Angel and Johnny || Sunday Afternoon

[x-firestar.livejournal.com]

Angel and Johnny meet in the kitchen. Advice is offered.



Johnny flopped on a chair in the kitchen, bottle of water in his hand, still breathless from his run. He'd never really admitted to anyone just how frequently his powers had pinged on runs through the woods over winter as branches rustled and things moved around him.

But going out there was getting, slowly and gradually, easier. He still needed to nerve himself up for the runs. He still needed to calm down again after but familiarity with the environment and meditation sessions were slowly getting him to a point where he could do it more easily and today had been a good one.

Angel, of course, was walking in just a few minutes later, disturbing the peace. "Hey," she said as she went straight to the cabinet, sure there were cookies or something in there she could munch on.

Johnny watched as she rifled through the pantry. "Hey. You're out of food in your suite, aren't you?" he asked.

She blinked as she turned back to look at him, opening and closing her mouth a few times. "Maybe," she finally said. "In my defense though, finals are coming up. I've needed a lot of study snacks." Never-mind that she lived with the chef who loved to bake.

"You want a sandwich?" he replied, getting up and opening the fridge and staring at the contents. "I was gearing up for lunch and ..." There was half a chicken, some cheese, lettuce and tomatoes in containers. Johnny stacked them up in his arms and grabbed the mustard, dumping his load on the counter next to the bread box.

"Mmm....well, if you're offering." She grabbed a package of cookies out of the cabinet for later. "Yeah, sure."

Johnny nodded and began to slice open bread rolls and then cut up ingredients. He was tempted to try and slice the tomatoes with three knives balanced between his fingers in a bad impersonation of Logan but thought he should practice that in private first. "Aww, man. You have finals? What's your major? And could you melt the cheese and toast the rolls for me, before I put the salad in?"

"Visual comm. Which is basically taking a lot of pretty pictures, but I'm in a photo history class this semester. Ugh." As she spoke she pulled out a bowl and a cookie sheet, placing the rolls on the sheet and heating them up before putting the cheese in the bowl and doing the same. Being a walking microwave had its benefit.

"Oooh, thanks. You really did get the useful powers. ...is it safe to eat?" Johnny asked and began to assemble the rest of the ingredients. "So, you have to take pictures that look like those olden days ones, with the angry nineteenth century people glaring at the cameras or what?"

"They're good sometimes. And I've never gotten poisoned off my own stuff. Kyle nuked a hot pocket on my neck once and he's still kicking, so I think it's safe." Angel grinned. "I wish, that sounds like so much more fun. Actually we just stare at those photos for hours and hours and decide what makes them artistic and why they're famous and good and what not. It's boring."

"Kyle has a healing factor. He can regrow his own toes," Johnny pointed out acerbically before biting into his roll. "Huh. Sounds terrible," he said through a mouthful of food.

"...True." Angel grabbed her own roll, munching. "But I don't remember him curling up on the ground screaming in pain after he ate the hot pocket, if it helps." She laughed a bit. "It's all right. It's not what I'm interested in personally, but I see the value. Sometimes."

"I'm glad you do," Johnny said. He was still buzzing from his run but the afternoon stretched out in front of him, empty and unfilled as usual. "I'm bored."

"Nothing to do?" Angel asked curiously, picking at her roll for a moment before popping a small piece into her mouth. "Want my homework?"

"I'm not that bored!" Johnny shrugged. "No, not really. I need a job or something. With someone who doesn't mind me going 'argh!' and screaming like a little girl every half hour."

"Well that does limit your job prospects." Angel smiled a bit. "Hmn...something around the mansion would probably be good. Don't have to worry about explaining your powers. Um...hey, what about Lorna? Sounds like she might need an extra pair of hands."

"Lorna?" Johnny blinked and shrugged. "I never thought about asking her. I thought about Fred but ehn. Too much outdoors is kind of rough on my powers right now."

"Might be worth looking into," Angel said with a shrug of her own. "I mean, seems like something that would be really calming, right?" As long as a fly didn't buzz by and cause him to flip a pan of something hot on himself. But she'd keep that thought in her head.

Was this what his life was going to be? Looking for things that were going to be suitably calming and avoiding the woods, traffic and shopping malls because of the way they set his powers off? The thought was awful but he was starting to feel resigned to a life spent with powers that just couldn't handle the outside world.

He gave a cheerful and entirely fake grin. "Also, food! You forgot about the whole food thing. Food is awesome."

"Of course!" Angel smacked her forehead dramatically. "How could I ever forget food? Honestly, there must be something wrong with me. I wouldn't eat everything you make, though, Lorna might not like that."

"Yeah, well, maybe I could just make you like, extra food. Or something like that. I don't know. I totally passed Home Ec and Food Tech in eighth grade. I'm like, awesome at this shit."

"Well there you go, then." Angel grinned in return. "You totally got this."

"Yeah, I do."