Tornados from a butterfly's wing
For a long time, Ama had kept to herself. Nev had been a capable guardian (when present) but had never been keen on affection. She knew it was because she made her guardian a bit uncomfortable. A natural effect of a child being too intuitive, maybe, and the way her eyes made it so difficult to tell if she was really looking at you or not. It had all added up to her choosing to avoid the population at large wherever possible.
Suspecting someone doesn't like you is one thing. It's an entirely different thing to know for sure. Luckily, the pony-mare had learned a few things as she'd grown, one of which is that no one really has control over how they feel about things, but that those feelings often made sense if you dug deep enough. It made it easier to deal with her own feelings of loneliness and sometimes rejection, when she looked back and realized why those feelings existed in the first place.
Maybe Borderline just hadn't gotten that far yet in her own journey. Ama was no mind reader, couldn't make others tell her why things were the way they were. But if they did say, it helped her put the pieces together in a way that often made sense. Maybe eventually she and Borderline would get to the point where they could start figuring out the grey lady's puzzle together.
She was getting ahead of herself, though. It was the excitement, to have this bright start to a new friendship. She smiled brilliantly when Borderline expressed openness to the idea she had set forth. "I'll give you a few days to think on it. No need to decide right away." It was a big decision, after all. There was also the matter that Yan had been building on recently. A trip to the mountain was in order soon, but she would let the copper stallion share that news with Borderline. He was the mastermind behind the plot, after all.
On impulse, the butterfly mare reached slightly to kiss the grey woman on the cheek. A mark of friendship, of trust, of things to come. "It'll all turn out. You'll see. And you can eat my wings if they don't." It was a lighthearted promise, and perhaps more than she had any right to guarantee. Still, it felt true in the moment. They would let the children play a while longer, make small talk that did nothing but offer them a chance to get to know each other a bit better. And then they'd go their seperate ways again, innocent of the changes the world had brewing.
...Amarine
@[Borderline] Good place to wrap it up?