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Jaune reached for the big pot.
It was thoughtless, a habit so deeply ingrained that he didn't even register it was Blake standing by the counter and not Saphron. He'd grown up jostling elbows in a crowded kitchen. There was an art to it that he'd picked up after a while, slipping in and out of everyone's space, learning to reach under arms and then over shoulders as he got taller.
He needed the big pot, and the big pot was in the middle cabinet. RWBY and JNPR were all packed like sardines into the little kitchenette down the hall from their dorms, so Blake was standing between him and the middle cabinet, and so he just kind of... went around her.
She was facing away from him, her attention on the cutting board in front of her. And then, the instant she registered his arm looping over her shoulder, she startled so badly that she dropped her knife on the floor. He jumped too at the resulting clatter, and only then did he realize she'd whirled around and flattened herself against the counter.
"Sorry!" he said, and pointed to the cabinet. "I just need the big pot."
Blake handed it to him. Jaune passed it over Ruby's head to Pyrrha, who started filling it in the sink. The awkward moment soon passed.
It wasn't weird—she wasn't a super touchy person, and it was his bad for forgetting that not everyone had seven sisters to desensitize them to sudden invasions of their personal bubbles. He made a mental note to give her more space next time, and otherwise completely forgot about the incident.
Until next time arrived some weeks later, and Jaune warned Blake that he was going for the spatula by her elbow, and she looked at him like he was some kind of alien.
"What?" he asked, feeling slightly uncomfortable with how intensely she was staring.
"It's not like it's my spatula. You can just grab it."
Jaune did, with a flourish. "I know! Just wanted to give you a heads up, that's all."
Her mouth opened, and for a moment it hung that way, with no sound coming out. She finally blinked. "You... don't have to do that."
"It's no big deal," Jaune assured her. "I'm a clumsy cook, I should probably come with a warning label anyway."
The moment stretched, suspended on the slight wrinkle in her brow, as if this was somehow confusing or concerning or in any way A Thing. Jaune didn't know what to do with the stupid spatula he was still holding. He was halfway through trying to find a politer way to say, "This doesn't matter, it's actually really easy to just not jumpscare you for no reason?" when she abruptly turned back to the can of tuna she'd been opening.
"Thank you," she told the counter.
And that was that.
"Hey! Nice ass, sweetheart!"
It happened so fast—and the response was so instinctive—it never actually occurred to Nora that the guy might not be talking to her. She was used to walking with Ren, who only got catcalled in very specific places. But they were planning his birthday party, so obviously he couldn't be the one to go with her to get presents, and Blake was quiet like he was so Nora was hoping she might have some insight into which books he might like.
Anyway, by the time she realized the jerk might've been talking to Blake actually, Nora had already turned and wolf-whistled. "Not so bad yourself!" she yelled back. "Careful though, last guy I went out with needed a metal hip and a restraining order!"
She wasn't totally sure what she was even implying, but she smiled with as many teeth as she could and opened her eyes wide enough that there'd be whites showing all the way around. Suddenly jerkface remembered that he had stuff he was supposed to be doing and walked off. Fast.
"Whoops," she said, grinning sheepishly at Blake. "Sorry, maybe I should've warned you first."
Blake blinked at her. "That's... um. A unique way of handling it."
Nora shrugged, spreading her hands in a what-can-you-do kind of gesture. "I can scare them off most of the time. And when I don't, usually they do something that gives me an excuse to fight them, so. Win-win!"
At that, Blake actually smiled a little. "Thanks. Really. If I was by myself I would've just ignored him, and then I would've been worrying about whether he'd still be there on my way back."
Nora hesitated for a moment, then decided to just go for it and said, "You could've kicked his ass, though. If you wanted to."
"Maybe." Blake looked away, rubbing one hand up and down her arm. "I, um... I wouldn't want to get into trouble."
"Oh!" Nora clapped her on the shoulder, and laughed. "Right, yeah, I did not start doing that until Ren and I were already in training. Cops are way more dangerous than that guy."
