#im 84% sure that if freya had dance lessons dimitri did too but .... yolo

[enthusiastiics]

❝ My mating dance is mostly seizures. ❞ // dimitri, vf

@mortecula

theresia was sure that if not for the fact that someone was always home, the house she lived in would be the location where dares regularly took place. the house was old — as old as the town itself — and while other families had modernised their homes, the severin family had not followed suit. thus, they lived in a dark victorian building that seemed to loom omniously above the town. the perfect scenery for a cheap horror movie.

within the house, things were better — less gloomy, a little brighter. but as her grandfather and her father alike had refused to let anyone  from the outside  do any major remodelling, it still did not keep up with the light-filled home theresia’s cousin lived in. however, the reason why the severins did not want a stranger to see the building plans was easy: there were countless hidden rooms and secret passages, secrets the family had carefully kept for a long time.

secret passages theresia had been using recently to sneak dimitri in and out of her home. while she doubted that her father would mind her having a guest over, troubling him while her mother was in hospital seemed wrong — and this way, he would not have to lie, should dimitri’s mother ever catch on and accost her father to interrogate him.

lounging on the windowsill while she balanced her sketchbook on her knees, theresia had been doodling the dress she wanted to sew for the next dance at school — she would need her father’s help for this, but she would not bring it up until she had a clear idea of what she wanted. talking about the dance was both safe and awkward; it was safe because it had nothing to do with his cousin, six feet under, it was awkward because she could not remember dimitri ever having been at one of the dances in the past.

“ that’s nothing some dance lessons couldn’t fix, ” she said as she put aside her sketchbook and stood, flinging her bag onto her bed and stretched her arms before she circled dimitri who was sitting on the carpet, math homework forgotten. inside the safety of her home, theresia was not just kind and lively, she was bold. this was a place where she felt wholly like herself, no masks, no hidden facets. in any other place, she would have made another suggestion, would have reminded him that his cousin was an excellent dancer and had the patience of a saint when it came to teaching. but here, in this room the suggestion was another.

she grinned — wide and with all her teeth — as she held out her hand. “ i am a good dancer, i can teach you, ” she said, her offered hand a dare.