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A workaholic and a grouch enter a pizza joint ... (Wanda interrupts someone's breakfast and decides to partake)



He'd only just finalised the paperwork on the flat he'd purchased in the city, but Jean-Paul found himself sleeping on a mattress in the unfurnished apartment far sooner than he'd have expected. And it really was just a mattress. He woke ill-rested, ill-tempered, and hungry. The negative feedback was going to be the death of him, one day, but he'd rather suffer all of that than risk someone else's life. And what was he doing, staying in the mansion as he had been, if not risking everyone's lives there?

Too many poor decisions on his part had led him into something very like complacency. Others knew the danger and they chose to stay near him anyway - that had sufficed as justification for staying where he was with them. It did not, any longer. Logan had a point - Logan had a very, very good point.

One day, he wouldn't be able to control himself. One day, he wouldn't remember in time that the memory, whatever it was, wasn't real. Jean-Paul would hurt someone, do them some damage. And then where would he be?

Pushing those thoughts from his head, he pulled on the clothing he'd worn the day before, looked at the letters sticking out from where he'd tucked them beneath the mattress, and then moved to the window. A moment later and he was airborne, heading for a hole in the wall pizza place that put more on their pizza pies than just cheese and pepperoni. He could get almost all his caloric intake for the next four hours done in one sitting - and it came with an amazing milkshake, too.

At first glance, the woman coming in through the doors looked like she was on her way to work - business suit, heels, briefcase. On a closer inspection, however, it was obvious that she had either just gotten off of work or had fallen asleep at the office. Wanda looked irritated and hungry, more irritated that her suit was crumbled than that she'd spent most of the night at the office before falling asleep at her desk. After all, she was used to sleeping at the office when a project loomed or when she simply didn't want to stop working.

Workaholic at ones best.

She paused when she spotted a familiar face in the back and considered her options. Obviously, after the miniature explosion that had rumbled through Snow Valley after Jean-Paul's arrival, she knew roughly what he'd been up to. But he looked grumpy and hungry, a combination that generally didn't go well together. And while they'd been friendly, the whole Jake thing had thrown an unknown element than neither of them had sought to work around.

However, Wanda was also grumpy and hungry. And decided that she'd done worse in her life than to annoy Jean-Paul - though she did make sure he heard and saw her coming before she paused at the side of the table. "Are you waiting for a party to help you eat that and can I volunteer my services?"

Halfway through an extra large pizza covered in four different kinds of meat and probably six vegetables, Jean-Paul paused to finish chewing. He'd watched Wanda approach, wondered if she was actually going to stop to speak to him, and then made sure he had a reason to make her wait for a reply. Swallowing, he asked, "Why?"

It wasn't that he had any specifically negative memories of her. Jean-Paul just found that he didn't really have any good ones, either. The fragments he could recall from when she'd slept with Jake were sparse and whatever he'd felt at the time had mellowed in the face of his new problems.

Reaching for his milkshake, Jean-Paul ate a spoonful - only in this restaurant did they make the milkshakes thick enough to actually need a spoon.

Wanda just rolled her eyes and dumped her stuff on the bench across from him before she sat heavily. "Because I have not eaten in 24 hours and certain people will kill me if I admit that. Because I haven't actually seen you in ages. And because I can outbitch you on a good day." That said, she delicately took a slice of pizza that was roughly the size of some New York pets off the platter inbetween them.

She probably should have just left him to his Queenlyness and gone off to get her own pizza but she actually did look forward to seeing how he was getting on. When he wasn't glowering at her, anyway.

"Orgueilleux comme un paon," Jean-Paul muttered, making sure he kept his milkshake on his side of the table and well out of Wanda's reach. She seemed to have a fondness for taking his things. Of course, that probably had nothing to do with pride and she didn't really seem like a peacock, but the insult fit anyway, at least to his mind, and that was all that mattered. "Today is not a good day for either of us, I think, and so we are evenly matched."

Picking up another slice of pizza, Jean-Paul took a bite. The peppers were crunchy, but not as crunchy as carrots or apples or celery, and so chewing vindictively lost most of its fun. He frowned at the woman across from him. "You order the next pizza, then. And pay."

