[PRP] Visitation (Chaya, Holly)

[The Semblance of Unity]

She sighed creakily. "I like you as my friend, too. I feel like I do not have many and you are very dear." The lick tickled her hand and she smiled for a moment, wondering how he would feel if Hollandaise licked him back.

"I think.... we... should not think about it," she said sadly, because she had no other solution. "It is far off, and we can be close now...." It was a dubious solution at best. Hollandaise wasn't sure why graduation suddenly seemed something to dread.

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There was a kind of warm blurring, and Chaya turned over to wrap his arms around Holly's waist and rest his cheek against her hip. "You're a good friend and I like being here," he sighed, and closed his eyes. "I will be here a while still. My mamas asked when I'm moving up to year two but I don't know yet." His tail stayed tucked against his leg, his ears still ambiguously angled back.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"I am already in year two - we could move together? Timing, yes?" She laid her arms across his warm back, unashamedly trying to leech his warmth. The cooler months were terrible.

"I think you are very smart, Chaya, maybe you could already take your exam? Gradating should be good." Hollandaise did not sound convinced. "Are your mothers nice?"

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Chaya was a ghost, but unlike many ghosts, he was reassuringly animal-warm, often slightly translucent, yet solid and present unless he wanted to dissolve. He did not, at the moment. He wanted to be here, being held by Holly and letting her warm herself in a hug, and so he was. "We could," he said, a little uncertain. "Maybe I could. Nobody said but I can check. Do they call you up to do it or do you have to just go do it?"

"My mothers are nice," he said. "I have three mamas, my hound-mama who I look like, my banshee-mama, and my poltergeist-mama. They're all different but they're nice creeple. And my papa, too. He's a headless horseman."

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"They left a note upon my door, but I think that it would not be bad to ask. You are a good hound and surely you can." She looked down fondly at him, stroking twiggy fingers quickly through his hair.

Hollandaise worried her lip for a moment. "Do you miss your... family? Do you ever go to visit them?"

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"I'm a good dog," Chaya sighed, almost reflexively, and his ears relaxed, not pinned back as anxiously but laid back to let Holly pet his hair more easily.

"Sometimes," he said. "I haven't been back. The scareling is probably getting big now. I should try and visit ... "

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

She smiled. Chaya was a good dog, and Hollandaise felt closer to him than most, although she never did spend too much time analyzing her emotions. It tended to confuse her. Her ears twitched at the mention of a child.

"Scareling? Do you have a scareling, Chaya?" This was news to her, and it was shocking only in that it did not fit within her currently defined view of a 'family'. She had a lot to learn, she thought. "Scarelings are nice. Zar has two and the one I met made a nest in my hair."

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Chaya shook his head a little. On impulse, he lifted his chin to place a kiss on Holly's hand. "No, it's not my scareling ... Mamas and Papa had a new pumpkin that was going to hatch a week after I went away. So I have a little brother. He's a banshee." He sounded relaxed, apparently not really upset to not have met his baby brother yet.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

Heat washed across her face as the small kiss. It always made her blush, slightly, but Hollandaise thought it wasn't a bad thing - it just made her feel warm. She let out a small creak.

"Oh, your brother? I wonder if it is nice to have a sibling. Will you go back soon? A banshee - how noisy! I wonder if he will be as nice-looking as you. Do you think you will get along?" Hollandaise spoke as if this was the best thing in the world. And, because it was not really even, and because she wanted to, she leaned down and pressed a kiss to the top of his head. The angle was awkward, but Hollandaise didn't care. He smelled pleasantly sharp, of forests and something chill that tickled her nostrils pleasingly.

"You smell nice," she said, voice muffled, before straightening back up.

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"He is probably very noisy," Chaya said contentedly. "He probably screams a lot and nobody sleeps." This, perhaps, was the source of his lack of upset over not having met his newest sibling. He rolled onto his back with his head in Holly's lap, smiling up at her, his ears flicking as she kissed the top of his head. His hand reached up to touch her shoulder, a light grip that did not hold her and dropped easily away after a moment. He liked her; he liked to curl up with her and lie down like this and touch. He didn't know why, but that didn't matter.

"You smell nice too," he answered, and took a breath of her green-sap scent, wood and leaves and an earthiness that was her own.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"A day visit, perhaps. With no sleep intended!" The touch on er shoulder made her smile. She had often worried about creeple touching her leaves, pulling them out... but Chaya was so gentle. Hollandaise did not feel the urge to flinch or pull away. "I think I should like to have such a family; it somehow sounds nice. Even if there was a small brother with enough lungs for fifteen creeple."

She leaned down, curving her back until she could gently touch noses with him. Her nose was cold and Hollandaise wrinkled it at him. "Hmm, I think that you smell better. Would it not be interesting if everyone tasted as they smelled?" Tendrils of hair fell haphazardly around her face and her ears flicked back and forward. She was being fanciful, but sometimes flights of fancy were the best.

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"Maybe you can come meet my family too. I like my family, mostly," Chaya said, and laced his fingers over his belly comfortably. "I think you would like them."

"You have a cold nose! I think I'm supposed to be the one with the cold nose!" he teased, his eyes crinkling up with his smile. "I think you taste good," he added, and licked her playfully.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"I would like to meet them, I think. I like the idea of family - it sounds nice." And warm, like a blanket on a cold day. Hollandaise wondered if that meant families could cause over-heating. Surely not.

She creaked in surprise at his lick before leaning down to lick him back. "Hmm, you taste... I do not know..." she said, mock-seriously, and made as if to lick him again.

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"My family is nice. I scree-mail them. My moms are proud of me." Chaya's tail thumped once, contentedly.

"I taste like hound!" Chaya licked Holly's mouth, his eyes crinkling up with happy amusement. "And ghost!"

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"Is your papa proud, too?" Then she squeaked a little as Chaya licked her mouth. "Hound and ghost and different things, perhaps. But that is not how this is done, I think." It was still a bit of an odd angle, but Hollandaise leaned down the last few centimeters and kissed him. She'd been reading up. Or maybe she just wanted to kiss him. It was nice, after all.

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