Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“How about ‘Rise of the Lycans’?”

Consternation flashed across Weiss’ expression, but Blake’s attention was directed at her laptop. Weiss thought that seemed like an odd choice for movie night, but Blake was deeply involved in environmental science and ecology, so maybe a documentary wouldn’t be that far-fetched. “If you’re interested in the subject, I guess I don’t mind.”

Blake was expecting a bit of resistance to her suggestion of action-fantasy schlock, but the phrasing seemed a little odd. Nonetheless, she shrugged and started up the movie.

The art direction’s remarkably gothic for a nature documentary, Weiss thought as the intro began. That leather outfit looks supremely uncomfortable for field work, too. Then the title screen flashed up and her immediate facepalm hid her blush but did little to muffle her mortified “Oh.”

Blake turned at the sounds. “What’s the problem?”

Weiss refused to meet Blake’s eyes as she muttered, “I thought the movie was titled ‘Rise of the L-i-c-h-e-n-s’ when you asked.”

The embarrassed confession was met with a snort of laughter. “And you were okay with a movie about moss?”

“They’re not mosses!” Weiss’ head came up sharply as she corrected Blake with a snap. Belatedly, she realized she’d fallen for the bait. “Wait... you know that.”

“Oh-ho. You’re cute when you’re flustered,” Blake smirked at the still-flushed cheeks.

“Stop that! I agreed because it was your suggestion.” Weiss’ flush intensified. “I figured you wouldn’t make any bad recommendations.”

Blake dropped her teasing. “To be fair, it’s known as a bad vampires-versus-werewolves movie, so I wouldn’t be so sure about the latter.” Well, mostly dropped her teasing. “If that’s not your speed, I might be able to find a real documentary on moss for you.”

“They’re not—” Weiss sighed as she cut herself off. “I’m not sure what I’d rather not watch: a documentary on lichen or a bad vampire movie.”

“You’d probably choose to watch the documentary.” Blake shot her a knowing look. “But how about a romantic comedy instead?”

“Sold.”

Chapter Text

“That’s not exactly accurate.”

“Oh?”

“A person’s heirs aren’t determined until they’re dead, so the proper term would be ‘heir-apparent.’”

“You’re expected to inherit the SDC. Normal people,” somehow Blake kept an entirely straight face, “would call you an ‘heiress’ regardless of the technicality.”

“We,” she gestured between herself and Blake, “are not normal people, and since when have you not delighted in technicalities?” Weiss glared.

“When the technicalities are directed at me,” Blake answered easily.

“Besides, ‘heiress’ isn’t accurate for another reason. My shares of the SDC are held in a beneficiary-controlled trust. As both the trustee and the beneficiary, I already have access to my shares of stock and voting rights; I don’t have to wait for my father’s passing.”

Blake made a face in response.

“You are taking a law class. Shouldn’t you understand this kind of stuff?”

Blake’s tone went flat. “I’m taking a faunus law class. Trust me: estate management is a low priority. Criminal law is usually a much more pressing concern. The number of faunus who have enough assets to warrant the use of a trust probably number in the low hundreds.”

Weiss cringed inwardly at having blundered into a sensitive topic—wait! “Did you just make a pun?”

Blake merely grinned in answer.

Chapter Text

“Is dating a girl just another way to rebel against your father?”

“That might be a factor, but it’s certainly not one of my primary motivating factors.”

“And dating a faunus girl?”

“Blake...” Weiss began in exasperation, but switched to a humorous tone as she continued, “I have to admit, I am delighted by the prospect of giving my father aneurysms over my dating life, but that’s just icing on the cake.” Weiss leaned forward with a piercing blue gaze. “What about you? Is dating a major stockholder of the SDC some sort of Trojan Horse ploy so you can sabotage its operations from the inside?” she asked in a teasing tone. Her smile grew as she extended the allusion. “Whose voice should I try imitating to draw your secrets out?”

Blake played along. “You know it wouldn’t work.” Her mouth twitched into a smirk. “Say, if you adopted Trojan dress, would that make you a Phrygid Ice Princess?”

Weiss slapped at Blake’s shoulder. “That’s awful. And those caps look awful, too.”

The smirk softened into a smile. “But, I suppose, you are the most beautiful woman in the world...”

“Does that make you Menelaus?” Weiss made a facetious grimace. “I think the House of Atreus actually puts my family to shame. At least we’ve never engaged in cannibalism or incest.”

“That you know of,” Blake couldn’t help adding before pointing out the glaring omissions: “but murder and adultery?”

Weiss shrugged wryly. “I can’t be sure,” her countenance darkened, “but I wouldn’t put it past them.”

