"So… movies?"
"What's playing?" Ianto asked, taking a forkful of his gang garee gai.
"No idea. Thought we could just go someplace close."
"And see whatever's playing next?" Ianto said dubiously. "Or perhaps you had in mind not bothering to actually watch a film?" he smirked.
"So not true!" Jack protested.
"Of course. How about we pick up a paper and find out if anything interesting is showing?"
Jack sighed. "Well, if you want to be boring about it…."
"I prefer to think of it as organized," Ianto grinned.
"I'll be right back," Jack said, dashing from the sidewalk café and returning with a copy of that day's paper. "The Indy, sorry."
Ianto took the paper and rolled his eyes. "Well, they'll all have the same show times, at any rate."
"What do you read?" Jack asked, sitting back with his beer. "Let me guess… The Times?"
"Guardian," Ianto said, barely looking up from thumbing through for the entertainment section.
"Oh, yeah."
"That is, I generally keep an eye on as many as I can, to be thorough… for obvious reasons. And we keep the Metro in the tourist office, even though I don't think it's anything but the most widely-circulated birdcage liner in the country. And if I had birds, I'd prefer they were better read."
"Isn't that what James Joyce is for?"
"Good point."
"He actually spoke like he wrote. You know how sometimes you meet someone at a party and from a distance they seem good-looking or at first sound interesting? A five minute conversation with him and I started hoping for a hoix to run through the room. After 10 minutes, I almost jumped out a window."
"So, you didn't…?"
"Yan, at the time, I thought he'd have wandered off in the middle of sex or started talking about cows. Years later I learned… well, let's just say when you said some fetishes should be kept to yourself, you were so right."
Ianto looked up from the listings, mildly curious, then closed his eyes and shook his head. "Films. We've got… Eddie Murphy as an alien… no, as a spaceship manned by tiny…." Ianto shook his head. "Never mind. Untraceable… oh, torture-porn… nope. The Eye, blind violinist gets corneal replacement and sees disturbing images from the donor's life…. Bloody hell."
Jack reached over the table and had a look for himself. "Zach and Miri Make a Porno?"
"Are you asking me?"
Jack grinned and shook his head. "Twilight… hell no. Mirrors… Keifer Sutherland witnesses clues from the past. Oh, yeah right, been there. Rambo… again. Over Her Dead Body… deceased fiancée gets jealous of the psychic… wow, really? The Happening… mass suicides… yeah, again, been there. Alien versus Predator. They don't have the first clue. That whole 'planning ahead' thing actually sounds reasonable now."
Ianto smiled. "Oh, I don't know. I know a place with some really good films on offer. Good sherry, as well."
"That wouldn't happen to be a very tidy flat by the bay, would it?"
"It might be."
"Proprietor, one Mr. Jones… ace archivist, caffeine-delivery wizard, and cinema buff?"
"That's the place," Ianto grinned.
Jack leaned across the table and stole a bit of miniature corn from Ianto's plate. "How late they stay open?"
"All night," Ianto said, "provided you're a member of the club, that is."
"Do they have a Captain Jack Harkness on the rolls?"
"As a matter of fact… that's the only name on the list. It's an extremely exclusive club."
"That's the best kind," Jack grinned.