WHO: Graeme Dorny & Joy Diserafino
WHAT: Gummy bears!
WHEN: August '78
WHERE: The restaurant where he worked!
It had been forever since she'd been here.
A year or more--no, two, the last time had been during summer break of seventh year--and the place hadn't changed a bit. It still looked and felt the same itself, even though something inside of her was acting up at seeing the place again. Maybe she was nervous, because... ugh, she didn't know why she was nervous, it was just Graeme's workplace, she'd been there to see him like, a million times! ... But would he mind that she was coming to see him now? What if he did? And what if it was overkill? They'd just seen each other last night, they weren't dating anymore--what justified overkill for friends?
See, if she had talked to him more after they broke up, she would have known what being just friends with him was like. But the last time they'd been just friends was like, fifth year, and that was way too far back to remember after years of being girlfriend and boyfriend.
But. Whatever, she had to forget that or she'd never--oh, there he was! Before she could come to her senses and turn and run out the door, Joy scurried back to the table that she saw Graeme sitting at (lunch break, hah, she still remembered this stuff!). "Gooood afternoon!" she chirped, sliding into the seat across from him. The grin on her face was absolutely genuine despite the weirdness of nerves she was still feeling. "I brought you something!"
GUH! He really couldn’t believe how cheap some people were. Stupid wankers didn’t even leave him a tip! And, it wasn’t like he wasn’t any good at his job! No, no, he was amazing at his job. Everyone got what they ordered in a timely manner, it was still hot (or cold, depending on what they ordered) when they got it, and he always had a smile on his face. He actually cracked a few jokes every now and then to entertain the bastards. But, this was a normal day for Graeme, and he knew better than to put him in a bad mood. People sucked sometimes, and he had come to accept that a long time ago. He just had to go on with his day. Aaand, that was what he planned to do. Eat his lunch, think about how much people sucked, and then go back to work.
Sitting alone at a table near the back, he had a half eaten burger and fries sitting in front of him on a plate, his fingers holding one of the thin potato slices as he swirled it through the river of ketchup that was on his plate. He had actually been drawing a picture with the tomato product on the plate, tilting his head as he looked at the horrible messy version of a dog that he had just created. Shaking his head, he placed his ‘paintbrush’ into his mouth and started chewing, but almost choked as he heard Joy’s voice. Taking a large swig of his coke, he cleared his throat and mirrored her grin, leaning back in his seat as he wiped his hands on the napkin. “Good afternoon!” he replied, laughing a little bit. “What are you doing here? I mean, I’m glad you’re here, but I wasn’t expecting it.” He pushed his lunch to the side and leaned forward now, wondering what it was that she had gotten him, his brow raised curiously.
Joy grinned, groping around inside her purse for a second before her hand emerged with a nicely sized bag of Gummy Bears, which she set on the table between them. It seemed a little lame for a gift, but she seriously hadn't been able to think of anything else that didn't seem... too much. Like coming here. Which apparently wasn't too much (thank gosh), because he was smiling and happy, so that was good. But anyway.
"You still like Gummy Bears, right?" she asked, actually slightly afraid that he magically hated them now. "I mean, I know it's nowhere near concert tickets, but I had to do something to thank you for letting me go with you."
He looked down at the bag of Gummy bears, and that laugh erupted from his throat once more as he reached out the grab it from the center of the table, looking at it. "You didn't have to thank me at all, but I've never been one to turn down gummy bears." Opening the bag, he took a green one and popped it in his mouth, sighing happily as he tasted the lime flavor. "I'm in heaven. I swear." Obviously it wasn't very hard to make the guy happy.
Leaning over, he offered her the bag so she could take a few before placing it back in the center of the table so they could take more when they wanted them. "So, you had fun last night?" He knew she did, because she hadn't stopped laughing. Erin and her were dancing around all night, singing along to the music, while he just sat back and watched..,and it totally had nothing to do with the fact that Joy sat next to him a lot when she got tired. Nope. Not at all. But, the two blonde dancing was probably more entertaining than watching the show. Sure, he liked the Hobgoblins, and Stub was one of his great friends, but them flailing was hilarious.
