Chapter 2 – Cookie Time
A couple of days later he drops by the kitchen again. Elizabeth has authorized a mission to Elisia, the planet where they're supposed to negociate for food so he figures he might as well take Elizabeth's advice. The recurring nightmares he's had since the storm are raking his nerves and he tells himself a glass of milk and a couple of cookies might do the trick.
It's earlier and a few of her staff are still cleaning the kitchen tops while she is putting away the leftover desserts in the fridge.
"Good evening," he says, leaning his shoulder on the doorframe. "Is it a bad time?"
She turns and smiles at him. "Not at all, Major. Do you need Dr Weir's dinner?"
He shakes his head. "No, ma'am. She went to the gym with Teyla . But it wouldn't hurt to drop a tray at her office in an hour or so. I can take it with me when I leave here."
She nods and motions for a young redhaired assistant to prepare the tray. "Did you want anything else, Sir?" she asks him, patiently waiting, her hands folded in front of her.
"Well, first of all, if you could please stop calling me that. I feel like you're addressing my father," he pouts.
"Sorry, Major. Bad habit," she apologizes. "You may go," she tells her assistants. "I'll finish here." They file out and say goodnight to them both.
The kitchen is now eerily quiet. "Well," she reminds him. "May I help you, Major Sheppard?"
"Oh, yes. I was wondering if you could grant me a couple minutes of your time and maybe offer me a glass of milk," he adds suddenly feeling self-conscious. She is indecipherable and he wonders if he's invading her private time and space.
"And a couple of cookies," she adds, her eyes crinkling.
A weight lifts off his chest. He gives her his trademark lopsided grin. "Yes, ma'am. That would be great. I mean, if it's not too much trouble."
She motions for him to sit at the table and warms him some milk in a pan with a pinch of nutmeg and a teaspoon of brown sugar then pours it in a glass and adds a plateful of freshly baked cookies, pushing both items gently towards him.
She goes to wash, rinse and then dry the pan and he feels awkward again. "Ain't you going to come and sit too?" She smiles and pours herself a cup of coffee and sits in front of him without a word.
He munches on his first cookie and hums with pleasure. Her eyes crinkle again, making him smile.
"What?" she finally demands.
"You smile with your eyes," he says, hiding a grin behind his glass as he lifts it to test the temperature of the milk.
She blushes just a little. "You suggested you wanted to talk to me," she points out.
"Oh, yeah, right. If you've got the time," he adds and for the first time he sees something that looks like a shadow cross her face.
"I've got all the time in the world, Major," she says. "How can I help?"
He feels awkward. "Well, see, first I want to apologize. It was rude of me to tell you I had never seen you when we obviously stepped through the gate together."
She laughs. "No need, really. I know people don't usually notice me and it's rather to my liking. Was there something else, Major?" she adds after a while, seeing how uneasy he looks.
"Well, Dr Weir has asked me to prepare for a mission and she'd like to include you for trading reasons," he starts.
She lifts her hand. "I know, Major. Dr Weir sent me a memo. Of course I will join your team if you need me there."
"Well, yeah. Here's the thing. I usually don't like taking civilians with us. Whatever can go wrong often goes wrong these days so I need to know the members of my team before we head off-world," he says, realizing as he utters the words how wrong it sounds. "Not that I don't trust you," he adds hurriedly.
She smiles. "I understand. But I thought you'd read my file," she remarks.
"I will. I just want to know first hand instead of reading about you. I damn well know a report or a few lines on a file cannot tell you who a person really is," he answers, frowning, thinking about his own run down with too many judgemental people.
She falls silent. He feels her relunctance at having to tell him about herself. "I'm not really good with people," she finally whispers, her eyes intent on her coffee, avoiding his gaze.
"Pot, meet Kettle," he quips, making her jerk up her head in surprise.
He grins at her. "OK, Louise, let's start with simple things." He looks towards the back of the room where her jacket with her nametag on it is hanging from a peg on the wall. "You're French, yes?" She nods silently, stirring her spoon in her cup relentlessly though she's not put sugar in it. "How did you end up here?"
She looks up. "I don't understand what you mean. Is there something wrong with me being French?"
