"Okay... so I just cut here... and here... and here and.." The Greek held up her current project before her eyes, un-folded the paper, and gazed at the nifty wedding bells she'd just made.

...or at least they were supposed to be wedding bells. They turned out looking more like bats. She glanced from her work, to the instructions on the screen of her laptop and back in confusion. "...But... but I followed all the directions!"

Sighing defeated, she tossed the bat-bells into an ever growing pile of unidentifiable shaped paper, and tossed her safety-scissors away from her. Perhaps it would be best to turn her attention elsewhere for a while. Andrea's eyes landed on the small pile of tester dresses she'd finally managed to find, and she crawled to her feet.

The women working at the bridal store she'd stopped by earlier in the day had been nice about, and understanding enough, to send her home with a few dressed they'd had in back. Some had stains or tears on them. Some had funky stitching or missing parts. Andy didn't rightly care so long as she could put them on and study what best fit her.

Huffing as she pulled the pile of fluffy lace and tool into her arms, and shuffled over to a full length mirror she'd dragged into the living room with her, and plopped the dresses down in-front of it. Now it was just a matter of getting the darn things on over her t-shirt and jeans, and posing-- or whatever ladies did-- in front of her reflection.

Looking at the first dress in her hands, she pursed her lips. How exactly was she supposed to get this thing on?... It didn't look like there was a zipper anywhere in sight. With a shrug, she lifted it and her arms and started to wriggle-dance her way into the poofy, while atrocity.

After the rather disastrous encounter with Sylar in the sewers, Tses had gotten talked into staying at the mansion for a few days to 'recover'. Mostly this just included raiding the free food and enjoying a roof over her head for a change. But Tses was restless, and good behavior didn't seem to be going well for her. Grumpy, irritable, and still pretty much looking for trouble, Tses was brewing for mischief.

Perhaps that was what made the figure in the living room such a prime target.

The figure was trying her best to wiggle into what looked like it should be a wedding dress. All the lace and poofs made it look like a giant pile of cool whip though. After a few moments of watching, Tses took an assessment of the situation. The disastrous looking paper projects, the ugly dresses. This is why she would never understand marriage.

"Maybe you should give up before you get into that. Unless you want to look like you're wearing a bridal store..." She remarked, leaning against the nearby wall.

"Maybe you should give up before you get into that. Unless you want to look like you're wearing a bridal store..."

The Greek jumped at the unexpected voice, her head and arms still buried in the under-fluff of a gown. Ira's sleek black head popped out from inside a sleeve, pink tongue lapping at he air. Andrea struggled with the dress, cursing in vivid, colorful Greek until she was free. Then, with disheveled hair and crooked glasses, she leveled a startled look on the woman who had just appeared.

"...Oh... I.. I did not hear you come in." What had she said? Something about a bridal store? Looking down at the dress in her hands, she dropped it as a brown flush crept across her cheeks and nudged it away from her with her foot. Maybe the woman had a point. Too much... everything.

"You do have a point." She dipped to pick up another; this one mostly some sort of silk. Holding it up to herself she scowled at her reflection in the mirror. The gown would surely show off every curve, or in her case, all of her un-curves. She caught sight of the woman in the mirror and started again.

"oh! How rude of me," The Greek faced the woman, though she didn't budge from her spot by the mirror. Her mind was too preoccupied with the wedding; she was having trouble with even the most basic task. "I'm Andrea. I.. do not believe we have met?"

Tses had seen several curious sights in her time, but watching the green woman struggle free of the awful wedding dress had to be the most comical. She didn't know how she managed to keep her composure, but only the mischievous glint in her eyes gave away just how unhelpful she was being to the other woman. The woman looked in the mirror, and Tses looked at the dress.

It was hideous.

"Well, Andrea, we haven't met, but let me be honest with you, you will have better luck getting married in jeans and a t-shirt that than monstrosity. You look like a stick of asparagus with a glob of ranch on you." She snorted. She didn't give Andrea her own name. With her arms crossed and the judgmental look on her face she looked less than inclined to spent time in formalities.

The color of her cheeks and her frown deepened, and she returned her gaze to the mirror. How rude! Honest, yes, but still rude! She did not look like a [i[]vegetable![/i] with ranch on her!

... did she?

Doubt crept into her expression, pinching the corners of her mouth as her bottom lip poked out. If someone could think something so terrible just because of her holding the dress up to look at it, what was that to say about her actually having it on? Would all of the dresses draw a similar reaction? Was there any dress out there she could wear?

The black snakes retreated into her hair to continue their nap, while Sloth kept one beady eye pinned on the unknown female. "... he said he doesn't care what I wear, so.. I suppose it will not matter all that much in the end."

Still, the Greek very adamantly did not wish to resemble any kind of food on her wedding day. She wanted to inspire happiness in people; not hunger pangs.

The doubt started to cross the woman's face, and Tses started to see it settling in. She didn't know why, but that amused her. Weddings were dumb, and if she could save this poor girl the disaster of having one, maybe she was being nice in the long run.

