Simple Gifts
Feb. 16th, 2011 10:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_scrappyThe Saturday before Valentine's, Ames returned from running errands to find a bright pink bakery box sitting on her doormat.
Her first thought was to pick it up. Her second thought, which had paid just a bit more attention in class, led her to kneel on the floor of the hallway and (gently, gently) press her ear to the cardboard, listening for clicking, humming, or any other sounds baked goods should not be making. She didn't hear anything, but that didn't mean much when it came to explosives. That's what Brody had told her, anyway.
There was a note on the top, tied with red ribbon to one length of the twine binding the box. She took a slow breath, then reached out with her thumb and pinky to grasp the very edge of the paper and gingerly turn it over.
Happy Valentine's Day it said in swirly type, over a faint rose-and-hearts pattern. That was it, though. No name, no quirky clues, no indication at all of who'd sent it. She sucked the inside of her cheek between her teeth and drummed her fingers on her thigh as she eyed the box with a roiling mix of suspicion and curiosity.
Oh, hell.
Her hand lashed out. Her fingers slid beneath the twine and in one swift movement she was back on her feet with the box held in front of her like it was a, well--
But nothing happened. And the muted patter of soft, crumbly things colliding into each other suggested that the box was, in fact, full of baked goods. Which meant that the last ten minutes had officially done nothing other than make her look like a complete idiot to anyone who happened to be watching. Awesome.
She fished her apartment keys out of her coat pocket, unlocked the door, and stomped inside.
She didn't pause to shuck off her coat or kick off her shoes. Instead she chucked her purse onto the sofa on her way to the kitchen, where she plopped the box onto the counter, plucked a knife from the nearby block, and sliced open the twine. She rested her fingers on either side of the lid, slowly sliding it up to reveal--
"...What?"
They were cookies. Fish shaped cookies to be exact, iced in a variety of cheerful blues, yellows, and oranges. Her first thought was that they looked delicious, but this time her first thought was also smart enough to point out that that only meant her would-be assassin had figured out she had a sweet tooth and was using it against her. Poison was much neater than explosives, after all. Harder to trace too, depending on what they used and how long it took someone to find her. At least that's what they said on all those crime shows.
She closed the lid again. Nuh-uh. No way she was falling for that.
---
...Until three hours later when her last ounce of willpower was steadily draining away. Sure they were a box of cookies from a bakery she'd never heard of, courtesy of an anonymous gifter (and she'd gone down her list of potential suspects, but the handful that weren't in the pen or half a continent away wouldn't have bothered to send her jack), but that didn't mean they were dangerous. Really, who'd have it out for her? She hadn't done any stealing off the clock since... the museum job. And she couldn't think of anyone she'd pissed off badly enough that they'd want her dead.
Of course she could've said the same thing a few weeks back, on the trip to Vegas she took before she got married. She tried not to think about it too often.
But still. The odds of a professional assassin using cookies as a murder method were slim. Right? There was no guarantee she'd eat them, after all. Banking a whole job on her doing so would be dumb at best.
Yet here you are. She thought. And here was a cookie, suddenly in her hand.
She sniffed it. No hint of almonds, so that ruled out arsenic. Then she poked it with her tongue, which didn't instantly start bubbling and dissolving before her eyes, ruling out...nothing, really, unless the assassin happened to be a cartoon character.
She wasn't going to get anywhere doing this. There was only one way to know for sure.
She drew a deep breath, closed her eyes, and jammed the head of the fish into her mouth. Her jaw moved in cautious silence for several tense seconds. Then, she swallowed.
A short gasp escaped her throat. Her eyes popped open. She sagged against the counter as her hand shot up to her mouth, which promptly crunched off another chunk of the cookie while Ames shivered in utter pleasure.
That settled it. Nothing so delicious could possibly be deadly.
---
Later, armed with two more cookies and a steaming mug of chocolate milk, Ames returned to her bedroom. Spread across the mattress were several blueprints pinned down by service manuals as thick as her thumb was long-- and all of them bore large, bold warnings that suggested their presence in Ames' bedroom might not be in compliance with federal law. Not that she'd let a little thing like that get in the way of higher learning; she never knew when she might have to bust a Raymore JS1328 Biometric Security System.
She plopped onto the bed and set the mug down on her nightstand, and reached to do the same for the cookies as well-- and that's when it caught her eye.
On her nightstand, nestled between her alarm clock and a cup holding the watery remains of last week's Big Gulp, was a can of fish food. It had been sitting there for a few days now while the reason for its existence remained not ignored, just...awaiting a free moment for further consideration. And a clue. A clue would've been real helpful. Because "Sure" fell into the same category of helpful non-answers as "Yes" when asked "Do you like the red dress or the black one?"
Fish cookies. Can of fish food."Let me know when you find..."
She picked up the can and turned it over in her palm, shaking her head as a smile wide enough to make her cheeks protest stretched across her face.
All right then. Tomorrow. Because Ames was guilty of plenty of things, but backing down from a challenge wasn't one of them. Besides, if she didn't at least take a shot at it all she'd get is eyebrow when he came back. If he came back. Her stomach gave a fretful lurch at the thought, but she willed the feeling away. It's not like he'd be the first person to breeze out of her life, if he did. She'd get over it, eventually.
So. In the morning-- or afternoon, depending on which offered her a better opportunity to avoid Chance, or Ilsa-- she'd go to the office. In the meantime though, there was an important matter attend to.
