Tam sat by her window, now overgrown with a more than a few potted plants. She hadn't picked up her books on comparative religions in a while, distracted by books on gardening and botany. Now, she was distracted by a single plant among many, an English Ivy, her first at the window.

Tam wore a blue sock and a green sock, loose black cotton sweat pants, and a Harvard hoodie. She never attended Harvard, but someone she slept with had. That guy probably remembered the fake name she had given him. She couldn't barely remember his face, never mind his name, though his hairless chest was all to easy to recall.

Tam sighed.

Then, refocusing her eyes on the English Ivy, she thought, Orphan! Was he going to stop by tonight? Or was that tomorrow night. Shit. Where is my phone. Or did I mark it on my laptop's calender? Shitshitshit.

Orphan arrived at Tam's apratment building. He had something for her in the passenger seat of his car, but decided on a whim to leave it there, as he wanted to surprise her in more than one way.

Wearing his well-worn leather jacket and work boots, a fairly new pair of jeans and a comfortable, old Dallas Cowboys sweatshirt, he bounds up the stairs to knock at her door.

Tam found her phone and was calling up the calender function when the door knocked. She frowned at herself for forgetting, then smiled big as she opened the door, seeing Orphan.

"Come on in. I was just about to throw some jeans on."

Tam heads to the dresser, drops her sweatpants, oblivious to the fact that Orphan is in plain sight and the door is open. She grabs a clean pair of jeans from her dresser drawer and pulls them on. Apparently, becoming Tam's friend reveals a lack of modesty in her.

Orphan comes in, closing the door behind him. He is somewhat surprised by Tam's lack of modesty, but being young and male and not completely unused to how comfortable Thyrsus tend to be with their bodies, he doesn't turn away or feel embarrassed about enjoying the view.

Once she's dressed, Orphan grins and says "I brought you something... well, two somethings, actually." He gets a faraway look for a moment, looking not at Tam or anything in her aparatment, but rather - completely ignoring intervening space and matter - at the front seat of his car. He extends both hands, as if grasping something, and a moment later, he is holding a small bouquet of pink and red roses in his right hand, and a small potted aloe in his left.

"Ta-dah!" he says, smiling. "A trick I've been working on for awhile."

"That's awesome! Aloe is such a cool plant! And you brought me flowers." She plants a quick kiss on his cheek. "You're so cute when you cave into the traditional greetings." Her smile suggests she isn't as big a fan of flowers as most women, but she is of the gesture.

Tam takes the aloe, and as she turns towards her plant covered window, she says, "Oh, and that's a neat trick." Her smile shifts to a sly "must not smile" smile as she tries to cover how impressed she is. When she puts the plant down on the floor, she turns, and is still obviously impressed, but trying to hide it.

"That must have taken some effort. Life and Matter for the plant and pot? What about Prime? You channeled Prime into that, right?"

Tam returns for the flowers.

"How long will these last?"

Yeah, he is so getting kisses tonight!

Orphan smiles at the kiss and the "cute" comment. "No Prime," he explains. "Space, plus the Life and Matter, like you figured."

"The flowers are the freshest-cut ones the florist had, so I'd hope they'd last for a fair bit. There's a packet of that stuff you dump in the water to keep them going for awhile." He smiles, a bit shyly. "I figured you'd be a lot more into live plants than the cut flower thing, but it's hard to find a rosebush in bloom around here this time of the year, and I'm not good enough with Space to apport anything that big anyhow. So, that's why I went with the aloe, too."

"So, up for Indian?" Indian, in all its varieties, was Orphan's favorite cuisine, but he hadn't had any since moving to Sacramento. He'd talked the two Indian guys where he worked, though, and they'd given him the name of what both said was the best Indian place in the area. "This place is supposed to be really good. They do mostly North Indian dishes, and from what I hear, their tandoori and korma are top-notch."

"Oh, Space, okay. So you didn't make the pretties, you just nabbed them from somewhere." Tam put her hands on her hips and gave Orphan a stern look. "You didn't pluck these from some housewife's vase, did you?"