"You'll never meet a better peacock," she commented, half-wryly and half-cheerfully. Wanda's French had been learned in Paris but the package was still the same. She did give the milkshake a once over but decided it was better to wave the waitress down and beg a mimosa from her. The older woman had obviously seen weirder orders than mimosa and pizza for breakfast because she didn't even bat at an eye.

The pizza was surprisingly good and Wanda ate with relish for a moment; though she had a disturbing habit of forgetting to eat in general when she was busy or stressed or half a dozen other things, she still enjoyed food. It was just the regularity of getting the food that was the problem. "And I believe that I have enough in my wallet for the next round and the room for it in my stomach as well. I would ask you how you are doing but, well, if you look like how I feel..." She shrugged off the wrinkled jacket and tossed it next to her, rolling her shoulders slightly.

Jean-Paul rolled his eyes at her peacock comment. "Female peacocks are not so pretty." Then he finished off his slice and settled back for a moment to let the food digest a bit. He'd inhaled the majority of what he'd eaten without actually tasting it and was now of a mind to at least enjoy a bit of it before Wanda polished the rest off.

He wished people would stop poking and prodding at him to figure out how he was. Or what he was doing. They meant well, Jean-Paul knew, but it did not help. "So this means you are either not a woman or you are not a peacock. You pick." There was a backhanded compliment in there somewhere, if you looked hard enough. If it distracted her from her possible line of questioning, then Jean-Paul was happy to have given it.

Wanda smirked for a moment - it wasn't hard to see what he was trying to do but it wasn't like she wanted a play-by-play of how he was doing. Conversation on any level would do, even the slightly strange conversation. "Well, the woman thing is a little hard to deny - though I could be a very good transvestite, I suppose - so we may have to double check my credentials on being a peacock," she replied before giving the freshly delivered mimosa a try. Her eyes lit up in pleasure as she took a second sip. Just what the doctor ordered. Well, a cheerful man who had said he was a doctor...

Jean-Paul rolled his eyes. "I am not so invested in verifying your gender that I would like to find a doctor to test you," he said, taking another spoonful of his milkshake and swallowing contentedly. "And is it not early for alcohol?"

"A mimosa is made for breakfast - and isn't it too early for pizza?" she returned. Wanda turned her gaze onto his drink of choice. "And a milkshake? Well, I suppose it is dairy and the pizza toppings hit every single food group..." She raised her drink cheerfully, looking more relaxed (if still as rumpled) than when she'd come in. "There's juice in here, that counts."

"There is sausage on the pizza," Jean-Paul said. "And chocolate, it comes from a bean." He took another spoonful, then reached for a piece of pizza. Pointing at her with it, he said, "You are unkempt this morning. Why?"

Wanda spared a glance at her jacket and then her shirt, though she didn't really need to. She knew what she looked like and to anyone who knew her in the least, 'unkempt' wasn't exactly a word normally associated with her attire. "I slept at the office last night," she admitted, shrugging one shoulder. "Again."

"Hm..." Jean-Paul's eyebrow indicated that he was critiquing her outfit, though it wasn't like he had any room to, really. They were both wearing the things they'd worn the day before, after all, and hers looked professional, at least. "I think you should not do that. Set an alarm for yourself, maybe." The bite he took out of the pizza was entirely too large for anything resembling polite, but he didn't really care. "Or have a personal assistant to do things for you. Like beat you out of the office. With a fish."

Like quicksilver, Wanda's entire demeanor and expression changed. She looked years younger and a world less stressed as she threw her head back and laughed, the mental image of Amanda and Illyana chasing her out of Snow Valley with a cod in hand. It wasn't a very long laugh, which was good as one tended to worry about ones sanity with a long laugh, but when she finished, she was wiping her eyes gingerly. "Well, I think the next time I have the urge to crash in my office, I shall be chased out by that mental image alone!"

The smirk was on Jean-Paul's lips before he could stop it, one corner of his mouth quirking upward while he chewed. "Then my good deed for the month, it has been done."

"Month? You? Let's try a year."