The night was going well so far, they had made their way through most of the pizza and were sipping on their second beers. Lauren was enjoying the younger girls company, she was witty and had a dry sense of humour, much like the doctor herself. Ava had just got up to move the pizza box into the kitchen and off the table in the living room where it was sitting when the door knocked. She exchanged a confused glance with Lauren but continued to head over to the kitchen. "Um sorry, I'll just be a minute." Lauren said towards Ava. She was going through a list of people it could be, and one person came to mind: Bo. The doctor hoped it wasn't, the succubus was still jealous and protective whenever she was seeing someone, even though she had good intentions.
When Lauren opened the door she was slightly relieved but mostly confused as to why Tamsin was facing her.
"Hi Tamsin, is something wrong?" Lauren had never got on particularly well with her and immediately thought something must have happened for her to be making a house call.
"No, not exactly," the valkyrie pushed pass the doctor and let herself in.
"Well what the hell are you doing here then?" the doctor replied, frustrated. Tamsin, having noticed Ava sitting at the end of the kitchen island, turned and handed Lauren the files she was carrying.
"Well you know the group of Fae that are in town? I need you to run the samples in here and tell me whether it was them that made the kill. The Ash is gonna flip his shit if we don't get some solid evidence against them soon so he can banish them," she rolled her eyes as if the Ash needed to relax. Tamsin glanced back over her shoulder slightly, "Little young for you, Doc, isn't she?" she taunted Lauren with her usual smug looking grin.
"What, no, it's not like that," then Lauren realised what she was saying and that she didn't have to justify herself to Tamsin of all people. "Just give me the files, I'll have them done as soon as I can."
"Ok, ok," the valkyrie's face shifted to indicate Lauren was over reacting, "Have fun." She winked at the doctor as she left for the door.
Lauren tried not to let herself get annoyed and reminded herself she still had a guest. She turned and headed towards where Ava was still seated, scrolling through her phone. She looked up when the doctor approached, stuffing her phone away. "Sorry, I had an email from my professor," Ava commented, smiling apologetically.
"No, that's ok, sorry about Tamsin. She was just dropping off some samples. So what is it you're studying anyway?"
"Well my masters was in Psychology and French and now I'm just doing Psych. I don't know why I did French really, I guess cause I'd picked some up from travelling but I'll never use it. So, yeah, now it's just psych."
"Oh, so you're a fellow scientist then?" Lauren joked.
"Why doctor, are you mocking me?" Ava feigned feeling insulted, "I'll have you know we actually do cognitive science for a semester each year." She said in a posh accent.
"Ok, I think someone might be a little tipsy." Lauren laughed.
"Oh, I'm fine. It's gonna take more than a few beers for you to get me drunk, you know." Ava stood and announced, "I'm off to the loo" in a terrible English accent.
"Well you're not convincing me of that very well. Hey, could you take the box set upstairs while you're going up?"
"Sure." Ava smiled widely. She hadn't had this much fun in a long time. Once she had left school after her masters she had taken a year out to focus on recovery, having suffered with an eating disorder the four years previous. She had isolated herself and lost most of her friends, she still had Leda but she spent most of her time with her boyfriend. Ava was struggling to find people with common interests having just started school again and the doctor was turning out great company to be in.
She ducked into the room she had accidentally stumbled upon the week before and slid the box set into the gap on one of the shelves where it belonged. Everything definitely had its place and was meticulously kept throughout the doctors apartment. Then her eye caught something she didn't expect to find amongst the books and memorabilia. She walked over to the corner of the room where, next to two armchairs and a table, stood a record player. Ava grinned as she began to browse through Laurens collection. She knew she really shouldn't but couldn't help herself, she was always so interested in what music people listened to. She glanced through a few she didn't recognise, some she did, some she laughed at a little until she came to one she had herself too. She picked it out and wondered out onto the landing, craning her head over the banister. "Hey, I didn't know you had a record player."
Lauren cocked her head up from where she was sitting at the counter, "Yeah, I was born at a time when records were the way people listened to music." she replied, somewhat sarcastically.
"What, no you weren't, you're not that old." Ava laughed.
