+Hey yourself! So I worked on that movement spell a bunch last night,+ he says cheerfully. +And I figured out a way to make it so I don't have to maintain it for you and you don't have to maintain it yourself. I just have to make you a tiny little device, with just barely enough power to keep the one spell going. It won't have to turn it on and off, because I bet you'll want it on all the time, so I don't think I'll have much trouble making it, and it'll be about as smart as an amoeba.+

+I'm... surprised,+ Bella says, +both that you can do that, and that you'd be inclined to, amoeba or no amoeba.+

+The amoeba is kind of the important part,+ he says. +I wouldn't make you a device if it was going to wake up. All devices are a little bit alive, but as long as it's not alive enough to want things, I'm fine with it. I don't think it's all that different from you making me a sweet potato. Those are biological too, remember?+

+If sweet potatoes could talk I'd be in a bit of a pickle,+ Bella says. +So to speak. So - devices are not significantly more "related" to each other than I am to a sweet potato? This isn't going to be, like, your kid or anything, this is an - arts and crafts project?+

+Arts and crafts just about covers it,+ he agrees.

+Okay, neat. What's it gonna look like?+ She finishes disentangling her hair and starts pouring cereal. +Do you want to try Rice Krispies?+

Bella pours him some cereal and some milk on top and hands him a spoon. +Little droplet of blue-green glass on a necklace? And then if I accumulate more for more maintenance spells I can string them on together.+

"Sometimes people slice up bananas in their cereal," remarks Bella idly.

+I'll try that next time!+ he says, over magephone because noms.

Bella laughs and eats her own breakfast. +Is making the device time-consuming or mana-intense? This a before-school or after-school plan?+

+Probably after-school. I don't actually know how long it'll take; I've never done it before.+

+Okay then. Do amoebalike devices get names?+

+If you desperately wanna give it one, I guess, but I'd feel weird.+

+I don't have to, I just have no idea what the standard here is.+

Lexi yawns her way down the stairs and looks critically at the cereal box and cracks an egg into a frying pan instead.

Brilliance shrugs. +Does the standard matter? I don't know it either, I just know I'd feel weird naming a sweet potato.+

+I'd feel weird naming a sweet potato I was going to eat. If I were going to keep one on the kitchen counter because it was an interesting shape, or something, I might name it.+

"Good morning, Bella," says Lexi pointedly.

"Oh. Morning. Sorry, distracted," apologizes Bella. "You sleep okay?"

"I slept fine," says Lexi, more content.

Bella's done with hers too. +How would you feel about making Lexi little-devices to maintain some spells on her too? Like, not today, after she's loosened up some.+

+...I dunno,+ he says. +Ask me again after she's loosened up some.+

"I'll do it. You never did copy down my math," says Lexi. "You can do it in the car."

"Ooh, good point, thanks," says Bella.

"Youuuu're welcome," trills Lexi. She licks a bit of runny yolk off her finger. "Let's get outta here."

+Deck of cards?+ Bella cues Brilliance on the twins' way out.

He shifts and floats into her hand.

Brilliance comfortably occupies Bella's pocket.

+Sure,+ he says agreeably.

Bella and her sister do homework at the kitchen table, chatting companionably in half-sentences interpretable only to each other. Eventually Bella does what she deems to be enough, and she puts her schoolbooks back in her bag. "I think I'm gonna go," she tells Lexi.

"Gonna go do magic, learn to save the world?" asks Lexi wryly.

"Gonna go do magic, learn to conjure potatoes," amends Bella. "Saving the world might be trickier. But yeah, something like that. I'll see you later."

"Right, well, see you later," says Lexi, "um, thanks for not instantly taking off?"

+Poof!+ he says, and they poof back to the Planet of Sand.

"Device first or corn first?"

"Device first!" he says, shifting to staff form and hovering beside her. "Pick some sand, make some glass."

