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”So…pity.” Tarin laughed when Lee tried to make it sound a bit better for his benefit.

Lee at least admitted that once she’d understood a bit more about the game that she had found it interesting. ”I think I have Kevin hooked too.”

Lee was so happy tonight and it was kind of infectious. It wasn’t that she was usually dour or overly serious, but carefree would have probably been the wrong word too because Lee was constantly thinking about everyone and everything all the time. Here, right now, she seemed relaxed.

Tarin had to laugh when Lee pointed out that maybe Robert leaving had as much effect on the outcome of the game as the hat had and Matt seemed shocked that Robert was violent.

”At least where I’m concerned,” Tarin shrugged, ”Either that or I just have a very punchable face.”

Tarin had an ally in Matt as far as baseball was concerned and when Matt defended the noble sport, Tarin made a small toast in the other man’s direction with his beer bottle.

Rachel, it seemed, had taken Tarin far too literally and now thought that Lee was actually a lucky charm for the Mets in some official capacity.

Lee cleared things up pretty quickly though and it came to light that while Rachel had mentioned certain things to Robert, she hadn’t mentioned anything to Matt. It was interesting, Tarin thought, that Lee had known Matt for so long, had gone into business with him, and he knew next to nothing about Lee’s background. Tarin supposed it made sense though, Lee had only told her siblings recently. It was also really hard for Lee to talk about a lot of the things they were referencing.

Rachel just looked at Lee when Lee seemed surprised that Rachel hadn’t mentioned any of the things to Matt, ”I figured if you wanted him to know, you’d tell him.”

“Tell me what?” Matt said.

This was not where the night needed to go, not in the middle of a crowded bar. Not with how hard it was for Lee to talk about all of those things under normal circumstances.

”Lee hates to admit that she’s a baseball fan.” Tarin deflected, ”Hey…” he said, ”Do you think that they’d give us tickets if we told them about the interdimensional hat magic?”

It was an obvious deflection, and a poor one at that, but Tarin didn’t want Lee to have to talk about any of those other things if she didn’t want to.

Lee didn’t know how it worked, but apparently it did. Tarin was still smiling and was honestly thrilled that nothing more serious had been wrong. In fact, Lee was smiling and laughing at Tarin’s offer to hide so Lee could try again.

She said maybe later and Tarin shrugged and took another drink of his beer, a beer that was quickly disappearing.

”Maybe you just need more practice.” Tarin said as Rachel asked if Lee would be able to tell if it was her. That was an excellent question. Tarin wanted to test out the theory right then and there, but Matt spoke up then and asked if all they talked about when he was working was powers.

”What else would we possibly talk about?” Tarin said, ”You have to admit that this is really cool.”

Lee didn’t say anything when Tarin came up to the table, she also didn’t say anything when he draped his arm across the back of her chair, or when he commented on the fact that he was far worse at working his way through a crowd than Lee was.

The little “huh” that Lee uttered also didn’t escape Tarin and he noticed that she was biting her lip. It wasn’t the way that she bit her lip when she was being purposefully vexing, but the way she did it when she was worried or thinking hard about something.

Head tilting to the side, Tarin studied Lee for a minute as he stood there, ”What’s up?” he said, frowning slightly in concern. ”Everything okay?”

The idea that they had snuck anywhere was wildly amusing to Tarin as Rachel postulated that he and Lee had somehow stealthed into the bar. In reality, Lee had drug him through the semi-crowded space while he’d tried to figure out why a bar with people in it was causing anxiety. Luckily, everything had worked out and here they were, drinks in hand.

”Is that why we couldn’t find you.” Tarin said, ”We figured if we stood here long enough, you’d figure out we were here.”

There weretables, Tarin realized. He’d been so focused on Lee, and then the crowded state of the bar that he hadn’t really noticed as they’d made their way to the bar. The first time they’d been here, well, Tarin didn’t think that counted since he’d been so focused on what the hell was happening between him and Lee that he was lucky he remembered anything about this place. Taking another drink of his beer, Tarin decided to go back to being a wall flower and letting Lee talk to Rachel. It was probably safer that way.

Despite the fact that he’d lived in New York for a vast majority of his life, Tarin had never had the kind of ties to people or places that Lee had made in her time in the city.

It was just another example of how impressive Lee was. In spite of all the things that had happened to her, all of the things that she’d been through, she’d still gone out, done things, met people. Made connections. Lee would have never been able to simply walk through the rift without a second thought.

”Well, from all indications, you’re pretty good at what you do.” Tarin said as it occurred to him that they’d never really talked about what Lee did at work. She knew so much about his work that it was generally just a topic they didn’t talk about. ”I can see why you like it here though…”

”I can see why you needed to get that order in earlier this week though.” he said, taking another drink. The more they spoke, the more relaxed he was starting to feel in this space. The number of people wasn’t bad at all.