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perpetual_motionTitle: Toaster of Truth
Author: Perpetual Motion
Fandom: Keen Eddie
Pairing: Monty/Eddie
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Minor spoilers for “Sucker Punch”.
Summary: Monty, Eddie, a toaster, and a waiting room.
Dis: Not mine. Made it all up. Fox treated them like shit.
Author’s Notes:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
julianlee's birthday was in May. This is her birthday fic. It is very late. Deal. julianlee has been wonderfully patient. Also, this is an AU where Fiona actually went to New York with Nigel at the end of “Sucker Punch”.
Toaster of Truth
By Perpetual Motion
Their yelling match stopped when Monty picked up the toaster from its spot on the counter and flung it straight at Eddie’s head. Eddie, as usually happened when objects came flying at his head, got nailed.
“The fuck?” He slumped to the floor, one hand over his left eye, the other braced on the floor to keep him mostly upright. He pulled his hand away from his face and saw blood on his fingers. “You just threw a *toaster* at me.” When Monty didn’t answer, Eddie raised his head. Monty was standing in the kitchen looking absolutely shocked. “Monty.”
“I just threw a toaster at you.”
”Yeah, I covered that.” Eddie touched his head again and came away with more blood. “I may need stitches.” He glanced at Monty again. Monty was staring at the toaster. “Hey.” Monty looked at him. “Little help? I’m seeing triple, and it’s shiny.”
“Help, yeah. Sure.” Monty hurried across the kitchen into the living room and helped Eddie stand up. He held Eddie’s head between his hands and checked out the damage. “Stitches, yeah. I’ll take you to hospital.”
“Thanks.” Eddie’s voice was sarcastic. “Seems the least you can do, considering you *threw* a *toaster* at me.”
“Well.” Monty didn’t say anything else, just grabbed a light blue cloth from the kitchen for Eddie to press against his head and led him outside to the car. He waited until they were both buckled in before he spoke. “I was making a point.”
“With a toaster?”
“Yeah.”
“Aimed at my head?”
“Yeah.” Monty knew Eddie was giving him his ‘you English people are fucking crazy’ look. He didn’t say anything. He knew Eddie would ask.
“How does a *toaster* have anything to do with what we were fighting about?” Eddie was exasperated. They’d been yelling and screaming and name-calling for three hours, and they hadn’t even stopped for a water break. And he’d taken a small appliance to the head that apparently symbolized the whole problem for Monty.
“It was her toaster.” Monty’s tone stopped the conversation cold.
Eddie couldn’t come up with any response that would restart the conversation, so he stared at the window until they arrived at the hospital. He let Monty help him out of the car, since he was still a little iffy on his feet. “You were helping me rewire a socket in the kitchen. We finished, and you went to toss me the toaster because you thought I was looking. I wasn’t looking.”
Monty snorted. “I think I’ll handle the part where we lie so that I don’t get arrested.” He led Eddie into the reception area for trauma and gave his best smile to the woman at the desk. “Hello, there. My mate here just got a toaster slung at his head by his girl. We think he needs stitches.” The woman smiled beautifully at Monty and handed him the paperwork with a wink and her phone number on a post-it.
“Oh, sure, go with the modified truth.” Eddie slumped into a chair and let Monty fill out the paperwork. He narrowed his eyes, and winced from the pain it caused, when Monty slipped the post-it into his pocket. “Hey.”
“Hmmm? Are you allergic to any medication?”
“No. What are you doing?”
“Making sure they don’t give you something that’ll close your throat.”
“Not that.” Eddie yanked the post-it out of Monty’s pocket. “What are you doing?” He shoved the post-it under Monty’s nose.
“Never hurts to have a back-up.” Monty’s tone was distracted as he checked off chicken pox and pneumonia from the ‘had previously’ list. “Have you had mumps?”
“No. What do you mean ‘back-up’?” Eddie was getting angry, and his head was starting to pound.
“Back-up as in back-up.” Monty plucked the note from Eddie’s hand and slipped it back into his pocket. “In case you decide to go back to New York and track down certain parties that we don’t ever talk about.”
Monty’s tone, dejected and angry and matter-of-fact, was like another toaster to the head. Eddie had to remind himself not to fly into an argument in the middle of the hospital waiting room. “I like London,” is all he could think to say.
“It’s a nice place.” Monty gave Eddie an once-over, then stood up to give the clipboard back to the woman at the desk. He sat down next to Eddie and straightened his shirt collar. “But New York is a completely different person.”