Blake did a double-take, and Nora wondered if maybe she'd been wrong about the subtext. Except she looked more astonished than scandalized, and then she said, "How did you...?"
Oops. Not something she super wanted to talk about, actually. "Eh, I've been around. In Mistral, so, you know."
"Ah," said Blake, like that explained everything. And maybe it kind of did—the Mistral police were pretty infamous for their corruption scandals.
(And if she'd spent most of her childhood avoiding cops because they'd take her to an orphanage, and the orphanages in Mistral were also infamous in a completely different way, then that was the kind of subtext she'd happily keep to herself.)
"Anywho!" Nora skipped for a few steps, dragging Blake along behind her and leaving both jerkface and the conversation he'd started in the dust. "I seriously need your help here. Because Ren doesn't like thrillers at all and they're the main thing I read, so I have no idea what's good."
Blake let herself be towed. The only sign any of that had just happened was the way she squeezed Nora's hand—just once, gently but firmly. Like a second thanks, one she wasn't able to say out loud.
Nora squeezed back. She wasn't sure what she'd done, exactly, but she did know that Blake was welcome to it any time.
"Oh my god, you're Pyrrha Nikos! Can I get a photo?"
It was only years of practice that let her friendly smile stay pinned in its place. The girl was already pulling out her scroll as Pyrrha turned, startled green eyes meeting starry blue ones. She hadn't noticed her staring until it was too late.
Normally she would say no to an impromptu photo unless she was at some sort of event, which this wasn't. She and her friends were just here to enjoy the outdoor sculptures in a nearby park. But... well, the girl couldn't be older than thirteen, and Pyrrha didn't have the heart to disappoint her. It was over in less than a second anyway, barely time to stoop down into frame and flash a wider grin, all teeth and dazzle and no substance whatsoever.
Her face felt stiff, afterwards. It had been a while since she'd needed that expression.
"Oh!" said Ruby, turning around with a startled blink when the flash went off. "Oops, sorry! Didn't mean to photobomb you."
Looking down at the girl's scroll, Pyrrha realized she was right. Ruby and Yang were both caught in the background, their backs to the camera. Jaune's leg was visible in the lower-right corner. At the very back stood Blake, caught staring into the eyes of a massive stone lion, her face at a three-quarter turn but still plainly visible.
Blake, who turned around at Ruby's startled exclamation. Who broke her staring contest with the statue and hurried over, her mouth drawn and tight, to examine the photo. Who, they had recently learned, used to be part of a terrorist organization. Could someone recognize her from a stray photograph? It wouldn't have to be very likely—Pyrrha knew from experience that stray photographs of her had an alarming tendency to go viral on social media.
"I'm sorry," Pyrrha said, more to Blake than the stranger. "I didn't ask my friends if they wanted to be in the photo."
Ruby waved her hands frantically. "What? No, no, it's fine! I was just surprised, that's all!"
But Blake had finally gotten close enough to look, and her pinched expression said everything Pyrrha needed to know.
"I'll have to ask you to delete it. We can take another one with just us."
The girl's face started to fall, then brightened at her offer. "Oh, sure!"
It wasn't much. Another second, another fake smile, and Pyrrha could send the girl gently on her way. Blake shot her an apologetic look that she waved off.
"It was nothing," she said, quietly, in case Blake didn't want the others to ask questions.
Blake's response was softer still, as if she hadn't meant for even Pyrrha to hear it.
"No. It wasn't."
By the beginning of their second semester, Ren was well-used to being lumped together with Blake as the Tea Drinkers. He found it a bit ironic, then, that their tastes didn't actually overlap at all. He liked green tea, as well as herbal brews like mint or ginger. Blake preferred black. He detested even the smell of bergamot—Earl Grey was her favorite.
At first, he assumed that was why she froze when he handed her the box he'd picked up while he was restocking his own supply. He'd seen her have playful arguments about personal tastes with Yang before. Maybe this was more of the same?
"It's very easy to remember your favorite," he tried, "considering it's the wrong answer."
The unnatural stillness gave way to genuine distress. "How much was it? I can pay you back."
What? "That's not necessary."
