Adam, who turned out to be a surprisingly punctual individual (only when it was convenient for him), was at Allegra’s hotel by 7:30pm, as agreed at the park. He paced inside the lobby, oblivious to the curious look with which the younger boy behind the front desk followed his movements. Despite his excitement, the young man was a little nervous. There was just something… different about introducing his favorite person to his family, even if it was just his brother. It had seemed like a perfectly casual, no-big-deal idea earlier that day. Now? Well, now it was a little nerve-wracking.

He sent Allegra a quick “I’m downstairs 😊” and moved to a small sitting area in the lobby, absentmindedly examining the abstract painting above the fireplace mantel as he waited.

Allegra was just throwing on a pair of shoes when Adam’s text buzzed, drawing her attention to her phone now lit on the table. He was here. She tried to ignore the sudden flash of nerves which caused her stomach to jolt, knowing it wasn’t logical for her to be anxious about the evening. She had no reason to believe that Adam’s family wouldn’t like her. Then again, if this didn’t go well and his brother ended up not liking her after all, he would certainly tell the entire family and the rest of them would undoubtedly follow suit. So there was that.

Now officially out of time to panic, she finished lacing up her boots and stood to examine her reflection in the mirror. Black boots with the slightest heel, dark fitted jeans, a soft v-neck in a flattering color of dark green. She wore a light layer of make up, managing to highlight her large eyes and prominent lips without clouding her pale skin with any excess product. Her dark brown hair had been meticulously washed and straightened, no longer stringy and limp but shiny and soft, falling about her shoulders voluminously. She shared an uncertain look with the mirror before gathering her things. Alright. As ready as she would ever be.

Allegra grabbed her light leather jacket, slipping it over her shoulders as she exited her room and started towards the lobby, arriving just moments later through the doors of the lift. She spotted Adam easily with a quick glance around the lobby and made her way over, noticing his interest in a piece of art. She smiled, some of her nerves dissipating as she casually sauntered up to his side.

“Into Abstract Expressionism, now, are we?”

Adam turned, his attention shifting to the girl at his side. His serious expression cracked into the brightest of smiles, like a child receiving an early birthday present. “Mm, I still prefer geometric abstraction,” he replied with a shrug. Moving entirely based on instinct, the boy reached out, taking one of Allegra’s hands and gently pulling her in to greet her lips with a quick kiss. “You look nice,” he noted softly, the smile returning to his expression as he pulled away from the girl.

Allegra just barely had time to crack a smile before Adam pulled her closer and greeted her with a kiss, successfully distracting her from any further banter until his next words. “Thanks,” she smiled, the slightest anxiety furrowing her brow as she kept his hand but took a step back, glancing at her own outfit as if for the first time.

“Do you think it’s enough?” She knew it was silly to ask, but while they were still within the same building as her wardrobe, she wanted to make sure. “I was thinking about a dress, but I thought it’d be too much…” Biting her lip, she locked eyes with him again for some sense of reaction, "Are the pants too tight?" She turned around to show the entirety of the outfit, “I mean, the boots are sort of high, I guess…”

When had Allegra ever cared so extensively about her appearance? Clearly, she was nervous.

Adam raised his eyebrows slightly as Allegra asked if her outfit was ‘enough’, as if she didn’t see the very casually-dressed boy in jeans, a t-shirt and a jacket standing in front of her. “Babe, you l—” He stopped as she continued, speaking of dresses and tight pants and boots. As she turned, Adam totally took her concerns into consideration and examined the sight with an objective eye. Or he tried anyway, but naturally if there ever was a person who struggled to find any flaws with Allegra Reynolds it was Adam Kipling. She may as well have been twirling in a garbage bag, he’d still think she wore the plastic unfairly well.

