Yaris 75, 2717 - Evening
It was galling, utterly and completely, but... Well. He was right. Neither novel was very good, but the one she'd smashed into his pretty, gold-ringed face was the better of the two. She didn't much care for the main female character, she was rather typically written and had little to recommend her, but the other side characters were in turns thrilling and charming. Even if neither novel hung together very well, and she still thought Fahren's switch to fantasy fiction had been a good move, of the two options, Murder Beneath Vienda was the lesser.
Also, she couldn't stop thinking about him saying that all of the details about the sewers were wrong.
Cerise was not a great fan of debts. If there was a prize for the winning, she thought, there should be a punishment for the losing. Reluctantly, she concluded that she knew what seemed to fit best: she should apologize. Or at least admit she had been mistaken, which was the same, wasn't it? Surely it was.
The problem was, she wasn't quite sure how to go about accomplishing this goal. She had gone by the Stack Exchange, once or twice, but she hadn't seen Emiel or the other young man who had been with him. That would have been too much of a coincidence, really. Cerise would have to come up with a different plan, eventually.
The thought had gotten lost somewhere in the flurry of midterms, and studying for them the week before as she always did. The exams themselves had gone fine. Cerise had no doubt about that--this, too, was not unusual. As her final midterm finished, she thought that what she was probably going to do was go back to her room and read. The idea of going out had some appeal, but she hadn't anyone to go out with at the moment, and she didn't want to be in the Stacks alone. She had forgotten about her debt, until her ears caught the edge of a conversation in the hall.
"No, I'm telling you--we should go to the Badger. We always go where you want to go, Alejandro. It's not fair."
"It's not faaaair--listen to you!" The Alejandro in question put on a rather poor and nasal impression of his friend. "Fine. We'll go where you want to go this time, okay? We'll go to the Singing clocking Badger, you absolute prick."
From there the conversation, such as it was, had devolved into youthful friendly jostling and a lot of elbows to the ribs. Perhaps not so friendly. The name stuck out to her, and Cerise frowned, trying to remember--and then it slid rather abruptly into place. Emiel had said the name of the place--he tended bar, he said, at that very tavern.
There! That was perfect then. She would go, and she would tell him he had been right, and... And he could hit her, she supposed, if he wanted to. That seemed like a very unpleasant prospect, but it also seemed fair. Much more fair than her hitting him in the first place had been, although she couldn't find it in herself to regret the action. He had been very irritating.
Cerise returned to her room. To get a book, she thought, because as long as she was there, she might as well ask if he'd read any of the ones by Fahren that she thought were any good. And if he hadn't, perhaps she could give him one of her copies. There were three of them; he hadn't written many, before he retired. Cerise thought a moment, and put all three in the bag. That was also payment, of a kind. Better than hitting her in the face--at least she hoped so.
It also made sense to change out of her uniform. It was still Yaris, and though the heat was retreating the closer they edged to Dentis, it certainly wasn't gone entirely. There was a moment when Cerise had caught herself fussing over her choices--as if it mattered at all! As if the way she looked had anything to do with anything. In the end she chose her favorite walking skirt in a deep garnet, a plain cream-colored blouse she thought had always fit her particularly pleasingly, and no jacket at all. Which wasn't quite proper, but she didn't care--it was hot outside. All of these things were close at hand, well-loved favorites. Not in any way selected because they looked nice, as she didn't care if she did or not.
So that was how Cerise Vauquelin found herself arriving at The Singing Badger, absolutely packed to the gills with students happy to be freed from exams (for a time). Shoulders squared with her bag slung over them, and all three of Fahren's best works inside of it. Even in the utter chaos of a packed house after midterms, Cerise felt confident she could pick the purple-haired wick out fairly easily. He rather stood out, after all. Striding in with swift and unforgiving clicks of her heels, she hovered a moment towards the front, until--yes, there he was. Easy to find after all.
With no care at all for anything else he might have been doing, she crossed the tavern floor, hurtling like a comet towards an unsuspecting planet. Only to hesitate when she got close enough to feel the edge of his glamour. Perhaps this had not been such a well thought-out plan, after all. No--no. She had come all this way, and she would admit that she had been wrong, and that would be that.
"E-Emiel!" Gods she hoped she remembered his name correctly--the other one had shouted it loud enough. And besides, if she was wrong, it was too late now--she just had to commit, and see what happened. "I, uhm. Ahem. You were right. The other one is better, after all." She had something of a glower on her face while she said it, but she was pleased to note that she hadn't blushed. Much.