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A smile formed on the brunette's lips. "Fine." She repeated.
She'd take what she could get. While this was in no way the end to all the feelings she'd been harboring, it was a step in the right direction. For once, she didn't feel the need to run away. For once, she felt more like staying than hiding.
"Show me what you got, Gallo." She raised her eyebrows in challenge.
A sigh fell from the brunette's lips. She tilted her head at the blonde before shaking her head. "Trying to get rid of me?" Still, she smiled.
She leaned back, propping herself up on her elbows. She tossed the blonde a lazy glance. "What if I want to stay and watch you dance?" She would get a great view from here, after all. "If you're up for it." Chandler tossed a quick glance towards the blonde's foot; She didn't know the blonde's power as well as she hoped, but she wondered if it made her joins more mobile and less susceptible to damage.
As the girl started moving, Chandler was left wondering what she'd gotten herself into. Of course, she didn't worry for too long before she followed after. She'd never been one to worry too much. Besides, what was the worst that could happen?
Brows furrowed at the question. "Clothes are just clothes." She offered, hoping that would be enough of an answer. She didn't have a lot of sentimentality when it came to clothes. She could always buy new ones, right? A hand came up to her shirt, fingers running over the yellow hand print now plastered on her shirt. "Other than this?" She shook her head no.
"I am, yeah." She felt no shame in it, and really, she couldn't blame the blonde for her reaction. It was hardly a thing either of them had expected when coming here.
It felt like a safe in between, too.
A smile formed on the brunette's lips. "Yeah, but that's sort of the point." Maybe they would be less likely to fall back into bad habits. Maybe not.
She looked at the hand still holding onto her own. The hand she'd once claimed to know as well as her own. She felt the familiar pull of the even more familiar power. "Saturday, 7PM. That cute little place by the park, yeah?"
She'd still a lot to figure out about the power. She still wasn't entirely sure how it worked, or how she even decided on what color to go for, but she supposed she'd done well for her first attempt. "I don't even like yellow..." She said, head tilting. Ah, well. It didn't really matter.
Her head perked up, brown eyes coloring with curiosity. "It depends really." She offered with a shrug. "But generally somewhere between thirty and sixty minutes." She had no idea what the other girl had in mind, but thus far, she had no reason to distrust the girl. Whatever she was thinking of, Chandler was positive it would end up being fun.
Or wholly frustrating, but that was a commodity when it came to mimicking powers. It was hardly the girl's fault.
It was a step in the right direction, and while Chandler might not have felt sure about it all, it was progress. She supposed it was silly of her to harness such anger towards the blonde. Sadly, it wasn't as easy to get rid of as she would have wanted.
She thought about it for a moment, her mind seeming muddled still, but perhaps the mud had cleared. If only just a little.
"Let's go on a date." They'd seemingly skipped all the traditional steps before, so maybe going through the motions was the better step. They couldn't very well fall back to where they'd been. It didn't seem right.
Chandler found a sense of comfort in her words. While her natural instinct told her not to believe it, she knew better. Callie didn't lie. She spoke the truth, always, even if it was only her version of it. Callie believed her own words and that was all that mattered.
Lacing her fingers with the hand so easily offered, Chandler fell silent. She wondered if it could really be that easy. If that was all she'd needed to hear. She felt content, sure, but was that enough?
"You never know." She offered with a shrug. She'd met all kinds of people during her lifetime, so she didn't think anything would surprise her at this point. Of course, this girl didn't at all strike her as someone too shy to hold hands with another girl, but Chandler had learned it was generally easier when you gave them a heads up. Fingers laced with her own and Chandler's eyes closed; she could feel the shift, the way the girl's abilities were mimicked and her own was replaced. Each power felt different. Each had a different sensation. The girl's power felt... Strange, but in a good kind of way. It felt inspirational and warm.
Dark brown eyes opened then. "Hm." She mused. She wasn't sure what she'd expected it to feel like, but this wasn't it. The ability felt personal, and not at all generic, like some powers did. It was... Oddly nice.
Dropping her hands, she stared at them for a moment. It always took her a moment to figure out how the powers worked. She concentrated on her hands and nothing happened, which meant that the ability was similar to her own in that retrospect; Either fully or partly touch based. She placed her hands on the stomach of her t-shirt and nudged at the power and concentrated in on it; two yellow hand prints was left once she lifted her hands.
"Something like that, yeah." She laughed. She supposed it was like that in many ways. She could, technically, have any ability she wanted for a short period of time, though, it always required other people. And other people wasn't something Chandler had in tenfold.
