I looked at Gilpatrick and cocked my head, waiting for an answer, while he just smiled and waved our waitress over.

"What did you need, hon?"

He smiled up at her, and her professional smile kind of melted away as a real one replaced it. "Can you get me a coffee, two hot chocolates, an appetizer sampler, and some menus?"

She turned that very real smile to me. "Anything for you?"

When I paused, Gilpatrick chuckled and said, "go on, Nelson. I'm buying."

I stuttered out, "I... I don't want to take advantage?"

He shook his head. "If you'd expected, it'd be taking advantage. If you'd asked?" He held out a hand and wobbled it. "Maybe, maybe not. But neither of those is what's happening. D'you know what the number one cost for people living in the States is right now?"

I shrugged, although I suspected I knew the answer. When he waited, I realized I was indirectly wasting the waitresses time and said, "gotta be housing or medical insurance."

"Damn straight. I can go to a VA Hospital if I get sick, which I never do, and let's just say I've got a pretty good track record when it comes to finding places to crash. Hell, this time of year I can even find a spot in a park somewhere and rack out if I need to." He smiled up at the waitress. "But I prefer finding somewhere accommodating."

She giggled, and I said, "yeah, I'd like a hot chocolate too, and, um, a basket of onion rings?"

"You got it. I'll be back with the menus in just a minute."

Gilpatrick chuckled, shaking his head as he looked at me. "What?" I asked, more confused than upset.

"You really think I'm gonna drink two hot chocolates by myself?"

I'm lucky my skin doesn't show blushing much, because I sure as shit felt it. "Oh, hell. We should call her back, before..."

He caught my hand as I started to raise it, shaking his head as he did. "Don't worry about it. I'll drink it, or you'll drink it, or maybe we'll give it to her."

I set my hand down and said, "really? Flirting with a waitress? Isn't that kinda, I dunno, not really fair to her? She's not here to make friends and meet people, it's where she works."

He just smiled, although he nodded a little as he did. "Yeah, I get that. I'd never push. I mean, maybe, when I was way younger? But the world was a different place back then. Sensibilities change. But I can still play my part in that old game, just let her know that I'm open to the idea of her giving me her number, or giving me a call if I leave a card with the tip."

I smiled back, "fair. With the tip? Good to know you don't think the card itself is a tip."

He laughed at that, the rich, full sound filling the room with joy for a moment, joy that got reflected back from everyone except a curmudgeonly sort sitting all alone at a big booth in the corner of the room. "Oh, there was definitely a time I would have thought so, but those days are long, long past."

"Aw, I've heard so much about age and experience beating youth and enthusiasm."

That got another laugh out of him. "Oh, they've both got their benefits. I'm still in pretty damn good shape for a man my age, though, and when it comes to experience?" He shrugged, then lowered his voice so it carried to me and maybe the next table instead of filling the room. "I've had a partner or two tell me the card was a hell of a tip."

The waitress, who had just returned with our menus, heard the last part of that, but I don't think she'd caught the earlier byplay. I don't think she meant for us to hear her muttered, "mighty full of yourself, ain't you?"

Gilpatrick certainly did, though. He smiled up at her and said, "no offense intended, ma'am, but I'm certainly neither that long or that flexible." When she just stood there, jaw slowly dropping open at his brazenness, he gently took the menus from her, handed me one, fanned through the pages of his, smiled up at her and said, "I do apologize if I've offended, miss. Not my intent at all. Can I get the chicken fried steak with onion rings and corn instead of the mashed potatoes?"

Stolen novel; please report.

She blinked, then said, "you still want gravy on those?"

He tilted his head back and forth, then replied, "yeah. Yeah, let's go with that. Along with that can I get a stack of pancakes, two eggs over easy and some rye toast?"

She curled her mouth down into an appreciative frown, then pushed her professional smile back on and said, "impressive appetite."

He titled his head as he gave a self-deprecating little shrug. "I live a real active lifestyle. Got in the habit in the service and never really lost it when I retired."

She looked down at him with something a little less professional, maybe a little more calculating. "You seem pretty young to be retired."

He laughed at that, then said, "well, you know what it says on my cards and in my file, right?"

She shook her head. "No?"

He flicked out a card, simple sleight of hand, but she still smiled at the trick, which turned into a little chuckle when he said, "Black don't crack, baby."

She laughed, took the card and slipped it into her apron, then turned to me. "Can I get you anything?"

