Audrey steps into Club Coze with her purse slung over her shoulder, and looks around for Eva.

Eva raises a hand from her booth and waves slightly, her silver hair gleaming in the light. She's wearing a long black dress with silver feathers embroidered along its bodice. The air next to her shimmers unsteadily; she must have raised the privacy screens already.

Audrey walks over and sits across from her, ducking her head slightly. Her hands settle in her lap, and she looks at Eva seriously.

"So." she says.

"So." says Eva. "Would you like... coffee or something?" She knits her hands together on the table.

Audrey shakes her head. "I don't think so. I think we should just... get right down to it."

Eva nods. "You first or me first?"

"Me first." Audrey takes a breath. "I - without meaning to... denigrate what you've done for me and, um, to me... I mean, I can see the way that you've helped me grow and blossom and be more than I was before... but... I feel… uneasy. I feel like the entire time I've been with you, you've been… following a script, saying… "I can help this inexperienced girl, I know how that works, I know how to help her." And that doesn't feel like you - see me, see the girl you care about, I feel like I'm your - patient, or something, not your girlfriend." She knits her hands together.

Eva runs a hand through her hair. "That's… I mean, I'd do this for just about anyone - "

"That's exactly the problem. I don't feel like… I'm special to you, despite all the things you've said to the contrary. It feels like you had a plan and you followed the plan and it didn't really - matter that it was me specifically, that any other cute inexperienced girl could have made you fall as hard and as fast."

"Audrey, it's been - decades, since I've let anyone in as close to me as you." Eva crosses her arms. "What more could I have done?"

"You could have - I don't know. Told me what your hopes were for me. Been… more attentive…" Audrey trails off. "I don't understand it, okay, objectively you're wonderful but something isn't right. I keep going back to… my decision to be with you, after you told me that you'd - been hoping the entire time that I would go out with you, that you'd directed me to your friends deliberately - and it just feels like if you'd been a slightly different person I would have regretted that a lot." Audrey folds her arms as well, and looks at Eva seriously.

Eva shakes her head. "But I'm not that person."

"It's true, you aren't. But… it still means something that you were willing to lead me around by the nose like that. This whole time, you… you haven't been treating me as your equal. You've been playing with me like I was - a particularly bright cat. It's not remarkable about me that I'm… able to communicate, or honest, or even brave. You've met plenty of people who are all those things. What you like about me is that - I'm all those things so early. It's not that the dancing bear is good at dancing, it's that it dances at all. I feel like… for this entire time, you've been grading me on a curve."

Eva winces. "I -" She looks down at the table. "I've been - doing my best to support you and help you grow and let you make your own choices -"

"Was it making my own choices for you to push me into therapy with Clematis? Was it making my own choices to tell me December would help me learn about hypnosis?" Audrey's brow furrows.

"You always could have walked away." Eva frowns back.

"Be realistic. You knew I wasn't going to." Audrey huffs. "If I'd walked away, I would have - failed your test, not been the person you wanted to have. You were… only willing to be mine if I moved towards you."

Eva leans back in her seat. "That's called respecting consent, Audrey."

Audrey lets out a breath. "Yeah. I guess it is. But you did a lot of stacking the deck."

"Was that wrong of me?" Eva tilts her head. "I only wanted to help you."

Audrey scowls. "Don't duck the subject. It - doesn't matter what your motivations were, the point is you were - willing to push."

"Should I have just left you to stumble on your own?" Eva frowns. "That's a kind of harm done to you too."

"That's just it - it was… You were testing me. To see if I measured up to your standards. And your standards include my wanting to fuck you."

"Of course they do! I don't want to fuck people who don't want me to fuck them - "

"You're not listening." Audrey sighs. "We're going in circles. The point is, this whole time, you've been my - mentor, maybe, and never my partner. Never willing to offer more than you had already decided to. Never willing to… be genuinely vulnerable, and not just supportive. Even when I was the one doing things to you, you were always in control."

Eva looks down at her hands. "I…" She exhales. "… there were moments where you surprised me."

"But they were the exception and not the rule." Audrey taps her foot against the floor. "You've never really and honestly been mine this entire time…" Audrey tilts her head. "Except maybe for at the very end of this morning. And that was… something I had to push for. You never offered to me what I've been offering to you this entire time."

Eva nods slowly. "You... you're not wrong. I've been... hiding from you. From everyone, really... I... This sounds really convenient but I was actually planning to tell you a bit more about my history and... why I haven't dated for the last couple decades, and what's special about you." She rubs her hand against her inner elbow and sighs. "This is kind of weird, and I... understand if you want to leave about it... but I need to be honest with you and speak my heart."

Audrey frowns. "This sounds kind of serious. Go on?"

Eva sighs. "Three decades ago I was a practicing hypnotist, close to Clematis and December and... people whose names I don't recall anymore. I was popular and well-liked in the community. But then one day I - stopped seeing anyone. Stopped doing hypnosis. Dropped the whole thing like it had never happened, didn't go back to my old friends." 

