[For Jean]

[leftwithmybones]

McCoy is trying to think of anything except 'the last time you tried this, things ended up in a terrible disaster on the proportions of ruining your life'. That really wouldn't behoove anything good. So, instead of dwelling on that, he's turned his attention to cooking greens and as close as he gets to steak on an open-fire, grill made of random pieces of metal lying around.

He's not in anything too fancy. A pair of jeans and a short-sleeved t-shirt, sitting around outside his hut and drinking beer, just waiting for her to show up.

Maybe he's gone too far in the direction of casual, but it beats being too anxious and eager about something that he's not exactly sure how to define yet. And yeah, that voice in his head crowing on about how he's a fuck-up isn't exactly a welcome presence at that moment. So he'll take it slow and easy, one thing at a time.

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[leftwithmybones]

He can't help a soft laugh at that, glancing back over his shoulder at the hut. "I have to warn you, it's not much to see," he murmurs, modest as he can be as he serves food onto the plates and hands one out to her. "I mean, the new place will hopefully be something to see, but the old? Wood and shingles."

[risesagain]

Taking the plate, she shrugs dismissing any fears he might have with a gesture. "So is my place, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see it. You can learn a lot about a person based on where they live. Whether that is good or bad is something else."

Her own place is nothing to brag about, but she's planted a few flowers in front so there is that at least. Her own personal touch on the place.

[leftwithmybones]

"Well, then, does this mean that you're going to be looking at my home to tell whether I'm good or bad?" he asks, slightly wary because hell, he's not sure if he's going to really like the idea of that. Not if the opinion comes out bad, at least.

[risesagain]

"Not unless you want me to. I promise to withhold any and all judgments unless asked to make them."

That is the least that Jean can do. It doesn't do any good to judge things. It would just make tonight more stressful and all she wants to do is relax and enjoy it. Just for once.

[leftwithmybones]

"Maybe if you give me a little forewarning," he says with just the hint of a smile. "I mean, hell. I've got a noisy nosy cat and an emotionless roommate, so I don't think you're going to think my home is impeccable, of all things."

[risesagain]

"Maybe, I am definitely willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. Call it my years of teaching experience finally getting to be stretched a little."

Besides she has no room to judge anyone given what it was like back at the Mansion. That aside, Jean isn't willing to trade any of that time away. She just wears it with a little pride. "You don't strike me as a cat person, to be honest."

[leftwithmybones]

"The cat and I have a truce," McCoy admits, shaking his head because the situation of how they came to be roommates still amuses him slightly as much as it frustrated him. "I don't like cats. Maybe, once upon a time, I would've let my daughter have a dog, but it's the Island who decided I needed a cat. I let the damn thing bother my roommate more than me."

[risesagain]

"I like both. Actually the only pet that I've never really understood would be birds. Even lizards can get some sort of pass from me, but birds...they just make me sad."

It is the fact that they are kept in cages. Jean understands the craving for freedom all too well. To be trapped because someone thought that you were pretty doesn't suit her at all. It seems pointless.

[leftwithmybones]

"It's not like you saw many pets, where I worked," McCoy admits as he gets a little more comfortable, like every passing moment brings that to them in their conversation. "I wouldn't feel right seeing them in space, anyway. Space is barely meant for humans, never mind pets."

[risesagain]

"You've got that right. All of the times I've been in space it never ended well."

There is a level of knowingness to what she says. Space was where the Phoenix found her, where she and Logan nearly died. Where parts of her life were destroyed bits at a time. "I thought you worked in space? Or did I get that wrong?"

[leftwithmybones]

"I worked on a ship, up in space," he admitted, but that wasn't the whole truth. "I mean, I went up there because I barely had anywhere else to go, but I went up there because Jim did. When I was a mess, what I had nothing left, he became my best friend and I wasn't about to let him romp around the universe without a good doctor to patch him up."

[risesagain]

"That's kind of sweet." It really was. It wasn't every day that you heard about people who followed others to save their behinds. Of course Jean had done it multiple times, but she knew that her life was not the norm.

"Maybe not the whole part where you had no where else to go, but the other part of it. That's nice."

[leftwithmybones]

"Hell, he was my only friend. It's pretty desperate," McCoy admits, setting aside his plate when there's nothing left to be eaten. "I like to think at least there was something not so self-serving in there. Makes me feel better, at least."