we have a problem (dahlia)

STOP WHATEVER YOU ARE DOING RIGHT NOW AND GET OVER HERE! IT IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT. I WOULD NEVER WRITE IN CAPITAL LETTERS OTHERWISE! MAKE HASTE! I CANNOT EXPRESS MY URGENCY ANY FURTHER THAN THIS!

He'd sent Dahlia the message hurriedly that morning, via crystal. He also added a floo location nearby his house and directions on where to go from there, then some other instructions:

Bring food. Do not knock at the front door. Message me on your crystal when you are close. Hurry!

Now he was stood outside on the grounds of his house, biting at the side of his thumb (which he hadn't done for a few years now), and waiting impatiently for Dahlia's arrival. That is, if she was actually taking him seriously and was going to make an appearance.

@Dahlia Travers

Dahlia looked at her crystal at the complete wall of capital letters coming from Comarth. Ever the dramatic she didn't really do much more than roll her eyes as she read the text. Then came the instructions to bring food... Was he serious? She was not his glorified delivery service but she was definitely going to give him a piece of her mind for trying to make her into such! He could get his own food or starve for all she cared! Shouldn't his house elves at least be able to provide him with a snack? She had worked herself up into a right state of temper by the time she had thrown the floor powder into the fireplace in her family's great room and then stepped through to the address he had given her.

She was going to do just what he told her not to do and go knock on the door. Let his mother know that he had thought her to be his delivery service that required such rush and haste. She had actually thought maybe something had been going on. Then she spotted him on the grounds before she reached the door and thought better of actually knocking. She didn't really want to be interrogated after all. She stomped up to him and poked at his shoulder as she spoke. "I am not your food delivery service, Selwyn. There had better be something more important that you wanted aside from food. If I wasted a trip here because you have become peckish when I have a very busy schedule then I'm going to be very angry." She didn't bother making threats of what she would do with her anger... Let him use his imagination.

@Comarth Selwyn

Thinking that he'd heard a shuffling in the hedges, Comarth spun his head in the opposite direction, now thinking that he'd seen something as well. Perhaps he was just so on edge that he was imagining things, but he went to investigate it further. No sooner had he taken a step, however, and there was a sharp tapping to his shoulder.

A flame brighter than dragon breath flared through her eyes as she spoke. Caught off guard by this, he didn't interrupt her complaints. When she finished, however, he'd pressed his finger to his lips.

"Shh!" he hushed, pointing towards a window nearby them left slightly ajar. "Just follow me," he whispered urgently, "I'll explain everything!"

Tugging on her sleeve pointedly, he inclined his head to one side towards an ivy-ridden archway, indicating that she should follow. Going through that and down some stone steps, he turned to a pathway which had several twists and turns in it, until he reached the edges of a towering hedge spanning as far as the eye could see. "In the maze," he said, entering it himself. Once he turned a corner, he paused to catch his breath.

"Your Father is here. My Mother invited him."

@Dahlia Travers

Dahlia actually stomped her foot on the stone path when he had the audacity to listen to her rant then shush her! How dare he?!? But he pointed at the window that she could see from where she stood was slightly ajar. She was merciful enough to shut her mouth instead of continuing to berate him for taking her away from whatever breakthrough she could be making with her potions if he hadn’t dragged her away. He spoke in a whisper and she was pretty sure she had never heard such urgency in his tone which had more to do with her following him than her fingers at her sleeve did.

How far were they going to go through this maze before he stopped? Did he even know the way back to the beginning or were they going to be wandering around the shrubs for the remainder of the evening and into the night. All of these questions were pushed to the back of her mind when he finally stopped and suddenly dropped the bomb on her. ”my father?” she looked at him, confused as to why his mother would have invited her father over. Did they have some sort of a relationship that she hadn’t known of before? ”I didn’t know my father and your mother actually knew each other all that well. Why would she have invited him here?” she asked, not catching on to why he was so upset by this but also not thinking of what the consequences of such a meeting could be.

@Comarth Selwyn

"I wouldn't have thought much about it, if Melanthius hadn't shot sparks through my skull," he admitted, lowering himself to a stone bench which he knew the location of within the maze. He didn't get too lost in it nowadays. Hopefully he wouldn't today. He decided not to reveal these inner doubts to Dahlia.

