Round Two

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Harry's still rather new to this whole Milliways business, and it takes him a good while to accept the fact that he went through the front door from Perry's house, and has now gone back through that same door to find himself in a completely different house.

He's going to ignore the whole other country business all together. For now.

"That's, uhm... What the fuck?"

OK, he wasn't sure what was going to happen, but this was not it.

Comments

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"No. Harry. Who the hell is Flower?" he asks. This conversation is not getting any easier.

"Hey, about that," says John as he looks up. "Where did you two meet?"

Harry has no idea how to answer that, so he just pays attention to his plate.

[mscontrarymary.livejournal.com]

"At a bar. You know, the old fashioned way. None of this weeks of internet angst, like some people. We hit it off."

Mary's met people without certain papers before, you see.

"We were just going to chill with a movie, but now I'm just waiting for Bill and Mike to pop out of the..."

She suddenly looks horrorstruck.


"Oh no. John. You didn't invite Mike did you? Or Bill?"

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John looks like this this the best idea ever.

"Should I?" he asks eagerly. "I'm sure they'd love to hear about this, after all."

Harry seems like he's just realised something.

"Hey, you didn't go home with me because I look like this Bob Joe Whatever guy, did you?" he asks Mary.

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Mary looks mortified.

"What? No. Cripes, what do you take me for? You're cute, and I like you. That's it. He's in no position to talk about taking people home on a weird coincidence, anyway. John, shut up and eat your lamb.

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John puts his hands up in mock surrender. "Hey, you didn't have to come after my toast," he says.

"The fuck does he keep talking about toast for?" asks Harry.

This whole thing is getting a bit too weird for him, so he gets up to find the movie.

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Mary watches him since 1) if he makes a break for it, she wants to be able to get hold of him before he wanders out into a big city he doesn't know very well, and 2) the view is good.

"When I met John properly, I'd actually gone home with his flatmate. He made me toast and we hit it off. He still dines out on the fact he won me with toast to this day, despite the fact it was almost twenty years ago."

She realises what he's looking for.

"The DVD's in there. Just grab the remote, it's on the TV." She nudges John and makes a gesture that says 'Get a look at his arse' (no walkie-talkie).

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"Oh. Uhm. Who keeps the remote on the TV? Doesn't that defeat the purpose of it being, you know, a remote?"

John shrugs lightly. "He has a point," he says.

"So, wait." Harry comes back to the sofa and mashes buttons until something happens. "You slept with him because he made you toast?"

[mscontrarymary.livejournal.com]

"Well, there's was more to it than that. I think. I was very hungover. Our first kiss was magical. He had morning breath and I actually wanted tea, but he was in the way of the kettle."

Mary still laughs (fondest memories are often not the most romantic).

"Anyway, no complaining. You didn't even feed me."

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"Hey, it's not my fault we got interrupted by a big, gay Hitler," Harry defends.

It's John's turn to laugh and ask, "What?"

Harry's never used a DVD player before. Someone better help him.

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"Oh, he is gay. I wondered."

Mary finally takes pity on Harry and takes the remote off him. Maybe DVD players are different in the States.

"Harry took me back to his place. Only it wasn't his place, it's just where he's staying with this enormous blonde guy who burst in on us and started yelling, dragged Harry here out of bed and kicked him out, and then we made polite conversation whilst I was getting dressed."

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John nods. "So, your typical Friday night then. All right."

And in Harry's defence, between being 2005, prison, and never having any money when he's not in prison, he's just never had the opportunity to use one.

[mscontrarymary.livejournal.com]

"You be quiet. I remember a few three am conversations that started out 'So that guy and or girl I went home with has a fill-in-here and now I'm stranded and or sad.'"

Mary snuggles into Harry a bit as the movie starts, still nibbling on bits of poppadom. Just because John is here to point and laugh doesn't mean she doesn't intend to spend the evening a little like she wants to.

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"No, that's Saturday Night," John corrects.

"And Sunday night is all hangovers and funny limps?" asks Harry as he dares to put an arm around Mary's shoulders.

Seriously, he's relying on Mary to not let this go to far, because really, Harry is the king of poor judgement.

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"John always has a funny limp nowadays."

Mary observes, and she relaxes into Harry's arm, because it's nice that he's finally gaining an admittedly shaky grasp on the conversation.

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"No, that's Sherlock's area," John says.

Harry makes a noise of surprised disgust and covers his ears. Seriously, why do people gotta talk about this stuff?

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Mary's jolted by his movement, and sits up, confused, thinking quickly.

"Hey, why did you..." For once, because the gods smile on everyone once, she doesn't say anything. She'd be lying if she wasn't a little disappointed by Harry's reaction though, mainly because now she doesn't know what to do. Scenarios flicker through her mind, and she settles in the end for getting up.

"I'm just going to grab some of the sweets."

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"Oh, come on," John says. "It's not catching, you twat."

Harry ignores John. "You got any more of those jelly things?"

[mscontrarymary.livejournal.com]

"No, I only got one bag of the jelly babies. But I got Skittles and Smarties and crisps and Jaffa cakes."

Mary tips the sweets, Skips and Twiglets into bowls and comes back through. Before she sits down, she squeezes John's shoulder in a 'bros before hos' kind of way.

"The pink flower-shaped ones are Skips and the brown ones are Twiglets." She tells Harry. "Skips are kind of prawn-cocktail flavoured."

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"What do Twiglets taste like?" Harry asks. He takes one anyway, and seems less than impressed with it. "Seriously, what is that?"

John snorts. "Wow. He's distracted that easily? You sure about this one, Mar?"

"Hey, fuck off, Slick."

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"Oh wow, you can almost smell the testosterone."

Mary rolls her eyes, annoyed at both John and Harry for acting like children, even if they're both kind of justified.

"Keep it in your trousers boys, I've seen 'em both and there's not that much difference."

She picks up a Twiglet. "And it's called Marmite. We pretend to love it on toast to annoy foreigners." She eats it anyway.

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"Well it sure annoyed me," Harry says. Twiglets are not something he'd consider food. Ever.

John leans back and watches Harry for a moment. "So, what do you do, Harry?" he asks in a tone usually reserved for scary big brothers and over-protective fathers.

Harry has no way to answer that without sounding like a dick, so he chooses to ignore it entirely.

[mscontrarymary.livejournal.com]

Mary dies a little on the inside, and considers beating John to death with a pillow. As much as she loves the guy, the shotgun cleaning's getting a little old.

"Harry's... New in town. He's staying with a friend till he gets sorted out."

Sneakily, in the hope that whatever happens, this will show Harry no hard feelings, she drops a Skittle into his hood.

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John nods. "So, if I hadn't shown up and paid for this, you would have?" he asks Mary. He sounds less than impressed.

Harry just sighs. "Should I just go?" he asks.

[mscontrarymary.livejournal.com]

Mary glares at John, and since Harry still hasn't noticed the Skittle thing, drops a few more in there.

"He's new in town John. He's only got dollars on him? Anyway, I know how he feels. It happened to me in Auckland. I don't know what I would have done if the guy next to me on the plane hadn't taken pity and let me stop at his for the night. Harry, you can stay if you like. I don't mind."

She sits next to the cat, an equal distance from both John and Harry. The cat ignores her, but she rubs him behind the ear anyway.

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"I just didn't expect to get the third degree," Harry says. "Seriously, who are you supposed to be? Her brother?"

He ignores the fact that they've apparently slept together though. Because, ew.

John only snorts and shakes his head. The real Robert Downey Jr is on the TV, so he pretends to pay attention to him instead.