She broke a piece off of one of the cookies and popped it into her mouth, then slumped against her pillows with a sigh. Bliss.
Her first thought was to pick it up. Her second thought, which had paid just a bit more attention in class, led her to kneel on the floor of the hallway and (gently, gently) press her ear to the cardboard, listening for clicking, humming, or any other sounds baked goods should not be making. She didn't hear anything, but that didn't mean much when it came to explosives. That's what Brody had told her, anyway.
There was a note on the top, tied with red ribbon to one length of the twine binding the box. She took a slow breath, then reached out with her thumb and pinky to grasp the very edge of the paper and gingerly turn it over.
Happy Valentine's Day it said in swirly type, over a faint rose-and-hearts pattern. That was it, though. No name, no quirky clues, no indication at all of who'd sent it. She sucked the inside of her cheek between her teeth and drummed her fingers on her thigh as she eyed the box with a roiling mix of suspicion and curiosity.
Oh, hell.
Her hand lashed out. Her fingers slid beneath the twine and in one swift movement she was back on her feet with the box held in front of her like it was a, well--
But nothing happened. And the muted patter of soft, crumbly things colliding into each other suggested that the box was, in fact, full of baked goods. Which meant that the last ten minutes had officially done nothing other than make her look like a complete idiot to anyone who happened to be watching. Awesome.
She fished her apartment keys out of her coat pocket, unlocked the door, and stomped inside.
She didn't pause to shuck off her coat or kick off her shoes. Instead she chucked her purse onto the sofa on her way to the kitchen, where she plopped the box onto the counter, plucked a knife from the nearby block, and sliced open the twine. She rested her fingers on either side of the lid, slowly sliding it up to reveal--
"...What?"
They were cookies. Fish shaped cookies to be exact, iced in a variety of cheerful blues, yellows, and oranges. Her first thought was that they looked delicious, but this time her first thought was also smart enough to point out that that only meant her would-be assassin had figured out she had a sweet tooth and was using it against her. Poison was much neater than explosives, after all. Harder to trace too, depending on what they used and how long it took someone to find her. At least that's what they said on all those crime shows.
She closed the lid again. Nuh-uh. No way she was falling for that.
---
...Until three hours later when her last ounce of willpower was steadily draining away. Sure they were a box of cookies from a bakery she'd never heard of, courtesy of an anonymous gifter (and she'd gone down her list of potential suspects, but the handful that weren't in the pen or half a continent away wouldn't have bothered to send her jack), but that didn't mean they were dangerous. Really, who'd have it out for her? She hadn't done any stealing off the clock since... the museum job. And she couldn't think of anyone she'd pissed off badly enough that they'd want her dead.
Of course she could've said the same thing a few weeks back, on the trip to Vegas she took before she got married. She tried not to think about it too often.
But still. The odds of a professional assassin using cookies as a murder method were slim. Right? There was no guarantee she'd eat them, after all. Banking a whole job on her doing so would be dumb at best.
Yet here you are. She thought. And here was a cookie, suddenly in her hand.
She sniffed it. No hint of almonds, so that ruled out arsenic. Then she poked it with her tongue, which didn't instantly start bubbling and dissolving before her eyes, ruling out...nothing, really, unless the assassin happened to be a cartoon character.
She wasn't going to get anywhere doing this. There was only one way to know for sure.
She drew a deep breath, closed her eyes, and jammed the head of the fish into her mouth. Her jaw moved in cautious silence for several tense seconds. Then, she swallowed.
A short gasp escaped her throat. Her eyes popped open. She sagged against the counter as her hand shot up to her mouth, which promptly crunched off another chunk of the cookie while Ames shivered in utter pleasure.
That settled it. Nothing so delicious could possibly be deadly.
---
Later, armed with two more cookies and a steaming mug of chocolate milk, Ames returned to her bedroom. Spread across the mattress were several blueprints pinned down by service manuals as thick as her thumb was long-- and all of them bore large, bold warnings that suggested their presence in Ames' bedroom might not be in compliance with federal law. Not that she'd let a little thing like that get in the way of higher learning; she never knew when she might have to bust a Raymore JS1328 Biometric Security System.
She plopped onto the bed and set the mug down on her nightstand, and reached to do the same for the cookies as well-- and that's when it caught her eye.
On her nightstand, nestled between her alarm clock and a cup holding the watery remains of last week's Big Gulp, was a can of fish food. It had been sitting there for a few days now while the reason for its existence remained not ignored, just...awaiting a free moment for further consideration. And a clue. A clue would've been real helpful. Because "Sure" fell into the same category of helpful non-answers as "Yes" when asked "Do you like the red dress or the black one?"
Fish cookies. Can of fish food."Let me know when you find..."
She picked up the can and turned it over in her palm, shaking her head as a smile wide enough to make her cheeks protest stretched across her face.
All right then. Tomorrow. Because Ames was guilty of plenty of things, but backing down from a challenge wasn't one of them. Besides, if she didn't at least take a shot at it all she'd get is eyebrow when he came back. If he came back. Her stomach gave a fretful lurch at the thought, but she willed the feeling away. It's not like he'd be the first person to breeze out of her life, if he did. She'd get over it, eventually.
So. In the morning-- or afternoon, depending on which offered her a better opportunity to avoid Chance, or Ilsa-- she'd go to the office. In the meantime though, there was an important matter attend to.
She broke a piece off of one of the cookies and popped it into her mouth, then slumped against her pillows with a sigh. Bliss.
