"We'll still be friends, but we'll kiss too." Rose smiled up at him, "I kind of want the kissing practice anyway. You know, so that I'll be prepared one day when I actually kiss a not friend?"
"I understand that, but me?" Nathanael admitted, and while Rose's idea of a friends with benefits type deal was way more PG than he'd heard of before, he still wasn't sure why should she choose him or not just chance it when she did get a boyfriend one day.
"I trust you. You're one of my closest friends, and you'd never hurt me." She murmured softly, "I like you a lot as a friend, and so kissing you shouldn't be so bad. Besides, I grew up with Luka and Juleka, and so I wouldn't want to kiss Luka at all."
Nathanael shook his head with a smile; her logic was so simple, but it wasn't bad logic. He could kind of get along with that actually. "Okay. What happens if I say, 'yes?'"
"We kiss and we cuddle and we hang out more. It's not technically dating, but we get to just be close without worry of anything like that." Rose looked so happy at the thought that Nathanael's heart warmed despite itself, and he really wanted to just pull her close and hold her against his heart.
"Okay, it doesn't sound bad." Nathanael admitted, still adjusting to the thought of all of that with Rose.
"It isn't bad, and we'll take it slow. Just hugs and cuddles and may be kisses on the cheek for now." Rose beamed up at him, "Nothing drastic like kisses on the lips until we are much more comfortable with it." Her idea of a friends with benefits kind of relationship, Nathanael could really get behind as she wasn't trying to rush him into something without some kind of plan, and it really was innocent, just sort of practice for when they'd both actually fall in love one day.
There were just no romantic feelings between the friends though.
"Okay." Nathanael figured, 'Why not start now,' so he pulled her into a gentle and somewhat quick hug, nothing too slow and cuddly, but nothing too fast and awkward. It was sort of like their friendship hugs though may be just a second or two longer. It felt nice and relaxed, and Rose was warm and soft in his arms, just shorter enough that she fit so very comfortably there.
It started out so slowly that no one seemed to notice a change, not when Rose leaned up against his side and rested her head gently by his shoulder, not when she giggled and looped a hand around his arm, not when she just smiled at him when no one else was looking.
For Nathanael, it felt like there was an extra bolt of lightning between the two of them, an extra static that wasn't distuinguishable and yet felt far more pronounced than it looked. No one said a word about them looking like a couple or being more than friends.
It was a really easy, gradual shift, and Nathanael hadn't thought too much more about them being just a tad above normal friends until quite a while later.
About a week or two into their friends with benefits type deal, Rose asked Nathanael a question that he hadn't been prepared for at all despite her hand in his and her arm looped just so around his. Her beaming and absolutely innocent smile when she asked him didn't do anything to stop his mind from blanking as he stared down into pretty blue eyes.
"Can I kiss you?" It felt far different than her just taking his hand in hers whenever or when she got tired and practically fell asleep against his arm. It was completely different than any platonic friendship that Nathanael had had, and yet as he looked into her eyes and saw hope, he couldn't really turn her down.
"S-Sure." Nathanael took a deep breath as if to steady himself as Rose stood up on her tiptoes, throwing both of her arms around his neck either for balance or because she'd saw couples do that before, and she pressed so closely that for a moment, all that he could feel was warmth. Her lips were soft, a little wet from either the times when she licked her lips or when she pulled her lip into her mouth when she was thinking about something deeply or really nervous. It was an observation that Nathanael had never expected to realize from this friendship ages ago.
Rose kissed so gently and slowly, like she was afraid to hurt him or slip up, and it felt so weird, kind of awkward like just kissing a friend, and kind of silly like they really shouldn't be kissing like this in this moment.
Every second dragged on, almost agonizingly long as he tried to kiss her back the way that she kissed him, and as her smooth lips brushed against his, he wondered if kissing was usually this awkward. It wasn't gross, but he couldn't really taste her, not without his tongue, and he'd never really had any experience to compare it too.
When Rose pulled back and screwed up her face into a sillier expression as if contemplating what kissing was like for her and yet bringing everything back into something that made more sense than that awkward, tingling feeling that hadn't stopped Nathanael short with desire. He didn't feel compelled to kiss her, just kind of confused.
"That was weird." Rose stared up at him, and Nathanael couldn't nod his head quick enough as Rose leaned back against his side, "I think that I like cuddling and hugs more."
It was sort of like trying to figure out how to 'romance' without the romance part actually being there, and Nathanael figured that may be kissing wouldn't be so weird if they'd actually been dating or planning to date anyway.
Rose can be a bubble bursting with a random thought and yet Nathanael had not expected anything like that to shake him to his core. "You look handsome today."
