The Nettle Tea Chronicles

Zoe

It took a while before Zoe and Cass were ready to leave the restaurant. They guessed it was because it was just a random Thursday, but the tables had never filled up to the point that they felt like they should vacate just to clear the space, and even their waiter was happy to let them relax and chat. They even ordered two desserts, because one order of the kulfi hadn't been enough.

In the end, they split the bill and left a solid tip for the waitstaff, given they took up a table for almost two hours. Zoe was bundled up in her large coat, mittens, and scarf again, ready to brave the cold once more.

Cassandra, in sharp contrast, wore an extra long women's peacoat, but not a particularly thick one. It looked really good on her, with the navy blue of the coat making her longer dark blonde hair look lighter by contrast. She did also have a lighter gray scarf tucked into the jacket, but it only wrapped around the base of her neck, and it looked more like it was for fashion than for warmth.

As they made their way to the nearest subway station to split off for the night and get home, Zoe watched as Cass' nose got progressively more red thanks to the cold and the fairly long walk. A few minutes in and Zoe was struggling not to laugh at Cassandra, who looked distinctly like Rudolph, her bright red nose standing out against her otherwise pale skin.

When Cassandra wrinkled her nose mid-sentence, Zoe couldn't help but chuckle. Cass raised an eyebrow in question and said, "What?" in a flat tone.

"I'm sorry, your nose is just so red from the cold. It's very cute." Zoe continued to snicker, holding a mitten in front of her face.

"Uh huh." Cass said, flatly. "So is yours, you idiot."

"Oh, really? My face doesn't feel that cold though…" Zoe said, pulling down her scarf a little. It had been pulled up over her nose, so she had truly thought that between it and her warm breath, her face was decently warm.

"Oh, it's red, alright." Cass said, her flat tone replaced with a teasing one.

"Yeah, well, so are your cheeks."

Cassandra responded to that by putting her hands to her cheeks with an open-mouthed look of shock. "What? No way!"

Zoe snickered again, "Are you sure you aren't cold without more layers?"

Cass smiled at that and settled down. "I'm sure. Or, it's more likely that I'm just used to the cold like this. Never really got all that bundled up as a kid, so now I just deal with the cold."

"Huh. I mean, I grew up here where it gets plenty cold and I never did that."

"Personal choice, then?" Cass mused. "Or maybe it's more of a nature versus nurture thing."

"Could be. You still look cold, though."

"Yeah, well, if I dressed like you I'm pretty sure I'd be sweating, even in this cold. As long as I keep my torso warm, I'm usually fine." Cass shrugged. "And peacoats are warmer than they look."

"Oh, really? I've never owned one."

Cass turned to Zoe with a devilish little grin and looked her up and down then chuckled. "I'd offer you mine, but I'm pretty sure it'd drag on the ground if you wore it."

Zoe thought she made an angry face at her friend, but Cass just laughed harder. While the coat definitely would not drag on the ground, Zoe was quite a bit shorter than Cass, by around 8 or 9 inches, she guessed. And the coat came down to Cass's knees. While she wouldn't admit it out loud, she imagined that, yes, it would indeed look silly on her.

But she still didn't appreciate the joke about her height.

"Why're you laughing?" She asked, once again trying to look at least mildly angry.

"I'm sorry. Really, I am." Cass said, "You just looked so much like an angry puppy just then. Something about the way your face scrunched up, I think."

Zoe fought against the urge to kick Cassandra in the shin. Show her exactly what she got for making fun of someone short. Instead, she took a deep breath, muttered a short, "whatever," and turned away from her friend, acting like she was pouting instead.

If Cass thought she looked like a cute little dog, she could use that against her instead.

"Oh, Zoe, I'm sorry. You've never been bothered by height jokes before, though." Cass said, immediately sounding regretful.

And she was right, too. Zoe had never really been bothered by people joking about how short she was. Her height just was what it was, and she honestly enjoyed being so short sometimes. It let her get away with some things that probably wouldn't fly otherwise.

But for some reason, Cass saying it right then did tick her off.

Having recognized that, though, she sighed. "Yeah, it's fine."

"Still curious about the peacoat?"

"A little. Maybe I'll go shopping over the weekend. See if I can't find any good last minute Christmas sales and get one."

"That's a good idea. If nothing else, you can try them on and see what I mean. They're really quite warm. I think it has something to do with the way they're layered. Or maybe the fabric choice? I'm not sure." Cass shrugged.

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"I'll take your word for it. Wanna come help me pick one out?"

"When did you want to go? I have plans to be a couch potato all weekend, but I think I can move some things around to be free."

"Sunday? I haven't finished all my weekly stuff for Mag Mell yet, so I wanted to do that on Saturday probably."

Cass shrugged. "Sunday works for me."

"Neat. We can solidify plans later then once I have a better idea of when I want to go."

"Is that code for 'whenever I wake up on Sunday'?"

"...No." Zoe said petulantly, which prompted Cass to laugh. Zoe joined her as they started down the stairs to the subway platform.

