"Oh, no, you don't—" have to be sorry, was how he was going to finish the sentence, but he realized midway through that this was a redundant sentiment, and if they continued on this way they'd just both keep apologizing in circles for a situation for which neither of them were at fault. Which was just silly, and it would waste a good deal of time when it appeared that they had already loitered too long to avoid becoming conspicuous. Alfred's cheeks grew even redder. Did those people looking at them know they were stuck under the mistletoe? It would almost be worse, he thought, if they thought the two of them were just dawdling around together for the sake of it, because then the inevitable kiss would seem... well, intentional. Not that it wasn't going to be intentional, he supposed — given the choice between kissing Miss Zelda Fisk and just staying there forever, he'd clearly choose the former, but... well, this was going to be rather awkward, for both of them.

Had she ever been kissed before? Alfred didn't know and was certainly not going to ask — he didn't know her hardly well enough to go diving into her personal business that way! — but was suddenly rather self-conscious. If this was going to be her first kiss, that was a lot of pressure on him, he felt. For however long it took for her to be kissed by someone else she might be carrying around this memory and thinking that this experience was what all kissing was like, and — well, that was just a lot, and he felt preemptively guilty for potentially disappointing her.

"Do you — uhm, do you want me to do it — properly?" he asked, rather uncertainly.