“You threw a toaster at my head. It hurts. Can we skip the part where we make you a metaphor for London and make Fiona a metaphor for New York?” Eddie was exasperated. “New York is New York, and London is London, and you’re Monty, and she’s Fiona, and even if I *wanted* to prance off into the sunset with her, I wouldn’t be sitting around here with *you* pretending like I didn’t.”
“You won’t mail her the toaster.”
Eddie was lost again. He fell back on the standard. “What?”
“She’s e-mailed you, called you, and sent a courier for that toaster, and you won’t send it.”
“So?”
Monty rolled his eyes and gave Eddie a look that clearly read ‘you’re an idiot’. “You’re trying to grasp the final strings of your attachment to her and keep hold of them.”
“I-“ Eddie cut off when Monty gave him another ‘you’re an idiot’ look, this one had a few expletives in it. He thought about it for a minute, tried to see it from Monty’s point of view. Fiona kept insisting on getting her toaster. Eddie wouldn’t send it. He took a great deal of glee in not sending it. It clicked. “Have you ever been friends with a woman you *haven’t* slept with?”
“Well, that’s quite the stupid question.”
“That’s what I thought.” Eddie took the cloth off of his head to check his bleeding. “Fiona is a friend. She hates me with a passion most people tend to reserve for Hitler and his buddies, but she is a friend. However, because of the level of animosity that she feels for me, I like to mess with her when I get the chance. When she lived in the flat it was easy to do. I just had to be there. Now, she’s across the ocean, and it’s harder to get her riled up. I can tell you *exactly* how much it bothers her that I won’t send the toaster to her. Is it wrong to screw with her like that? Maybe. But I figure I’m due, seeing as she spent the months she was living it what was supposed to be *my* flat making it hell.” Eddie checked his bleeding again and left the cloth off of his head. “Also, she hit me a couple of times when we were finishing up that fighting ring, and I hold grudges against people who hit me.”
Monty was very quiet for a few minutes. He watched Eddie as Eddie prodded at the cut above his eye. “What kind of grudge do you hold against people who throw toasters at your head?” He sounded worried.
“Seeing as I think this is going to be a one-time adventure, I’m willing to let it pass if you’ll agree to *tell* me what’s bothering you rather than throwing small appliances at my head.”
“Yeah, okay.” Monty held out his hand and they shook on it. They lapsed back into silence, but Monty still had one more question. “Why don’t you talk about her?”
“Is she worth talking about?” Eddie leaned his head back on the seat and turned it to look at Monty.
“I talk about Audrey all the time. We even lunch with her sometimes.”
“That’s because she stole my perfect roommate for sex and started sending you to visit so that they could have sex all over your apartment.”
“And then we started having sex all over your apartment.” Monty grinned a little at that.
Eddie grinned back at him. “Seemed fair.”
“And the sex is great.” Monty’s grin went slightly wolfish before dropping off of his face entirely. “So, we lunch with a woman I used to sleep with and that I still live with, but we never even *mention* the woman you lived with but never slept with. Why not?”
“Because there’s nothing to mention. You and Audrey like each other. I like Fiona, and she hates me. We didn’t have the warm and cozy relationship you had with Audrey.”
“Ah.” Monty went silent again.
Eddie sighed. “Look, we’re going to be here for awhile, so why don’t you lay out the rest of your questions so that we can tackle them all at once. I’ve got nothing but time and a possible concussion.”
“It’s not a concussion.” Monty tapped his fingers against his knee. “Why do you like her?”
“Because she hates me.” Eddie shrugged at the confused look Monty gave him. “I like messing with people. It’s kind of a hobby. By extension, the fact that she won’t be swayed makes me like her.”
“That’s sick.” Monty shook his head at the mere idea of liking someone because of a one-sided hatred. “Have you considered seeing a shrink?”
“This from the sexaholic?”
“I am not a sexaholic. Just because I had sex who whomever I pleased before I fell into your bed does not mean that I have some sort of odd dependence on sex. I enjoy sex. A lot. As you well know.” Monty sounded peeved. “You damned Americans are such prudes.”
“I’ll tell that to a couple of our former presidents.”
“You do that.” Monty pushed his hair off of his face. “Why-“ He cut himself off so quickly that his teeth clicked together.
