Laurie & Jean-Paul, Wednesday Evening (backdated)

[x-quebecois.livejournal.com]

"Recipe: A series of step-by-step instructions for preparing ingredients you forgot to buy, in utensils you don't own, to make a dish the dog wouldn't eat." - Author Unknown


Laurie sat down across from John-Paul, curling her legs up as she watched him, and waited to see what he'd do. It was a strategy she'd often used on the more reluctantly social denizens of the mansion, and usually worked on all of them with differing degrees of success.

Jean-Paul looked at the girl who'd settled in so comfortably across from him and raised his brows. When she didn't say anything immediately, he raised them a bit higher and asked, "Oui?"

"What'cha doin'?" she asked, giving him a completely innocent smile.

She was not at all checking up on him after the whole kitchen incident, nope, not at all. She was just, being her normal, sociable self, that was all. Nor was she keeping an eye on him because he was close to Vanessa, and she felt a need to look out for those her former suitemate was close to. She wasn't doing either of these things, except of course, that she was entirely doing those two things.

"Eating?" Jean-Paul said, the word more a question than anything else, since it was obvious he was eating, given the carton of leftover Chinese on the counter before him and the aluminum container of curry near his elbow. This, he felt, was a trick question.

"Why are you eating take-out?" Laurie asked, settling her hands under her chin, and giving him the full weight of a doe-eyed stare. "You know there's a bunch of us here who'd feed you, and it's not like you're not an extremely decent cook yourself."

Except for the fact that Jean-Paul was no longer an extremely decent cook. He was a cook who couldn't remember most of his favourite recipes, a cook who couldn't finish anything. Instead of saying that, he answered with, "Take away is easier."

"How?" she asked, leaning back in her chair and giving him a quizzical look. "You used to love cooking, far as I know."

"Past tense is key there," Jean-Paul said, picking up a piece of chicken from the curry with his fingers and eating it. He chewed for a moment before nudging the Chinese carton toward her. "Mixed vegetables with pork and shrimp."

Laurie examined the contents of the Chinese carton for a moment before she reached for the spare set of chopsticks and started fishing out the little shrimp pieces, chewing slowly to savour the flavours.

"You don't like cooking anymore?" she asked after awhile.

Did he enjoy it? "No." It was too frustrating to enjoy now. Reaching over to the curry, he picked out a potato this time, putting the whole of it in his mouth and chewing. He swallowed, at least, before he continued, "No, I do not."

"Why the change?" Laurie asked, all innocence, tucking her hair behind one ear as she reached again into the carton and skewered a piece of pork.

"For someone who is eating my food," Jean-Paul said, his tone almost philosophical, "You ask many questions. Talk less, eat more."

"I'm nosy," Laurie admitted, chewing thoughtfully on the piece of pork as she watched the man in front of her. "I'm told it's very rude."

"Oui," Jean-Paul agreed, nodding. He picked up another bit of chicken and ate it. "It is." He didn't sound particularly offended, though. More like he was simply stating a fact.

"Should I be offended that you find me rude?" Laurie asked, her tone somewhat airy as she skewered another shrimp from the carton.

Jean-Paul, despite the somewhat bizarre behaviour and seemingly eternal crankiness since his return, was an easy companion to eat with, she thought. He hadn't yet accused her of being a bully, or yelled at her in any fashion, it was refreshing.

"Would you be offended, really, if I said you should be?" He didn't think she would be. Something about her behaviour just flashed that fact at him like a massive, blinking, neon sign. Jean-Paul raised an eyebrow at her, but kept eating because he was hungry.

"Hmm, that's a rather philosophical question, you know," Laurie noted, taking another bite of pork. "I suppose I could be if it would make you happier. Ring Vee and cry on the phone about how you're a horrible man who was mean to me. Or, I could simply sit here and eat with you and ask you questions of a prying nature."

"Vee?" Jean-Paul asked, brows rising as he peered into the carton from which Laurie kept picking bits of pork and shrimp. "Eat some of the vegetables."

