It's been a very long time since I've posted, I know. But here's something a little different.
"I didn't know you could cook."
Mick just shrugged, not looking up as he deftly flipped an omelet. Leaning against the frame of the kitchen door, Amaya watched dubiously as he moved around the kitchen, sprinkling a handful of cheese into the skillet before switching off the burner.
"That doesn't look done yet," she observed, moving to sit at the bar.
He turned around, eyes slightly narrowed as he stared at her. "No backseat cooking."
Amaya grinned sheepishly, holding up her hands. "Sorry. I forgot how seriously you take Breakfast for Dinner in this century."
Muttering under his breath, he turned back the stove.
"But if I get salmonella from eating raw eggs—"
Mick exhaled forcefully as he hunched over the stovetop. "Eggs keep cooking for a while," he said slowly, as if speaking through gritted teeth. "Even after you take them off the heat." She watched as he started briskly whisking a pot of bubbling, raspberry-colored sauce. He paused for a moment, the whisk hovering in midair. "But if you don't think they're safe—"
"I didn't say that," she said quickly. "I trust you." The sentence hung in the air as Amaya watched him slowly lower his arm.
"Right," Mick finally grunted as he resumed whisking. He worked in silence for a while, until it seemed as if he'd forgotten Amaya's presence behind him. It was something like a revelation, watching him cook. Not for the first time, she wondered why the rest of the team insisted on treating him like a thug.
As he poured the sauce into a blue porcelain bowl and set it next to a plate of crêpes, she asked, "So, where did you learn how to cook?"
He didn't answer her immediately. Instead, he tapped the edge of the whisk sharply against the edge of the bowl, knocking off the excess sauce. Amaya found her gaze drawn to his hands and their swift, sure movements as he put the bowl aside and turned the face her.
"In the kitchen," he said gruffly, leaning against the counter and wiping his hands on a dishrag. She had to force herself to look at his face, not his hands.
"Well, obviously, but I mean . . ." She trailed off as he began to chuckle. "Oh, stop being an ass," she said, laughing.
Still snickering to himself, Mick turned back to the stove. "Sorry. Couldn't resist." He started piling dirty dishes in the sink, the sleeves of his shirt straining as he lifted some of the heavier pots. It was . . . distracting. Another couple of moments passed before Amaya realized that he had never properly answered her question.
"What I meant before was—"
"Yeah, I know what you meant. How does a career criminal know how to sauté?"
When he didn't say anything else, Amaya rolled her eyes. "Well . . . how does a career criminal know how to sauté?" she prompted.
Mick went very still, one hand gripping a wooden spoon so tightly that his knuckles began to whiten. After a long moment, he said quietly, "Tell the others the food's ready."
"But—"
"Hurry up. If it gets cold, I'll never hear the end of it from Haircut."
She stood very slowly and walked to the door. Pausing at the threshold, she said, "Look, I didn't mean to . . ."
Still not looking at her, he waved her off. "Just go tell them."
Sighing, Amaya left. As she headed toward the bridge, she couldn't help but wonder if all men from the 21st century were so temperamental, or if it was just Mick Rory.
The Waverider was unusually quiet that evening. Other than a few minor skirmishes with some time pirates, 1953 had been uneventful. Sara had chosen to hide the ship in a warehouse on the outskirts of London for one last night before returning to the temporal zone. Outside, it was the evening of June 2nd. Elizabeth II had just been crowned Queen of England. The celebration had consumed the city, and the rest of the team had disembarked to join the festivities.
Without saying why, Amaya had declined to join them.
Instead, she walked through the halls, appreciating the quiet calm that had descended upon the ship. As much as she enjoyed working with the Legends, their antics tended to be accompanied by considerable pandemonium. There were times when Amaya found herself missing the professional detachment of the JSA facilities. Funnily enough, her bouts of nostalgia tended to coincide with Nate and Ray's sparring sessions in the cargo bay.
Eventually, Amaya found herself outside the kitchen again, hovering uncertainly in the doorway. Mick had been the only person besides herself who had remained on the ship. In all likelihood, he wanted a quiet evening alone as well. The lights were dimmed, casting the farthest corners of the room into eerie shadow. He was sitting with his feet propped up on the table, a bottle of whiskey keeping him company.