"I was saying to him about how my Mother was asking questions about you," he went on, "And then, he suggested she was doing this because... she was looking at you as a prospective bride. For me."

He shook his head.

"Now your Father is here, and I'm quite sure you're right. They don't know one another intimately. Not enough that she would invite him over for a catch up."

Comarth wasn't looking at her, he was distracted by the rings he'd adorned his fingers with. That was the real bomb. They were both in deep shit!

@Dahlia Travers

A frown creased Dahlia’s features as she listened to Comarth ramble on about something Melanthius had apparently done. Shot sparks through his skull? Was Thius really thinking of this whole healer thing and maybe trying something experimental? It was possible… then again, this was Thius they were talking about so probably not. He wouldn’t break the rules like that. She placed her hands on her hips, one hip jutting out just a bit in her impatience for him to just bloody explain himself already. Instead he seemed more inclined to make himself comfortable.

Then her jaw literally dropped as he got on with it. Her? His bride? It was a preposterous idea! It would never work. Unless she secretly was looking for some way to off her son that wouldn’t lead back to her. Could that be possible. ”no.” was all she was able to get out at first. Not that he was the absolute worst person she could think of for her parents to try to marry her off to but she still couldn’t believe this could be happening! She thought she had time. That she would at least be able to get her business going before her parents started trying to marry her off. She thought she might have more time to get out of it! ”Its still too soon. I haven’t had time to come up with a plan to avoid their marriage plans.” and if Dahlia had ever looked panicked, it was right in that moment.

She plopped none too gracefully on the stone bench beside Comarth then had to resist the urge to rub her backside as the stone bit into her tailbone from the sudden contact. Instead she just winced a bit. How could this be happening! ”did you hear anything they said before I arrived?”

@Comarth Selwyn

"I know."

He was gnawing at the edge of his thumb again, seeing the skin peeling away and turning raw. His Father used to put Murtlap Essence on his fingers when they bled, but the essence itself tasted absolutely vile - vile enough for him to stop going back for another bite. Now that lesson had become unlearned in his current distress.

As he was staring, fixated with a gap in the hedges, he jolted slightly on the sudden impact of her sitting down.

"Enough for me to run out of the house," he sighed, "She was looking for me as soon as he arrived, but I was brushing my teeth. Then I came downstairs and heard snatches of their conversation: mostly my Mother trying to sell me like a piece of meat. Then I heard the words wedding and betrothal and knew I had to get out of there. If I were present, then I couldn't very well speak with you privately, could I? If we were discovered, we would probably be forced into sitting there in silence listening to them..."

He shuddered.

"That's why I missed breakfast and asked for you to bring food: I'm hiding from the elves as well, as they'd likely alert my Mother," he murmured, as his stomach growled, "Did you bring any?" he asked pitifully.

@Dahlia Travers

Dahlia was in disbelief! Why had her father not even mentioned this meeting to her? She had been in her room working on her potions when he had left, and he hadn't even thought it pertinent to tell her that he planned to go to a meeting to decide her future. She clenched her hands into fists so tight that her short nails dug into her palms, leaving half-moon-shaped indentions in her skin that she paid no mind to, the slight pain not even registering as she tried to figure out how they were supposed to make sure this didn't happen. This couldn't happen.

Things only seemed to get worse as he opened his mouth again. "They actually said those words?" She spoke of the words wedding and betrothal as if they were horrible taboo words that should never leave her lips. A sigh left her lips as she allowed her head to fall back as she stared up at the gray sky above them. It looked like it might rain. Wouldn't that be just her luck? "We could be in deep shit, Selwyn." She said in a wholly unhappy tone. This was a bloody disaster.

"No, I didn't bring food. I thought you were just trying to get me here because you wanted food. I didn't realize it was something like this." Even if now she wished she had food because she hadn't had breakfast yet that morning either. Though, that was the least of her worries right now when she couldn't figure out whether she was going to be sick or not. "What are we going to do about this?"

@Comarth Selwyn

He nodded glumly, swallowing a dry throat.

"We are in deep shit..."

So she thought she was being called here just to serve him food? He would have laughed if their situation wasn't so dire, and miserable, and the last thing he thought of doing was laughing.

It was turning overcast when she asked her question. He thought about it. They both knew this day would come eventually: perhaps they could have continuously dissuaded their parents away from wives (or husbands, in her case), but sooner or later they would be forced to marry and that was that. Neither of them wanted it because they saw marriage as a burden. The wife (or husband), would just get in their way...

