Title: Sweet'N Low

Author: Syn

E-Mail: veruca_werewolf@hotmail.com

Rating: R

Fandom: Dead Like Me

Content: George/Rube

Spoilers: First Season

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters, nor am I associated with Sweet'N Low in any way. 

Summary: George is sure she's done something wrong, but Rube won't give her any clues.

A/N: Employing the big run on sentences for this because I like that style...and George/Rube. There's no point to this fic, I just wrote it one night out of nowhere cuz I missed watching the show on Friday's.  :)

Feedback: I would greatly appreciate it

 

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He doesn't understand me.  I can tell by that dark glare, the corners of his lips turned upward in annoyance (amusement?), his head cocked just so--like he's ready to throw an insult or a weighted question in my direction like I couldn't possibly understand the importance of his work and his world and his system.  Like I'm a child all of sudden, unworthy to sit at his table, to order him bacon or coffee or eat the whipped cream off the top of his cocoa 'cause he didn't order whipped cream and he doesn't want it now and he's already made his complaints to management but they don't give a shit and he's fine with that because he understands how hard it is to be behind the grill now and he just let's it go with a push of the mug in my direction and a smile.

 

That's how he's looking at me.  Just looking and I haven't even said anything.  I just sit down and pick up the menu and I wonder what have I done wrong now?  Am I late?  No.  Right on time.  Am I jobless?  No.  Working at the wonder of Happy Time again.  I haven't done anything and yet he's looking at me, just looking and what?  Is there something on me?

 

We sit in silence and he stirs sugar into his coffee--sugar not Sweet'N Low because he says he's not going to die (again) anyway so why worry about stupid shit like the benefits of Sweet'N Low versus sugar even though I don't know if there are benefits anyway--then he clears his throat like he's going to say something and he flings his arm over the back of the green booth, the leather squishing and squelching under his rear in a way that makes me want to giggle, but I can't giggle because if I do he's just going to frown at me even more.  So I sit up a little, the plastic menu smooth in my palms.  Michelle's around somewhere, bustling through the tables with a coffee pot in her hands and its obvious our table will be the last on her route because his cup is fresh and steaming, but that's okay because he's got something to say and I don't want anyone to overhear him; at least I think he has something to say, if only he'd say it already and stop LOOKING at me.

 

I tear my gaze away from his dark coal orbs and look down at the menu, scanning over the tiny print and perfect pictures of waffles and syrup and eggs like eyes and bacon like smiles--as if the customers really care about that crap; my stomach rumbles and I think, maybe it'll vibrate through the table at him and he'll smile and say something like eat up, Peanut, its on me, but he doesn't and my last twenty burns in my pocket--three more days until payday and I'm pretty much screwed until then, like always. 

 

"What you having?"

 

So he speaks.  I look up, blonde hair snarled over my nose, judging him and how to answer that simple a question because its not simple; he's got the look still and I know he's waiting for just the right moment to kick in and yell at me and where the hell is everybody else?

 

"Don't know yet.  Kinda want eggs--want my bacon?" I'm offering him an olive branch and he's gotta know it, gotta see the silent plea in my eyes--whatever I did, I didn't mean to and I swear I'm trying to be a good obedient Reaper and I can't even remember doing anything bad so STOP IT!

 

"No."

 

"You like my bacon.  Its crispy and you don't have any and I don't want it..." I say, trying to smile but he remains stoic and stodgy on the other side of the table. 

 

"I ate earlier."

 

"Okay...but you could eat again." Why am I pressing?  Stalling the inevitable, I guess.

 

"I don't think so."

 

I slap the menu back on the table with a thud that echoes through the restaurant; everyone ignores it because I guess they're used to weird things coming from this side of Der Waffle Haus and its better not to ask sometimes.  He looks me right in the eyes, drilling down through my head as if he's trying to get to the bottom of something, like the way Encyclopedia Brown used to do in those books; he'd just think and think and that huge head of his would come up with a solution out of nowhere because he thought long enough and hard enough and read so much it was all right there in his head if he could just remember it and he always did--that's how he's looking at me now.

 

"What did I do now?" I'm blunt and to the point because I'm sure he has a point that I want to get to.

 

He looks fairly startled at my non-beating-around-the-bush and blinks in the soft overhead lights, the spoon with which he's still stirring his sugar--sugar not Sweet'N Low--clatter-clinks against the coffee mug; he grips it, as if that one tiny sound gave away far too much and he's not happy about it, then clears his throat once again.

