torchwoodteaboy | [RL WITH SULU][backdated to the 10th]

Entry tags:

[RL WITH SULU][backdated to the 10th]

Ianto stood in his kitchen, in front of a grocery bag on his table. A grocery bag full of food that he had bought in preparation for making it with Sulu. For Sulu. ...what the hell had he been thinking, he wondered, as he stared at the bag in front of him before starting to pull the different ingredients out. He had absolutely no idea how to cook. He could call his sister and ask her about it, but. That would mean he'd have to call his sister and ask her about it, and although he'd come out to her a while ago, he still wasn't quite ready to talk to her about either Sulu or Jack.

He'd looked up a recipe, and really, how hard could it be?, he thought to himself, as he refrigerated the ingredients that needed to stay cold. They just had to follow the recipe, and everything should turn out fine, right? He certainly hoped so. He'd like to not make a fool of himself in front of the other man if he could help it. Sure, Sulu wouldn't mind, he figured, but. It'd be nice to get this right at least, he thought, as he went to get out the right sized pot from the back of his cabinet where it'd been sitting for probably the majority of the time he'd owned it.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Yeah," Ianto said, looking at what they had to do. "I think so. There's really not that much preparation that we can do. I'd rather measure things out as we need them, not sit here and do that now, so..." He looked to the other man, with a smile. "I suppose we wait now, then, huh?" He looked amused. "You know what they say about a watched pot, and how it never boils. Maybe we should sit down for a moment. The stove's electric, it's going to take a moment or two to get the mechanism even heated in the first place," Ianto said, with a nod towards the kitchen table.

Ianto was the one holding the box with the recipe on it, which, in Sulu's eyes, was enough to make him the one in charge (as if being in his kitchen, cooking in his century wasn't enough). So, when Ianto suggested they sit, he easily moved to one of the chairs closest to Ianto, sinking into it and looking at the other man.

"Did you ever expect me to seriously take you up on the suggestion of cooking at home?" Sulu asked, grinning a little.

"Honestly?" Ianto asked, setting the box down on the table, taking his jacket off to hang on the back of the chair and then going for his tie next, to get a little more comfortable. "Not in the least. I thought that we were both joking about it to begin with, until I realized that you were serious." Once he had the tie knot undone, he slipped it off and hung it over the back of the chair with his jacket. "Which is probably why I came off as a bit of an arse, until I figured out that you weren't having me on. And then, well..." He shrugged. "Didn't want to back down from a challenge, I suppose."

"If it helps, I didn't really think you were being any more teasing than usual," Sulu said with a grin. "With any luck, though, this isn't going to be a huge challenge or anything. I really don't want to get bested by a pot of boiling noodles and some sauce." Not that Sulu really thought that would happen; he had a good feeling about this night. Either way, it was going to be good, even if they somehow overcooked the pasta or something. "But, yeah. Now you know - I'm actually interested in doing mundane, domestic things with you. Just don't ask me to help you with chores, like cleaning or something. I end up getting really busy when stuff like that comes up," he said with a wink.

"I'm sure if I really wanted to I could come up with some sort of bribe that might be successful in getting you to stick around and do them," he said, with a smirking smile in the other man's direction. He leaned back in the chair, stretching a little. "It's nice to know that you are interested in doing things like this with me, though. I mean. It's kind of a part of life, after all. I can't be sex on the beach and taking me flying in a spaceship all the time. There does have to be a time when I...y'know. Have to go to the market and make supper and clean my flat, things like that."

Sulu ran a hand through his hair, grinning back at Ianto. "It'd have to be one hell of a bribe. I made getting out of cleaning up an art when I was a kid, you know. I don't take out the trash for just anyone." Even though he wasn't entirely kidding, the truth was that Sulu really didn't try too hard to get out of cleaning up, and he did it whenever asked, so. Ianto probably really wouldn't have to work too hard.

But maybe it'd be fun to see how far he'd go to get Sulu's help...

"I've told you before, but the mundane things are more interesting for me anyway. I don't get to sit around boiling water and making pasta, usually, so... it's a good change of pace. Even though sex on the beach and flying are really good alternatives."

Ianto smirked at that comment about bribery, mischievously rising to the challenge. "Yes, well. I'm pretty good at thinking on my toes, and I'm pretty sure I have a whole arsenal of material to use if I so feel the need, so. Challenge accepted, Lieutenant, should the occasion arise."

He let that settle for a moment, before shaking his head, breaking the moment. "Really though... It's nice. That you don't mind. At least that way I won't start to bore you, if it turns out that we ever hit a calmer patch of things where... I don't know, this sort of thing might become the most exciting parts of our lives." Okay, probably wasn't going to happen, considering their jobs, but. Who knew, right? Maybe they would hit a dry spell where home cooking was all they could get? ...god, Ianto certainly hoped not.

