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[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly had, of course, sworn to fight at Harry's side in the matter of the dishes. Or, if Harry prefers, to lend moral support from nearby. He...hadn't really sworn to get up before dawn to do this, if only because Harry had neglected to explain his cunning scheme.

So it's his usual breakfast time when Feuilly comes down to the common room, his laptop under his arm, and pokes his head into the kitchen. And blinks to see Harry already there. "--When did you start?"

Uh, and good morning and stuff, that too.

Comments

[harryhotspur]

"I have not eaten, the saucers go-- ah, thy pardon--" The water-flicking as he turns to point was totally unintentional, truly! "That cabinet there. I cannot think why there is no magic to accomplish this," he mutters as he returns to the sink to try and rinse the suds off of his hands and arms.

[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly hunches his shoulder to wipe off the water that got on his cheek. "Well--there are oversized intelligent rats that do the dishes. That's--that probably counts as magical--"

Mmh, why do the dishes have to be up so high?

[harryhotspur]

"...that is so." Damn you, Feuilly, and your logic.

Hands rinsed and dried, he turns back to Feuilly and asks innocently, "Hast need of lifting?"

(He will cling to that extra inch or two has has on Feuilly in height with pride, alright.)

[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly would be giving him a dirty look over his shoulder but he can't quite turn right now, not standing up as high as his toes will allow--

There.

"--Good point, you're taller. You put the rest away, Harry."

[harryhotspur]

"Nay, I sought but to help thee!" Harry protests. But he dutifully gathers up the remaining dishes and sets to putting them away. (The extra two inches are feeling less impressive now.)

"Hast thou eaten? Wouldst thou? 'tis my punishment, not thine, thou shouldst not fast."

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Well, neither should you. Come on, if there's no more dishes just now, we'll get some coffee and some breakfast, and then wash up after ourselves. Hm?" Sound good? He's already collecting his laptop to take back out to the main room.

[harryhotspur]

Harry has a sneaking suspicion that he's being mothered right now, but he's been awake since before four in the morning, so he's not going to protest. He falls into step beside Feuilly and wipes that stray bit of soap froth out of his hair, and then-- just before they pass into the main room, while they're still in the solitude of the kitchen (the rats having largely dispersed upon realizing that this Harry, unlike the other one, would only be providing entertainment in the form of spilling soapy water everywhere, which is really only funny the first time) edges up close enough to bump his shoulder against Feuilly's and plant a playful kiss on his cheek. Hello, good morning.

[tu_vas_triompher]

He's not mothering! He's...oh, all right, maybe there's a little fussing there. Feuilly isn't confident that Harry wouldn't decide that skipping breakfast was part of his ordeal. But there's also a lot of just-got-up going on, enough that when Harry bumps into him with a kiss, he returns it with a muzzily pleased smile.

Hello, good morning.

And hello, good morning, Bar. Bagel. Coffee. Thank you. And--hm--staring somewhat vacantly at the television screen. It's a very sunny day...somewhere. Bright green field. People running around.

[harryhotspur]

As the Bar seems to have automatically offered up two of everything, Harry finds himself staring down a cup of coffee. A small bowl of sugar appears beside it. As he all but shovels sugar into the cup (why is the spoon so tiny?), he glances up at the TV just in time to note with surprise: "That is my name."

[tu_vas_triompher]

"--eh? Oh!" Yes. It is. Feuilly hadn't quite caught it, but he'd heard it, and now he's looking at the screen with more attention. It's gone in a moment, but there's very definitely a picture of a rooster standing on a ball, labeled TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR.

Then there's people running around again. "It's--we saw this before, when we were looking for a, a movie. Is Tottenham a--place?"

[harryhotspur]

"I think--" He frowns. "There is a village so called. Near to London."

(Henry V will build an abbey near there, and after Henry VIII dissolves it, the land and building will ultimately pass into the hands of the Percy family! But not yet.)

