And there was your mistake right there, Liliana. Because you let him get away with it, and now? He was going to be insufferable, looking at her now with a knowing sort of grin, the kind that seemed to be right on the brink of sing-songing something about how she liii~iked them and wanted to shaaa~are with them really cool plaaa~aces that had meaaaaning, because she was one of the chococrew now, whether she liked it or not!

You wanted to kiss up all over their buddy's face and do nice things for them, and so now you were in! Them's the rules!

But, instead, he was going to chuckle, and say something maybe a little different, but probably no less terrible.

"So you're saying," he mused, letting his attention drift over the performance just a little bit more before it returned back to Liliana, "is that we're gonna have to make this a regular thing, huh? Do it again next year? And the year after that, and the year after...."

He let it trail off into perpetuity.

"Makes sense. Should probably get to know the place pretty good if me and Liz are gonna be sending our kids here one day maybe."

And there it was, the lean in, the grin, the shamelessly wagging eyebrows, and, if he wasn't still just a little bit scared (okay, more than a little, let's be honest) of Liliana, he would have even nudged her with an elbow. But she was, at least, saved that particular indignity.

For now.