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[jageskro]

Jag was just grabbing the old bag of peas they kept just for this purpose out of the freezer when he heard someone walk into the kitchen. He pressed the peas to his bruised cheek, then grabbed a beer out of the fridge, because one more wouldn't hurt. It wasn't like he was drunk. No, he wasn't drunk.

He turned around and smiled at the sight of Em. And no, he wasn't at all a little wobbly on his legs. "Heeey, Emma."

Comments

[jageskro]

"Oh yeah," Jag confirmed. "Cheers. You wanna share a joint?" It was just what he needed before going to bed.

[offthebeatenpath]

"Would you believe I've never smoked?" she asked, although she wasn't sure if that was an answer or not. More a prelude to an answer maybe.

[jageskro]

The biggest surprise was that she hadn't smoked once in the last year or so, and that he hadn't noticed. "Huh. Well, come on then." He pushed up and dropped the can in the bin, then gestured for her to come along. "It probably won't have much effect, first times usually don't."

[offthebeatenpath]

If asked, Em couldn't have said how she'd gone this long living in the squat without trying pot. Hermiting at the wrong times, most likely. Or painting or reading, or otherwise being off in her room. She hadn't really thought about it, until he asked if she wanted to join him. "So I've heard. Although it makes me wonder how people get to a second time."

[jageskro]

"Because they trust their friends," Jag replied with a grin. He gestured for her to come with him into his room. It was mostly untidy, with dirty clothes piled up in a corner, waiting for him to give them a wash, and buggered fire gear lying around.

He grabbed his pot and skins and dropped them on the bed, pulling his boots off before sitting on it. "You've got to go through that first time. Then you can really experience it."

[offthebeatenpath]

While her room was usually neat, almost obsessively so - although that wasn't difficult when you didn't have ton of stuff - except for the nest she made of her bed and high chance of books, cards, or a sketch pad lost in the blankets, the lived-in feel of Jag's was comfortable too. Sitting on the bed with him, Em tucked her sock-clad feet under her. "I am in your more experienced hands."

[jageskro]

"That sounds dirty," Jag grinned at her, focusing back on what he was doing immediately. He grabbed an empty CD case to lay the skin down on, and licked the side of a cigarette to neatly tear a strip off of it, so he could use its tobacco.

[offthebeatenpath]

"Only if you make it sound that way," Em said, rolling her eyes fondly all the same. She hadn't meant it that way, as innuendo went it was pretty weak, and Jag had a boyfriend, so she wouldn't have meant something like that anyway. "Generic you, not you you."

[jageskro]

"I I definitely went there," Jag pointed out with another grin, arranging the tobacco on the skin.

[offthebeatenpath]

"That's on you then, innit, bab?" her usual American English sliding into something close to his Brummie, a verbal nudge when she couldn't nudge his shoulder because his hands were busy.

[jageskro]

Jag laughed, looking up at her. "That was good."

[offthebeatenpath]

She grinned back, a bit of color rising in her cheeks anyway. "You were asking for it. And no, that's not supposed to sound dirty either."

[jageskro]

Jag chuckled, turning back to the task at hand. "And now you you've gone there. Bab."

[offthebeatenpath]

"Nope." Em didn't giggle, but it was a near thing. "I just recognized that you have a dirty mind and might try."

[jageskro]

"Blame your gutter mind on me, why don't you," Jag teased, crumbling some pot onto the tobacco.

[offthebeatenpath]

"You're a corrupting influence. Look at you, giving me pot and everything." Her face was a picture of innocence. "Some of my favorite people have been corrupting influences on the sweet, innocent convent school drop-out."

[jageskro]

"You dropped out of convent school, I'm not taking the blame for your corruption," Jag told her with a snort, and tore a little cardboard out of his pack of cigarettes to make a filter.

[offthebeatenpath]

"Corrupting influence," Em repeated, but her innocent look failed her when she couldn't hold back the laughter.

[jageskro]

"Always the quiet ones,"Jag retorted, and rolled the joint at last, licking the skin and closing it up. He lit it with a tiny flame, taking a deep drag on it, then held it out to Em. "Pretend it's an apple."

[offthebeatenpath]

Well, Em was one of the quiet ones, and only people who knew her well, like Jag, got to see more than that. So she wouldn't argue that point. "An apple?" she repeated, not following at all.

[jageskro]

"Corrupting influence, yeah?" he offered, holding the joint out for her.

[offthebeatenpath]

From apples to pomegranates to Persephone to the underworld, but Em didn't need to follow that thread right then. She grinned, taking the joint and holding it the way he had. "The apple would've been my downfall. I never could resist knowing more." Then lifting the joint to her lips, she inhaled cautiously.

[jageskro]

"See, you had the seed of corruption in you already," Jag grinned, watching her take her first drag.

[offthebeatenpath]

Pro tip: Laughing in the middle of your first toke, not a good idea. Half laugh, half cough, and it made her eyes and the back of her throat itch from the smoke.

When she could breathe again, Em shook her head. "I am not touching that one."

[jageskro]

Jag smirked, and leaned over the side of the bed to grab the bottle of water on the floor and hold it out to her. "So many directions I could go with that one."