Week 1: Natalie's Date, Part 2

Feeling that it would be awkward to continue sitting around and waiting after being prompted like that, Natalie stood to get ready to leave, Aífe following suit. They left to a smattering of “bye”, “see you later”, and a nervous “good luck” from Mallory as the remaining crowd finished breakfast.

Now that Aífe was alone with her date, she finally got a chance to take in Natalie’s appearance as the blonde led them toward the entrance to the garden. Natalie was wearing a delicate white sundress, flowing down to her knees and showing off her long legs quite nicely. As she stepped out into the sunlight, she opened up a white parasol to shade herself from the morning sun—something that probably wasn’t necessary within the magical area of the Lily Garden, but served to make her look even more elegant. As the blonde turned back to look at her, Aífe found her pulse quickening as she was reminded of who exactly she was going on a date with, feeling woefully inadequate standing next to a model who looked like she stepped right out of a painting.

“Hello? Aífe?” Natalie’s words suddenly jolted Aífe from her stupor. “Did you hear me?”

“U-uh, yes! Or… actually, wait. Could you repeat that?” Aífe stammered out nervously, trying to surreptitiously wipe the sweat that had started to coat her palms. “I think I was lost in thought just now…”

“Geez, you’re actin’ like me all of a sudden.” Natalie chuckled, a small smile forming on her face. “I was sayin’ that I’d like to go on a stroll through the garden with you. You get a chance to see all of it yet?”

“No, now that I think about it.” Aífe scratched her head as she thought. “You’d think we’d’ve spent more time out there, given that it’s supposed to be this place’s calling card.”

“Well, that’s good.” Natalie breathed an internal sigh of relief. “I was worried someone else might’ve already done this with you. Not exactly great for my first date if I’m just copyin’ someone else.”

As Natalie and Aífe began their leisurely stroll, the rest were breaking away to focus on their own plans for the day (and Cecilia to her job). Seeing Aria beginning to walk through the other set of double doors, Erica and Aoba followed behind—Erica thinking quickly and coming up with the trick of saying “the place where Aria went” in her head as they walked through. To her mild surprise, they ended up in the immediate next hallway, standing in front of Fuyumi’s boutique and the TF shop. Looking around, they saw the alien standing in the TF shop looking for a specific mirror. As they made to follow her inside, they noticed Fuyumi waving from the counter of her boutique. They waved back as they entered the TF shop, not noticing the look of disappointment on the seamstress’ face as she realized they weren’t coming to buy any clothes.

“What’cha looking for?” Erica asked the alien browsing the mirrors, Aria nearly jumping out of her clothes in alarm at the sudden question.

“Jesus! Fucking startled the shit out of me!” Aria tried to catch her breath and get her heart rate back to normal. She looked at her two tagalongs with an annoyed expression. “I should ask you the same. You need something?”

“We were gonna kill time at the arcade,” Erica shrugged, “thought you might want to come along. It was Aoba’s idea, actually.”

“Well… I just thought that we haven’t really spent that much time together, even though we’re roommates this week.” Aoba nervously explained. “I just thought that it’d be a shame if we finished the week without managing to get even a bit closer. I still don’t really know anyone here that well, aside from Aífe and Erica.”

“I guess that’s pretty sweet of you.” Aria’s face softened. “Sorry I was snippy—just didn’t expect anyone to talk to me just then. I was trying to remember which of these mirrors was for meta Tfs—I got a voucher at the arcade during my date the other day.”

“Damn, that’s pretty lucky.” Erica looked down at the slip of paper Aria was holding out. “Those can be expensive. My upgrade cost most of my BP, and that’s taking advantage of cheating the random upgrade, too.”

“Yeah, I was going to use it to remove that dumb princess TF from my options for the next poll,” Aria explained, “y’know, the one where I get tied up somewhere and Aífe has to come find me?”

“That one did sound really inconvenient.” Aoba nodded, following Aria’s train of thought. Though I might not actually mind that one so much. It could be pretty nice to have Aífe swoop in and rescue me like she’s my knight...

“But then I was thinking that it’d be more point-efficient to use it on that premium path removal that you got added to the shop.” Aria elaborated as Erica pointed her to the correct mirror and Aoba stopped paying attention, her brain quickly filling with thoughts of yuri. “But at the same time, none of the paths I’ve got are actually that bad—I just got crappy TFs the first time. Do I really wanna lose out on the opportunity to get cool video game powers or a better voice just for the sake of efficiency? And my vtuber path might give me a way to manipulate electronics, or enter the cyberworld, or something. Not to mention that there’s no guarantee that the new paths I could pick from would be any better.”

“Yeah… sure.” Erica nodded along, the alien rapidly losing her. “So just use your voucher on the single TF removal, and then you can save up BP or try to win another one. That’d give you time to see what other kinds of TFs you could get.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Aria allowed herself to be swayed by Erica’s logic, at least partly because she was growing tired of thinking about this particular dilemma. As the mirror glowed, the voucher in her hands disappeared, and Your Princess is in Another Castle was struck from her list of potential TFs, Aria continued to stand there and tap her chin in thought.

“There something else?” Erica leaned closer to try and see which option Aria was considering this time.

“Aífe told me I should really consider upgrading my TF while I can still use your exploit.” Aria furrowed her brow as she thought about the purchase. “Only problem is it would use pretty much everything I have left.”

