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WHO: Darcy & Stan
WHAT: Kid-free night
WHEN: Sunday
WHERE: Stan & Darcy's apartment.

Now that the kids are actually out of the apartment Stan's not entirely sure what to do with himself - and it's a little hard to remember what exactly he used to do with himself back before Olivia came into his life, truth be told. He vaguely remembers nights with Bill's books back home. Puzzle nights. Date night with Patty. Nights spent relaxing in the tub with a beer. Some of those things are things that Stan hasn't entirely given up as a dad now, though. Puzzles have to be kept up out of Olivia's reach - and baths get cut short (and have stopped completely since getting the trio of roommates, but Stans's not really complaining about that), but Stan isn't sure that he really gave up that much. Other than time, maybe?

So now that he's standing in the space between living room and kitchen, the new father doesn't exactly know what to do with himself as his eyes seek out the other parent in this scenario.

"How long do you think I should give Eddie and Chrissy before I text and check on them, you think?" Stan blurts out before he actually realizes that he's going to say anything, his hand finding it's way up to his face and half rubbing the stubble that has developed on his chin - a choice that he'd sort of fallen into given he no longer needs to keep it clean so that the stubble doesn't bother his wife. Glasses low on his nose, Stan half turns his arm to get a look at the screen projected from the communication bracelet - as if there might already be a message that's come through for him since they dropped the kids off. "I know they're probably okay, but still can't hurt to check just in case...."

It took him forever to make sure that he got everything together for Ollie's first overnight, let alone get her dropped off even though it wasn't really taking the twins and his daughter very far for to get to Eddie. And now he can't shake the feeling that he's forgotten something - or like something is off. But maybe that's just what it feels like the first time you're actually away from your child?

Forcing himself to drop his arm and stave off the urge to text Stan follows that question up with a different one, trying to distract himself. Though he wonders if Darcy is having any of the same internal battles that he is. "So what're the parental go-tos on a childless night? I don't think I've actually been apart from Ollie yet." Stan admits, dropping his hand from his face and letting out a bit of a chuckle.

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Darcy was maybe even faster to jump on Eddie's offer than Stan himself was and the offer hadn't originally been to Darcy at all. Being a single mother is hard enough sometimes, but being a single mother to a rambunctious set of five-year-old twin boys is a lot and now she's in a place where her support system is down to one...and she lives with him, so there's no escaping the kids.

She's coming out of the kitchen with two glasses of wine in hand, on held aloft while the other is making its way back down from her lips after having taken a sip while walking. "Don't you dare text them, Stanley Uris, I haven't had a no-kid night in over two months between the demon infestation back home and coming here. You text them, that gives them a chance to change their minds and I need this, dammit," she laughs, handing him the other glass as she makes her way into the room. "They're two doors down. If something is wrong, Eddie will text you. If you're going to trust him with your kid, then trust him with your kid, sweetie."

She lowers herself onto the couch and takes another sip from her wine glass. Grinning up at him, she nods. "That...explains a lot, actually," she replies. "As for the parental go-to...I don't know if I can answer that for you. It depends on the parent."

Taking another sip of her wine, she shifts herself into the corner of the couch and looks back up at him thoughtfully. "For me, it's wine, a good audiobook, and a nice, hot bubble bath that I luxuriate in until the water goes room temp," she admits. "For my friends Jo and Chuck, it's a date night. It is whatever you want it to be, mi amigo. What would your go-to be for a recharging night after a long, shitty week at work, before you had the baby?"

Stan's hands go up, automatically, in a playful gesture of a surrender alongside the bemused smile on his face. "Okay, okay - no texting - I will resist the urge." Stanley chuckles as he reaches for the wine glass offered to him and nods with a soft 'thank you' before he brings his newly acquired glass to his own lips. "I still can't wrap my brain around the demon infestation thing, I can't imagine how much added stress that is along with the norm." Stan shakes his head, curl drooping down onto his forehead having been shaken loose from where it had previously been settled on his head.

He didn't realize this before getting a sip in, but the drink is probably more needed than Stan is proud to admit, actually. Might make all of this a whole lot easier. Glass to his lips, Stan follows after his friend and roommate. "I trust Eddie - I do - I guess it's just first time jitters is all. I know he's got this - Ollie adores him." Stan admits as he moves to take up the spot on the other end of the couch. "And the twins seemed taken with Chrissy - especially Con." Stan grins, taking another sip as he sinks into the couch in thought as he considers what he would have done after a long, shitty week.

"Go out for a nice dinner that I don't have to cook or clean up after, complete with a dessert that is a little too rich to have that often and then come home and have a couple of beers while I soak in the tub, actually." Stan admits, reaching up with his free hand to rub the back of his neck. "So we've got some similar thoughts - we could go get some dinner, or order something in, if you're interested? Something that you don't get to eat often because the boys don't like it?" Stan offers, sitting up a bit and putting his wine glass down on the table as he moves to look at the screen - only this time at some of their options. "Sushi, a nice steakhouse, Bev and I ate at this great Italian place a while back too...?"

Stan rattles off, eyes moving between the screen and Darcy.

"Yeah...I mean, it was kind of par for the course in Lawrence, so it mostly just meant not leaving the house until the hunters and superheroes said it was safe to," she replies, entirely too nonchalantly for the subject matter. The sad thing is, Darcy's been numb to demon infestations and Seal shenanigans for years, now.