Bella picks up a little handful of sand between the bands of blue and green; it averages to a lovely aqua. She pools it into the middle of one hand and picks up Brilliance with the other and commands the sand to melt smoothly together into a droplet without heat. (And she pays attention.)

She hands over the droplet.

Bella clicks her heels together and murmurs "flight" and goes zooming about while he works.

Bella lands next to him. "Will it talk at all, or just - be itself?" she asks. "Also I completely forgot to bring something to string it on, hmm."

"It's not gonna talk," he says, holding it out to her. "You can just shove it in your pocket for now, I guess, but try not to let it fall out. Okay, ready?"

Bella reaches out and touches the droplet. "Yeah - like so?"

Brilliance laughs.

Bella's laughing too, breathless with it, breaking into random dance.

He chases after her, just because he can.

She lets him catch her, and she hugs him tight. "Thank you!"

"Hugs're pretty awesome," Bella agrees. "It's great, it's the best thing, I feel amazing."

Mmmmm snuggly hugs.

Grateful happy hugs! "It's amazing, I love it, it's like I'm telekinetic only with myself, I'll never trip over random nonexistent things again, I love it."

"I love that you love it!" he laughs, tucking her shoulder under his chin.

"Best present ever." Squeeze.

"Awwwwww." Squish! "I think hugs might be better than ice cream," he adds contemplatively.

"Is ice cream the current winner in food?"

"Yep!"

"I should try more flavours," he says, snuggling her some more. "I want to try everything."

"I'm getting that," she laughs. "You are one serious hedonist."

"I definitely am," he giggles. Hug hug hug. "I don't understand how anybody else isn't."

"Got other things on our minds," Bella shrugs.

"Yeah," he laughs, "how."

"Well, I'm also a lot more used to food and hugs than you are, maybe the novelty will wear off in seventeen years."

"Mmm, I think that'd be kinda sad," he says.

"A little, I guess."

Happy snuggly hug!

"I'm glad I found you. I'm sorry I'm your favorite person - I mean, not directly, but sorry that you've known such a bad quality of person, pretty much all I've done for you is be not-horrible."

"I like you," he says. "You're nice. Maybe you call it not-horrible, but I call it nice."

"Well, I try to be nice, but everything you've seen me do is either minimum standard of not-horribleness stuff, or selfishly motivated," she points out.

"So? What I'm saying is," he lets go of her so he can gesture emphatically, "your minimum standards are high compared to what I'm used to. And you're sorry about that, and that's sweet. And I'm just gonna keep appreciating it the way I appreciate hugs and ice cream - it's something nice that I'm not used to yet."

He grins at her. "Aww, you're cute."

"Pff." Bella's no longer being hugged; she twirls gratuitously.

Brilliance laughs.

+Hi!+ he says ebulliently. +Last night I got to taste somebody's dick! I think I have a new favourite taste.+

+...+

+It was so much fuuuun,+ he says.

+Oooomigod.+

+...What?+

+You know that's a sex thing, right, it's not like it's a food? How long did you say you'd been on Earth, a hundred years?+

+I know what sex is,+ he laughs. +So? I liked it, the guy liked it, everybody wins! Mmmmmm.+

+Okay, wow. I really didn't expect to hear that, but okay.+

He giggles. +Maybe I should try more kinds of sex, too.+

+I had been kind of operating under the assumption that devices weren't wired that way?+

+That's a weird assumption,+ he says. +I've got the parts and they all work. And you know how I feel about human-style sensory experience. Isn't sex supposed to be like ice cream but better? I mean, generally?+

+I don't think they're supposed to have a lot in common in the details, but reportedly they are both enjoyable,+ says Bella delicately.

+...Is this not something you wanna talk about?+

+I just don't actually, you know, know. As of last night, apparently, you have had more sex than me.+

+...But I mean, you also have parts and they also work, right...?+

+...I am a healthy seventeen-year-old female, Brilliance, yes.+

+And you've had more than like three days to find out what an orgasm feels like. Man, why haven't I done that yet,+ he wonders.