She turned to leave, but stopped, bracing one hand against the doorjamb. With every day she spent away from 1942, her indecisiveness grew. And it always seemed to be worse when she was around Mick.
Even with his back to her, he knew she was there. "What do you want now? I'm tryin' to drink."
Amaya hesitated for a moment longer, wondering if she shouldn't just go back to her quarters and leave Mick to his whiskey. But there was something about the sight of him sitting alone in the darkened kitchen that propelled her forward into the room. "Maybe I'm thirsty," she said, shrugging as she sat down across from him.
"You don't drink."
"Not really, no. The JSA didn't allow it."
"This ain't the JSA."
Amaya smiled at him, catlike, and reached for the bottle. "No, it's not." His eyebrows shot up as she took a long swig from the bottle. He looked mildly amused as he crossed his arms, waiting for her reaction. Truthfully, the whiskey was absolutely disgusting. And it burned. But she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of knowing that. So she channeled every ounce of self-discipline she still had and slid the bottle back to him with a straight face.
"Your turn."
Mick looked at her shrewdly, calculating. Finally, he said, "You don't want to get into a drinking contest with me. I'll win. Every time."
Amaya leaned forward and smirked. "Really? Because that's not what Sara says. She has some really interesting stories about the first time your team was in the Old West."
Scowling, Mick snatched the bottle, drained it, and stood up. He stumped over to the fabricator and ordered, "Gideon, set us up. The good stuff, too, none of that crap Haircut drinks."
"What does Ray drink?" asked Amaya.
Gideon's crisp voice filled the room as the fabricator hummed to life. "I believe Dr. Palmer prefers lite beer, Ms. Jiwe."
She laughed as she watched Mick suppress a shudder. "Exactly," he muttered darkly. "None of that."
Three hours later, Amaya knew exactly why the JSA had a ban on alcohol. Even slumped over like she was, even with her eyes squeezed shut and her hands gripping the table, the room was spinning sickeningly.
"Okay, maybe this wasn't my best idea," she mumbled. Even the sound of her own voice sent splinters of pain arcing through her temples.
She heard Mick chuckle. "I'm impressed. I thought you'd be puking by now."
Amaya's eyes shot open. The tabletop was littered with empty and near empty bottles, forming a kind of glass forest between her and Mick. "I'm fine," she retorted, reaching for the nearest one. She missed by half a foot, her fingers grasping aimlessly at empty air. "I'm good to go."
Mick just shook his head and gently pulled the bottle out of her reach. "You're ready to pass out is what you are." He tried to stand up but, Amaya was pleased to see, couldn't keep his balance and collapsed back onto the chair.
"Oh, shut up," he grumbled when he saw her face. They sat in silence for a few moments. Or it might have been closer to an hour. Or several hours. Amaya couldn't tell. She was suddenly engaged in a fierce battle with the contents of her stomach, which seemed intent upon violently reentering the world.
Eventually, she managed to lift her head and look at Mick. He was staring at her impassively, his head propped up on one hand.
"What?" he asked.
Amaya tilted her head slightly, considering, and immediately regretted it. When the world stopped spiraling again, she said, "You never did tell me how you learned to cook."
"Nope."
"C'mon," she wheedled. "I'm drunk, you're drunk. You can tell me. I probably won't even remember in the morning anyway."
Mick snorted. "This ain't drunk," he said stubbornly.
"Then stand up," she said, smiling slyly.
He glowered at her. "Why do you care how I learned to cook?"
"Because," she said, swallowing hard as she forced herself to sit up straighter, "I've seen you cram everything from raw eggs to half a meatloaf into your mouth. Your palate never seemed particularly refined to me. But then you start whipping up omelets and crêpes like Bobby Flame—"
"—Flay," he corrected, looking pained. "Bobby Flay."
"Whatever," she replied dismissively. "But that's my point. You know who that is. I just want to know how."
Mick sighed and looked down at the table. His fingers began tracing the grain of the wood, and again, Amaya felt her focus slipping. But this time, the alcohol wasn't to blame. Her gaze lingered a heartbeat too long on his hands as they moved across the surface of the table. Not for the first time, she wondered what those hands would feel like on her skin. Mick's rough voice broke into her reverie.
"In prison."