Seeing the shadow clouding ice blue eyes, Blake knew she needed to lighten the mood. With some quick mental substitutions, she started reciting in a measured cadence, “Weiss, sit with me and love me so we’ll laugh at all the sour-faced strictures of the wise. This sun once set will rise again, when our sun sets follows night and an endless sleep—”

Almost by reflex, Weiss continued the recitation. “Kiss me now a thousand times, and now a hundred more, and then a hundred, and then a thousand more again, till—” with a jerk, she broke off the recitation and snapped out of her trance.

Blake was trying her damnedest to curtail a face-splitting grin, but she did manage to speak without laughing. “Please, don’t stop on my account.” She lost the battle against her grin as she leaned forward. “Or...” her amber eyes took on a predatory glint and she traced a finger along Weiss’ jaw, stopping under the point of her chin, “did you want me to do what you’ve so beautifully asked?”

Weiss was stock-still as she struggled to process what she’d just said and what was happening right now, but she didn’t cringe at the touch, nor did she pull away.

Blake could see those pupils dilate until the light blue eyes were light no longer, but Weiss still made no outward response. It seemed like her conscious mind hadn’t quite caught up with her desires. Time for a little mischief. Blake shifted her hand to fully cup Weiss’ flushed cheek, fingers dipping into the snowy white hairline. She pulled gently as she moved forward to close the gap between them, leaving a tantalizing sliver of space between their mouths. She held the precarious position for several hot breaths before continuing past Weiss’ lips and stopping within nibbling distance of her ear. “Till with so many hundred thousand kisses you and I shall both lose count...” she sighed in a sinuous, sultry voice and grinned as it elicited a full-body shiver.

That finally broke Weiss out of her reverie. She captured Blake’s wrist at her cheek. “Are you trying to seduce me?” She didn’t sound angry, but she didn’t sound particularly seduced either. Her pupils, however, were very dilated.

“I do believe you asked me to kiss you.” Blake didn’t laugh aloud, but her amber eyes danced with amusement.

“I was quoting Catullus’ poetry! That you’d started reciting!”

The best way through Weiss’ defenses wasn’t with a direct siege, but rather a tunnel under the fortifications and sapping the walls from there. “Okay, so you don’t want me to kiss you.” Blake began to turn away.

“Arg!” Weiss tightened her grip on Blake’s wrist and walked her backwards into the wall. Given her limited vertical reach, Weiss had to settle for pinning the wrist at shoulder height.

“Oh, is that how we’re doing it?”

“Stop talking, you idiot, and kiss me!” Weiss made good on her demands and tangled her free hand into black waves, tugging Blake’s head down far enough to reach with her lips.

After several long, breathless moments, Blake pulled back with a bit of effort. “Are you sure you want this?” she asked with remarkable clarity, given the fact that her bottom lip was still firmly trapped between Weiss’ teeth.

“Do I look like I’m dithering?” Weiss growled with slightly less clarity. As it turns out, “dithering” is quite difficult to say when your mouth is full of someone else’s lip.

“Just making sure.”

“I can’t believe we’re having a conversation like this.”

Blake raised an eyebrow. “Whose fault is that?” she asked, twitching her still-trapped lip.

“Fuck!”

“That’s getting way ahead of yourself, heiress.”

Blue eyes narrowed at that.

“I’m sorry. Let me try that again: ‘That’s getting way ahead of yourself, beneficiary-and-trustee-of-a-beneficiary-controlled-trust-containing-a-substantial-portion-of-SDC-stock.’ Did I get that right?”

“I can’t believe I’d fallen for you,” Weiss huffed.

“I bet it’s making you wetter,” Blake snarked back. “But seriously, can you let go? It’s very uncomfortable.”

That was the last straw. Two can play the escalation game. Weiss did let go of the lip, but followed up with a furious kiss and slid her thigh between Blake’s legs. She was too short to get a good angle, but she reveled in the momentary flash of surprise in those amber eyes.

The surprise was quickly followed by a smirk. Blake rocked forward, bringing their bodies flush against each other. “I think,” she drawled as she ground down slightly, “there’s a highly inappropriate joke about founding Athens here.”

“Making you Hephaestus.”

“You’re the one who put your leg there. I think we can share the blame.”

“Fine,” Weiss sighed, “but discussing chthonic semi-deities makes for lousy pillow talk.”

“Shall I conjugate—” Blake nipped at Weiss’ ear, “some verbs instead? Amavi... amo... amabo...” Each word was punctuated with a kiss. “Better?”

“Amemus,” Weiss continued, “because the subjunctive is clearly sexier, and two is better than one.”

Blake smiled in return. “Of course we may.”

Chapter Text

“Dip pens give you a greater amount of line width variation, but you do have to—as the name suggests—dip the nib quite frequently.” Weiss demonstrated the full range of flex as she started writing.

Blake watched in fascination as the ink flowed from the nib. As the pressure from the downward strokes splayed open the tines, the ink held up as a continuous, translucent, iridescent film as the nib continued to lay down a broad, blue swath on the paper. Finally, as the ink in the breather hole dwindled, the surface tension broke and the bright white paper was suddenly visible through the gap.

