Quote:
Originally Posted by
Mad Eye Touz 
Feeling she'd finally done her duty in cleaning up her poor, unsuspecting cherry-bombed companion, Aspen returned to her seat. She kept the napkin close at hand though for the inevitable next disaster.
He LIKED being the catalyst for disaster?? Aspen blinked at him, her smile being replaced with something closer to confusion. In fact, was he PROUD to be the reason Aspen kept doing really embarrassing things, like falling out of chairs and drenching them both in cherry-goo? Was that what made him grin so? That WAS confusing.
But he did have one part right: Aspen did not hate the catalyst. She didn't hate that he was proud to be the reason she did kept doing wonky things - wonky even to her. "You feel correctly. I don't hate you. You've been very patient with ...all things me." And even those things that weren't typically her. No, no, Aspen did not hate Cornelius. She... wasn't exactly sure WHAT she felt for him at the moment.
"...do you think the two are mutually exclusive? I think," Aspen ducked lower, trying to hide the 'nice smiling thing happening on her face' behind the jug of pumpkin juice, " that the two are interchangeable in my case. I kind of wish the experiment were reversible at this point. Like, if I smile at you, will something embarrassing happen to you? "
Cornelius grinned proudly as Aspen confirmed that she didn't hate him, and that he had been patient in 'all things her'. But to him, it didn't feel as though he was having to find patience for all things Aspen, he was just more amused with her than anything else.
He listened as she asked if the two things were mutually exclusive and his eyebrows rose, not quite understanding what she was talking about. But his smile widened as she tried to hide her expression behind a pumpkin juice jug, vague amusement in her expression. He rested his arms on the table, crossing them before himself and listening as Aspen expressed her small wish that the experiment was reversible. Confused, he furrowed his brows at her, and listened as she continued to wonder aloud if something embarrassing would happen to him if she decided to smile at him.
Surpressing his smile just barely, he gave a nod and a bit of a shrug, leaning forward half way across the table and resting his chin on his folded hands as though to show her the face she was experimenting with.
"I dunno, maybe you should try me," Cornelius suggested, wondering if she would actually decide to smile at him or instead back out and throw a book over her head. Which, he had to admit, would amuse him endlessly. Aspen seemed to be doing that a lot; amusing him.