week four | mingle

[marriagebroker]

Final week at the estate! Final week with your friends. Final week with your beaus. Time to make the most of it, everyone!

In fact, to celebrate this fact, today there is a cake. It's nothing special, just a nice little cake to enjoy with your morning coffee or throughout the day. Yay, cake!

And when Wei Wuxian arrives that morning, he is going to call out once again for everyone to join him, near the cake.

"Everyone, I have another announcement!"

Hell yeah, announcements.

Boom Boom Room | Dates | Property Damage
Truth Booth Voting | Match Ceremony Voting

Comments

[phenomerom]

[ He'd kept a hand braced against the countertop near where he'd deposited the coffee cup, looming a little as he watched Yi Sang while waiting for a response, and Rom exhales softly at that before pulling back. ]

... your parents named you aptly, Mr. Yi Sang. That's quite the idealistic response.

[poans]

I am also odd.

[Growing up, he was always something of an oddball. It was difficult for him to express himself and to be understood in turn; however, most people accepted his eccentricities and let him be. He was seldom bothered by virtue of his talents, which were considered desirable by society.

Yi Sang looks up from the cup. Rom, from the sounds of it, was led down a different path.]

. . . I cannot claim to know the depths of your pain, Rom. What I can say is that you are quite the compassionate individual, indeed, to regard your parents so.

1/2

[phenomerom]

[ Rom gives a slight cant of the head at that, thinking, as his gaze slides aside. -- pain? Has he been in pain? Physically, certainly, many times, but never beyond a level he could survive. But he knows that's not what Yi Sang means.

His silence is broken only so he can fetch his own cup, taking a small sip of the coffee. (The coffee Edamura brews tastes better.) ]

... it's not compassion.

[ His usual showmanship's been completely cast aside for the moment; his delivery is quiet and even. ]

I simply know how things are. I am an anomaly, not meant to exist alongside normal people barring special circumstances. -- and even among those of my kind, I'm abnormal. Different. [ Potentially harmful. ] Accepting my parents' path of action has nothing to do with compassion. To expect otherwise would simply be unrealistic.

[ -- he'd realized at a young age that he was something different and other. And so long as he could keep that fact in mind, he couldn't be hurt by his parents' actions. They hadn't been cruel to him; they had simply done what was logical. It hadn't been his fault that he'd been cast aside. ]

[phenomerom]

[ Rom takes another small sip of his coffee before he giving a wan smile. ]

You're terribly kind, Mr. Yi Sang. But people like you are rare. ... it's not a bad thing that you're idealistic, and I hope you get to stay that way.

[poans]

[Out of consideration for the hospitality, he takes a sip himself, though his chest twists at the words that follow.

Rom's logic is a lifeline. To cut it would mean to fall into a pool of untold emotions; acceptance of the facts is therefore a necessity to sidestep the yawning despair below. It's a tightrope on which Rom walks, drawn far over the heads of others, who roam a seemingly separate plane.

Yi Sang's idealism has invited unimaginable harm, both to himself and to others. In thinking he could get away with doing what he loves innocently, time stopped and everything lost meaning. He knows now where he's erred, and he won't change. But Rom . . . ]

That day at the parlor, what inexplicable visage etched itself into your retina?

[phenomerom]

[ Rom blinks at that. Regards Yi Sang neutrally for a moment.

Then it's the return of his usual showmanship. ]

Ahhhh, that? No need for you to worry about that now, Mr. Yi Sang!

[ Complete with dramatic hand gesture. ]

That ice cream parlor was haunted, certainly, but it wasn't much more than a garden variety malicious spirit lurking there. I made sure to keep a vigilant eye on it, so it shouldn't have affected you at all. I'm glad I was able to be of service~

[poans]

[As he suspected, there was something there, which Rom shouldered alone. The crossing doesn't appear to go both ways, and the thought weighs Yi Sang's eyes shut.]

. . . Thank you still, for your care.

[That wasn't a mere service. Even if it isn't exactly compassion, there's still a warmth to be found in Rom's heart that's worthy of validation.]