Weiss caught amber eyes staring. Well, that was kind of the point. “Like what you see?” She couldn’t keep the smugness out of her voice.

“Why yes.”

Uh-oh, that tone of voice can’t bode well.

Blake stood directly behind Weiss’ chair and leaned forward, stopping just short of making full body contact. She gently trailed a pair of fingers along the dip pen and up Weiss’ arm, slowing drawing across her collar bones, ending with a loose embrace around her neck. “The shoulders on the nib are quite something,” Blake breathed into ivory locks.

Weiss couldn’t see Blake’s face, but she’d bet anything that there was a glowing smirk.

Her other hand slid down Weiss’ side and stopped at the waist. “But the body isn’t lacking either.” There was a gentle purr in her voice as her hand slipped lower to rest on a thigh. “Tell me, just how far can these tines... spread?” A gentle nudge accompanied the question, provoking a shiver.

Weiss barely swallowed a whimper as the hand on her leg ghosted its way towards the center of her stomach and down.

“Or maybe I haven’t primed the sli—”

Nope, not going there! Weiss sized the wandering hand with a jolt and turned with narrowed eyes. “Are you trying to tease me to death?” she hissed.

Sure enough, Blake had a blinding smirk plastered across her face as she reached out to caress Weiss’ brilliantly flushed cheeks. “Capillary action’s a hell of a thing.”

Chapter Text

“Here, I made you this.”

“What?” Weiss squinted at the seemingly empty palm proffered to her.

“A tiny crane?” Blake’s confusion was audible as she raised her index finger slightly.

“Oh.” Weiss leaned in for a closer look before giving up. “Hang on.” She turned away and reached for something in her bag. Donning a pair of silver-rimmed glasses, she took a third look. “Oh!” A minuscule blue origami crane was, indeed, balanced precariously on Blake’s finger. “That crane is tiny!”

“How observant.”

“How did you manage it so small?” Weiss looked up in awe.

Blake was too busy staring at Weiss’ face to answer.

“Remnant to Blake. Blake? You there?”

“You wear glasses.”

Weiss couldn’t help but return the snark. “How observant.”

That tone snapped her out of the trance. “I...” she trailed off into a mild blush. “I have a thing for glasses.” A deep breath. “Oh my god, Weiss, you’re beautiful.”

The near-growl and dilated pupils that darkened the amber gaze derailed her impulse to tease Blake for the confession, and a blazing kiss threw off the rest of her high-reasoning faculties entirely.

When they finally broke away, she faintly noted that the kiss had tasted of sweetness and “Was that... fruit?” she asked as she readjusted her glasses.

A second, equally hot kiss was the only answer she received, but she found it hard to mind the non-sequitur as she felt fingers tangling themselves into her hair. A blur of moments later, she found herself panting, disheveled, and more than a little light-headed, though slightly more cogent. “Blake, are you going to answer, or are you just going to jump me?”

“You’re wearing glasses, Weiss!”

“If it’s the latter, I’m going to have to take my glasses off.”

“Nooo!” groaned Blake.

Weiss couldn’t help but chuckle at the theatrics. “As much as I appreciate the attention, they’re my only pair and they’re not going to survive much more of this.”

“It’s not like you wear them much, and you’d be able to overnight a replacement pair.”

“Blake!”

“Fine!”

“Do I need to take them off, or can you control yourself?”

“Keep them on!” came the immediate, slightly desperate plea.

“Okay,” Weiss replied, though she didn’t sound entirely convinced. A change in topic was probably the safer option. “The kisses tasted of fruit.” Oh, wait, maybe that topic wasn’t the best idea.

Thankfully, Blake stuck to her promise. “Blue Starburst candy. I fold cranes from the wrappers.”

“Speaking of cranes...” Weiss looked around. “Where did it go?”

Blake looked slightly abashed as she shrugged. “It’s probably somewhere on the desk or carpet? I kind of dropped it. I’ll just fold you another one—I can make a bunch out of a single wrapper.”

Weiss understood the nonchalance, but she didn’t want to lose the gift to the weekly vacuuming either. A moment later she spotted it on the floor. “Found it.”

“Here, I’ll put it in a pendant.” A minute later Blake handed over a small glass bulb with the blue crane stoppered inside.

“You still haven’t told me how you managed to fold such a tiny thing,” Weiss continued as she strung the pendant on to her snowflake necklace.

“I’ve got a natural 18 dex, plus a feline racial bonus,” Blake wiggled her ears, “brings it up to 20.”

Weiss’ expression went blank.

“You’ve never played Dungeons & Dragons.” It wasn’t even a question, but it sure sounded disappointed.

“I haven’t,” replied Weiss, cautiously.

“We’re remedying that right now. Let me get you a character sheet while you text Ruby and Yang. Tell them we’re doing a one-shot DnD campaign this weekend.”