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Everything that used to be a village is part of a city," Feuilly grumbles. He still has trouble, reading histories, reconciling the thick urban Paris neighborhoods with the fields and markets he remembers. It must be a greater change still coming from 1403.

...And, right, speaking of reading histories, he could be finding out about this. Bagel gripped between his teeth, Feuilly opens up his laptop and starts typing, four-fingered. TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR.

[harryhotspur]

"Thinkest thou it is a city?" It certainly seems like it would have to be, where else would you gather that many people?

Harry leans to peer over Feuilly's shoulder, to see if he has answered the most important question: "Why does it bear my name?"

[tu_vas_triompher]

"I don't--" Look, he's typing as fast as he can, okay? It just...takes a while for him to work out what he's looking for. Wikipedia. All right, he's heard of that. "--founded in 1882--oh, they have a motto, it's Latin, Audere est Facere, to dare is to do--"

Right, right, sorry, why are they called Hotspur? There's an article about the history--

"Just--a moment--see if they say something on the, the television?" While your boyfriend wrangles with this Future Tech?

[harryhotspur]

Yeah, but-- yes, alright. He turns back to the TV. Mostly they seem to be narrating the action, names he doesn't recognize coupled with anecdotes that don't really make sense. But gradually, he realizes--

"Football. This is football?"

If it is, why is no one hitting each other? Why does the man in the striped shirt get angry every time they push each other? God, the future is weird.

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Mmhmm, football--um. It says that, um. You. 'Lived locally in the 14th century?' And also that your family had land in the neighborhood later on?" And also that Harry is famous as a character from Shakespeare's play, but Feuilly isn't going to poke at that just now.

He looks up at a noise from the crowd, but nothing seems to have happened. Oh. Oh, all right, someone...came close to getting the ball into the big net. But he didn't.

[harryhotspur]

Harry frowns. "If we did, I know not of it."

But he also might not be considering the question too deeply: he seems rather distracted by the game. Not that he's still entirely clear what's going on.

"Which is mine?" Again: the important questions.

[tu_vas_triompher]

Shrug. "I'm just reading from here."

He grins to himself at the question. Right. "Their emblem is a cockerel standing on a football--hm. Colors, white and navy blue." It looks white and black on the television screen, but the other team is in red and blue, so. There you go. Tottenham Hotspur.

"Does it say the score?"

[harryhotspur]

It takes him a moment of searching the screen to notice the little box in the top corner.

"Neither for either, if that is the score," he says, pointing.

He props his chin on his hands, coffee and bagel momentarily forgotten. "It looks not like football."

[tu_vas_triompher]

...hm. No points. All right. Plenty of running around, though.

"What should it look like?"

[harryhotspur]

"More people. More kicking. Kicking each other," he clarifies. There's lots of kicking the ball going on.

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Ah." At the moment, they seem to be sending the ball more or less back and forth? "Kids play something like it in France, too. But not so--" Not so big and bright. Just, you know, kids kicking a ball around, if someone has a ball or a reasonable equivalent.

Hm.

He goes back to the Wikipedia page. Are these Tottenham Hotspur people...good at football?

[harryhotspur]

"It is played very oft for Shrove Tuesday-- betwixt parishes. Some do come to look, but not--" He waves his hand at the screen. "Not so many as this. --what, is't done?"

They seem to be stopping, though Harry can't see any reason why. "Half time," he echoes after one of the commentators. Huh.

[tu_vas_triompher]

There are a lot more people in the world than there used to be. But yes, it's quite a crowd, bigger than Paris theaters.

Feuilly looks up again. "'Half Time?' I'll look that up. But here--you have a long-standing rivalry. With some players called Arsenal. Probably not the same as parish games, but--" Hey, Harry knows who to...cheer against...?

[harryhotspur]

"That man-- that man who wears no colors, he would not let them hit each other." It is plain from Harry's tone that he finds this simply disgraceful.

He edges over to peek over Feuilly's shoulder again.