Her returning smile said, Of course you didn't.

"Nope, I just left them in my car. I can't make things out of nothing, but I can get stuff if I know where it's at. It works best if the stuff is somewhere I know really well, or have a close connection to."

Tam slipped her sneakers on without untying them.

"Can you use that little trick to grab your blade? That would be useful. I mean, you would never be out of arms reach of your weapon. What else can be done with Space?"

Tam stood and headed to the door with a "time to eat yummies" look on her face.

"I have to get better with Space before doing that with my katana is an option, and that's going to take awhile," Orphan says, as they head down to his car. "But I can use it to grab my wakizashi. Or with a few seconds notice, I can have a pistol, without worrying about having to sneak it through metal detectors. Or I can have a flashlight or a medical kit or a jug of water or whatever tools I need, or a couple spare magazines of ammo at a moment's notice. That's why I've been working on it... so I don't get stuck without something I really need."

He moves in front of Tam to hold the door for her, and again to open the passenger door of his car, continuing to explain the whole while. "I've been buying a lot of stuff and handling it a lot, spending time where I'm storing it, trying to get a feel for it, developing a close connection to the place and the gear. The whole sympathy thing, that's really important to doing anything with Space. Even people really good with it, good enough to teleport or whatever, they have an easier time going to places they know well than places where they haven't spent a lot of time."

Tam allowed herself to be subjected to the lady-like treatement as she thought, Silly boy.

As she sat down with Orphan standing at the door of the car, she said,
"This sympathetic connection ... you need to spend lots of time handling things you really need?"
Her voice was innocent enough.
"When do I get put on that list of things you really need?"
But, there was a look of devilishness in her eyes, as she looked up into Orphan's eyes.

Orphan stammers a bit, blushing, and as usual when he's nervous... he blithers. "Um, yeah, you need to handle the, uh, the stuff..." He pauses a second, dispelling images of ways he might like to "handle" Tam, then continues. "Or, um, at least a lot of time around it. But, um, you, um... you don't need to go on a list."

Knowing he sounds about as smart as Forest Gump right then, he decides to forego the words and reaches for Tam's hand.

Tam reaches up to hold Orphan's hand, and leans forward to kiss his knuckle, then she looks up into his eyes.

"Sweetie, get in the car and stop blushing." Her face is lit up like the adoring date that she is. "It is time for dinner."

She lets go of his hand.

"You really need stop all the blushing around me. I'm nothing to get all flustered over. I'm just a girl with the forethought of a field mouse and the wiles of a kitten. If you can't hold your wits against me, we are both in trouble."

Despite her words, she is totally flattered that someone would be flustered around her. The men she usually 'associates' with tend to be more smooth to the point of being slick, though they hardly showed her any respect.

"Dinner it is," he says, while thinking "When did I become such a dweeb?"

Orphan thought back to his pre-Awakened life. After age four, when his dad had run off one night, he'd become a troubled kid. Other than his mother, he wouldn't let himself trust, wouldn't let anyone get close. A chronic under-achiever, he got into fights, and drugs, and trouble with the law. He'd tried to get his act together after a stay in a juvenile detention facility, had tried religion but didnt' find anything there that sounded or felt like truth to him. From there, he had developed an interest in the occult, had started to flirt with Satanism, even.

"That stupid tattoo," he thought. "What the hell is she going to think about that?"

Back then, he'd been smooth. He'd been a convincing liar, and he'd never had any problem getting laid. He knew just what to say to get into the pants of the kind of girls who were interested in guys like him. Relationships? He hadn't had any of those to speak of, but he also hadn't cared.

Things had changed, with his Awakening. He'd found a direction, he'd learned to trust and respect others and had worked hard on becoming someone worthy of trust and respect. He'd started to actually care about people.

"I stopped being a loser and an asshole," Orphan thinks to himself.