+My leading hypothesis having been demolished, I have no idea.+

He cracks up.

+Yeah, in retrospect it was silly of me to think that, and I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you managed to stumble across a proposition if you were out wandering around, you're cute and everything.+

+I am really cute!+ he agrees. +If I saw me walking around, I'd hit on me too!+

Bella giggles into the magephone.

+Now I wish there were two of me so I could fuck myself,+ he says wistfully.

+You'd be the expert on whether that's something you could accomplish by magic or not,+ Bella says wryly.

+Nah, I don't think I can pull it off.+ He laughs. +Too bad.+

+Alas. So if you're not non-sexual, what are you? I assume you're familiar with the fact that there's kinds.+

+I don't think I have a kind,+ he says. +What's the sex equivalent of the way I feel about food? I'm that. Except I've had more food than sex. Which is definitely something I hope to change. Hey, wanna have sex with me?+

+...Context like what?+

+Like, I'm not sure of actual percentages, but often people who have sex are also dating or something?+

+...Yeah, and? What are you asking, here? I wanna have sex with you because I wanna have sex and I know you and I like you and you're nice.+

+There are ways to like people, though. I'm trying to figure out which one you mean.+

+I like one person,+ he points out. +It's not like there's anything to compare the way I like you against.+

+Nope! I'm not even as good a disease vector as your average deck of cards, 'cause I shed all that stuff every time I change form.+

+Okay then. I will - think about it.+

+Okay,+ he says brightly. +Think I've got time to go try out my body some before you have to go to school?+

+We'll be going any minute, I've been dithering staring at this hair elastic trying to figure out how to get the glass droplet onto it, I probably don't even have time left for an actual breakfast and will just grab cold poptarts on the way out.+

He laughs. +Lemme at the hair elastic.+

Bella trots downstairs, puts the hair elastic on the kitchen table, checks the time, and puts her poptarts in the toaster.

Brilliance picks up the hair elastic; his spell diagram unfolds beneath him. The hair elastic comes apart at the join. He holds it out to Bella. "Put the bead on it, I'll join it back up."

"Cool. Is this repeatable without a new spell if I accumulate more?" she asks, stringing on the bead.

"Nope," he laughs, reuniting the ends for her and letting go of the elastic. His spell diagram goes away. "But the matter manipulation was pretty tiny, I didn't even need to incant for it."

"Cool." She tests the stretch; it will go on her wrist and hold up a ponytail. "Thanks!" And she spins on the ball of one foot towards the toaster when it pops, and plates her poptarts and breaks one in half and hands him a piece.

+Thought you might.+

"Come on, Bella," calls Lexi from where she's putting on her shoes, "we'll be late!"

Bella holds her poptarts in her mouth, ties her shoes, and follows her sister out the door. +C'mon!+

+But food!+ he laughs.

+Well, all right, finish your half a tart and when you're done warn us before teleporting into the car,+ laughs Bella.

+Will do!+

Off drive the Swan twins.

A few minutes later, he says to both of them, +Okay, I'm good to go.+

+Okay, c'mere.+

He teleports into Bella's lap.

Brilliance remains comfortably in her pocket the whole time.

School ends; Lexi goes home with Jessica today and Bella drives home alone. "Leaning towards yes, but on the condition that you don't inform - by any channel of information, no insinuations or meaningful looks or significant pauses - Lexi or Charlie. It'd be their business if I acquired a boyfriend, but if I'm just having sex one time because it sounds like it might be pleasant that's another matter."

"...Okay," he says. "I'll try not to. I don't actually know how good a liar I am. That good enough?"

"Well, you don't really have a lot of conversations with them anyway, so the standard for how good a liar you have to be isn't high, and anyway I don't mean lying. Like, literally no one in the world has had sex with me, and also literally no one in the world goes around stating, 'I have not had sex with Bella Swan! No sir!', so, you know, that is not exactly the form that discretion takes here."