 

"Who said you did something?" He challenges me, because I know a challenge when I hear one and that was a challenge.

 

"You said.  You've got it said all over your face and there's nobody else here and you don't want food!  That means I'm in trouble.  What did I do?" It all comes out in a rush because I can't keep it in.  I want this whatever this is to stop and everything to be good again--and it was good until tonight too; everyone's been getting along and reaping in harmony and Mason has stopped chasing Daisy (much to my relief...at least I think its relief--I'm sure its relief because I like Mason or I liked him or I'm sure I was going to like him or something, but that's not the point) and my family is doing okay so that means it was all good. 

 

And now this.

 

"Everyone's late and I already had waffles.  Nothing's up."

 

"And the look on your face?  Just gas?" I snap, annoyed and perplexed and vexed and several shades of irritated.

 

"What look?" And he attempts to wipe it off his face, like he's been caught or something and I'm even more irritated by it. "Is it gone?"

 

And he says this so innocently, in a tone I've never heard from him that I'm a little shaken, taken aback for a moment like whenever Delores spills one of her pearls of wisdom or blow stories and smiles like I should get it because Millie is a huge alcoholic--and I keep forgetting about that lie, why do I always forget that one?  He's wiped his express clean, or as clean as he's ever going to get it with those dark, pitfall eyes and the way his mouth always curls whenever we talk, like he's so amused or annoyed with me all the damned time.

 

"No.  Its not fucking gone.  What's going on?" I'm confused and its not just a way of life for me right now.

 

"Nothing.  I said nothing, Peanut."

 

"Fine then.  Let me have my assignment and I'll leave you alone."

 

"You don't have to go."

 

"I don't?  You have 'get gone' face."

 

"I don't mean to then.  Stick around and get something to eat.  The others will be here soon."

 

I look at him, torn between suspicion and relief because I'm not getting my ass chewed out for something I don't remember doing and even though I knew I didn't do anything I had that guilty feeling you sometimes get when you think someone suspects you and you're all paranoid about it--did I?  I don't remember but maybe...coulda been me...?  That weight firmly off my shoulders, I sit back, muscles unclenching and the seat squelching and squealing beneath me (though not as much as him because he's much heavier, but not a bad kind of heavy--he's the nice kind of heavy that makes you think of warm fires and apple cider) and pick up my slammed menu once more.

 

Michelle drifts by and I catch her attention.  She smiles, puts a glass of water and a straw down for me and then lifts her pencil; even though she probably knows what I'm going to order already, its still a formality. 

 

"Two eggs, over easy, two slices of toast, hash browns and..." I glance slyly over at him and he's opening another packet of sugar, though not watching his nimble fingers as they rip and tear and scatter tiny white crystals all over the table; he does this weird squinty thing that I take is approval and then I look back up at Michelle. "And bacon.  Extra crispy.  And could I get a cup of coffee, please?"

 

She nods and moves off, leaving me at the table with him once again and I watch as he dumps the sugar into his already sweetened coffee, the garish pink packets of Sweet'N Low ignored for the pure white ones next to it in its tiny little container.  I tilt my head and watch as he opens another packet, this time not spilling any of the precious sweet contents onto the smooth tabletop as he tosses the ripped seam of the wrapper aside and then dumps it in; it floats on top for a split second the way Hershey's syrup will float on the surface of your milk if you get the stream of chocolate thin enough and make a swirly pattern to distribute the weight evenly, and then it sinks slowly down toward the bottom of his cup, which is surely a graveyard for sugar by now, the sediment sticking to the bottom and sliding up the sides with each drink--only he hasn't drank anything yet.  Maybe he just likes to dump all the sugar in and then feel the stick of it in the bottom on his spoon as he stirs it, attempting to make the tiny crystals dissolve, even though he knows they won't?

 

"That's a lot of sugar." I say, reaching for the water Michelle put on the table; the sides are slick with sweat and the ice cubes clink inside the glass in a pleasant way; I take a drink, looking at him over the rim, half his face distorted by the glass, melting downward toward the decline of the water as it slides into my mouth--he looks odd like that and I keep the glass to my lips for a split second longer than I normally would just to watch him.  He smiles slightly and looks at his cup.

 

"I like sugar." He says simply, as if I couldn't tell.

 

"Don't you think that's a little much?"

 

"No.  I've got a sweet tooth, makes it better, somehow."

