Luther's alarm shouldn't be as gratifying as it is, but it is. Instinctive. Just narrowly edging toward wide-eyed. Uncertain. Instantly arguing the brass tacks of the girl's words and not the harmless and curious longing, or her own easily upped ante in that sway. Hollywood is a world of lights. At least, it looks that way, especially to someone so young.
(Young in a way that neither of them, none of them, had ever been. But it's her job, even more now, to know and care what it is people want from her.)
She can't entirely justify why she's throwing the yoke of it on him, too. She could easily apologize and look to the girl's mother for help, diffuse this all in seconds. And yet. She doesn't know which is more appealing and unsettling by that feeling too: the nervous panic of Luther's suddenly careful movements and even slower words, or the way he holds his hand out all the same, as she lets herself take a step toward it, and him, taking it.
That hand that never left her hanging.
(Until it did.)
Is there a note of the pettiness none of her siblings would find surprising, somewhere deep inside it? A pale excuse to find herself back disastrously close to him, like in the cab, chasing that pricked longing that could only hurt her more in the end? A refusal to let him get comfortable, or anywhere near to control any of what happens here, in the place that is her world, and hers alone, now?
But all those question marks, and safer than's, are turning into smoke as her other hand settles against his shoulder, fingertips curling it only barely, and she finds herself whispering, with the edge of that smirk peeking out again. "Try not to make it look too much like you'd really rather flip the table and use it as a shootout shield."
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(Young in a way that neither of them, none of them, had ever been.
But it's her job, even more now, to know and care what it is people want from her.)
She can't entirely justify why she's throwing the yoke of it on him, too. She could easily apologize and look to the girl's mother for help, diffuse this all in seconds. And yet. She doesn't know which is more appealing and unsettling by that feeling too: the nervous panic of Luther's suddenly careful movements and even slower words, or the way he holds his hand out all the same, as she lets herself take a step toward it, and him, taking it.
That hand that never left her hanging.
(Until it did.)
Is there a note of the pettiness none of her siblings would find surprising, somewhere deep inside it? A pale excuse to find herself back disastrously close to him, like in the cab, chasing that pricked longing that could only hurt her more in the end? A refusal to let him get comfortable, or anywhere near to control any of what happens here, in the place that is her world, and hers alone, now?
But all those question marks, and safer than's, are turning into smoke as her other hand settles against his shoulder, fingertips curling it only barely, and she finds herself whispering, with the edge of that smirk peeking out again. "Try not to make it look too much like you'd really rather flip the table and use it as a shootout shield."