Work Text:
“Shit! Fuck!” Tai proclaims in rapid succession, as (act one) her hand slips, turning the otherwise neat “n” into something of a lop-eared checkmark and (act two), her knee promptly knocks on the underside of her desk. “Dammit!” She grits out with a pained hiss when (act three, grand finale) the slight jerk of her elbow sends an assortment of multi-coloured markers nosediving to the floor.
Slumping back in her chair, Tai reluctantly looks down at the little square of paper in front of her, silently cursing past-Taissa for deciding that typography and hand-drawn cards were her forte. But it’s Van’s birthday, for god’s sake! And the idea of just picking up a card from the store never quite felt right to Tai. Van was special. A special kind of special that could never be contained in corporate teddy bears or cartoon cats spouting puns.
Now, multiple hours of dedicated toil later, Tai is starting to believe that maybe even the shabbiest of the corner store’s googly-eyed felines would be a better fit here. What a cruel joke.
(She ends up giving the card to Van anyways, presenting it to her like a dog would a chewed-up slipper. As could have been easily predicted by anyone except for Tai herself, Van wholly and unquestionably adores it. With a distressing lack of regard for future-Tai, Taissa immediately decides that hand-drawn cards were a wonderful idea all along and that she totally should make one next year, too.)