Chapter Text

Weiss squeezed in behind Blake on the oversized office chair and rested her chin on a convenient shoulder as she snaked her hands around into the oversized kangaroo pocket at the front of the faunus’ hoodie. As uncouth as the item of clothing was, it was decidedly warm and comfortable.

“Let me finish this section—it’ll just be a few minutes, mm?” Blake nuzzled into the contact as she returned to typing.

Weiss watched Blake’s fingers dance over the keyboard as precisely as any virtuoso pianist. Who knew that finalizing a draft paper could be so mesmerizing? She smiled as Blake tapped an odd combination of keys and a footnote appeared in the text. “On my computer you can just use ‘option, command, f’ for a footnote.”

Blake twitched a little at the commentary. “I like my cost-effective computer and custom keyboard shortcuts just fine, thank you.”

Weiss watched the cursor move to an unwieldy URL in the footnotes and suddenly formatting view flashed on before Blake deftly hit another combination of keys and a strange rectangular character appeared in the URL, breaking it neatly across two lines. “What is that?”

“Weiss Schnee, don’t tell me you don’t know what a zero-width space is! That’s grounds for breaking up!”

The teasing tone alleviated any actual threat in the statements, but Weiss was already looking up the unfamiliar term on her Scroll, driven in part by the playful threat but mostly her own curiosity. “I’d tease you about being such a sucker for formatting nuances, but it is kind of hot,” she admitted.

“Clearly I should have put that on my dating profile: ‘knows what a zero-width space is, and knows how to use them.’ Not the, ‘enjoys long walks on the beach at sunset’ nonsense.”

“I’d probably take the bait.” She nibbled at Blake’s ear lobe. “Are you done yet?”

“Not if you keep distracting me,” Blake shot back, though she sounded more breathless than annoyed.

Weiss took that as a challenge. “Tell me about your... body-text margins,” she murmured, sliding a hand out of the hoodie pocket to trail up Blake’s torso.

“I need to get this section done!” she whined, but made no move to stop Weiss’ wandering hand.

“I love those en dashes in your number spans. Much classier than mere hyphens,” she moaned.

Blake froze. “Bedroom, now.”

Weiss smirked to herself as she extricated her limbs from around her girlfriend’s body and sauntered out of the study. She was halfway across the hall when the sound of a door slamming behind her stopped her dead in her tracks. “Hey!”

“I told you, I need to get this section done!” came the reply as the study door lock clicked into place. “I’ll make it up to you in a few minutes!”

Weiss merely growled at the closed door.

“I’ll whisper sweet, sweet formatting porn into your ear?” Blake’s conciliatory tone dropped an octave as she switched to a sultry husk. “A flush left covers your whole body, and your block quotes are tightly spaced and corseted in with perfect, one-inch indentations on both sides. Anticipation fills my gut as I slowly slide the tab stop one, two, three notches...”

“You’re ridiculous,” Weiss countered, but the hoarse edge of her voice betrayed her.

“We’re ridiculous.”

“Well, you’re not wrong.” She relented. “You have ten minutes before I break down that door, got it?”

“Yes, ma’am!”

Chapter Text

Weiss could see the feline ears canted forward, denoting interest, but it took her several more steps to see what Blake was staring at intently: an open box of chocolates. “Having trouble deciding which one to eat?” she asked, sitting down next to Blake.

Blake gave a small twitch of surprise and a resigned laugh. “Not really.” As anticipated, a highly expressive white eyebrow quirked up at the response, so she preempted the next question. “I was actually wondering if the chocolatier could have piped some footnotes on to the pieces. That would make it easier to match up the flavors,” she gestured at the myriad descriptions printed on the inside of the lid.

She thumped her head into Blake’s shoulder. “I really shouldn’t be surprised.” Then a thought struck her: “You’re not that picky about chocolates, though, so why do you care?”

Blake seized Weiss by the shoulders and glared. “Since when do I ever pass up an opportunity to add footnotes to something?” she asked in faux outrage. The glare softened. “If I knew which chocolate was which, then I can make sure to leave your favorites for you.”

Oh.

Weiss pinched the bridge of her nose in fond exasperation. “Is that a footnote on my valentine?” she asked, gesturing with the offending card.

“I couldn’t just leave a source uncited!” Blake defended indignantly.

“Oh my god, you’re such a nerd.” Weiss rolled her eyes as she tried to hide a grin.

“Look who’s talking!”

“I bet you’d put a footnote on our wedding cake.”

Blake blinked rapidly in surprise. “Well, that escalated quickly.” Then she considered it for a moment. “But you’re not wrong.”

Weiss narrowed her eyes at the admission. “You would.”

“Of course.” Blake beamed a rare broad smile as she wrapped her arms around Weiss and laid a kiss on her temple. “It would say, ‘And they lived happily ever after.’”