"I mean I don't know how good I am at pretending something isn't true when I know it is," he says. "I haven't really had to do much of it before. I don't know how I might accidentally let somebody know, but if I don't know how then it's harder not to do it, see what I mean?"

"Well, default to magephone when we're not alone? You do that anyway, it won't look weird."

"Sure, okay," he says agreeably.

"Okay then." Pause. "Huh, I expected this to feel more momentous. Interesting."

"Huh," says Brilliance. "Why?"

"There's a fair amount of cultural baggage associated with the first time somebody has sex. Mostly girls," shrugs Bella. "It's stupid, but I expected it to have more subtle effects on me than it appears to."

"Oh," says Brilliance. "Yeah, I guess I've seen some of that."

"Okay," says Brilliance. "Should we bring a blanket or something, though? I mean, sand's pretty comfy, but it gets in places."

"Oh, good point." She hops out of the car, goes inside, and locates a picnic blanket. And, after a moment's thought, a packet of tissues.

"Okay, all set?"

"Yup."

He activates the dimensional transfer, then slides out of her pocket and shifts human. Out of habit, he includes clothes.

He plops down beside her and gives her a hug, leaning his head on her shoulder.

Snuggles! These are probably part of the normal course of events, right?

Bella likes being ice cream. Bella really likes being ice cream. She wriggles a little closer.

+Mmmmhm. I feel tasty,+ giggles Bella.

+You are fucking delicious,+ he informs her.

+Oh good.+ She was nervous, but this has mostly given way to relaxed lissome warmth. (The droplet on the elastic around her wrist helps, though she's not as aware of it as she is when she's attempting to walk or run.) Her hands drift around; one winds up in his hair and one around his waist.

+Mmmmmmmm I like it when you touch my haaaaaair,+ he says, closing his eyes briefly between kisses.

+Mmmm,+ says Brilliance, resting his head on her shoulder again and stroking a hand down her back. +That's nice. You're nice. I like you.+

+I like you too, so that's good.+

He giggles softly.

Kisses kisses kisses is that the edge of his shirt? It is. Bella's hand should go under it.

Ooooh. He wriggles happily.

Yes, that was a good idea. She nudges up his shirt a bit more and tucks the rest of her forearm under it.

Brilliance makes happy happy sounds and snuggles up and nuzzles the side of her neck.

Oooh that is a good place for nuzzles. Bella makes an undignified happy squeak.

Ooh! How about kisses, are kisses good there too?

"Nnnnf," mumbles Bella, squeezing him. +Okay this was a fantastic idea.+

+I knoooow,+ says Brilliance, by magephone because his tongue is busy. +You are so tastyyyy.+

+Mmmmmm I think you should take off your shirt,+ Bella asserts.

Bella makes more happy noises and sets about investigating what her awesome idea has made available. Insofar as she can with her head tilted all the way to the left like that, which means mostly by hand.

Brilliance continues to explore, with dedication and enthusiasm, every possible combination of his mouth and her neck. He also wriggles happily whenever she touches him.

Bella is slowly and steadily melting into a mumbly smiley puddle.

+I am so so glad you think so,+ purrs Bella, squirming. +Maybe I should take my shirt off.+

+That would be awesome,+ says Brilliance.

Bella wriggles out of her shirt, although she pauses a couple of times to steal more kisses. Then it is off!

Bella turns out to be ticklish in some of those places!

"You are cuuuuuuuuute," he giggles.

"You're tickly!" she exclaims, squirming.

"Is tickly good or bad?" he inquires, hugging her lightly.

"It's good but it makes me try to get away anyway," she laughs.

"Okay," says Brilliance, and he goes back to treating Bella like she is all-over ice cream.

Bella wriggles and laughs and reaches out to touch whatever bits of him come nearest her hands as they do so.

