A/N: I'm not sure I really set myself up the most efficiently for this prompt. Ah well, I dug myself into this hole.
I know you need your daily installation of unwanted Lithuania in a RoChu fic, too, so don't worry - *finger guns* I got you covered.
5. laughter
A few weeks later, Ivan finds himself without classes or ghost chaser duties, so he decides to sit around on the internet in his room for the entire day. Yao goes out in the morning, wherever he goes - Ivan doesn't really know, he's been meaning to ask but has never got round to it - and Ivan is just finding some lunch when Yao returns.
Yao appears through the door, loudly proclaiming his arrival, and upon seeing Ivan with a slice of toast and a bottle of vodka, remarks, "That had better not be your lunch today or I promise I will risk getting classified as a poltergeist to wreak havoc on your life."
Ivan is not sure where to begin. Yao's hard to argue with when he gets like this - especially when he gets like this and the reason concerns food.
"It's your lunch, isn't it?" Yao continues, and Ivan nods more sheepishly than he'd like to. "That is disgusting. It's an insult to the culinary world. Put that away, eat something real, this is an important meal of the day and I will not stand for you eating toast and vodka for your lunch."
"I don't really want to make something real."
"Go out, then. Restaurants exist."
"I don't have the money for that."
"You're right, you don't. Sandwiches exist."
Ivan drags himself to his feet and puts the vodka back in the freezer, leaning to get out of Yao's way when the ghost floats over to inspect the food supplies currently in his room. "Actually," Yao says, "Sandwiches won't do either. Go out and buy ingredients and I'll teach you how to cook. You don't have classes today, do you?"
Ivan shakes his head, and before he knows it he's outside his front door with his coat half-on walking to a store, listening to Yao list off things he'll need. The clear sky outside gives the illusion of being warm, but the air is sharp and cold, and Ivan pulls his scarf a little bit tighter around his neck.
"Cold?" Yao asks, floating ahead of him and dodging a man walking past them, "You living people are so fragile and weak. You have to eat, sleep, maintain a particular body temperature - it's much more convenient being a ghost."
Ivan almost replies - except then realises he's in public with people surrounding him, and is forced to settle with a smile behind the fabric of his scarf.
They reach a relatively cheap supermarket and Yao more or less drags Ivan around the shop, pointing to things, making off-handed comments about the price of everything these days, telling Ivan why this one particular brand of flour is a complete rip-off and he should not buy it, ever. Ivan wonders exactly how long it's been since he's got to talk to someone in a situation like this.
"Oh- Ivan."
Ivan spins around upon hearing his name from a voice that's too soft to be Yao's, and finds Toris Laurinatis stood next to him, looking up at him with wide eyes. His nose and ears and cheeks are red with cold. "Hello, Toris. I didn't think I'd see you here."
"Yes, I, uh- I ran out of bread and I couldn't really do without it, so..." Toris trails off and his gaze darts behind Ivan's shoulder for a brief second, before he glances at the people around them in the shop, then at the floor. "I'm guessing you don't have any duty today either."
"No," Ivan replies, "I don't."
He begins to turns around, to where Toris was looking - and remembers that Yao is right behind him, watching their conversation with furtive glances and pretending to run a finger absent-mindedly along the shelf.
He turns back to Toris and tries to keep his expression as straight as possible. If Toris were to ask questions now-
Toris stays silent, glancing at Yao, glancing at Ivan - his expression says he saw them. Saw Yao talking, saw Ivan listening, paying attention, picking up whatever Yao asked him to get.
"I, um..." he begins.
Ivan remembers that Toris Laurinatis hates ghosts.
"Was it you who cleared up the Alfred Jones case?" Toris asks, frowning slightly. Glancing at Yao again.
"Yes, that was me," Ivan replies. Toris looks up at him, an expression that Ivan can only call unease beginning to paint his face.
"That's amazing, I don't... that's good. That's really good." Toris looks over his shoulder, at the entrance, and gives Ivan a shaky smile. Ivan pretends he doesn't notice his gaze flit to where Yao has wandered across the aisle. "I'll be going, then. I've got what I wanted, so, uh..."
"Bye," Ivan says, giving him a little wave, and watches him quickly turn tail and run.
Yao floats over and pulls a face, glancing at the basket of things Ivan has managed to gather. "Wow, what was his problem?" he says, more to himself than anyone else. "Well, I think we've got everything we need. Let's go pay and then I'll see how desperate your cooking skills are."
It does not take many minutes of Yao attempting to instruct Ivan to cook for them to both be falling around laughing.
Ivan is not a bad cook - he used to bake cakes with his sisters all the time before he went to university. It's just that after he arrived at university he just sort of stopped having time to cook an actual meal.
As a result, everything Yao tells him to do, Ivan does with about a fifty percent chance of success, and every time something goes wrong Yao throws his hands into the air as if praying to a god that he'll somehow gain the ability to touch things again, just so he can take over Ivan's cooking for him. When he was alive, Yao says, he was a very good chef and he cooked for all of his siblings every day before he left for Russia, and then in Moscow he would sometimes cook for all the students on his floor. He describes the events with the same arrogant pride he always talks about his life in, except Ivan detects a small but solid note of regret in his voice.
He doesn't ask, though - ghosts are regretful by nature. Particularly those who died young.
Yao is one of the least vile, least depressed ghosts he's ever met, though. The least vile and depressed ghost he's ever met - that's how it was possible for Ivan to get so attached to him.
Somehow, as Yao pretends to sit on the counter and holds his head in his hands in despair, Ivan manages to produce something surprisingly much better than the sandwiches and pizza and vodka he's been filling mealtimes with for the past few years. He makes sure to gloat to Yao about it - look, I am better at cooking than you said I am.
"Yeah, yeah, okay, whatever. I'm not the one who has to eat." Yao jumps off the counter and floats over to the desk that Ivan has sat down at, choosing to just hover in the air a few inches above the ground.
"Do you miss eating?" Ivan asks.
"Yes," Yao replies, without any hesitation. "Yes, I do, I miss food a lot. Don't eat in front of me. I still stand by what I said earlier - I'll become a bitter and angry poltergeist and ruin your life if you do."
He is smiling as he says it, though, and Ivan laughs, "All right, then. Go and ruin your heart out."
"Oh, you'd really let me do that? I'm honoured, thank you."
They fall quiet for a few seconds, and then Ivan cannot stop himself anymore and breaks into a wide, happy grin, that Yao does not hesitate to join in with.
A/N: Another quick thing, I've been meaning to write a little background thing because I won't work this into the actual story without ruining everything for everyone. To be honest I should probably have done this sooner.
First things first, exorcism. As far as the ghost chasers' knowledge goes, there is no further realm for ghosts after exorcism. It's just the end for them. Have fun with that fact.
Second thing, poltergeists. In this AU, the word "poltergeist" is a special class of ghost used by the ghost chasers for two types of spirits. The first type is normal ghost that is just abnormally aggressive and irritating, and the second type is a ghost that can touch physical objects.
Research into these hasn't really taken off properly, but for some reason there are a few ghosts every now and then that can interact with physical matter, and naturally these are the ghosts that cause the most problems - as they can break things, move things, mess with real people, whatever you can really think of.
Even without this ability, though, it's still possible for a ghost to cause a good amount of havoc, which is why if they get annoying enough they're still classed as poltergeists. Alfred Jones was one of these, although he was convinced he was "teaching himself" to be the other type. There is one of the second type mentioned in this fic, although they haven't been met yet haha.
Finally, Yao is, evidently, not the second type of poltergeist - he's not a poltergeist at all. Wouldn't it be nice if he was, though ;)?