Blake was already fumbling for her wallet.
It was only a few lien. But of course, only was a relative thing. There were times when a few lien could make the difference between life and death. A packet of cheap ramen—a plastic poncho to keep the rain away—a train ticket further south before winter set in.
Ren knew that. And he had a feeling that Blake did, too.
He caught her wrist, gently but firmly, and tried to pour as much understanding as he could into his smile. "It's perfectly alright. You can repay me with a box of jasmine whenever you'd like."
It was sitting outside team JNPR's door the next morning, unwrapped and unadorned, as though desperate not to call attention to itself. He picked it up, shaking his head with another wry smile. Neither of them ever mentioned it again. But from then on, by unspoken agreement, they alternated restocking each others' favorite teas.
Learning most of her friends' drinks of choice was easy. The way Ruby took her coffee was seared into Weiss' memory from the moment she first learned it, the way traumatic events tended to do. Yang's was quite simple, a dash each of cream and sugar to cut the bitterness, with no care or consideration whatsoever paid to whether it was a light or dark roast.
In time, Weiss learned that Pyrrha liked her coffee black so long as it was of decent quality. That Jaune put whipped cream in his—and worse, it actually tasted rather nice that way. That Nora could not under any circumstances be given any form of caffeine, and Ren didn't like it, so the two of them were best served with hot chocolate and tea, respectively.
As for Blake?
She didn't like coffee. Which was fine, except that whenever Weiss asked her how she liked her tea, Blake would shrug it off, or tell her that there was no need and she was perfectly capable of doing it herself. Which was true, obviously. It was just—
Weiss just wanted to be able to make it.
So one evening, when they were preparing for a team movie night, she studied what Blake did. All in all, it wasn't an especially complicated process. Boil water. Grab one of the tea bags Blake kept in the back of the leftmost cupboard. Pour the water on it once the kettle started to scream. Weiss timed that part on her scroll, as surreptitiously as she could, and came up with three minutes and forty-two seconds. Then, all that was left was to fish out the tea bag.
Weiss copied the notes she'd jotted down on her scroll into a proper notebook, and tucked it away for safekeeping—just in case.
It took less than a week for just in case to happen. Naturally, it hit Jaune first. He was sick at breakfast, and then had to spend the entire weekend huddled in team JNPR's dorm, being tended to by his teammates. Who then also caught the bug.
The perils of dorm living—it spread through their building like wildfire, and among their two teams, only Nora and Weiss herself were spared. (Weiss made a point to wear a face mask and sanitize her hands whenever she touched a shared surface. Nora, when asked how she had escaped, just said she was "built different.")
In an attempt to alleviate her teammates' obvious misery, Weiss made them drinks. Hot chocolate for the Xiao Long Rose sisters, because as wonderful as coffee was, it wasn't ideal for sleeping off a flu. And for Blake, she finally had the opportunity to dig out her notes and brew some tea.
With her... somewhat checkered kitchen history, Weiss honestly expected something to go wrong. Surely she would somehow contrive to burn the water. Perhaps it was luck, or perhaps brewing tea was so simple that it was genuinely impossible to mess it up, but she returned to the dorm triumphant with two hot chocolates and a mug of tea that looked exactly like the ones Blake made for herself.
Weiss presented the tray with a flourish. (And so what if she was a little proud of herself? It had turned out very well, thank you very much!)
"Ooh!" Ruby leaned down over the side of her bed, snatching up one of the mugs and giving Weiss a miniature heart attack.
"Are you trying to fall and break your neck?!"
"Hey!" Yang made a grabby motion from underneath her pile of blankets. "We're dying of thirst over here!"
"You're welcome," Weiss said testily, and bent to present the tray to Blake before Yang could see her smile. "Here. At least one of you has some sense of manners."
Blake didn't take the mug. She just stared at it, and then at Weiss. "How did you...?"
Weiss had not expected to have to explain herself. She looked away, feeling suddenly embarrassed, and a little worried that what she'd done was somehow rude. "I watched you make it once."
"...Oh."
