It's Not What It Looks Like

ᴇʟᴇᴠᴇɴ | ꜰʀɪᴇɴᴅꜱ ᴡɪᴛʜ ʙᴇɴᴇꜰɪᴛꜱ

‧̍̊˙· 𓆝.° ｡˚𓆛˚｡ °.𓆞 ·˙‧̍̊

𝐌𝐞𝐧𝐚 𝐦𝐚𝐲 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐛𝐞 𝐚𝐧 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐭 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐢𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐚𝐥 𝐩𝐡𝐞𝐧𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐡 𝐬𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐨𝐥 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬, 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐢𝐭𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐨𝐟 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞, 𝐬𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐲𝐛𝐞- 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐲𝐛𝐞- 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐦𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐛𝐞 𝐟𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐝.

"On the contrary," Lyrica comforts her, watching as Silena rests her head against Mena's shoulder. "This is precisely how it usually goes. You needn't worry."

She, quite clearly, can not even begin to understand how dire this situation truly is.

Of course, all parties are going to end with someone being drunk off their ass. Mena might be a romantic, but she isn't entirely oblivious. She just didn't expect that someone to be Silena- and she definitely didn't expect drunk Silena to act like this.

It was a pretty reasonable mistake of her to make, her roommate's general demeanour considered. After all, Silena Valentine should, by literally every single rule of nature known to man, not be an affectionate drunk.

Yet here they are.

"Keeks is going to flip if she shows up like this."

Silena, as though trying to demonstrate what exactly seems to be the issue, raises her finger to poke Mena in the cheek, an entirely too focused look on her face. Ever since she reappeared about five minutes ago, totally wasted, she has been doing that a lot.

"Keeks?"

"Silena's dad."

"I could give the two of you a lift to the diner?" Lyrica offers, because she's a literal angel. "You can wait until she sobers up a bit, and it's only a five-minute walk from Silena's house."

Mena bites her lip, slapping Silena's hand away as it begins to near her cheek again. She doesn't want to ruin her friend's fun, but Lyrica waves off her concerns quickly.

"It's no problem. I've got an early morning episode of Downton Abbey to catch, anyway."

That is how Mena finds herself sitting in a diner at three in the morning, drunk Silena staring at her intently from across the table.

"Can I hold your hand?"

Mena snaps her head up alarmingly fast, and nearly flicks her french fry across the room.

"What?"

Immediately, Silena looks away.

"Nothing. Forget it."

Yeah, right. As if anyone could simply forget something as monumental as Silena Valentine asking to hold their hand.

"No, no, hold on. I was just unprepared. You can hold it."

Silena frowns. She tucks her hands under her arms, as though she doesn't trust herself not to accept the offer otherwise.

"If you don't wanna, you don't wanna."

"I wanna," Mena says, as assuringly as she can. She reaches across the table, uncaring of how strange she must look, and carefully pulls one of Silena's hands towards her own, until they're clasped together. Then, she victoriously raises them in the air.

"There."

Silena looks up at their joined hands in wonder.

She brings them down to her eye level and turns them around- once, twice, six times- before finally giving a satisfied nod.