the dice was loaded from the start

Damien could tell that he was pleasing to Cilla, and he wondered what exactly he was doing. He wanted to remember what method or style it was, so that he could keep it and use it, and improvise it. It seems he thought the world to be made up of methodologies and systems and one could control and change and fix things if one could know and master them. But the boy did not really know what he was doing, exactly. He was just ... talking? Being himself? He shrugged to himself, thinking that perhaps it was just himself then. It was a good boost to his ego. Mother had called him her little prince when he was younger, and he had always liked the sound of it. Although, along the way, he grew out of wanting to hear it.

The boy continued to grin when it seems as if Cilla began to hint further at her intentions. He liked when she said that it would be a long time before father wakes up, and he assumed they would snogging at each other's faces til then. But he was happy with that. She had taught him how to do it, and he had thought the sensations from doing so perfect. He always felt like doing more, though. But he never really knew what or how. Still, Damien never admitted it. It would be too embarrassing for someone who felt the need to cover up any lacks for dignity. Damien saw that Cilla's eyes had ran over the pool, and was delighted. It seems like they could really go for a dip, and he was curious to see what she would wear. He still remembered the first time he saw a woman swimming when he was just a child. He had thought she was wearing ridiculous, since he had always just gone in swim shorts. It made him curious about the woman's body too, because it looked so different from ... men. Of course.

Suddenly, Damien felt annoyed at the presence of the house elf. Sure, he had helped a lot, but he was making a bit of a noise when all the boy wanted was for some peace with this girl. He scowled as he watched Diddy finally place the food down, waiting impatiently to ask him to scoot. But before he could do so, Cilla had done it for him. Settling back into his chair, he watched her and smiled, glad to be alone at last. Damien thought about the girl's question and pondered on it for awhile. Father was definitely more wealthy than mother, and it definitely had to do with his celebrity job or status, or whatever. He remembered that Father had other dealings too, but they were never talked about, but he seemed to be getting quite a bit from some adults who dressed in black all the time, and who come to visit his father once in while, always talking in hushed whispers.

"Well, actually, I only have ..." Damien frowned. It was really not a lot, at all. He thought about lying about it. He wanted to impress her, and the truth would now. But how could he lie to his first girlfriend?! Damien took a long pause before deciding to lie anyway. Appearances, really. One cannot belittle them. "Only six actually, not a lot." He offered a slight smile to accompany what he had just said, his face masking his thoughts. Then, as if he remembered, Damien stood up, walked to the chair nearest to Cilla, and pulled it out. "Please," he offered in a slight bow, as if he was in a theatrical act. Damien had always emulated characters he had seen. It was a habit for a child who grew up alone with his mother. Only later when he have real siblings, did all his imaginary friends went poof.

Damien raised both his eyebrows. He had indeed forgotten about the fact that he had to tell Cilla to bring her swimsuit! The boy never thought of the need. He had always just gone, even without shorts, since it was after all his house. And his sisters had their own swimsuits, so it never really made it to his mind that he had to tell Cilla. "Well, you can have my swim shorts. I have spares." He chuckled as soon as he said that, although Damien had meant to keep a straight face.

Cilla smiled as he said he only had six. "Well, that's quite alright, They ARE hard to come by these days.. seeing as that woman a while back tried to set them free.. hah! They are happy with their lot in life... why mess up their world?" She giggled and ran her hand through her hair, smiling at Damien she sat down gracefully, and looked at the food. "It does look well prepared." She nodded, and looked up at Damien when he mentioned his swimshorts. "Oh no! Girl's don't wear shorts to the pool.. I'll just call my servant and have him bring my swimsuit over later, it's fine.. we'll have a nice dip shall we?" She felt a lot older for some reason, sitting here and chatting by the pool, lunch spread out in front of them. She felt like she was a queen, enjoying her meal in her home, with her king.