“Moon…” He gently pulled her a couple steps closer again, the smile on his expression revealing a mix of amusement and endearment. “I think your outfit is enough, the pants are just right, and your shoes the perfect height,” he assured her, going through the list of concerns she’d just expressed before pecking her lips lovingly. “You look perfect. And besides, Geoff and Bri are the kind of people that run errands in PJs and a coat so I wouldn’t worry about them too much,” he added, flashing Allegra another smile. “C’mon,” he requested softly, keeping her cold little hand snuggly in his own as he began to lead them out of the hotel.

Allegra promptly went quiet as Adam pulled her closer once more, reassuring her with a few words and her favorite nickname. She offered up a sheepish smile, knowing she was overthinking this a tad. But how could she not when she was meeting a member of her favorite person’s family? It was difficult not to treat this like her biggest exam yet. Still, she managed to let some of her stress go somewhere between the loving kiss he placed on her lips and the anecdote about the pajamas. She smiled, nodding without another word as they started out of the hotel and towards transportation.

The journey to his brother’s place was a lot less nerve wracking than Allegra’s process of getting ready alone. Adam’s presence at her side seemed to calm most of her nerves and properly distract her from anymore needless worry, now far more concentrated on the novelty of being out in the world with Adam Kipling. Perhaps the excitement of it would wear off eventually, but for now it was still fascinating to be moving through the world with Adam at her side. Not in school, not in the competition, just… out. It felt strangely like their runaway weekend - to be waltzing through the world hand in hand, surrounded by strangers, doing whatever they wished. And in many ways, it felt entirely new. Something different entirely.

Though Geoff’s place wasn’t too far from Allegra’s hotel, the couple didn’t arrive until about ten minutes past eight. Partly due to slow transportation but also from a genuine desire not to rush. Adam chose to make them walk a bit more than necessary, but they moved at a leisurely pace, more concerned with comforting their own and each other’s nerves and simply spending a bit of extra time alone before meeting up with their hosts. What Adam hadn’t taken into consideration when he led them out of the train and onto the streets was how not only relaxing but also tiring the remaining distance would be to walk. So they were only a couple blocks away from their destination when the boy suddenly stopped, crouching in the middle of the crowded sidewalk to allow for Allegra to climb on his back once her boots decided they should’ve probably stayed in the train for a few more stops. And to Adam’s fascination, no one seemed to notice the unusual couple walking through the crowds, their invisibility filling him with a sort of excitement over the newness of it. He’d almost forgotten what it was like to be with his favorite person without their classmates around, staring, whispering, starting false rumors. They were ordinary again, privileged with the rare gift of privacy.

The home of the oldest Kipling sibling was located on the topmost floor of of a small narrow building with no elevator, which left Adegra with the task of climbing up the stairs for five floors. By the time they reached Geoff’s floor, Adam carefully released Allegra and knocked on the door. He gently took her hand, and in that one second, his exhaustion from walking and climbing stairs disappeared completely to be replaced by a slight nervousness instead. But he didn’t show it, flashing Allegra a reassuring smile instead.

It didn’t take very long for the door to open, flooding the hall with light and revealing a familiar face, even for Allegra who’d never seen it before.
Geoff was quite different from his brother, and yet it was somehow obvious the two were related. While Adam was pale, Geoff sported a healthier golden glow; while the younger boy’s hair was so dark to be almost black, Geoff’s hair was a lighter shade of brown, almost passing off as dark blond under the right lighting, and while Adam was rather lanky, Geoff had a slightly more muscular build. But they shared the same deep blue eyes, and expressive eyebrows and boyish smiles. And despite Adam’s earlier commentary, his brother didn’t welcome him and Allegra in a coat and PJs. Though he still looked perfectly casual, in jeans and a black long sleeved top, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows and revealing forearms tattooed in a familiar style.

“And here we were thinking you were going to bail,” said Geoff, raising his eyebrows at Adam in that same way the younger boy usually did to Allegra.

Adam rolled his eyes at the accusation but smiled, gesturing with his free hand to the girl at his side. “Geoff, this is Allegra. Allegra - Geoff,” he finished by gesturing toward his brother with playful formality.

