Who: Alice and River What: Random meetings at the park, and promises of baking. Alice also continues to see things differently When: Friday, a couple days after Alice met AJ Where: A park Status: Compete Rating: PG-13 for poisoning pigeons in the park (not really)
It was a lovely day at the park, and Alice had generally pledged to get out more after talking to AJ. She’d left Dinah at home today, wanting a bit of peace to herself, even if the cat had protested mightily.
She sat on a bench and watched the pigeons curiously. They way they bobbed and strutted around, as if they owned the place.
Judging by their numbers, they did!
As Alice watched, a woman practically danced up to a group of pigeons. She had a bag in one hand, and a gigantic iced beverage in the other. The pigeons weren't afraid of her at all and didn't bother fleeing from her presence. It was like she was an old friend.
A few seconds later, it was revealed why - The woman opened up the bag and started dispensing crumbled up pieces of what looked like some kind of bread substance.
"Curious," Alice said, tilting her head and watching as the girl danced and tossed out bread substance. She wasn't sure what kind of bread that was, but the pigeons seemed to love it. Finally, she asked, "Excuse me, are you poisoning the pigeons in the park?"
"Oh hello there!" River exclaimed, and waved a hand at Alice. It was the hand that was still holding the bag, causing it to sway in the air with her motion and spill more crumbles of something fairly bread-like.
It wasn't actually bread, however, as it was crumbled up bits of scone. River had overbaked heavily, and everyone she knew was pretty much sconed out. Even Navi had almost been slightly less than cheerful about the extra scones she kept bringing over.
Not that much ever made Navi not cheerful! And the woman had never said anything. Still, scones. There'd been so many left over that she was now feeding them to pigeons and squirrels, "I'm feeding the birds some leftover scones!"
"Oh. Poison would be more interesting." Alice pulled her legs up onto the bench and hugged them as she watched River feed the pigeons the leftover scones.
"Why do you have scones left over? Couldn't you bring them down to the shelter?"
"I tried that, but they were sick of my scones there." River said, mournfully. She finished tossing out the crumbs of scone to the pigeons, then waltzed over to the bench and took a seat next to her new friend.
She glanced at Alice and smiled, a bit sheepishly, "I overbaked. I really, really overbaked. There were just way too many scones."
"That must have been very many scones then," Alice replied, looking over at River. She tilted her head. Something about the girl was interesting. More so than the too many scones. The world was sideways for River.
She could appreciate that level of nutters.
"It was..." River trailed off and got a vacant expression on her face, like she was actually trying to count and remember how many batches of scones it had been. She shrugged after a few seconds, "It was a lot of scones. I think I need to give up baking as stress relief."
"That must be some stress," Alice replied. "To make so many scones. Did you consider making biscuits? I love biscuits."
"Do you mean british biscuits, or american ones?" River asked her cheerfully, "I've baked some cookies, but mostly swedish tea rings, muffins, scones, and pies. I could make some british style cookies, I suppose. I'd need to find a good recipe for that..."
"Biscuits," Alice insisted, staring at her like she was daft. There was only one kind of biscuit. And that was a British biscuit. That thing yanks call a biscuit was a sore imitation.
"I don't really know what you're talking about," River said, cheerfully. She took a long sip off of her iced coffee and wagged her feet back and forth on the bench a bit.
"My name's River. If you want, sometime you could teach me how to make biscuits?"
"I'd love to!" Alice's expression softened, like maybe River wasn't as daft as she'd thought, "I'm Alice. Is now a good time?"
River took a look at the time, and nodded her head. The idea of making new friends and then learning to bake entirely new things with them had her all excited, "I don't have anything to do for a few hours! How long does it take to learn to make proper biscuits?"
“Precisely as long as it needs to take,” Alice replied, bouncing to her feet. The world seemed to expand around her, colors brightening in her eyes as she looked down at River. Seeing her. Seeing sideways.
The sideways world was far more colorful and far more fun, anyway. River jumped up off the bench and to her feet, then bounced on her heels a bit, swaying back and forth. Sort of like she somehow felt her new friend Alice might do, if given time to stand idle.
Then she giggled a bit, "Of course!" Because it made perfect sense. There was no rushing the creation and baking of proper biscuits. If she was late somewhere, well, she hoped that she didn't end up late somewhere. She had a class later that evening, but she knew exactly what grade she needed to pass and keep her scholarships, and how many classes and papers she could skip, if she wanted to.
Not that she generally did - she loved school! But baking Proper Biscuits was awfully important, "Let's go! I'm going to meet your cat! I'm very excited about this."
Alice had in fact started to sway back and forth as she waited. Baking Proper Biscuits was incredibly important. Things began to take shape as she looked around. One tree was a caterpillar, and the sky was unusually bright colors. In the distance, Stark Tower had once again turned into a mushroom. She turned her head and the illusion was gone.
She smiled at the other girl, "Don't worry, love. I won't let you be late for any important dates."