Peaches

Title: Peaches
Fandom: Corybantic Dance 2
Characters: Mike, Quentin
Rating: T
Warnings: A few expletives.
Notes: Quentin is very good at cooking and very bad at eating. Good thing he's got a friend like Mike.

Quentin leaned back into the living room and threw a wet rag at the back of Mike's head. "Get up, lazy ass. You said you were going to help me. Mom's coming home, tonight."

"Quentin, your apartment is cleaner than my mother's kitchen. It always is, because no one is ever here, except you, and you've got the god given sense to clean up after yourself in the public rooms." Mike twisted around on the couch and threw the rag back. "If you want to do something useful, stop wiping down already clean parts of the kitchen, and go dig out that laundry-coated pile of books that claims to be your bedroom. Hell, I'll start."

As Mike stood, Quentin looked moderately offended. "That doesn't matter. She won't be here long enough to care about my room — she never is. But she spends all her time in hotels, and those are really clean. She can't come home to something less clean! Why would she come home, if it wasn't at least as good as being gone!"

"Quentin, you're irrational. Make some lunch and then sit down and eat it." Mike shook his head and walked around the couch, to the kitchen door. "Your mom comes home because you're here. And I doubt anyone else would be able to keep the place as clean as you do. It's probably because you cook so much — everything's always clean and right where you need it, because cooking would be drama, otherwise."

Mike avoided the point he really wanted to make — that with as much money as Q's mom sent home, she wasn't staying in nice hotels. It was fairly likely she picked the cheapest dive a city had to offer, unless lodging was part of the contract. But, these were the kinds of things he didn't say about his best friend's mother — and certainly not to that best friend, doubly so in the mood he was in. On the other hand, Quentin really needed to stop moving, stop panicking, and eat something, before he fell apart and made a mess. He'd done it before, and it never ended well.

"I'm not hungry! Why would I make food that I then have to clean up after, if it isn't dinner for mom? At least she'll understand that mess!" Quentin was down on his knees, washing the back of the oven.

"I don't cook in your kitchen, Q, but I'm about to make an exception if you don't do it for yourself," Mike warned, opening the fridge. "It'll be a grilled cheese, because those are pretty hard to screw up, but it'll be food, and I'll damn well sit on you until you eat it."

"Fine! Jesus Christ! Fine!" Quentin could not wrap his brain around Mike's behaviour. Why was it so important for him to eat? He wasn't hungry, and there was so much to do, still! He reached out to grab the cheese from Mike and stared foolishly as the block of cheese slipped through his fingers and bounced off the floor. Now, he was just irate. Nothing worked the way it was supposed to, today. He punched the side of the refrigerator and ground his teeth as he leaned over to pick up the cheese.

"Tell me what the last thing was that you ate." Mike sounded concerned, but like he had an idea.

"How in the fuck should I know? Sometimes, I eat things. Most times, I don't." Quentin started to vibrate as he slammed the block of cheese onto the counter and pulled a knife out of the drawer. He dropped the knife, then dropped it again. "What the fuck!? It is not that hard to slice cheese."

Mike opened the fridge again and pulled out a tupperware full of canned peaches. "Q, sit down and have some peaches. I'll make you a sandwich."

"I'm not goddamned incompetent! I'm just having some trouble with this knife because my hand's all slippery from the soap." Still shaking, Quentin pressed the knife into the cheese. Then the world got grey and spun, just once. He gripped the counter with his free hand. "Mike? Am I completely irrational?"

"If I say yes, are you going to stab me?" Mike held the peaches out, defensively.

"Okay. I'm good with that." Quentin lowered himself to the floor, holding on to the counter. He turned around as he reached the floor, and leaned back against the cabinet. "Did it get darker in here?"

"No. Lean to the right." Mike was reaching for the drawer as Quentin's head cleared it. He pulled out a fork and shut it quickly. "You are going to eat some peaches, Q. I am not fucking around. It is dark in here because I think the last time you ate was at my house, on Wednesday. It's now Saturday."

Quentin took the peaches and the fork. "I don't know. You might be right. It's only a couple of days. It shouldn't make that much difference."

"Adam and I are bringing you lunch, next week. We're gonna come down to the theatre and make sure you eat, while you're shouting at people about how not to paint things." Mike stood up and grabbed the cheese and the knife, moving the sandwich project to the kitchen table.

"Aw, man! But, then everything's going to taste like paint fumes!" Quentin complained, around a mouthful of peaches. "And, I have to be able to eat without punching Adam, or I'll spill something on the damn stage!"

"Better you should have half a lunch that tastes like paint fumes, than not eat at all. Hell, better you should punch Adam, than have no lunch." Mike stopped slicing cheese and dropped some bread in the toaster. "Toasted, buttered, and broiled. You taught me well enough to remember."

Quentin hugged Mike's leg. "Aww, you remember. You're awesome."

Mike looked down in frazzled amusement. "Stop hugging my leg and eat some more peaches. You're still all fucking goofy."

Quentin opened his mouth, a wicked look creeping onto his face, but Mike cut him off. "If you tell that joke, best friend or no, I swear to god I'll throw toast at your head."