As promised, he was back, this time for more than just a few minutes.

Dominic navigated his way back through the hospital halls (of course, after getting a proper guest pass), up a few floors and navigated some more until he found the right door. After knocking once he let himself in quietly, just in case she was still asleep. His blue gaze landed on Hannah's form on the bed first, then on the tray of food that was barely touched on the table nearby. And he frowned.

"You really should try and eat, y'know. I hear it's good for you," he joked, offering her a small smile as he approached.

Hannah quirked an eyebrow at him and smiled. Her dry lips made it a bit of an uncomfortable gesture but it didn’t stop her from laughing softly anyway. “It tastes disgusting.” Plus if she heard the nurses gossip right, one of the residents got food poisoning yesterday from something that came from the cafeteria. Faith in the establishments cooking prowess was quickly diminishing.

“I don’t think I could keep it down anyway.” Whatever they had her on at the moment not only killed her appetite but made it kinda hard to keep things down for very long. Saltines and water were about the best she could do; or ginger ale if her mom brought some in.

"Well," he started as he crossed the room, ultimately ending up by a chair where he set his bag down.0 "If you need me to get you food that doesn't taste like feet to you, just let me know." His smile widened some, and though he wanted to try and get her to eat he knew better than to force anything on a patient. Dom ruffled through his bag for a few seconds and quickly pulled out a number of items.

"Anyway, since you're not eating! Let's do something to get your mind off of being bored or whatever. Let's see…"

Carefully he laid out a series of cubes, small children's games (namely an old barrel of monkeys), playing cards, Yu Gi Oh cards, and a yo-yo for the hell of it. "Take your pick!"

“You know,” she paused to pick up one of the two multi colored cubes. “You never did finish teaching me how to solve this.” Her smile became a bit lopsided since she remembered how hard she had failed to figure out row two. Sure she was able to get the blue and orange piece into the right second row corner however each time she got it there the blue was on the orange side and the orange was on the blue.

There was a small part of him that was relieved to see her pick up the colorful cubes, and as she spoke he reached for one of the others ones and started solving it. "I tried to, but you got stuck and we didn't have time after that. You're just lying around now," he continued, already finishing up the second layer. "So plenty of time. Do you still remember the first layer at least?"

He glanced up again, completed puzzle in hand and a full on grin of satisfaction splitting his face.

She nodded her head in response pretty confident she could still get that far. “At least I think i do…” she added then began the motions to solve the green layer first. It took a few minutes, okay more like ten minutes, to finish but at least she didn’t give up.

“Okay, now what?” Hannah looked up at him expectantly with a bit of a triumphant look on her face. Had she been in any other place than a hospital bed she may have added a ‘Ha! take that!’ or a ‘I told you so’ coupled with a satisfied grin.

While she worked to solve the first layer, Dom turned his focus to the stack of old Yu Gi Oh cards, flipping through them and recalling the memories of back when he still cared about the game. Now it was just fun to pull out and look at, not so much use. When she asked what to do next he looked up and took a second to make sure she had it right, then picked up another cube and fixed it so it matched hers.

"Okay, so there's three possible places the piece you need is gonna be…" he started, then slowly demonstrated each one so she could understand easily and follow along on her cube. "The general sequence is pretty easy to remember...but I don't really get what it means. I found it online way back. It's 'don't laugh, debauched liberals debate filibuster, drink and fart.' So it's down, left, down, down, front, down, front."

The look on Hannah’s face was priceless. It was a cross between ‘excuse me’ and ‘come again?’ “Uhhh….” The sound was long and drawn out. “I think I got it,” she said though there was a vast amount of doubt in her own voice.

She took the cube back from him and like a lamb looking up to her shepard she hoped he’d correct her if she made a mistake. “So this one here…” she made sure the piece she wanted to relocate to the side opening was aligned in the proper place “Left..no down, left down. Um what was next?” Oh this was going to take practice.

"Down," he answered quickly, then watched as she tried and (mostly) got it right. He only needed to correct her a few times, and before long she had half the second layer done. "See? Not too hard, and no one ever does their first cube in under ten minutes so don't even worry about that."

Out of habit he was messing up and half paying attention to the cube he had in his own hands as he spoke. "Just practice and you'll have it down in no time. Lemme know when you're on the third layer."

Hannah concentrated on the motions and after several minutes of trial and error she finally got the second row complete; not as fast as the first row but it was progress. “How much time does it take you to solve them now days?” she wonder out loud. The last time she clocked him at the cafe it was maybe five minutes but that was almost three years ago.

"Depends on the size of the cube," he answered quickly, then smiled when he saw she was done. He fixed his own cube once again to match hers and explained the next step.

"To get the third layer there's two steps. First step is making a cross, so you need to look at two pieces in particular. The left piece and the back piece; they need to match the center. If they don't, just go ahead and do the sequence and you'll get it eventually…" It was the last word he spoke that elicited a laugh from the periwinkle haired girl; eventually.

