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"Oh." Not really through the barrier, then. The hand in his chest lets go.

"That's rough. I'm sorry." He pauses again, searching for more words, then remembering something, feels a drop in his gut. The air around him twists coldly.

"Not to bring down the mood even more, but if no one's told you too, uh... the Starrs have gone. They were called back onto the ferry like Tayrey, I think. Apparently it happens sometimes." Random disappearances. Same as the last two worlds he got pulled to. Maybe existence far from home is just not stable, like isotopes decaying, shooting off its extra particles. It makes him wonder if him and Darcy are doomed sometimes--but there were those dreams, and anyway the Starrs came and went together. "Nobody's really sure what it means, but I guess they're going wherever they've gotta go."

It can't be death if this place is death, anyway. Phil drops the pasta into the pot.

"I'm still figuring out what to... I mean, me and and all the kids were really close to 'em. I don't know."

Edited 2024-07-16 06:43 (UTC)

"Yeah, I uh... I heard. I counted them both as friends too."

Hawk rubs at his throat, then remembers he's still got onion on his hands and goes to the sink to wash it off.

"Obviously we weren't as close as you all were, with the ship and... the ship and all. They were good people. I hope if they're going anywhere, they're retiring somewhere nice and peaceful. Maybe with a cure for her condition. I don't know."

All three of them. It's a naive thought, but if they could make it here away from all the suffering of their past circumstances, maybe they could make it somewhere else.

"Uh- look, I hate to be a wet blanket but could we uh- I don't want to spend all of dinner as a vegetable on the floor. How- how's farm life treating you?"

Talk his ear off, got it.

"I miss dishwashers," is the first thing that springs to mind, and he's reaching around for salt while he talks. "And washing machines. God. But, uh, good, mostly. The kids are good, it's nice having our own space with us and their pets. And the quiet is good."

The water shuts off. A moment later he realizes he's put the pasta in too early and grumbles about it under his breath, before he moves out of the way and heaves the pot over to the stove, like the weight of the water means very little to him. "Have I told you already that I hear a lot? Physically, I mean. Owls can hear the little heartbeats of mice in the snow, and I'm the same way. Back on that old ship it wasn't crowded, but it was noisy, and you know, mostly indoors. It's a lot to try and shut out the activities and conversations of everybody you know at once every day, and all the noise coming out of places like the club or the arcade at the same time. One time all sixty or so of us got trapped in the same stone room, and with the arguments breaking out, it got so loud I fell down."

He goes looking for a pan. "I knew it was stressful, but I didn't realize how much stress it was every day until after I had a few quiet weeks at the farm. Well. Not quiet. It's crickets and bullfrogs and chickens out there. But even in town it's okay. It's not closed in. Do you have meat here?"

Ah, sweet pretend normalcy as if his world hasn't been turned upside down. Thanks, Phil.

"You have both of those. They're called 'your kid'. Mom always used to say the only reason she had us was cheap labour," he jokes, rubbing at his face just a little. For sure notices how he hefts that pot though, and Hawk makes a note to ask Phil to heft him like that.

"Pan," he preemptively echoes as he digs through his cupboards and drawers, placing the handle in Phil's hand the way a nurse would a scalpel, "spatula or wooden spoon?" he offers, careful to make his interruption to his talking brief.

"And I have some sausage left in the ice box," Hawk gestures to it, "but tell me about it. I just have the ears my parents gave me, but you forget how quiet normal places are with bombs dropping on your head. Can you hear my heartbeat right now?"

“Better than a mouse’s,” which is to say, yes. “And I can hear your lungs. Who knows, maybe I could hear your nerves if I really tried.”

The pan goes on the stove. He stops for a moment to wash his hands more thoroughly at the sink, then dips towards the icebox. “I can hear your neighbors, too. Sometimes I can hear the town from the house, when it’s quieter. Nothing distinct. Just sort of a general bustle.”

Edited 2024-07-16 22:48 (UTC)

"Like a human ecg machine. You ever think about going into nursing?" he jokes lightly, fussing through the cupboards for some seasonings. Mostly dried herbs- he keeps meaning to plant some basil in the windowsil, but he's kept the curtain that faces Mulcahy's apartment tightly shut since the argument.

"Must be nice. You'd never get lonely, even all the way out there. I missed that buzz of people going about their day so much before I got here. Y'know- back in Boston every now and again, one of the places I lived, you'd hear people coming home from the bar. Mostly just falling over themselves, but every now and again you'd hear someone singing. It was nice when I couldn't sleep. Not nice when it woke me up, though."

"Yeah? Do you like singing?" he asks, as he fetches the sausages. Not frozen, just cooled, so he's pretty sure he can just get to chopping. Phil grabs another cutting board from where it's leaning against the counter wall and another knife.