He realized suddenly that as much as he'd changed, he'd still never had anything even approaching a real relationship with a woman. He'd been with a few women, especially during the year before he came to Sacramento, when he was a nomad, going wherever Fate took him, but those had been one night stands. Other than his mother, who had died shortly before his Awakening, and his mentor, he'd never had a truly meaningful relationship, and neither of those was anything like the sort of relationship he was considering in regard to Tam.

"Suicide-bomber zombies, I can handle, but going on a date with a girl I like and am interested in sleeping with? That's kinda pathetic." Nonetheless, he smiles. "But better than being an asshole, I guess."

He turns and looks at Tam while stopped at a traffic light. "That... field mouse and kitten stuff... do you really think about yourself that way?"

"Are you implying I'm not cute as a kitten?" She smiles teasingly. "Sometimes, I do. A field mouse that can summon the Spirit of the Wind or channel Primal energies like streams in the mud, but on my own, I tend to act first. I'm finding myself more grounded when I have other people to think about."

Tam looks at Orphan in the light of the red streetlight.

"Where did you go just now? You retreated a little into your mind. I hope I wasn't too obnoxious and deepen your embarrassment. Even kitten have little claws and teeth, and we poor things don't always know we are using them."

She isn't teasing as much now, despite the recurring metaphor.

"You sure you haven't been studying Mind?" Orphan jokes, grinning, as the light turns green and he continues to drive. "Seriously, I was thinking about why I was blushing and why I get flustered around you, and, well... it's because I like you, and I'm really attracted to you, and ... well, uh, I'm not really very experienced at the whole relationship thing. Sex, yeah... but actually connecting to people... " He shakes his head.

After a few moments, he continues. "I had sort of a screwed-up childhood. I was a messed-up kid on a road to Loserville, got in trouble with the law, and into drugs and drinking and... all kinds of dumb stuff. Then I Awakened. I was sixteen. I didn't even finish high school, though I did get my GED last year while I was in Florida for awhile. Point is, a lot of things people figure out growing up... I never did.

"You know, Tam, I'd have to think really hard to remember all the girls I've been with. It's not like there've really been lots, but mostly those were just one-night stands, just about sex, not about the girls as people... and I'm sort of ashamed to say it, but I really don't remember who most of them were. I'm not like that any more, but much as I've learned about fighting and honor and magic, I still haven't learned much about connecting up with people in a meaningful way. I've never actually had what I'd really even call a girlfriend."

Tam smiles.

"I think we were fated to find each other ... little 'f', not big 'F'. I had a tame childhood. Well, tame by your standards. My parents had a handful, though. I was always wandering off, and as I got older, the I just wandered further. When I got into boys, I played around, too, but I think I paid more attention to who they were. At least, until I got out of high school. When college hit, I awakened, was pulled into the Boston branch of Hogwarts, found plenty of boys who looked like men, and well, I played the field."

Tam was quiet as she recalled some of the highlights with a smile.

"But, yeah, I getcha' on the whole, 'what's a relationship?' thing. I had a couple, but they usually coincided with summer break, winter semester, or 'If I don't eat lunch, I have an hour'."

Tam held back for a moment, then said,

"When we first met, I kinda brushed you off as someone I'm not interested in, but as the minutes, and seconds, passed, I can see what other women see. I caught myself, hit the breaks, but found I was still interested. I'm liking the fact that both of us are trying to figure out this relationship thing. It is like we are walking new ground together. It makes me all giddy inside."

She shrugs her shoulders and shivers a bit, just like a giddy school girl.

She is still smiling.

Orphan smiles at her smile, and in relief she doesn't think he's a complete dork.

"I like the idea of walking that new ground with you, us doing it together," Orphan says, driving one-handed as he reaches his right hand over to take her hand.

"So... tell me about Spirit," he says, wanting to change the subject to something lighter, and something where he could mostly listen. "I've gone through the basic tutorial stuff, but I'm still trying to get a sense what all it can do, what the risks are, all that."

Tam holds Orphan's hand with pleasure.