 

"Too much sugar in my coffee gives me the runs." I say, reaching for a packet of the pink substitute next to the original white. "Sweet'N Low doesn't though."

 

"I read somewhere that Sweet'N Low gave rats cancer.  There's a warning on the label." He says and I blanche, then peer down at the packet in my fingers. Nothing on the front, but I flip it over and stare at the tiny reddish print on the back, mouth falling open.

 

"What kind of a fucked up company would try and sell this shit to people and then put a warning on the fucking label telling the customers just how bad it is!  Whose idea was this?" I exclaim, tossing the half-opened back on the table, my mouth open because it just seems so damned unfair.  Sweet'N Low, man.  Its supposed to be so much better and it SO isn't. "Its like that Olestra crap my dad wouldn't let my mom eat because it caused anal leakage."

 

"Now you know why I use the sugar.  At least you know what you're getting." And he stirs vigorously, then takes a slurp of his saccharin drink, his eyes closed for a split second so that I can see what he'd look like asleep, as if I cared what he'd look like anyway but the thought occurs to me that I don't know and now I know and its kinda fascinating.

 

"Well, its not really a big deal if we use that crap, right?  I mean...not going to die, right?"

 

"Truth in advertising though.  I have principles."

 

"You do?"

 

"Yeah."

 

"Okay..." I sigh, then rip open a package of his sugar (because I will forever know it as his sugar) and dump it into my own cup, stirring like he does, as if there were some method he uses that makes it even better than before and then take a drink; just the right amount of bitterness/sweetness to make me happy. 

 

He takes a drink.  I take a drink. 

 

What a bizarre day, I think and then wonder why the hell he was looking at me like that when I first got here because I know he was thinking of something--I don't know what and I know he won't tell me--and then I decide to let it go.  It obviously doesn't matter.  If he wanted to talk about something--and I have no idea what he'd want to talk to me about if he wasn't yelling at me or doing something nice for me or buying me dinner or a bike or comforting me--then he would.  I'm sure he would.  Pretty sure.  Kinda sure. 

 

I stare at the betraying packet of Sweet'N Low on the table between us for a few minutes then look up and catch him again--he's watching me, just watching me like...I don't know!  I want to ask him what's going on, why are you looking at me like that, but something catches my eye and I turn to stare at the doorway, where Mason and Daisy come sailing in, followed closely by Roxy in her uniform.

 

Michelle lays my food down a second later and I thank her, then scoot all the way over in the booth to let Mason and Daisy in.  Roxy sits down next to Rube and its business as usual. 

 

Nothing to ask him, nothing to talk about.  Except I think there is and I don't know why.  The hell did I do? 

 

He won't look at me again though, even when I give him my bacon.  He chews thoughtful, hands out the assignments and then tells us we can go.  Go do our jobs, get out of his hair. 

 

I finish my food, stuff my last sixteen dollars into my pocket (praying it'll last until payday and knowing it won't) and then leave, go out into the world and take a life like I always do.  I follow Roxy out the door--she's giving me a ride to my assignment (R.D. Hunt, 1430 Silverlake Drive, E.T.D. 10:53am), and look back over my shoulder at him. 

 

He's got the Sweet'N Low packet in his fingers and he's twirling it like I used to do with my gum as a kid, just twirling it in my fingers until my mom yelled at me to stop and he's not looking anywhere in particular and not at the door where I'm standing with a lot of questions and the faint taste of sugared coffee in my mouth.  

 

"You coming?" Roxy calls as she climbs into her tiny Meter Maid car, head sticking out the window at me in annoyance.  I nod and close the restaurant door behind me and quickly climb in beside her.  As we pull away with a screech, I see him standing at the window, peering through the blinds; I can't make out his expression from here but maybe I don't wanna, maybe he wants to keep that expression to himself and not let it out. 

 

I frown and stare down at the post-it note in my fingers, the words written in his clear handwriting swimming against the yellow paper like some kind of code, like in that Keanu Reeves movie with the green code that's really a whole different world or something, only this is really the real world.  Roxy turns another corner and Der Waffle Haus disappears, leaving him far behind, along with any answers to questions I'm not sure how to ask; I stuff the post-it into my pocket and stare out the window.

 

He doesn't understand me, I think, but then again, I don't quite understand him either.  Maybe I will someday and maybe he'll tell me what's bothering him someday too, and maybe I'll know what I did and stop feeling guilty (cause I do feel guilty again, I can't help it) and things'll be good again.  I hope so.

 

I really hope so.

 

(end)

 

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