[With the peanut butter finished, Ilsa gives Valo a soft scratch on the head and pushes herself up to her feet, all while listening to Eustace very, very carefully. She may not be looking at him, but her ears are telling, still turned in his direction even as she walks away to the kitchen. She just finds it easier to busy herself with something, finding it too awkward to simply stand there and watch him as he tells her all these things that have been on her mind for just as long, confusing her and making her doubt herself...
...?
But she feels his eyes on her, fixing her with an intense stare that has her lifting her gaze to look at him and meet his. She immediately regrets it and drops them back to the counter where she's set down the spoon for now.
This is certainly not a conversation she ever imagined would happen. Ilsa has gone over it all in her head so many times—her ideal relationship, the perfect wedding, how she wanted it to start and end... She had it all planned out, and then Eustace swooped in and shook it all up. To no fault of his own.
And honestly...? She's not completely turned off by the idea of it. Not when she thinks back to how much fun she did have with him on the dance floor and at the bar... and then everything that happened after.
It's just that there are so, so many complicated feelings, all of them influenced by the drinks that they had... Without them, she thinks she might be surer of what she wanted. She always is, and this is the first time she's taken this long to even begin to figure it out.
Her train of thought is why she takes a while to answer. Not because she doesn't want to work through whatever this now is, if it's anything at all—how presumptuous of her—but because she is almost mad at herself for not having a solution right away.
Why is it that the one thing that she wanted in her life is also the thing that's weighing her down so much?
Ilsa runs her fingers through her hair again.]
I can neither ignore what happened nor accept it and carry on.
[It's the last part of what he said that's grabbed her.]
I think something did change. I knew that it did when I remembered that, even when I didn't know who you were, I was... drawn to you anyway. [She very deliberately avoids "attracted".] It wasn't like that with anyone else and I think there was a reason for that.
no subject
...?
But she feels his eyes on her, fixing her with an intense stare that has her lifting her gaze to look at him and meet his. She immediately regrets it and drops them back to the counter where she's set down the spoon for now.
This is certainly not a conversation she ever imagined would happen. Ilsa has gone over it all in her head so many times—her ideal relationship, the perfect wedding, how she wanted it to start and end... She had it all planned out, and then Eustace swooped in and shook it all up. To no fault of his own.
And honestly...? She's not completely turned off by the idea of it. Not when she thinks back to how much fun she did have with him on the dance floor and at the bar... and then everything that happened after.
It's just that there are so, so many complicated feelings, all of them influenced by the drinks that they had... Without them, she thinks she might be surer of what she wanted. She always is, and this is the first time she's taken this long to even begin to figure it out.
Her train of thought is why she takes a while to answer. Not because she doesn't want to work through whatever this now is, if it's anything at all—how presumptuous of her—but because she is almost mad at herself for not having a solution right away.
Why is it that the one thing that she wanted in her life is also the thing that's weighing her down so much?
Ilsa runs her fingers through her hair again.]
I can neither ignore what happened nor accept it and carry on.
[It's the last part of what he said that's grabbed her.]
I think something did change. I knew that it did when I remembered that, even when I didn't know who you were, I was... drawn to you anyway. [She very deliberately avoids "attracted".] It wasn't like that with anyone else and I think there was a reason for that.