Audrey's frown deepens. "Why? Was there... some kind of scandal?" 

Eva shakes her head. "I don't know. I erased my own memories of two decades back from that point. Overnight, people I cared about became... strangers to me. I had lost all my hypnosis skills as well, so even if I'd wanted to continue from that point, I didn't have the experience to. Clematis and December tried to get me to talk about it, at the time, but... I was too scared of whatever it was that got me to cut out all those memories. It was awkward to try to pretend to be friends with them, and I didn't want them to know what I'd done to myself, so... I ghosted them. I never explained what had happened." 

Audrey taps her thumb against her other elbow. "So... for all these years, you haven't known what went wrong?"

"Yeah." Eva looks away. "The Namer's War was right around that timeframe, so my best guess is that there was something about it that I - desperately needed to forget. Some pain, or some secret, or both. Something I couldn't just explain to Clematis and December, something that - I had to hide, and bury, and deny. Something worth cutting out part of who I was just to try and pick up again afterwards."

"... I see." Audrey sighs softly. "It's never simple with you, is it?"

Eva shakes her head. "I'm afraid not."

"You wanted to hide this from me, too?" Audrey tilts her head. 

"Yeah. I... really struggled, about talking about this. I don't even know what went wrong. It could be literally anything, and that's terrifying to me. But..." She looks down at the table. "Three decades of lies is enough. I have a chance to start again, and - I'm going to take it, if I can. And that's because of you. Because I wanted to - be the person who'd deserve your love and care and service." 

"You're not doing something drastic, are you?" Audrey's voice gets a little higher-pitched. 

Eva shakes her head. "No, all I'm doing is... looking. I still have the memories I excised, and... I told Clematis this morning, and asked her to help me recover things without - you know, recklessly taking it all back at once. She said she'd help." 

"Do you know what she'll find?" Audrey tilts her head. 

"I don't. But I... trusted her once, and I think I still do. Despite everything that's come between us." 

Audrey nods. "Have you told December?"

"I haven't, yet. I... wanted to hear your answer, first." 

Audrey frowns. "I... can't promise that I'll stay. It does matter, you - being open and honest with me about this. But if you're - I don't know, a mass murderer or something, secretly - then I'm not going to be yours, and I would hope you wouldn't expect that of me in the first place."

Eva shakes her head. "I don't think it's like that... I really hope it's not like that. I don't think that kind of thing is... in my nature. But it could be, and if it is, I promise I'll tell you. Or if I don't, Clematis will - she's going to have access to everything, and I know she'll look out for you." 

"I'll hold you to that." Audrey taps her fingers against her arm a little more. "That said... while it's good that you're telling me this, and I understand that you're trying to be open and honest... None of this changes how you've treated me over the past few days. Even if you had a reason, it doesn't - make you treating me as less than you justified." 

Eva's face falls. "I..." She opens her mouth, then closes it. She looks down at her lap.

"Yeah." Audrey's voice is quiet, but it carries far enough. "I thought you might have trouble with that."

Eva squeezes one hand in her lap with the other, tight enough to hurt a little bit as her joints creak. "I... I really was just trying to help you."

Audrey nods. "Yeah. But you never treated me as an equal. Not until the very last moments of our time together. You... if only it were so simple as you lying. That would be easy, I could just wash my hands of you and be done with it. But you don't lie, you just hide things; you don't set out to hurt me, you just do accidentally because you won't get down on my level and speak to me like a person and not a - apprentice. You're so old and so used to getting your own way that you've almost convinced yourself that your way is right just because it's your way. Because you're a kind person, and people are thankful for that, and it's so easy to hide behind that charming smile of yours and - be the good mentor, be the charming datemate, be - anything but vulnerable, anything but yourself." Audrey blows a strand of hair out of her face. "But at the same time, you're the woman who went down on one knee in a public bar for me when I couldn't speak, who guided me gently through losing my virginity, who helped me realize that I'm at least a little pretty in my new body and that - I can be strong enough to be intimate with someone." She smiles crookedly. "But that doesn't mean I'm going to settle for anything less than an honest and detailed apology."

Eva looks down at the table, and unclenches her hands. "I..." She leans her head forwards and lays her forehead into her palm. "... I never meant to hurt you." 

Audrey shakes her head. "We've established that. You did anyway."

"I still don't really understand... how, though. I was genuinely doing my best for you, being... there for you to lean on, there to help you, there to - guide you. I am a domme, that's part of who I am, so it's... very natural for me to take the lead."

Audrey 's frown deepens. "Clematis told me that if I had a problem, or if I ever wanted you to stop, you would want to hear it. And so far all I've heard is excuses. I've been clear - the issue is that you never really treated me like an equal in your own heart, and been willing to be vulnerable and raw with me like I have been with you. All this time you've been... wearing a charming mask of the person you think I want you to be, but I don't want you to be that person, I want you to be you. Does that make sense?"

Eva sighs softly. "... Yeah, I see what you're saying. And if I ever - belittled or condescended to you, I sincerely apologize for that. I never meant to treat you like you were - beneath me."

