fandomhigh | Lunch Tuesday 3/6

Annette took her tray with her salad bowl and a bottled water, and found a place to sit and eat quietly. After her near disaster in Home Ec (http://community.livejournal.com/fandomhigh/1264356.html?thread=74353380#t74353380) this morning, ~~which is still being played out~~ she thought a little quiet would do her wonders.

Chad's stomach was reminding him of how little he had been eating during The Time of Emo that Shall Not Be Talked About, so he got a lot of everything, as much that could fit on his plate, and went to find a place to eat and not think about Ranma's bouncing boobs from Driver's Ed earlier.

Damn, those things were bouncy...

He shook his head and noticed Annette sitting there by herself and remembered that he owed her either an apology or a thank you, probably both, and so he approached her.

"Mind some company?"

She was in sort of a daze, thinking about that possessed machine from Home Ec this morning, so Chad startled her a little when he approached her.

"What? Oh. No, not at all, I would love the company, Chad." She smiled a little tentatively and looked down at his tray. Her eyes bugged. "Hungry?"

"A little," Chad said as he sat down across from her.

Annette poked at her salad. She wasn't much hungry.

"Teddy's home." She said, smiling across the table at him. "I meant to say hi to him yesterday in class, but I didn't get the chance. Is he doing okay?"

Chad grinned a little, returning Annette's smile, but then seemed to be a bit distracted as he got a little caught up on the reason for his grin. With a shake of his head, he made himself push through all that and remember that Annette had asked a question. "Yeah, he's good. A little shaken up, but can't blame him there..."

A new expression, a worried slight of a frown, accompanied his mouthful of food.

"I'm glad. And hopefully the shaken up will fade over a course of a few days or so. Least I hope for him, anyway."

Looking at him as she was, she noticed the change that took over his features. "You troubled over something, Chad? I mean, I'm not being nosey, I swear, and if you don't want to answer I understand perfectly." She looked down and shut up, a little fearful now of saying or doing the wrong thing in front of him. Her concern might come off a little heavy, and it was that that she worried about.

Chad didn't mind. "Jus' worried about him, that's all."

He considered a piece of zucchini before looking over at her. "M'sorry for being so tough to deal with this past week, too, Annette. S'really cool of you to have put up with me like you did."

Nodding, she understood that. "I know you are." Goes hand in hand with caring for someone.

Tilting her head, she was surprised a little when he apologized to her. It was really unexpected. "No, Chad, don't be sorry. I have nothing to forgive you for. You missed him; those kinds of feelings overlap anything or anyone else." She smiled gently. "I can be pushy, I know it."

"M'kinda glad you were," Chad grunted a little. "If I wasn't being such an ass, that carnival would've been a lot of fun."

Chuckling, she replied, "It was fun. I still had fun, Chad."

"...Yeah?" Chad sounded very doubtful. He even looked a little doubtful. Kind of.

She played with a piece of lettuce and nodded, "Yeah. Really. I socialized a good bit while you contemplated your soup bowl."

"...That soup bowl needed a lot of contemplation," Chad responded in defense, with a slight grin.

"I'm sure it did. Eat me or eat me not." She might have snorted a little and cracked a grin.

But her features changed a little and she admitted softly, "I need to tell you I'm sorry too."

Chad arched an eyebrow at her. Not that she could see it with his hair, but, y'know. The frown was a little noticable, though. She was awesome and he was an ass. What did she have to apologize for?

"What for?"

"Well, the other night. Friday actually. I was there, at Caritas. And...you were too...and I didn't bother to even say hey or anything and I don't know if you even saw me..."

"Yeah, but...you were with someone," Chad said, trying to remember who. Some blonde guy he didn't think he knew. "An' I didn't really want to be bothered that night, anyway."

"Yeah, that's kind of how I looked at it too. But just in case we saw it differently, I wanted to toss that sorry out there."

She grinned. "You know, Chad, sometimes I think I think too much."

"Maybe a little," Chad agreed softly, before a mouthful of put pie-a, and thinking maybe sometimes he didn't think enough.

She was quiet for a little while, letting him eat, then said softly, "I think you are wonderful, Chad. You have this unique ability to make me feel as though everything is okay. I hope you know you can always count on me, for anything. Even when Teddy doesn't ask me to look after you."

Annette had caught Chad with a fork half-way to his mouth, so, jaw slightly hanging open, he stared at her sudden revelation, then blinked, not knowing what to think. It seemed really out of no where, and caught him off guard, but, really, the idea that someone like Annette was sitting there telling him he was wonderful was just..strange and confusing and something that he wasn't really used to. Just like Teddy yesterday. No one...ever said stuff like that to him before. Ever.

And he didn't know how to respond. He set his fork down, closed his mouth, and looked at Annette a moment longer as he tried to figure something out. To come up with something, anything to say that might let her know he appriciated her words.

"...Really?" was all that managed to come out.

Nice, Yasutora. Real nice.

It was amusing, watching him. It was not hard to tell that she caught him off guard and she thought probably she was a little too sentimental. But Annette was careful in her picking of friends and deep down, she felt that Chad was genuine. He may not say much, and grunt even more, but she knew if she ever needed him for anything he wouldn't hesitate to be there for her. Least it was how she felt.

"Yeah," she replied, looking back down at her bowl. Getting up from the table, she came around to his side and bent slightly, moving to kiss his cheek. "Take care of yourself, Chad. I've got to go now."

The kiss on the cheek was even more of a surprise than the long litany of words, which explained the delay in the small smile that melted from the initial response of tensing slightly. He grunted a little, feeling both amused and embarrassed, and a little flustered. "T..take care, Annette," he eventually managed.

Lunch Tuesday 3/6

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