Eddie raised his eyebrows and immediately regretted it when a new shock of pain went through his head. “What?”
“Nothing.” Monty was very studiously *not* looking at Eddie.
“Monty, *what*?” Eddie was getting frustrated again. His was stuck in a hospital waiting room, his head hurt, and he was going to have to admit to being nailed in the head with a *toaster*. On top of that trio, Monty was starting to act suspiciously like every girl that had ever given Eddie the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ line. “Oh, shit.”
Monty’s head snapped up at Eddie’s swearing. “What? Are you all right? About to pass out?” He touched his fingertips to the wound on Eddie’s head.
“No, I’m not passing out.” Eddie brushed Monty’s fingers away from his head. “Are you about to call it off?”
“Call what off?” Monty’s attention was still on Eddie’s head. He wasn’t touching the cut, but his fingers were hovering over it like they wanted to zoom in and poke it.
“Your engagement to the Queen. What do you *think*?”
Monty’s brow furrowed, and his eyes dropped from Eddie’s forehead to his eyes. “Why would I call it off with you?”
“You threw a toaster at me.”
“And?”
Eddie sighed with impatience. “You *threw* a toaster at me. And now you’re sitting here making assumptions about Fiona and not finishing questions.”
“How do you turn that into a break-up?” Monty sounded confused.
“I…” Eddie trailed off as he thought about it. He didn’t really have an answer that made sense. “You threw a toaster at me. People don’t throw small appliances at each other unless something’s wrong.”
It was Monty’s turn to sigh. He leaned away from Eddie and slumped against his chair. “I believe you and I are in a very fucked up relationship, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay then.” Monty cocked his head at Eddie. “New rules, then.”
“Sure. What have you got?”
“Number one, I won’t throw toasters at you anymore.”
Eddie touched his wound again. “I’d appreciate that.”
“Number two, you will ship that damned toaster to Fiona and get it out of your flat.”
“Okay.”
“Number three, I will finish my questions, no matter how ridiculous they sound.”
Eddie couldn’t help but grin at that. “Ridiculous?”
“Yes.” Monty sounded slightly ashamed of himself. “You must understand, this question goes against every rule I’ve set up for myself as a man in a time of sexual freedom.”
“Understood.” Eddie leaned forward. “What’s the question?”
“Oh, God,” Monty took a deep breath and asked the question to the floor. “You and I, we’ve been doing what we do-“
“Would you just call it a relationship, already?”
“See, I would, except that the whole idea of a relationship is *also* against all the rules.”
“You know what I love about us? You can fling a toaster at me, and I can sit in a waiting room, and then you can put me into *more* pain by *insulting* me.”
Monty flushed, and he gave Eddie a glare. “I’m trying to ask why you’ve not asked me to move in with you. It’s a bit difficult. Do you *mind*?” Monty realized what he’d said just as he finished, and he covered his mouth with his hand as his eyes widened.
For his part, Eddie was having a similar reaction. His hand wasn’t over his mouth, but his eyes were huge. “I thought…” he tried to remember the argument they had had about the exact issue of sharing a place from a few months before. “You said you’d never move in with me because then we’d be getting way too cozy for your liking.”
“I’m aware of what I said.”
“Yeah, well, I wasn’t aware you’d changed your mind.”
“I wasn’t either.” Monty made a pained face. “Then Roger moved into my flat, and it became Roger and Audrey’s flat, and I was just the roommate who was sent over to your place for their previously mentioned, all-encompassing apartment sex. I see them, and they’re happy. And you and I get on all right, so I started wondering why you hadn’t said anything.”
“Because you’d looked at me like I was crazy.”
“I do that all the time.”
“You look at me like I’m American crazy. Not like I’m crazy, crazy.”
“Ah.” Monty nodded. “All right, then.”
Eddie realized that Monty wasn’t going to say anything else on the subject if he wasn’t pushed. “I didn’t know I was supposed to ask.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not against the idea.”
Monty smiled a little. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Eddie shrugged. “We’d have to get a new toaster.”
Monty’s smile widened. “Okay, yeah, we’ll do that.”
“You can’t throw it at my head.”
“You’ve no sense of fun.”
“Must be my damned American sense.”
“Must be.”
*
Fiona eyed the package with suspicion when the delivery man handed it to her. She recognized Eddie’s handwriting. “Excuse me.”
The delivery man looked up from his list of packages. “Yeah?”
“Did this package twitch or tick or vibrate when you were handling it?”