At least, that was what she told herself as she chuckled and moved closer to look at the dress again. "He said he doesn't care? Maybe that's your warning sign, Hun. If you can't look any worse..." She poked the fluffy fabric and rolled her eyes.

"At least your hair isn't green. You only would sort of look like broccoli if you did an updo... The dress is bad, but have you worried about your hair?" The stress of the last few weeks was making her words somewhat icier and cruel. She wasn't usually such a bully... But like Loki and other mischievous individuals, sometimes there was a little line they pranced across.

Couldn't look any worse?! Andrea openly gaped at the woman, who had crossed the room at some point when she was distracted. She would have taken the comment as an insult if she weren't starting to panic about what she was to wear, and if she would look like--

"At least your hair isn't green. You only would sort of look like broccoli if you did an updo... The dress is bad, but have you worried about your hair?"

-BROCCOLI?!

Her teeth snagged her bottom lip in blind panic, and the silken dress fell from her grip. Her hands were already up touching her hair in worry, while she leaned in and gave herself a good, hard stare in the mirror. Her dark, flat hair was long; she'd never really cut it save for trimming the dead ends off. Past her tush, nearly creeping along the back of her thighs. Her mother had always praised her over it; how long it was, how soft, and how straight.

Her fingers moved through it, teasing her serpents back out of the thick, black mess, and she chewed on her captured lip. "... I don't want to look like a broccoli..." What was she to do? Braids? A pony tail? Leave it loose and free to do as it wished? Andrea glanced at the woman again, anxiety having captured her expression entirely.

"...What would you do?" The woman's very first comment had entirely been forgotten. Andrea was too busy fretting to care if she hardly new her, or if she even had any advice to give, for that matter.

>>"What would you do?"

The question seemed ridiculous to Tses, who spent most her life with the same hair style. The ends were ragged, hacked off with a knife from time and never having seen a proper hair stylist. And yet here this girl was, asking her advice. Tses glanced at the long hair and considered it.

"I'd avoid curls... And I wouldn't put anything white in your hair. You wouldn't want your hair to look like it was moldy..." She said in consideration. She glanced at the length. "But if you leave it down you might sit on it, then if you try to get up you'd make a fool of yourself because you sat on your own hair... Everyone would laugh..."

She circled ever so slowly, like a tiger circling a deer. The terror on Andrea's face was far too evident... and far to amusing to stop. Tses' own face remained serious though as she 'considered' the 'situation'. "I guess you could always cut it. But the snakes might not like that much. Do they need to eat? That could get messy. I've always seen snakes eat mice and having them enjoy a midnight snake in my head would be a little odd. Blood all over your dress, little mice bones everywhere... Maybe they just eat stuff while you sleep though, so you might now have to worry about knowing what small animals they've slaughtered...."

The Greek was imagining every word spoke to her in her head. How she would look moldy; everyone laughing at her for various things. She cringed openly, fiddling with her hair, and tried to follow the woman's reflection in the mirror. Sloth's head followed her much easier; his pink tongue flicked out in her direction every so often.

"C-cut it?!" Panic caused her to hiccup, and she instinctively clutched some of her hair to her chest with both hands. "...but..." The blonde continued on swiftly. This time about the snakes; specifically about how and what they ate. Vivid images of the many times they seven had openly attacked birds of all kinds, as well as pets and people filtered in.

The color drained from her face. If she hadn't already been green, she surely would have turned the color just from the woman's description. "That i-is not what-- They are n-not-- " Try as she might, the words would not leave her mouth. They were stuck on her tongue stubbornly, leaving her feeling mute and helpless. Worse yet, all of her snakes were now vividly aware of the woman's presence; perhaps because they had recognized the word 'mice', or simply because so much of their hosts attention was focused on her.

The circling continued, and Tses kept a hand to her face thoughtfully. "Although having your hair long could be unsanitary. I mean, you are sitting on it all the time once it's past your waist. That must be awkward if you have to go to the bathroom. You know, you'd have to choose between holding your hair and holding your dress if you had to pee at your wedding. Unless you decide not to pee the whole day, and that could be awkward. Then you'd just be fidgety the whole ceremony, desperately hoping you didn't have to pee so your hair wouldn't end up in the toilet... Having mice bones in your head at nice doesn't seem so bad then, does it?"

She paused, looking at one of the little snakes, and measuring slightly with her arms in the air. "They probably have a decent striking distance... What if one of them bit the pastor? As soon as he asks if you will take your man to be your lawfully---SNAP! Ceremony over. Even before your husband goes to kiss you and realize you have toilet water in your hair....And you look like a broccoli. A moldy broccoli."

The picture completed she moved over to pick up the little people on the ground. "Ooo! Arts and crafts!"

Behind her glasses the Greek's eyes were wide. Had that woman just mentioned... pottying? Out in the open? Her brain was having a hard time deciding whether to light her face up like Christmas in embarrassment, or to drain the rest of the color out and let her blissfully pass out.