“Why not just go for it? It’s not like you won’t get more opportunities to earn BP. Mine was definitely worth it.” Erica made a show of adjusting the bow tie on her detached collar. The fact that she was still willingly wearing the bunny outfit even though she was no longer required to was proof enough in her eyes. That upgrade completely turned around her thinking on her TF—she now saw it as almost completely beneficial. Who cares if other people think I’m dressed weird? These are the most comfortable clothes I’ve ever worn, and I look sexy as fuck.

“Fuck it, fine.” Aria conceded, pressing the upgrade option. “But you owe me 1500 if it turns out that this upgrade sucks.”

-1500 BP (100 remaining)

Aria was engulfed in pink light, and Erica and Aoba were left speechless by what they saw as soon as the light faded.

If there was one word Aífe would have used to describe her date with Natalie so far, it would most likely be “awkward”. Certainly, the weather was pleasant, the garden beautiful, and her company equally lovely, but the conversation was… lacking, to say the least.

“If I’m rememberin’ right, this one’s a ‘butterfly pea’—” Natalie broke the silence. “Diona said it can make dyes that change color when you pour lemon juice on ‘em, but I didn’t really get any of the chemistry stuff behind it when she was tellin’ me about it.” The walk thus far had mostly gone exactly like this, with long moments of silence interspersed by Natalie regurgitating whatever she could remember of what Diona had explained about the various exotic plants. “She also told me its scientific name, but I don’t really remember that part, except I’m pretty sure it wasn’t somethin’ you should say in polite conversation.”

Aífe simply smiled as best she could and nodded along. It wasn’t like she didn’t find these facts interesting, but it didn’t really feel like Natalie’s date right now—it was more like what Diona’s date probably should have been. She was trying her best to stay positive, but she was worried that Natalie might be picking up on the sour vibes. The blonde was steadily getting more anxious as they walked, and as they approached what Aífe was assuming to be roughly an hour past when they’d started, Aífe could swear they were starting to cover ground they’d already been through. I really hope we’re not lost. I know I’d be embarrassed if a date I’d planned ended up requiring a rescue party before lunch.

It was after the fifth or so time passing the same section of rhododendrons that Aífe felt the need to speak up.

“Natalie, you can be honest with me—” the redhead started, her date nervously looking away in response, “did you… forget the way out of here?”

“O-oh! Um…” Natalie fidgeted with her hair a bit as she tried to figure out what to say, “I-I do know the way back. It’s just… gosh this is going to sound so dumb…”

“Hey, don’t worry,” Aífe assured her, “I promise I won’t think that whatever you’re worried about is dumb. Besides—whatever it is, I’m sure it can be any dumber than some of the things the other girls and I have said.”

“W-well… I kinda don’t have anything else planned.” Natalie finally admitted. “I really thought this would take longer.” Seeing Aífe’s blank expression staring back at her, she panicked and tried to elaborate. “I-it’s just—the other day, when Diona was showin’ me all the different flowers ‘n stuff, it took way longer! I mean, it felt like we were out there pretty much the entire time you and Mal were at the lake. Though I guess that makes sense, since she was tellin’ me all about the different plants and all the stuff she knows about them—that definitely took up some time… plus we were probably walkin’ slower since we didn’t know the layout of the garden. A-and it’s just—I don’t have any experience with this sort of stuff! All I know about datin’ is from romance novels, and they don’t really tell you how long anything takes, and—” She finally paused when she noticed Aífe bent over, struggling to hold in her laughter. “Come on! You promised you wouldn’t think I was dumb!”

“I promise, I’m not.” Aífe managed to squeeze out a sentence between laughs. “It’s not dumb. A bit silly, maybe—but not dumb. Natalie, you don’t need every minute accounted for. It’s okay if there are lulls in the date.”

“But it’s not just minutes!” Natalie protested. “It’s not even lunch yet, and I’ve already run out of everything I planned!”

“Then we’ll come up with plans on the fly.” Aífe finally stopped laughing, though her humor was still written on her face. “Do you really think all my other dates were these super romantic days where everything went right? Because I promise you they weren’t. I didn’t even spend the full day alone with any of them—whether it was chilling and watching anime with Erica and Aoba, Cecilia yelling at the staff because she had one of her moments, getting pranked by the mermaids while I was with Mal, a barista pouring her breast milk in my tea while I was poring over spellbooks with Elise, or having to deal with that big punishment ceremony interrupting my date with Aria—something un-datelike has always popped up.”

“What was that one toward the end?”

“Getting pranked by the mermaids while I was with Mal.” Aífe put on her best innocent face, which didn’t last long as both ended up busting into laughter. “Seriously, though, we don’t have to keep doing anything if we’re not enjoying it. Do you want to go somewhere and sit down for a bit, so we can think of plans that don’t involve walking in circles for several hours?”

“Fine, you win.” Natalie smiled softly, her worries eased a bit. “It’s a bit early, but we can go ahead and head to the spot I picked out for lunch. Besides—” she glanced down at her feet, “I don’t know about you, but the shoes I’m wearin’ today aren’t as comfortable as the ones I was wearin’ when I was with Diona. I tried to thread the needle between cute and practical, but I think I missed.”

“Great! Let’s go, then.” Aífe reached her hand out to Natalie’s, the blonde startling slightly at the sudden contact. “Your legs are longer than mine. Plus, while you might know the way out of here, I’m totally clueless—if we get separated, I’m gonna end up as the first Master/Mistress to go missing during a season of this stupid show.” Natalie found herself chuckling again as she led Aífe toward the next stop on their date.