“No.” The delivery man took a step back like Fiona might attack. “I’ve got all I need from you lady.”
“Yes, of course. Thank you.” Fiona closed the apartment door and carried the package into the kitchen.
“What’s that, Petal?” Nigel looked up from his calculator and ledger when Fiona set the box on the table.
“Something from Eddie. Possibly something disgusting and dead.” Fiona used a kitchen knife to cut the tape on the box. She rummaged around pounds of packing peanuts and finally came up with her toaster. “He finally sent it!” She held it out to get a good look at it. “I thought he’d never do it!”
Nigel stood up and examined the toaster. “There appears to be a dent.” He pointed to a caved-in area near the bottom of the toaster.
Fiona shook her head in exasperation. “Probably the shipping company. These Americans don’t understand how to properly handle delicate packages.” She looked at the dent and shrugged. “Oh, well, we’ll set it up so that side faces the wall.”
“Brilliant idea, Petal.” Nigel kissed her cheek then straightened up like someone had shocked him. “Loo!” He hurried for the bathroom.
Fiona set the toaster on the counter and nodded happily at it.
*
“How’s it look?”
“Manly,” Monty nodded, “very manly.”
“Great.” Eddie pushed the toaster to the back of the counter and turned to face Monty. “Black was the right choice.”
“Yes.” Monty stepped forward until he had Eddie pressed against the counter. “So, here we are.”
“Yeah.”
“In our flat.”
“Yeah.” Eddie pushed his hips forward a bit and bumped Monty’s hips. “You’re unpacked.”
“Yeah.”
“The toaster’s in its place.”
“Yeah.”
“We should celebrate.”
Monty dropped to his knees and unsnapped Eddie’s jeans. “We should.”
The toaster made a clanging sound when it bounced on the counter.
Author: Perpetual Motion
Fandom: Keen Eddie
Pairing: Monty/Eddie
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Minor spoilers for “Sucker Punch”.
Summary: Monty, Eddie, a toaster, and a waiting room.
Dis: Not mine. Made it all up. Fox treated them like shit.
Author’s Notes:
julianlee's birthday was in May. This is her birthday fic. It is very late. Deal. julianlee has been wonderfully patient. Also, this is an AU where Fiona actually went to New York with Nigel at the end of “Sucker Punch”.Toaster of Truth
By Perpetual Motion
Their yelling match stopped when Monty picked up the toaster from its spot on the counter and flung it straight at Eddie’s head. Eddie, as usually happened when objects came flying at his head, got nailed.
“The fuck?” He slumped to the floor, one hand over his left eye, the other braced on the floor to keep him mostly upright. He pulled his hand away from his face and saw blood on his fingers. “You just threw a *toaster* at me.” When Monty didn’t answer, Eddie raised his head. Monty was standing in the kitchen looking absolutely shocked. “Monty.”
“I just threw a toaster at you.”
”Yeah, I covered that.” Eddie touched his head again and came away with more blood. “I may need stitches.” He glanced at Monty again. Monty was staring at the toaster. “Hey.” Monty looked at him. “Little help? I’m seeing triple, and it’s shiny.”
“Help, yeah. Sure.” Monty hurried across the kitchen into the living room and helped Eddie stand up. He held Eddie’s head between his hands and checked out the damage. “Stitches, yeah. I’ll take you to hospital.”
“Thanks.” Eddie’s voice was sarcastic. “Seems the least you can do, considering you *threw* a *toaster* at me.”
“Well.” Monty didn’t say anything else, just grabbed a light blue cloth from the kitchen for Eddie to press against his head and led him outside to the car. He waited until they were both buckled in before he spoke. “I was making a point.”
“With a toaster?”
“Yeah.”
“Aimed at my head?”
“Yeah.” Monty knew Eddie was giving him his ‘you English people are fucking crazy’ look. He didn’t say anything. He knew Eddie would ask.
“How does a *toaster* have anything to do with what we were fighting about?” Eddie was exasperated. They’d been yelling and screaming and name-calling for three hours, and they hadn’t even stopped for a water break. And he’d taken a small appliance to the head that apparently symbolized the whole problem for Monty.
“It was her toaster.” Monty’s tone stopped the conversation cold.
Eddie couldn’t come up with any response that would restart the conversation, so he stared at the window until they arrived at the hospital. He let Monty help him out of the car, since he was still a little iffy on his feet. “You were helping me rewire a socket in the kitchen. We finished, and you went to toss me the toaster because you thought I was looking. I wasn’t looking.”