I guess we are boyfriend and girlfriend now. Wow, this takes me back.

Tam's smile fades as she realizes she doesn't have any close friends to tell all her news to. Back in school, she always had somebody to talk to.

I guess Orphan will be that person, now.

Her smile slowly came back, and finally, his last words sunk in.

"Spirit," she said, looking forward, "Well, there are some amazing things I've seen, like the True Face of Time. Well, not the true True, but that's what it called itself. There are some very powerful entities out there."

Suddenly, she huffed.

"It gave out hints of the future to everyone in the seminar, except me. It said I wasn't ready for such things. Falling Leaf agreed that I needed to grow up a litlte before I should be handed prophesies, but it still embarrassed me. Looking back, though, I have to agree. I am probably still not ready for knowing what the future holds."

Tam regathered her thoughts.

"I am half way to becoming a master, and I can awaken spirits for a short time. I can also heal them, hurt them and control them, but those last two, especially, are not so fun. To see a spirit stir within an object, to speak to it about it's dreams, that is amazing."

"The great thing is, you learn to speak to spirits early on. Some speak in riddles, and some just don't make any sense until you have time to think about what they are saying. But, when you wind where it has been, it is rewarding enough to hearing it's shushing voice."

Again, her smile faded. She looked over at Orphan.

"But you won't find that around here. Something is wrong with the Spirit World. I'm sure it has the packs all tweeked. I would hate to run across one of them."

Without realizing it, she squeezes Orphan's hand a little tighter.

Orphan is fascinated by Tam's account. "The seminar... you mean that one Ruby spoke at? I was there... did it hint anything about me? And... what more can you tell me about this True Face of Time. Would that be connected to Time somehow?"

"No, this was back in Boston. One of the Master, an Acanthus, in fact, summoned a powerfull spirit, powerfull enough that I don't think I could handle summoning it at the moment. It called itself 'True Face of Time', but you should know that the realities perceived by spirits are not quite the same as ours."

"It is the little spirits that I like. They are simpler, like puppies, though a simple spirit of Knife can still cut your finger off."

Tam's demeanor shifted as thoughts connected in her brain.

"I've been thinking of getting into horticulture. I'm not sure how I would start, but I want to create a greenhouse, maybe turn it into a sanctum ... "

Her voice trailed off as she is follows the trains of thought.

"A greenhouse sanctum sounds pretty cool," Orphan says. "I don't know a thing about horticulture, but if you need some help setting things up, let me know."

After a moment, he says "I was wondering... the stuff you were saying, about spirits of objects... could you awaken the spirits of my blades? That... would be kind of cool."

Tam looked up and over at Orphan.

"I could ... But it isn't like getting better blades. It is more like buying a puppy. You would have to take care of the blades on a spiritual level, and the spirit, if properly treated, will grow up."

Tam put her free hand on the hand Orphan's had given her.

"I wouldn't be able to make it permanent, so I might have to renew the spell regularly. We would have to learn what kind of essence will support it, and what kind of actions will produce the essence. Just like puppies, blade spirits will have different personalities. Some blades want blood, while others just want to cut things."

"However, should we get into a fight with something nasty, I'll awaken your blades and you will see what happens when your blades fight as your allies."

Tam's eye lingered on her driver.

"You mentioned something about Mind magics. I would like to learn some. I think that arcana will help me focus. It is the hardest for me to learn, but I think with a proper teacher, I would be an excellent teacher."

"Yeah, I didn't figure waking the spirit of the blades would make them sharper or anything like that - that's their physical aspect, not the spiritual one, so that's Matter, and I've learned enough matter that I can do that on a temporary level already. It's just..." Orphan thinks for a bit about how to explain it. "To the Brotherhood of the Demon Wind, like to the samurai of old, the daisho is considered part of oneself, a physical extension, but also more than that. As Arrows, it is important we know ourselves, and so it may be of benefit to know the blades as well. Plus... my blades belonged to my father, who was also Awakened, and of the same path. They may provide a way of knowing some part of him as well."