Once they both swiped through the turnstiles, they kept the conversation light and stood amidst the crowd for a bit together before Zoe needed to make her transfer to head home.

With a nice good bye and a wave, Zoe stepped off the train to catch her transfer. While Cass would be heading up to her apartment in the Bronx, Zoe needed to head to Queens for her apartment in Astoria.

Now on her own, the cold subway seemed colder than before, and she cuddled into her big jacket. Zoe was genuinely torn between just sitting there as comfortably as she could, or uncoiling to get her phone out for some entertainment. That would also mean uncovering her currently mittened fingers though, and that was a rough prospect.

Knowing that she still had at least a fifteen minute ride left, she decided to bite the bullet, and pulled out her phone for some mindless social media scrolling. Instead, when she saw the icon for the chat app, she opened up the Clan Nettle Tea chat and typed out a message to send.

{Nyx} : Y'all, next week is Christmas. I assume we're not raiding at least on Tuesday (Eve) and Wednesday (Christmas Day), right?

Once she sent the message, she waited a minute to see if she'd get a response. There was no immediate "x is typing…" message, so her mind wandered while she waited, eventually settling on how much she enjoyed her night. It was a little sad that the raid had been cancelled, but a break wasn't always bad. And she was sure that everyone would enjoy their own nights.

Having dinner with Cass was great. She had made it a point in the last several years to not go out one-on-one with her girl friends, and only go out with groups. But with Cass, they didn't exactly have a group to go out with. And she wasn't about to offer her college friends. She didn't think Cass would like the more party-focused girls anyway.

Inviting Cass out shopping with her was another one-on-one outing that she usually avoided. But at the same time, they had been going for lunches at work one-on-one for more than a year. And she was really looking forward to shopping with Cass, too. They had such different styles, and Zoe was looking forward to seeing if she could get Cass to try on some outfits she picked out while they were shopping.

Zoe just had to make sure she held the line.

No developing feelings for friends. She couldn't even let the thought sit with her; she immediately shoved it away. Nothing good ever came from catching feelings for friends. Zoe's last relationship had gone so badly that she hadn't even been interested in dating or anything of the sort since. She had deleted all the normal apps, and basically just decided that staying single would be fine for a while.

She was only 23 at the time. Even if she pulled herself from the dating pool for three or four years, she had plenty of time left to worry about it later.

No problem at all.

She wasn't exactly sure how Cass would react, but she didn't even really want to think about it. Sure, she had gotten a few hints that maybe Cass leaned that way, but nothing concrete. And certainly not enough to make her break any of the self-imposed rules she was currently living by.

{Caoimhe} : Oh, right. XD

{Caoimhe} : I'll be with my family those days for sure. Thursday is a possibility, though. We're not traveling or anything.

Zoe's phone buzzing with the response made her look down at it and smile.

{Nyx} : As expected. I imagine @Fiona would be about the same. I'll be with family, but if we wanted to do something small scale, I'll have a laptop.

{Evie} : I'll be at home witha bucket of fried chicken, flying solo for the holiday.

Zoe grinned at that, the picture of Cass relaxing with the bucket on her lap coming to mind again. She giggled as she responded.

{Nyx} : That's on you. I offered you a fake family for the holiday.

{Evie} : And like I said, solo > crashing a family event.

Zoe shrugged, but had to admit that perhaps showing up to a family holiday with a girl in tow might make things a little awkward. Her family knew she was into women, and would probably try to push them together.

She chuckled, figuring that Cass might have inadvertently dodged starring in a bad romcom.

{Bisky} : I totally forgot. I'll probably be running solo too. lol

{Mellody} : Aleister and I will be busy too, visiting my family.

{Bisky} : Don't forget to tell them I said Hi.

{Aleister} : Will do. I expect the return message will be something like "Should we send her some bagels?". They know you're hurting out there.

{Bisky} : If you send me some NJ/NY bagels I will love you forever.

{Aleister} : We'll see.

{Bisky} : T.T

{Nyx} : If they don't, I will.

{Bisky} : !!

{Bisky} : Really?

{Nyx} : Sure, I'd just need an address.

{Caoimhe} : Care to spread the love?

{Nyx} : We've got, what…3 people that live outside the tri-state area? @Firo you want some NY bagels, too?

{Bisky} : Nyx, if you send me some bagels, I'll send you some treats fresh from the bakery.

{Nyx} : Well, now I have no choice.

{Bisky} : What's your favorite kind of pastry?

{Nyx} : Bearclaw

{Bisky} : Done. I'll send you a dozen for a dozen bagels.

{Firo} : What's all this now?

{Evie} : Bake exchange

{Firo} : I have a killer cookie recipe. I'm down to swap.

{Caoimhe} : Christmas bake exchange?

{Nyx} : Oh hell yeah.

Zoe's head snapped up when she heard the announcement for her train stop, and she quickly stowed her phone to stand with a huge grin on her face.

She was looking forward to all the sweets that would be headed her way.