Joy was immensely pleased that he liked the gift, and it showed on her face. She happily reached into the bag and popped a cherry red bear into her mouth--everyone liked red, but what could she say? She just happened to love it too.
"Oh my gosh, so much fun," she answered once she had swallowed the candy. Merlin, they tasted so good, she was going to have to go back and buy a bag of her own before she went home. It felt like a new craving coming on... or maybe the bears just brightened her day a little more. "It was the best concert ever, I don't think I've been that crazy or let loose that much in... months, gosh!" Okay, so she was still a little high off of last night and how great it had been and she still felt like such a fangirl over Stubby and and was still happy over having spent the night with her two favorite people ever and she couldn't get over how nice people were to her because of Cormac and aaaand--hah, her brain was still in a tizzy.
“Good!” He said, with a smile still plastered on his face. “But, you have to admit, my dancing was the highlight of the evening. No one has moves like I do.” He gave a ‘cocky grin’ and reached for another couple of gummy bears so he could hold them in his palm and pop them into his mouth every now and then, not wanting to keep leaning over to grab some. “But, in all honesty, I’m really glad you had a good time. You and Er really seemed to be having a blast, and I’m happy it wasn’t just me imagining things.” Popping another bear into his mouth, he looked down and began to sort through them. “Oh, and just so you know, these things are like crack, and this bag is going to be gone by the end of my shift.”
Leaning his head back he popped one up into the air with his thumb and caught it. He suddenly had a flashback of them sitting in the boys dorm, throwing things at eachother to see who could catch the food in their mouths. He remembered laughing at how she kept jumping around with her mouth open, and…
These gummy bears were suddenly very interesting to look at.
"Well, I'm intending on going back and getting like, a million and a half more bags," Joy said, giggling at the sight of Graeme throwing the bear back into his mouth. Neither realized that the same scene was replaying itself in both of their heads, but--yeah, the gummy bears were really interesting right now, mmhmm. "So... yeah, you're definitely welcome to come over and share some with me anytime. I get all lonely during the day when there's no one around, anyway."
Somewhere Joy knew that the odds of Graeme ever stepping foot inside of Finn's house were... crazy bad, but she offered it because of how much she really, really wished it would happen. She knew that Finn had something or another against him, so as long as he was over while he was at work there shouldn't be a... hah, like Graeme would want to go over there anyway. Joy wouldn't blame him if he didn't, especially after how awkward things were between them about the baby thing (or maybe that was just wishful thinking, but come on, if it was then she had really gotten good at making things up in her head).
"I just don't get to see my friends very much anymore."
"I'm very jealous." He said with a sigh, tossing another bear up and then into his mouth. "I'm stuck here for another 3-...no, 4 hours." He groaned and began to chew on another bear...even though he almost choked again when she told him that he was welcome to come over and share some chewy candy with her in the house that she shared with the Giant. Only, she didn't say that. He coughed and took another sip of his soda, and placed it back down. Oh, he could only imagine what it would be like if he went over there...they'd be sitting around, eating Gummy Bears, and then in walks the Giant, with his stare of death, and Graeme would have to run away.
He'd have to run very far away.
Finishing off the last bear that was in his hand, he watched her before he sighed. "Yeah, I-...well, I can only imagine what it's been like. It can't be easy." So, he didn't really know what to say, but that was the only thing he could think of. He didn't want to pity her, because as horrible as it was, she had kind of gotten herself into this situation. Besides, no one liked to be pitied. Or, at least he didn't. He knew she didn't either.