Mainly those are the shirtless parts! Brilliance appreciates her attention very much.

That causes him to immediately transform into happy puddly moaning Brilliance!

Nnnnnf. Definitely a call for ongoing neck-kisses, then. Kiss kiss kiss snuggle kiss kiss.

"I love you," he sighs, tipping his head back.

"Wait," says Bella, "what?"

"I love you," he repeats with a sunny smile. "You're my favourite person and you give me all kinds of nice happy feelings. I like you, I love you."

"Okay, now I'm vaguely worried that you've got some kind of emotional dependence on me that I should be worrying about, like, am I taking advantage of you?"

"Yeah, I like you," agrees Bella.

"Okay," he says contentedly, and he snuggles up and kisses her on the cheek.

Snuggles and kisses and a satisfied conscience. All good things.

At some point their stated plan will involve removing their pants, too, but Bella's not in a hurry. Snuggles and petting and kisses.

Snuggles and petting and kisses! Bella is totally made of ice cream and you are never going to convince him of anything different.

Brilliance is pretty yummy too. Although not in an icecreamlike way, really.

Well, no. And Bella does not taste like ice cream. It's just that she is equally enjoyable to put his mouth on.

He is very very welcome to put his mouth on her.

Good, because that is among his favourite activities in the entire world.

Bella likes gentle little nibbles. Most especially on the neck. And the insides of her wrists. If he's being thorough about his empiricism.

He is being thorough as fucking hell! Bella can have all the gentle little nibbles her heart desires.

This might be a large number!

It's not like they're short on time!

It is not. Indeed it is not. Snuggle snuggle squirm happy little noises.

+I love you,+ he says again, hugging her and nuzzling her shoulder.

+You're cute.+

+So are yoooooou,+ he says, and kisses her somewhere in the jawline area.

"Mmmm." Bella squirms closer. This proves topologically difficult. She does it anyway.

Awwwwww she is cute, he is going to snuggle her some more now.

Bella's gonna nibble on his ear. It's right there.

"Mmmm," says Brilliance. "That is nice. I like that."

+Oh good.+ Nibble nibble squirm pet.

+Cause if we did, where would we get our food and shelter and music and whatnot?+

+Okay, point,+ he concedes, snuggling her. +It's just so much fun.+

+I am glad you are enjoying yourself.+

+Yeah, so'm I,+ he giggles.

Snuggle nibble sigh.

Snuggle snuggle snugggggggggle snuggle mmmmmm.

Kisses kisses, let there be no forgetting the kisses.

Bella's still wearing shoes too. That's dumb when one is on a picnic blanket for any purpose at all. She toes them off. And is half-helpful half-obstructive with the pants project.

Help and obstruction are pretty much equally welcome, as long as they both involve her touching him! Snuggly.

Snuggly indeed. It is an obnoxious feature of topology that two convex solids cannot be in complete surface contact. She is going to try to route around that annoying bit of math, like so.

Brilliance giggles and hugs her. At least they have limbs with which to mitigate the drawbacks of convexity!

They do! They do have limbs. Hurray for limbs. Bella has denim around some of her limbs. It is time to stop. Button zipper shimmy-shimmy.

Since Bella's help-hindering went so well for Brilliance, he decides to do some of that himself.

How clever of him! Bella giggles and, when she can kick her jeans off, kisses him again.

If they had really been thinking ahead, they would've brought something to put their clothes in, because there is no way all those articles of clothing are staying on this blanket indefinitely. But Brilliance doesn't care much. He has kisses to enjoy.

The sand's dry. It'll mostly shake out. Bella will think of that. Later. For now kissing and warmth and skin.

Alternating is good! Alternating means that Bella gets to swap between neighborhoods in her surprisingly large repertoire of noises. She's mostly letting him direct them here, because while both of them have more theoretical than practical knowledge he seems less inclined than she to let that interfere. That doesn't mean she doesn't run her hands over surfaces that present themselves, of course.

