Because Pizza [Rhys]

[Elanora Brennan]

It had been a mostly quiet Saturday and Nora had spent it lazing around home sketching not feeling much like trying to socialize today, before she had known it dinner time had come around and she hadn’t planned anything. Her roommates were out and Nora couldn’t be bothered cooking after a moment of thought she decided it would be a perfect night for Pizza and she could bring the leftovers home for anyone who felt peckish later tonight or tomorrow.

Decision made she grabbed her purse and keys and headed out the door, she considered riding it would be faster but she figured she could use the exercise if she was going to stuff herself full of delicious pizza. She pulled her warm jacket closer to her body as she exited the building and headed for downtown, her legs were still cold despite the jeans that encased them and she kept her walk brisk to ward off the cool evening air.

It didn’t take too long before she was outside the pizza shop, pushing inside she felt warmer instantly, the heat from the pizza ovens warmed the whole place up. There were a few people in there already and she joined the que looking over the menu, stepping up when it was her turn she ordered a simple thin crust Hawaiian pizza and one garlic bread. After paying she moved off and sat down to wait for her order to be ready. She smiled shyly at the guy waiting next to her presumably for his own order but didn’t say anything she wasn’t good at starting conversations with strangers.

[Rhys Rockwood]

Having spent a full Saturday beating himself into an agonizing lump of a person, Rhys was ready for a cheat meal. He'd grabbed one last bit of exercise at the gym before jumping into his car and heading off for pizza. Sure, it would 'damage' the effort he'd made that day...but eh, his metabolism would take care of that quickly enough. He was fairly certain that strict adherence to a diet was unnecessary due to the side effect of his endurance, but he still tried.

Tonight, however, he was opting to fail miserably. He was going to a whole, if not two, pizzas just for dinner. With maybe a side of bread. And soda. He was off the reservation for sure.

Despite the cold, he was standing around the the pizza shop in sandals. The sweatpants and jacket made sense, but his shoes and sleeveless shirt, eh, not so much. The ovens were keeping the place far warmer than outside, a fact for which Rhys was quite grateful.

Rhys hadn't been there for long when a young woman he didn't recognize at all came into the small restaurant. He was typically good at putting names to faces or recollecting them even after brief encounters, but he was drawing a blank on her. And unlike her, he was professionally trained to have conversations with strangers. Opening his mouth was no issue.

After she smiled at him, there was no internal debate. He was obligated to talk to her at that point. Confidently, he took the seat across the table from her and smiled back at her. "Hi there. I'm Rhys, and I'm failing at coming up with a witty opener. Hopefully that doesn't count against me." And now he was silently cursing his mouth for working faster than his brain. So much for his work training.

[Elanora Brennan]

Nora hadn’t intended her simple smile to result in the guy coming over to sit opposite her and introduce himself. She had just always been raised to be polite and felt it was nice to smile at people if you made eye contact instead of being a rude person and scowling or totally ignoring all people. The fact of the matter however was that he had come over and introduced himself and Nora wasn’t about to be rude to him now so she smiled, playing with her purse in a fidgeting way. “Hi Rhys, nice to meet you I’m Nora” she answered him giving him another shy smile and crossing her legs under the table.

She wasn’t really sure what to say next, was there a protocol to follow when a stranger came up to you? If there was, what was it? The only thing that popped into her mind what the lesson you learnt as a kid on stranger danger, she had a feeling that those lessons wouldn’t help her here. Though the idea of kicking him in the genital area and running as her mum has once taught her did seem like an entertaining option, not that he seemed the type to deserve that treatment.

“So….” she said awkwardly trying to search her brain for something interesting or witty or anything in general to actually say. “What type of pizza are you getting?” she asked lamely, since they were in a pizza shop why not ask about his pizza right? She had no idea what she was doing and wished her Pizza would hurry so she didn’t have to sit here being all awkward but pizza’s took time to cook so she could be stuck here a while.

[Rhys Rockwood]

At least having any question put before him helped Rhys find some words to start something of a conversation. "Well, I'm here for a massive cheat meal, so I went with a deep dish crust and loaded it with barbecue chicken, bacon, extra cheese, pineapple, and jalapenos," he admitted with a bit of a laugh. "Though really, it's only the cheat meal because of the crust..so naturally, I cheated as hard as I could and got a pizza that is normally at least half crust. I don't believe in doing something halfway."

