Ch 27. Day Off
It turned out that John couldn’t bring Andressa double the pastries the next day after all. The cleanup of the mimic building had meant that all nearby buildings needed to be closed down as well for safety reasons. Because of that John was lazing in the late morning with a rapidly cooling mug of coffee as he read one of the books he’d gotten earlier in the week from the Infinite Library.
He felt a bit guilty not being able to see any of his patients that day, but home visits were out of the question given how scattered they all were across Avalon and other planes. None of the appointments were emergencies anyway, and Andressa had managed to get all of them new appointments the following week without too much trouble. Maybe he didn’t feel guilty so much as useless.
He pushed himself off of his couch, finishing his coffee in a few large gulps. If he got moving that would probably help him feel better. He took a shower and got ready for the day, throwing on just a dress shirt and slacks without the suit-jacket and tie. He walked out of his front door and dodged a woman with the horns of an elk on the stairs as he made his way onto the street. It was nearly afternoon, and there was a warm breeze blowing through Avalon, pushing his hair into his eyes as he looked around. He pushed it back and started making his way to the market.
He wasn’t usually out at this time of day and expected for some reason for there to be less traffic on the streets, but of course Avalon didn’t exactly follow a normal nine to five work schedule. As such it was as busy as it always was. There was an entire herd of centaur taking up the main road, carrying their tents and goods with them as they made their way from the grasslands in one plane to another that could be accessed on the other end of the city.
John waited patiently until a few of the centaurs noticed him and parted so that he could cross the main road to the market. He gave them a thankful wave as he passed through which they returned. He’d heard some horror stories about centaur herds in general from the adventurers he worked with, but the ones that he’d encountered in Avalon had all been kind and reasonable.
There were no grocery stores in Avalon; instead there were a number of markets scattered around that sold everything from the golden apples of Idunn, to rice. The market nearest to John’s apartment was mostly fey and elven run. Usually he walked a bit further so that he could go to the more diverse one a few more blocks over, but he had the time to waste that day so he decided to go to the closer one first and if they didn’t have what he wanted he’d walk a few more blocks up.
The stalls weren’t built so much as grown, with a lot of the sellers actually offering sales straight from the branch or the vine. John didn’t do a lot of cooking. He preferred to go out to eat at one of Avalon’s thousands of unique restaurants and stalls, but he did like to keep easy food in the house. He stopped by one that looked less like a stall and more like a small child sleeping under an apple tree.
“How much?” he asked, pointing upward at the apples.
The cherubic child opened his eyes showing sclera as black as coal and smiled at him just a bit too widely.
“One unpleasant dream per, or a nightmare for four.”
John sighed. “Do you take coin?”
The child nodded. “Yes. Two copper for four.”
“Fair enough,” said John, handing him the payment. He held the bag he’d brought open under the tree and three of the apples fell into it perfectly, with him having to dive a bit to catch the fourth.
He heard a chuckle from the little changeling, but when he looked at them again they were seemingly back asleep.
He shook his head and continued shopping. After a few hours he’d added blueberries, strawberries, and some sweetleaf wine. His last stop was at Lembas’s famous bread stand and once he got a slice of that, it only took a crumb to fill you after all, then he started to make his way back to his apartment.
The walk back was pleasant, but because the day was so hot there were a number of lizardkin taking up space to sunbathe on the sidewalk so he had to navigate his way around them. There was even a small wyvern that took up the entire sidewalk and spilled a bit into the street. There was one guard standing there to respond to it, but he seemed a bit at a loss as he contemplated the size of it.
John walked up the stairs to his apartment and put his bundle of groceries into the freezer chest. Technically the dimensional storage bag he’d had them in would let them maintain their status for as long as they were inside it, but he liked his fruit to be a bit cold. He kept an apple out, and once everything was packed away he cored it and cut it into slices which he placed into a bowl. He began to eat as he considered what else he could do to kill the time. He didn’t mind having days off, but when they were unexpected he truly felt like he had no idea what to do with himself.
After finishing his apples and reading a bit more, John decided to force himself to work out a bit. He changed into some loose-fitting linen clothes he kept around and found the long staff with the weight enchantment on it. He worked his way through some basic movements that he remembered from half-assed attempts to join gyms back on Earth until he was sweating heavily. He didn’t usually bother since he spent so much time walking around the city, but he did feel a bit better after exerting himself.