Geoff smiled politely and took a step forward, greeting Allegra with a welcoming hug. “It’s nice to finally meet you,” he said. “Come in.”

Geoff opened the door wider and stepped aside to reveal a roomy loft with wooden floors and brick walls. Lights hanging from beams in the exposed ceiling bathed the space in warm, welcoming light and revealed a messy but cozy home. Some of the walls were covered in posters, their subjects ranging from 90s rock bands to obscure 60s French films. There were collages of intricate flower drawings on plain letter-size paper, of photographs of flowers in extreme closeup, and of candid shots of more personal subjects, like the boy’s friends and family. The lower half of these walls were covered in bookshelves filled with books on all things botanical, and on top of every bookshelf sat medium-sized plants in mismatching ceramic pots, so that there was an entire row of plants dividing the books below from the posters and drawings above. And there were more of them everywhere else throughout the home - plants hanging from the ceiling, standing shadowed in corners, sitting tiny and adorable on the coffee table and on short stools by the ceiling-high windows.

The open layout of the flat allowed no hiding spaces, so it was impossible to miss Geoff’s other company: a slender girl with honey-brown hair that fell only a couple inches past her shoulders in soft waves and matching brown eyes. She wore a soft cotton t-shirt that, based on the fade of the imagery on the fabric, must have been older than she was, and accompanied it with slim-fitting, high-waisted jeans. As her gaze fell upon the newcomers, the girl grinned and stepped out of the kitchen area, walking toward the new guests. She wore fluffy slippers but the sneakers under the coffee table revealed they were not part of her original outfit.

“Adam, Allegra, this is Bridgette,” started Geoff, gesturing from the new guests to the girl, “Bri, this is—oh. Wait, I meant—”

“Adam? Really? So you’re the one he’s been talking about for the past three years! It’s so nice to finally meet you!” gasped Bridgette with exaggerated politeness, stretching a hand out to Adam which the boy shook with a laugh. Geoff rolled his eyes with a sheepish smile but left his verbal typo uncorrected. “And you must be the one he’s been talking about,” she said, turning her gaze upon Allegra and gesturing toward Adam with a little movement of her head. “I’m Bridgette, but you can call me Bri,” she added, beaming as she offered her outstretched hand.

Allegra had very little time to panic during the tumultuous journey from the train to the front door, completely distracted until she found herself quite suddenly in front of a very familiar looking stranger. Geoff. He looked… a lot like Adam. As someone who had studied Adam Kipling’s features meticulously over the last few months, she was practically an expert and immediately spotted the similarities. The blue eyes, the smile, the eyebrows, the way of speaking… And then, in almost the same wave, she noticed the differences. There were a few that stood out to her immediately as she smiled, and prepared to offer up a hand only to find herself pulled into a welcoming hug in the next moment. “It’s nice to meet you, too,” Allegra responded through a weak laugh, regaining her smile as they started into the loft.

She couldn’t help staring. It was beautiful - the plants, the posters, the books, the windows… It seemed everywhere she looked there was some new detail, some hidden treasure. She was just starting to count the plants when Geoff introduced them to Bridgette. Allegra’s expression lit up with a smile at the girl’s gentle mocking, her silver eyes taking in the sight of the couple interacting with vague fascination before settling in on Bridgette herself.

“And you must be the one he’s been talking about.”

“Allegra,” she confirmed the introduction with a warm smile, shaking her hand as she gazed around the loft. "You have a beautiful home." It was shortly after sharing this honest opinion that Allegra finally seemed to register Bridgette's earlier words.

"You've been talking about me?" Allegra turned to Adam with new teasing behind her eyes, eyebrows raising.

Geoff and Bridgette smiled in unison to Allegra’s compliment and the boy muttered a flattered “thank you.” They wondered vaguely if she knew that the place was only his, as the couple actually lived in separate flats.

Adam was just about to mention this when Allegra turned to him, questioning Bridgette’s last comment. His brows furrowed and he made a playfully dismissive expression, as if the girl’s question was ridiculous. “What, me? About you? Pfft.”