But what if both husband and wife just wanted their own space from each other anyway? What if they both wanted the same thing?

"If we were to prevent it from happening today, it would happen again. Another girl's Father talking to my Mother, and perhaps one I've never met before or share nothing in common with. The same goes for you. As I see it, it's an endless cycle. Then my parents will turn around at me, aged twenty-five, and agree to the first girl they find without a single regard to my preferences. The same could happen to you."

A water droplet fell from the sky and rolled off his lip. He wiped it away.

"As I see it, we have three choices. Number one, stop it from happening and enter the horrific cycle. Number two, run away and become estranged from our families. Number three..."

He looked at her, hesitating.

@Dahlia Travers

Dahlia hated every single word that was coming out of Comarth's mouth. Not because they didn't make sense or anything but because they made perfect sense. There was probably no way she was going to be able to get out of some sort of arranged marriage. So really, it was just about hoping that the terms might be as agreeable as possible. If Comarth were to be her husband she at least knew that he would leave her alone. He wouldn't get in the way of her business plan or demand that she become some doting housewife. Another man might. And things would turn explosive. "Option number three is we just let this happen and hope for the best." She continued as she stared straight ahead, not able to look at it as she finished the one thing he hadn't been able to finish saying himself.

"You know they will expect us to show up at their functions as a couple. They'll expect us to..." She grimaced as she tried to bring herself to actually say what she was going to say. "They'll want grandchildren." Because wasn't that really what all of these arranged marriages were all about? Making sure the family names lived on and there were more little minds and bodies to mold into what they wanted? She turned to look at him then. "I had hoped to find a way to avoid this altogether but it doesn't seem that is going to happen." She frowned, this was an impossible situation but could she live with being Selwyn's wife of all things?

@Comarth Selwyn

He was relieved that her pendulum was swinging in exactly the same way as his. Or perhaps it was just the fact she was clever and worked out Option Three by process of elimination. When she didn't return his glance, he was looking in the same spot for was, chewing his thumb again.

Urgh - children. He almost looked as sick as he did when a mudblood walked in the room.

"Yes, yes, but we'll have a few years to work out how we're going to deal with that. Perhaps if we say your womb is haggard and dysfunctional, or we actually poison it somehow..." Such a romantic beginning to their betrothal by suggesting her womb needed to be painfully abolished. "Anyway - that all comes later. We may even find a way of getting out of the marriage altogether later on, but for now, I don't know about you, but I'd rather everyone shuts up about matchmaking and wishy-washy nonsense."

The rain was becoming more than just a few scattered drops now.

"Urgh," he moaned, edging along the stone bench in her direction, closer to the hedges for shelter, "There's a gazebo we could use for cover at X-42, Y-20. We are... X-40, Y-33-ish. I think. Which is North?" He looked up at the sky, nodding. "That way." He said, pointing at a solid bush. "I know the route. Definitely - sort of. Let's give it a try. I can't think properly when I'm hungry and wet."

He stood up to weave towards X-42, Y-20-ish.

@Dahlia Travers

”Haggard and dysfunctional! Poison my womb? I know you did not just suggest that! Poisons are a very dangerous practice to get just right and it isn’t like we can really test something like that! she was glaring at him now. Then she looked him straight in the face as she spoke. ”though, an accident to a certain part of your anatomy would be much easier and still yield the same results. “ she said, glancing down to that general area just to make sure he was following her thought process. Two could play at that game.

”Agreed.” she said, wishing all of this would just go away. But she had no false hope that people would stop talking if they let this happen. There would be congratulations, speculations, questions. She grumbled under her breath as the sky seemed to open up and begin pouring on them then. Just great. Now she was in an impossible situation and she was wet. Just her luck.

Already she was growing chilled from the sudden rainstorm she hadn’t been at all prepared for when he started talking about a gazebo. ”Ish? Definitely - sort of? I swear that if you get us lost and I have to spend the bloody night wet and lost in this maze we wont have to worry about any type of betrothal because only one of us will still be breathing.” she ranted but followed him anyway. At least she had enough common sense to know that he would inevitably have a better chance at finding the way than she did. But so help him if he really got her lost.

@Comarth Selwyn

After hearing her threats, he seemed to be creating a longer distance between them as he twisted and turned about the maze. He resisted the urge to shield his anatomy with his hands, out of her sight and twisted mind, knowing full well that her threats were never empty ones...

