gentle heart — joining

[BASTILLEPAW]

[div style="background-color: white; width: 100%; font-family: Georgia; color: #576a6e; text-align: center; margin: auto"]BASTILLEPAW AURELIUS  ✧
the ascendants — kuiper corporal — tags

[div style="line-height: 110%; word-wrap: break-word; text-align: justify; color: black; padding-top: 10px; font-family: Georgia; text-size: 6pt"]
It wasn't so much that Bastille actively disliked newcomers. He did not really enjoy socialization that much, but he didn't hate people, honestly. At times he wanted nothing more than to be away from everyone, and he dreaded small talk, but he was shockingly personable once he felt used to people and would show up to group events when it involved a group he liked. He was just... not great with others, one might say. His poor, proper mother had tried so hard to train better manners into him, for those brief few months that a fragment of her soul clung to him. Alas, Bastille lacked significant social cues and had literally raised himself in the woods. All he had were three assholes of past lives as guidance, and a vague inclination to try to be a better person.

So, it took him a few moments to realize that she was talking to him. A lot of newcomers tended to just blanket introduce themselves, and Bast wasn't here to realize she'd been doing this individually. She was just... staring at him, and Bast stared back, and eventually realized what she was waiting on. Right. Smooth, he thought, and the wind whipped a little more violently in response to his vague flash on awkwardness. "Oh-- uh, I'm Bastille." There we go. Look, mom, he was a real boy.

She was very, very... nice. It was a little unnerving. She smiled in the face of nerves and awkwardness (he could sense the slight uncertainty in her aura, the traces of anxiety -- damn, he seemed to have that affect on people). She looked each of them in the eye and individually tried to make connections. She was... kind, or something. Bast did not know what to do in the face of her stare, her softness, her clear and utter attempt at friend making. Oh no. Frenchie's etiquette courses had never involved befriending strangers, and Bastille had the sudden impulse to censor himself. He usually swore every other word casually, lacking any heat, but somehow he felt like this doe would take it personally.

He glanced very briefly towards Suite, as if she was going to come to his rescue, before he said awkwardly, "Uh, yeah. No one would mind showing you around, really. We've got maps and shit--" oops "-- but I mean, we usually give newcomers tours, too." Why was she still smiling at him? Dear gods, Bastille was going to die. He was not meant for the pleasantries and kindness of welcoming strangers, but he had felt guilty enough for spooking Hazel on the border, and now felt morally obligated to be a better person when Imperia was staring straight into his fucking soul. Especially since Hazel was currently there to see if he was just a bad host towards everyone.

Her sudden question prompted him from his chaotic thoughts, and he blinked, before glancing down slightly. "Oh-- yes. It was my mother's," he supplied, glancing back up at the doe. He wondered idly if fate hated him; the last thing he needed was another reminder of his mother and the pout the dainty little princess would have given him in response to his complete lack of social grace. He couldn't begrudge her of it, though. It wasn't her fault that the bengal's only accessory happened to be tied to Frenchie.