DOCTOR HORRIBLE! (i_sing) wrote in we_coexist, @ 2009-02-14 12:11:00 |
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Entry tags: | doctor horrible, laura kinney |
Backdated: When Billy Met Laura, parts 1 & 2
Have you ever tasted a chili dog before in your life?
Canned chilli was the greatest invention ever. Billy was remarkably grateful for the advances in ready made food. It gave him time to focus on more important things like his iPhone or the transporter beam. Today it gave him time to help a sixteen year old girl settle into the strange vortex of The City.
Hot dogs cooked in a toaster oven and in a matter of minutes, chili dogs were to be had. He plated them and brought the food into the living room where the DVD title screen of Lilo & Stitch waited for play to be selected. Handing Laura her plate, Billy took a seat a comfortable distance from her.
Laura stared at the plate Billy handed to her, both transfixed and confused. She had never seen anything quite so... juicy? clumpy? mess-looking? before and she didn't have a built-in reaction to it. It smelled appetizing, but didn't seem as practical as the protein bars and cakes she had been raised on. Those provided her body with requisite vitamins and minerals, but where was the health benefit in this?
Whatever the case, she thought, at least it has protein. Laura lifted up the chili dog uncertainly, careful not to slop any off the side. She took a hesitant bite of the...thing, and was... wow. It was the most amazing thing she had ever tasted, literally. Nothing at Weapon X could compare to this. All of a sudden the nutritional contents of the chili dog were the least important of things in Laura's life, pushed away by a new feeling. What she was experiencing now for the first was both unfamiliar and wonderful - what she was experiencing now was delight.
She turned to Billy and smiled. It was obvious to anyone that Laura didn't genuinely smile often, because her entire face transformed into something softer, more vulnerable when she did. Her eyes were wide when she spoke out. "I don't have words."
Billy paused. He didn't know how to respond to that and his smile was mildly uncomfortable. "You've never had a hot dog before?" He wasn't quite brave enough to ask what sort of world Laura had come from where there were no hot dogs. It would have broke his heart. He crammed a few more bites of food into his mouth and chewed with pouched cheeks. Swallowing he followed his question, "It's okay. I mean... that you haven't."
He cleared his throat uncomfortably and turned to watch the darling blue protagonist on the screen. Horrible was thought of Stitch admirably as a super villain, which made this particular Disney title his favorite.
Despite her distraction, Laura could tell (and smell) that Billy was uncomfortable. So she answered him with a look instead of words, and turned her attention to the cartoon on the television, and got thoroughly entranced.
With the exception of a few more trips (mainly on Laura's part) for more food, the odd couple watched the movie in comfortable silence. The movie rang uncomfortably close to home for Laura, but ended happily, so she didn't mind much. After all, when supplied with delicious food, a funny movie and pleasant, non-obtrusive company, how could the girl complain?
It was strange sharing the laundromat experience with his new roommate, but it didn't seem right not teaching her how to do basic, mundane chores. It was a sacred space where Billy could remember Saturdays spent eating yogurt with Penny. The mad scientist didn't bring with him any yogurt, choosing ice cream instead. Chocolate.
And as he was prone to do, his explanation of laundered sciences came out in song; "Laundry Day. Here we are. Watch the clothes, tumbling." But as with some of the music, not all of could be heard, fading subconsciously into the background past an invisible fourth wall; "Wanna say, how's your day? Here I go, mumbling."
"With our bleach stick we will stop, the stains. With our bleach stick we will fill the wash only two-thirds."
Laura had stopped wondering about the music about a week after she had moved in with Billy. Now it was just a part of being around him. And she liked being around him, even if it meant she had to involuntarily sing.
"Tell me how, how to wash, and clean my clothes, what's the phrase?" Laura looked at Billy, grasping for the word she was thinking, "expertly, without crease, fluffy soft, anyways."
Laura had shown Billy just how steep her learning curve was a while back. "With our bleach stick we will stop, the stains. It's color safe so I can put it in there with the darks, with no worries of it leaving marks."
The two of them had a strange harmony Billy just couldn't put his finger on. It was nice having her around, even if he couldn't bring himself to tell her the truth. He started to think of her dearly like a sister. Billy didn't want to scare her away. Not everyone was so understanding about the Super Villain profession.
In another aside he watched over her folding laundry as he sang, "I’m the guy to make it real, the feelings you don’t dare to feel. I’ll bend the world to our will and we’ll make time stand stiiiiill..."
Having never had a brother or familial figure of any sort except her 'mom', Laura didn't have a definition to fit her fondness for Billy. Being around a man who was so nice and sweet was a drastic change from the men at Weapon X, and she never wanted to leave him if she didn't have to (and now that her quest to find Wolverine had gone bust, she doubted she would). Strangely enough, she felt as though he'd be safer with her around, and she just couldn't risk him getting hurt because she wasn't there.
The music continued playing, and Laura found herself separating her clothes to the melody. "That's the plan, rule this world," she smiled at Billy, as she had picked up signs of a boyish fantasy to rule the world, "you and me, any day." She continued to hum to the music as Billy showed her how to set the different dials at different speeds and temperatures, and came to a decision: she would do everything she could to keep Billy happy. And singing.