"I didn't say you belittled me or condescended to me, Eva." Audrey sighs. "You keep missing the point. The problem is that... all this time, you've been acting like the relationship goes the way you say or it doesn't go. You're... I hesitate to say "controlling", but you're... at least a little manipulative. And I don't like being played with."

"You seemed to - " Eva cuts herself off. "... what am I saying?"

"I don't know. You seem to just be defending yourself without really thinking about it." Audrey sighs.

"I was about to say "it seemed like you enjoyed being played with", but - that's not actually a defense, is it. You're hurt now. It doesn't matter whether you enjoyed it then, it - wasn't a decision you endorse." 

"Yeah." Audrey lays her hands on the table. "It might have been okay, if - if I didn't have a life outside the Bowers, if I was someone just here to play and have fun and - do whatever it is you do all day. But you - you've changed my life, and I feel like it was - mostly an accident that it was for the better and not for worse." 

Eva nods. "I didn't - you did actually want to have sex with me, right, I didn't - force you, did I - ?"

"It sounds like you're starting to ask the right questions," Audrey allows. "No, you didn't rape me. I went into this freely and of my own will. But I do... doubt whether that decision was the wisest one, in retrospect, even if I wouldn't change it knowing what would happen afterwards. When people are manipulative like that, they're usually... not very good people." She looks at Eva seriously.

Eva sighs. "... You're right." She looks down at the table. "I... The truth is, I've done this... a lot of times. Not the way we did with you, with the - kneeling at your feet, and the saying I'll date them, and the - care - but I've slept with a lot of people, a lot of inexperienced people, because... Well, because I like helping them, because I like seeing them grow and flower..."

Audrey nods. "Yeah. But... you won't give me something solid to hold on to. I feel like whenever I try to speak about... things I understand, about work, about where I came from, about - things that are in my life - it feels like you're from another world. You care, you care so much, but when I try to hold on to you you slip away like mist." 

Eva taps her chin and tilts her head to the side. "I... I'm really trying to be vulnerable for you, Audrey, to - show you the person I really am - and be honest and forthright and caring - but... Something about that does ring true. There's the age and experience gap, but... I don't think it's that simple."

Audrey brushes aside a strand of her pink hair and leans in a little. "Yeah. I feel like... vulnerability, and manipulation, and - feeling like you're faraway - and all the rest of it - is... it's all connected, but it's hard to name the exact thing that's at the core of it all except to maybe say that we're very different people..." 

Eva hums softly. "You feel like I'm alien to you?"

"A little. It's not - the central thing. I feel like I understand you, I just - it feels like you're fake. Like you're too perfect, or not perfect enough, or just - different from how I think you ought to be. You say you want to date me - then why haven't you asked me if I want to do things outside the Bowers? Why haven't you... ever asked to make plans with me? You keep pushing the ball into my court, making me advance on you, when you clearly want me and care about whether I fuck you and - it's just disingenuous. It feels like you're pressuring me. Just ask, Eva, would it kill you to be direct about what you want and what matters to you instead of making me go to a fucking therapist just because you can't tell me I'm beautiful to my fucking face?" Audrey tears up and presses her hands over her eyes and takes a shuddering breath. 

Eva's voice goes quiet and small. "I… I'm sorry. I - I should never have let someone else tell you that instead of me."

Audrey looks up over her hands. "… You mean it?"

"I mean it. I… I've been trying to tell you that ever since I met you. I've said it out loud to you, even, I know I have. You just… never took it as more than flattery. I… I thought that if Clematis could help you see it, where I couldn't… Then I should send you to her." Eva takes an unsteady breath.

"You shouldn't have. You - know how to hypnotize people - you could have done what Clematis did, easily you could have - shown me you meant it, really meant it -"

"Yeah. I really should have." Eva looks down at the table. "I… I want… I want to hug you. May I?"

Audrey nods, still rubbing at her tear-stained face.

Eva gets up from her place at the table, and steps through the privacy barrier to Audrey's side of the table. "… Could you get up for me?"

Audrey steadies herself against the tabletop, and shakily stands. As soon as she's clear of the table, Eva seizes her in a fierce hug.

"I…" Eva presses her face into Audrey's shoulder. "I want… you. I want to be with you. For… a long time. Not just two weeks. Not just a month. Not just a year. I… it's hard to know for certain how long, to - guess - I've only known you for… such a short time - but I want you, Audrey, I want you in my life you matter please -" She chokes up. "Please don't hate me. I'm sorry."

Hesitantly, Audrey lifts her hands and pats Eva's back. "I… it's okay. I think you… see, now." She presses her own face into Eva's shoulder and hugs her close. "I - I love you."

"I love you too," Eva manages. And she presses Audrey in close against her and holds her like she might lose her.

Audrey holds her back, and breathes, and slowly they sway together. The café is forgotten.

"I…" Audrey nuzzles into Eva a little. "Thank you."

"No," says Eva, smiling through her tears. "Thank you."