Orphan squeezes Tam's hand.

"As to the Mind stuff, sure, I'd be glad to help teach you the bits I know. I'm just an Apprentice of Mind, but I can teach some things, including basics of mental defense."

Tam stares at the dashboard, thinking about the potential of Orphan's blades.

"Your blades have history, important history. That is worth something. They wouldn't just be bloodthirsty bits of metal. They probably want honor or something."

Tam's eye widen with the possiblity.

"We can awaken the blades, talk to them, see what they are like. Then, if there is something there, something really worth keeping awake ..."

Tam's jaw drops open.

"This will be like an enchantment, though, from a Spirit point of view, it is called a Fetish. Except a fetish is an outside spirit is placed in an object. Whatever. This will take time, but I think we can do this."

Orphan can feel Tam's excitement through their touch. He smiles at her excitement. "Sounds great to me," he says. "I'll trust you to know what you're doing with the Spirit stuff, and I'll be glad to do what I can to help you with Mind, and with gaining focus. Learning some Mind will probabl y help you with that." Thinking a moment, he asks "Do you practice meditation of some sort? It sounds like that would be a good thing for you to work on, as far as keeping focused and grounded."

"I do Yoga regularly. You should try it. It will keep you toned and sexy."

"Oh, I already do yoga. And tai chi. The fighting disciplines aren't the only ones I practice. It is good for toning." Orphan grins. "I don't know about the sexy part, though. Maybe I should check out that tantric yoga stuff."

"I will probably need a meditation coach, if you are talking about the whole 'sit-quietly-and-hum' kinda thing. I like yoga because there is always a sense of motion. Sitting still," Tam shrugs, "well, I don't remember a time when I could do that well, if at all."

Tam gently bites her lower lip, then she says, quietly, "As for the tantric thing, can we start out with tantric smoochies?" There is a sly look in her eyes, as if she were asking, not because she was shy, but because she was desperately holding onto the reigns of her wild side.

Orphan laughs at the idea of 'tantric smoochies', a goofy, joyous laugh that makes it obvious he's laughing at the joke, not at Tam herself. "I don't think I've seen that technique in any of the tantric manuals I've looked at, so I guess we'll have to try to figure that one out together," he says.

"As to the meditation, I do the quiet stuff but I also do the active stuff.... the way I approach tai chi and the way I do my sword katas half the time, it's very meditative. The key to meditation is to put yourself fully into whatever you are doing, whether it's focusing on a thought or image, or clearing your mind, or getting in touch with your body or trying to perfectly perform a series of movements. 'Mindfulness,' a lot of Buddhists call it. It's what they consider the optimal way of living. Anyhow, I'll be glad to coach you in that, but if you already can do yoga, I'm pretty sure you can do the other types, if you set your mind to it." After a moment, he asks "Have you ever considered that maybe you can't sit still mostly because you think you can't sit still?"

Tam welcomes the laughter. I like making you laugh, Mister.

"I can't sit still mostly because, I don't want to sit still. Imagine you are very thirsty, and there is a nice cool glass of water in front of you. Now, you may have various reasons why you should just sit and not take a drink, but you want to take a drink. You do not want to sit still."

Tam tilts her head to one side as she looks at Orphan.

"Does that make sense?"

"Sure," he says, nodding. "Long as one keeps in mind not wanting to do something is different from not being able to do it. A lot of people confuse not wanting to do something with not being able to do it, or fail at thing just because they think they can't do them... they expect to fail, so they do."

Orphan had first-hand knowledge of this. Shortly after his Awakening, he'd learned that not only was magic possible, but that he was capable of mundane things he'd thought impossible... that the only thing that had made them impossible for him was his belief that they were impossible and his own limited perspective of who and what he could do and be.

"It sounds like maybe Tam still confuses that a bit," Orphan muses. "Maybe I can help her with that."

About then, Orphan sees the restaurant ahead. "And here we are."