Chapter Text

They had been caught in an unexpected rainfall and had dashed to Weiss’ apartment to get out of the chill. In their haste—and impromptu race—to get indoors, they’d ended up in a tangle of limbs and laughter, leaning against the doorframe.

Blake shivered and started to remove her rain-soaked sweater.

Weiss decided to help. A few quick tugs and the dampest clothing was shed unceremoniously. The proximity of their bodies kept the heat in—and turned the heat up. “We can take a warm shower,” she murmured, “together.”

There was no audible response, but the kissing intensified and a black ribbon slid to the floor. Blake let herself be steered into the bathroom, managing not to trip over the shower stall ledge. She hit the tile wall with a faint oof that was largely muffled by the mouth over her own. Her cat ears twitched visibly as they slid against something cold and metal. Blake looked up at the obstruction, breaking the kiss. “That’s not a low-flow shower head.”

The noise of confusion Weiss made was adorable. The glare she shot at Blake, once she caught up with the change in topic, was less adorable. “Seriously? Now’s the time?”

“Sorry, it’s a pet peeve.” She didn’t sound all that sorry. “Why haven’t you installed a low-flow?”

Weiss’ internal filters snapped into place before she could open her mouth and shove her foot in it. Something told her that “I can afford to not care” wasn’t going to fly with Blake. She tried a more neutral approach to the truth. “We’re not in a drought area, and I like my showers hot and with real water pressure.”

Amber eyes narrowed. “It shouldn’t require a limited resource for someone to take steps to reduce wasteful behavior.” Blake maneuvered both of them out of the shower stall before turning on the faucet and reaching a hand in to test the spray. “A lot of models will give you similar water pressure without much loss in heat.”

Efficiency was certainly something Weiss could appreciate, but efficiency in achieving efficiency was still a concern: would the improvements in water reduction be worth the effort, pressure, and heat? Weiss reached past Blake and turned the shower off before examining the fixture for a model number and then headed out of the bathroom.

Blake trailed behind her in mild confusion.

By the time Blake reached the desk, there were already several data sheets on the laptop screen. Weiss pointed to a set of numbers. “This is the data for the model I have.” She pulled up a series of different data sheets. “These are the numbers for leading low-flow models.” Weiss paused for a moment before clicking her laptop into the dock. Once the laptop screen was cast on to the external monitors, she opened up a spreadsheet. “And this is the water, gas, and electricity consumption for this apartment over the last few years.”

Blake was already doing some calculations. “You shower for 12 minutes on weekdays and 20 on weekends, totaling 100 minutes of run time per week.”

“I’m not sure whether to be impressed or perturbed that you know my showering details down to the minute.”

“You’re the one who’s got spreadsheets for everything. You probably know exactly what temperature you run your showers at.”

“The apartment complex’s water heater is set to 150° Fahrenheit. Weekday showers are 111° and weekends are 113°.” Weiss stared levelly at Blake, daring her to make a comment.

A smile twitched at her lip, but Blake knew better than to let it fully form. Not every “I told you so” had to be verbalized either. “That makes 60 minutes of 111° showering and 40 minutes of 113° showering,” she amended her calculations.

Weiss was already pulling the gallons-per-minute and Atlesian-thermal-units data into a comprehensive formula. “I can’t fully account for the temperature of the water from the mains nor the heat loss from the apartment’s pipe system. A lot of this,” she tapped the bezel of a monitor, “is guesswork based on industry standards and averages.”

This time Blake let the smile form fully. “I trust you’ve picked reliable estimates.”

“Of course! That goes without saying,” she huffed. “Now the cost of gas has fluct—” Weiss stopped abruptly. A moment of stillness settled on the room before a flurry of keystrokes and clicks changed the screens from spreadsheets and technical specifications to an online order form. “I’m just going to order a low-flow replacement.”

Startled at the sudden reversal, Blake scrutinized Weiss. “You’re doing this to get me to shut up.”

“I’m doing this to make you happy.” Weiss rolled her eyes. “I shouldn’t be running qualitative analyses on things that will make you happy before deciding whether to do them.” She smirked. “Normal girlfriends would ask for flowers, but if a low-flow shower head is what makes you happy, then that’s what I’ll get.” A pause. “Actually, the shower head’s probably cheaper and definitely more useful, though it probably wouldn’t be as pretty in a vase,” she added, thoughtfully.

“You know me—I like utilitarian,” Blake grinned. “And since you like data analysis, perhaps we should test it out when it ships in?”

“Very, very thoroughly.”

Chapter Text

Weiss couldn’t make out much of the muttering from Blake, but she caught the word “spelled.” Sighing, she took the bait. “What was that again?”

Blake looked up from her screen. “Someone spelled ‘geezer’ as ‘g-e-i-z-e-r,’” she repeated with a curious twitch to her lip, “and... well...”