“Only every single day since, what? Four months ago?” said Geoff.

“Five, actually,” Bridgette corrected with a little nod.

“So that’s… what, like… one-hundred and fifty days? Somewhere around there?”

Adam rolled his eyes as Geoff and Bridgette began muttering amongst themselves, holding up their fingers and trying to calculate the exact number of days that had passed since the first mention of Allegra Reynolds. “I might have… mentioned you a couple times,” he finally admitted, embarrassment tainting his cheeks light pink. He gave the girl a small smile, as if this was some shameful fact that she would probably hate him for later.

"A couple times?" Allegra repeated, turning to evaluate Adam with her relentless silver gaze as amusement flooded her features. She didn't need to do much pressing, however, as in the next moment Geoff and Bridgette began their calculations to reveal the truth and Adam's face flushed a light pink color. Five months. And he'd mentioned her throughout all of it? Her skepticism faded, now replaced with a quiet flattery as she took his hand into her own and pulled him closer through the small distance that separated them.

Allegra's teasing expression melted into one of pure adoration, beaming as she leaned up onto her toes and placed an affectionate kiss on Adam's cheek. For just a fleeting instant, she managed to reinstate their own little world, creating a momentary bubble for the two of them as she murmured a barely audible, "Aw, Sunshine..." to his ear with a smile. In a second, the bubble was gone, and Allegra turned back to their company with a sheepish smile.

"Well, mostly good things, I hope."

Adam, successfully absorbed into Adegraland with Allegra’s words and kiss, watched the girl with silent fascination even as she pulled away, returning her attention to the other couple. Geoff and Bridgette looked between Adam and Allegra, to each other, then back, all the while wearing amused smiles.

“All great things, you’ve nothing to worry about,” Geoff assured Allegra, his amusement transforming into a warm smile.

Beside him, Bridgette brought her hands together in a silent clap, her expression radiating sudden enthusiasm. “Are you guys hungry? Come, come.” Gesturing for the others to follow, she began moving in the direction of the dining area, where a long, rustic wooden table with room for six had been set up. In the middle was a medium-sized pot sitting on a portable stove and around it were plates covered in vegetables, sliced carrots, mushrooms, spinach dumplings, and thinly sliced beef ready to be dipped into the simmering broth. Tiny bowls accompanied the larger plates, filled with different creamy dipping sauces. There were four empty plates, two on each side of the table, accompanied by empty wine glasses, regular and long-stemmed forks, and knives. As with every other surface of the home, there were a few tiny plants scattered between the plates, but Geoff was quick to collect and relocate them, as if afraid the food itself may eat them.

With Allegra’s hand still in his own, Adam followed Bridgette’s fluffy-slippered lead to the table and stared at the contents curiously. “Oh, is this that thing where you dip the food?”

Bridgette settled beside Geoff at the table and chuckled softly at Adam’s childlike description of fondue. “Yes, this is exactly that thing,” she confirmed with a nod. Just as the other two settled opposite to her and Geoff, Bridgette got back to her feet and began to pour white wine into their glasses. “But there are rules: no double-dipping,” she explained, “And if you lose your food in the pot you have to answer one trivia question.”

Adam furrowed his brow. “What? What’s that got to do with anything?”

“Nothing, it’ll just be fun,” Bridgette replied with a smile, grabbing her long-stemmed fork and using it to move one of the spinach dumplings into the pot, where it simmered. “Bon appétit!”

Allegra nodded gravely to Bridgette’s explanations of the rules, as though failure to follow the double-dipping mandate might truly get her kicked out of the party. She didn’t even question the trivia, as if this was a natural part of any dinner invitation, but cracked a smile as Adam demanded its relevance. “This is lovely…” she murmured quietly but genuinely, her large eyes taking in the sight of the spread, a little overwhelmed. She wasn’t sure of the protocol - if they were a ‘dig in’ sort of group or a more formal… Just as she began to wonder, Bridgette plopped the first dumpling into the pot and her question was answered.

