel and mystery pieces to learn like he's new while he's the most old and familiar person alive that I know. It's... I don't know. I'm gushing. I need to shut up. He probably needs time before I even ask him things like what the hell we are now. It's rational. Maybe he didn't tell me directly because he's actually upset about it, or..."

Eventually, that point and where Lilith's mind starts to go with it, it bids her to shut the hell up and draw in a breath while looking at Isabella through her own little irrational spazfest that's kind of a mirror of what the other woman was worrying about with the possibility of Alexander deciding to nope out. Then she just kind of grins after stopping, like they're a fine pair there together, "Yep, we're kind of bad at this. Oh well, it's not like they didn't know we were messy pains in the ass."

This glimpse of Byron's and Lilith's lives from their childhood never fails to interest her, not just because they provide her with a stark contrast of her own upbringing and inform her of the harsher reflections of what occurred on the other side of the tracks, but because they're her friends, and in spite of her inherent ability to turn other people off with her know-it-allness, Isabella has managed to find a few that have stuck, and she has decided to keep them. Her expression softens in sympathy, though it isn't without humor, when Lilith quips about not setting Mrs. Thorne on fire. "You were good kids," she tells her quietly. "Still are, I think." A flicker passes her eyes, then - guilt can be irrational, but in her case, not entirely unreasonable. She loved her parents, but it didn't change the fact that she left them, and refused to come home, when they did nothing but love her in return.

There's a sudden laugh when she shares the story about taking apart a sacred Nintendo (or whatever else boys worship these days), and it feels good to do it. She leans hard into the act, tension winding away from her chest and bright eyes flashing at Lilith, her grin so bright that it chases away the earlier shadows from her expression, and so open that the secret dimple that is normally hidden on her left cheek becomes prominent. "You know, I never would have met Kevin were it not for this Lover's Jewel business," she tells her. "But I can definitely see him do the entire girly scream thing and the slow motion dive trying to stop you."

Brows lift when it's revealed that Byron hadn't told her about Vivian until Seattle, when she knows that the psychiatrist had moved out several weeks prior to that trip, but she leaves off on the commentary and opinion until she hears the rest of it. She nurses her coffee in the absent, unfocused manner that suggests that her thoughts are elsewhere, though there is no question as to where they lie, fixed on the other woman herself as she details the progression of her relationship with her childhood friend. There's envy there, of course, she can't help but be jealous of Lilith in the way that she is often jealous of the accomplished and beautiful women around her - Vivian Glass, Erin Addington, but in a way, in this particular sense, it can't help but come from a deeper place because she knows what that is like - to have such a deep connection, only to lose it, but unlike Lilith's circumstance, she was unable to reclaim hers.

She can only imagine what kind of happiness that generates, but she can definitely see it - the way Lilith's near-violet eyes fill with life, unapologetic and unadulterated. "Obsession," is what she adds, quantifying the love and the mystery and everything else that she describes. "I mean, Fatal Attraction aside, when it comes to romance, I don't think that's a bad thing to have, either. I'm..." And there's a breathless laugh. "....insufferably proud." And how. "Nothing sets my teeth on edge like any inference that I'm less than a free and independent woman with her own dreams and aspirations." That is, in fact, how Minerva and Easton shamed her out of giving up something critical as a sacrifice. And that is precisely what happened. They shamed her. "But that's...definitely there. Even if I'm thinking about other things, and you know how much I love to think and can't stop, he's always there at the back, and when I stop thinking, he's always at the front. And it's not just how he looks, or the way he makes me feel, or what he does to me. It's his mind, all the things he doesn't tell me, and the things he doesn't allow me to touch, and in that? We're frighteningly the same."

She takes another bite of her danish. "So I get it. I do. And believe me, also, when I say that anyone would find it terrifying." She makes a face. "Alexander's told me that it was, so he'll probably bolt any time, and so quickly that my head will spin when it finally happens and that will be the day I'll probably crawl under your bed and let you feed me through a straw because I don't know how I'm going to function a week after that. But...I can't help....me. This. This is just how I am. But I'm so glad it's not just me, because we're similar there, too. You and me. I don't know if we're even built to hold back once we finally decide."