Brilliance has many, many surfaces, and he gets pretty enthusiastic about her touching any of them. The back of his neck and his lower back are particular favourites, and then of course there is his hair. Bella putting her hands in his hair is the best thing.

Hair is fun! Hair is pettable and finger-combable and scritchable.

So many ways to interact with it! So many interesting sounds and faces he makes when she does!

"Does this mean more places to put my mouth?" inquires Brilliance.

"You know what," says Bella, "it is, you're very clever and you get a prize."

"Awesome," says Brilliance, and proceeds under the assumption that the prize is getting to put his mouth new places.

He's very clever and he gets a prize and he takes Bella's snark module right offline.

"Brilliance," Bella obliges, whether because of nibbles or because of what he said.

He isn't sure which! He will just have to try again. Maybe a few more times.

"Nnnfogod." And a squeak which does not render so easily into the Latin alphabet.

+I love you,+ says Brilliance. +You're like ice cream but better.+

+I am ice cream that likes you baaaaack,+ Bella moans.

+Awwwwwwww,+ he says delightedly, and snuggle-nuzzles, and tries the nibbles again.

She's shivering like she's cold (but she's not cold, warmth is pouring off her) and babbling like she has forgotten English and one of her hands is in his hair and distractedly clenching there.

+Mm, nice,+ he says happily.

"Mmmhmmmmmm..."

+You are cute and tasty and I love you,+ says Brilliance.

Bella has words in her head, somewhere, she can get them if she really needs them, but her observation that they are both still wearing nonzero amounts of clothes and that this should stop does not require that she be verbal.

It does not, indeed! Brilliance is very much able to get the message without words needing to be involved!

Oh good!

Brilliance likewise feels that words are not completely necessary in order to ask if this, too, means more places he can put his mouth.

It does it does it does. Yes.

Bella is such ice cream.

Bella is the happiest ice cream.

She is, it's great. Brilliance is continually, delightedly amazed by all of the lovely lovely feelings that can be involved in two people finding fun ways to put their bodies together.

"B-brilliance. Ohgod."

+I love the way you say that.+

"Brilliance Brilliance Brilliance," repeats Bella helpfully. "Brilliance -"

That is nice, that is so nice, Bella is such ice cream, he loves her so much. Mmmmmm.

Presently she's shaking like a leaf, and she's got both hands in his hair, and she's trying very hard to say his name but it's not quite coming out entire.

Brilliance is absolutely right! He will also be absolutely right if he thinks the same thing of the bone-deep shuddering that starts a minute later and the fact that Bella manages to complete a word (it's "fuck").

When she can stop shaking Bella hauls on Brilliance's head a little; kisses are the urgently required next thing.

Kisses! Kisses, kisses, cuddly snuggly lovely kind-of-messy kisses. Brilliance is all over it.

"Suggestion" makes it sound like she has words. Bella would like to make a squirm about how to proceed from here.

"Fuck," Bella says again, and she reaches for his hip, because she needs a second, but then she squirms again and slides her hand up; the second has elapsed.

He presses his face against the side of her neck and nuzzles affectionately, and demonstrates his ability to follow suggestions.

He is the very best suggestion-follower and Bella is very glad of that because words are hard but squirming is coming very naturally!

Brilliance is really starting to appreciate her squirming!

Good. It's not going anywhere. Bella's going to wrap all four limbs around him and wriggle and mumble into his shoulder.

He also seems to be picking up her habit of mumbling ecstatic incoherencies.

That's interesting! Can she get him to generate more of those? She is ever so curious.

There are several ways to do that, and nobody here doubts for a second that Bella is capable of finding them all.

She is very systematic about looking once she sets her mind to it.

Pretty soon he is also generating an amazing variety of whimpers!

Bella does her best to investigate them, but she's back into trembly puddle mode again herself pretty much.