Allegra smiled faintly and took her own fork, scanning the various options before grabbing a mushroom and moving it into the pot. “What sort of trivia are we talking about?” she wondered aloud, doing her best to keep up with the conversation. She didn’t want to seem uninterested, as her quiet nature often appeared to those unfamiliar with her. “Should we be nervous?”

Bridgette looked off into space, savoring her dumpling as Allegra asked what kind of trivia they would be quizzing each other on. “That’s a great question.” The girl nodded her head and finished off her dumpling, her brown eyes scanning the table as if expecting to find the answer on a plate. Turns out, she did. “Food. Since we’re playing this over dinner, then the trivia should be about… food.”

From across the table, Adam bit into his beef with narrowed eyes. “Rather convenient topic for a nutritionist, Bri.”

Bridgette rolled her eyes at the accusation but smiled, obviously having meant to be caught. She wasn’t a cheater! “Alright, I have a better idea. Since we just met you guys ten minutes ago” - her gaze flickered on Geoff for the briefest moment, teasing his earlier mistake - “we’ll do a more… personal trivia.”

“Ask personal questions to get to know each other better? I like that,” decided Geoff, dipping a slice of beef just as Adam dipped a mushroom into the pot. “Adam, you first.”

“What? I haven’t dropped anything into the—”

“Now you did,” Geoff announced casually as he knocked the mushroom from Adam’s fork with his own.

Adam’s jaw dropped and his blue eyes widened with comical offense. “You bloody git…” He began to pull his empty fork from the pot, Geoff snickering maliciously in the background, then stabbed the older boy’s food so that it slipped from his own fork.

It was now Geoff’s jaw that dropped, his expression mirroring Adam’s from just moments ago as, along with his brother, he pulled out an empty fork. Bridgette watched all of this with a raised eyebrow, sipping slowly from her glass. “Are you twelve?”

“He started it!”

“I was trying to get the game started!”

“By cheating?”

“Oh c’mon, no one was going to drop their food in time for us to get anywhere. At most we’d get one question out the whole night.”

“Alright, alright!” Bridgette leaned forward, slapping both boys’ hands away from the pot. “Now you both have to answer a question. Actually, everyone in the table gets to ask the loser - that’s you two - any question that they like, and you have to answer honestly,” she explained, pointing from one boy to the other with her empty, long-stemmed fork. Geoff watched the way she waved the utensil around a little nervously. “Allegra.” The girl’s brown eyes traveled across the table and landed on the silver-eyed girl. “You can start. Ask whichever one of them whatever you want,” she instructed with a smile.

Allegra was having a lovely time watching the scene play out before her. Fascinated, her silver eyes neared the size of saucers as she ate her mushroom and followed the drama from brother to brother, laughing softly to herself at the particularly funny bits. As per usual, it seemed that the girl almost believed she was truly separate from the scene, completely entertained and invested in observing more than participating. That was, until Bridgette said her name suddenly.

Allegra’s eyebrows rose to her hairline and she blinked at the sudden attention, taking in the older girl’s offer. Ask either of them? Anything? She froze for a moment before slowly shrugging off her shyness. The quiet girl sat up a bit more and put on her best detective expression. Eyes large, lips pouted, expression giving nothing away, she moved her intimidating gray gaze from brother to brother, deciding. She lingered on Adam, her pout twitching into the hint of a smile as she caught his eyes with her own, tilting her head challengingly as though trying to read his mind in some way, threatening to choose him, and then --

“Geoff.” Her decision rang softly through the tense silence as she turned her gaze to Adam’s older brother across the table. “I think I’d like to hear an Adam story, please.” Under the table, Allegra’s hand slipped into Adam’s, their fingers intertwining as she flashed her boyfriend a triumphant smile over her shoulder. "Is there anything I should know?" she clarified her request, obviously teasing though her soft voice remained steady and smooth.