"I won't get us lost!" he hissed back to her, although he wasn't entirely confident of that.

Thankfully, his subconscious knack of direction led them to the right place: a large, stone gazebo almost entirely encased by vine. Darting underneath its canopy for shelter, he raked his wet hair off from his face and wiped the raindrops on his cheeks and forehead with his sleeve. "You see? You can always count on a seasoned adventurer like me." His smile was a little too smug.

It faded off quickly, though. "Hmm," he murmured thoughtfully, running his thumb across his lower lip but resisting the urge to bite down onto it. "We may have another problem. It's obvious that my Mother approves of you, but what if your Father disapproves of me?"

@Dahlia Travers

Dahlia couldn't help the savage smirk that came to her lips when she saw him squirm away from her at her threats. Good. At least he had sense enough to know that she would make good on them if the need arose. The only issue was making it seem like an accident. She didn't want to end up in Azkaban or anything. The time would come later though, maybe. They would see. For now she just had to focus on not slipping on the wet grass he was practically dragging her across on his way apparently to the gazebo. She had never hoped so much for someone to be right. She was beginning to get chilled from the rain and she really wanted to get dry.

Thank goodness, he was right because the gazebo came into view as they turned a corner and she picked up her pace to beneath the roof and away from the raindrops that were now pelting from the sky. She used her hands to try to scrape some of the water from her skin but it was no use. She was soaked clear to the bone. And as if to make matters even worse, her teeth had begun to chatter a bit, no matter how she tried to stop them. Curse the rain and her rush to get over here to give Comarth a piece of her mind so that she had forgotten a jacket. She rolled her eyes but she doubted it had as much punch as she had hoped since she was shivering. Great.

"Then we are worrying about all of this for nothing." She said in her most dismissive voice, or at least the best she could through her chattering teeth as she wrapped her arms around herself for warmth. She always did have a bit of a problem staying warm, was often cold, but this was ridiculous. "I'm sure that won't happen since as you said, your mother is probably in there trying to sell you like some sort of prized stallion or something." She rolled her eyes again. She was sure Mrs. Selwyn could be very persuasive.

@Comarth Selwyn

"I thought we agreed that we needed things to go this way!" he protested, the whine in his voice so clearly emphasised by the fact he was hungry and soaked through. Perhaps he would have stamped his foot as well, if it wasn't for the merciless heat in her eyes.

Still, she probably would have been wringing his neck at this point if it wasn't for the fact she was shivering. That's when he felt a rare flash of chivalry. Usually if someone was shivering cold, he would have overlooked it entirely, but she just happened to look that little bit more hopeless than your average person. Perhaps it was because she was a girl, or perhaps he may have thought it just a teeny bit adorable. She looked almost vulnerable for one, shocking moment.

He removed his wool jacket and placed it across her shoulders. Although he was quite skinny, the jacket seemed to swallow her frame like a tent. For some reason, he liked that.

"If he doesn't agree with it, we're back to square bloody one," he murmured, "And maybe you'll be forced to marry a boy who will send you love letters - like Melanthius."

@Dahlia Travers

Dahlia's father always told her that what she lacked in size she made up for in fierceness... But it was hard for even her to seem vicious and in control when her very teeth chattered. Which might have been what had given Comarth the courage to actually take off his jacket and drape it over her shoulders. Normally, she would have scolded him for such things but immediately the warmth of it from where it had been on his body enveloped her and she found herself wrapping it more tightly around her rather than throwing it in his face. She wasn't about to thank him, though!

A pure look of disgust came to her face as he mentioned love letters. "I don't think I could bear such things. Love letters? What is even the point." She crinkled her nose at the very thought, not realizing how cute the gesture probably was on her youthful face. "I could get stuck with someone who is so obsessed with me that they can't bear to let me out of their sight. It would be horrible." Even if most pureblood girls in her place would love to have a doting husband, that was not Dahlia. She thought it a fate worse than death. "I guess we will just have to make sure my father is able to see your good qualities, whatever they might be." She said, still snuggling the jacket more tightly around her as she had at least managed to stop her teeth from chattering.

