Wearily, Diami put her bags onto the kitchen table. She stretched a bit, looking at the bags. Her favorite grocery store was normally a few blocks away but a sidestep to avoid a bicycle barrelling down the street had thrown her into a one-way portal and a very long walk home. If Tasha hadn't been on the way to pick up a fare.... Diami sighed and reached a hand out toward the nearest bag.
A soft whisper of an air current floated through the otherwise still kitchen, perhaps from the open window.
Suddenly, slender hands in black gloves reached out of the darkness behind her, covering her eyes.
"Guess who!" said a smiling voice.
"Hmm..." Diami mused. "I don't know...but I should warn you that my boyfriend is really strong and handsome...and has a really _long_...sword." She turned around in the man's grip, his hands still staying over her eyes. "And from the feel of it, so do you..."
Diami's cheerful captor chuckles. "How lucky for me, then, that he hasn't the time just now to put it to good use..."
With that, he takes his hands from her eyes.
Diami looked up at her love. Merry blue eyes return her gaze from the eye holes of the red silk mask that covers the man's head from his hair down to his sharp, angular nose. He wears a red shirt with flared sleeves and a black vest and pants trimmed in gold. A rapier hangs from his belt, and a curious flat stone with a stylized broken arrow engraved upon it hangs from a thong around his neck. A black cape with a high collar billows gently around his legs in the soft breeze.
Noting a flower in her hair, his smile broadens. "Where did you come by -that- little ornament, my love?"
Diami blushed and reached a hand up to the daisy perched in her hair. "Oh, I bumped into a guy, walking out of the grocery store. He introduced himself as Tom and gave me this flower as an apology.... I don't think I've ever met him before, but he seemed familiar somehow..." She shrugged. "Oh well..."
"Aaaah... sounds like a gallant enough fellow. But alas for -him- that only -I- may take advantage of -that-" His eyes turned up towards the sprig of mistletoe hanging from the ceiling. "with the likes of -you-."
"Who's taking advantage of whom?" Diami asked him as her lips met his in a deep, deep kiss.
Catching her breath, she smiled happily up at him, encircled in his arms. "Go off and do your rescuing before some little old lady is forced to beat up her attacker on her own." She kissed him gently again on the lips and then let go of him. "And remember, we're leaving tomorrow morning to get to Sophie's by nightfall.. you know how she likes our visits. She's alone so much..." Diami shook her head to clear it of the sad image. "Now go, scoot! The sooner you leave, the sooner you can come back!" She made shooing motions with her hands.
He laughed, loud and carefree. "Of course, my dear," he responded, drawing his rapier and holding it on high. (But carefully, so as not to impale the ceiling.) "I'm off!"
With a twirl of his cape, he leapt from the window and was gone.
She sighed fondly. "What would I do without you, Willie?"
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