Blake took the mug. Cupped it in her palms, blowing gently to cool it. Took a sip... and promptly started to tear up.
"Did I do it wrong?" Weiss asked, already kicking herself—she'd been busy adding whipped cream to Ruby's hot chocolate when the steeping timer went off, and had foolishly assumed that a few extra seconds wouldn't matter, but what if—!
"No." Blake curled around the mug, sniffling miserably. "It's perfect, I'm just..."
"Sometimes I get kinda weepy when I'm sick, too," Ruby offered, when it became clear that Blake wasn't going to finish her own sentence. "Or you might have a fever?"
"I'm okay, really. It's... my mom used to make me tea when I was sick. That's all."
A blurry memory surfaced—a hand on her forehead, soft and cool, soothing away a fever. A hollow ache.
Blake had never talked about her mother before.
Weiss opened her mouth, but couldn't think of what to say. She just stood there as Blake recomposed herself and took another sip of her tea.
"Thank you, Weiss. This is exactly how I like it."
At first, Ruby figured she was doing the right thing. Blake had been hovering, after their big group hug on the floor at Haven, like she didn't want to part with them but wasn't sure if she'd be welcome. So Ruby had welcomed her!
Now, hours later, watching amber eyes dart anxiously around the room... she was starting to feel like a kidnapper.
"You really don't have to stay here if you're not ready, you know."
"I'm sorry. I know I shouldn't have—I don't want to impose."
"You're not!" Ruby waved her hands frantically. "There's no imposing, this place is huge!"
Blake hugged her arms around herself. "Right."
Yang would know what to do right now. She'd be able to take one look at Blake and just know what she really wanted, and what was her trying not to impose or whatever. But Yang was upstairs, probably already asleep, and she'd been all distant and weird since they got back from Haven. So. Ruby was going to have to figure this one out herself.
"Yang and Weiss and I have been sleeping in one of the rooms upstairs," she said. And then, gently, gingerly... "You can join us, if you want. Or I can put some sheets on the couch down here. Whatever makes you more comfortable, okay?"
"I don't know." Blake rubbed her arm, her ears flattening as she looked at the floor. "I really can just go and stay with my parents. The last thing I want is to try and force myself back into... into your lives if you don't want me here."
Ruby had a sneaking suspicion that the you in that sentence was more of a Yang, actually. That maybe the reason Blake looked so terrified was because she wanted Ruby to know, as Yang's sister, whether or not it would be okay for her to stay. Which sucked, because as her sister... Ruby had no idea.
Yang had been through a lot, this past year. Ruby had barely been back in her life any longer than Blake had. She didn't know what Yang wanted, and she was a little terrified of overstepping herself. But...
But maybe Blake didn't need Ruby the sister, right now. Maybe she just needed Ruby the leader to give her somewhere to start.
"I'll get some sheets," she decided. "We'll make up the couch for now."
Blake visibly slumped in relief—maybe because Ruby hadn't told her to leave, and maybe because she hadn't told her to come upstairs, and maybe just because she'd taken the choice out of her hands when she was already stressed and exhausted. "Okay."
Ruby led the way to the hall closet, and Blake helped her tuck sheets around the couch cushions. They worked in silence for several minutes, fluffing up pillows and choosing blankets, before Blake finally broke it.
"Why?" was all she said.
"Hm?" Ruby looked up from the ball of fleece in her arms. "Well, this one is really warm and soft, but it also sheds like crazy. So I think the main question is how much you'd mind being covered in green fluff tomorrow."
"No." Blake's eyes got hazy, and she wiped at them with the back of her sleeve. "I meant... why are you doing this?"
"Because you're my friend, and I missed you."
"I left. I hurt Yang, I hurt all of you—!"
"Well... yeah." Ruby shrugged helplessly. "That doesn't cancel out the other stuff. I want you here, Blake. And while you're here, I want you to be warm. So..." She gestured at the pile of blankets. "Pick your favorite?"
