ArchivedLogs:Plenty

Plenty
Dramatis Personae Jax, Steve
In Absentia	Christmas Day "{Maybe I should warn you,} I'm kind of stubborn."
Location <NYC> {Birdhaus} - Harbor Commons - Lower East Side
This house does not, perhaps, look much like what many people would think when they think of the home of a rock star. Modest and not flashy in a normal sense, it is nevertheless /eye/-catching -- huge tall ceilings, huge tall windows, wide open layout, a balcony from the second floor looking down on the first. Its walls have been studded with a number of long branch-like poles jutting out at angles; from the ceiling hang a few different trapeze-like swings. The furniture is minimalist, low-slung futons and a few overly enormous puffy beanbags, tables set low to the ground. The extravagant entertainment system is the one concession to ostentation. There are many boxes scattered around the living room, right now. Empty, mostly, right now. The kitchen smells like chocolate, warm and rich and fresh-baked. Jax is currently flitting, back from the living room into the kitchen to stop the oven timer from its beeping. Admittedly there's kind of a slower /trudge/ to his flit today, sluggish as he pulls the oven open to check on the cookies inside. Wearing a red shirt with a yellow star on the chest and newish-looking blue jeans, Steve has been wrapping boxes. On the floor beside him, his shield is still painted up in red, gold, and green. He sniffs appreciatively at the bloom of chocolatey aroma that fills the air when Jax opens the oven. Taping down the last flap of his current project with care, he gets up and drifts over to hover by the kitchen door. "{You making more rounds later?}" Jax's hands glow as he reaches into the oven, pulling out four trays of cookies. Chocolate chip, chocolate-chocolate chip. He trades these for two trays of unbaked ones, the glow in his skin fading once he closes the oven again. "{It's a lot to carry. Used to make these deliveries every other week but --}" He shakes his head, brows furrowing as he starts to transfer the cookies to a cooling rack. "{Really should get a. Hand truck.}" "{Every other week?}" Steve's eyebrows lift up, and he smiles, leaning against the doorframe. "{I was about to ask if your friends really like cookies, but then...knowing your cookies, that seems like a silly question.}" His eyes scan the rack appraisingly. "{I can help you carry them, but a handtruck can't hurt. Or a wagon. Maybe a sleigh and team of reindeer.}" "{Well. It wasn't /all/ about the cookies. I mean, it's for --}" Jax drops his hands to press against the edge of the counter, shrugging a shoulder. "{Usually deliveries were more for just staple groceries. And things like toiletries or first aid things or socks or --}" He shakes his head, teeth dragging against his lower lip. "{They're kind of. I don't know if homeless the right word. Have a home. Not very conventional. Money and basic goods hard to come by.}" He grins, quick and crooked. "{And cookies, too.}" "Ah..." Steve nods slowly. "{And I'm guessing they don't have easy access social services, either. Well, a /lot/ of people haven't, lately, but...some never have.}" His brows knit. "{And they tend to be the people most forget, when things get rough.}" He watches Jax with a faraway look for a moment, but he's almost smiling again when his eyes regain focus. "{You are a good man,}" he says at last, carefully, as if he suddenly doesn't trust his admittedly unwieldy Spanish. "{When things get rough...}" Jax trails off, his brows furrowing. "{Well. Let's just say I'd be /really/ surprised if any of the patrols bothered making sure /their/ part of the city was safe. Pretty sure they had to clean it out all on their own. But yeah. Not good access to -- a lot. But one of the few safe homes for -- a lot of mutants. The kind who look like my kids or Horus but -- maybe don't /have/ other homes or families to go to.}" He checks the timer on the oven, brushing his hands against his pants and starting back towards the living room. He pauses in front of the doorway, though, tipping an almost startled glance up at Steve at that last statement. His cheeks flush red, nose crinkling. "{Me? I -- oh. No, I -- it's not. I mean, lately I haven't even...}" His hand scuffs over the top of his head. "{Just wouldn't be where I am without a lot of help along the way, you know? Feels -- right. To try and pass that on.}" Steve frowns more deeply. "{I wondered sometimes, how many are like them, and how much harder it has to be for them outside of a community like this one.}" His mouth pulls to one side. "{Without people around who look human, who have an easier time holding down jobs and dealing with the officials...I can't imagine the kind of trouble they have even without this crisis.}" He straightens up and shifts to give Jax room to pass. "{Hardly anyone can get anywhere in life without a lot of help. Most people don't give back nearly so much when they have so little themselves. So yes. You. Are a good man. And I admire you.}" "{It is not easy, for sure. The world --}" Jax clenches his jaw, lips pressing together. "{It has a lot of. Cruel.}" He slips through the doorway -- pausing again just in front of Steve at those final words with a small catch of breath, a slight widening of his eye. His hand lifts, fiercely warm fingertips touching lightly to the outside of Steve's arm as his eye lifts to the other man's face, a small smile curling across his lips. He doesn't say anything, though; just dips his head and continues on back to the living room to start nestling the neatly wrapped boxes into /other/ boxes for transport. There's a greater levity in his tone when he answers, now. "{C'mon, you looked around my life lately? I got plenty.}" Steve looks down into Jax's eye when he stops before him. Lifts a hand and rests it on the other's man's shoulder briefly -- /his/ touch cool, if only by comparison. Then watches him go. "{It's relative, I guess. I don't hold others to /my/ standards of} 'plenty.' {But if even if I did, it wouldn't change how I feel.}" He gives a small, quick shake of his head as to clear it, then goes to help Jax load up the boxes. "{Maybe I should warn you,}" he adds with a lopsided grin, "I'm kind of stubborn." "{You? Stubborn? Ditching being the government's} posterboy {to come live with a bunch of} terrorist commie freaks? I never woulda guessed." Jax rests his fingertips lightly on the edge of one of the storage boxes, looks up at Steve across it with a brilliant smile. "{It's okay. I like stubborn.}"