He shakes his head and pouts. "No, absolutely not! I just don't know where to start so I was going for the obvious. Look, you don't have to answer this, OK? That was stupid of me," he says, standing. "It's late and you must want to catch some sleep."
"I got recruited by Dr McKay," she says, her voice barely above a whisper, her eyes trained on him.
He sits down again. "Didn't Dr Weir recruit you?"
"Nope, Sheppard. I am the reason why this little miracle is here among us," he hears Rodney's smug voice from the doorway. She turns to him and beams. "Rodney! I thought you'd forgotten! I kept a whole batch for you," she says, standing. To John's utter dismay, Rodney gives her a one-armed hug before reaching for a mug and pouring himself coffee as if he owns the kitchen. He sits next to John and grins at him. "I knew you'd meet her someday. Isn't she wonderful?" he gushes before helping himself to one of John's cookies.
John raises his eyebrows. "You know the cook?" he quips.
Rodney shakes his head in disbelief then smiles fondly at Louise whose eyes are crinkling again. "Of course, I know her! I recruited her! Do you really think I would have let anyone else pick the most important person for this expedition?"
John laughs out loud. "You'd better say for your stomach. No offense, ma'am," he adds for Louise's sake.
She smiles at him and swats Rodney's hand as he's trying to snatch yet another cookie from John's plate and pushes a box towards him. "These are the Major's, Rodney. No stealing!" she teases him. It's the first time John sees her open up like this.
"So, how did you two meet?" he prods.
Rodney answers, his mouth full of cookie, coughs and downs the rest with a gulp of coffee. John rolls his eyes at Louise making her smile again. "She was in that culinary show when I was in New Brunswick a few days before I left for the outpost in Antartica. It was about being able to make do with whatever was in the kitchen at a given time. She was amazing. She adapted recipes and even invented some at a moment's notice and the jury was bluffed. When Elizabeth said they were looking for a cook who might have to adapt to a whole new, unknown environment, I told her let me handle it," he explains smugly.
"And Elizabeth let you," John sniggers.
"Of course, she did!" Seeing John's look of disbelief, he adds: "Well, I might have mentioned the fact food helped a lot with my mood swings."
John chuckles and turns to Louise. "So you let him drag you down here without a moment of hesitation?"
He sees the shadow cross her face again for just a brief moment. "There wasn't much I was going to miss about Earth so I thought it'd be nice to try something different."
He sniggers. "Different like in Koyla? Or the Wraith? Did you have a death wish?"
Rodney elbows him, seeing her raise abruptly to her feet and head towards the sink to wash her mug. John sees her back tense then relax after a few seconds. "I guess I was like most civilians on this expedition, Major – totally unaware of what was waiting for us out there," she says without turning to face him. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I do need some rest. Don't forget Dr Weir's tray on your way out," she adds, filling a travel mug of coffee for her and resting it next to the sugar and milk. She then folds her arms in front of her and waits impassively, her face a mask of patience.
Rodney winces and raises from his seat, then having taken his cup to the sink, drops a kiss on her hair before grabbing his box of cookies. "Thanks, hon', for the cookies," he says.
"You're welcome, Dr McKay. It's a pleasure to feed you," she graciously replies. John lifts his glass from the table but she stops him in his tracks. "Don't worry about that, Sir, I'll take care of it."
He cringes but relents. "Goodnight, Ma'am. Thanks for the snack," he says.
"Don't mention it. Goodnight, Sir."
He exits the mess hall, the tray balanced in his hands, and walks quietly next to McKay. When they're not within earshot anymore, McKay hisses at him as he heads towards his lab: "Way to go, Sheppard!"
"Yeah, I know, not my best move," he apologizes and sees Rodney roll his eyes at him in exasperation. "But in my defense, I was trying to break the ice there!"
Rodney sniggers. "Well, good luck now. If there's one thing you should know about Louise, apart from the fact she's the best cook I've ever met and she's a damn sweet lady, it's that she has walls so high it's a miracle when she lets them down even for a short while. And you just blew it there, big time! Now, you have a snowball's chance in hell she'll ever open up to you again."
TBC