September 3, 2017, 10:58 AM

Beth let out a loud, annoyed sigh as she covered her face with both hands. "Why is this so goddamn hard?"

"Well, first of all, it's a Sunday..." The comment did not seem to have the desired effect, which Jack quickly realized as a pencil went flying past his ear. "Hey!"

"If I wanted to hit you–"

"You'd have hit me, I know."

Another sigh. "Maybe when I said this would be no problem, I was being overly optimistic."

Jack crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.

"Fine," she growled. "You can help."

"Actually, what we need to do is get Will to help," Jack told her, snickering lightly at her look of confusion. "You will never meet a man more patient than William Joyce."

Beth's eyes lit up. "We can make him do all these goddamn phone calls."

"On not a Sunday," Jack agreed with a nod before pre-emptively ducking.

"I'm not going to throw anything else at you," Beth promised, although she very much looked like she wanted to. Which got Jack thinking...

"Have you ever like... killed somebody with a pencil?" Jack asked, earning an eyeroll. Clearly she wasn't going to dignify that with a response. "Oh come on, it's a fair question!"

"Jack, are you asking me if I'm the MacGyver of murder?"

He stared at her for a moment before snorting a laugh. "Well, I wasn't thinking of it like that, but I am now."

"I really gotta stop putting bad ideas in your head." Jack could tell she was got to trying very hard to sound annoyed, but probably thought the idea was just as funny as he did.

Jack crossed his arms and gave her as serious a look as he could muster. "You could totally kill a guy with a pencil."

"Not with the cheap ones you buy," she countered with a smirk.

Jack couldn't let this goldmine of a conversation end. "What about a paper clip?"

She gave him a withering glare. "You want to find out firsthand?"

"N-no, no thank you," he returned, holding his hands up defensively. "Maybe I should go get you some more coffee."

Beth nodded with a smile. "Good plan."

"And a tranquilizer," he added as he moved toward the kitchen.

"Jack Joyce."


September 3, 2017, 6:23 PM

"Jack, that was..."

"Terrible," Will finished for her.

"I was going to say a good try," Beth returned, "but, uh, yeah I'm with Will on this one."

For the first time, Beth had let Jack make dinner. On his own. Unsupervised. And it had been a mistake.

"That's harsh," Jack returned with a petulant frown. "I tried my best!"

"I don't see how that's possible," Will returned very matter-of-factly, pushing his plate away. "You ate yours, so you must realize you completely fumbled this."

"Well, I..." Jack looked down at his empty plate. It did taste a little... different. "Figured that was just the Cheez Whiz."

"Jack Joyce, you made grilled cheese with Cheez Whiz?" Beth looked almost offended at this culinary choice.

"Not Will's," Jack clarified glancing at the almost untouched place.

His brother reached toward the plate and began gingerly disassembling the sandwich. Jack winced when he saw it. "You forgot to unwrap the damn cheese, Jack."

That took the scowl right off Beth's face. Now she was doing her best not to openly laugh at him.

"Well, that's a yikes I guess," Jack agreed, feeling a full-on blush rise in his cheeks. An amateur mistake, Jack.

"Cheez Whiz wouldn't explain the... unique taste," Beth continued, once she regained her composure.

"I used mayonnaise instead of butter," Jack offered, "but I didn't think it would make that much of a difference."

Will looked at him quizzically. "I used the last of the mayonnaise two days ago."

Beth's amused expression immediately evaporated. "Oh my god, Jack, did you...? No. God, you did, didn't you?"

"Wha...?" Even as the word left his mouth, he was already on his way to the kitchen. With a deep breath, Jack opened the door to the refrigerator and confirmed what Beth seemed to have already realized. "Oh my god, I used ranch."

"You had one job." It was meant to be an accusation, but the smile on Beth's face told him this would become a cherished memory. For her. And for Will. Definitely not for Jack, who was unlikely to ever live this blunder down.

"The containers look the same!" Jack returned with a frown. It mostly true. They were sort of the same shape. And the same color. And they were definitely the same brand.

"Jack it's a salad dressing," Beth reminded him, unable to suppress her laughter. "How did you not notice how thin it was?"

With a sigh of defeat, Jack closed the refrigerator. "Well, I guess I'm never cooking again."

"Oh, you're not getting out of this that easy," Beth returned, a broad smile still plastered across her face. She reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone. "Next time I supervise. This time I call for takeout."


September 4, 2017, 12:14 AM

Yet another text notification popped up, interrupting his seventh failing attempt at Candy Crush.

Beth
oh my god jack stop hiding and come to bed
Mon 12:14 AM

"I'm not hiding," he grumbled to himself under his breath. Oh, who am I kidding? Of course I'm hiding. With a defeated sigh, Jack closed the app and headed toward the stairs leading up from the basement. He made a note not to tell Beth where he definitely was not hiding.

"There you are," she announced with a satisfied grin as he peeked his head through the doorway.

"No teasing," he warned as he stepped the rest of the way through.

"About dinner, or in general?" Beth asked, the grin growing larger.

"Dinner," Jack returned, "although you could be nice to me."

"I'm always nice to you."

"Liar," Jack accused with a smile of his own as he tugged off his shirt and tossed it toward the laundry basket. A miss, yet again.

"Fine, no teasing at all," Beth offered, waving him toward the bed. "Come on, I've had to read this shitty biography of some random physicist while you were off sulking somewhere and I'm tired."

Jack climbed into bed next to her, leaning over briefly to look at the book she had now abandoned on the night stand. "Uh, I don't think Enrico Fermi really counts as a 'random' physicist."

Beth gave him The Look. "All physicists are random to me."

"Right, of course," he replied as agreeably as possible. After a moment he turned to face her. "So... you're tired of reading the biography, or...?"

Beth rolled her eyes with a light laugh. "You're such a pain in the ass."