[OPEN] Look in front of you NOW. Do you have a waffle?

[madeinoblivion]

Who: Replica Riku, AKA: Joe Fieldman ....and OPEN to everybody!
When: Wednesday, 1pm
Where: Brinners, in the Underground Mall Food Court
Summary: It's Wacky Waffle Wednesday, and who can turn down food that just costs a buck, and comes with all the toppings you want?
Warnings: This could get unreasonably silly.


Joe Fieldman didn't always know a great deal when he saw one.

But waffles-for-a-dollar with a loaded waffle bar included? Sounded like a great deal. Enough to make a trek down to the mall for them, anyway, and loudly inform his whole apartment, if anyone felt like tagging along.

Of course, the trouble with great deals, especially when they were announced over the public newsfeed, was that a lot of other people seemed just as eager to take advantage of them.

So Just-a-Buck waffles turned out to be over a fifteen minute wait, and by that time Joe had seen so many people pass by with Tantalus Torture piles of whipped cream and strawberry syrup and chocolate chips and sliced peaches and sausage gravy that he decided to buy himself a stack of about <i>eight</i>.

Luckily, he's brought along a old half-forgotten journal he'd found underneath his bed last week (Ciel Phantomhive had managed to make him so self-conscious about the state of his bedroom that he'd actually decided to give it a clean) to amuse himself. He couldn't for the life of him remember where or who he'd gotten it from (Christmas before last, maybe? Or for a 'birthday'?), but it came with all sorts of entertaining instructions for what to do with the pages, and so he went about doodling bubbles and poking pencil holes, dog-earing pages and blackening the edges while he waited to aquire some food to stain the stain log with.

Okay, so it was slightly immature. So were overly-loaded waffles, but plenty of people seemed to be perfectly fine with partaking.

Comments

[pullsheavendown]

The past week or so hadn't been the best ever for Roxas. More than one emotionally-intense encounter had left him feeling a little drained for a while. But there wa sone thing that always helped fortify a teenage (or virtually-teenage) boy:

Food.

waffles weren't normally something he had outside of breakfast time, but why not? They were good, filling, and didn't cost a lot of munny. By that logic, he wasn't too surprised when he spotted his roommate with a stack of them. He grinned as he made his way over to the table and slammed his own tray down.

"Looks like someone's hungry."

[madeinoblivion]

(Let's don't ever let them know how un-teenaged we technically are, by overcompensation, which means eating lots.)

Joe's tray was full of doubled up waffles, and in the end he's decided that the best way to eat them was clearly sandwiching them as bread between plenty of messy, tasty toppings. This, he figured, was a stroke of personal genius.

"Looks like you are too!" He laughed, chewing on his first waffle sandwich (nooks and crannies filled with black cherry compote with chocolate chips)

[pullsheavendown]

Joe's plate was actually kind of gross, but in a fascinating sort of way. Roxas actually had to force his gaze away.

"Not as much as you, I don't think." He pulled the chair out and plopped into the seat. "But hungry enough. And it's a good deal."

[madeinoblivion]

"Well, I never said it was a contest, Roxas!" Joe laughed- but if it was, he'd certainly win.

Against anyone.

Except maybe-possibly Maya or Yako. Neither of whom were here anymore. Which made the hypothetical victory of any uninitiated eating contest sort of a hollow victory.

Taking another bite of his waffle sandwich, he slid his sneakers up onto the opposite chair beside Roxas, eying the register line.

"Guess a lot of people got the same idea though, right? Do you see anybody with more than eight?"

[pullsheavendown]

Roxas would not even try to win against Joe. Not that his friend was a giant pig or anything, but, well...just look at the size of their waffle servings. As far as he was concerned, Joe had already won.

"I don't think so. There was one guy who had something like a waffle mountain, but it was mostly toppings." He craned his neck, trying to catch sight of him again, but the place was too crowded for that.

"Do you think the pharmacies are going to sell a lot of Pepto later?"

[madeinoblivion]

"Oh c'mon." Joe laughed, a little uneasy, because that pink stuff he'd only tried once after too many hot wings which tasted pretty nasty. "Waffles don't give you a stomachaches!"

"They'd better not. We'd had enough being sick to last us forever."

[pullsheavendown]

"They do if you eat enough of them." But to prove that he wasn't afraid, he shoved another huge forkful and chewed for some time before swallowing.

"You don't think that's going to happen again anytime soon, right? People getting sick?"

[madeinoblivion]

"Well, I don't think eight's enough." Joe declared with a huff, making a vigorous point of biting and chewing another mouthful. "(Getting there maybe, but not enough.)"

"I sure hope not." He muttered after a longer moment, shoulders cringing a little with the thought of sitting up watching his friends waste away in the hospital again, or getting phone calls of a frantic Xion while he was running through the rain from the pharmacy. "I'm sick of chicken noodle stars."

[pullsheavendown]

Roxas shrugged and dug into his own pile. Definitely not enough yet—he was still hungry.

"Well, I'm sick of Jell-O." He grimaced at the memory. "I never want to eat anything that wriggles again. That stuff was the worst." Though it hadn't been the worst part of that awful month.