Weiss squinted in consternation, tapping away at her own laptop. “How? Is that even a wor—oh god...” she trailed off as the search results came up. Porn star. She ducked her head, hiding her blush.

An amused chuckled floated through the air. “I see you found out what I found out.”

“Yes, yes I did.” Weiss’ voice was tinged with regret.

“But did you check the image results?”

Her head snapped up. “Blake!” she hissed.

A devious twinkle flashed through her amber eyes before she glanced back down at her screen with a grin. “She’s so very, very wet—liable to soak everyone in the vicinity. Gushing, you might say...” Blake drawled.

Weiss sat in mild horror—and anticipation—unable to look away as her girlfriend theatrically rotated the laptop screen into view. But whatever she might have expected wasn’t what was displayed. Weiss’ palm met her forehead with an audible smack. “Geyser.”

Chapter Text

Blake’s shoes were haphazardly strewn in the vicinity of the doorway, and her keys half-dangled out of the tray on the kitchen counter. Weiss made a quiet tutting noise as she checked the fridge and liquor cabinet. Two beers and a bottle of gin were missing. Probably not a drinking emergency. But, then again, it was still fairly early in the evening.

Stilling herself, Weiss listened for noise in the apartment, but heard nothing beyond the hum of the central air. Sighing, she started checking the rooms for her wayward girlfriend. She found one beer bottle, half-full, on the desk in the den. The second one, empty, was next to the wastebasket by the door. Weiss smiled to herself. Even while drunk, Blake was always conscientious about separating recyclables from trash. If anything, she was more militant about recycling when she wasn’t fully sober.

A few moments later, she found her mark sitting on the floor of the bathroom with an array of graph paper scattered around her and the gin in arm’s reach just under the sink.

Blake looked up at Weiss’ pointed cough. “’m ’gineerin’,” she mumbled in explanation, and promptly returned to leaning over her work.

Weiss barely stifled a giggle when Blake overbalanced and nearly faceplanted herself across her sketches. Drunk-Blake did not handle teasing particularly well, so she directed her own attention away from laughing outright at the uncoordinated flailing. Carefully moving some sheets around, Weiss sat down next to her girlfriend. “And what are you working on?”

“A bat,” she declared, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“Can you show me?” The question came out a bit patronizing, but—thankfully—drunk-Blake was also a bit oblivious to nuances of tone.

The only answer she received was a small sheaf of paper shoved at her, and a barely-audible harrumph.

Flipping through the sketches, she picked out a baseball bat studded in spikes of some sort. Most of the drawings were of the pointed protrusions, with copious annotations on various methods of attaching them to a wooden bat. Gently nudging Blake to get her attention, Weiss handed the papers back. “Are those claws on the bat?”

Blake blinked owlishly at the question.

Pointing to a large sketch of a wickedly curved... something, Weiss tried again. “Is this a claw?”

“No no,” Blake flapped a hand dismissively. “They separate claws.” She turned that final word around in her mouth, drunkenly rolling the syllable around. “Claaaw. Ses? Claws-es? Clawses.”

Weiss wasn’t quite sure what to make of that declaration. “They... what?”

“Commas separate clauses!”

Weiss took a moment to parse that. “Okay. Commas separate clauses.” She looked carefully at the sketch again. Yes, that’s a comma. “But why do you have a baseball bat studded in random commas?”

“Not random,” Blake huffed indignantly. “Caslon. Adobe Caslon. Pro. Bold.” Thrusting another page—this one covered in various comma shapes—at Weiss, she continued rambling. “I also checked Garamond, Georgia, Palatino, an’ Times, an’ a bunch of others, but I didn’t like ’em. Too spindly—no structural integrity. Or not classic enough.”

Aside from the fact that the list was alphabetical—and completely failed to answer her actual question—something else niggled at Weiss’ mind. “Blake, dear, were you only looking at serif typefaces?”

“Of course.”

“It’s a comma! It doesn’t have serifs!”

“’s the principle of the thing!” The rest of Blake’s petulant response devolved into incoherent muttering.

Reminding herself to pick and choose her battles wisely, Weiss decided to abandon that particular line of questioning. “Blake?” She coaxed her girlfriend’s chin up and away from whatever she was angrily scrawling. “Why are you drunk engineering a baseball bat covered in sharp commas? While sitting in the bathroom?” But, then again, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

“Not carpeted,” she declared, bonelessly gesturing at the marble tiles of the bathroom. “Desks too small,” she added, gesturing vaguely towards the rest of the apartment. The statements were punctuated with what sounded suspiciously like a “duh.”

Of course Blake would focus on the least relevant part of her questioning. Fighting back a long-suffering sigh, Weiss noted that she’d probably brought this upon herself: holding a conversation with her inebriated girlfriend was—unremarkably—rather like herding cats. “Okay, I understand why you’re in the bathroom,” she kept her tone reassuring, “but what about the comma bat?”

