Everybody Gots to Eat

Who: Rafael, Rafe, and OPEN to multiples!
Where: Econo Foods grocery store
When: Late afternoon

It was intolerable, that was for certain. The throng of humanity, the literal cluster of them all bustling between aisles, bumping Rey and not apologizing, leaning around him to pluck service tickets from the meats and seafood counter, gabbing about their mundane little lives. But it was also amusing. They were so scared, and why? Snow? It certainly seemed so. He'd heard the same conversation replayed a dozen times in his time spent shopping with Rafael: more snow might come, you should stock up on groceries, is your snow blower tuned up, and so on and so forth.

And as much as he hated to be in agreement with these people, they shared reasoning. His own pantries had been somewhat bare when the storm hit, and Rey knew it was best to stock up on basic amenities he could use for several dishes just in case he was stuck cooking for himself and Rafael again. Still, it'd be wonderful if it went faster, or at least if there was something entertaining to make his wait more enjoyable. "All of this for peasants cuts of meat, no?" Rey murmured to his brother in Spanish as he leaned an arm on the grip of his cart, sighing impatiently.

Rafael felt slightly overwhelmed with the crush of humanity in the store. There was too much movement, too many conflicting colors, too much to look at. Rey had put a bag of pretzels in his hands to hopefully keep him occupied, and it was still there, mostly untouched. Everything was far too distracting, and he kept thinking he saw a long shock of dark curls amidst the crowd. Moving past the yogurt, turning as a colorful box of crackers caught her eye, mulling over cheddar or pepper jack. It wasn't her, of course, she was dead, he'd attended her funeral, seen her in the casket. He couldn't tell what he'd done to her, of course, they made sure of that.

Perhaps it was that very fact that made it still feel unreal. He couldn't remember -- still -- being present as her life left her, it made things ... difficult to accept. Rafe realized very belatedly that Rey had spoken to him and blinked away from a cluster of people around the lunchmeats and looked at his brother. "What?" he asked in English.

If there was any single sign that would tell Rey his brother was overwhelmed by the situation, it was that. Rafe usually spoke Spanish reflexively, and that snippet of English was a hint at how hard he had to wrestle his focus back from wherever it had been. Which was deliciously amusing. Rey's lips curled faintly in what could've been a consoling smile as he reached to take the bag of pretzels from Rafe, turning them over and shaking his head at the few that had been crushed. "I said that necessities such as these try my patience, brother," Rey amended, "If I must wait for one more person getting two pounds of... olive loaf, I may scream." And that'd be a sight for certain, Rey losing his temper while Rafe stood by patiently, lost in his own thoughts.

"I detest olive loaf," Rafe said after a brief pause, falling back into the language that Rey had used first. "That's not what you're getting, is it?" As distracted and spacey as he'd been in the past handful of days, he still had an appetite, and it quailed at the very mention of olive loaf. He glanced down at his empty hand and wiped it on the side of his pants. It was hot in the store, despite the temperatures outside, and his tail was highly uncomfortable stuffed down his pant leg. He wanted to get out of here as soon as possible, and looked ahead of them at the line. What was Rey standing there for anyway?

"Are you daft?" Rey asked in kind with a cynical edge to his smile, pleased to be done with English for the moment. He didn't like editing his opinion of these people, but speaking his mind in English would lead to... unpleasantries. "I would vivvisect myself before I dined on such things, Rafael. No, we wait for salmon, swordfish, and whatever passes for choice steaks here." They'd at least be adequate, or they'd better be with what the advertised prices were. Rey wasn't exclusively a carnivore, but he did enjoy feasting on what had once been life. "If you grow bored, go and fetch a new bag of twists," he instructed, handing back the pretzels and tearing off the bottom part of the shopping list, "Do not jostle them so, either. The same aisle should hold a few other items, so if you wish to leave this place all the sooner? Eliminate them from the list."

He took the pretzels and the part of the grocery list, giving Rey a withering glare. The goddamn things could've gotten crushed in shipping, how was he to blame? But it was a chance to walk around for a while, perhaps look for Chelo. It was possible she was there, the whole town was there. He tossed the pretzel bag down at Rey's feet and without a word turned to walk away, hoping to at least vaguely remember where they'd come from. But be damned if he was going to ask. They were in a never-ending purgatory anyway, how long he took didn't really matter.