Welcome to Gaia! ::

She could have sworn that she'd smelled the wafting scents of all that grease at least three to four minutes before the knock on her door came. She hadn't expected the visit today, and it showed in the way her hair tumbled carelessly without any perfectly tied bows and ribbons holding any of the curls into position, and the alpaca pajama shorts set that matched Shiloh's perfectly. When she opened the door, she eyed Dawson warily, as if she hadn't yet decided if she was going to let him in or not. The smell of that fast food started to hit her harder now, and it, more than anything, won her over. She decided to forego perfection just this once - especially considering how stubborn the man was being - and let him into her room.

"Your store told me that it was thirty minutes or it would be free, and it's been, like, a full day." She informed him, her catty voice filtering easily through sarcasm and a smile. "I am so not giving you a tip."

She closed the door behind him, slapped him firmly on his rear end, and then cleared out her desk to give him enough room to set down whatever he'd brought her. "Where did you get all of this? No chicken from the cafeteria, right?"

"Boss?" Maebe wasn't sure what he meant by boss, or if he was calling her boss in some strange submissive act, but she found it hard to truly care. She began picking food out of the bags, and separating them carefully into piles. She didn't look desperate to eat any of it, so much as determined to take stock and allow maximum pickiness.

"I had a burger, once." She mulled over the thought quietly as she sorted. "On a vacation. It was from this place called In and Out." She smiled to herself, and ended the story abruptly there. Whether or not she liked the burger was irrelevent; she just wanted to use it's name in a twisted pun now.

Her hands stilled in the bags when he held out his arms, and she hesitated on her decision. He wanted to hug her, and comfort her, and be her friend, and friends had never been her forte. They disappeared faster than even love did. She pulled her hands out of the bag, sauntered dangerously at him, and slid her hands as far around him as she could. Her face turned, paused, and then sunk against his body.

"I still say sex would be better." She grumbled with an unhappy resignation."

Dawson was like a cartoon character. His movements seemed surreal in their exaggeration, and they amused her just as much as they tired her. She tried not to smile as he wink wonked, and fell limp in his brisk, overwhelming hug. She, of course, had eaten burgers many times in her life. His misinterpretation coupled with her disappointment at his lack of response to the sexual innuendo made them a perfect duo of calamity and confusion.

But then there was food, and that failed to matter as much.

The burger was placed very carefully in front of her, unwrapped, and then picked at. Burger King was always so messy. "I do. Thank you."

She contemplated the entire table's worth of food, and realized that Dawson had done all of this simply because he thought of her as a friend. What would he do when he actually liked someone? Build them a shrimp boat?

"Where are my fries? Ahh." She dumped the bag out, scattering the fries directly onto the table and picking at them happily. "What a mess." She sounded quite satisfied with the fact that grease and crumbs were getting everywhere on her pristine desk and carpet. In fact, her fingers shuffled the fries around, just to see them leave tracks.

"You've bought entire platters worth of food. I thought I was joking when I said you were going to get me fat. Perhaps I was underestimating. Thaw assures me that he doesn't think the possibility of a heart attack is likely on his watch, but we're going to prove him wrong, aren't we?" She held out a long, droopy sweet potato fry near his mouth.

The fry was half gone in the blink of an eye, and she pulled her hand back and popped what was remaining in her mouth. Then she finished picking at her burger until it was perfect - every ingredient needed to be shifted and moved to be perfectly shared amongst the burger. The pickles and tomatoes were spread out instead of stacked, in harmonious shapes, and then the bun was pressed back down on the top.

She picked up her burger, but instead of biting into it, she watched him eat - and watched with sharp, intensely focused eyes, as blobs fell on the plate below. They splattered into shapes worthy of a Rorschach test, and she looked until she found a shape within.

She smiled at what she saw, and found it very fitting.

"I'll take your word for it." She announced, finally taking her first bite. She could have attempted the typical small ladylike bites to try and seem impressive, but her relationship with Dawson had veered just slightly to the right, where she had to accept that sex was off the table until Deus had broken him in better and he realized all that vestigal virgin bullshit was nonsense. Therefore, she took a normal, messy bite, and enjoyed it.

She'd eaten one bite. One. And he was done. She swallowed, and tried to contemplate where his burger had gone. It was a magic trick. His compliment was registered, but only in distraction.

"If I had the proportions of a Barbie doll, I'd be a terrible fighter." She pointed out, grabbing a handful of fries. "I'd snap in half. But I'd like to think I'm as close as I can get. I'm glad it seems that way." Her eyes lit up for a moment, and she pushed herself up enough to get on her hands and knees, and crawled quickly over to the tiny door she used for her closet. "You know what else Barbie has? A lot of shoes." She'd all but abandoned her food in place of pulling out the tallest, most dangerous pair of stilettos she owned, and dropped them on the floor beside him. She took the other one and started to lace it up, admiring her legs as she did so. "Barbie would be jealous."

She considered it for a moment, but surprisingly decided not to put on the other shoe and catwalk for him. This was for the most part simply because the heels did not match her pajamas, and also, she was wearing pajamas. If she'd been fully dressed and matching, she probably would have shown him a few things. Perhaps not catwalk moves, but something worthy of a smaller stage, surely.

Instead she unhooked the shoe, and let it drop beside the first one. "I know." She murmured, flopping back down on the floor. The smell of the burger stole her attention again, and she took another bite. It was a strange, comfortable silence, and that frightened her. So she threw a fry at his face.

"That's why I buy them. That's why I buy anything. I use what I've got."

She shifted down, and laid on the floor, flipping her hair until it splayed in perfect ringlets like a giant halo around her head. Then she stared at the half-eaten burger, and contemplated its existence. Instead of eating it, she popped fries in her mouth instead. They were smaller, easier, and she could eat them without thinking too hard about it.

"Thank you." Her voice was muted, but heavy with meaning. It was unclear whether she was thanking him for the food, or something else. She had no plans to clarify.

Small talk. Maebe pushed the remainder of her burger away from her sight, as her stomach rolled with the thought of it. She stared at him popping little shrimp in his mouth, and oddly wondered if she would ever be able to focus on anything long enough to eat with such gusto. It was an exhausting thought.

She closed her eyes for a moment, and desperately tried to think of an answer that would not exacerbate more small talk. "I learned how to crochet vaginas made out of wool. They're selling on Ebay right now, I'm making a killing. I sell them with tiny bottles of lubricant because wool is very itchy and yet men still think a wool v****a is worth ********." She picked up another fry, and slowly sucked it into her mouth. "I found out that my ex-boyfriend has officially moved on, and is living upstairs with my girlfriend, and without me." Another fry was sucked between her lips, slower this time. "I had a measles party for one of my children. See, vaccinating your children can cause autism, and I refuse to let the government put my child in danger."

She said all three of these things as if each one were completely, and utterly true. Then she opened her mouth, and arched her throat. "Pop one in for me." She demanded, pointing at the shrimp.

"It's been very difficult." She murmured, nodding her head sagely. "I've encountered a lot of opposition but I'm steadfast. No vaccines." Her mouth opened again, waiting.