I'd gotten so involved watching Gilpatrick flirt that I'd completely forgot to look at the menu. I flopped it open and just opted for the first thing I saw. "Can I get the chicken-fried chicken? Oh, and do you guys have waffles?"

She nodded. "Yep. You want one?"

"Yeah."

"With the chicken or separate?"

I thought about it for a half second, and the jar of syrup in the condiment holder on the table decided me. "With, please."

"You want gravy with that?"

I could tell she'd already guessed my intentions, but said, "No thanks."

"Anything else?"

I shook my head and smiled. "Unlike my friend here, I definitely do not live an active lifestyle. I eat anything more I'm gonna start inflating like a balloon, ass first."

She laughed, took my menu, and said, "I'll have your appetizers out in just a second, guys."

With that she sashayed away. I do mean sashay, too, because I was in a perfect position to appreciate how she did. Aesthetically at least, although Gilpatrick openly turned his head to watch her first few steps. I looked at him and quietly said, "how the hell do you do that? Are you sure it's not some kind of mental Power?"

He chuckled and replied equally quietly. "If it is, it's one anybody can develop. For me? It's kind of like bushido."

That got one of my eyebrows going up of it's own accord. "Samurai philosophy?"

He nodded. "Yeah. You know it?"

"I mean, I'm not an expert, but I've watched a few Anime."

"See, there you go! So much new stuff to enjoy, I can't really overstate how awesome a time it is to be alive. Anyway, yeah, you've heard the part about accepting death if you're going to pick up a sword?"

"Not really?"

"Well, it's part of it. I mean, I've visited Japan and trained with a few guys a while back, but just to be clear I'm not an expert myself or anything. But I got that part really well. If you go into a fight with any kind of fear at all? You're at a disadvantage to the guy who has none. By accepting death? You let go of that fear. You go into the fight a walking dead man, so you can focus every bit of yourself on winning. Which doesn't always mean living, depending on what kind of a fight it is."

I nodded. It seemed like a really nihilistic way of looking at the world to me, completely at odds with Gilpatrick's stated and obvious enjoyment of life, but I could understand intellectually what he meant. "Okay, I get it, but how does that apply to, y'know," I nodded to the waitress, who was headed toward us with two plates of appetizers on a tray. "Flirting?"

She stepped up and set my onion rings in front of me and Gilpatrick's sampler in front of him. "Thanks, Denise."

She'd seen him glance at her chest as she bent over, and I'd seen the slightly annoyed look in her eye, but when he called her by the name on her nametag prominently displayed on her left breast, she thawed a little. "No problem. Do you want me to wait until you're done with those, or bring your food out when it's ready?"

"Whichever's easier on you, but if you don't care? Bring it out as soon as it's ready. Can't think of anything that's better cold than hot." He smiled up at her, a completely non-professional, honest smile.

She smirked down at him as she pulled four cups off the tray and put one in front of me and three in front of him. "I can think of a couple things."

Now it was his turn to raise an eyebrow. "Do tell?"

She laughed just a little. No, actually she giggled. Maybe tittered even. "We've got milkshakes."

"Oh, I might definitely have to check those out when we're done here."

When she said, "just let me know," I absolutely could not tell whether she'd said it as a flirtatious invitation or an attempt to upsell him with dessert.

When she got far enough away that he stopped looking, he turned back to me and said, "little bit of both."

I blinked. "You said you don't have mental Powers?"

He laughed again. Gilpatrick liked to laugh, and he'd made it clear that he found the modern world a joyous place. "Nelson, I've been around long enough to have a good guess what people are thinking after talking to them long enough. Enough to roll the dice on it at any rate. I mean, what's the worst that happens? I wind up embarrassing myself a little. Everybody should do that now and then. Shows them it's not the end of the world." As I blinked at that, trying to figure out whether that was a description of some kind of really low powered Mental Power or just a lot of experience conversing with people, he said, "it's like the flirting thing. If you go into it afraid of getting turned down, that fear's gonna show through. If you go into it knowing, balls to bone, that you're gonna get turned down, so you just have fun and play with it? You've got nothing to be afraid of. You'd be surprised how often that makes things easier. Or, y'know, harder, but in all the right ways."

I laughed at that, managing to keep my voice conversational as I choked out, "oh, yeah, I know what you're talking about."

He looked me straight in the eye at that point. While his smile hadn't dimmed in the least, he seemed absolutely serious when he said, "I know."