Monty snorted. “I think I’ll handle the part where we lie so that I don’t get arrested.” He led Eddie into the reception area for trauma and gave his best smile to the woman at the desk. “Hello, there. My mate here just got a toaster slung at his head by his girl. We think he needs stitches.” The woman smiled beautifully at Monty and handed him the paperwork with a wink and her phone number on a post-it.
“Oh, sure, go with the modified truth.” Eddie slumped into a chair and let Monty fill out the paperwork. He narrowed his eyes, and winced from the pain it caused, when Monty slipped the post-it into his pocket. “Hey.”
“Hmmm? Are you allergic to any medication?”
“No. What are you doing?”
“Making sure they don’t give you something that’ll close your throat.”
“Not that.” Eddie yanked the post-it out of Monty’s pocket. “What are you doing?” He shoved the post-it under Monty’s nose.
“Never hurts to have a back-up.” Monty’s tone was distracted as he checked off chicken pox and pneumonia from the ‘had previously’ list. “Have you had mumps?”
“No. What do you mean ‘back-up’?” Eddie was getting angry, and his head was starting to pound.
“Back-up as in back-up.” Monty plucked the note from Eddie’s hand and slipped it back into his pocket. “In case you decide to go back to New York and track down certain parties that we don’t ever talk about.”
Monty’s tone, dejected and angry and matter-of-fact, was like another toaster to the head. Eddie had to remind himself not to fly into an argument in the middle of the hospital waiting room. “I like London,” is all he could think to say.
“It’s a nice place.” Monty gave Eddie an once-over, then stood up to give the clipboard back to the woman at the desk. He sat down next to Eddie and straightened his shirt collar. “But New York is a completely different person.”
“You threw a toaster at my head. It hurts. Can we skip the part where we make you a metaphor for London and make Fiona a metaphor for New York?” Eddie was exasperated. “New York is New York, and London is London, and you’re Monty, and she’s Fiona, and even if I *wanted* to prance off into the sunset with her, I wouldn’t be sitting around here with *you* pretending like I didn’t.”
“You won’t mail her the toaster.”
Eddie was lost again. He fell back on the standard. “What?”
“She’s e-mailed you, called you, and sent a courier for that toaster, and you won’t send it.”
“So?”
Monty rolled his eyes and gave Eddie a look that clearly read ‘you’re an idiot’. “You’re trying to grasp the final strings of your attachment to her and keep hold of them.”
“I-“ Eddie cut off when Monty gave him another ‘you’re an idiot’ look, this one had a few expletives in it. He thought about it for a minute, tried to see it from Monty’s point of view. Fiona kept insisting on getting her toaster. Eddie wouldn’t send it. He took a great deal of glee in not sending it. It clicked. “Have you ever been friends with a woman you *haven’t* slept with?”
“Well, that’s quite the stupid question.”
“That’s what I thought.” Eddie took the cloth off of his head to check his bleeding. “Fiona is a friend. She hates me with a passion most people tend to reserve for Hitler and his buddies, but she is a friend. However, because of the level of animosity that she feels for me, I like to mess with her when I get the chance. When she lived in the flat it was easy to do. I just had to be there. Now, she’s across the ocean, and it’s harder to get her riled up. I can tell you *exactly* how much it bothers her that I won’t send the toaster to her. Is it wrong to screw with her like that? Maybe. But I figure I’m due, seeing as she spent the months she was living it what was supposed to be *my* flat making it hell.” Eddie checked his bleeding again and left the cloth off of his head. “Also, she hit me a couple of times when we were finishing up that fighting ring, and I hold grudges against people who hit me.”
Monty was very quiet for a few minutes. He watched Eddie as Eddie prodded at the cut above his eye. “What kind of grudge do you hold against people who throw toasters at your head?” He sounded worried.
“Seeing as I think this is going to be a one-time adventure, I’m willing to let it pass if you’ll agree to *tell* me what’s bothering you rather than throwing small appliances at my head.”
“Yeah, okay.” Monty held out his hand and they shook on it. They lapsed back into silence, but Monty still had one more question. “Why don’t you talk about her?”
“Is she worth talking about?” Eddie leaned his head back on the seat and turned it to look at Monty.
“I talk about Audrey all the time. We even lunch with her sometimes.”
