Third Floor Common Room; Monday Morning [12/21].

[howareyanow]

Wayne was planning up a trip back home for the holiday and change since he had the time and the resources, but he figured he'd work his plans around squeezing in one more Monday Morning Breakfast for the year before he hopped back north of the border until the next semester. With that in mind, and also the fact that it was pretty clear skies after that nice little bit of tom fuckery last week, and there were no classes he needed to get to, you better believe Wayne went all out with the breakfast that morning, with all the usual staples.

He considered doing a little bit of Christmas spin on the pancakes, but he figgured everyone'd had enough of that sort of thing fer a while now!

Either way, it was Monday, there was breakfast, everything was nice and back to normal, jus' as it should be, and so Wayne was...mostleh content.

Jus' so's long as he didn't think too much on the snowmobile. At least it hadn't been lost in vain.

[[ and open breakfast is of course open! ]]

Comments

[snowdroplace]

You know what Elli had done all of Sunday?

Sleep.

She was still tired, come Monday, but she could only lay in bed for so long. Also, she was hungry.

"Good morning, Wayne!"

[howareyanow]

"Elli," Wayne greeted her with a stout nod as he flipped a pancake, surprising no one. "How are ya now?"

[snowdroplace]

"I'm well, thank you," she said, though of course she could have elaborated on that. "And yourself?"

But the easy routine was so comforting.

[howareyanow]

The elaboration was fer after all the proper formalities were out of the way, besides! And while it wasn't quite exactly right and made Wayne twitch slightly, it was good enough, and so he proceeded steadily, almost cheerily (fer Wayne, anywhey) with the usual, "Oh! Not so bad."

Followed quite naturally by, "Fix you up a plate?" while said plate was pert'near fixed already.

[snowdroplace]

"Yes, please," she said, smiling. "How are your bruises?"

[howareyanow]

"Barely bothered stickin' 'round fer dinner," Wayne was happy to report, which wasn't entirely true, but, again, close enough. They really weren't much worse than any bruises he'd have gotten after a few donnybrooks back home, realleh, and the only real damage he'd taken was to poor heart.

And then the plate was finished and being handed over with the requisite nod.

"You get some rest?" he asked, because she might not have taken any battle damage, but her health and well-being was higher on the priorities list than his own.

[snowdroplace]

"Oh, yes," she said, with a bit of a laugh as she took the plate with a murmured thank you. "I slept yesterday away."

And just saying that aloud felt indolent and luxurious, even though she'd done it because she'd just been that tired.

"I'm glad you're doing well! I really can't thank you enough for being my escort."

[howareyanow]

"Don't mention it," said Wayne, and he meant it, because you didn't help out fer the acolades or attention, you helped out because it was the right thing to do! "Jus' glad it's over, and that we can move on until the next one, which hopefully won't be fer a while, now."

[snowdroplace]

"Or never," Elli said longingly, though she knew that was a fever dream.

Elli folded herself onto one of the couches.

"What about your motorcycle?" she asked. "Have you been out to see if it can be salvaged yet?"

[howareyanow]

"Snowmobile," Wayne corrected, because he'd definitely be a stickler about something even less pedantic than that, "and considering it's still in better shape than when we first found 'er, I'm pretty sure she's still got more'n enough life in her. Might be a project to bring Shuri in on," there was no might there, he was almost a little glad fer what happened on account of the fact that it meant he could bring Shuri in on it, "but, either way, it'll have to wait until I get back from home."

[snowdroplace]

"Sorry," she said, "It's a bit confusing all the things people have to drive here! Snowmobile, snowmobile, snowmobile."

Ah well. At least she was trying.

"You're going home for the break?" she asked. "I was planning to go home for a few days, myself."

[howareyanow]

"Well, y'see, a snowmobile..." Wayne started, before treating Elli to a rather drawn out and specific dissection of what exactly made a snowmobile a snowmobile (beyond, y'know, the snow), and what made a motorcycle a motorcycle (beyond, y'know, the motor), and the biggest distinction between the two that she would surely retain entirely and find incredibly useful in her every day life, with the placid patience and dryness of an encylopedia brought to life and wrapped in flannel and a turtleneck (because it was colder now, and you lost a lot of heat in the neck).

"And," he said, almost as if by way of conclusion to his lecture, though the two points were completely unrelated, "y'know what they say: there's no place like home for the holidays. Think I might throw out an invitation to anyone who might want to come on up fer the annual Christmas party, though. It's tradition....and you don't fuck with tradition."

[snowdroplace]

At least his lecture gave her time to eat while she listened, wide-eyed and attentive, to his explanation.

Most of it was going to go right over her head but she got the basics.

"We don't celebrate Christmas back home," she admitted. "We have Starry Night Festival, instead. It's very lowkey compared to... everything here. Is your party going to be on the day of?"

[howareyanow]

"The day before," Wayne informed her with a nod. "Christmas Eve. 'Cause Christmas Day's fer families."

And recovering.

"But there's Christmas movies," he explained, "and gift-giving, oh you've got to have the givin' of gifts, and there's usually jingle juice, but you've gotta be careful with that, because you've got to stay classy until midnight, fer the Three Wise Men, that's the main event..."

[snowdroplace]

"What's the Three Wise Men?" she asked, since the way he trailed off there felt like she was expected to ask.

[howareyanow]

"Three shots at the stroke'a midnight," said Wayne, holding up a hand with three fingers extended, and each one folded back in as he named them off: "A shot of Irish whisky, a shot of American whiskey, and a shot of Canadian rye whisky."

[snowdroplace]

"Oh, Goddess!" Elli laughed a little. "I see why now people have to be careful before midnight!"

[howareyanow]

Wayne nodded sagely.

"And there's no spittin' before midnight," he said. "It's not dignified."

Literally almost everyone wound up spittin' well before midnight, which was a bit awkward, with there being but one bathroom in the entire farmhouse.

[snowdroplace]

Elli hesitated.

"Is... is spitting ever dignified?" she wondered.

Because ew.