"What the hell is that, doll?" the voice behind her startles her from her deep concentration on the toaster in front of her, but not enough that she looks away from the pastry gooodness. To Darcy, toasting the pastry to a perfect gold is an art form, and she doesn't dare look away in fear of missing the precious moment the toasting is done. Guessing that he's talking about the shiny silver packaging that still holds one last pastry in it, she blindly points at the box, not taking her eyes away from the prize. He huffs, but she can see from her peripheral view that he grabs the box.
"S'mores Pop tarts. The hell is that, doll?" Silence. Then: "Goddamn, the amount of sugar and fancy named shit in this...Lewis, are these things even edible?" A smile quirks at the edges of her lips. He actually read the ingredients and nutritional facts! Who does that? That is totally something she has tried to avoid because she doesn't need or want to know all of the less than wholesome, kosher shit she's been putting in her body by consuming the goodness known as pop tarts. She nods. Of course, her sweet dears are edible! How else had she survived on a college student's budget while at Culver and then while keeping Jane alive in the asscrack of New Mexico? "Actually, I don't know why I'm asking you that. Of course, you'd think it passes as edible!" Aw! He knows her!
She holds up a finger behind her, gesturing for him to hush. Then she presses the cancel button on the toaster and up pops her pop tart, a perfect golden all the way around. Delicately grabbing it with the tips of her fingers to keep from burning them, she plates it. Turning around, she nods to let him know he can continue talking as she blows on her food to cool it down.
"Darcy, how have you not died yet?" He's got an incredulous look in his eyes. She arches a challenging eyebrow as she picks up her tart, blows on it, and then takes a considerable bite. She chews it with deliberately slow and dramatic movements. "Jesus, woman! Fine, go sit down." Amused at his antics, she sits down to watch him as she polishes off the rest of her tart.
He mutters something unintelligible, but Darcy can make out words like "edible, my ass" and "ma" and "have my hide." She watches as he pulls out a cutting board, some actual kitchen knives, and grabs a towel to hang on his left shoulder. Then he's taking out some eggs, olive oil, vegetables, shredded cheese and a pan. After pouring a small amount of the oil into the pan and turning the burner on, he sets about preparing...whatever it is he's gonna make. With expertise, he rinses the veggies and then cuts them into to precise slices or cubes. Then he cracks the eggs almost perfectly in half, stupidass show off, into the pan. Next, he adds the veggies and cheese. While his back is turned to finish up the food, she takes the opportune moment to unashamedly ogle his fine piece of ass. Hey, she may be mute, but she sure as fuck ain't dead or blind.
Only a few minutes later, he's turning around with an omelet of admirable size in his hands. He slides it over to her, a fork quickly accompanying it. A teasing deceptive expression in her eyes, she makes a big show of getting some of it on her utensil and inspecting it before putting it in her mouth. Then her eyes widen as she swoops down on her food for more. Wonderful, amazing flavor bursts in her mouth. She can hear a chuckle from wherever he is, but she ignores it. Instead of inhaling the blessed omelet, she eats it slowly, savoring the flavors coming at her. There are a couple spices, so she thinks he probably sprinkled some on top while his back was turned to her.
By the time she's a little more than half way through with hers, he's sitting down with a much larger omelet of his own. While he eats his, he sports a proud and smug smirk. Once he's done, she's already practically licked the damn plate clean. "So?" he asks unnecessarily. She growls in her throat before wildly throwing her hands in the air. She gestures at him and then the empty plates repeatedly for a few solid minutes. Then she settles for simply sighing and motioning at him to explain.
He gets up and gathers his plate. He's about to grab hers as well, but she stops him by doing it herself. Her mama taught her that if they cook, you either clean everything up or helped them if they were too stubborn to let you do it alone. The pair goes over and put their stuff in the dishwasher. As they continue to clean up the kitchen, he tells his story.
"Growin' up, we never had a whole lot of food in the kitchen at any given time. Somehow, my ma still managed to make nearly everything taste good. As a little kid, I loved helpin' her make dinner most nights. My ma gave zero fucks about the whole idea that the kitchen is a woman's place and not a man's. She believed that if you wanna be a cook, then you can damn well be one. If I popped into the kitchen while she was cookin, she'd teach me everythin' she knew about what she was makin'. It, well, it became somethin' special.
"Then, when I, well...after hydra, Sam said I should find a hobby, somethin' that wasn't connected to hydra to ground me in the present. My first memory about my ma was us cookin' together, and I've been figuring it out ever since." She smiles warmly at his explanation. "Our, um, movies were...well, at first I heard that you were playing that Lord of the Rings movie, and I figured why not cuz it was on my list of things. Then I...I just kept goin' back. An' our Thing became somethin' that kept the, uh, bad shit away." The capitalized "T" when he says "our Thing" is completely implied, and she has to keep in a tiny squeal in at hearing that he has placed such high emphasis
She's touched. She really is. She's always loved their Thing, but now, she loves it so much more.
"So, I was lookin' around with the help of F.R.I.D.A.Y. for a place that teaches ASL. If...you still wanna, that is."
A bright smile stretches across her lips. They hadn't actually really talked about the subject since that conversation all those weeks ago. Of course, she'd been discreetly looking for a place, but, just like his little offering of friendship that one seemingly horrible night, she hadn't been entirely sure he'd been serious about ASL with her.
"Anyways, I, uh, found this place in Brooklyn. The AI and I were lookin', and I think they're good. They're called ASL NYC. They do private lessons…" he trails off at this.
It makes sense. While he's been cleared by the government, a lot of people were full of shit and didn't really agree. Plus, she knew it would be much better for both of them to have a private thing. Less stress for both of them. She nods agreeably as she scrubs the tables and he does the pan.
Once everything is cleaned, they mush over to the couches in the communal room. She makes sure to get all cozy on her bit of couch before giving him her full attention. "I was thinkin' we could maybe do it more one-on-one, but, you know, with both of us there. It would, uh, be easier if I weren't in a big classroom. Figure I could do it if it were only the three of us."
She holds up a finger to tell him to wait a sec while she pulls out her phone and starts to type with a fury. Then she hands it over. Awesome. I was thinking that too. We could...call them?
"I was thinkin' maybe we could ask Natalia to look for someone. If she trusts them, I think I could too." He's sheepish about it, even reaching up to scratch the back of his neck. His eyes flick down and then back up to hers unassumingly. She smiles and holds up two thumbs up encouragingly.