.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Phenex can tell Erimael is already drawing his conclusions about him, and they're all exactly what he wants them to be. A typical Horn, young and reckless, immature and overly confident. He may not have the best poker face, but he's great at painting a facade over his true self. It's creating an illusion without altering anything but himself, and he's quite talented at it. Perhaps he has overdone it slightly by revealing any information about he and his group. He wants the Wing to think he's foolish and loose lipped, true, but he hadn't meant to say anything important. What concerns him more is that he had been entirely unaware he had even mentioned Alastor to the Wing, which means he needs to start paying more attention. There was a look of hesitance that crossed Phen's features, but it was gone a moment later.
"Shoes, actually, are still a little difficult." Phen answers, slipping out of his head and back into conversation. "But fortunately, I don't have that problem." He twists a bit in his seat so his shoes are visible, and he wiggles his feet back and forth to show off the straight-laces, no need for any tying there. But that's because Phenex is lazy, not because he can't tie a bow.
He doesn't bother to give any reaction or say anything in return to what the Wing says next, because he doubts that he cares about why or why not She might still trust him. Besides, that's something Phen would rather like to keep private. That entire part of his life is better locked up inside his head, there are things he did that he should be ashamed of, and other things that his enemies could use against him. Instead he focuses on watching the Wing as he speaks, admittedly only paying a little more than half attention, because his mind is now wandering and he's wondering what might Erimael's wings look like and how large might they be. Truly, he should know by now that curiosity killed the cat, but he's sort of the dog-type anyways.
Phenex secretly likes hearing Chicago being called his city. That's not entirely true, no, but it doesn't make him like the sound of it any less. What he likes less is the idea that he now not only has to room his group, but apparently he's also become the supernatural homeless shelter in the last second and a half. Or... perhaps this is a good thing.
He doesn't know if the Wing looks down to see his little color-trick, but Phen does. Phen stares, and makes a mental note to convince the Wing to do more of that for him before he speaks up again. "I don't know exactly what you seem to be assuming about my group, but I assure you we aren't just some ragtag team of unruly, disrespectful Horns. There's Wings that have joined us too, yes, your perfect, goody-two shoes species are fraternizing with us immature, destructive Horns. Shocking, hm? So don't assume we don't have manners or don't know how to treat our guests with a little bit of hospitality." At the end he realises there's tiny puffs of smoke coming out of his nostrils as he breathes, and he quickly shuts out the anger he has pouring in from a hundred years of pent up rage towards Wings thinking they're a thousand times better than Horns simply because they were trained by Him.
"I need to order pizzas." Phenex says, choking down the rest of his coffee before he stands. He reaches into his pocket to grab a small wad of bills and, after searching for a moment, he throws a tenner down on the counter. "Let's head next door so I can order and tell them where to send it, after that we can go grab your group I guess and talk about whatever 'ground rules' you have in mind." He makes air quotes around the word, mocking the Wing. "Unless you don't need to, then we can make up some rules, that I'm most likely going to break by the way, on the way to mine."