@Comarth Selwyn

So that spontaneous kiss - when was it supposed to happen, he thought, distracted by how her freckles were bunching up on the bridge of her nose. Perhaps it wouldn't be such a good moment to do it now, when she was so rightly complaining about boys being romantic and soft and affectionate. He didn't want to be romantic, or soft, or affectionate!

She looked nice though. Her hair was in threads by rainwater, and there was a droplet she'd missed still clinging to her eyelashes. It was really... cute.

"No - I actually agree with you there," he confessed grumpily, folding his arms over his chest. "My most favourable qualities are the ones I actually have to think about before doing them. Well, to a parent's standard they would be favourable qualities..."

This mulling wasn't achieving very much.

"Unless, of course, you act as though you are completely and utterly smitten with me in the most grotesquely convincing way..."

@Dahlia Travers

Comarth was probably lucky that she wasn’t able to read his mind in that moment. She surely wouldn’t have appreciated being thought of as cute of all things. She was not some cute little puppy or a small child or anything of the sort. But alas, she just stood there wrapped in his jacket as she thought over what he was saying. Of course, he would have to struggle to show such qualities. She sighed. This was all ridiculous. She hated every moment of it. But it was convenient when she thought about it. This gave them both the sort of out they had been looking for. ”I doubt my father even remembers having met you so a lot of it will depend on what your mother tells him… and I’m sure he will want to meet you if he thinks it’s a possibility. You will just have to try to impress him.”

A look of outrage came to her face then. Her? Completely smitten with him?!? That would never happen! Though… he did have a point. If she could pull it off then maybe her father would be more agreeable. He did want what was best for her after all, right? She ran her hand through her wet hair, sure she probably looked like some sort of drowned rat at the moment. ”it would have to work both ways. You would have to act completely head over heels for me as well or my father would never buy it. He knows I’m not some lovesick fool who would just chase after someone who had no interest in me. The thought of such a thing would be completely preposterous.” not that she would chase after anyone in such a way but to do so in a one sided manner would never happen. No, if she was to act like a fool. So would he have to.

@Comarth Selwyn

Trying to impress people was one thing, succeeding to impress people was another. He wished that it was as simple as it was with dragons: all they had to do was roar their flame breath over a muggle village and incinerate them to ashes. But no - impressing people in their society meant acting similarly to Hector Burke or Ptolemy Rowle. Being airs and graces and finger sandwiches and lar-di-dar.

He could really go for some finger sandwiches right now...

"What?!"

He forgot about finger sandwiches for a moment.

"Bu-but... I highly doubt I could be at all convincing, Dahlia!" he protested, but then his stomach rumbled. Sooner or later, he knew he'd have to go back inside the house to get some food. "Nng... I can't take it for much longer. We're going to have to get some food somehow, and that likely means alerting the elves, which definitely means my Mother will be alerted, which means..."

"How are we going to do this?" he groaned, knowing neither of them were capable in the slightest.

@Dahlia Travers

"And you think I can be convincing?" She said, her eyes attempting to glare holes in him when he seemed to think that she was the type who would be able to pull this off without issue. It wasn't like she had ever in her life thought about being able to pull off such an act. And there was no way she was going to be trying to act all smitten towards someone who acted indifferent towards her. She would never beg anyone for their affection, even if she wanted it, which she didn't. She wasn't the begging type.

"Will you stop thinking about food for ten minutes!?!? She commanded. He acted as if he were starving to death, not as if he had only just missed breakfast. She shook her head, the only part of her upper body that stuck out of his jacket that she was still wrapped up in. He was hopeless.

A sigh left her lips as she paced around the gazebo. She had no idea how they were going to pull this off! "I guess we're both going to have to figure out how to act like two fools in love very quickly." She said it with a grimace. Was this even going to be possible? She didn't hold out much hope but they had to try.

@Comarth Selwyn

The dragon flame unfurled inside of her eyes again, and he found himself attempting to match it with a contemptuous glower. Sometimes he wished he could transform into a dragon just to swallow her whole, and other times he wanted to see how she looked after kissing her. He'd never had two, simultaneous ideas in his head that conflicted so much.

"Well excuse me for thinking you may have an advantage," he commented loftily, "You know, with you being a girl and everything. Surely you have a natural predisposition to these sorts of things, however deep they may be buried."

He couldn't forget about food for ten minutes, and it was increasingly obvious.