The other girl grinned then, which had the brown eyed brunette tilting her head curiously. Her curious expression turned blank for a second before the corner of her lips quirked. She'd always been vary about copying the powers of others, because you never really knew what you got yourself into. While she didn't always control when it happened, she'd always preferred staying away from the whole thing. This idea, though, intrigued her.
"You're going to have to hold my hand, then." She didn't have to, of course, but it had its benefits. One, it usually worked better through touch, and two, it was a nice excuse to hold hands with the girl. How could she ever possibly refuse such a chance? Holding her hands out, Chandler couldn't help the almost smug smirk on her lips. She wiggled her fingers then. "Let's see if you're right."
Perhaps if she'd been better at expressing herself, she would never have found herself in this mess to begin with. But what was the point in thinking about that? There wasn't anything Chandler could do, or think, that'd change the past.
She lifted her head, dark brown eyes focusing on her face. Callie had always been better at putting words on feelings. Even now, it was as if Callie could see right through her and speak the words Chandler wasn't able to.
"Would you?" She wasn't sure if it was something she wanted the answer to. Chewing on her bottom lip, she pulled her gaze away.
"No." She wasn't. Not really. It was less Chandler being pissed and feeling unforgiving, and more her not being able to really understand how she was feeling. She supposed it was unfair to put all the blame on the blonde's shoulders; What she'd done hadn't really been so terrible. It wasn't as if the two had been dating. Not really. It wasn't Chandler Callie had cheated on.
Maybe it was less her feelings being hurt, and more her pride. She didn't know. She'd never allowed herself to really understand the way she was feeling.
"You're not." She added then, fingers plucking off invisible lint from her sweater.
The girl was right, whether Chandler cared to admit to it or not. Despite her parents stressing the subject and the apparent norm about how everyone should have figured out their life by the time they finished the subject, Chandler wasn't too worried. If all else failed, she did have a few things she could fall back on. "Combined with your power, I find that hard to believe." She said truthfully. "But here's to hoping."
Ah yes; The training rooms. Chandler had spent many hours of her time within rooms like these, like every other student before her. Though, with her power, she supposed it was a little different for her. While other people had a chance to get familiar with their power's limitations and side-effects, she got them all thrown in her face like, 'here, figure this out'.
"Power mimicry." She replied without hesitation. She supposed she was lucky; She didn't have to deal with side-effects on a regular basis like most others. She usually only had to deal with them when mimicking a power and she'd learned to handle that part rather nicely. At least, she didn't accidentally mimic powers as often as she'd used to. "I have the easy one, I suppose." She shrugged.
Was it really that simple? They couldn't be friends - which only left the two options. Either Chandler needed to get her shit together and get the fuck out or she needed to get her shit together and grow the fuck up. Neither of which proved to be very easy choices to the power mimic.
Energy left her body and she dropped to the floor. Rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand, she sighed. She wasn't supposed to be making a choice. Not this choice. She was supposed to take whatever came her way and not have to deal with all this emotional bullshit.
It had never been her forte. It never would be.
"Yeeeaaah." She said, dragging the word out. "We're fucked."
Callie had been right, at least to a degree. It needed to be said. Or rather, Chandler felt better saying it. Whether that was because she, for once, actually admitted to having actual feelings or because she was mad and felt like lashing out, didn't really matter at this point.
She tensed as the blonde drew closer, but she didn't flee. Even when every fiber in her body told her to.
"Oh, I don't know." Her voice dropped along with her gaze. She couldn't move ahead and she couldn't very well be stuck in the past. It didn't work, but neither had running away. She felt stuck.
"Sometimes... Sometimes I wonder if it would have been better if I'd never met you, but then, I also realize that's just something I tell myself to, you know, feel better. But it wouldn't be." She shook her head. "Easier, I mean." When all came to all, what she'd experienced with Callie had been real. Maybe that was what had hurt the most.
Dropping her eyes to the floor, Chandler pressed her lips into a hard line. This was exactly the thing she'd been wanting to avoid. Not only the topic in itself, but the feelings that came with it. It made her feel equally pissed as it made her feel like shit.
She heard the words and they made sense. She wondered if that was how she'd been feeling all along? Was all these negativity simply an excuse to keep herself from realizing that she was done, once and for all? No. That didn't feel quite right. Even through the anger and the hurt, Chandler knew she wasn't done.
She could even feel the way that such a simple touch caused her entire body to tremble.
"That's not it." She said quietly. "I do want to be around you, Callie. Don't you get it? That's the problem." She looked up, despite the way her voice trembled. "I don't want to be wanting to be around you, but I do." She shook her head, annoyance flaring like a bad aftertaste. Not towards the blonde, but annoyance towards herself: She was mad at herself for being so weak.
