Third Floor Common Room; Monday Morning [03/16].

[howareyanow]

No amount of blanket forts and hot cocoa and adorable stuffed German shepherd plushies (of which there were several just hanging out in the third floor common room that morning, and also one very familiar lifesized pitbull mix plush that was never leaving Wayne's side if he could help it) could excuse the fact that Wayne had called this travesty, and he was not going to be happy about it.

Because he came in, he made breakfast, just as normal, just as you please, and all the pancakes looked like pancakes, the bacon looked like bacon, the eggs, the potatoes, the fruit...all looked like they should, but none of it tasted like it should. And it wasn't consistent, either. Sometimes it was the pancakes that tasted like sausage. Sometimes, it was the eggs that tasted like coffee, and then then the eggs turned around and tasted like toast with strawberry jam on it.

The coffee tastin' like pancakes with syrup wasn't too bad, he had to admit, but it was the principle of the matter, and the fact that he tolt Nina she was jus' settin' 'em up for exactly this thing.

And so it was a very grumble-muttery Wayne at the stove that morning...

...although it was hard to be too grumble-muttery when surrounded by adorable plushy pups, too.

[[ open breakfast is ooooopen! ]]

Comments

[bookbeltof_love]

Nina was, like, looking a bit perplexed as she wandered in for breakfast this morning, a chocobo under one arm.

"Gooooooooood moooooooooooorning??????????????????" she ventured.

[howareyanow]

"Nina," said Wayne. "How are ya now?"

All just a normal, typical, tradition Wayne greeting, right? It may have seemed a bit...stiffer, darker than usual, but it was also sometimes a it hard to tell with Wayne, wasn't it?

[bookbeltof_love]

And, you know, usually she'd have been right on top of that but right now that was seeming more like a footnote to her contemplations of the morning.

"Oh, you know, a little confused????????????????????" she said vaguely. "How are you?????????????"

[howareyanow]

"Ohhh," Wayne drawled, easily enough, but with a particularly hard squint at the wall as he turned back to the stove. "Not so bad."

He flipped a pancake. A pancake that would taste like betrayal.

"Confused how?" he asked.

And also: "Fix you up a plate?"

Because that would be important.

[bookbeltof_love]

"Yes, please," she said, since that was half the reason she was here.

The other half, obviously, was to bother Wayne.

"And, like, confused as in I…….. woke up in a blanket fort," she said slowly. "When I didn't go to sleep in one……………."

It had been a bit disorienting.

"And, like, I think they got confused with the toys because this little guy definitely belongs to my brother and not me??????????????????????"

Like, he was cute and all, but Nina knew who appreciated chocobos more in her family.

[howareyanow]

"Is it really all that surprising, though?" Wayne asked, as blithely as he could manage, which wasn't very, but an effort to sound casual about it was made, while he fixed up a plate for Nina, all the usual stuff, without knowing what any of it was actually going to taste like once it reached Nina's mouth. "You make it sound like this place doesn't usually just up and do something on a whim jus' because it feels like it. Or are there....exceptions, fer blanket forts and stuffed animals?"

Or breakfasts that tasted all wrong, one of which was being passed on over to Nina with the usual nod.

[bookbeltof_love]

Nina paused and looked at him.

"You're, like, taking that awfully calmly," she said doubtfully, taking her plate and going to add some syrup onto it like she usually did.

[howareyanow]

"It's jus' blanket forts and stuffed animals," Wayne informed her. "Ain't no reason to get excited."

Especially when there were much, much more disconcerting things to deal with...

And also: PUPPY PLUSHES, NINA. And a big ol' Gus-specific one! Far as Wayne was concerned, that put pillow forts and stuffed animals in the top ten best things this island ever did.

[bookbeltof_love]

"I hope they eat you first," she said, a touch sulkily, taking her plate and going to sit down next to a puppy plush. "Then you'll see!!!!!!!!"

She cut one of her sausages and took a bite--------

"Um."

[howareyanow]

And Wayne's shoulders straightened, his chin lifted, just that tiny bit more as he stolidly went back to flippin' pancakes.

"Whassat, Nina?" he asked brusquely. "Something wrong?"