Amaya wrenched her eyes away from his hands, hoping he hadn't noticed her sudden fixation. She swallowed a sigh of relief when she saw that he was still staring down at the table. "In prison?"
"Yeah. Iron Heights." Mick exhaled heavily. "Len―Snart and I had a job go bad. Ended up with fifteen years apiece." He finally glanced up and met Amaya's eyes. "Not that we served the full sentence," he added, grinning.
Amaya surprised herself by laughing. When she had first met Mick, she had considered it her responsibility to ensure that he ended up behind bars. She certainly wouldn't have been laughing with him over breaking out of prison.
All she said now, however, was, "Ah. Early parole?"
"Exactly."
"Still, though. They taught you how to cook in prison?"
Mick shrugged one shoulder indifferently. "They had different programs."
"It's just . . . Everything's so different in your time," she said absently, staring as the half-empty bottle in front of her. "Dating, education . . . even prison, apparently."
"What? No felon cooking programs where you're from?" he asked, smiling crookedly.
Amaya laughed quietly. "No, not at all." And then, because there was still alcohol zipping through her veins and Mick was actually smiling, she asked, "So what did Snart do?" The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. Mick stiffened instantly, as he always did whenever anyone brought up his old partner. His hands curled into fists, and Amaya waited for the inevitable explosion.
But maybe he wasn't as immune to whiskey as he claimed to be. Because instead of igniting, Mick seemed to deflate, the anger in his face replaced by deep, empty grief.
"He was working on his GED," he muttered, slowly unclenching his fists. "I thought it was a joke. We were thieves. Who cared if he graduated high school? But being a dropout . . . it always bothered him." Mick made a disgusted noise and stood up abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor. "A lot of good any of it did him." He turned to leave.
"Wait don't . . . I'm sorry," she said, getting up to follow him. "I didn't mean to—" She pitched over halfway through her sentence. The floor rose up to meet her, and suddenly Amaya found herself staring at dull gray ceiling tiles. She groaned and closed her eyes.
Mick cursed loudly, and she heard him stumble over to where she was lying. "You're trashed," he muttered. There was a rustle of fabric and leather, and the next thing Amaya knew, his hands were supporting her back, trying to lift her upright.
"No, don't do that," she moaned, trying to pull away. Her eyes flew open as her stomach began to heave. She jackknifed violently, her body convulsing as she fought against the bile rising in her throat.
"Hey, hey, relax," Mick urged, helping her lie back down. Something soft and cushiony appeared under her head. His jacket. She curled up on her side as tremors began to radiate out from her core.
Shivering now, Amaya asked hoarsely, "What was in that whiskey?"
Mick just shook his head. "Whiskey never did this to a person," he said, looking unnerved. "Gideon?"
"Yes, Mr. Rory?"
"Can you scan her from here?"
"Unfortunately, if Ms. Jiwe is not in the medical bay, I can only perform a cursory examination."
"Can you tell anything from that?" asked Amaya, swallowing hard as her body shuddered.
There was a slight pause, and then Gideon responded, "You appear to be suffering from some sort of toxicity. Alcohol poisoning seems like the most likely scenario, considering your activities this evening."
Amaya just shook her head. It took too much energy to speak, but there was a nagging thought in a fuzzy corner of her mind. Her eyes began to flutter closed.
"Hey, don't do that," Mick warned, shaking her shoulder roughly.
She groaned and turned her head away. A wave of icy clamminess washed over her face, seeping down under her skin and into her brain. The effort it took to think was suddenly too much.
"Damn it," he growled. He said something else, but her ears were suddenly filled with soft ringing. The sound grew louder until it drowned out everything else. She was dimly aware of something pressed up against her face, warm and rough and callused, and as the feeling drained out of the rest of her body, she tried to focus on that comforting pressure. But eventually, even that slipped away, leaving Amaya to sink into the cold darkness creeping steadily over her mind.
I have not forgotten my other stories, especially Chaos Theory. I swear I will finish it. To my great shame, I have become one of those authors that doesn't update for more than a year. Other than life is very demanding, I have no excuse. I am so sorry. But hey, Legends of Tomorrow and Foxfire is pretty awesome, right? Also, I'm on Tumblr now, so if anyone wants to shoot me some Foxfire or Captain Canary prompts, feel free.