It wasn't much; it certainly wouldn't have the same effect as the word hot, but Nathanael wasn't wearing anything too unusual and hadn't done anything different with his hair. He'd just thrown on a slightly paint splattered, red button up shirt, and some old jeans that looked nice enough to wear to school.
The jeans felt a little snugger than Nathanael wished he was wearing, and just may be if he'd been trying to look nicer than usual, he'd wear a newer button up. He had some new ones from just two months ago on some random shopping trip with his mother.
"Thank you. You look pretty." He tried, and Rose really did. She wore a light pink dress that came to just above her knees, and somehow the pink highlighted how light and pretty her skin really was. Nathanael hadn't thought much about it until she'd complimented him however.
"Thank you." Rose smiled a sweet, endearing smile and then promptly latched on to his arm, "Are you eating with Juleka and I today or are you going to eat with Marc or Alix today?"
"I'll eat with you." Nathanael never really made lunch time plans though he had been eating a lot with Marc lately and trying to see if Marc and Alix would like to become friends and may be hang out too.
Alix today had been in another competition with Kim and likely wanted to focus on that, and Marc had said that he had a story idea that he wanted to work on during lunch earlier in the morning. Nathanael didn't midn sitting with Rose and Juleka today, and besides while his heart may have been buzzing a bit from her random compliment, it wasn't enough to distract him from how comfortable it just would be to sit down at the same table with Rose again.
The second time that Rose kissed him, she hadn't really asked, just look at him kind of funny, concentrated, and stood up and done so. It felt less awkward, but it took Nathanael a second to realize that he could just wrap his arms around her waist and hold her close for just a moment as she kissed him.
Once again, he followed her lead, but something just felt different than last time, not a whole lot, but there was a spark of something undeniably there, nothing super romantic as far as Nathanael knew and nothing like the way that he sometimes wondered if kissing Ladybug would have felt like back before he gave his first kiss to Rose and discovered just how awkward kissing could be.
No one started out a pro despite what Nathanael kind of wished, but when Rose pulled back, she was smiling.
"That was better." She beamed up at him, "May be the third time's the charm whenever we try it again. May be even actually dating someone might be like that."
"Probably." Nathanael agreed, just so that he wouldn't have too put all that much thought into that since he was already starting to feel guilty over kissing someone that he didn't have romantic feelings for. He'd wanted to date Marinette for so long, and when his feelings switched over a little more towards Ladybug, he'd never paused to consider kissing anyone else like Rose was.
It still felt a bit out of the order that things were supposed to be in, so Nathanael bit his lip and pretended that it didn't make that much of a difference that since they'd been extra cuddly, gave longer hugs, and now kissed that he hadn't fallen head over heels for Rose yet or at all.
Just, he'd want something like this out of a relationship with real feelings considered, but yet he didn't have those here.
Rose really was cute, and Nathanael had no idea why the thought had hit him today all of a sudden as they hung out with Juleka, Marc, and Alix. She was wearing some casual jean shorts and a yellow top with a yellow ribbon along the front of it, just above two buttons.
She wasn't dressed up or really trying to be cute, but she just was. Something about Rose sparked something off inside Nathanael's chest, and he wasn't sure if it was his heart that was going off like a rocket or if he was beginning to feel faint by the power that he was giving Rose's tiny hands.
Rose just kept on smiling though, humming some old song that he couldn't place underneath her breath, and just letting her bright, sunshiney smile be all the sunshine that Nathanael needed in his world.
She was adorable, and Nathanael just couldn't find the words for it.
"Hey, Rose, can we talk?" He asked when it became too much and felt like his heart might just explode in his chest.
"Oh, sure." She smiled while she waved bye to their friends, and once Nathanael and her were behind an old brick building, he kissed her for the first time ever.
He'd never paused to actually start a kiss, and it felt almost like fire when she reciprocated, gasping into his mouth, and tried to stand as tall as she could to kiss him better. Her skin burned him and yet it didn't hurt, and while it still felt weird, Rose became a match or liquid fire or something beyond Nathanael's control, and he couldn't let go of her if he tried.
It hit him when she pulled back, that he was falling for her, not by how she kissed, but by the little things. Hearing her hum oldies, laughing over a spontaneous joke of hers, noticing just how cute she looked without trying, knowing that she often pulled her lip into her mouth while she was thinking really hard over something, how she still sometimes treated Nathanael like glass, how she loved to cuddle and hug him and thought that kissing was weird.
It was every little thing comprised in her own list that made up everything that Rose was, and he was beginning to fall for all of the little things about her. His heart stuttered at the thought, and he smiled down at the cutest girl that he knew.
Rose was already way more than just a friend and on her road to becoming way more than a friend with benefits, and Nathanael still wasn't sure how everything would work its way out, just that it would.