[rewritethesky]

So, waffles seemed like a good idea, although Namine did decide to wait and hang back at the apartment for a bit. School was coming up again, so some paperwork and preparation were in order.

But cheap waffles seemed like a good idea, and she's never really been to a place that offered free toppings for them. Might as well meet Joe for a nice little lunch, right?

Except after getting her rather modest helping on a single waffle with simple toppings (light whipping cream, chocolate shavings and strawberries), she really can't help but stare at her boyfriend's portion.

Namine knows that the boys can eat a lot but... did Vexen make him with a secret second stomach?

"Is that... gravy?"

[madeinoblivion]

"Well, someone told me you should eat waffles with fried chicken." Joe shrugs, looking at her plated waffle, which unsusprisingly manages to look much more dainty and appetizing on the plate than his four waffle sandwiches, dripping with syrups and melt-y soft serve ice cream and various combinations of nuts and fruit. And the one with gravy, which he supposes is his 'savory'.

"...which is weird, you'd think sausage or bacon or something might go better?"

There was a fried chicken place across the way, on the other end of the food court, but now that he was settled and eating, Joe felt considerably less keen on the idea.

"So you got all your school shopping done, huh?" He at least had the manners to chew and swallow before speaking, flipping through the battered journal beside his tray to see what other pages he had yet to mutilate creatively.

[rewritethesky]

"Fried chicken?" Honestly, that doesn't really sound all that appetizing to her. Maybe it's a guy thing. But it doesn't sound like it would taste very good, and she remembers taking a class about healthy eating.

...It's funny, relying on things she found out through school now. Maybe this is how other, girl Somebodies work.

She sits down across from him, nabbing her utensils and getting to work on her own waffle. "I think sausage or bacon might be more fitting. Waffles are kind of like breakfast food, and so are they, right?

"Mmm, almost. There's just a few things I need to pick up still." Like clothes. She has all her appropriate art supplies picked out, but there's something in picking clothing that just makes her nervous. She could ask Xion or Kairi to help her out. They'd probably follow the fashion trends here more than anyone else.

Fidgeting over the thought of shopping, she spears some waffle and strawberry and stares at the book. Not one of hers or Xion's. Maybe Roxas'? But he wouldn't do that to his books.

"Where did you find that?"

[madeinoblivion]

"I guess because it's salty, and the waffles can be sweet?" Joe shrugs, with absolutely no attention payed to food pairings, except that 'fried' and 'cheese' usually worked together, and so did 'cookies' and 'milk'. Somewhere in there, he tried to cram a few things in that he knew were healthy, too. "...So it's good-weird, like sea salt ice cream, maybe? But if you ask me, waffles should be anytime-food. So I'd eat them with almost anything, at least to try it the first time."

...which was totally not a dare invitation, or at least he didn't mean it that way, although something like a boastful declaring tone always had this creeping habit of sneaking it's way into Joe's voice.

"Huh? What, this?" He glanced down at the journal, thick with taped-in things and glued in things and shredded pages. "Under the bed. It's some weird journal I started a long time ago and must've forgot to finish. There are directions, for what to do with the pages. You're supposed to mess it up."

"Anyway...you still have some more stuff to get? I though I saw the bags, with your supplies." And snuck a wincing peek at the receipts, too. Who knew art stuff could be so expensive? He really needed to find another good source of munny, soon. The landlord had been talking about raising rent.

[rewritethesky]

"I guess that's true." Sea-salt ice cream and waffles are still two completely different things to her, but she could see where Joe was coming from. Still, chicken just seems a little odd to her, but that's what he wants.

She blinks at the book some more, wondering what is hidden in those pages. She couldn't imagine doing that to one of her sketchbooks. "Instructions like what?"

Namine glances down at the mention of her bags. She's been trying to keep them hidden ever since they played hosts to Ciel in Joe's body, just to help keep the apartment clean. A lot of it she could afford, but it was expensive. "It's supplies for class, but... I wouldn't mind picking up some new clothes."

Back-to-school clothes shopping for the first time.

[madeinoblivion]

"Well," He thumbs through, some pages are messy with intentional stains and others are almost completely covered in ink from being doodled on. "There's page for fingerprinting, a place to put fruit stickers, a page to poke holes in, and some you're just supposed to shred up...lots of things" Shrugging, Joe shuts the journal again, sliding it away out of sight beneath his tray.

The journal probably wasn't filled with the kind of 'art' that someone who was talented at it, like Namine, could take very seriously. In fact, someone who went to school for it might even be a little offended by the 'wrecking' process.

And what is it with girls needing so many clothes, when they already had perfectly good nice ones to wear? But Joe bites his tongue on those opinions, though. No girl ever wanted to hear it.

"So you're going to go with Xion, or Aqua?"

[rewritethesky]

It's far from fine art, and Namine can already envision most of her teachers snubbing their noses at it and the idea of messing up what could be a perfectly fine sketchbook. But she stares at it very curiously as he flips through it. Fine art, schmine art. It might not be her taste exactly, but she could tell that he's had fun with it, and that's really what mattered.