Bella hugs him tight and enjoys and is enjoyed and enjoys being enjoyed and breathes out all her air in a long moany sigh.

Brilliance cuddles her and loves her and enjoys everything about this experience.

"Brilliance," sighs Bella.

He grins and kisses her.

Kisses, kisses kisses kisses -

Kisses kisses kisses kisses he is getting all kinds of pleasantly shivery now.

Shivers! Bella suspects that's a good sign. She slides her face past his and nibbles at his neck.

Kisses. Hugs. Hugs and kisses.

Bella holds him and watches his face in fascination.

Slowly, radiantly - brilliantly - he smiles.

+Good?+ she asks, glad she doesn't have to decide between asking that and kissing him.

+So good. Way better than ice cream. I love you so much.+

+You're adorable.+

Bella agrees! Cuddle time. Yes.

Cuddle tiiiiiiime. It's so cuddly!

+It was awesome! We're awesome. I love you.+

Bella kisses his temple.

He makes a happy humming noise and snuggles up.

Eventually, Bella says, "We should probably put on our clothes and do some magic."

"Okay," says Brilliance. He gathers up his clothes, shifts to deck form clothes and all, then shifts back into human form looking as reasonably tidy and not-like-he-just-had-great-sex as he usually does.

Bella laughs and takes a little longer to get into hers - although after she's got her bra on she says, "I don't suppose I can pull the same trick via some clever application of the Barrier Jacket?"

"You know, I don't actually know," he says. "I feel like it would only work that way if it was the Barrier Jacket outfit that you took off and threw all over the ground." He grins. "Maybe you should do that next time."

This is the first implication that there might be more than one time. "Maybe. You're seeing this happening regularly?" Bella asks, shaking sand out of her T-shirt.

"Well, yeah," he says. "I mean, if you want. I definitely plan on having sex again, but it doesn't have to be with you."

"Hmmm." Bella pulls her shirt over her head. Her jeans wound up on the corner of the picnic blanket and didn't wind up sandy, so that's more straightforward. "- I dunno. One time to see what it's like for fun, I can do that, I just did, I feel like if it's gonna be a recurring deal I'd want, like, labels, context, that sort of thing."

"...Labels and context like what?" he wonders, flopping down on the blanket just because.

"Like, a boyfriend," says Bella.

"Okay. What's a boyfriend?"

"Uh, are you starting from zero on knowing what it is or just soliciting clarification?"

"I'm not starting from zero," he says, "but I've only ever heard of it in the context of humans and humans and I have no idea how I fit in, and I don't know what it means to you specifically either."

"Well, I mean, you're a person, in the relevant ways you work pretty much like a human," says Bella. "And I've never had one before so any definition I concoct is not stress-tested."

"...I think maybe you need to pretend I'm starting from zero," he says, "because I still have no idea what being your boyfriend would mean, like, practically."

"...Okay, explaining humans to an alien mode engaged. So humans have all this emotional and cultural stuff that sits on top of sex and is also an end in itself. All the component bits are technically optional - including the sex, for some people - but common components several of which would generally be involved include, like, exchanging presents, and celebrating Valentine's Day because that's a couple thing, and exclusivity with the sex and/or the romance, and, like, emotional intimacy, and a sort of general courtship trajectory, and the relationship having a sort of public-facing aspect where the involved parties' loved ones know, and general life-event-support stuff, and defaulting to each other for situations where having a date is called for, and mutual prioritization in each other's lives, and I'm sure I'm forgetting some stuff. And because all these things are optional, and because all these things can happen without people being technically officially together, there's a fuzzy zone that gets a line drawn through it and that line is called 'deciding to label this thing these people are doing "dating"'. Does that make sense?"

"...Yeah," he says. "So which parts of that do you want? 'Cause right off, I can tell you exclusivity with the sex is not happening. I love having sex with you, but I'm not gonna give up having sex with everybody else for it. But on the other hand, you're already my favourite person and I already love you, and those aren't gonna stop if we don't fuck again."