“That’s because she stole my perfect roommate for sex and started sending you to visit so that they could have sex all over your apartment.”
“And then we started having sex all over your apartment.” Monty grinned a little at that.
Eddie grinned back at him. “Seemed fair.”
“And the sex is great.” Monty’s grin went slightly wolfish before dropping off of his face entirely. “So, we lunch with a woman I used to sleep with and that I still live with, but we never even *mention* the woman you lived with but never slept with. Why not?”
“Because there’s nothing to mention. You and Audrey like each other. I like Fiona, and she hates me. We didn’t have the warm and cozy relationship you had with Audrey.”
“Ah.” Monty went silent again.
Eddie sighed. “Look, we’re going to be here for awhile, so why don’t you lay out the rest of your questions so that we can tackle them all at once. I’ve got nothing but time and a possible concussion.”
“It’s not a concussion.” Monty tapped his fingers against his knee. “Why do you like her?”
“Because she hates me.” Eddie shrugged at the confused look Monty gave him. “I like messing with people. It’s kind of a hobby. By extension, the fact that she won’t be swayed makes me like her.”
“That’s sick.” Monty shook his head at the mere idea of liking someone because of a one-sided hatred. “Have you considered seeing a shrink?”
“This from the sexaholic?”
“I am not a sexaholic. Just because I had sex who whomever I pleased before I fell into your bed does not mean that I have some sort of odd dependence on sex. I enjoy sex. A lot. As you well know.” Monty sounded peeved. “You damned Americans are such prudes.”
“I’ll tell that to a couple of our former presidents.”
“You do that.” Monty pushed his hair off of his face. “Why-“ He cut himself off so quickly that his teeth clicked together.
Eddie raised his eyebrows and immediately regretted it when a new shock of pain went through his head. “What?”
“Nothing.” Monty was very studiously *not* looking at Eddie.
“Monty, *what*?” Eddie was getting frustrated again. His was stuck in a hospital waiting room, his head hurt, and he was going to have to admit to being nailed in the head with a *toaster*. On top of that trio, Monty was starting to act suspiciously like every girl that had ever given Eddie the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ line. “Oh, shit.”
Monty’s head snapped up at Eddie’s swearing. “What? Are you all right? About to pass out?” He touched his fingertips to the wound on Eddie’s head.
“No, I’m not passing out.” Eddie brushed Monty’s fingers away from his head. “Are you about to call it off?”
“Call what off?” Monty’s attention was still on Eddie’s head. He wasn’t touching the cut, but his fingers were hovering over it like they wanted to zoom in and poke it.
“Your engagement to the Queen. What do you *think*?”
Monty’s brow furrowed, and his eyes dropped from Eddie’s forehead to his eyes. “Why would I call it off with you?”
“You threw a toaster at me.”
“And?”
Eddie sighed with impatience. “You *threw* a toaster at me. And now you’re sitting here making assumptions about Fiona and not finishing questions.”
“How do you turn that into a break-up?” Monty sounded confused.
“I…” Eddie trailed off as he thought about it. He didn’t really have an answer that made sense. “You threw a toaster at me. People don’t throw small appliances at each other unless something’s wrong.”
It was Monty’s turn to sigh. He leaned away from Eddie and slumped against his chair. “I believe you and I are in a very fucked up relationship, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay then.” Monty cocked his head at Eddie. “New rules, then.”
“Sure. What have you got?”
“Number one, I won’t throw toasters at you anymore.”
Eddie touched his wound again. “I’d appreciate that.”
“Number two, you will ship that damned toaster to Fiona and get it out of your flat.”
“Okay.”
“Number three, I will finish my questions, no matter how ridiculous they sound.”
Eddie couldn’t help but grin at that. “Ridiculous?”
“Yes.” Monty sounded slightly ashamed of himself. “You must understand, this question goes against every rule I’ve set up for myself as a man in a time of sexual freedom.”
“Understood.” Eddie leaned forward. “What’s the question?”
“Oh, God,” Monty took a deep breath and asked the question to the floor. “You and I, we’ve been doing what we do-“
“Would you just call it a relationship, already?”
“See, I would, except that the whole idea of a relationship is *also* against all the rules.”
“You know what I love about us? You can fling a toaster at me, and I can sit in a waiting room, and then you can put me into *more* pain by *insulting* me.”
