A/N: Another one. 'Nuff said.
Basically, this is a few hours after the Claire Meade party—Betty shows up in the deli to help a bit. This takes place after the end of 2x12, right after the hug thing, when he closed his eyes, awww!
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All'Improvviso Amore
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The window, once a tall pane of glass inset into the wall, is gone, eulogized only by a few jagged lines protruding from the pane. A sheet of heavy construction plastic is nailed and staple-gunned into place along the edges of the window's deathbed. Pieces of the logo lie scattered on the tile floor and the shelves inside the deli; an eye here, a pickle-smile there. One large piece, part of the G in "Gio," lies on the sidewalk, and she bends down to pick it up with her right hand, running her left along the plastic to steady her.
"Be careful, I worked hard on that."
His voice startles her, but considering that she's standing outside his shop and holding a piece of his name in her hand (and it's cut her, and she hardly notices until she looks down briefly and sees blood streaming from her hand), it shouldn't really be a surprise. She lets go of the knife, drops of blood clinging to the already red logo, and stands up straight to face him.
"Hi," she waves awkwardly, showing off her injury without really realizing it.
He's holding the door of the deli open with a foot, and with a jerk of his head he motions her inside. As she steps over the jamb, he takes her hand, still suspended in the air, and brings it close to his face. His breath heats her palm as he inspects the slice. "We need to clean this." He closes the injured hand inside his own and leads her around the edge of the shop, still littered with shards of glass, to the sink in the back.
With a flick of his wrist he turns the hot water on and gently rubs the wound with antibacterial soap. As the triclosan molecules attack, she cringes slightly, her fingers curling inward, but he uses his other hand to massage her wrist gently as he rinses the soap away and pats the cut dry with paper towels. She watches him open a cabinet and remove a giant red tackle box—something was written on it but he marked it out and wrote "first aid" in slanting, thin print in black Sharpie along the side. Digging through the box, he comes up with peroxide, gauze, and an Ace bandage. He motions her over to the counter and begins to disinfect and wrap her hand.
"You're awfully prepared," she remarks, the first words either of them has said in at least five minutes.
"I have to be," he responds simply. "It's a deli—big knives, clumsy sandwich maker. You do the math."
"You've still got all your fingers," she jokes weakly as she flexes her own digits, ensuring that they all function well.
Replacing the first aid box and closing the cabinet, he leans against the counter and peers at her as if he's seeing her face for the first time. "So why did you really come down here? Was it just to bleed all over my deli or do you actually have something to say?"
She's mildly taken aback by his frustrated tone, and she crosses her arms until she realizes that that makes her hand throb even more, so she just lets that hand dangle and puts the other on her waist. "For your information, Gio, I came down to help you clean up. I can see you need it." She walks back into the main part of the deli, taking a broom from the wall by the sink.
As she begins sweeping the shards together into a pile in the middle of the room, she doesn't even look his way. Good thing, too, because if she did, she'd see that he is leaning against the half-wall separating the area with the sink from the rest of the shop. His eyes are trained on her as she scurries around with her broom, trying to prove to him that she can ignore him. She's been doing a good job of it until she takes the smallest peek from behind her thick curtain of hair and meets his gaze. He smiles a tiny smile and ducks back behind the wall to retrieve a dustpan, then strides forward.
She goes back to brushing her slowly growing pile together and he meets her near the glass mountain. Bending his legs, he crouches down and positions the plastic dustpan by the hill. She sweeps the pile into the dustpan; he stands up and dumps it in the trash in the back. This cycle repeats itself until the floor is clean.
When she's done with the broom and he's done with the trash, she sits down at one of the metal tables and he sits opposite her.
"I'm sorry, again," she says with a sigh. "That perfume made me psycho."
"So you didn't really mean any of those things that you wrote in the note?"
She shakes her head. "I'm sorry about that, too."
"What made you want to write that?" He leans in. It's that thing he does, where he moves his whole torso closer and tilts his head a bit, his eyes narrowing like he's concentrating on a Rubik's cube—she would know, she caught him working on one when she came in to get lunch.
"I told you, the drugs in the perfume." She leans back, away from his penetrating gaze, but distance has no effect on those eyes.
He shakes his head, dark hair falling into his eyes. "No. No, something must have provoked you. Was it me coming in? I really didn't mean what I said about Henry. See, I didn't even call him Egg Salad. Isn't that what you wanted?" His eyebrows furrow the slightest bit.
Gio… crush on you… She doesn't remember all of the superfluous words on account of the poison in her system but she does remember the important ones.
"Amanda… said something," she responds, unwilling to tell him exactly what.
He leans back and swats at the air with a hand. "Forget her. She's such an airhead—she never knows what she's talking about."
She stands up and pushes her chair in. "You're right. I'll forget what she said. She was probably wrong."
"Probably," he agrees and stands as well. "Well, thanks for helping me out some. I've got to try to get this place in shape to reopen today, and I know you've got to get back to work, so…" he walks back behind the counter and deftly prepares her "the usual," wraps it up, and puts it in her good hand. "It's on the house."
"If you ever need any more help…" she lets the sentence trail off as she accepts the package.
"Naw, I'll be fine," he looks down and she blushes a bit. "And I'm sorry about your hand."
When he looks up she opens her arms, and he embraces her, her breath warm on his neck. His hand is caught a bit in her hair but he doesn't mind, and he closes his eyes and smiles, just because she can't see him. She pats him awkwardly with her bandaged hand and they part, too soon for him. But she kisses him on the cheek, and his face blooms vermilion under traces of light peach lip gloss.
"Have a good day," she waves with her good hand as she steps out the door. He sort of falls back down into his chair, a dazed grin on his face, knowing that good things come to those who wait—and even if it takes months, he'll be waiting for her.