For a long moment, her golden gaze was hazy with confusion as Blake fumbled around her memories for an answer. Suddenly, she jerked away. “That damn author!” The exclamation was accompanied by a hiss. “Where’s m’ laptop?” Blake grumbled as she glanced wildly around the bathroom, “I’ll show you.”

Weiss could only close her eyes and take a deep breath. Her head was spinning far too much for a sober person trying to take care of her not-sober girlfriend. A soft thump and a groan caught her attention. She turned to see Blake, flat on her back, throwing an arm over her face to shield herself from the ceiling lights.

It was rare for Blake to be flopping around like a starfish. Normally, the faunus’ body language was a little stiff, even behind the feline grace. Like she was closed off, trying to protect herself from the outside world. But here she was, carelessly sprawled across the bathroom floor, her shirt riding up and hair mussed... and murmuring about beating some author up with a baseball bat?

A full-body shiver wracked across Blake, breaking Weiss out of her reverie. Sighing fondly, she shifted around for a better angle to help her girlfriend up. “Sweetheart, let’s get you off the cold floor, okay?”

“’kaaay,” came the slightly petulant concession.

Figuring Blake would be better off with a meal, rather than being tucked straight into bed, Weiss navigated towards the couch in the living room. Depositing her grumpy charge on the long sectional, she headed to the kitchen to fetch a glass of water and call for delivery. Pizza was probably a good idea: no cutlery involved. Well, for Blake, at least.

When she returned, Blake was half-draped across the coffee table, squinting angrily at her laptop screen while furiously swiping at the touchpad.

This time, Weiss failed to stifle her giggle. Drunk-Blake was terrible at using computers—her inner cat kept tracking the cursor on the screen, distracting her constantly. Weiss allowed herself a full thirty seconds of indulging in the antics before reaching for the laptop and exchanging it for the glass of water. “Here, drink that. Then tell me what you’re trying to do—I’ll do it for you.”

Blake launched into a breathless ramble with the occasional useful tidbit interspersed. Something about bad editing ruining a perfectly good story? One hundred missing commas? The excessive snark about FFN and the lack of a private messaging feature on AO3 seemed irrelevant to her core task, but Weiss duly noted Blake’s opinions on the matter. She had nearly finished deciphering the rant when a buzz from the door interrupted them. Blake perked up as she caught the scent of food, and soon the laptop was all but forgotten.

In no time at all, Blake had demolished her half of the pizza, a specialty tuna melt that she’d once convinced the shop to make just for her—though Weiss’ generous tip was probably what kept that option on the menu for future orders. The combination of alcohol and food proved potent. Soon after finishing her last slice, Blake was having trouble keeping her eyes open as she tried to tidy up the table.

Weiss firmly took the pizza box away. “I can handle the cleaning. You need to go to bed.”

“Still earlyyy.” The objection was enveloped—and thoroughly undermined—by a jaw-cracking yawn.

Weiss rolled her eyes. “You’re falling asleep, so go to sleep.”

“But... compost. And recycling.” Blake crossed her arms defiantly and glared.

Weiss pinched the bridge her nose in exasperation. Of course. “Yes, dear, I’ll be sure to compost the napkins and recycle the box.”

It took some more cajoling—and a few threats—to tuck Blake in. When the grumbling from the bed finally evened out into the slow, steady breaths of sleep, Weiss allowed herself a moment to think. Arguing over preposterous aspects of typography was nothing new, but that strange bat certainly was. She pondered Blake’s outbursts as she collected the graph paper in the bathroom, restored the bottle of gin, and sorted the trash. On her final sweep of the apartment, her gaze stopped on the abandoned laptop.

A few minutes later, Weiss had finally found what had driven Blake to drunk-engineering: it was a popular fanfic with a decent story line, but there was an appalling lack of commas. She stopped reading after a few chapters. Partially because she hadn’t seen the TV series the fic was based on, but mostly because she was itching to brain the author with a bat studded with commas. Maybe Blake was really on to something?

She flipped through the sketches again as she reached for her Scroll and pulled up her contacts list and dialed...

“Hello, Velvet. Do you still know anyone with access to the materials lab? I have a project proposal if you’d like some freelance work.”

Chapter Text

The holiday decorations were fairly minimal in the apartment: some pine branches across the mantelpiece and a matching tree in the corner, but Weiss wanted to add a few more accents. She’d seen Blake shudder every time they walked near scented candles, so anything overly aromatic was a no-go, thus precluding a substantial portion of her options. She looped back around the aisles again. Perhaps a few red bows and—she scanned the displays—mistletoe? That’s a Thing, isn’t it? She smiled to herself as she headed to the checkout counter.

When she got home, Weiss found Blake napping in the armchair by the fireplace, curled into herself—arms crossed and feet tucked under—enjoying the warmth of a merry blaze. Placing a gentle kiss between the cat ears, Weiss nudged Blake’s shoulder. “Hey.”