"Obsession fits. As long as we don't kill each other, it's fine. Anyway, you could hide under my bed and drink wine and ice cream smoothies through a straw, sure. Or... and hear me out... we could just set him on fire for being dumb if he tries to pull the rug and hits the skids simply because it's all scary and not easy sometimes." Lilith listens to Isabella at length with a slight smile on her features that doesn't seem so much to be tailored to each conversational context so much as the idea that they're actually sitting and having these conversations at length. And she's probably not serious about catching Alexander on fire no matter what he does (probably) but the deadpan makes it sound so like her, it's basically obligatory to threaten blood and fire for kicks.

After a tiny squint of her eyes, she looks at her phone when it buzzes with some random bank alert, but that seems to remind her of something. She picks it up and looks at some old texts again before suddenly her lashes bat a few times and she puts it down, brows knit, "You know what? I read my messages I missed in the hospital just to kind of clear them and they all ran together as just stuff to respond to later and he did tell me things got strange here and there in summarizing when I asked, more or less, with some details here and there regarding some things. But now that you went and mentioned the texts a bit ago and I looked again, I think maybe I missed more than I realize." She pauses with concern, then makes inquiry, head tilting a smidge with worry and curiosity alike.

"Byron was actually kidnapped or you thought he was because things got strange? Who kidnapped him? And what's the deal with his old house?"

Lilith orders a cappuccino from a passing waitress instead of getting a refill on her normal coffee. She feels like she wants a cup to nurse, suddenly, while hearing whatever's about to be said. Granted, there's nothing Lilith could have done or can do now, right? But all the same, what if he's still in danger? And they pissed off Grant Turner in Seattle, so... she should maybe know these things, she thinks.

"Please don't set him on fire." Lilith might not mean it, but Isabella plays along, because this is part and parcel of her, too, and she loves the fact that she can throw fireballs at anything that annoys her. "Is it weird that I love that about him, too? The fact that he doesn't make it easy? If he did, I probably would have been bored ages ago and I would have already left." All bullshit, and the young woman across from her would probably know it - something deep had gotten its hooks into her as far as Alexander is concerned, and if anything? Lilith and her problem with the Ring had been a catalyst for it.

"I think with how we started, we have you to thank and to blame, but I don't think I'm drunk enough to tell that story. Let's save it for the girls."

Isabella winks at that, and takes another drink of her coffee, though this pauses when Lilith asks about the house. "...he'll probably kill me for talking about it," she says, looking up at those near-violet eyes. "Because he's made it very clear that he doesn't want to talk about it, and I promised I'd be discreet, but considering the fact that quite a few others knew he was taken and I had already told you in texts when it was happening? He did. Get taken. By smoke people...I don't know what they are, exactly, just that if you tried to do something to them, they disappeared into the smoke. Anyway, they took Byron off the stage and brought him back to his old house. And while I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that he doesn't want to spend a lot of time there, I have serious doubts about it leaving him alone. Alexander has more on it, he's actually experienced the house at the daylight hours, but something isn't right there."

She touches her fingertips against the table. "From what Alexander managed to tell us, it somehow developed a will of its own. I don't know how it started, but possibly when it was sold to another woman that Byron knows. I know he wants to deal with that problem himself, but...between you and me? I think it wants to lure him in. And I think it's even...using you to do it. Or memories or reminders of you. The house has possessed two women I know of who look like you, so I don't think you should be going anywhere near there, either."

"Mm. Mhm." Lilith kind of keeps making those noises spottily in her throat with the easy nature of her attentive focus during conversation taking a shift to hyperfocus in her concerned state of imagining it happening, the very principle of it, the idea that it's using her image to possibly hurt him gets a drawn out version too, then... when Isabella is finished explaining, the brunette sits back against her chair and uncrosses her legs to put a heeled boot back on the floor with the other. And for a moment there, she honestly looks like she's about to go kick some women's asses, possessed or not, regardless of what they did or didn't do, and then kick some house ass too. She doesn't joke about fire to solve a problem this time around. She might actually be considering it the way she's sitting there in still silence when the other woman is done speaking. Fire does rather take care of houses, doesn't it?

Then Lilith's cappuccino arrives to kind of jolt her out of whatever protective flareup, ideas for action, or general agitation she's experiencing there in her silence. It's not overlong, honestly, but it's long enough to be telling, especially after all those low and throaty comment-non-comment noises out of her during the telling. After drawing in a deep, sharp and fast breath of air audibly through her nose, she thanks the waitress and picks up the wide cup that was dropped off with the foamed, sprinkled, and steaming liquid to blow down into. Then after carefully sipping the fresh coffee drink, she lowers it just enough to speak over a bit slowly to Isabella.