Beaming at Damien she set in to eating. It tasted... alright, Cilla was used to other food of course, everyone was, and it really was okay.. The House Elves must work pretty hard, and were getting ready for Dinner.. maybe that was it.. they had gotten distracted and made it.. not quite GREAT, but good.. yes.. good. Cilla's eyes took in everything around her, analyzing it for later thought, memorizing where little details were without really even realizing she was, it was a habit of hers, that she had picked up from her father. He had taught her the ways of good journalism, and well, she was quite excited, and actually very well trained, in getting the scoop that she wanted, even if it was never actually written down, just put into the journal that was her head.

"So tell me about yourself.. Damien.. Do you enjoy being here in the summer? It's a nice place, I do admit.." She smiled at him, and secretly thought, not quite as good as our summer home, but nice. A pleasant smile still on her face as she ate the food daintily, trying not to look to hungry, it was rule number one in her family. No matter how hungry you were, you acted as though your appetite was tiny, and if you really were much hungrier then you appeared, you ate when you got home, in the privacy of your own home.. you never ate until you were full in public.. EVER. So when she had finished what she qualified as dainty enough to make her appetite appear to be a small one, she sighed, and pretended to look full, even though she was still pretty much starving, she had sated the hunger for the moment, enough to keep her stomach from rumbling embarrassingly until she went home, and was able to actually get some food.

Damien merely nodded. Then he recognized a feeling. It was probably the first time he ever felt shame as a d'Eath. Sure, he had a fancy house, but there were fancier ones, belonging to richer, and more established families. He did not know the rules that those families keep to be that way, and so he saw them as one would if one did not belong to that world of seeming aristocracy. Lorcan d'Eath possessed fame, mostly with the ladies, and fortune, from his singing career, but his name could not hold up in reputation to some of the old and established Wizarding families. Damien was beginning to realize this. It added to his list of insecurities. But he said nothing. The boy merely nodded absentmindedly when Cilla went on about house elves. His mother's apartment had none, and here at the residence there were only three. It was two, at first. He wondered how his father procured the third one.

Damien grinned again when he thought about how he had suggested that Cilla wear his swimshorts for swimming. It was stupid of him. Girls always covered up, and Damien always wondered at the need to. It made him even more curious, as if by covering up, it was begging for him to unravel its secrets. Although Damien had reached out for the bruschetta on the table, he kept his eyes on the older girl. He was completely wrapped up in ensuring that she approved of everything. If he were were older and wiser, he would have been less paranoid about such things. Now, he merely felt the pressures of being younger, less rich, and probably less of a man than the older Slytherin boys. If this could work, with Cilla, then he could want nothing else in the world.

"Well I enjoy being here all the time. It's quiet in the day, makes it good for quality time with myself ..." swimming and reading, that was about all he did so far in the days of summer back home. Damien also made sure to avoid his younger siblings, whom he found annoying only because he did not like younger people. In front of father, he had to put up an act as a decent older brother. Behind his father's back, Damien treated them as if they were invisible. On that thought, he was hoping that none of them were around sneaking peeks at him and Cilla. He could not see any smaller faces anywhere, and the boy assumed that all was well. He really could not understand why his father would go and have so many children with different women. It was a lot of trouble to Damien.

Soon enough, Cilla stopped eating, which took Damien by surprise. The food had only laid a layer of foundation at the bottom of his stomach, there was more to be filled. "Is it ... bad?" In his head, he was already stomping to the house elves for a lecture. He had told them to make a good one, and apparently it was not as pleasing as he thought. "What have you been doing for the summer?" Damien decided to divert the conversation to other topics. He really did not want to fume over the food now. "Have you met with the other Slytherins?" Sure, Damien liked his first relationship for the fact that it was with Cilla. The thing is, being with her should have its perks too, he thought. Damien had expected to be introduced to the other older Slytherins, all part of the popular clique in the house of Slytherin. They were the influential part of the house, and most of all, they were Cilla's friends.

