******************************************************************************
                               Today's Weather:

The sort of bracing weather that makes the song "Winter Wonderland" a true
sentiment. Though the air is crisp, there is no wind, the snow is white
and fresh and the sky is blue. The sun dazzles off the white blanket in
the day and the artificial lights sparkle off it like a zillion diamonds
during the night.

******************************************************************************

It's not snowing, it's not even windy, which means it feels a /lot/ less
cold out; Kitty is absently whistling to herself as - gloved and scarfed
and jacketed - she knocks at Kess and Tulio's door.

There's the sound of feet on stairs, as Kess skips lightly down to the
front door. Opening it, she blinks, then smiles warmly and steps back to
give Kitty room to come inside. "Hey, Kitty." She looks tired, a little
worn around the edges, and is dressed in a simple sleeveless shirt atop a
pair of odd, black leather trousers that cling to her legs and seem to
have plates protecting the lengths of thigh and shin. She waves the way up
the set of stairs behind her, to where another door leads into the
apartment proper. "Didn't expect you by today. Everything okay?"

Kitty's finally stopped looking tired herself, which makes her all the
more alert to the nuances of Kess's expression. And of her outfit, which
gets a second glance and mildly impressed raised eyebrows. "Everything's
fine," she promises as she slips in and starts up the stairs. "I just
figured, I promised to keep you updated - I could at least drop off some
information, right? And see how you were doing?" Hint, hint. Everything
okay?

"I'm fine." It's her usual response, and she tries to back it up with a
smile as she nudges the door closed behind them. Just don't ask about the
other night when she got horribly drunk - she's at least over the hangover
now. Kess wanders across the foyer area of the apartment to another set of
stairs, this time leading up towards a loft-like room, which acts as the
place's lounge. "C'mon up. Something I should show you up here anyway. You
found out some new stuff?" She gives Kitty a curious look; she's trying,
really she is. But at least she has something to show Kitty, in the form
of a tailor's dummy sitting in the corner of the lounge, swathes of white
material draped from it in dress-shape.

"Some," Kitty agrees. Well, it was new to her, anyway, and she's entirely
unaware that Kess has seen Constantine since then. More stairs! No wonder
Kess likes Tulio's apartment. It's all high up. She pauses to eye Kess
again for a moment. "You sure you're up for visitors? You look kinda
tired. I could come back later?" And then she comes to catch up, and this
time she stops in her tracks for a different reason. Figure, and drape,
and white, and ... "... oh." Very, very wide dark eyes.

"No, Kitty...." Kess looks immediately sorry, turning to look at her
friend, and then stops too and smile gently. Aww. She reaches out to take
Kitty's hand, to draw her forward slowly. She falls silent, watching the
reactions, and that in itself helps her relax. The dress itself is simple
in design, a sweep of fabric from neckline to floor, and if Kitty looks
closely, the hem is chased around in a design of glittering white
stitches, detailed with tiny pearls, describing a pattern of lithe
dragon-shapes and snatches of the pictures on Kitty's medalion. "It's not
quite done yet," she offers softly.

Triskelions and oak-leaves. The medallion Kitty was given in the dream,
when Kess was watching over them. "It's /beautiful/, Kess," she whispers,
and as the other woman draws her forward, she tucks her other hand behind
her back like a little girl: don't touch the art, you don't want to get
fingerprints on it, do you?

"You like it?" Kess sounds unsure suddenly, clinging to Kitty's hand with
both of hers. She gives a nervous smile. "You should probably try it on.
I, um... well, I guessed, and it's gotta be right, so...." She lets
Kitty's hand go to step behind the tailor's dummy, to unfasten the dress.

"Like it?" Kitty repeats, her voice very small. "Like it? Kess, it's, it's
-" Try it on? Nobody's got her hand! Reaching out to try to clasp Kess's
again, she just manages to brush fingertips. Her voice stammers to a stop.
Maybe she /shouldn't/ be trying it on; her eyes seem to be leaking a
little. Tugging gloves off hastily, she rubs at them and swallows and
tries to get her voice back.