Instead, her ears darkened considerably, while the rest of her fade remained the same mottled shade of green with a considerably more shocked expression on. She was trying to come up with something to say back, when the conversation took a darker turn. Now, instead of personal hygiene and mouse bones, she was forced to consider the very real possibility that something bad could happen because of her mutation. Sloth cast a look back at her as if demanding she not take the woman seriously, but Andrea didn't notice. One hand had slipped up to cover her mouth, while the other had her hair in a white-knuckled grip of terror.

"..I... I would never allow that.." She'd tie them back, or.. or tape their jaws shut! She knew herself well enough to know that there were necessary precautions she would take, there always were.

But.. what if it wasn't enough?

Her breath hitched in her throat, she dropped her gaze, and tears pricked at her eyes. What was she to do? Her dream wedding... all of the plans she'd made... would Saph even understand? Movement caught her attention, and with no strength in her voice she called out to the woman and raised a weak hand as if it would stop her.

"No, wait, those are-.." Too late. Andrea bit her lip again and pressed a hand to her forehead. Was it suddenly hot in the room? She felt like she was burning up.

The expressions of terror from 'Andrea' were not missed to Tses, but perhaps the exact level of fear she was creating was not noticed. She was having fun, and while she was probably shattering a number of dreams, she didn't think she was having any lasting consequences. Sure, she would think she looked bad in the dress and maybe get cold feet on her wedding. To Tses that wasn't the most awful thing in the world. But as the woman went to stop her from grabbing the paper, Tses glanced over.

"You look a little green. Er, greener. Less vegetable, more vomit." The thief remarked, glancing down at the little paper project. "Are you having a Halloween wedding or something... Because these look a bit like bats..." She muttered thoughtfully.

Rooted to the spot, Andrea refused to look at the woman. She did however drop her hand from her face, choosing to grip her arms nervously around her middle. She didn't have the strength to defend her art from criticism; not that she should have anyway. They were terrible and she knew it. That was also the point of art, was it not?

"I... I have never been good at art." Was her hesitant reply. She stared down the crumpled shapes of the wedding gowns she was supposed to try on and prayed that the woman didn't discover any of her other attempts deeper into the pile, like the folded napkins that had turned out looking more like wiener dogs, than swans.

Maybe she was going about this whole thing wrong.. maybe she was looking in dark corners for things she did not need? Saphirus always told her she was beautiful, didn't he? Then surely it was so. He had confidence enough in her that she barely needed any for herself. The Greek knelt to pick up a plain, simple dress from within her gown pile, and held it up to herself in the mirror. Surely if he were there with her, her husband-to-be would tell her to cheer up and trudge on. Even if all she saw staring back at her in the mirror was a moldy, green vegetable trying to pass itself off as a bride, she surely had to hold her head high for Saph. Even if everyone laughed at her... even if something bad happened. Even if she was weeping on the inside, she needed to remember that it was more than just her special occasion.

Tses slowly glanced at the green skinned woman, some of the amusement wearing off as she stood there. She glanced at the little 'bats', then back at the girls annoying dress, and she thought she saw something peaking out from under the folds of the dresses like napkins. She shook her head as she set the papers on a nearby table. "Why on earth are you even doing all of this anyway? Weddings are ridiculous. All they are is silly attempts to parade around in dumb clothes, see relatives you have no interest in, and wast money on just one event." She crossed her arms and stared at the woman staring at the mirror.

"No one really cares about the flowery stuff anyway. In a year you'll both be bitter and divorced, or he could dump you. That's what guys do anyway. They make you get all oooey gooey in love, then dump you when you have a bad day." She could see the snakes wriggling still. She wondered what it would be like having snakes on her head.

The image of moldy broccoli stayed stuck in her mind.

Her attention turned back to the woman-- had she given Andrea a name? The Greek suddenly could not remember. Whatever the case, the female had her undivided attention. Listening to her, Andrea could not help but feel sad. The lessons her mother had instilled were often vastly different from that of most people she had met in her life in New York. Marriage was a frivolous, short-lived thing that romantics and desperate people did.

She avoided looking at the woman when relatives were mentioned, choosing instead to finger the fabric of the dress in her arms. "It might be true that today ceremonies do not ring true to what they used to be... some consider them old fashioned, but... I am also old fashioned. Marriage is a sacred unification between two souls. I will swear myself to him, and he to me." She glanced at her reflection in the mirror, catching sight of a glint from he ring around her neck. It brought a small amount of peace to her troubled mind.

"I have absolute faith in Saphirus... but if for some reason that bond fails then it was never meant to be... I do not think I can live my life having never taken a step forward for fear of having it backfire.. it would be lonely and cold; even if my skin is not perfect.. even if my body is different... even if..." Her frown deepened and her grip on the dress loosened. "... even if this will all come tumbling down on me in the future."