Après moi le déluge

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden leaned against the kitchen counter, her elbow resting on the surface and her chin resting on the palm of her hand. There were crumbs sticking to the back of her arm now and she idly brushed at the flour marking the inside of her wrist

Comments

[jamesmadrox]

I lived in Paris back in the X-Corps days. I wouldn't say I'm an expert at French but I know enough of it to get by and make a few comments here or there.

"Bien oui, ça neige," said Jamie with a shit-eating grin as he headed over to the fridge, intent on finding something to throw in a sandwich. "Nous sommes victimes de l'Île de la Merde."

[wishesandsmoke]

"The Island of Shit?" Eden translated, looking over at the man with a sheepish grin. It wasn't exactly a word Marian had taught them, but there were some words that got picked up by default. "C'est un nom interessant, but, um, accurate sometimes. What's the word for accurate?"

[jamesmadrox]

She looks familiar. But I'm not placing it just yet. I'm thinking...television? Movie, maybe?

Jamie scrunched his nose and looked over the door of the fridge. "Yeah, that one didn't translate that well," he admitted, before he closed the door and put the mystery meat on the counter. "I guess Craphole Island's just one of those words." He reached for a plate from one of the cupboards, frowning slightly. Accurate, accurate, accurate. Uh...

"Précis? Je pense?"

[wishesandsmoke]

"Merci," Eden said, smiling and just resisting rolling her eyes at herself. "I can see how that would be a little hard to translate. But I just started taking French last month, so."

She shrugged. It was something to do anyway, even if the languages didn't seem all that useful here. Japanese just got less and less so with Hiro gone now.

[anewwaive]

"I don't know what the fuck you're saying, but it's kind of hot hearing it anyway," he said, leaning against the wall. Okay, so the smell of food might've led Gideon straight for the kitchen after he came in from the cold. Even better the cook turned out to be someone he was sure he could weasel free shit out of. Heading over, he took a look at what had been made.

"Shit, you didn't have to bake for me," he added, shooting her a grin.

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden bit the tip of her tongue, grinning over at him and pushing off from the counter. "Good," she said, brushing her hands against her jeans, "'cause I didn't. Veronica made them."

She tilted her head to the side, shrugging, almost unconsciously coy. "I was practicing French. For class." If she was going to be sharing these things, it was lucky someone had turned up she liked to see around.

[anewwaive]

"Veronica...that the short chick with the blonde hair?" he asked, gesturing to around her size. He hadn't seen her in a fucking long time, which was probably good, because she was a little bitchy.

Whatever. She didn't have to know he was one of the people who would inevitably take what she made.

"There's classes here?" he asked, raising a brow. He couldn't even begin to imagine why anyone would want to take classes when they didn't have to. But then, Gideon wasn't really ever that great a student himself. "So what were you saying? Had to be fucking good if you were talking to cookies."

[wishesandsmoke]

Eden laughed, sounding almost surprised. "Hey," she cautioned playfully, "watch who you're calling short. I'm not all that much taller than her, and if I get offended, I won't share."

She grinned, shrugging again as she rocked back on her heels, hands against the counter. "Yeah, there's a whole school. It's something to do, you know?" She'd missed out on college and all that back home, too, so maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to try making up for it a little. Back then she could've talked her way into any school in the country, but it hadn't seemed all that important. "I was just practicing, like, location stuff. You know, 'where is the beach'? That kind of thing."

[all_happening]

"Oui, il neige beacoup," Penny teased as she walked into the kitchen from where she'd been watching quietly at the doorway for a few moments. "The French sounds good. Any occasion for the cookies?" From the way she was eyeing them, perched on the edge fo the table already, the implied question was really There's one for me, right?, but she wasn't going to ask that. Yet.

[wishesandsmoke]

"I don't know," Eden said, shrugging. "You'd have to ask Veronica. I think they're almost cool - want one?" She knew enough by now to read Penny, and it was the natural question in the presence of cookies anyway. Besides, they smelled damn good. Idly Eden wondered if the steady supply of baked goods over the last week or so was going to empty the kitchen of flour, but for the moment she really didn't care.