"I don't remember if you've told me if you're much of a musician, but I play piano. I've gone through a lot of the classical and jazz repertoire, plus a few others here and there. I picked it up while I was an adult. Needed some kind of long-term hobby."

"Is the pope Catholic?" he counters, posting up to watch Phil cook after he finishes retrieving everything.

"Only recreationally, nothing lofty, just songs I like. Whatever's on the radio and a couple of musical numbers here and there. You perform much? I'd do just about anything for a decent jazz standard. Or a half decent one. Quarter decent is my limit though, I won't go any lower and that's my final offer."

Stoves get lit, pots get boiled, things put in pans, et cetera.

“Eh. I used to perform a lot, and I wouldn’t mind if I did again, but these days I mostly just play for myself at home. Weather’s my main job. Although I’ve been thinking about adding a little music segment on the radio show on late nights once a week, but, uh, we’d need a bigger studio first. And a piano.”

He hums thoughtfully over the stove. “I don’t have any music books from home here, so, no promises on the decency, but maybe we’ll go to Empty Pockets some time. I’ll play something for you.”

"Right- yeah, I was going to ask how wrangling those rain vampires was going. Y'know I figure the weather is a hard enough job when there aren't lives at stake," he jokes, cracking into a toothy smile.

Cooking things continue to happen look at em go they're hitting all the right combos in this minigame.

"Careful, people will talk. Not about us, about you risking life and limb to play on a killer piano. Did they ever manage to get rid of that thing, do you know?"

That joke cracks a laugh out of Phil.

"Hm? Oh, pshaw," he says with a dismissive wave. "Empty Pockets got a new piano a while ago. That big girl was our Yamaha, she came over from the prison ship. I used to play on her and feed her all the time back when. So did Dimitri. It was easier when there were platters of free sushi." Sigh. Now he either has to get groceries for her from the butcher or go hunting. So far, he's only done the former.

"She's moved in with us at the farmhouse, so Pockets is safe once more. Don't show up at the house uninvited, though."

"Not unless I want to get acquainted with her A-sharp teeth," he grins, pleased with himself.

"I want to take a moment to recognize a sentence that'll never get said again, but does your killer piano have organs?" buddum tish, "Y'know- is she an animal or just animated?"

The wisecracks really are nonstop with him. Phil dignifies them with a quiet snort.

“Animated but with carnivorous habits. She’s just a regular piano inside. I have no idea what happens to the stuff we throw in.”

As he’s plating things, “She’s a fan of Schubert though, and Brubeck. She nips me less when I play those. I also used to have this book—it’d show different pieces every time you opened it unless you put a bookmark in it. It was a nice way to get new repertoire in a prison. I had a hell of a time copying down my favorites by hand, though.”

Soon enough, he’s holding two plates of some honestly pretty dang good-looking pasta. Someone really knows how to cook. “Vóila, the spaghetti of our labor.” He gestures with his head towards the kitchen table. “Let’s go sit down.”

"Not bad for just noodling," Hawk offers, going to retrieve salt and ketchup before remembering that this is food made by a real human and not by committee. So instead he brings the cutlery- and again, despite the disarray of the apartment, his eating utensils are very clean.

"Ah, Schubert," Hawk says, which really says it all, "but uh- Brubeck? I'm not familiar."

Didn't found his quartet until '51.

"Wait- no, don't tell me, play some for me when we go to Empty Pockets. I'd hate to open all my presents early. Gotta leave something for next time- I don't want you thinking I'll just listen to your composers all on the first date, even if you did make me dinner."

“Date,” he repeats as he’s setting things down and trots back to the kitchen for a corkscrew. “So is this really—are you being facetious, or—”

He cuts himself off with a soft snort. “I just, uh, don’t really know what to expect from you after you ran off from the hot springs like that.”

Hawkeye magnetizes him, with his sly little charming looks and his easy quips and a heart the size of Manhattan, but sometimes Phil finds him nerve-wracking in a way he can’t quite pin down. Maybe it’s how energetic the man is. Maybe it’s how he’s unguarded yet evasive, or the relentlessness of his intellect, and that Phil is afraid he can’t keep up. He’s surprising, in a word.

Edited 2024-09-03 19:38 (UTC)

"Oh that- that was just because I'm a wildcard. I might climb out the window in a minute, whom as I am to the ineffable exhortations of my soul," he jokes, trying to regain some dignity from the hot springs incident. It won't work, but it's an attempt.

