Welcome to Gaia! ::

Aphismet, slightly ashamed, ran a hand through his now-mussed hair and replied: "Erm, I work at a pizza parlor." He smiled sheepishly. It was painfully ovbious he was near the same age as Shuura, and yet he wasn't attending any kind of post-secondary institution. He hoped she wouldn't bring it up. "I make the pizzas, so I don't really erm, interact with customers. I'm not really good at that," he admitted. "If you're looking for a job for the summer, we're hiring counter-workers, to take the pizza orders and all that stuff..." Since she said she was between jobs, Aph supposed she would be looking for summer employment. People had already come by to apply, but Aph thought it would be good for Rivener to have a friend at the parlor while Aphismet worked.

Rivener smiled at Gage as brightly as he could manage. He succeeded only in looking extremely pleased with himself. "It's good! No hurt, see?" he said, lifting his hand up to show Gage. The skin was smooth as before. "I'm safe!"

Shuura rubbed her eyes and yawned again, missing Julian's look of surprise. Which was a good thing, or else she would probably have said something nasty in retort.

"That's a nice thing, then, to have a steady job," Shuura commented disinterestedly on Aphismet's line of work. In truth, with his slightly disheveled appearance and comedic "worried parent" act, she thought this socially awkward dude was like...30. Or at least, she imagined all pizza restuarant chefs to be 30+ year old chefs who talked with accents and smelled of flour and salt. "Thanks for letting me know about the possible job openings, though," she said with a little more enthusiasm. The guy was nice in his own way, she supposed. Kind of socially incompetent, but nice. She offered him a lopsided grin. "You have a card or something?" although she was quite certain that the job opening at Cafe Jubilee would offer much better pay, she was also considering the possibility that she might need to juggle two jobs in order to cover certain......expenses.

Vyn wondered briefly what they were talking about. So far the grounded ones had not mentioned her name, or mentioned Gage or Rivener. Therefore, she concluded, they were not talking about anything of importance. Looking over at her two fellow Frei, she observed that although Gage had touched Rivener, Rivener didn't appear to get the blistery stuff she had when she had brushed Gage by accident. This made her slightly annoyed, although she didn't understand why.

Julian either did not notice his effect on his new acquaintance, or he had not the capacity to worry over it. It was not that he had meant to be condescending, even with the line about the other's career. There was something in the man's tone that suggested otherwise, but the fact he was unable to cook anything more complex than bacon was simple truth.

"Is there anything to be sorry about?" the scientist questioned calmly. If nothing else, it might be interesting to dive a little further into Mr. Aphismet's worldview.

Gage allowed the closeness with only a briefly wary look in "River"'s direction. He was more or less all right with the other invading his personal space as long as harm was not caused by either of them. The last thing he needed was for his immense guilt from being a humanoid form of pesticide to double.

"I work in the lab, or play," he responded, his tone taking on a sour note at the word "play".

Rivener watched Vyn go, giving her a subconsciously sultry smile of farewell. He just didn't know how to smile any other way. He then turned his attention back to Gage. "How do you know work? Did your guardian teach you? And what's play?" Although he knew what playing WAS, he couldn't understand how Gage was managing to do it by himself.

"Err, well, erm... Goodnight, Miss Shuura," Aphismet offered, after smiling sheepishly at his lack of parlor flyers. It was unfair for someone to expect him to carry the flyers around at night, but he still felt immeasurably guilty about it. "And I, uh... I was just sorry that I couldn't accomodate her request," Aphismet explained to Julian. "I'm sorry to ask, but um... How do you know when they," he pointed to Rivener as he spoke, "are done eating? How did Shuura know she could leave?"

Aphismet was also very worried about being left alone with the other man, but then again, it shouldn't be much different. After all, he wasn't doing much better when the girl WAS present... "Oh. Then, that should mean that um... Rivener would be okay to return home by now." Aphismet tried to hide the relief from his voice, but didn't manage it very well. He couldn't wait to get out of here, back to the relative safety of his apartment.

"I think I'll go, then. Thank you, for erm... Er, thanks. It was nice to meet you," he continued as he started to walk away, wary that Julian would ask him what he was being thanked for. Honestly, Aphismet didn't even know. He reached out and wrapped his hand around Rivener's wrist, and pulled the floaty Raevan towards their home.

Riv had been wondering what Gage might mean by "play is like work." And what kind of work was he doing anyway? Riv himself wasn't allowed anywhere NEAR the pizzeria's kitchen... The Raevan had been about to ask more questions when he was tugged away. Perplexed, he wondered why Aph seemed in such a hurry, but he figured it didn't matter: seems like it was time to go.

"It was nice to meet you, Gage," he said with another of his sultry smiles, before dissapearing around a bend in the path.