Her gaze lingers on the book under his tray a little too much. Maybe there was a page she could draw on in there. She hasn't drawn too much for him lately, and he does deserve it. "You're trying to finish it now?"

She bites her lip, idly playing with half a strawberry and her fork. The one that probably would be best to go out with would be Kairi, but, it's been a while since they've talked last, and she doesn't really want to intrude on her Somebody's life.

"Maybe just Xion. I wouldn't Aqua coming, but, I think she's a little busy. But, Xion knows a lot of things, ah... about what girls should do."

[madeinoblivion]

"Oh, she just thinks she's some kind of expert because she reads all those stupid magazines in the bathroom." Joe laughs, rolling his eyes. Xion seemed to be interested in some really girly things, once she got on a kick...baking, cute dresses, kissing her boyfriend in the back of the movies and grinning about it when she came home. (Joe blamed Ven entirely.)

To be frank, it was a little worrying sometimes. He and Roxas had to work to keep the boy-level of the apartment balanced out with the girls being...girls. Namine could, of course, could be as girly as she liked. And he supposed that a few new nice things for school would be okay, as long as none of the boys in her classes got the idea they could like her as much as he did.

He taps his pencil at the journal, and makes little pressed dots with the end of tip against the cover.

"I figure I'd take a crack at a few pages again." Joe shrugs noncommittally. "Until the next time I get too busy and forget about it."

[ibreakrules]

Sometimes you just need a little bit of a reminder from home. Frau had pretty much given up on finding any tea that came remotely close to Labrador's, but he still wandered different shops just in case. Every once in awhile when he didn't have work and felt like going on he'd make his way down to the black market as well. More often than not it just turned into a perusal of everything and not a real hunt for tea, but he didn't mind.

He was on his way back to the surface after finding nothing of interest when he spotted the huge crowd outside of one of the restaurants in the food court. Frau had never stopped at any of them, but the large group drew his attention and he made his way over. After glancing around for a little while to figure out what was going on, he spotted someone he knew. He hadn't run into Joe for awhile, but that wasn't going to stop Frau from going over. He was quite capable of being a pest to just about anyway.

Frau hovered behind Joe's back, looking over his shoulder at the plate.

"What is that? Dessert or a waffle? I'm pretty sure you have more other stuff on there than actual waffle."

He smirked and couldn't help picturing Teito's face if the kid saw what Joe's plate looked like. The thought only made his smile grow.

[madeinoblivion]

No teas here,by the looks of things, but this level of the food court was crowded with lots of people and lots of breakfast food at midday.

Three teenagers were at the table, two blondes and the boy with distinctively razored silver hair, and also with the biggest appetite, by the looks of things.

Joe grinned, holding up two of his waffles, the goopy filling between them slopping out a little and falling back onto his plate.

"It's a waffle sandwich. The toppings are free today, so-" His shoulder lifted in a casual shrug. "Why not have dessert? It can be both, right?"

[ibreakrules]

"If you say so."

It didn't look all that appetizing to Frau. There was just way too much on there, and a lot of it was dairy. He'd pass thanks.

"And that's not a sandwich. You can pick a sandwich up in your hands."

[madeinoblivion]

"What does it look like I'm doing?" He scowls with insistence, talking through a mouthful of food before swallowing.

It was messy, sure, but then most of his favorite foods were messy.

"I eat what I like." And justifying himself didn't need to go any further than that. "And we all like ice cream, right? And there are waffle cones, and ice cream sandwiches, so why not both?"

[ibreakrules]

"It looks like you're making a mess and getting more on yourself than in your mouth."

Frau's laughing though. He's not really here to criticize or correct. What does he care what Joe does? This isn't harmful to anyone or himself.

"I don't."

[madeinoblivion]

"And who are you, my mother?" Joe scoffs in smart retort, although immediately afterward he throws a quick wary glance at the girl sitting across from him at the table, then reaches guiltily for a napkin to wipe his mouth and clean some of the sticky mess off his hands.

It wasn't that messy, really. He wasn't going to bother eating waffle sandwiches with fork and knife... that'd ruin the whole point of feeling clever about inventing them!

But Frau's second comment leaves him a little taken aback, exchanging incredulous looks with Roxas. This household's idea of quality friendship time revolved around sharing ice cream, a tradition that Xion and Roxas had been quick to pass along.

"Wait, seriously? You don't like ice cream at all? Have you tried every flavor, and...you don't?"

[ibreakrules]

Frau was sorely tempted to plant his fist on the top of Joe's head in response to that. Did he look like someone's mother? Hell no. Pretty much everyone considered him a bad influence too, so nobody would even allow him to get close to "parenting."

He did, however, catch the glance Joe sent the girl's way and couldn't help smiling slightly. Teenagers. Too cute. Instead of commenting on either one though he just focused on the last question.

"No. I don't do dairy."

[pullsheavendown]

Roxas had been gaping, mouth slightly open but not so much that Frau could see the chewed waffle in his mouth (ew) and he hastily closed it when the newcomer spoke again. Manners, boy.

"You should," he said after swallowing. "Or try some of that sorbet stuff, I heard it doesn't have milk in it."

There had do be something that would work for him. It was ice cream after all.