When Danika woke up from a dream about Aishin cursing softly at Lin Hao, who was wearing his work avatar and somehow attaching wings to MatchlessMinion, she wondered if her apartment was on fire. A trace of smoke flavored the air. It got stronger when she opened the VR-medi pod and looked out. "Open the window?" she advised Shinichi.
He finished turning off the stove and set the smoking pan he held on the counter. "Sorry! I was hoping to surprise you," he explained hurriedly as he crawled over to the window and fumbled with the latch.
"It flips," she told him. "And I'm definitely surprised…" She asked as she pulled herself over the edge and dropped to the floor, "Um, what are you trying to make?"
He ran his hand through his hair after he got the window open, and surveyed her counter. "A mess, apparently. But I thought I was going to make crepes, they're pretty easy looking…"
She scooted over to the counter and examined his attempt. The pancake was thick and still raw looking in places but burned in others, and torn and folded from his attempts to turn it. "You're just cooking it too hot and it's not thin enough for crepes," she explained as she discarded it.
She tasted his batter, and it seemed ok. He'd beaten it smoother than she usually managed, so she just got out the milk, a little startled to discover a new quart carton beside it. Then she realized that he'd brought all the ingredients he'd need. There were small baskets of berries and a whipped cream dispenser on the counter too. She added what she thought was about enough milk and handed the bowl to him.
He looked at her blankly. "Stir it in?" she suggested. "Your batter is really nice, I'm too lazy to get mine that smooth usually."
Since the pan was already warm she just wiped it out and turned her little burner down to medium low. When she took the bowl back from him she poured a small dollop into the pan, and lifted it to swirl the batter out and around, until it cooked too much to move.
Shinichi watched with an expression of disgust and she apologized quickly, "I'm sorry, I started taking over without asking." She scooted back and waved him forward.
"No, it's fine!" he protested quickly. "You're just making it look as easy as I thought it would be."
"Well, I've cooked them before," she pointed out.
"I know it doesn't look like it, but I've at least watched people cook them before," he told her unhappily.
She glanced at him. "Then you cook the next one. It's really mostly just practice, and they'll taste the same even if they aren't perfect?" She pointed to the bubbles that had popped on the surface and begun looking a bit cooked. "When it's almost cooked through like that is when it's ready to turn over. If you wait until then, if it folds over on itself when it's turned, you can just unfold it too."
She turned it and waited until it stopped steaming around the edges. Then she remembered to explain that, "When it stops steaming a bit, check to see if it's done."
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She slid the crepe out of the pan and onto the paper plate he had waiting. Then she set the pan back on the burner and handed him the bowl of batter. "I'm going to get dressed," she said decisively.
He grinned at her suddenly and asked, "Hold off until I've managed one?"
"OK," she agreed easily.
He looked nervous as he poured the batter and his first crepe was weirdly lopsided and had a bulge on one edge, but other than that it went fine. While the first side was cooking he asked, "Do you always sleep like that? In just long pajamas?"
"Uh, yeah?" she replied questioningly.
"Don't you miss having blankets to cuddle into?" he asked.
"The VR-medi pod keeps me warm enough," she pointed out.
"No, I mean, I don't know, it seems hard to get used to," he tried to explain.
"It was a lot harder to get used to the futons that everyone uses here, even if it's shaped like a mattress on a bed, than it was to switch to sleeping in the pod," Danika told him.
"What? Mattresses and futons aren't really the same," he protested.
"But none of them have springs underneath," she explained. "We moved here when I was little, I started school here, but it was pretty much the weirdest thing. I felt like I didn't sleep for weeks, and you can't bounce on a bed like that either!"
Shinichi laughed and teased, "A little monkey jumping on the bed? I've heard that rhyme."
She stuck out her tongue, but then agreed, "Maybe." She looked at the pan and added, "Flip it now."
"Why did your family move here?" he asked as he turned the crepe over.
"My mother's parents were here, but after her father died, I think in a traffic accident, her mother's health started declining. I guess we moved here so that she could take care of her. Her mother was quite a bit older than my father's parents, he's the eldest in his family and she was the youngest."
"Was?" Shinichi asked.
"She died before I turned 10. I don't remember her really well compared to my father's parents who we lived with before we came here. But I've visited them many times, and they've even come here and visited me and my father. They are still in pretty good health and keep in touch with me. My grandmother on this side was awfully grumpy and I was kind of scared of her, even though my mother told me that she was just in a lot of pain and she wasn't really upset with me," Danika explained a bit unhappily. "But it wasn't just me, some of my cousins said they were scared of her too!"
"Danika…" Shinichi said quietly, "it's OK? And I'm glad you stayed?" He finished starting the next crepe, which came out a bit rounder, before turning to hug her for a moment.
"We stayed because my father likes the company that hired him when he immigrated," she told him more cheerfully. "He said this country has the last of the corporations that believe in lifetime employment. He says other countries don't have places that invest in the employees lives so that their employees will invest their lives in them anymore."
"He immigrated?" Shinichi questioned. "Shouldn't he have had dual citizenship?"
"I don't know," Danika admitted. "I do I guess? But I'm not sure I wouldn't have to go through immigration if I changed my country of residence. Or maybe it's because his mother said she gave up her citizenship here when she ran away with my grandfather. I don't think she regrets it though, because she always says, 'it's nice to come back to visit, but home is so much quieter!' Sorry, I'm going to get dressed now."
Shinichi laughed and suggested, "Hurry?"
"I will," she agreed. She started to scoot over to her closet and stopped. "What is that?" she pointed to the huge bag in front of it.