He was wiping his face off with a towel when he heard a knock at the door. He tossed the towel to the side and went to answer it. Last time he’d gotten a knock on the door it was a goblin in a girl-scout uniform trying to sell baked goods that had been clearly taken from a dumpster.
He opened the door to a pretty red face. She was wearing a black halter top and shorts along with a wide brimmed hat with holes specifically for her horns, circular white sunglasses, and a smattering of golden jewelry.
“Andressa?” he asked, surprised.
“Have you forgotten what I look like without a desk in front of me?” She asked with a teasing smile.
“That, and I wasn’t expecting to see you at my door.”
She shrugged as she walked past him and started to look around.
“This is a nice place, I was expecting something more bachelor-y.”
He closed the door and turned to her. “A Pulp Fiction poster on the wall and a bed without a frame?” he asked.
“Pulp Fiction?” she asked.
He shook his head, “Just a bad Earth reference.”
She nodded and shamelessly opened the door to his bedroom and peeked inside. She laughed. “You sleep on a hammock? Were you raised a sailor?”
“I just find it comfortable is all.”
“What do you do if you have female company? Or is it too rare a thing to worry about?”
He opened his mouth to retort, but it had moved faster than his brain did and he had nothing. She’d caught him on the back foot by arriving at his apartment, not to mention he’d only just finished his workout. She had already darkened to a particularly pretty shade of burgundy by the time she’d walked into his kitchen.
She slung her backpack off of her back and placed it on the counter in front of her. She reached inside and pulled out two large smoking containers. She looked at him.
“I figured I owed you for all the treats you bring in every morning. It’s that dwarven barbecue you like so much. The smoked cave-boar ribs in that sweet dark sauce.”
He blinked a little and smiled at her. “That’s my favorite actually.” She’d seen him take that order back into his office more than once. He didn’t like to eat ribs in public. He didn’t exactly do so in a dignified manner, as that wasn’t possible. It was probably just another method to bother him, but it was also a thoughtful thing to do so he decided to ignore the other motive.
“Thank you, Andressa.”
“You’re welcome.” She looked around. “I take it back, only a bachelor wouldn’t think to get a dining table.”
She lifted each of the heavy platters with one hand and put them down on the coffee table. His mouth was watering as he sat next to her and started to dig into it. As he figuratively tore into his, she literally tore into her own. Demons' sharp teeth and powerful jaws meant that they usually ate this type of meal; bones and all, and she was no exception. Andressa would bite the ribs in half, suck the marrow out of the remaining half, dip that half in more sauce and then finish it off. He’d been used to strange eating habits with all of his experiences in Avalon. The only problem was that the crunch of bones was so loud they couldn’t really talk until she was done.
He blinked. He was surprised that he’d rather hear more barbs from her than be able to put his full focus on his ribs. His crush was even worse than he’d thought. He decided to just enjoy her company and the ribs. When they were done she ignited the barbecue sauce on her hands and mouth to burn them clean. It left the apartment smelling delicious.
“Do you have any other plans for the day?” he asked as he took her plate and his own to the trash, a large hole that led to the bottom of the tree where it fed on all the refuse from its tenants. It was starting to get dark out.
She sighed and laid languidly on his couch in a way he found tantalizing. “No, I’ve been having trouble figuring out what to do today to be honest.”
He reached into a cabinet and hesitated as he moved to grab the bottle of wine. “Would you like to have a drink?” he asked.
“Sure. What do you have?”
“I have red and white wine. I usually go out to drink. These are gifts from a halfling vintner. I also just got a sweetleaf this morning.”
“I’ll have the white.”
He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. He’d been expecting her to ask for the red.
She smiled back at him. “What? Not everything I like has to be red.”
He shook his head as he brought the bottle back to the coffee table along with two glasses. He handed her the bottle and she quickly removed the cork with her bare hands and a smirk before handing it back to him to pour.
He generously filled each glass and took a nice long sip. It was a dry white, and quite good. Andressa seemed to share his opinion as she let out a satisfied sigh after finishing her sip.
The one glass became two, and then three, and then very suddenly it was the middle of the night and Andressa had fallen asleep on the couch after he’d gotten up to go to the bathroom. John grabbed an extra blanket and gently draped it over her shoulder, feeling a bit of a jolt as his hand brushed the bare skin of her arm.
“Sleep well,” he said as he walked back to his own room, not noticing that her eyes had opened.