"Tall blue lady, likes guns," Laurie replied, pushing one carton away and pulling one with vegetables closer. It wasn't bad for takeaway, although she was positive she could do better. "Or there's always my boyfriend, he likes guns too."

Laurie grinned at him suddenly over the cartons, hoping he would see that she was teasing him.

"I do not know a tall, blue woman called Vee," Jean-Paul said, a line forming between his brows as they drew together. "But Morgan fits this description." He wondered if Morgan's middle name was Vivian or something. "Is there another blue woman at the mansion now?"

"Nooo, it's Morgan. Vee is um, a nickname I made up," Laurie said, realizing that she'd possibly said way too much. She'd forgotten not everyone knew that name. "And you will not stop me on my quest to pry, you know."

"It is a quest? That is very... Arthurian. I feel like you should be wearing armour, though. With a feathery plumb on your helmet." Jean-Paul pulled another bit of potato out of the curry and hummed to himself as he ate it. "And a very big horse."

"There's large horses in the stables," Laurie mused, chewing on a mouthful of vegetable. "I could ride one in here, although you'd have to find the bells for my toes."

"Why do you need bells for your toes?" Jean-Paul asked, licking the curry off his fingers almost contemplatively.

"I can't be completely naked, I'm just lucky I've got enough sort of blonde hair or I'd need a wig," Laurie noted, not at all sorry that she was being so vague.

"You would not be naked at all," Jean-Paul said, expression confused now. "That is what the armour is for. And the feathery plumb." Shaking his head, he muttered something about children these days and how they always seemed to assume things they didn't understand meant they had to take off their clothes. "There is a song. It is by Jermaine Stewart and it is called 'We Don't Have To Take Our Clothes Off.' You should listen to it."

"I was talking about Lady Godiva," Laurie noted in a prim voice, spoiled entirely by the cheeky grin she couldn't keep hidden. "What colour plume?"

"The woman who makes chocolate?" Jean-Paul didn't know what that had to do with prying into his business, but he supposed it could be a reference to something he didn't understand. "I do not know. It is your plumb. You pick." Meanwhile, he planned to finish off the chicken in the curry, but he needed some rice to pour the sauce over. There'd been a carton somewhere - he just had to find it in the refrigerator.

"No, she was a lady in Coventry who rode a horse naked through the streets to protest her husband's taxes on the people of that community," Laurie explained, watching him search through the refrigerator. "And yellow, I always loved the colour yellow. What are you looking for?"

"Rice," Jean-Paul replied, frowning a little. Then he looked back over his shoulder and asked, "Why are you protesting taxes?" This line of logic seemed entirely illogical to him, but that could also have been that he was busy concentrating on food. Asking nosy questions, so far as he could see, had nothing to do with taxes or chocolate.

"I don't think there's any left, unless you want fried rice and then I think there's some at the back of the fridge but I don't give it a vote of confidence for quality or how long it's been in there," Laurie replied, resting her chin on the palm of one hand as she watched him search. "And I'm protesting your inability to let me pry unnecessarily into your life, obviously."

Jean-Paul wasn't really in the mood for questionable fried rice, so he put the top on the rest of the curry and put it back in the refrigerator. That left him with mixed vegetables, shrimp, and pork. "Yellow is nice." What else was he supposed to say? He wasn't really one for colour much, these days. "I am sorry that my inability to let you pry unnecessarily bothers you." Except that he wasn't, really, and it showed.

"Yellow is a great colour, although if we're talking of favourite colours, then that would be brown. I wouldn't worry too much about my offence at you not letting me pry, I'm sure I'll find some way to get through it. I'm strong that way," Laurie replied, watching him, and then pushing the vegetables toward his side of the table before snagging the shrimp. "You need to eat more vegetables."

"I eat more vegetables than most people would find good," Jean-Paul said, though he took the carton of mixed vegetables and picked out a piece of broccoli. "Also, brown is a warm colour." He liked it, himself, though you wouldn't know it by looking at him these days. Greys and blues, blacks and a plain white tee were his colours of choice more often than not these days. "It goes well with yellow."