[FIN] Pancake Party

[BlackFireKitsune]

"Heh, no, I don't think I'd be able to get another apartment if I burned this one down," the blond noted as he waited for Zevran to finish. He didn't particularly feel like going into detail about apartment management, so he refrained from doing so as he stepped closer to take out a few pancakes once Zev finished; one for himself, one for Taavi and the smallest one for Vanessa, including fruit. "Where's the cream you brought?" He asked as he licked a bit of the fruity syrup off one of his fingers.  

[TawnyAngel]

Zevran made a noise of mild disappointment when Abel licked his fingers clean. "I was going to get that for you," he lamented in dramatic tones but with one of his frequent smirks on his lips. "Ah well, next time perhaps? The cream is over there, I will get it." As he spoke Zevran crossed the small room to collect the can and then turned to the door and indicated it with his head. "Shall we then?"  

[BlackFireKitsune]

What? Going to get-- oh. A wicked grin flashed across his face all too briefly before it vanished, replaced by a small smirk. "Next time sounds good," he agreed readily as he picked up the three plates. It wasn't a difficult feat, it just required a bit of balancing. After a brief glance to the stove to make sure all of the burners had been shut off, he nodded. "I think this is everything, so yeah." Yep, all of the plates, Zev had the cream, both mugs of coffee were pretty much done or too cold to drink anymore, so that was everything. Even if it wasn't though, it wasn't like they were going very far.

Once Abel rounded the corner into the living room, he headed straight for the coffee table to set the plates down. "Alright, here are the sweet pancakes, as promised!"  

[TawnyAngel]

"Oooh, is that a promise? I certainly hope it is," Zevran smirked as he followed Abel through into the next room.

After finishing off his pancake Taavi had curled up on the sofa with Vanessa; when Abel and Zev came in he looked up with a small tired smile, but worn though it was it did crease the corners of his eyes a little. "Oh you two are back? I heard a lot of giggling, what were you up to? Do I want to know?"  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"We're back," he echoed as he passed both Taavi and Vanessa a pancake plate; the latter took hers eagerly. After he pushed a few things aside, the taller blond sat down on the coffee table with his plate in his lap. "We weren't up to anything except cooking," he replied innocently enough, though the faint half-smirk in his expression spoke to the contrary. "Nothing too inappropriate, anyway."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Much to my despair of course," Zevran added with a soft chuckle. "But to be quite serious mostly we were cooking and getting a little carried away with it; flambé happened." With this statement Zevran sat down cross-legged on the floor and started to eat his pancake, he could have added cream he supposed but it looked good as it was already.

"Well that's okay then; thanks," he said as Abel passed him one of the plates. There was some kind of sauce with the pancake this time, which made it softer and so easier to cut with just a fork? Not that he'd even tried last time. He did try this time but, nope, the plate just tipped and nearly spilled the sauce in his lap; Taavi gritted his teeth in order to avoid spitting a curse out of the sudden rage that flared up inside him. Could he not just cut the ******** pancake up? No, he couldn't. "I'm not hungry," he said abruptly, setting the plate aside on the arm of the sofa and curling up again.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

A small smirk flitted across Abel's face for a few moments. "It's true, it happened. And we didn't set the kitchen on fire," he added as he set about cutting his pancake into pieces. He might add cream, perhaps...

Ah, nope.

"Oh that's good, yours looks a lot better than mine anyway," he said once he finished cutting his pancake up into pieces and he reached both arms out to swap his plate with Taavi's. It was a lie, of course; the pancakes all looked more or less identical. "And you should at least try a bite; it was on fire, that means it has to be good."

Vanessa had already devoured half of hers; the lower half of her face and the entirety of both paws were coated in sauce and fruit as evidence of this fact.  

[TawnyAngel]

After a few moments of hunched helpless anger that really had very little to do with the pancake Taavi exhaled, uncurled, and reached for the plate. "Alright. You two did go to a lot of trouble." It turned out to taste pretty good, he wasn't in the mood to appreciate it really but it was still nice. Taavi looked up at Abel and Zev and tried to smile again, it didn't really work this time. "You two can cook for me again," he said rather more hollowly than he'd intended to. This was exhausting; trying to interact with people, swinging between anger and nothingness and.... Why had it had to happen to them? He didn't deserve it, Valour certainly didn't. Hadn't.

