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 Posted: Mon Jan 27, 2025 6:27 pm
“Here boy,” Riker called out from the kitchen, tapping the block of cheese he was getting ready to open on the counter. He had crackers and some pieces of random slices of meat ready to be made into mini sandwiches. Sharing with Maxim was only fair.
It wasn’t difficult to make himself at home there in Evan’s house. Well… Zac’s house. And the home of several others. Julian was there so that was nice.
He was going to bring the plate up to Julian to share, but he knew he needed to give him some time to focus on writing a paper he’d had assigned.
Maybe he would convince Julian to take a break and they could practice their instruments together. Riker was still trying to learn the basics of the guitar from Dering he’d been gifted, and he was eager to learn.
“I’ve got some cheese. I know you want some,” he said again as he pulled out a knife to start cutting the block into smaller pieces.
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Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2025 3:38 am
Todd had been having a rather nice midday nap when he woke up feeling a little hungry. It had been an accidental nap—he'd fallen asleep over his latest plushie project, a little creature from something called pokemon that he'd learned about from doing research on making plushies on the internet. The one he'd picked was called a lycanroc. He liked the orangey one best. Maybe he was biased. Also, he'd definitely been asking to just fall asleep because he'd been working on it on his bed. Yawning and stretching, he sat up and put away the materials, padding downstairs and detangling his hair with his hands as he went to the kitchen to see what he could scrounge up. He perked up as he realized someone he'd yet to meet was in the kitchen—and already knew he liked cheese? Zac must have told him. Tail wagging, he answered chirpily, "Yes, please! Thank you."
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Posted: Fri Feb 07, 2025 3:21 pm
Todd beat Maxim to the kitchen but only by a few seconds; before he showed up there was a noise from the other room, like furniture scraping on the ground, and a muttered swear from someone who could only be Zac, annoyed that the dog decided to rearrange the living room in his haste. “For what, some cheese?” he’d muttered. “You get enough of that.”
And then, silence from him as he moved the--presumably--table back into place.
Maxim bumped his nose against Todd as he came into the room and looked up with Riker with expected eyes and an open mouthed-smile. His tail wagged expectantly behind him, perfectly in sync with Todd.
If it had been Evan, Zac wouldn’t have bothered joining them in the kitchen.
Except, he knew that was Riker. He’d seen him come down from Julian’s room.
So far as he knew, those two had never met. Didn’t Todd know not to take food from strangers? What if Riker was just some kid who had broken in and was robbing them? Had Julian told Todd about his friends? It wasn’t like he was the most social kid, Zac thought he was half-broken so he doubted he’d have offered more information than necessary to placate everyone in the house.
Uggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
There were a million ways this could go wrong.
He dragged himself to the kitchen to make sure none of them came to pass.
He didn’t bother to introduce Riker to Todd, or vice versa. Oh, Todd definitely looked like he'd just crawled out of bed. He looked at the block of cheese Riker was handling and asked, “What are you making?”
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Posted: Thu Feb 13, 2025 5:05 pm
That was most certainly not Maxim responding to him. Unless Maxim suddenly knew how to talk.
Riker froze, but not before dropping the whole block of cheese onto the plate he’d been setting the crackers on, sending them flying across the counter. He hissed and winced, eyes darting from the snack carnage to the strange man that was suddenly under the impression that Riker had meant to offer some cheese to him.
Even worse was another voice in response to the sound of Maxim scampering from the living room to the kitchen. Riker bristled.
Ugggggghhhh. Zac.
He was probably going to come up with something snarky and mean to say, just to make sure Riker knew his place was below him in terms of importance or something.
“Nothing for you,” he anxiously barked at Zac, clearly trying to sound tougher while being clearly flustered. “I meant to call for the dog--”
Oh…
Riker glanced at the other man again. With his tail wagging like Maxim’s. That was probably insensitive of him. Or…. accurate? He wasn’t sure any more.
He’d picked up the block of cheese again, and quickly gathered up the crackers that had been scattered about, wondering if he could just… duck under the counter and disappear.
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Posted: Wed Feb 26, 2025 2:04 pm
Todd beamed at Zac, happy to see him. "Good morning," he chirped. "...Ahh... What time?" He tilted his head, ears perking slightly as he realized it probably wasn't morning anymore. He hadn't checked the time when he'd come down. When he realized there was tension in the room, though, he paused in the middle of putting his hair into a braid, making a little confused noise as his tail stopped wagging. He glanced between the two men with an intense frown. "...Sorry," he said quietly to the man whose name he did not yet know. "Todd shouldn't assume. Cheese just... very good." He flushed with embarrassment. Dog."Maxim good boy," he said quickly, reaching down to pet him. "He should have cheese. Yes?" He hoped that whatever was going on between Zac and the unknown man would go away. He wasn't good at this. Anxiety balled up in his chest and he took a deep breath to try to quell it, squishing Maxim's face a little.
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Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2025 6:58 pm
Zac held none of the tension Riker had built up, and looked at him with an exasperated squint. Riker, stop throwing cheese, what are you so stressed out about??? How did you get to be so weird? Was he afraid they were going to rob him of all his snacks?
He had to draw in a deep breath and force his face to relax. Todd was sensitive to emotions and Riker was radiating stress. “Maxim should have cheese, yes. And if Evan were here, he’d have told us all that we haven’t had our daily cheese intake, and you know Riker works with him, right? So I’m sure he knows how important cheese is when it comes to strong bones.”
Cheese was cheese and Zac was talking out of his a**, but Maxim agreed with everything he said and now that Todd wasn’t wagging, he wagged twice as hard to make up for it. He looked at Todd and lapped at his fingers enthusiastically, nearly dancing in place because everyone kept talking about cheese.
“Todd, this is Riker. Julian’s friend. He’s staying for dinner,” he said, even though Riker hadn’t yet been invited. Zac just sort of assumed he was going to be here. “I’m making steak. Got some good ones from the butcher.”
He rubbed his hands together, as if he couldn’t contain his excitement. “You saw them, yeah?” he asked as he passed by Riker to open the fridge. They were right where he left them in the fridge, laid out on a pan. “They’re gonna be perfect tonight. Did Evan tell you not to use this?” he asked, pulling out a paper wrapped cylinder from the cheese drawer and taking a place next to Riker at the counter. “It’s dry aged salami, don’t make a dumb joke. I get real bitchy when people eat it because, first, it’s expensive, and second, they don’t know how to appreciate it. But, it just so happens to pair best with that cheese you’ve got, so I’m gonna share with you two. But not the dog, he won’t appreciate it. He eats grass.”
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