Sure, the BBQ sauce was off diet too, and the pineapple was arguably borderline, but the combination was mouth watering. And that was without even mentioning the SECOND pizza that was a carnivore's dream of meats piled onto bread. Rhys could spare Nora the details of his every meal. For example, he certainly didn't LOOK like he did this, but he could put away the entire large pizza in a sitting then do it again in thirty minutes. His power consumed fuel sources incredibly fast.

"Gonna be honest though. I didn't sit down to talk about my fantastic taste, at least not when it comes to pizza toppings. I saw a pretty, young woman order a pizza and sit down alone and had to wonder how such a thing happens or if she was just picking up the food for a larger gathering with at least one other person." Rhys had noticed her fidgeting while talking. Either she was a high energy person like himself who just had difficulty sitting still for any amount of time or she was uncomfortable with the way he had approached her. He was trying to give her an easy out of the friendly chat if she needed it.

"If you don't have plans though, I'd be more than happy to invite you to have dinner with me tonight at this tasty little pizza place I know. They're pretty good, though I've been told it can be hard to find," he joked, clearly talking about the exact restaurant in which they were already occupying a table.

[Elanora Brennan]

Nora sat listening and somewhat shocked at how much detail the guy went into about his Pizza, she spoke a lot and fast when she was nervous he seemed to just speak like that normally, or was he nervous like she got? However from his body language she wouldn’t have guessed he was nervous so maybe some people just talked a lot just because who was she to judge. “It sounded pretty good until you mentioned jalapenos” she said wrinkling her nose a little thinking about the nasty little things, she wasn’t one for anything that burned her mouth.

Nora just nodded as he went on about it being a cheat meal, she didn’t eat stuff like pizza all the time or anything but she also wasn’t big on the whole diet thing. Life was too short to stress too much about being super strict with a diet, she ate vegetables and all that she just wasn’t into calorie counting and all that jazz. Nora looked up with a somewhat skeptical look on her face when he went on about a pretty young women, she wondered if it was something in the water around here, this was the second, or maybe third guy to hit on her she wasn’t sure about the last one he had been as awkward as her, but either way she was more used to being invisible then being complimented or hit on.

“I don’t have other plans” she said with a slight non committal shrug, she wasn’t sure what else to say, she didn’t have plans really other than laying around in her room sketching before going to bed so why not have dinner with him she was already here after all. “I will keep my eyes open for that pizza place though” she said with a shy grin.

[Rhys Rockwood]

Rhys was doing what he could to take note of her reactions while he talked with her. She didn't say a lot, so she likely was shy or leaned toward a more observant approach when meeting someone. It was also possible he was just dominating the conversation without meaning to. That happened sometimes when he was trying to compress extra information into his speech without using too many words. It was funny how trying to avoid doing something would lead precisely to doing that thing.

She also seemed a little uncomfortable with the compliment. Not that he could blame her. She likely pulled more of those than she would like. Perhaps it was better to just relax and get to know her a little for now. Maybe they'd hang out again, maybe not. He at least wouldn't feel like he hadn't tried.

"You should. I've been told it can be quite hard to find when attempting to meet people here," he joked. "So, what do you do for a living? Rhys asked. Maybe he could get her to open up a bit if she was talking about something personal without being too close to her.  It was worth the attempt.  Worst case scenario, she told him she would like to avoid talking about work, and he'd have to come up with another topic she might want to chat about.

[Elanora Brennan]

Nora smiled slightly at his joke “I will keep that in mind” she said with a slight laugh. She sat twirling her ring around her middle finger, it was a habit she had picked up when she got given the ring. The calming effect it had on her helped her to look up when he asked about what she did for a living. “I’m a secretary at the moment, it pays the bills, but drawing is what I enjoy most” she answered, she was still new to the job but she liked it, her boss was lovely and she didn’t have to deal too much with people which suited her just fine.

“How about you? What do you do for living?” she asked wondering if it his job had anything to do with his power which she knew was super endurance thanks to her own power, she imagined him being some sort of sports star or at least a rising one, super endurance would be sure to help with that right? Before he could answer a waitress came over with both their orders, she smiled and thanked the women quietly before turning back to get Rhys’s answer.

She took a sip from her Coke before turning to her own pizza and pulling a slice away pulling at the cheese to help it break away, she took a bite and chewed slowly savoring the taste.