It's A Wonderful Cover Life - Outtake

If you follow me on Twitter, you probably know that it took 19 tries before I finally liked the next scene of Cover Life (and came up with one that didn't bring the story to a staggering halt).  This is not that scene.  But I've figured that the story's been gone a while, due to various reasons, so I'll give you a lil' somethin' somethin'.  Plus Nervert liked it and the poor guy has been beta'ing so much stuff that fell victim to the delete button in the end, so this is for you, buddy.  Mistakes are mine - I can't remember anymore what I've fiddled with.  

“Why are you mad at me?” he asked.

“I’m not.”  If it was a lie, she wasn’t obvious about it, but he still didn’t buy it.

“Okay, why were you mad at me?  And don’t tell me I’m imagining things,” he added before she could deny it again.  “I’ve been around my sister, and my sister and her boyfriend, long enough to pick up on this sort of thing.  What did I say or do…”

“You chopped onions,” she interjected. 

Chuck blinked, surprised.  “You’re mad because I chopped onions?  Is there some sort of protocol or something that I’ve missed?  I mean, you don’t treat your staff like servants, so I really didn’t think I was overstepping a line.  As a matter of fact I figured it was safer to hide out in the kitchen under the circumstances and I couldn’t just stand there and watch Lou cry and not do anything about it.”  He stopped for a breath. 

Sarah frowned.  “Lou was crying?”

“Onions,” was his only explanation.  He was still trying to wrap his head around Sarah’s answer. 

“Oh.” 

“So,” Chuck said when it seemed she was not going to elaborate, “that doesn’t really answer my question.”

“Beckman could’ve walked in on you and that would’ve been very awkward to explain.”

“Beckman would’ve thought that me chopping onions was odd?”  He was having trouble following Sarah’s train of thought, not sure if it was a woman-thing or a one-too-many-mojito-thing.

“Will you forget about the onions.” 

“You’re the one who keeps bringing it up.”

“Because Lou finds it so sexy.”     

Now Chuck was at a complete lost.  He could understand that Lou enjoyed working with food, being a chef and all, but it was hard to believe that anyone could find an onion sexy, or chopping onions, or… Then something in his mind clicked, but before he could say something, Sarah confirmed his suspicions.

“She was flirting with you for the world to see and you weren’t exactly subtle about it,” she blurted.

“I wasn’t…” Chuck tried, but Sarah, it seemed, was on a roll. 

“Oh, come on!  She was all ‘I think a man who cooks is sexy’ and you were ‘can you give me lessons’ and...”

“Now hang on,” he interrupted, “that’s not what she said.  And when I asked for cooking lessons, I meant exactly that…you know, with carrots and potatoes and onion…I’m moving out on my own and I have a child to feed and the last time I checked malnutrition was an act of child abuse, so it was a legitimate request, no strings attached.  There was no flirting.”

“Lou was flirting with you,” she insisted stubbornly.

“If you say so,” Chuck conceded.  The alternative was to deny it, which would just lead to a she-was-she-was-not argument and no one ever won those.  But Sarah was like a dog with a bone. 

“You didn’t notice?”  She looked like she was about to add something, but instead she shook her head.  “You didn’t notice,” she said again, more to herself than to him.  “So I guess Jim and Larry were right.  I could jump on you naked and you wouldn’t…”   

“I would notice,” he cut in before thinking.  Then his mind went to a bad place and he flushed bright red.  Sarah just stared at him, her mouth agape.  He swallowed thickly in response, resisting the urge to tug on his collar.  It felt like the temperature in the car had shot up several degrees.  His brain searched frantically for something to say to remedy the situation.  He’d deduced that Jim and Larry were actually Jeff and Lester and asking about that seemed stupid.  And bringing up the kiss now could just steer the conversation further into the proverbial minefield.  “I wasn’t flirting with Lou.”  Not much better, he thought.  Realizing he’d said that already, several times, he added lamely “Just to be clear.”  

She nodded slowly, visibly grateful for the segue.  “Okay.”

“Were you jealous?” his mouth ran away with him again. 

“No,” she answered, a little too quickly. 

Chuck almost believed her, but she was chewing on her bottom lip, a tell-tale sign that she was nervous.  Maybe, he thought, the kiss had nothing to do with sticking it to the men at the club who had ignored her all night, but with the fact that she thought he was interested in someone else.  There was only one way to find out, but before he could say anything, Sarah spoke up.

“Chuck, do you want to go on a date with me?  A real date.” 

He was rendered speechless.  That was the last thing he’d expected her to say.  He struggled for a response, and when the silence grew too long, he said the first thing that came to mind. 

“Because you owe me?”