"The more sickening it is, the better, apparently..." he wondered, thinking about Melanthius again and how he described his affections for Lestrange. "How about a nickname? Food isn't actually a bad subject to consider where they're concerned. Fruits... or sweet-sounding ones (all of them I hate, of course, but I can't exactly call you Bacon can I?) ... apples. I like apples. Apple is a terrible nickname, though. Apple sugar... apple sauce, apple blossom?"

He took her hand gently, cleared his throat, and proposed in the most deadpan of voices: "I wuv you, apple blossom."

@Dahlia Travers

He actually had the nerve to glower at her! She stared right back at him without missing a beat. Maybe his glower would shrivel a lesser person but not Dahlia! No, she wasn't intimidated. Even if his glower had changed to something a little different that she couldn't quite put her finger on. She raised her chin in defiance. "You should be sorry for making such assumptions." She said in an equally venomous manner. "Just because I'm a girl doesn't mean I am destined to be all mushy and romantic. The very thought." She huffed at the end. How dare he think she was weaker just because she was a girl? Because that was what she saw all the lovey-dovey stuff as, weakness.

She stared at him when he rattled on about nicknames. Did they have to? But then he remembered Melanthius and Bellona and all of the nicknames they threw around in their nauseating shows of affection. She nearly choked on the very air she breathed when he finally landed on a nickname before professing his love for her. "Merlin, that was horrible." She said, not caring if it hurt his feelings or not. "They will expect physical contact. Hand holding, other chaste shows of affection. You think you can handle that, darling?" The term of endearment sounded entirely foreign coming from her lips but she wasn't sure she could actually come up with a real nickname for Selwyn. Not without some thought.

@Comarth Selwyn

"Fantastic," he marvelled, far from being offended. A smile cracked at the corner of his mouth. For being horrible was exactly what they wanted, wasn't it? Romantic, slushy, horrible, terrible, ghastly. To him, they were all synonyms of each other. "I can handle anything, my apple blossom - with you by my side..."

He was beginning to get the hang of the words, at least; but his tone could do with some work. He couldn't get that sing-songy cooing that Melanthius was capable of, and that's what really made it mushy.

Just as he was about to release her hand, he kept holding it - remembering what she had said about hand-holding and what he'd said about being able to handle it. There wasn't anything particularly unpleasant about it, he thought, noticing that her palm wasn't sweaty or coarse or sticky or anything of the sort.

"Can I touch your face, as well? Or your hair? That would come over well, I should think. I'll pinch my cheeks a lot so it looks like I'm blushing - you should do the same. We could really do this!"

@Dahlia Travers

"Or course, you can. I am the wind beneath your wings after all." She said with a smirk. This was horrible and disgusting but it had now become a bit of a competition in her mind. Who could be the most disgustingly romantic and still make it seem real? She wasn't sure how well either of them would actually do but they were off to a good start, weren't they?

She didn't pull her hand away from him. It wasn't as if his holding her hand was entirely horrible. His much larger hands engulfed hers and they were much warmer than her own which felt almost as if they had been frozen. No, she couldn't very well complain with the warmth of his spread through her own ever so slowly. "Burke is always touching Lestrange in little ways that make me want to puke, so I think it would probably be a good idea if we want to be believable." She said with a sigh. "I shall just have to make sure I can appear to enjoy such things." She said with a thoughtful little frown. "Yes, I think we can do it! You had better not try to make me appear weak with this little act though or..." She paused, letting him think up his own consequences before she went on. "I will end you." She said it in a sing-song, gushing voice that she thought would make Burke and Lestrange look as if they were merely acquaintances with little care for each other.

@Comarth Selwyn

It wasn't a case of her being female and having an advantage, it was the case of her being very observant of others, and having that as her advantage. If she wasn't observant of others, she wouldn't have been good at discovering their weaknesses. She wouldn't have been good at making her potions to exploit these weaknesses. She had all the fury of a dragon but the cunning of a serpent.

"Dahlia..." he said, lowering his voice slightly. If he couldn't manage the tone, perhaps he could get away with merely lowering his voice. "How could you ever - ever think that you could be perceived as weak?" he asked her dramatically, taking both of her hands and clasping them gently within his own, staring into her eyes. "Even if I dare try, I could never succeed. Your strength and your brilliance shine far too brightly, my beautiful apple blossom!"

Too much?

He wanted it to be too much.

Perhaps he'd been bitten by this competitive bug as well.

@Dahlia Travers