OOM: Christmas dinner with Pyrrha and Egil

[ostro_goth]

[[Ctd. from here.]]

Teja opens the door, laden as he is.

His usually comfortable, creatively untidy room is still that -- there is even Ferdinand the cat, sprawling all over Teja's bed, fast asleep. There are simply two new doors, one of them leading to a kitchen that provides all the modern comforts and appliances as well as a space to comfortably sit and eat, the other leading to Egil's room in Loki's apartment on the 12th floor.

One better should not think about how that works.

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[ostro_goth]

Suddenly, Pyrrha is the cats' favourite person ever -- they sit by he feet, lean against her legs, lovingly look up at her face.

"... whatever dire things may follow after," Teja says, watching them all very fondly, "we have this moment, and I shall carve it upon my heart and hold it to my mind's eyes when things become difficult again."

With Weyland in the mix, it is a when, not an if.

[scarred_grin]

The cats get some scritching and petting--they're family, after all--before Pyrrha returns to her chair.

"I think you might really like your one present, then," she says. "I hope you do--I spent a long time on it."

[ostro_goth]

"I am sure I will, especially if it resonates with this moment and will remind me of this homely hour out in the dark and cold," Teja says.

Dark and cold there will by, of some kind, before this is through.

[scarred_grin]

"Oh, it does," she says with a smile. "Almost perfectly, I think. Well, you'll see when you get it."

It's not something that most people would have made, but she thinks it's appropriate.

[ostro_goth]

"You are raising my expectation, now," Teja says, with a little smile.

[scarred_grin]

"...well, I can get it if you just want to open it now," she says. "I'm okay with that, and Egil's not gonna tell anybody."

Even if he tried, who would believe him?

[ostro_goth]

"Suspense can sometimes be held quite plesantly," Teja says. "When would be the right time to open them, by your book?"

[scarred_grin]

"Anytime is fine with me," she says. "The cats already got to open theirs, after all. How about between dinner and dessert? Give things a little time to settle."

[ostro_goth]

"It seems like truly a good time," Teja agrees.

[scarred_grin]

"I think we're gonna have plenty of leftovers for tomorrow," she says. "But it's better to make too much than not enough."

She's finished eating. Anytime is fine with her.

[ostro_goth]

"We need not cook again tomorrow, if we do not wish to," Teja agrees. He is still eating, as he has, maybe, spoken too much during the meal.

[scarred_grin]

"Leftovers are great," she grins. "Do you take lunch with you to the forge, or do you come back inside to eat? Because leftovers for the next day's lunch, especially stuff you can just reheat and remake into sandwiches... it's one of the secret joys of life."

[ostro_goth]

"I come back inside to eat, after the work is done," Teja says. "Also, it would be odd not to share with whoever shares my work, but Javert never accepts any thing, on principle, and whatever one pushes upon him, he insists on paying for himself."

[scarred_grin]

"Well, if you ever want me to pack a lunch for you, you just let me know," she says. "Or come find me and I can cook for you. I don't mind it."

All the little signs of affection people normally give in relationships.

[ostro_goth]

"I might do that, at times, when you are there," Teja says. "Soon, after the New Year, I shall start with the charcoal kilns; and then, I will definitely feed those that come to help me, as it is hard, hungry and thirsty work, and dirty to boot; so making them wash up first to eat, and then continue working after, would be cruel. I will just have to tell Javert that the food is not negotiable, and part of his pay."

[scarred_grin]

"You just tell me how many people, and what kind of diet restrictions they have," she says. "I'll cook for you and them, and I'll even bring it out to you."

She likes to be useful.

[ostro_goth]

"I would love that," Teja says. "It is how it would work among my people, if there was a great undertaking for which people come and help."

Pause.

"That is to say, it would feel like home."

[scarred_grin]

"It's how my people do it too," she says. "Your friends come over to help you move, you buy them all pizza. Andi and Toro had people over to help clean and paint the next-door house to be their workshop, everybody got lunch and dinner. Even if you pay people to help, you still also give them food."

[ostro_goth]

"Yes, indeed," Teja says. "So I will declare it custom and forbid Javert to pay for it."

[scarred_grin]

"Exactly. If it's my people's custom and your people's custom, it's got to be other people's custom too, and he'd be offending everybody if he refused. Sometimes you just gotta shut up and eat."

[ostro_goth]

Teja gives an actual chuckle, and does so -- he does not speak again until he has finished his dinner.

Then, he looks at her. Expectantly, almost.

[scarred_grin]

"I didn't mean you," she says with a laugh, but gets up to get the presents anyway.

She offers over what, judging by its shape and size, is probably a framed picture. "You may as well start with this one."

[ostro_goth]

"There is more than one?" Teja says, starting to open it.

[scarred_grin]

"Oh yeah, there's a few," she says. "Not all from me, and not all for just you--some of them are from him, and there's at least one there for both of us. It's a little ominous. You can open that one too."

This one? It's the one Pyrrha is so proud of and also nervous about. It's a family portrait in ink and watercolor, but it looks like an out-take of a more serious portrait session.

There's Teja in his big-G Goth finery, seated in a vaguely thronelike chair, with Pyrrha in her small-g best standing behind him, a hand on his shoulder. Egil, on Teja's lap, is reaching to pet one of the cats, also on Teja's lap; Teja is watching him with obvious affection and tenderness, and Pyrrha's watching too, leaning in to say something to Teja.

Another of the cats is perched on the arm of the chair, looking triumphantly down at a third cat, who is looking up and preparing to jump to claim the territory. The fourth cat, lounging on the floor in front of the chair, is the only one actually looking out at the viewer.

[ostro_goth]

"That is..."

Teja is at loss for words.

"It is perfect. It is who we are. This is who we shall be on our wedding day, for all the world to see. It is family. It is to take into dark times."