Nodding and giving him a small smile around the lip of her wine glass, Darcy takes a deep breath and sighs it out softly after lowering the wine glass again. "I can't really relate to that," she confesses. "I was fortunate enough to have a huge support system for the twins and because it was my first time being a parent and there was only one of me and two of them, I didn't really have any choice other than leaning on the people around me if I wanted to sleep, literally, ever, that first year." She pauses to take another sip of wine and gives him another little smile. "But I can empathize, at least. You're doing great. Just don't text and ruin that," she finishes with a playful grin.

When Stan offers for her to join him for dinner, Darcy lifts an interested eyebrow, a little surprised. Granted, it hasn't been lost on her that he hasn't been wearing his ring this whole time she's been here this go around, so she's not super shocked that he would feel comfortable going out to dinner with another woman, romantically or not. It's just a little surprising because Darcy hasn't actually been out to dinner with a man since she and Ethan had been married. Technically, she's still married to Ethan, she just hasn't been home in about three years, and she's doubting she'll be back any time soon, so she's sort of given up on the idea of that relationship staying in place.

A small smirk pulls up the corners of her lips as he looks back up at her. "Wow, two hours into your first chance away from the kid and you're already asking me out to dinner? Why, Stanley..." she says, playfully fanning herself with her free hand and laughing. "Actually, that sounds kind of incredible, Stan. You're a genius."

She, too, leans forward to set her glass down on the coffee table, pulling up menus on her own screen. "I could go for any of those....but let's just make sure wherever we go, they have an incredible dessert menu," she says with a grin.

"I don't think I would have survived Lawrence." Stan notes in earnest. He couldn't even fathom the idea of going back home to help his friends with his own monster from the past, let alone consider living some place with demons running around. That's something that Stan can't help but be thankful about when it comes to Eglaf - there are things that happen, of course, but it seems tame in comparison to IT. He can't imagine if that happened, or something else here, with Olivia to now consider. He's glad he doesn't have to figure out what he would do with Olivia in that situation.

Brushing that topic away from his brain, Stan gives a small grin. "I started out with a pretty good support system - I still have one, it's just smaller in number with Bev and Ben and Richie being gone. I probably should work on the whole making more friends here, though, to broaden my horizons." Stan admits, with a facial shrug as he reaches for his wine again and takes a sip from it before sitting it back down, nodding with his chuckle. "Promise, though, no texting - I'll wait on him to text me if there is anything they need."

For his part, Stan isn't trying to look too much into the offer he's just made, or over think it. Which isn't easy. He did spend the first portion of his arrival in Eglaf worried about Patty and cycling between regret and the realization that she would never be here with him, and the fact that a part of him very much wanted her here, but the longer he sat with those feelings in the background the more and more he realized that Patty would never be happy here - it'd break her brain. That's the entire reason that he couldn't just tell her what was going on. That was part of the reason that Stan had known at the time that he only had once choice with knowing he couldn't go back to Derry, couldn't handle it.

"To be fair I haven't gone out to dinner with another adult without my toddler in tow in quite a while." Stan laughs and grins at Darcy. And yet there isn't any worry about her turning him down - or this being a bad idea. He's pretty sure his gut has never led him astray to this point, so he just grins at Darcy. "I don't know about genius, but I have the occasional good idea." The accountant moves closer to Darcy on the couch as he pulls up the Italian place and points to the screen.

"What kind of desserts do you like? The Italian place has pretty good tiramisu and they've also got canolis, panna cotta tarts, and gelato - and the steakhouse has cheesecakes, mousse, pie, and a few actual cakes, I think." Stan lists off as he switches over to the steakhouse. "Those are the best two for dessert I'd bet."

Darcy shakes her head. "Nah, I think you'd have been fine. It sounds like lunacy but there was actually a lot of downtime between shenanigans. Plus, yeah, there's demons but we have amulets or tattoos to keep them from possessing us, and there's a shitload of legit superheroes and demon hunters in Lawrence. Most of the time, when things get crazy, you just hunker down and let them do their thing. Us normies have it pretty easy, comparatively, in Lawrence.

"I think if you'd holed up like the rest of us and kept your head down, you'd manage no problem. Especially if you were able to make it to my house, which I had a hunter friend protect by putting a Devil's Trap just inside every entrance and giant ones under the flat white paint on all the ceilings. Any demon trying to get into my house isn't going to get very far," she explains.

It's weird to think about Stan being in Lawrence, though. She wonders if they'd have gotten to know one another if he'd been brought through the Seal instead of her being brought through the portal. Given her well-established group of friends and her ongoing fling with Peter Vincent, something tells her that she might not have noticed him. It makes her grateful for being the one who traveled instead, since Darcy genuinely likes Stan and she's glad he's a part of her life.

"Anyway..." she segues, more than happy to move past the subject of Lawrence when she isn't there — she misses it, sometimes, when she's on one of these temporary relocations. "You should come to the Halloween fundraiser at the food pantry and meet May. I think she's one of the few people over the age of 35 in this place, and Lord knows we all need to stick together to stay sane surrounded by teenagers and twenty-somethings," she says, grinning because she's only half-joking.

It isn't lost on her when he moves closer and Darcy just smiles to herself a little, willing herself not to read into it. Stan's marriage didn't come to a disastrous end; he died. She doesn't want to let herself get lost in the idea that he might be ready to move on if he isn't, and even if he is, there's nothing saying she'd be his first choice. Still, a little color rises into her cheeks creating an especially pretty blush at the apples.

"Hmm...okay, that's actually really tough because you're presenting me with panna cotta tarts and cheesecake and asking me to choose between the two most amazing desserts known to man..." she complains playfully, her brow creased with feigned seriousness as she looks up at him. "That's just rude," she adds with a smirk. "They both sound really good to me. Have you been to both? Is one better than the other or...if you haven't tried one, we should just go to that one," she suggests.

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