Momoko's place, El Paso, Texas, late Monday night

[lovemykilt]

Priestly tended to go a little extra scruffy in times of emotional stress. Especially ones like now, where he decided a good way to deal with it was to spend a long weekend out in a national park living in a tent and "communing with nature".

It seemed like a Trucker-y thing to do, okay? And when he tried to kill his best friend, following the presumed example of a former assassin turned hippie-peacenik seemed like a good plan.

Alas, he did not find peace in the desert. He found sunburn and a lot of sand and some spiny lizards and what he was reasonably certain was an old coyote campsite and very, very little water. Which, okay, yeah, desert, but. California had deserts, too! Admittedly, not very near to the coast, where he spent 98.763% of his time. There'd been a school trip to the desert once in middle school.

He hadn't much liked it then, either.

"Momo!" He called, hanging out in the doorway as he tried in vain to get a little more of the dust and sand out of his boots. "I'm back!"

[ooc: mainly for one, but also open to phone calls/emails/etc.]

Comments

[heromaniac]

"Priestly?" Momoko stuck her head around the corner of the door and waved at him from the kitchen, her hair in a kerchief. "YOU CAME BACK! I wondered if maybe the coyotes got to you!"

[lovemykilt]

"Nope, no coyotes. Either literal or metaphorical. A couple horny toads, though." Literal and metaphorical. "What, you thought I couldn't do a weekend in a desert?"

Admittedly, he wouldn't blame her if she didn't.

He finished shaking out his boots and came in properly. "Are you cooking?"

[heromaniac]

"Ha ha," she laughed at his joke just as much as it deserved, then shook her head. "I worried maybe you'd gone loco and jumped into a cactus patch.

"And. Uhm." She looked behind her. "Actually I'm cleaning! I cooked Saturday."

Yes, it was Monday. So what?"

[lovemykilt]

Priestly should have left a bunch of casseroles in the fridge for her, shouldn't he. "What'd you cook?" And how crusted up were those pans of hers after two days?

[heromaniac]

Yes. Remember how the fridge had been so full of boxes from her cafe job when you arrived, Priestly? Mrs Wilson did the cooking unless Momoko was really trying.

"Uhm. I don't think it has a name. I just threw some things together because Jaime was coming over. It totally took forever to make, though?"

The fettuccine was cold so she'd warmed that up, not even thinking what to do with it. Then she'd found the hamburger and decided to add that, so she'd needed to brown the meat. And then she wanted to put onions in for flavour but the pan was dirty from the meat, so that meant she needed to use another pan. And then the tomatoes, because everything Mrs Reyes made with tomatoes was tasty! But they needed a pot. And then there was the bowl to mix it all, except she'd overflowed the first one and had to pour it into a second one (she'd cleaned up the floor, don't worry!) and then mix it all up... but it didn't look right and she'd finally decided to bake it in a casserole dish!

Ah!

"It was a casserole, though!"

[lovemykilt]

Well, that was technically accurate. Any food made in a casserole dish was a casserole. Much like how any mix of food with a sauce could technically be called a salad.

Priestly gaped at the kitchen. "Did you use every dish you own?" His tone was more sort of baffled and vaguely awe-struck than judgey. He kept to a very strict stance of non-judgement. Just -- how many pans did she need?

"I'm sure Jaime loved it?"

[heromaniac]

"Well, he ate it? But it's totally hard to tell since we'd had a fight and were trying to fix it." She looked over the kitchen. "Well, I had to do a lot of cooking in a short amount of time! The test site was only half an hour away, so I had to hurry!"

"It looks much better now that I've put all the dishes in the sink and scrubbed the counters down."

She was going to have to buy more cleanser when she went shopping.

[lovemykilt]

It was a little bit frightening that this was better. Priestly moved automatically to start washing up some of the dishes. Kitchens were meant to be organized, Momo! Clean and organized.

He wasn't too busy to shoot her a concerned look, though. "What'd you fight about?"

Focussing on Momo: way easier than dealing with any of his own shit.

[heromaniac]

And used by other people!

"Eh! What are you doing?" Not that she minded the help, of course, but she had to make some sort of protest... as she picked up the towel to dry. (Yay, help!!!)

"I made him go take his DATs while I went and saved some hostages on my own. He wanted to put them off and go help, too."

[lovemykilt]

Priestly just snorted a little at her token protest. He knew you better than that, Momo. He finished the first pot and handed it to her. "The old crime-fighting versus school thing, huh." He grimaced. "You guys work things out?"

If they hadn't, he had a feeling the kitchen would be a way bigger mess. Along with the rest of the apartment. And hopefully someone would have called him home from the desert to help. Did Mrs. Wilson have his number?

[heromaniac]

"Crime-fighting versus his dream and our future." She ran the cloth over the pan, her own face a grimace. "We did, but I was totally scared for a while there. Jaime doesn't like to confront people when he's mad."

[lovemykilt]

"Sounds like he didn't run away, though," Priestly said. He had done his fair share of storming off and running away when he got pissed off. Though he usually yelled a lot, first. "You guys had a home cooked meal and everything."

Okay, was this onion fused to the pan?

[heromaniac]

Either onion or noodle! oh! Maybe it was from when she tried to make croutons?

...

Don't ask what had happened to the "croutons". Just remind her that they were out of bread when she next went shopping.

"He didn't!" and her smile showed how very happy she was about that!! "But I was afraid he would. We're trying to work on our communication because we've had so many problems in the past about it and we don't want to mess up things this time, but I was totally sure he was too mad at me."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

*ringtone of Dinah!*

Because she's back home in New Gotham, and it's been longer than a week for her without talking to her BFF at this point.

[lovemykilt]

And really, that just wasn't right.

"Perfect timing," Priestly answered, skipping right past any awkward with the ease of too much practice. "I just got home from my vision quest."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Ooooo. Did you see your spirit animal? Was it a chameleon or a blue-toed booby?"

Hi to you too, Priestly.

[lovemykilt]

"Neither. It was a horny toad." That joke wasn't getting old any time soon, no. "I don't know how much wisdom I got out of it, though."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah cackled, because sometimes she was 12.

"You didn't feel enlightened and made whole and one with the desert and the stars or anything? Awwwww. Maybe you should ask the toad for a refund."

[lovemykilt]

"I'm not sure I'd want to be one with a desert, anyway. It's all dry and dusty."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"And arid. Lifeless? ... the hot part would be fun." Could this metaphor be wrung out any more? Naaah. "So was it a bust aside from the toads, or did you at least get some cactus wine out of it?"

[lovemykilt]

"You know, I'm thinking I'm just really not the cactus wine type. Sand's supposed to have an ocean attached. There's just no way around it."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Awwww." Dinah grinned, then sobered a little. "But, does the ocean have to have sand attached?"

Because New Gotham? Mostly had rocks.

[lovemykilt]

"Hey. I'm not running away." Since he'd just had this conversation with Momo, after all. "I'm coming back. I'm just . . . clearing my head, first."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"I am really relieved to hear that." Dinah sighed, pushing a hand through her hair. "I mean, I know you said that, but... It's a lot to take. And I know you've got a life here now, and all. And yet."

[lovemykilt]

"And it's not like I haven't done it before." Made it halfway around the world on that one, too. "But you know I always tell you where I'm going. That's not going to change unless you stop wanting to know."

She still wanted to know, right? He was pretty sure, but -- he'd tried to poison her.