"Oh, well, good, I will have to cook dinner for you tonight as well then," Zevran replied with an encouraging smile and - when Taavi wasn't looking at him - a quick glance of query to Abel. "I do already have all of the ingredients, and some are fresh so they should really be used soon...."  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Taavi's attempt at conversation earned him a soft, warm smile, and Abel nodded his head. "Sure, tonight sounds good." Was it though? Would Alyssa drop in on them? He hoped not. He really, really hoped not. He hoped not anyway, but especially now that he'd agreed to dinner. Was it selfish of him to want Zevran to make dinner for them that evening too? While he enjoyed the food - and he was certain he'd enjoy Zev's cooking later that evening too - he mostly just wanted the company of his friend. But Taavi had suggested dinner, and Zevran had suggested tonight, so Abel could only feel but so guilty and selfish.

He could still feel apprehensive over the ever-present possibility that his blackmailer could drop in whenever she felt like.

Still.

The taller blond glanced over at Taavi once he'd swallowed a bite of his pancake. "What d'you want to do today?" Surely they'd want to check and see if anyone had seen or heard word of Valour anywhere yet, but maybe he had other things he wanted to do also?  

[TawnyAngel]

What did he want to do? Nothing really but he didn't want to just sit around here either. "Um." Taavi moved a bit of pancake around in the sweet lemony sauce. "I don't... Well I was going to meet up with Sasha today, I guess I'll still do that? After I call the office just in case they've..." He shrugged, if there was any news they'd have called him but he felt he had to check anyway. "But yeah, dinner tonight would be good. Thanks." Having an extra person around would mean conversation he could listen to without joining in.

"Excellent," Zevran beamed, "tonight it shall be then, I assure you that you will not be disappointed. I have seldom had complaints about my skills, at least not for some years now. Everything requires practice before one becomes really good at it yes?" And that went for far more than just cooking.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"Ah, okay," he said with a nod. In lieu of further comment, he stuffed a bit of pancake into his mouth and chewed thoughtfully. Sasha... He still didn't really know how to feel about him. No, that was a lie; he didn't like him, but he felt bad for not liking him because Taavi liked him so much. But he just... didn't really seem like a good fit for Taavi. The guy needed someone loving and appreciative who actually cared about him - and showed they cared about him - and Sasha didn't seem like he did at all. Actually it seemed like he didn't really even know Taavi that well despite dating him for.. How long had they been dating now? A year? No, Taavi could do so much better... But Sasha hadn't exactly done anything bad so Abel felt guilty silently hoping Taavi would one day do better when he cared for his boyfriend so much. "That's a good idea, maybe they'll have heard something." But in all likelihood if they had, they would've let him know by now.

Dinner, dinner was a good topic to move to. Abel looked toward Zev keenly to ask, "What would you make for dinner?"  

[TawnyAngel]

"I was planning on paella, really you are supposed to use a proper pan but that big deep pot you have will do fine. You both like seafood? Shellfish to be precise. If not I can make a version with meat instead." Zevran preferred the seafood version himself but if Abel or Taavi wouldn't enjoy it there was no point at all in making it.

"I like shellfish," Taavi nodded, setting his fork down for a moment to tuck his hair behind his ear. "I'm not really a picky eater... not that I'm saying your cooking is bad but I eat it anyway. Uh. Yeah. Seafood's good." Normally he'd be dying of embarrassment right now and worrying he'd really badly insulted Zev, but as silver linings went not having the emotional energy to care wasn't a very good one.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"I like it too," Abel agreed as he nodded his head. "I'm not picky either, I'll eat just about anything. If you make it though then I'll definitely like it." It was kind of heartbreaking to see Taavi not even really care that much when he fumbled with his phrasing, but he didn't really.. know what else he could do for him. More hugs probably, but not when they both had pancakes in their laps.

On that thought, Abel stuffed another chunk of saucy, fruity pancake into his mouth.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Thanks Zev... I'd offer to do the dishes afterwards but uh," Taavi nodded at his arm. "So, I guess Abel gets to do that right?" He'd make it up to him at some point, things like that had seemed to balance out pretty well in the ten months he'd been living here.

"Excellent! Paella it shall be then and flattery, Abel, will get you served first." Ahhh, how was Taavi going to manage the shells with only one hand? Oh well he would deal with that when it came to it, perhaps he would just pre-shell Taavi's portion before he gave it to him and not mention it. Not mentioning glaringly obvious problems seemed to go down as well in this apartment as the pancakes were.