It takes Hardison a couple of minutes to notice that Parker is sitting across the table, staring at him, and it takes a lot of self-restraint not to let loose with a string of cursing.
"Woman, where'd you come from?" he sputters as he closes his laptop.
She shrugs. "I was in my office and saw you were still here. What are you working on?"
He leans back in his chair and studies her, noticing that she's gotten rid of her shoes and shed her jacket. "Just wrapping some stuff up from the job. I thought you had gone home."
"I didn't want to."
"Why not?"
She narrows her eyes at him and presses her hands to the table; then she moves, and the next moment, she's sitting on the table, her legs crossed and an orange in her hands. He blinks because he doesn't understand how the fruit just appeared, and he's hit again with the knowledge that he really doesn't have a clue about Parker.
"So, I'm going to get coffee with Peggy tomorrow."
"Well, that's good," he says immediately; according to Sophie, it's a good idea to encourage Parker to do "normal" activities.
"But, what do I do?" she asks as she wrinkles her nose.
"I don't understand what you're asking," he replies as he sits back up and scoots a little closer to the table.
"Will I have to talk about stuff?"
"Well, yeah, that's kind of what you do when you get coffee with someone. You drink coffee and talk."
"But I don't know what to talk about. I don't know what Alice likes."
"Parker, you're Alice. Just talk about stuff you like to do."
She shakes her head and glares at him. "But I like doing thief stuff. I can't tell Peggy about that, can I?"
He sighs. "Okay, good point. But, I mean, you like doing other stuff, right? Like, your plant?"
"My plant doesn't do anything. It just sits there," she grumbles.
"Well, plants aren't really supposed to do stuff. They just look nice."
"That's dumb."
"Then why do you have one?"
"Because you said that we could bring one, and I thought that was something normal people do."
"There has to be something you like to do other than stealing things," he presses. "Right?"
"I like hanging out with you," she says softly, looking away and letting her hair fall into her face.
He tries to keep from grinning too much at that, and he places a hesitant hand on her knee. When she doesn't flinch away, he keeps it there and cranes his neck to catch a glimpse of her face.
"I like hanging out with you, too." He pulls his hand back because he can feel the muscles in her leg twitching like she wants to run; even now, he knows she doesn't really like to be touched. "Maybe we could go catch a movie or something tonight. You can always talk to Peggy about that."
"What movie?" she asks as she turns back to him, her eyes lighting up at the idea.
"Well, there's that new one with the robots and explosions," he suggests with a sly grin.
She jumps off the table and bounces to the door of the conference room. "Yeah! And, I get to have popcorn and candy?"
"Whatever you want, girl," he replies as he follows after her.