Kess looks over the shoulder of the dummy as she carefully gathers the
fabric up in her hands, to lift it off. That done, she steps to lay it
down carefully on the couch, and then moves to wrap her arms around
Kitty's shoulders. "I'm glad you like it." She's blushing at the other
woman's reaction, and will give a tight, warm hug if she's allowed, eyes
closing. Okay, well, that's something she didn't screw up, then.

Apparently not - since Kitty's not objecting to the hug. Arms wrap around
Kess in turn, clinging for a moment: she still knows how to keep from
ruffling the other woman's feathers by accident, too. "It's wonderful,"
she whispers. "It's perfect." And a little hiccup of a giggle, before she
can add, "And we can't let Pete see even a /bit/ of it before the
wedding," teasing as she hugs. Mustn't sniffle on the birdgirl's shoulder!

Kess wouldn't mind her feathers being ruffled in the least, and in fact,
she's almost clinging to Kitty herself. Wings unfurl to curl around them
both briefly, in an unconscious gesture in response to the approval.
Feathers rustle against Kitty's back before the birdgirl realises, at
which point she pulls them back and steps out of the hug with an
apologetic expression. "He won't," she promises. "He's not allowed,
remember?" Rules and superstition and all that. "So, you gonna try it on?"
Let's move on before there are tears on both sides.

The apologetic expression receives a faintly puzzled look - Kitty can't
imagine what Kess would have to be sorry for. She takes a deep breath,
though, and manages a grin. "Well - he is supposed to see me /once/ before
the ceremony, if we go for that bit. To put the veil on." She blinks
twice, firmly, and starts taking off her scarf and coat, then the sweater
underneath it, leaving herself in T-shirt and jeans and jewelry; she
pauses there to give Kess another faintly inquiring look. Won't mind if
the birdgirl doesn't. "Supposedly people used to be concerned about there
being a last-second switching out of brides, or something, so the groom
got to make sure he was getting the right girl..." Joking. If she's
leaning on the humor, she won't have trouble with the hydraulics anymore,
right? Right.

Some people just get twitchy about wing-wrapping hugs, and Kess is never
sure how any one person will react to that. Wingtips twitch lightly behind
her as she returns the inquiring look, blankly at first and then with a
smile. Nope, not minding, but she will turn around to fiddle with the
dress in case Kitty requires that much privacy. "Tulio's not due home for
a while. And, we can always make you a cloak or something to go over it,
if you want it to be a surprise." She even seems quietly amused by the
humour. "Oh, which reminds me, you gotta tell me what kind of veil you
want. I've got the material, but I wasn't sure how you wanted it to go, or
if you were having a tiara or a wreath or...." She pauses and shrugs
cheerily.

Hey, there are swimsuits that cover less than Kitty's got on under the
jeans and T-shirt. Kitty removes the medallion and jade dragon pendants,
as well, but keeps the rest of her usual shiny stuff: her ring, the charm
bracelet on her left wrist, the silver star necklace. "I just don't want
Pete to choke and back out when he sees the dragons." Yes, she's almost
laughing. "So - have to make sure there're witnesses. And I /really/ want
to make sure at least one of them has a camera." Because the expression on
his face might just be even more priceless than usual. "Oh, that's a good
question. I was thinking a wreath, or maybe combs?" She grins suddenly.
"If it weren't winter, we could've used leaves, maybe. To match."

Once Kitty is ready, Kess turns to present the dress, ready to step into.
"I can make something out of oak leaves, in white. Bit of both, maybe."
She pauses, then cocks her head to the side, birdlike and
feather-twitching. "Pete won't like the dragons?" She's hoping from
Kitty's tone that the reaction the other woman's expecting isn't a bad
thing. Good-shock? Please tell me it's a good shock?

"Oh, that'd be /perfect/." Eyes still shining, but not actually running
with tears, now. Kitty steps forward carefully, trying to make out which
of the folds of white are folds and which she can slip her body into.
She's got a few visible scars, along her abdomen and side, the back of a
shoulder, high on one thigh. None are recent, though, and she's lucky:
they're all easily enough concealed by clothing. "And Pete won't /admit/
to liking the dragons. He claims they hate him." At least Kitty sounds
pleased about it.

