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 Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 12:17 pm
"Yeah, it was something I had to learn. It takes practice," Annie said, smiling and nodding. She took a piece of sushi from the boat but spoke more before she put it in her mouth. "I still don't think I'm very good."
Lori lifted his plate then and offered it to Maia, not to take the entirety of but to take a piece. His rolls were cooked and full of all different things, not just one or two ingredients like what sat in the boat. "Here, try one of these."
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 12:31 pm
"Better than me," Maia said. At least she figured that. Annie had certainly had more experience than she had. "I asked Toby to teach me when he has free time. He showed me about cooking pasta last night. So I should be able to at least do that. And sometime soon, I'll be able to read recipes. Dari's teaching me to read."
Maia took one of Lori's rolls, offering the plate back. She tried it, expecting an unwelcome flavor. But hey! Those were alright!
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 12:35 pm
Annie nodded. "Oh good! When you can follow a recipe you'll be totally fine. I mean, most of the time." She grinned. "I can't say what I make always turns out like it's supposed to. It's good to learn by doing or watching too, though."
"So, in the future, you like the 'special rolls,'" Lori said, smiling and taking his plate back.
"Try a cooked one," Toby urged, pointing to the boat with his chopsticks. He remembered it was taboo and lowered them, though. "They're very different."
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 2:25 pm
"I've learned most things by watching and listening," Maia said, thoughtfully. "It wasn't very hard to blend in with the kids on my beach." Adults had been another story, it was like they were from an entirely different worlds.
"I'll remember that," She said. Special rolls. They tasted so much better than regular rolls.
"You'll trick me and make me eat eel," she accused Toby with a shake of her head. She took another bite of her shrimp. "That brown stuff looks suspicious."
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 2:34 pm
Annie nodded. "Me too." At least that was how it used to be, before she'd been taught just like Maia. She had decided to stay with the government sector that had saved her. Being an agent was too much for her tastes, but she'd wanted to give back. So she did.
"Once you can read these we'll come back," Lori said, "and you can get some crazy combinations."
Toby smiled, and that was never a good sign. He was watching Maia for a moment, saying nothing. He had been planning to trick her but she'd sapped all the fun from it.
"That's because it's eel," he said and ate another piece, wrinkling nose nose at her cheekily. "How do you like the nori?" Because it was seaweed, and she had eaten a veggie roll wrapped in it, but if she didn't want to try eel on principle she probably wouldn't want to eat seaweed once she knew what it was.
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 3:19 pm
Maia smiled at Annie: so someone knew how that was. She nodded at Lori. "That'd be fun. Then I'll know what food tastes good."
"I knew it! And depending on the eel, I could be electrocuted or poisoned or--" she made a face at him. "At least while they're alive. Do they cook all the poison out?" She finished her shrimp, pushing her plate in front of her. "Nori?" She asked.
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 3:23 pm
Toby snorted with laughter, politely covered his mouth, and chewed and swallowed. "It can't hurt you. They cook potential poisons out and it's just meat like anything else. Yeah, nori. The green chewy stuff." He nudged a cucumber roll wrapped in it with the tips of his chopsticks.
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 4:30 pm
Maia still didn't seem willing to try the eel. "It's your favorite, you eat it," she said. She took another vegetable wrap, chewing it thoughtfully. "Tastes like seaweed," Maia said, "the kind they put in salad. I've never liked salad much though." She was more fond of meat. The leaves were crunch, but they didn't have the right flavor.
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 4:36 pm
"Oh! So seaweed is a-ok but longfish is gross?" He ate another one blatantly, right in front of her face, staring intensely. Annie laughed. Dari shook his head. Nothing was weird to him when it came to eating. He'd eaten everything from cucumber to steel. It was tricky learning what exactly you needed to function in an alien lab.
"I agree. Down with salad." Lori held his fist out to bump.
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 5:04 pm
Maia made a noise of disgust. "Eels look like giant worms. They're disgusting and can kill you if you touch them. And some of them spit this awful slime. Seaweed is much better."
She bumped fists with Lori, grinning at him.
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 5:06 pm
"But they're fish!" Toby replied, not really trying to reason with her so much as tease her. "You know what else spits slime?" His face crumpled with disgust. "Children. And people seem to like them just as well."
"...well, not to eat," Lori corrected. Toby's expression dropped to a smile and hung his head. Well, he had him there.
Lori was especially proud of the fist-bump. Clearly she had met some trendy kids at her beach.
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Posted: Fri Aug 07, 2015 11:18 pm
"Disgusting deadly fish! Sharks are fish too, but I certainly wouldn't try to eat one!" Maia made a face. Children spit slime? She supposed the very young babies did. "They're cute though, and not at all disgusting. And eels don't possess that cute huggable feature small children do." Maia was especially fond of children, and while they shared one trait with the eels, she was not about to be convinced eel was any more edible than blowfish.
"Did you know some people eat crabs? But you wouldn't eat a spider, but they're all creepy."
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Posted: Sat Aug 08, 2015 7:57 am
"I think you're racist. Racist against eels." Toby had lifted his nose in mock condescension. "I didn't know that about you, Maia."
Lori was looking down at his plate. Huh. There was a moment's silence and he turned to the selkie across the table. "I'm eating crab."
Toby snorted. "They're still bugs, just ones that live in the ocean and are big enough to not be mostly--" He stopped himself and eyed the people eating around them. Right. "Gross."
"Well then bugs are delicious," Lori decided.
"Oh, yeah, I've eaten sea-bugs before. All the time," Toby replied, then said to Maia: "You know, lobster is one of the most expensive meats out there? It's considered high-class in a lot of places, and getting a sandwich with it always costs more than the fish and chips."
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Posted: Sat Aug 08, 2015 8:08 am
"They're still gross," Maia pointed out. Racist? Huh. What exactly was racist? It must have been something bad, from the way Toby reacted. It had something to do with eels though and she wasn't changing her mind.
"Crab's are okay to eat," Maia assured Lori. "Spiders though. Nope!"
"I'll save my money and buy fish and chips instead."
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Posted: Sat Aug 08, 2015 8:14 am
"I don't think I know a single person who's eaten a spi--hah. Actually...." He had dared a kid to eat a spider once in grade school. He did. It had made everyone laugh. The teacher wasn't all too happy about it, though. "Nevermind. I think you'd like fish and chips. It's greasy Euro-american fare. Pretty standard. The 'chips' are french fries though, because the British are a backward folk."
Annie laughed. "She's the racist?"
"What? I've got some English in me somewhere, I'm sure."
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