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[imthepilot]

Bodhi can't help but get up and fiddle. He's slept so much since the accident, he finds it hard to stay still for too long. Even if holding Galen in the afterglow is magnificent.

Instead he investigates Galen's little kitchenette, seeing what he might have to work with. He's starving!

Comments

[galen_erso]

The food is basic, but very good -- bread, eggs, oil; caf, rice, nuts. But in the cold section, there are some actual fresh fruit and vegetables, and some wrapped-up dark meat.

Also, a small unopened set of spices that looks costly and imported, like a core world version of rim world spices.

[imthepilot]

"Did you lay this in for me?" Bodhi asks the sleepy Galen, investigating the spices. He opens a couple and sniffs them, humming happily. "Last time I was here I seem to recall your kitchen having less food than the crumbs under a pilot's bunk."

[galen_erso]

"Hmmm," Galen says from the bed. "Wanted to do better. Have my life ready for you.'

[imthepilot]

Bodhi's heart clenches and he has to brace his hands on the bench to steady himself. He moves back to the bed, kneeling down next to Galen. He brushes Galen's hair back from his face, kissing his sleepy cheek very softly. There are the hazy of tears in his eyes. No-one has every done anything like that for him before. Made a place for him like that.

[galen_erso]

"Are the spices all right?" Galen asks, lifting his head far enough to return those kisses. "Bodhi?"

He lifts a still languid hand to touch Bodhi's eyelashes, as if marvelling at this reaction.

[imthepilot]

"Galen. I-" he swallows around the lump in his throat. "Thank you." It isn't big enough. Words aren't big enough for how grateful he is. How much this means to him.

[galen_erso]

Galen puts his finger to his lips, then reaches for that back of Bodhi's neck to pull him close again and lovingly kiss him

[imthepilot]

Bodhi leans into it, trying not to cry. Stars, Galen just breaks him, every time. He breaks the kiss, resting his forehead against Galen's. "You're incredible. And I'm making us omelettes.

[galen_erso]

Galen softly chuckles at that. "You're just as incredible," he says. "Food in my kitchen! Is there enough salt and spatulas and wherever else you need?"

[imthepilot]

"Salt and spatulas." Bodhi snorts warmly, kissing Galen again. "You really are hopeless."

He gets up with care, feeling his burns pull and trying to hide a grimace. "I have everything I need." A lover, who loves him back.

He smiles again and strokes Galen's hair with a lingering touch before going back to the kitchen, investigating the vegetables with interest and sniffing the dark meat. What he needs is a really sharp knife.

[galen_erso]

"I'm no longer hopeless," Galen says. "I have you. You know about all those things in there."

There is a drawer newly filled with implements and cutlery, including a basic set of good kitchen knives, and a few overly specific tools meant to deal with vegetables or seafood they don't even have.

[imthepilot]

Bodhi chuckles, testing the edge of a knife. Sharp enough. He unwraps the meat and starts shaving very fine slithers off it with a steady hand.

"You mail ordered all of this, didn't you?" He teases, gesturing with a utensil Bodhi's never seen before. Some core world specialty thing he's never had cause to need. "I don't even know what this is for."

He marinates the thin strips of meat in a bowl of oil, adding a pinch of a couple of spices, breathing in the unique fragrances.

Bodhi cooks with the unconscious sensuality of someone enjoying themselves greatly.

[galen_erso]

At some time during this process, Galen gets up from bed, wraps a ratty robe half-heartedly around himself, and leans in the jamb of the doorless opening to the kitchen and just watches the process and inhales the scents, an alert and fascinated presence behind Bodhi.

[imthepilot]

Bodhi is different when cooking. More comfortable in his own skin perhaps. Burnt and scarred as it is. He chops some green bean-like vegetables fine, chomping on one raw just to enjoy the crunch.

He offers one to Galen, pulling down some mugs to make some caf.

[galen_erso]

Galen takes it, and crunches down on it.

"I didn't know you could eat them raw," he says.

[imthepilot]

"Only when they're fresh." Bodhi warns. "They keep well but after a week or so, they get to be too bitter to be eaten raw. I haven't had them for ages. My grandmother use to grow them on our roof." He savours the peppery sweetness of the fresh bean.

More vegetables and some form of fungus with an earthy scent which he cuts fine and adds to the marinating meat.

"Do you mind readying the table once all this is in the pan, it won't take more than a minute."

[galen_erso]

"I have plates and bowls and everything," Galen says, squeezing past Bodhi in the tiny kitchen to get it from an upper cabinet.

As he passes, he drops a small find kiss on Bodhi's shoulder.

[imthepilot]

"Practically domestic." Bodhi smiles, his breath catching at just that little touch, that almost careless show of affection. He can't help but wonder if Galen knows how powerful effect he has on Bodhi.

[galen_erso]

"I'm trying to," Galen says, getting two plates from the cabinet. "It makes sense again."

Passing back out the way he had come, he lingers a little longer, cheek pressed against Bodhi's hair.

He sounds happy.

[imthepilot]

Bodhi leans against him, lingering on the moment. "You'll have to show me how, Galen. I've never done this before." His voice is soft, unsure.

[galen_erso]

"Domesticity?" Galen says, still lingering. "It's easy, because people seem to be pack animals. And hard, because everybody is different in small ways."

[imthepilot]

Bodhi reaches back to cup the back the back of Galen's head, holding him close. "I want this to work. For however long we have."

[galen_erso]

"So do I," Galen says. "We have about four standard weeks during which we can work out a way how to make a niche for us so this can work open-ended."

[imthepilot]

Bodhi turns his head to catch Galen's lips in a kiss. "Thank you for understanding." He gives Galen a little nudge. "Now let me cook. Leave the plates, this won't take long."

He throws everything together, hands moving swiftly as he cracks and scrambles the eggs. Again, that easy rhythm, that relaxed state that comes from cooking.

It doesn't take him long to have two very tasty omelettes on plates, bring them to the table. "Breakfast."

[galen_erso]

The table is set neatly, and Galen is already at it, mug of caf in hand, apparently having watched Bodhi the entire time.