She did indeed make Link blush, and she did so by merely smiling at him when she walked up to her seat.
Perhaps he was thinking about all the things she'd suggested she could do...
Zelda was delighted to learn that she could hold his hand under the desk during class. He was left handed, so it didn't stop either of them from taking notes. Although she may have distracted him a little too much for his note taking to be very high quality. She'd give him hers if he needed them.
After class was over she turned to him and gave him another broad smile. "Would you like to go to coffee again? Or perhaps lunch, if you're hungry."
Link returned her smile. "Sure," he said, then struggled to put his books away with one hand.
She loosened her hand, but he didn't take the opening to let go. That made her blush a little bit.
"So, coffee or lunch?" she asked as they left the school together.
"Lunch sounds nice, I assume you already have a place in mind?" he replied with a smile.
She did indeed.
And so they went, they ate, and they enjoyed laughing and flirting together. A little bit of clumsy flirting on Link's part, but adorable all the same. Hours passed with Link talking about the games he liked to play, and Zelda talking of the books she liked to read. They spoke about times spent as they grew up, experiences they had in common, games they had both played. Movies they had both seen.
Link talked about his sister, and Zelda listened and watched the light in his eyes as he spoke about his family. It was such a pretty light.
And so they spent the rest of the week.
A few of the days Link had needed to work his part time job in the evenings, but the afternoons were still all for them.
Every day they talked, and she saw Link becoming more and more comfortable with her. And he got a lot more smooth in his compliments. She felt a little pride in having taught him to do so.
It was Friday now, and they were chatting and laughing in the Café with a muffin and a croissant. Zelda had gotten an iced white chocolate mocha, and Link had experimented with a white chocolate americano after some prompting from Zelda.
"So how's the coffee?"
"It's good," Link said, lifting one shoulder. "I like black more though."
She smiled. "Well, I'm glad you tried it," she replied.
"Me too," he said. "It's good to try new things, I just don't come across many situations where I'm likely to do so."
"Speaking of new things... Would you... want to come back to my house? I have a bit of a theater there, and we could watch some movies tonight..."
Link's eyes widened. "You really want to bring me to your mansion? You're comfortable with that?"
Zelda smiled and nodded. She'd told him the other day that sometimes inviting people to her house for the first time felt weird to her. "Yeah, totally. I'd like you to see it. It's a little ridiculous, I'll admit, and not something I would have really chosen for myself... But it has a nice garden, and a few useful rooms inside."
"If you're cool with it, I'd love to go. I've been a little curious about that place since I moved here, actually."
Zelda tilted her head to the side. "Really? That's cool, you get a firsthand tour now," she said with a little laugh. "Because your girlfriend owns it."
~*~
The gate opened, and she started down the driveway.
"Woah... It's actually smaller than I thought..."
"It got smaller as I got older. It felt a lot bigger when I was young."
"You grow up, it stays the same."
She parked at the base of the steps and left the key in the car as she got out and started up the steps, not waiting for Link to catch up.
He hurried after her and met her just before the front door.
"You ready to explore this ridiculous place?" she said.
"Yeah," he replied, "I wanna see the places where you spend a lot of your time."
"Oh, well in that case," Zelda said as she turned and pulled him along after her. "The gardens would be the first place."
They went back down the steps and around to the side of the house.
"That was a pretty smooth line, by the way," Zelda said.
Link raised his hand to the back of his neck. "Oh... well... I came up with it on the way here."
"Ooh, planing ahead, nice." Zelda squeezed his hand and brought him around the bend of the house. "There they are," she said proudly. "Some of the plants are getting a little bit... dead this time if year, but there's still some flowers that do well in the fall."
Link examined the wide stretch of the gardens. There were apparently sections for flowers divided by which season they were best in. The fall one was still flourishing, while most of the summer was wilted or completely dead. A half circle of trees encompassed half of the garden as though framing it in. At the center of each section was a brick patio, and benches along the edges of it. In the center of the four sections was a wooden patio with more benches, and also what looked like a tool shed.
Link stepped forward without Zelda dragging him. "It's very impressive," he said as he headed toward the fall section.
"It's my favorite part of the property," she replied.
"Are those all fruit trees?" he asked as he pointed at the apple tree in the semicircle.
"Not all, but most."
When they reached the fall flower section, he followed the path along the flowerbeds. It was like a mini maze, but there wasn't really a destination, apart from the patio in the center.
Link took a path out of the flowers and walked up to the wooden patio in the center. "Oh, what are these?" he asked, pointing to several trellises along the path.
"Grapes. They vine well so they're good for a trellis. The harvest is over, but the leaves have yet to fall off."
He nodded. "That's cool... What do you do with all the grapes?"
"Staff pick them, and I think they process them into juice and jam and freeze the grapes by themselves too. They take some home, and give some to family friends as well. Too much fruit for just this household, and that certainly applies now that I'm technically the only one living here."
"Technically?"
"Well, some staff live here too."
He nodded, continuing up the path to the center. Once he reached the patio he examined it with a critical eye. "It's very well built."
"If it's here then I'm sure it is... But how do you know?"
"My grandma and the family do projects like this ourselves instead of hiring people to do it, so I've built a deck before. This was obviously done very well."
"Oh, you've built a deck?" she asked. "That's really cool."
He shook his head. "Nah... wasn't a huge deal.. And it wasn't just me."
"You kidding? It's really cool!" she repeated. "I've never done anything like that."
He smiled. "Okay, okay, it's cool," he said, then looked back toward the main building. "What's next?"