Kess holds the dress open so it's easy to slip on, and scoots around
behind Kitty to fasten it. She, herself, is scarless, as Kitty may have
seen once when the birdgirl was undressed enough to show, and none of the
injuries that were tended then seem to have left any lasting marks. No
memories of past injuries here. "Well, you can promise him that none of
/these/ dragons will bite," she says with a hint of amusement. Poor Pete!
And he lives with one too. She doesn't seem too bothered by the scars, as
long as they're all old and don't look still tender. "How's that feel?"

Yes. And that one eats his cigarettes and drinks his Scotch and steals his
clothes. Hee hee hee. Ahem. "Cold," Kitty teases her lightly. "It feels...
do you realize, I think this is the third time I've worn a dress in the
last ten years?" And it's hard to pay attention to the fabric when her
heart's distracting her by doing this weird pounding thing. "Does it drape
okay? What with me having no hips to speak of and everything? Kess, how
did you manage to /do/ all this? Do you have the secret power of not
having to sleep?"

Kess walks in a little circuit around Kitty, adjusting the fall of the
dress with a twitch of fabric, and she flicks her friend a little smile.
"I don't sleep too much usually. Every minute counts." She's never still
these days, seeking distractions wherever she can. Thinking too much isn't
her friend. Which is probably why she looks so weary, whenever she's not
looking Kitty in the eye. "Could do with taking in a bit at the waist, I
think." She steps in to pinch the material, head tilting as she studies
the fall of the skirt. "Your hips are just fine." And she'll damn well
make the most of them.

Kitty's thinner and more solid than most women: less fat, more
muscle-over-bone. It skews the proportions a little. She hesitates, then
lifts her hand - not looking down at the white or she /might/ start crying
again - to touch Kess's arm lightly. "Seriously," she says more quietly.
"Are you doing okay?"

Kess was looking at the dress; the touch to her arm makes her look up, and
her gaze is more openly troubled then. She can't sustain it for long, and
drops her gaze to smoothe at the white fabric again. "I'm fine, Kitty,
really. Just... restless, I guess." Shoulders shrug, a gesture echoed by
her wings. "There's a lot going on, you know?" She gives a weary smile at
that, briefly shown before she moves around behind Kitty again. "Don't
worry about it."

"Yeah." Kitty starts to try to look over her shoulder at Kess, then
desists when she realizes what it's doing to the way the cloth falls.
"Anything you want to talk about? Or could use any help with?" When
proactive types collide...

"It looks fine on you. I think I know which bits I've gotta alter to make
it fit properly." Kess is looking at the dress again. The question makes
her smile grimly as she starts to unfasten the zipper again. "Help? No,
I...." That's exactly the problem. "It's me that's not much help, Kitty."

Kitty starts to turn, and fortunately checks herself at once upon noticing
the tug at the zipper. Careful of the dress. Therefore, Kess is hugged -
more fiercely - only after Kitty's free of the white cloth again. Which
means she's being hugged by a half-naked girl, but hey, not only are they
both girls, they're both engaged. So who cares. And Kitty replies,
bluntly, "Oh, bull/shit/."

Kess is a little startled by the hug, but leans into it after a moment.
Wings tremble as they add their own embrace. "I am, Kitty," she says
softly. "Haven't been much use to you guys, not really. Or others. I seem
to have a habit of upsetting people, lately." People she cares about, too.
She doesn't appear to have noticed that Kitty's half naked, or to mind.
Mind really not on those kinds of matters right now - the hug is what's
important.

"Oh, Kess." Use to people. Like she has to be? "You've been taking care of
Tulio, haven't you? And doing your job? That's helping people, isn't it?
And if those pants are what I think they are -" and Kitty's voice takes on
a hint of her grin - "you've been setting up what you need to help in
other ways, right? And you've been doing this - which is wonderful /and/
beautiful - and that's only what /I/ know about, and I don't know /half/
of what you've been up to. And... y'know, we all manage to upset people.
Most of the time? People get over it. It's okay."