[savvyquinn-blog]

It’ll taste fine, though, I swear. My step-father is French, I’ll have you know. He may not have been able to teach me how to cook anything amazing, but the Lord knows he taught me how to make a damn good pancake.

[collinbanks]

[He quirks an eyebrow.]

How'd your mom meet a french dude?

[He leans back in his chair a bit, and watches Paige cook.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

[Paige shrugs lightly, looking back at the stove.] I got the shit in the pan, it’s cooking, smelling nice…so I think it’s going well. Guess we’ll find out when we taste it, huh?

[collinbanks]

Okay, I guess. 

[Collin turns back to his coffee, which was cooling now, and takes a deep swallow.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

[Paige laughs, finding his response ridiculous, but enjoyable, nonetheless.] Damn, I’d hate to walk in on you in the tub. I’m sure mermans exist somewhere, but all that’s coming to mind is you in a seashell bra.

[collinbanks]

[Collin laughs before he really has a chance to think about it. He clears his throat, suddenly a bit uncomfortable at the idea that he would do anything as effeminate as wearing a bra. He swallows his discomfort before he says anything.]

How, uh, how's the food coming?

[The kitchen had begun to smell incredible, and he tries to remember the last time he'd woken up to the smell of pancakes, and can't.] 

[just-ryan-gibson-blog]

"The animal, the animal, trapped trapped trapped ‘til the cage is full! 

The cage is full! The day is new and everyone’s waiting, waiting on you and you’ve gooot tiiiiiiiiime!”

[collinbanks]

[Collin bangs on the bathroom door]

You mind hurrying up in there? It's been forever, and this is kind of the only bathroom I've found so far.

[savvyquinn-blog]

[Paige smiles a little, shaking her head.] So, California’s don’t eat, then? They just drink? [She thinks it over for another minute, then nods, her smile fading.] Hey, that makes sense. They live over on the coast. Could have been merpeople in a past life. Imagine drunk merpeople, swimming in circles.

[collinbanks]

[Collin drops his head forward and chuckles at that. It's not a full laugh, there's too much restrain to it, but it's a laugh, and it feels good. He nodds, a smile still on his face.]

Yup, all californians are actually mermaids. Every time I take a shower I sprout a tail and flowing hair.

[savvyquinn-blog]

[She smiles and finishes reading part of the box before looking over to him.] Yeah, what do Californians eat? Like…what’s a normal thing to eat over there. Rhode Island’s got a bunch of Dunkin’ Donuts all over the place. And since it’s by the coast, we’ve got a fuckload of seafood too, you see? So…what do California’s eat?

[collinbanks]

[He shrugs]

I dunno. Probably the same thing you eat anywhere. 

[He smirks, almost laughs, making his mind up on an answer.]

Coffee and alcohol, mostly. 

[It's three parts joke and one part his life. But he takes another sip of the coffee in his hands, as though to prove a point, and smiles.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

Alright, whatever you say. [She pulls out the required ingredients and takes them to the counter, reading the box over once more while returning to the fridge to close it. Afterward, she goes back to the cabinets, searching for a large bowl.] What do Californians even eat, usually?

[collinbanks]

[He raises an eyebrow at her.]

What do we eat?

[There's a bit of a laugh in his voice. He sits back in his seat a little to look at Paige a little better as she moves about the kitchen.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

Sweet. [She nods to him and puts the box back on the counter, opening the fridge to find the butter and milk, whatever else they have. His unease goes completely unnoticed by her] You want anything else on them? There’s tons of shit in this kitchen—just no oatmeal, apparently.

[collinbanks]

[He simply shrugs, leans forward, resting his elbows on the table, and takes another sip of his coffee.]

Whatever you make's probably fine. I'm not picky. 

[Which was true. He'd basically eat anything put in front of him. He used to be picky as shit, but he's changed a lot since then. He likes to think he's grown, though most days he feels more like he's caving in on himself.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

[Paige looks over to the stove, staring at the pan without bothering to blink once. She doesn’t understand why he can’t just hand her anything, why he has to continue to put the shit elsewhere instead, but he’s already sitting down elsewhere, so the moment to ask is gone. She shakes her head a little and picks up the box of pancake mix again, reading it over.] Do you want any of this or not?