"Okay," shrugs Brilliance. "...Are snuggles a separate thing from sex, here? Because snuggling you is awesome and I wanna do more of it."

"Separate thing, but would also need thinking about. Hugs are categorized differently, and random casual touching differently still, those can both happen."

He nods, and smiles, and hugs her.

Hugs. "Everything on the list up for grabs?" she queries.

"I'm not sure," he says. "A lot of it's still human-context stuff - like, I don't know what you mean by 'general courtship trajectory' but I'm betting having sex and falling in love and then calling myself your boyfriend ain't it, and it's not like I'm ever going to be in a situation where I need a date for something, and you're gonna have a hard time explaining me to anybody who doesn't know about magic... and I'm not sure what some of them mean, like 'life-event-support stuff', what's that? But sexual exclusivity's the only automatic no."

"The trajectory thing is more about a steady increase of seriousness, like, there's whatever you're doing, and then time passes and you're doing more of it. We're already cohabiting and stuff, so there's some constraints on how much trajectory there is to be had in any standard sense, but it's not nonexistent. And I might be in a situation where I want a date for something, I might get invited to a wedding, hell, with my droplet I can probably learn to dance and show up at school dances, I don't have to explain you, you can just be mysteriously sourced. Life-event-support is, like, if Lexi were in the hospital and for some reason I couldn't just magically fix this problem, would it be appropriate for me to cry on you. Or would you show up to my graduation ceremony and clap at the correct times."

"You can cry on me all you want," he says, hugging her again. "And if you really, really want me to show up to your graduation ceremony and clap, I can probably do that too."

"That was just an example, I'm not ruling out the possibility that I drop out of high school completely and just do magic instead," laughs Bella, hugging him back. "Okay, well, I'll think about it. - It might help if I knew why exclusivity was off the table?"

"...Uh," he says, "I like sex. I mean I really like sex. I like sex like I like food. I fucking love ice cream, but I wouldn't eat nothing but ice cream for a year. I love fucking you, but I wouldn't fuck you and nobody else for a year. I mean, I've never even had sex with anybody else except that one guy I gave a blowjob to - I wanna find out what it's like with different people, you know?"

"Both metaphorically and literally, you didn't eat anything for four hundred years," Bella points out. "Now it's an impossible tradeoff when presented with your ostensible favorite person versus assorted random strangers?" She keeps her voice very even. She has no grounds for jealousy at this time; it will therefore be viciously killed if it should happen to intrude.

"Um... yes?" he says. "Why do I feel like that's the wrong answer? You're my favourite person but you're not the only person who exists and I feel kind of weird about being expected to pretend you are?"

"I don't expect anything," she reminds him. "There's a reason I didn't ask about any of this ahead of time. It didn't matter for just," she gestures at the picnic blanket, "once. It might turn out to matter - although then again I'm not sure till I've given it some serious thought - for anything beyond once. And pretending other people don't exist isn't the idea, anyway."

"I just... you were sad when I said you were my favourite person, you were sorry because you want me to know more people I can like. But if I want to like them with my body, suddenly you're my 'ostensible' favourite person, like you're not sure it's true anymore?"

"The reasons I'm your favorite person are sad, like, I'd be your favorite person by default because you have kind of a person-impoverished history, but that's not an inherent property of favorite person hood. I'm Lexi's favorite person, but she's had plenty of chances to find alternatives, if we didn't get along she'd have some friend who'd be her favorite person or maybe it'd be Charlie or Renée. Presumably at some point she will find a boy and they will fall in love and I won't be her favorite person anymore. Lexi's my favorite person. Presumably at some point I'll find a boy and fall in love and - she won't be anymore - and making that trade-in for anything less than the most special, most unique relationship seems - bad."

Bella hugs him back and sighs.

Hug hug hug.

"So, yeah, that's where I am on that."