The Perk, Tuesday Noonish

[rebelseekspizza]

Being a grad with no more classes was kinda nice. Dante got to hang around the house all day, watch TV, eat stuff, go to work once a week... occasionally nip back to Limbo City to kill a couple of demons.

But he woke up that morning realizing he hadn't actually gone out into Fandom itself for quite a while. And he had a hankering for sugar. So there he was, at some time closer to noon - he wasn't crazy enough to just roll out of bed in the morning - flirting with the barista over the strawberry cream drink he'd just ordered.

Though the flirting involved no small amount of references to crappy but entertaining reality shows.

"Nah, I'm not messing with you, I so watch that shit."

It was a nice day.

[[ open! ]]

Comments

[justice_undone]

To no one's surprise, Breq preferred tea to strawberry cream drinks. She entered the Perk after taking a long morning walk, and when she saw Dante, she remembered to smile.

"Hello. I haven't seen you in a while."

[SP?]

[rebelseekspizza]

Dante glanced away from the barista and grinned right back at her. "Sorry," he said. "Been kinda busy. I suck. What's up?"

[ always! ]

[justice_undone]

"No need to apologize. I'm glad to hear you're busier than I am," Breq said. "Anything music-related?"

[rebelseekspizza]

"Nah," Dante said, saluting the barista with his drink as he pushed away from the counter. "We should jam again sometime."

[justice_undone]

Breq placed the order for her tea, then said: "We should. I've practiced."

The enthusiasm she felt about this had her forget to make it show on her face, or be heard in her voice.

[rebelseekspizza]

"Practiced what?" said Dante, who couldn't glean any excitement out of her expression.

[justice_undone]

"Oh, just different songs I've picked up. And some of the ones we played together."

Still no visible enthusiasm, but it was definitely there.

[rebelseekspizza]

"Got anything interesting you wanna share?" Dante said, walking towards her. "Like, what kinda songs?"

She always found the best weird shit.

[justice_undone]

"Oh, this one."

Breq began to hum, slightly off-key, then stopped.

"I suppose it would be better if I actually played it," she said, still expressionless.

[rebelseekspizza]

"Or if you played it on your phone," Dante supplied helpfully.

[justice_undone]

"Oh, of course. Although you won't hear the way I adapted it," Breq said, pulling her phone out of her pocket. "I made a playlist."

She pressed play. It was a very long playlist, containing an extremely wide variety of songs. If there was a common theme here it would be very hard to find. Breq skipped past a few songs, playing a little from a few different moddable ones.

[rebelseekspizza]

For what it was worth, Dante didn't talk the whole time, nor did he look like he was getting impatient.

Instead sometimes he tapped along with the beat, and sometimes he didn't, taking notes in the back of his head.

Look, Breq's taste in music was weird. But he respected weird.

[justice_undone]

"Do you like that one?" Breq asked after a while, when she had noticed the tapping. "I think it might be possible to do a version that is a lot more aggressive. The lyrics are supposed to be about romantic love, though, but I don't understand the language so perhaps it doesn't matter."

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy was on her third lap around town when she spotted a very familiar figure through the Perk's window. She was flagging by this point anyway--a pity, back in high school, she'd been able to do several laps around the whole island before wanting to die--and decided to adjust her course and head over to get something to drink.

"Hey," she said, slightly out of breath. "What's up?"

[rebelseekspizza]

"Strawberry cream," Dante said, holding up the cup with a big grin.

[spin_kick_snap]

"Ooooh, that sounds wonderful," Kathy said, slumping down next to him. "...After like three gallons of water, though."

Which she was absolutely gonna go get. In a minute.

[rebelseekspizza]

Dante snickered. "You wuss," he said, patting her on the knee under the table. "Have a good run?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Other than the fact that I'm dying right now?" Kathy asked, draping herself dramatically over the table. Though, huh, it did feel nice on her flushed skin. "It wasn't terrible. Just a circuit around town a few times. I'm not up to doing the whole island yet."

[rebelseekspizza]

"Better not be, you gotta invite me for that," Dante said, grinning. He took a sip of his drink, getting whipped cream all over his face.

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy blinked, trying to figure out when Dante would want to run with her--then cracked up when she realized what he meant. "Stop trying to horn in on my bisexuality experiments," she said, looking up at him--and laughing harder because of the mess on his face. "You got a little something right...here." She gestured, indicating his entire face. "Good look for you though."

[rebelseekspizza]

"Yeah, I'll bet you think so," Dante said, smirking merrily as he wiped at his chin.

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy leaned over, trying to snag some whipped cream for herself "Does look kinda familiar, now that you mention it..." she teased.

[rebelseekspizza]

Dante snickered, poking her under the table with his foot. "We should hit this place up more often. The strawberry's good."

You thought everything with strawberry was good, Dante.

[spin_kick_snap]

Yeah, that was pretty much exactly the same thing Kathy thought, too. "You think that terrible strawberry tequila is great," she pointed out. "Your bar is so low even I can't wriggle underneath it."

Wasn't stopping her from getting a fingerful of cream and licking that off her fingers, though. "But yeah, I wouldn't mind stopping by more. Look at us, getting up and out of the house sometimes."

[rebelseekspizza]

"Being adults. At a coffee place," Dante said, snickering.