[collinbanks]

[He raises his eyebrows at her, just slightly thrown that she would offer to make him food when he's perfectly capable of making food himself. But only slightly. He's usually not one to pass up on someone making him free food, but he considers saying no. He doesn't want to eat any damn food from this place. But none of it seemed to be deadly, and he was already drinking their fucking coffee. He had no real pride left to lose. So he swallows the panic in his stomach and nods. ]

Yeah, that, uh, would be great.

[He manages a smile, but it doesn't stick.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

I know how much it is. [She tilts her head at him and waits for him to find the pan. She had been planning on doing it herself, but he seemed to be very eager to do it, so she was going to let him. When he pulls it out of the cupboard, she walks over to him and extends her arm to take it from him.] Yeah, that’s fine, thanks. 

[collinbanks]

Cool.

[He places the frying pan on top of the stove, and crosses the kitchen again to the now full mug of coffee sitting under the spout of the maker. He takes it and crosses to a table at the far end of the kitchen where it rests against a waist-high wall separating the kitchen from a sort of dining area, sinks into one of the seats and taks a sip of the coffee.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

[She breaks into a smile when he mentions that he likes coffee and shakes her head.] Well, yeah, obviously. That’s a lot of caffeine, though, don’t you think? [She lifts her cup of tea to her mouth and takes a sip before sitting it back down on the counter.] Hey, and you wouldn’t happen to know where the pans are, would you?

[collinbanks]

[He gives her a look] 

It's only two cups. 

[He clears his throat, trying to fend off the awkward feeling that tends to accompany any sort of criticism. Not that Paige seemed to be criticizing him, but it still felt that way. Damn, he just really needed a drink. he steps around her.]

I think the pans are over here.

[He crosses away from her, grateful for an excuse to put some distance between himself and Paige. He stoops to open a cupboard next to the stove, and pulls out a large frying pan.]

This okay?

[savvyquinn-blog]

  I guess I’m making it then. Thanks for the tea. [She glances up from the box and over to his hand when he extends her cup out towards her and begins to get up from the floor, closing the cabinet once she’s up. She supposes that she’s taken too long with getting up and that’s why he eventually set it back down on the counter, but she isn’t sure. She also figures that he could be a result of laziness, but either way she has to get her own cup. Setting the box down on the counter, she walks over and picks up the cup, her eyes skimming the coffee maker.] You’re making another cup?

[collinbanks]

Yeah.

[He tenses slightly as she nears him to pick up her cup. He doesn't know why his body's freaking out. Touching a girl is fine. It's good. He should want to. He's supposed to want to. Touching a girl doesn't hurt because there's nothing wrong with touching a girl. He forces himself to relax, to act like a fucking human being. He shrugs. Clicks brew on the machine.]

I like coffee.

[savvyquinn-blog]

Sweet. [She manages a small smile and then returns to the cabinet.] Haven’t found the oatmeal yet, no. Did find some pancake mix, though. Should I make that instead? I think we’ve got all the rest of the stuff here for it. [She pulls herself away from the cabinet, box of mix in hand, and goes back to her seat on the floor, reading it over.]

[collinbanks]

Do what you want.

[He shrugs, hopes he manages nonchalance, and nearly jumps out of his skin when the coffee maker dings, announcing that Paige's tea is finished. He swallows. He needs to calm the fuck down. He wasn't this bad yesterday, or at least wasn't this jumpy yesterday. He'd managed to work himself up into have two panic attacks yesterday- thank you Cam, really-, and he still hadn't been this jumpy. He felt like he was going to crawl out of his own skin. Instead, though, he lifts Paige's mug up from under the machine and sort of holds it out toward her where she's sitting on the floor reading the back of a box of pancake mix.]

Here, your, uh, tea is done, or whatever.

[He doesn't move toward her, though. He doesn't really want to. He doesn't want to touch her, though he knows that touching a girl has never actually done anything bad to him. Well, except make him feel wrong and sick and violated and like 'no' is a word he no longer has any actual right to. But touching a girl has never hurt. He knows that. God, he knows that. What the fuck is wrong with him? 