His explanation went on for a little bit, and he demonstrated the technique with the cube he had in his hand. When he was done, he glanced over at her and blinked. "If I lost you, just say so and I'll go over it again."

“So… what have you been up to lately. It seems like everyone is so busy with school… and other stuff… I feel so disconnected sometimes.” Thanks to moving two years ago and health issues she was held back an entire year. Now all her friends were in college while she was finishing her senior year of High School. It sucked yes but there wasn’t much she could do other than keep working through her school work so she could join them next Fall.

He stood there in thought for a moment, listing the various things that happened to him since she moved away. It didn't take long to filter the more important things though, and after messing up another cube he gave a shrug. "In order of importance for me, I guess...the fact that I'm seeing someone tops the list," he said slowly, almost hesitantly. Not that he was hiding it or anything, but he wasn't sure if it was a good topic, so he quickly moved down his list.

"From there I met some family that live nearby, am mostly passing my classes, and still helping out friends at school. I helped Delilah with some modeling stuff, man. That was…" he couldn't say "awkward" because of who he had to work with, so he let it hang. "Yeah. Um...and that's basically it?"

“Wait. Hold up. Go back to that first one…” Oh he wasn’t going to get off that easily. “Did you ask her or did she ask you?” So Dominic was in a relationship now? The one guy that was the closest she had to an older brother as she was going to get had finally found himself a girl. Now that was something to talk about.

He wasn't sure if he ought to laugh or be a little nervous that she was asking him to go back to the teensy detail about him being in a relationship. "Ahh…" he started, a sort of stupid grin crossing his features for a second before he got it under control.

Sort of.

He ended up looking down and focusing on the cube in his hand for a second. "We sort of mutually came to...an understanding? It happened a little unconventionally, I guess. Almost backwards..." Dominic looked up at her again to see how her cube was going.

Even though she had been going through the motions the same time he was, she still had a bit of difficulty solving the first portion of the final row; sure, as corny as it may be… crosses were kind of her thing, cubes however were not. “Kay, now what?” Hannah asked once the four parts where in their respective spots since the first two times around adjacent pieces were switched and refused to go to their proper places.

"Now you need to get the right corners in the right place," he said. "The sequence is…" and he demonstrated once again on his own cube, until he got each corner piece where it was supposed to be. "They don't need to be facing the right way, but they need to be in the right place."

Hannah nodded, following along with the same motions though it wasn’t quite as easy as one would assume since her cube colors weren’t identical to his. Hers had two corners that were already in the right place and facing the right way. The other two looked more like headlights on a Scooby Doo bus. “So I guess the more important question here is are you two happy?” He was a hard person to read at times and this instance was no different; perhaps she shouldn’t be trying to pry as much as she was.

There was probably only one thing in the world he was an open book about, so the wide smile on his face was probably indication enough. Still, he gave a nod. "This ridiculous night life aside, I think so," he started, then poked at one of her odd corners and motioned for her to turn it left. "She wouldn't put up with me if she wasn't, so that's how I see it. Also she probably would've kicked me to the curb. So. Since I've still got a roof overhead, there's that, too."

Hannah turned the left side down then the bottom row to the left as directed. “Does she know… about…” she nodded her head from side to side a bit not really wanting to finish the sentence. “About what goes on after school?” Two more twists and the final pieces turned into place. With a triumphant smile she held the cube out to him like a child would a prized picture they drew at school and were handing it to their parents to put on the fridge.

"That's actually how we met," he said with a laugh before inspecting the cube she presented to him and giving a thumbs up. "Nice. Alright, so after that the sequence is just right, up, right, up, right, up, up, right, up, up and you keep going 'til all the corners are solved."

Again he paused and blinked, giving a lopsided smile. "I'll write it down if you want? Sorry. I move a little faster when I get close to solving one…"

“Heh, if you don’t mind I’d appreciate it. Then maybe I could practice a bit when there’s nothing else on TV.” Lets face it day time TV shows really suck during the week. Plus they are mind numbing and dull full of one too many drama shows or news stations. “It sounds like you two get along pretty well. I’m glad you found someone that you can share both sides of your life with.” Secrets like of this magnitude were nobodys friend. Life was hard enough as is keeping it from her parents, and Tristan. It was her burden to bare and getting them involved would only put them in danger more than likely if she told them anything. “Thank you for trying to teach me again.”

He huffed and took steps back on his own cube, frowning slightly. "I'll go slower, but I'll write it down anyway. I'm gonna be here when you solve one for the first time, Hannah. It's practically a priceless moment."

“I’m sure you will be. Here,” she offered him back his cube. “Mix it up and I’ll try it again?” Practice made perfect and she had all the time in the world right now to do just that, why not take advantage of him being here to go again?

"No doubt. 'Cause this is gonna happen right now. Alright…"

He did as she asked and mixed up the cube before giving it back to her, smile returning as he watched her try to solve each layer again. It was fun, sharing his hobby with a friend, and particularly so when said friend was in the hospital. He was happy to kill time here if it meant it helped her, even a little.