Monty flushed, and he gave Eddie a glare. “I’m trying to ask why you’ve not asked me to move in with you. It’s a bit difficult. Do you *mind*?” Monty realized what he’d said just as he finished, and he covered his mouth with his hand as his eyes widened.
For his part, Eddie was having a similar reaction. His hand wasn’t over his mouth, but his eyes were huge. “I thought…” he tried to remember the argument they had had about the exact issue of sharing a place from a few months before. “You said you’d never move in with me because then we’d be getting way too cozy for your liking.”
“I’m aware of what I said.”
“Yeah, well, I wasn’t aware you’d changed your mind.”
“I wasn’t either.” Monty made a pained face. “Then Roger moved into my flat, and it became Roger and Audrey’s flat, and I was just the roommate who was sent over to your place for their previously mentioned, all-encompassing apartment sex. I see them, and they’re happy. And you and I get on all right, so I started wondering why you hadn’t said anything.”
“Because you’d looked at me like I was crazy.”
“I do that all the time.”
“You look at me like I’m American crazy. Not like I’m crazy, crazy.”
“Ah.” Monty nodded. “All right, then.”
Eddie realized that Monty wasn’t going to say anything else on the subject if he wasn’t pushed. “I didn’t know I was supposed to ask.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not against the idea.”
Monty smiled a little. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Eddie shrugged. “We’d have to get a new toaster.”
Monty’s smile widened. “Okay, yeah, we’ll do that.”
“You can’t throw it at my head.”
“You’ve no sense of fun.”
“Must be my damned American sense.”
“Must be.”
*
Fiona eyed the package with suspicion when the delivery man handed it to her. She recognized Eddie’s handwriting. “Excuse me.”
The delivery man looked up from his list of packages. “Yeah?”
“Did this package twitch or tick or vibrate when you were handling it?”
“No.” The delivery man took a step back like Fiona might attack. “I’ve got all I need from you lady.”
“Yes, of course. Thank you.” Fiona closed the apartment door and carried the package into the kitchen.
“What’s that, Petal?” Nigel looked up from his calculator and ledger when Fiona set the box on the table.
“Something from Eddie. Possibly something disgusting and dead.” Fiona used a kitchen knife to cut the tape on the box. She rummaged around pounds of packing peanuts and finally came up with her toaster. “He finally sent it!” She held it out to get a good look at it. “I thought he’d never do it!”
Nigel stood up and examined the toaster. “There appears to be a dent.” He pointed to a caved-in area near the bottom of the toaster.
Fiona shook her head in exasperation. “Probably the shipping company. These Americans don’t understand how to properly handle delicate packages.” She looked at the dent and shrugged. “Oh, well, we’ll set it up so that side faces the wall.”
“Brilliant idea, Petal.” Nigel kissed her cheek then straightened up like someone had shocked him. “Loo!” He hurried for the bathroom.
Fiona set the toaster on the counter and nodded happily at it.
*
“How’s it look?”
“Manly,” Monty nodded, “very manly.”
“Great.” Eddie pushed the toaster to the back of the counter and turned to face Monty. “Black was the right choice.”
“Yes.” Monty stepped forward until he had Eddie pressed against the counter. “So, here we are.”
“Yeah.”
“In our flat.”
“Yeah.” Eddie pushed his hips forward a bit and bumped Monty’s hips. “You’re unpacked.”
“Yeah.”
“The toaster’s in its place.”
“Yeah.”
“We should celebrate.”
Monty dropped to his knees and unsnapped Eddie’s jeans. “We should.”
The toaster made a clanging sound when it bounced on the counter.
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no subject
on 2005-02-14 05:29 pm (UTC)You have Monty's voice so pegged. I think my favorite line is, "I believe you and I are in a very fucked up relationship, yeah?" So Monty. The interactions between him & Eddie crack me up - especially when he goes on that little ramble about being "a man in a time of sexual freedom." Awesome. The scene with Fiona & Nigel is fantastic - Fiona would ask if the package ticked, & any fic that can work in "Loo!" is a keeper in my book. The "your engagement to the Queen" made me laugh out loud.
But, most importantly of all: he threw a toaster at Eddie's head. A toaster. You rock.
It's awesome, love, thanks. Well worth the wait!
no subject
on 2005-02-14 05:38 pm (UTC)Whatever will I do with you?
::Ponders::
So glad you enjoyed it, and I worked the "Loo!" moment in just for you.
"Loo!"