"Naturally arise," Sulu pointed out, "You can't go manufacturing a huge mess in the flat just to bribe me over here, you know."

The chances that their lives would ever calm down to the point where they'd get to play being normal for the long term was highly unlikely, that was for sure. It was a nice thought, but he knew if it happened they'd probably be driven crazy or something. He wouldn't really want it. Nights like this were plenty, as far as he was concerned. "I think we'll just have to stick to spending a night every so often pretending to be boring, with the way Torchwood and Starfleet have us wrapped happily around their fingers."

Ianto chuckled slightly, shaking his head. "I think you know me a little too well to ever think I was capable of purposely making a mess out of the order of things that I've so carefully established. Lucky for you, there won't be any manufactured messes to help me with."

"Sounds like a plan, though. Pretending to be any other normal, boring couple every now and again. I don't see you enough for it to be every day, though, so we better stick with only occasionally for now." He paused for a minute of their conversation, listening. "You know what, though, I think the water might be finally boiling now. It might be time for phase two, here." And Ianto didn't know whether he was anticipating or dreading the next few steps in cooking, really.

"Wouldn't want to over do it, right?" Sulu joked, grinning as Ianto paused to listen to the water. When he announced that they could move on with their cooking, Sulu pushed his chair back and stood, moving over to the pot. "Alright, so. Time for the pasta? And then the rest of it while that's doing its thing, right?"

Ianto nodded. "Yep. Time for the pasta, and then we start on the rest of it." Standing, Ianto made his way over to the pot, opening the box of fettuccine. "Alright, so... How much do you think we should make? I don't know about you, but serving sizes are never really enough for me. It might do to double the amount of pasta they say to put in. Or at least make it more than the suggestion. I don't think we really want to make the whole box, though..." Ianto didn't know how well leftovers would keep, considering he was never really home to eat them.

Sulu would have said the whole box, if only Ianto hadn't said the exact opposite of that. "I don't know - half of the box? Maybe three-fourths? I mean, pasta keeps forever, doesn't it?"

Then again, he was used to replicators making only the allotted serving size at a time, so maybe he was a bad person to come to in that case. "You're the guy with the box, you should probably pick. I'd say just put the whole thing in, but then again, you never know if you'll want to save it for something."

Ianto stood, having found the right pot, and thought about it for a moment. "Maybe... Well. The recipe might account for you using the whole box, actually. So maybe we should do that. I mean. It'll keep in the fridge, right?" He turned and looked dubiously at the refrigerator, wondering when the last time he'd cleaned the thing out was. The fact that he couldn't remember in the first place saying something, he thought.

"We'll... We'll just use the whole box. Here," he nodded towards the box. "You start that, just stir it in with a spoon in the drawer next to you, I'll set a timer for you and start on the rest of this." He went to the fridge and got the butter, cream, and cheese out of it, putting them on the counter. Okay, melt the butter. He could do that, he thought to himself, as he started to measure out the right amount. "Got it done?" he asked, turning to look at Sulu.

"It's just pasta," Sulu suggested as Ianto gestured to the box, "It's not like it won't keep. It's right up there with take out Chinese food, right?" Opening the box, Sulu contemplated two modes of action. One - he could just dump the box in at once and save time. Or, two - he could put handfuls of pasta in at a time.

Given the fact that he had a bad feeling about dumping a bunch of pasta into a pot of boiling water so close to his person, he decided to go the safer route, making sure the pasta didn't make the water spill over and burn him.

"I think I've got this part covered," he said when Ianto turned to check on him, having successfully done his part in this whole cooking process. He idly gave the pot one more stir before raising a brow at the other man, smiling a little. "What now, head chef?"

"Even Chinese food goes bad if you leave it in the refrigerator for a couple weeks, you know," Ianto said, shaking his head at the other man. "I'm going to hope that the reason you're saying that is just that you've never let it go that long before."

"And as for what's next," he said, stepping over to set the microwave timer for 11 minutes like the box said, before turning back to the pan, "we melt the butter." He looked over at Sulu. "Okay, so. Not the most exciting cooking to do, but. Melting butter. Can't really go wrong there, yeah?" He checked the box. "Then we add the cream and let it simmer for five minutes." Whatever simmering meant. He probably should have done a little more research on this than he really did, but how hard could pasta be, for god's sake.

Sulu grinned. "Maybe in the future, Chinese takeout never goes bad," he said, giving Ianto a wink before moving aside so the other could reach the other burners of the stove. In reality, he'd never left food in his fridge that long; either his family threw it out, or he ate it all well before it went bad. He wasn't one for needless waste. Well, usually, anyway.