[all_happening]

Penny beamed, her legs swinging in the air. "And here I though you'd never ask," she said, and bit gently at her lip as she looked between Eden and the cookies once more. "I would love one." And as far as she was concerned, damn good would have been an understatement. They were a necessity, almost, given that she'd trudged all the way to the Compound from her bus through the still heavily falling snow, a feat she wasn't likely to try again, even if it meant spending the night on the rec room couch.

[wishesandsmoke]

"Careful not to burn yourself," Eden cautioned. "I just took them out of the oven a couple minutes ago. There's hot chocolate, too." She flashed a grin at her friend. "If this place is going to change seasons on us, at least it provides, right?" Christmas had always been a time of minimal celebration growing up, but she was going to make up for it this year. All of this... whatever it was wasn't going to deter her.

[fallen_hyperion]

The weather was beginning to wear on John. It rarely snowed like this in the south of England, and in any case, he had enjoyed the unfamiliar warmth and beauty of the tropics. Winter weather had its own beauty, but all in all he would have preferred a little sunlight.

Miss McCain was making biscuits in the kitchen. He had thought her the prettier of the two friends, though Miss Mars had her charms as well, and was intrigued by her seemingly false name and quieter manners. "Le météo à est désagréable," he said in his execrable schoolboy French, as he went to put a kettle on. "Bonjour, Mademoiselle. There is flour on your shirt."

[wishesandsmoke]

"Oh, God, thanks," Eden said, standing up straighter as she looked down at her shirt, dusting some of the flour off. It left a white streak all the same, faded against the dark blue but still very much there. At least she'd gotten cookies out of the deal without having to do any of the work, she reasoned. "Bonjour, m'sieur. Le météo? Is that... what? The weather? I'm just learning." She smiled over at John, in a pleasant enough mood despite the flour and everything.

[fallen_hyperion]

"I think so - it is either météo or... temps? Though that means 'time' as well, which I suppose might give one some insight as to how the French perceive the world, but I cannot make anything of it."

John recalled that in their last conversation, he had unwisely brought up the subject of trepanation, and mentally cringed at the memory. Fanny would have been furious at him. He hoped Miss McCain had forgotten about it.

"Is there some occasion?" he asked, indicating the biscuits. "I have seen that there are all manner of Christmas activities planned - though I have no notion of how Saturnalia might be celebrated here." He was fairly sure biscuits were not part of it, however.

[wishesandsmoke]

John was lucky that Eden had grown accustomed to spending time with people more given to intellectualism than she was herself. It wasn't a connection she'd've spent much time thinking about herself, that between weather and time, but if others did, she was unfazed by it.

Saturnalia, she'd figured out, was the Roman one. The big Roman guys running around were getting all geared up, from what she'd seen, but she wasn't about to spend much time thinking about ritualistic animal sacrifice either.

"No occasion," she said, dusting her hands against each other with a satisfied little smile. "Not that I know of, anyway, beyond liking cookies. They kind of go with Christmas, though. Want one?"

[butcivilization]

"Aujourd'hui il neige beaucoup. Observateur, mademoiselle." The smell of baking wafting down the hall had led Combeferre to the kitchen, and now he smiled gently at Eden as he wandered in. "Good afternoon, Miss McCain. Why, you never informed me that you spoke French." He was fairly sure her knowledge of the language was recent, but he could not help the teasing.

[wishesandsmoke]

"Parce que je ne le parle pas bien," she said with a wry little smile. "Plus I only just started last month. Henri, hi." The wryness fell away, replaced with warmth as she moved away from the counter and began to wipe the flour away busily. No point in getting more on her. "Want a cookie? They're fresh."

[butcivilization]

He chuckled. "Fair enough." Combeferre approached the stove to take one of the offered cookies. "I'm afraid it was your baking that tempted me here in the first place. Thank you."

[wishesandsmoke]

"Oh, it's no problem." Eden shrugged, brushing her hands against her jeans. "I didn't actually make them." It wasn't a big deal, but there was no point in deceiving people as to her ability to make cookies. "How've you been?"