"... I suppose he wouldn't tell me that unless he had no choice, especially while I was in the hospital or injured and raw with trauma. I might have fireballed it or he might have had to sit on me to keep me from trying. And now, after the fact, he probably just doesn't want to talk about it or worry me. Also he's Byron so he wants to handle it himself, whatever's going on there. I didn't even like going in there the few times I was allowed over and inside back when, but it was one of those things you don't say to someone. And I knew enough to assume things about why. But I never blamed the house itself, of course. It was the air and the way... even talking felt too loud, and I felt like it'd be so easy to misstep in some way."

Lilith drinks again, then decides with an eventual lowering of her cup to put the hot liquid down for a spell so it can be more tolerable for sipping, features contemplative more than anything. The thoughtful consideration runs deeply, though, and it's tinged with paranoia or agitation, or both, "I'll not bring it up directly, in partial for his sake. It's better to let it come up naturally with prompt of some kind to get him talking where he doesn't want to talk, anyway. I obviously don't like the idea of any of that or what it means for the future, perhaps, but..." There's a tilt of her head in minute fashion, a subtle steeling and then acceptance, "The important thing is that I know now and know what to possibly expect, in whatever regard. And I know to pay more mind to see if he's bothered on a deeper level by any of it, talking or not. So. Thanks for the heads up, even though I'm ten kinds of late getting around to understanding what the messages were."

There's another pause before she manages a semblance of a dryly humored smile to ease her back into casual instead of stiff with reaction, legs re-crossing with a foot at caffeine bounce under the tabletop, "I also know to fuck the hell out of him, twice. A round for each time something tried to rip us apart, mm? Rawr. How's Alexander in bed? I'm finding myself suddenly--" Her hand holds up with palm turned outward, head shaking, "Wait no, girls night and drinks, way better situation for that."

"Well, Byron's stubborn and complicated, and he's always tried to tackle every insurmountable problem by himself, regardless of whether it actually works," Isabella's words are dry, but fond, too. She likes that part of him, because she can relate to it. In that regard, they are the same. "But I'm not about to see him fall into the clutches of his evil old house if I can help it, especially one that seems to like using you, or reminders of you, as bait." She drains the rest of her coffee, and eats the last of her danish, wiping her hands with a paper napkin before she sighs. "It would suck, honestly, if some ancient dwelling tried to ruin anything for the both of you."

The young woman's reassurances earns her a smile from the archaeologist, and a hint of relief. "I'm a meddler and provocateur by nature, but I try not to do it too much, or too willingly," she says with a breathless laugh. "But the way he was taken scared all of us, the people who cared about him - I don't know what those things wanted to do to him while they had him in the house, but I'm not keen on finding out, either. Still, it's something that will have to be dealt with, sooner rather than later, and in the end, I hope he tells you and comes clean with it. It's not as if he doesn't know about Alexander's suspicions, or mine. We've told him."

Her more carnal solutions, spoken candidly, wrings a bright laugh out of her. "Never change," she tells her warmly before she reluctantly starts to rise from her seat and when asked how Alexander is in bed, another grin, wicked in its bent, manifests like a scythe. "He cheats," she replies. "But the details will have to be lubricated by copious amounts of alcohol. I can't wait to get together." With a quiet and reluctant sigh, she nods to her papers. "Anyway, thanks for inviting me out to breakfast, I needed this." Her hand reaches out for Lilith's, to squeeze if she'll let her. "I'll talk to you soon? Keep me posted on everything, and I'll do the same."

Lilith still has cappuccino left and she's not quite ready to go back to the Penthouse where Byron is probably taking some morning calls in his office, not while still feeling the grr of confrontational urge based out of concern moreso than any bother about the smoke and mirrors and omission about it all. She knows Byron isn't exactly going to tell her everything when it comes to much of anything because he decides what he wants her to hear based on a few factors at a time, no doubt. But grr!

(Don't burn down a house on the way home Lilith, drink your damn coffee and sit.)

She has to have that self-head-talk, seriously, eyes momentarily distracted with the direction of self-admonishment before she realizes Isabella is rising and prepping to leave, grinning some at the laugh and promises about the juicy bits come ladies' night. Her hand reaches to turn into the squeezing reach as she looks up with a fond smile for the woman, "I'm holding you to the good stuff. And I warned Erin about me and tequila already, so really, how rowdy I get with words or thrown elbows, it all depends on you guys when one of us decides we need shots. But hey. We'll talk soon. Feels good to do it. Take care of yourself, pretty lady."