(Untitled)

[stillbecoming]

Buffy is by the fireplace, attempting to toast marshmallows on a polearm.

It's going about as well as you'd expect.

Comments

[isaysimplewords]

Cal is just observing.

. . . he's normally not the "just observing" type, but Buffy's choice of implement looks like it requires some extra concentration. Never interrupt someone handling a deadly weapon, even if it has marshmallows on it.

[stillbecoming]

Buffy is apparently not giving her polearm the attention it demands, because she's looking around the room, instead of at the sharp and deadly weapon with the flammable object on the end of it.

"Hey!" She waves. With the hand not holding the polearm. "Nice to see you again."

[isaysimplewords]

Well, she knows what she's doing, right?

(Cal is keeping an eye on the polearm, for all the good it's likely to do.)

"Hi, Buffy," he smiles, waving back. "How've you been?"

[stillbecoming]

"Little bored," she says, as if the polearm s'mores aren't a clear signal in themselves. "Although now I really am starting to feel like a regular."

[isaysimplewords]

"Yeah?" Cal asks. "Recognizing people more often?"

He pauses.

"Realizing you're not surprised that you're doing that in a restaurant and no one's told you to stop?" Because that seems pretty uniquely Milliways to him.

[stillbecoming]

"...Well, now that you mention it." She looks around guiltily. "But yes, I meant the part where you're the second person I've seen here tonight who knows my name. It's practically Cheers."

[isaysimplewords]

Cal laughs.

"And by coincidence," he says, "I'm glad you came."

There are a lot of things from the eighties and early nineties that Cal doesn't remember very well. The Cheers theme song does not fit in that category.

[stillbecoming]

"People are all the same," Buffy says cheerfully. "Although marshmallow toasting implements aren't." She looks at her own. "Want to try your hand at this?"

[isaysimplewords]

"Sure!" Cal can't imagine who wouldn't. It is a dangerous weapon that isn't at all suited for the task it's being put to, after all.

In some ways, Cal is still eight years old.

[stillbecoming]

She offers the handle.

"Be warned, it's heavier than it looks."

It looks heavy.

[isaysimplewords]

Cal braces himself accordingly as he reaches over to take it.

He doesn't brace quite enough, and the marshmallow trembles, falls off, and bounces off one of the fish on the way down.

"Whoops."

[stillbecoming]

"Here!" Buffy's ready with another one. "They'll probably eat that one. I've never really understood why they're in there." She fishes around. "And I have the graham crackers ready. I think."

[stillbecoming]

"Here!" Buffy's ready with another one. "They'll probably eat that one. I've never really understood why they're in there." She fishes around. "And I have the graham crackers ready. I think."

[isaysimplewords]

"Thanks."

As Cal works on pulling the end of the polearm out of the flames and sticking the marshmallow on without clouting anyone with the blunt end, which is about as awkward a process as it sounds, he continues,

"Yeah, I don't know. I don't think I've ever even asked anyone. They're just, uh - there."

[stillbecoming]

"Swimming."

Buffy tilts her head, eyes never leaving the fish. "In...the fireplace."

She tosses another marshmallow in, and watches a very purple fish gobble it up. "They're a lot less creepy than those things with the shells, at least."

[isaysimplewords]

"Things with the shells?"

Cal, carefully maneuvering the be-marshmallowed polearm tip back into the fireplace, is a bit distracted.