neutral_omens | (no subject)

Entry tags:

pepper,
wensleydale

(no subject)

Date: January 8th, 2001
Status: Private - Wensley and Pepper
Setting: Kitchens
Summary: Someone needs to talk about why that didn't go so well....

Pepper hadn't run into Wensley at all in the past week. Not even seen him going up the stairs while she was coming down, or any of that. So she took matters into her own hands. What Adam had said aside, hiding in a big, old stone cold mansion was not helpful to anyone's health.

She wandered down into the kitchens, hoping to find that the Spectacled One had buried himself in work, like he usually did when he was feeling uneasy or depressed. The scents coming from the kitchen had never been better, so she had to assume that she was right.

She pushed the door open. "Allo?"

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She tried not to roll her eyes. Really, she did. "Don't be so thick, it don't suit you. 'Course he coulda let you walk off, 'f he thought you wanted to. I mean, you 'f all people should know that Brian looks big and solid, but he's really just a puddle of goofy smiles most the time." She tilted her head, trying to catch his eyes. "He was prob'ly scared, Wens. I mean, you were too... that's why you left, wasn't it?"

Wensley looked back up at her, then looked down again. "I suppose I was scared," he admitted. He looked back over at her. "You really think so?"

She nodded imploringly. Something had to turn out right from all this. Someone had to have a happy ending, and she was going to make sure it bloody well happened. "I do. And I think you better talk about it, y'know. Can't just pretend it didn't happen and go back to scufflin'. Too big for it now."

"I have tried to talk to him!" He sounded more angry than dejected now. "I've been looking for him all over the Manor, and he's been nowhere at all." He wasn't exactly sure what was going on, but to Wensley it felt like he was losing a cosmic game of hide and seek.

"Well, then leave a note under 'is door to let 'im know you want to talk," she insisted. "'S not that hard to figure out. Just make sure that you get through to 'im. You can't do this, not now. We got to stay together now that we're all 'ere again."

Wensley sighed. She was right, of course; no matter how brashly she phrased her explanations, in the end she was always right.

"I know," he reassured her. "I might have mentioned this before, but I missed all of you."

"I missed you too, pain in the arse that you are." That would have been mean on someone else perhaps, but she was smiling too wide. "It was sort of sad bein' Pippin at uni. Pepper sorta got kept in a dusty box under the bed, an' she didn't like it much."

Wensley was too used to Pepper's brand of love; he smiled almost as widely at being called a pain.

"Peppers don't grow very well in the dark," he agreed sagely.

"No, they just get all shrunken an' brassed off," she informed him. She leaned over until they were pressed shoulder to shoulder. "You gonna be all right?"

He didn't move, let himself soak up the contact.

"I'll be fine," he reassured her. Then a thought hit him. "Is Adam chasing down Brian like you did me?" he asked, somewhat suspiciously.

Pepper smirked. "You know full well s'not my business to say what Adam does." The she paused for dramatic effect. "But yeah, he is. Had to make sure he got an earfull or a ear to bend too. So don't feel funny 'bout it. S'our job."

"I was just makin' sure someone else go to be as embarrassed as I have been," he replied, smiling a little more. It felt better to have talked to someone about all this, even though he wasn't exactly reassured, and even though they had already known. (Why was it that if he was so bloody smart, Wensley wondered, everyone knew the important things before he did?)

She laughed. "All for vengence, then, eh? We'll make a real pirate out of you yet." She nudged his ribs with her elbow. Wensley was the smart one. Just sometimes he was smart about the wrong things.

"Yarr, me matey," he replied, curling one hand into a hook and squinting an eye. He laughed, then, dropping his pirate guise. "You three are better pirates than I am," he admitted. "I'll just make sure the loot gets evenly divided."

"Well, someone has to," she agreed sagely, trying her very best not to cackle at his pirate voice. He never really was one for parroting of any sort. "Otherwise the loot would be so mucked up it'd be useless. Sensible just like always. That's all you've got to do now, jus' keep bein' the sensible one. Then everythin'll be fine." She was sure of that.

"Right," he said. Just like always. That should get him through this ordeal.

"Don't you have some gardening to do, or some other boys to threaten?" He would be fine now, and Pepper surely had other things that needed attending to.

She nodded. "Yeah, should get back to it. You should come visit me sometime, y'know. I really dun't bite anymore, even if the plants do. And if you dun't I'll get worried again and come after you, so you better."

She pushed his glasses back up on his nose, hopped down from the counter and headed back to the greenhouse.

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