Sometimes, Yang would look at Blake, and it just wouldn't feel real. She'd be standing out on a balcony on the upper levels of Shade Academy, the setting sun gilding her hair and fur with strands of gold. Then Yang would make some tiny imperceptible noise, and her ears would twitch and swivel, turning just a little faster than the rest of her head. And she'd be silhouetted against a backdrop of flaming orange and brilliant crimson, her gold eyes shining in that way they did that made the sun behind her look dull by comparison...
And Yang would think, no way this is real. No way I actually get to be here with her.
Her friends could tease her all they wanted. (Which they did, mercilessly.) She threw her whole body into making her greeting as big and loud and goofy as she could, every time, because when she did...
"O wise princess, your brave hunter returns with a gift!"
...Blake would roll her eyes and smile, soft and fond, and every single time it was the best thing Yang had ever seen.
"I'm still not a princess," she pointed out. "It's an elected office, I don't get any official title for being related to him."
"I see." Yang pretended to ponder this, all while very ostentatiously taking the brown paper bag from behind her back and studying it. "Then I guess that means you don't want this lemon poppy seed muffin—"
"I didn't say that!"
Blake snatched the bag out of her hand before she could even blink. Yang collapsed against the railing, tipping her head back to laugh into the deepening purple sky. "Okay, okay, easy! Don't bite my hand off, losing the one was enough."
A low moan told her that Blake had just started on her gift. It also short-circuited her entire brain for a solid thirty seconds, during which her girlfriend shifted so that she was leaning into her side. Yang draped an arm over her, and did nothing to fight the dopey grin taking over her face.
"You're sweet," Blake said, once she'd finally come up for air. "And this is delicious, and you're going to spoil me."
"Ruby and I passed a bakery on our way back. I got her a cupcake too, and for me and Weiss, so it's not like I went super out of my way. And..."
The moment stretched a beat too long, prompting Blake to look up from what was left of the muffin and frown. "Yang?"
"Can I say something weird?"
Blake's lips quirked, threatening a sly grin. "I hate to tell you this, but I think that ship has already sailed."
"You're hilarious." Yang bopped her gently on the nose with one finger, and felt her heart seize a little when Blake scrunched it up in protest. "What I'm trying to say is... would it be so bad, if I did spoil you?"
"I wasn't being serious, Yang."
"I know. I just—" Yang sighed, wishing for the thousandth time that she was better at putting things into words off-the-cuff like this. "I remember, back when we first started at Beacon, any time somebody did something nice for you? You were always so shocked. It was like... you couldn't believe that anyone would want to make you happy, so you had no idea what to do. But you don't do that anymore. I show up with a muffin and you tease me for calling you a princess."
Blake's face fell—which was pretty much the opposite of what Yang had wanted. "I don't mean to take you for granted."
"That's the thing! It's not a bad way to take it for granted." Yang gesticulated wildly with her free hand, in her desperation to make herself understood. Because the last thing she wanted was for Blake to go back to gaping at every tiny kindness, as if she couldn't fathom the possibility that she might deserve it. "You treat it like it's normal for people to care about you. And that's good, because it is."
"Maybe." Blake glanced away, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. "That doesn't mean I should stop appreciating those things. I want to keep noticing them, especially—" She blushed. "Especially with you. You deserve to be appreciated."
Yang shook her head. Not in disagreement—just in disbelief, that Blake could say something like that without realizing it made her feel like she was ten feet tall. "Yesterday you let me ramble at you for like two hours and helped me calm down about the boba trip. So, today I got you a muffin to show you that I appreciate you. And so maybe tomorrow you'll do something else to show me that you appreciate me. I think... I want that to be how we treat each other all the time. I want to give you food and—and maybe you'll be surprised because you didn't know what and when, but—but you won't ever be shocked, because it's just something we do. You know?"
Blake's mouth fell open. Her eyes welled up, and just when Yang might have started to panic, she felt soft lips press to hers. She could taste the lemon.
"Okay," she said breathlessly, when Blake pulled away. "That one might be hard to pull off enough times that it's old news, because I'm not totally sure what I did."
"Yang..." Blake put a hand on her cheek, and beamed at her. "I mean this in the best possible way—but I don't think you could stop surprising me if you tried."