Damien merely wanted to have some information about them, as if by knowing the summer plans of others, he felt more with the older students, as if he was invited to their club. The boy continued to eat, pretty sure that he would get bored of the food soon and want to get into the pool. "Oh, and Cilla, perhaps you want to ask your servant for that swimsuit. Any minute now." Damien smiled, hoping that did not sound like a demand. He did not know how to place demands one a girl like that, although he definitely could do it to anyone else that he deems lower than himself.

Cilla looked at Damien when he asked her if the food was bad. "Oh no! No, I'm just not as hungry as I thought I was! It was very good Damien." She said smiling at him, hoping to put him off his guard, he had looked so angry for a moment, and it had worried her slightly, for she wasn't sure what he could have been angry about, and she assumed it was the fact that she hadn't eaten much. She had simply learned, it was something that every pureblood learned, at least that's what she gathered from her mother. Well.. every pureblood female... so she wasn't sure why he looked so angry for a moment. Though somehow she gathered that he hadn't exactly been angry at her.

"Oh, yeah." She said grinning at him. "Do you know Athena Goyle? I hang out at her house all the time during the summer. She's my best friend, and we go and hang places with the other purebloods I guess.." She said shrugging. "We spend a lot of time together, because technically our hanging out time is supposed to be our suitor shopping time." She giggled and shook her head. "But I just hang out with Thea.. I swear, my parents won't stop pushing suitors on me until I marry one of them! It's crazy how much they want me to marry into the right family.. Sometimes makes you feel like nothing more then a slab of meat that can walk.." She said, frowning, before shaking herself out of it and grinning. "But it's how my life is! And I"m used to it!" She attempted to laugh it off quickly, and then stood up when he mentioned her swim suit. "Alright, let me just call him." She said and pulled out a phone, flipping it open and walking a little ways away so as not to disturb his eating, as she spoke.

After a few minutes of conversation, she came back. "He'll be here in like.. five minutes, that should give us time to finish up here, and get things cleared away." She smiled at him and took a sip of her water, looking around the pool area as the light hit the water, and caused the little rippling things to show up on the ceiling. She watched them for a moment, before turning her attention back on Damien, smiling at him, before letting the silence extend into the almost awkward.

Damien gave a weak smile at Cilla's seeming assurance about the food. But his attention was soon caught by the mention of a name that had intrigued him as early as he began to learn the names of older Slytherin students. Well, he had an idea that Cilla was pretty good friends with Athena Goyle. This proclamation of a best friends relationship was, however, new to him. He nodded though, happy to learn that. Perhaps, soon, he would get to know the other girl too.

"Yes, Athena Goyle. Well, I know who she is, at least. How is she like anyway?" As much as she was interesting to him, Damien still felt intimidated whenever he saw Athena in the common room. She seemed to have that sort of effect on the younger students too, so he was probably not alone in that. One day, he wanted to make sure, he would be the one among them to befriend her and perhaps break that barrier.

Now, though, he was more interested in Cilla, of course. "Suitor shopping? Call that off! Will your parents like me?" It was an incredibly ignorant question. Both sets of Damien's grandparents were supposedly pureblood wizards, and so are his parents. But for Lorcan d'Eath to be part-vampire, there must be something that Damien was not told about. Funny thing was that he did not venture to question that fact. Besides, Lorcan d'Eath was famous merely because he was a wizard entertainer. Most of the d'Eaths dealt with things that were not told to Damien. There was a lot he did not know about the family.

Damien continued with the food when Cilla stepped a little away to get on the phone with her servant. He was curious about the girl's family. When Damien learnt about her father's occupation, he was intrigued. But he did not want to seem too eager. Damien was already too eager about the girl, and it made him worried about the way he was throwing himself out at her. It was not wise, but he had difficulty reigning it back.

"Well, I'm going to ask Diddy to bring my swimshorts down." Damien wiped his mouth with a napkin on the table and stood up. He walked a couple of steps to the direction of the kitchen and yelled for the house elf to fetch his swimshorts, before turning back to Cilla. He walked to the girl and planted a kiss on the top of her head, slipping his arms around her in what would be a decent embrace.