All she got in return was a sleepy grumble.

“I need some help putting up a few more decorations.”

Another grumble.

Weiss sighed as she bit the proverbial bullet. “And I’m too short to reach.”

This time she earned a quiet snort as Blake finally opened her eyes.

“I’m going to put a bow on the door and the mantle, but I need you to put this up on the hallway lintel.”

Blake made no move to uncross her arms, so Weiss simply dropped the sprig of mistletoe into her lap and returned to her own tasks.

Five minutes later, she returned to find Blake still seated in the armchair, gazing at the mistletoe with an inscrutable expression. “What’s wrong?” she asked gently.

Blake glanced up, looking as if she were about to speak, but the silence stretched on.

Weiss furrowed her brows. Her family was never particularly keen on holiday accoutrements, especially not “tacky” traditions such as mistletoe, but she was fairly sure that lots of people were quite enthusiastic about it. She had it on good authority that some people, in fact, seized every opportunity possible to kiss under the mistletoe.

Wait.

Kiss under the mistletoe.

And she’d just placed a sprig of mistletoe in her girlfriend’s lap.

Suddenly the warmth of the fireplace was magnified a hundredfold as a blush raced across her cheeks and down her neck while several very graphic images raced across her mind. “I’m sorry, I-I didn’t mean to proposi—” Weiss began with a stutter.

But Blake was also speaking, her voice calm but still raspy from sleep. “Do you know the history of kissing under mistletoe?” she asked, spinning the sprig idly in her fingers.

This wasn’t where Weiss was expecting the conversation to go, but oh god, that husky tone. She mutely shook her head, not trusting her own voice.

“Men were allowed—encouraged—to kiss women under the mistletoe, and any woman who refused would have bad luck.” Gesturing angrily, Blake glared at the offending vegetation before looking up at Weiss, fire dancing in her eyes as she raised her voice. “How sexist is that? How bullshit is that?”

Weiss could only blink in surprise.

Blake continued her rant. “We’ve build up an entire holiday tradition around something that borders on sexual assault! Even if that’s not how it’s perceived nowadays, there’s still an element of coercion present. How many people have been pressured into an unwanted kiss—or worse!—because of a stupid sprig of parasitic plant?” She practically spat the last few words out, the sleepy rasp in her tone giving way to heated spirit.

She wasn’t really sure how to react. The sexist history of the tradition was definitely discomforting, but her passionate girlfriend was anything but. Well, first things first. She nudged the spark guard open, plucked the mistletoe out of Blake’s grasp, and unceremoniously tossed it into the blaze.

Blake startled. “I didn’t mean to send your traditions up in... uh,” she glanced at the fast-disappearing mistletoe, “smoke.”

Weiss gave a small smile as she squeezed herself into the armchair. “It’s okay. It’s not my tradition at all. I just thought that—” her voice caught in her throat. “That... well, kissing is... nice,” she finished lamely.

“It is nice.” Blake affirmed the point with a small kiss to Weiss’ cheek. “But you did look very surprised and worried.”

Weiss made a choked sound as she recalled exactly why she’d backpedaled in the first place. “It’s n-nothing.”

Blake fixed her with an even stare.

“Really! I wasn’t worried about anything.” The lie sounded pathetic even to her own ears.

“Then what were you apologizing for?” Blake’s tone was somber as she pressed the issue. “I know it’s our first holiday season together, and I don’t want to... mess anything up.”

Oh god, a guilt trip. “It’s just embarrassing, okay?” Weiss mumbled into Blake’s shoulder.

Blake frowned minutely as she sat up. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to embarrass you, but I don’t know what—”

Weiss pressed a finger over Blake’s lips to stop the unwarranted self-recrimination. This was turning into a full-blown guilt odyssey, and now she was caught between Scylla and Charybdis. “No, it’s not you, I... I was just worried that I’d accidentally propositionedyoufororalsexbyplacingthemistletoeinyourlap.” The speed with which she finished the sentence rivaled the speed of the flush that blazed across her skin.

For several excruciatingly long moments, Blake simply stared at her.

“Look, I’m not familiar with the whole mistletoe thing and—”

“What made you think I’d say ‘no’?” Blake interrupted with a smirk.

Now it was Weiss’ turn to be stunned into silence, but her blush intensified.

Blake backed down at the flustered expression. “I wouldn’t have said no to kisses either.”

Weiss finally found her voice. “But your spiel about—”

“I don’t want to be coerced into kissing anyone,” Blake cut her off, “but I want to kiss you.”

Oh, in that case... Weiss leaned in and pressed her lips chastely against Blake’s. “Kissing is... nice.”

“It is nice,” Blake agreed, following up with a gentle nip.

“Very nice,” Weiss breathed.

“Indeed.”

“Stop talking, you idiot, and kiss me!”