But he still can't seem to bring himself to cross over to her, so he just sort of sets it on the counter beside him, and starts about the process of making himself another cup of coffee, playing it off like he's just too damn lazy to bring the cup to her.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

[Paige tilts her head at him, not fully accepting his words. Though, she realizes now that maybe her mind was just playing tricks on her, just as it had earlier, when she swore she saw her name on the door to her room. And maybe that was just it. Maybe he hadn’t been shaking at all—maybe she was going crazy. She turns back to the cabinets and opens up the one next to the cabinet she had just closed, peering inside.] Yeah, okay…I just said green tea. They have that, right?

[collinbanks]

Yeah, they do. 

[He clears his throat again, a nervous tick. His hand is still shaking slightly as he reaches for the cup, and he glares at it. He needs to pull himself together, for fucks sake. 

He puts the little infuser into the chamber, places a mug beneath it, closes the chamber and presses brew. He takes a deep breath, and doesn't turn toward Paige until he's managed to compose himself. After a beat, he looks over his shoulder.]

You, uhm, find the oatmeal, or whatever?

[He asks, though he couldn't actually care less if she'd found the fucking oatmeal. He just wants something trivial to pull him out of his own head before he thinks himself back into a panic like a fucking idiot.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

Green tea, I guess. I’ll probably put a little sugar in it. Peppermint, if they have it. [She shrugs and closes the cabinet before glancing back at him.] Coffee working on you already? You’re shaking.

[collinbanks]

[Paige's question manages to slam him out of his own head and into the present. If he's not in the middle of a full on breakdown, giving him something to focus on can usually manage that. He takes a breath through his nose, trying not to be too obvious about the fact that his brain was trying to suffocate him only moments before. He swallows thickly, and his voice shakes when he speaks.]

What? No, I-I'm fine. [He clears his throat, turns his attention to the cabinet in front of him.] What, uh, what did you say you wanted?

[Fucking useless, really. Can't listen, too stuck in his own head to pay attention. The absolute definition of a fuck up. He forces his breathing to normalize, grateful for the way his lungs seem to be accepting air again]

[savvyquinn-blog]

[She turns to look at him, forgetting that she’s halfway into the cabinet, and hits her head on the side] Ow, fuck! [She pulls herself out from inside the cabinet and sits on the kitchen floor, holding her hand to her head.] Yeah, that’d be good…thanks.

[collinbanks]

Yeah, sure, no problem.

[He places the coffee infuser on the counter top, and begins shuffling through the teas.]

You, uh, have any kind of preference. This place is fucking stocked.

[It sort of washes over him then, all over again, where they are and how dangerous every moment could be. The cabinets and food and clothes and beds- they weren't there because this was some fucking vacation. They were set there because Collin and every other person was trapped. He considers backing out of the kitchen entirely, mentally kicking himself for drinking the fucking coffee, for falling asleep the night before. He really hadn't meant to sleep at all. That was stupid. His life seemed to be nothing more than a big ball of stupid. He could have died in that room, drinking that coffee. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Worthless fucking piece of shit can't even keep himself awake when his life literally depends on it. 

He struggles to regain control of his breathing, but recognizing the attack is making it worse. Who just fucking panics in the middle of making someone else tea. All he's doing is making tea. He can't even handle that without crumbling into a full out break down. No one else seemed to be having any real trouble coping with the situation, yet here Collin was breaking down at every interval. Stupid, worthless, fucking idiot. He strains to pull in a breath, evenly, and keeps his back to Paige, hoping she'll either not notice him falling apart like a fucking pussy, or ignore it. He keeps reminding himself mentally that he's not dead. He didn't die. He slept through the night and he was fine. He drank the coffee and he was fine. His vision isn't tunneling. He doesn't think he's shaking too bad. It's not a full on attack. He's fine. He can handle this. He just needs to man the fuck up. He's fine. Breathe in, breathe out. Fine. He's fine.]

[savvyquinn-blog]

Right. Right, I forgot you used to party and stuff before we got here…I have a terrible memory, I’m so sorry…god. You’ve always got to tell me something at least three times before I actually retain it, it’s terrible. [She begins to stick her body into the cabinet, looking further into it. The oatmeal is not there.]

[collinbanks]

[Collin just nods, the conservationist in him still mostly dead to the world. He's finished his first cup of coffee much more quickly than he had intended. He turns to the cabinet and grabs another infuser cup.]

I'm gonna make another cup. You want me to put some tea in for you first, or...?

[He looks back over his shoulder at Paige, who seems to be in the middle of being swallowed by a cabinet.]