He almost continues the gag, but. Hawk glances over to the rest of the apartment and thinks about the state he and it were in when Phil showed up. Phil has an evenness to him such that it was impossible not to feel better, a kind of... grounding normalcy. Even as the situation about Henry remains, nuts as that is, he feels like he could at least take a swing at making this a date.

But Phil has already proven himself to be unimpressed by Hawk's lechery and lines. There's every chance he could ruin it like he's ruined things with Radar and Mulcahy.

His puckish mischief dims, just a little.

"Look- I think you're great, I hope I haven't made a mystery out of that. And I appreciate you making me dinner too- there's nice and then there's this, right? But uh-" he pokes at the spaghetti, sniffing at it. Ah, rich and luscious, the slightly meaty quality of cooked tomatoes, clinging desperately to an al dente noodle. Where was he? Oh, right.

"Let me sort my head out first. I know this is a bad look for me, but after that? You're gorgeous and I want to take you out. That's all. Nothing more complicated, honest. No lines, no come-ons, no pressure, I just want to buy you dinner and take you out dancing."

There's a complicated little tangle in his chest that Hawkeye's words knock on, but... a date doesn't have to be a commitment. That's what him and Rita turned into, but dates can be just for fun, and Hawk doesn't exactly seem like the date-to-marry type. Hell, God knows Phil wasn't for ages. So.

"Alright." Somewhere in the back of his head, a flowery little voice niggles at him to let himself let go a little. "Sure. Take me out some time, when you're feeling better."

It's nice that he's really, really trying to make a good impression. He wonders if he treats everybody this way or just the people he's into.

He wanders back to the table with two glasses, pouring for them both after he pops the cork. "We could dance for a little tonight too, if you want. Could help."

It's almost a relief more than anything, that Hawk hasn't lost his ability to be charming in his time here. Still his characteristic cutting to the chase, just... a little more gentle, not batting the idea around so much. Not so evasive. Like approaching a horse, hand out and careful, making sure it sees you coming.

He thinks about their time at the fair and how eager he was to make Phil laugh, but here it's... maybe it's just the passing of time and the circumstances, but Phil went more than out of his way to cheer Hawk up. Maybe that was a miscalculation, that Phil is just more reserved than the people Hawk's known in the army, nearly every one of them throwing themselves out there knowing that tomorrow there could be none of them left. Dignified, even. Kind, and gentle, and patient. The sort of man that Hawk would want to be around even if Phil had said no, if he'd misread the invitation.

Hawk beams around his mouthful of genuinely really delicious spaghetti. He goes to talk, then remembers it's still not the 4077 and he should pretend like he has table manners and isn't a pig at a trough. When he's finished his mouthful-

"Oh yeah? Kicking some tires before you take me for a test drive?" he reaches for the glass of wine, "sure, only if you want to be impressed. I'm a matched set, magic feet and fingers."

Hawkeye hasn't spat it out in disgust or made faces yet, so he's assuming the food is a success. He scoops up some while Hawkeye chews; not better than Darcy's, but damn good if he does say so himself. There's pride in that. He hopes he's at least a little impressed.

Phil hums. "Then you can test your mettle, hotshot. I've had a lot of practice. But here, c'mon. Let's have dinner first."

He reaches for his own glass, lifting it. "Shall we drink to something?"

Hawk lifts it in turn, thinking about it for a moment.

"Well, I've already been drinking to Henry, so let's not do that again. To your great cooking and better friendship?"

He hums thoughtfully for a moment.

“To great food and better friendship.” There, now it’s for both of them. Their glasses clink and the toast is made. Ah, this is a good red. Even in a foreign world he’s still got it.

“Okay! Let’s have dinner before it gets cold.” And if Hawk has nothing more to add, he’s tucking in.

"I do mean it," Hawk adds as he continues to eat, "you did a kind thing for me, P.A., not everyone would be willing to come over and scrape a guy off the floor like a piece of gum, y'know?"

Actually decent wine, what a treat and what an oddity. He's expecting it to taste like gin.

"You're a good man, Phil."

Phil stalls for a moment. He looks up at Hawkeye, seeming to search for for something. Whatever it is, he doesn’t find it, and he looks back down at his plate.

“I’m just making up for lost time, that’s all. Ten years ago and remembering my coworker’s names would’ve been like pulling teeth.”

Hawk offers a hand across the table.

"You want to cut yourself as much of a break as you give everyone else? I'm not having dinner with Phil from ten years ago. My time machine is still in for it's 25,000 years service."

He smiles wanly. Now's maybe not the time to get into his complexes about being a 'good person,' especially to someone who he believes really is and who he also just had to scrape off of the floor like a piece of gum. So.

"I'm working on it," Phil concedes, taking Hawkeye's hand in his. Don't mind how he holds onto it a little too firmly to not make it feel like an apology.

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