MHA #2 | Friday Evening

[defenderofdesmoines]

Annie and Diego had passed a real rite of passage as a long-term, cohabitating couple this evening: they had gone on a date to IKEA.

(And yes, Annie had insisted that this shopping trip was a date. There had been golf pencils and lingonberries involved as well as picking out furniture with umlauts, okay? Date.)

And of course, now, they were back home with their spoils spread out on the floor in the form of a set of unassembled shelves, their associated little pack of hardware, beer (necessary), and the set of directions that Annie was now considering.

"Huh, this is fun. They just use this little cartoon man to tell you what to do," she said, flipping the page over to show Diego. "Probably so they don't have to translate it from Swedish."

Something like that, Annie.

[for the fella!]

Comments

[defenderofdesmoines]

"I'll accept that explanation," Annie decided, cuddling up to him a bit more. "At least we don't need it, like, immediately. It's not like an emergency shelf."

Considering they still didn't even know what they were putting on it.

[knife_bender]

"Do emergency shelves exist?" he asked, sounding amused.

[defenderofdesmoines]

"I'm sure they do somewhere," Annie told him airily, because yeah, now that he'd repeated it, that didn't sound like a real thing. But she wasn't going to back down. "In case you need a shelf in a hurry."

[knife_bender]

"In case you really need to put something on display in a hurry," he said. "I'm sure that's happened before."

[defenderofdesmoines]

"You don't know that it hasn't," Annie countered, shifting around to kiss him because she didn't have a better comeback than that. So kisses would just have to do.

[knife_bender]

You know what? He was fine with not having the last word when it came with kisses. This was much better than building a shelf.

[defenderofdesmoines]

Kissing was a lot better than building a shelf! (And it also would strengthen Annie's argument that this whole thing had been a date, too.)

Annie smiled into the kiss, nipping lightly at Diego's lower lip as she wrapped an arm across him. Like, just in case he was thinking of turning his attention back to building that shelf or something instead of keeping it here on her.

[knife_bender]

That shelf was going to remain in pieces in a corner of the living room for the next three months, at least. So, yeah, no danger of him stopping to go back to building the Ikea shelf.

"Still don't think shelf shopping counts as a date," he murmured. Just had to get that in there.

[defenderofdesmoines]

To be fair, they'd probably still set things on top of the unassembled shelf pieces in those three months. So they'd use it.

"Why not?" Annie asked, sounding amused as she shifted to press a kiss to the underside of his jaw. "Why doesn't it qualify?

Because from where she was sitting -- which was very nearly in his lap -- it seemed to be working out pretty date-ishly.

[knife_bender]

"Because we were buying furniture," he said. "That's like the least romantic thing on the planet."

[defenderofdesmoines]

"We were buying something together to put in our home, which is incredibly romantic," Annie corrected, smiling against his neck before placing a kiss there.

Never mind that they'd failed to actually assemble the something! They'd picked it out together!

[knife_bender]

"There were Swedish meatballs involved." That may have been the least romantic food ever.

[defenderofdesmoines]

"And they were great. You realize this is just making me want you to take me on a real date that's up to your standards," Annie teased, trailing her fingertips along the arm that wasn't around her shoulders.

Last time they'd done that, they'd ended up in a shootout, so she probably should be careful what she wished for.

[knife_bender]

"My date ideas usually end up with us trying to find people to beat the hell out of." Or getting dressed to find people to beat the hell out of and then deciding to stay in and have sex instead.

Let's be real, that wasn't just a pollen thing.

[defenderofdesmoines]

"So much more romantic than going furniture shopping, you're right," Annie teased softly, pressing a kiss behind his ear. Though it wasn't exactly un-romantic. "I have a uniform here, though, so we could go out and do that if you wanted."

Or she could just put the uniform on and they could make it halfway out of the bedroom before deciding to stay in. Either/or.

[knife_bender]

"I kind of like you here just like this," he said, bumping his nose against hers lightly. "Even if it wasn't a date."

[defenderofdesmoines]

Well, that made her smile a little wider, even as she moved to kiss him again. "Just like this?" she asked lightly, teasing. "No changes?"

She could think of a few things. They were on the floor, for one thing.

[knife_bender]

"I'm open to suggestions," he said, nipping at her bottom lip.

[defenderofdesmoines]

That earned him a pleased little hum as she pressed herself a little closer. "I mean, the floor isn't the most comfortable. We could sit on the couch," she suggested innocently, trailing that hand along his arm again. "Or the bed."

Just suggesting pieces of furniture at random.

[knife_bender]

"Oooh the bed," he said lightly. "We should go check that out. You know, just to make sure nothing happened to it while we were at Ikea."

[defenderofdesmoines]

"Do you think something did?" Annie asked, all wide-eyed concern as she pulled back enough to start to stand. "I mean, I'm pretty attached to that bed."

There had been a time about a month ago when she'd been literally fantasizing about just sleeping in it, after all.

[knife_bender]

"Well we better make sure," he said as he got up. "Just in case."

[defenderofdesmoines]

"Bed thieves could have broken in," Annie decided, going onto her toes to give him another light kiss as soon as they were both on their feet.

'Bed thieves' seemed like as much of a thing as emergency shelves did.