The first thing Joy noticed (she had been listening for it, honestly) was how Graeme avoided her invitation. Oh well, it had been worth a try... "It's not," she said, shrugging off his words. He was right, she didn't like to be pitied. Joy may not have been the smartest girl to ever grace this green earth, but she wasn't naive enough to know that whatever she was going through now was her own damn fault. Anyway, things had improved a lot from that night that she had confronted Finn.
A lot.
"So how have people been, anyway? Liz? Dorcas?" Joy knew very well that the latter of those didn't like her at all (and quite honestly never had, even though she'd been her roommmate for seven years). It wasn't hard to tell that Dorcas had always imagined Joy less than what Graeme deserved, which had been hard to ignore for two years straight, but... Meh, it didn't do her any good to be bitter over it. And she and Graeme were like best friends, so she could do him the courtesy of asking and being polite about it. "I saw in the journals that Dorcas is home again."
There was really nothing more he could say in responce to her affirmation of how hard it was to be pregnant at 19, and the guy who got you that way wasn't even your boyfriend, or husband, or...anything more than just a guy. A friend, but they didn't start out that way, did they? He pushed this to the back of his mind, and paid attention to the questions that were being asked.
Liz and Dorcas. Okay, he could talk about them. They were easy to talk about! "Yeah, she was in Brazil for what seemed like forever. She's good though. I saw her a couple of days ago so I could talk to her about y-...things. Just, things that were going on that day." Okay, this soda was going to be gone very soon if he kept taking large sips whenever he got nervous. "And Liz is fine. She's still with Ian, works at her Dad's shop, living life, being Liz." there was really no other way to describe his blonde best friend. She was just...Liz.
"So, how's Finn?" Hey, he had to ask. It was just...polite.
Now it was Joy's turn to nearly choke on her candy, as she not only--had she really?--heard the name 'Finn' escape from Graeme's lips, but in the form of a question asking of his well-being. Was he sick or something? From everything that she could gather, he didn't care about her very imposing and famous baby's father--
--but of course he didn't. He was asking out of coutesy, just like she had asked about Dorcas out of courtesy and.. fuck, she was really tangled up in this. She just! If Graeme and Finn could be not afraid of and not agitated about the other, respectively, that meant Graeme could come visit her and everything would be okay aaaand... sigh. Joy knew she had to do something, it wasn't okay for her so be so hung up over this situation with Graeme and to be so eager to get to know him again and the spark she was feeling definitely had to go away or else... well, it'd just be bad. She was still pregnant, it was wrong. She should at least try to be single until she had had this baby, because she and Finn should be focusing on each other and on Cormac, despite their talk, at least until then.
"Hm, well... Finn is Finn, I guess," she said with a shrug, before remembering that Graeme wouldn't know what that meant. Of course. "That is to say... he goes to practice, gets worn out, comes home, and we sit down with Donnelley and eat cereal as we watch football and I tell him what his schedule is for the next day. He's tired a lot and sometimes kind of cranky and I think its really started to hit him that he's going to have a son in less than three months, so that's making him stressed. At least this is what I infer, Finn's not much of a 'let's share our feelings' sort of person, but I think I'm getting pretty good at figuring him out."
He was very glad that she actually explained what 'Finn being Finn' meant, because as far as he could tell, the guy just played Quidditch and slept. But then again, based on her definition, he wasn't too far off. Nodding, he ate another gummy bear, and waited for her to finish before he said anything at all. "Yeah, you were always good at that sort of thing. Then again I never shut up, so you were always informed about what I was feeling that day, whether you wanted to know or not, so..."
He stared at her for a second and then looked down at his ketchup dog, and ate something else. He didn't look at what he had grabbed, but since it wasn't gummy, and it felt greasy and warm, he figured it was a french fry. He didn't care, he needed something to keep his freaking mouth occupied so he didn't say anything else that was idiotic. "I'm happy that things are working between you two...I mean, civily. That you two are getting along. Because that's good. For Cormac. And you. And him."
Okay, so it was obviously going to take a lot more food.