"Well thanks, how kind of you to say, " Lauren shifted from her seat and headed towards the stairs but continued their conversation.
"Well you know what I meant, I bet you were listening to cassettes or CDs mostly, you were born in the 80s, right? Or have you secretly had a ton of plastic surgery to make you look younger and amazingly beautiful?"
"Yeah, I was born in '81. No aesthetic surgical procedures of any kind." Lauren cringed slightly at admitting her age to the younger girl but couldn't help but smile a little at the compliment she had tagged onto the end of her question. She was now standing next to her and gestured for Ava to enter the room she had just left. Ava complied and realised this meant the doctor was thirty three, she hadn't thought Lauren was that much older, seven years was a bit more than she had expected, "Wait so you're thirty three then?," she faced the older woman, "I thought you were like thirty one, max." Ava shrugged showing her indifference, age really never bothered her although she reckoned she wouldn't date anyone much older than Lauren.
"Yep, thirty three. Which record did you pick out?" Lauren said wanting to change the subject as quickly as possible, she didn't like to be reminded of the age gap between them as she was finding herself more and more attracted to the girl as the night went on. It didn't bother Lauren too much, technically she had slept with someone more than 500 years older than herself. But it wasn't just sexual attraction she was feeling towards Ava, they were getting along well and had a lot in common and that could mean more than just a one night stand.
"Oh, um Piaf. I have this one too, it's one of my favourites actually."
"Mine too," Lauren replied, "although I can never sing along to it, my French is awful. Non-existent, in fact. I bet you can sing along just fine though, non?" maybe she herself was getting a little tipsy, the doctor thought to herself.
Ava laughed at the doctors use of French," No way am I going to sing in French right now. But-," she placed the needle on the spinning record she had set up,"-I will dance with you."
"No, no. I don't dance, I'm not nearly drunk enough."
"We can fix that, later," Ava took the beer out of the doctors hand and placed it on the table behind her, "viens, danser avec moi!" Ava took Lauren's hand in her right and placed her left on the doctors hip, she thought the waltz hold more appropriate for the classic French record they were listening to. Lauren giggled despite herself at the young girls dramatic motions, she only vaguely understood what she had said but Ava's use of French had left her powerless to disagree.
They were both laughing and spinning more or less in a small circle around the room as there wasn't much space. Ava tilted her head up to look at the doctor and slowed her silly side to side swaying, sliding her right hand from Lauren's to rest it on her shoulder. They continued to sway slightly as Ava moved her other hand to rest on the doctors left shoulder and around the base of her neck. Just as the song finished Lauren leaned into Ava, their lips met softly at first and then she deepened the kiss. Ava tangled her hand in the doctors hair at the base of her neck while Lauren pulled her closer, wrapping her arm around the younger girls waist. They kissed until the end of the next song when Lauren pulled back slightly and looked down at the smaller girl. Ava's combination of smiling and biting her lip made the doctor want to kiss her again but she decided against it.
"You know, it's not fair that you can just speak French and get people to kiss you." the doctor commented, smirking.
"You know, it's not fair that you can be so damn attractive and get people to kiss you back."
"Hmm, do you want to stay for another drink?"
"Well I do want to but I should really be responsible and stop now since I have a meeting with my professor in the morning."
"Yeah, I suppose you should." Ava sighed and stepped back a little, removing her hands from the doctor's shoulders. "Eugh, I hate being responsible. But I promised myself I would be during my Phd since I was definitely not during my masters."
Lauren smiled and picked up her beer, closing the top of the record player. "Well it sounds like you should be getting home soon then. But we should do this again sometime, if you'd like?"
"Yeah, I'd like that. Catch you downstairs in a minute." Ava said grinning, she never had got to the bathroom like she'd intended. Lauren headed downstairs and began collecting the empty bottles to recycle.
"Hey, so I'm gonna head off but I'll call you soon, yeah?" Ava said as she approached the bottom of the stairs. She grabbed her jacket off the couch and turned to Lauren.
"Ok, sure, I had fun."
"Yeah, me too," Ava replied, leaning in to kiss Lauren goodbye on the cheek and smiling as she turned to head for the door.