He had no idea what simmering entailed, but either Ianto knew or Ianto would figure it out. Sulu really had no place in a kitchen, and that was a fact. "Alright, so. You... do that, and I do something else? Or we both can stand here and stare at the butter melting, whichever works for you."

"Maybe in the future, people are full of it," Ianto countered, before paying attention to what he was doing once more. "I don't... I don't know if there really is that much to do. I mean..." He picked up the box, reading over it quickly. "You could measure out the Parmesan cheese for me, if you like. One and a half cups of the stuff. Here..." He went to the cupboard, quickly digging out measuring cups. "A one cup measuring cup adn a half-cup one. That out to do the trick."

"Meanwhile," he said, turning back to the pan to see that the butter was melting correctly, "I should measure out the cream. Since I'm going to need to use it in a second." Now if only he could remember where the liquid measuring cup went...

Sulu grabbed the cups from Ianto and moved over to the table, grabbing the bag of cheese. "How accurate can they possibly expect you to be with measuring out this?" he groused, goodnaturedly enough despite the fact that he really wasn't sure how accurate he was supposed to be at this point. Still, he managed to rip open the bag without causing a huge disaster, and went about filling the two cups. "I mean, seriously. This is a really inaccurate science."

Ianto measured out the cream needed into a measuring cup, moving to stand back at the stove. The butter was mostly melted, so he decided he might as well pour it in. What next? Oh, simmer for 5 minutes. He set that to simmering and went to wash out the measuring cup. Washing dishes, at least that was familiar. The only familiar thing about his kitchen, really. "It's not precise, no. Hell, most cooks even measure ingredients by what 'feels right'. So who knows, really. I'll never really understand it myself..."

He looked at the clock. Only a minute of simmering had happened. God, cooking took more time than he really had patience to give it sometimes. He understood why he wasn't more of a cook in the first place in that moment.

"What if everything feels right?" Sulu sighed, moving the now-filled cups over to the side of the oven. "That seems like the kind of logic a kid uses when deciding what kind of toppings he wants on his pizza." He grinned, "You know, 'Man, potato chip and chocolate pizza sounds awesome right now,' that sort of thing."

Not that Sulu had ever considered that in the slightest. Really. (It had been a disaster.) "How long do we have now, anyway?"

Ianto gave Sulu a look that obviously said he knew the other man must have been speaking from personal experience. "Well. 'Potato chip and chocolate pizza' isn't something you'd attempt to make twice, now is it? I'd say that any amount of either thing would turn out pretty bad no matter what. So I suspect that it's a little different than that."

He turns to look at the clock. "We're supposed to let it 'simmer' for five minutes, then add in the rest of it, whisk so that it heats through and serve it. As for the pasta," he said, checking the timer. "We've still got a few minutes on that too." So far so good. Maybe this cooking thing wasn't so bad after all?

"What I should've done was use shaved chocolate, but all I had were candybars," Sulu admitted casually, like it was completely normal for a kid to try out horrible pizza concoctions.

When Ianto gave him the times for their various stages, Sulu couldn't help but grin. They had a few minutes overall, right? That was plenty of time for him to reach out and grab Ianto's hand, pulling him over to where he was leaning against the counter. "You know, I have no clue what simmering even means," he said, his hand moving to Ianto's waist once he'd effectively pinned himself between the other and the counter top.

"Remind me never to agree if you ever offer to make me a pizza," Ianto said, shooting the other man yet another look.

Ianto wasn't sure where Sulu was going with the grabbing his hand and pulling him, but he went willingly because...well, why not? He trusted Sulu. And the other man didn't disappoint, pulling him closer to himself and then putting his hands on Ianto's waist to hold him there. Ianto smirked down at Sulu slightly, leaning into Sulu and trapping him there completely. "I'm assuming that it's got something to do with heat..." he said, softly. "You know. What with it being a cooking word and all," he teased.

"You have no idea what it means either, do you?" Sulu prodded with a half-grin, raising an eyebrow as his fingers stroked the parts of Ianto's waist that were within their reach, leaning up to kiss the corner of Ianto's mouth. "Let's hope you got it right, in that case, because otherwise things might get burned. Or not heat up enough."

Ianto shook his head slightly, with a soft chuckle. "Not a clue," he said, affirming Sulu's guess that he really didn't know what he was doing. He pressed closer to the other man, leaning in to plant a slow, passionate kiss on his lips, simply because he could, also because...well. It was hot, having him pressed up against the counter as he was. Ianto wasn't too British to be able to understand that. He pulled away after a moment, though, pressing his forehead against the other man's and smiling slightly as he said. "You're being awfully distracting from the cooking, you know..."

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject