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“All right, Jim. After you’ve started the water, I need you to wash those green beans, then dry them on a towel. Once they’re dry, trim the ends, and cut 'em about yea big.” Bones spreads his thumb and index finger to indicate a length Spock would call three point two five centimeters. “I’m going to get started on the bacon. Let me know when you’re finished with them.”
Dinner is just going to be BLTs with a side of green beans, but Bones has thought this meal out about five steps ahead of Jim and knows what each of them should be doing at any moment. Jim figures cooking with Bones is the closest he’ll get to what it’s like working with him in the OR, since being the person on the table whose life he is trying to save isn’t really the same thing.
Bones lays out thick strips of bacon in the cast iron skillet he calls a family heirloom. Once, back at the Academy, Bones caught him trying to wash it with a scrub brush and soap. He was sure Bones was going to file a room change with housing right then and there. Jim tried to point out that something with five generations of McCoy food grease adhered to it was a potential health hazard or at the very least kind of disgusting, but Bones wouldn’t hear any of it.
Jim has the green beans washed and dried, so stops to check on the bacon while Bones is working on the tomatoes. There is one piece that is just starting to sizzle around the edges. Jim goes to pick it up by the end but isn’t fast enough and burns his thumb a little.
“You’ve got the patience of a toddler. Stop fiddlin’ and let 'em cook,” Bones says, without even turning around. Not for the first time Jim thinks Bones needs to be psi tested again, the man clearly has some sort of psionic abilities. “And you didn’t finish those green beans, did you? We need those stat.”
Jim gets to work next to where Bones is slicing the tomatoes into neat, even slices, the juices pooling on the cutting board. Bones had picked the tomatoes out himself at the market that morning. He grumbled the whole time about how much starbase ones would never compare to earth-grown ones, especially not to the Cherokee Purples his grandma grew, but that didn’t stop him from greedily filling up a bag of orange, dark red, and pinkish tomatoes.
“Good god, what are you doing to those beans? Go prep the lettuce instead.” Bones leans against Jim’s side nudging him out of the way and taking the chef’s knife. He lines up a handful of beans at a time to trim and chop, making quick work of them. Once the beans are on the stove, he starts on the avocado.
Bones never wants to admit San Francisco rubbed off on him at all, but Jim’s pretty sure that David McCoy’s Famous BLTs didn’t have avocado on them. Jim’s will be served strictly sans avocado though. Something about avocados being cross-reactive with latex allergies and Bones wanting to eat his damn dinner, not manage a case of anaphylaxis.
“You can drop the toast in now, then go set the table.”
Jim knows when he’s been demoted. While he is trying to remember which drawer has forks, Bones has pulled the green beans off the stove and gotten them in a serving bowl and is flipping the bacon over. Bones puts the toast down for another round, then quickly dresses the green beans with olive oil, a squeeze of lemon, and salt and pepper.
The toaster pops again and Bones is ready with two plates. He takes a moment to pull the bacon off the stove onto a paper towel-covered plate, before turning back to the toast and spreading a layer of mayonnaise on each slice. Mayo is another ingredient Bones seems to have thought a lot more about than Jim. It’s creamy, a little gross on its own, but good on a sandwich. What more is there to say? Apparently a lot. Bones keeps threatening to bring a case of some particular kind aboard next time they’re earthside, but if Bones brought everything back he said he would, they’d have the whole damn planet.
Bones puts together the sandwiches, carefully layering lettuce, tomato, and bacon on, plus avocado for his, before cutting them on the diagonal. Jim does not understand the alchemical process that renders bacon and white bread - two foods Bones hassles him about anytime he catches Jim with them in mess - acceptable for eating when combined on a BLT. He’d ask, but he already knows Bones would just tell him not to look a gift horse in the mouth.
Bones brings the plates over to the table, along with the serving spoon for the green beans Jim had forgotten. After the first bite, they’ve both got tomato juice running down their chins, and Jim jumps up to grab paper towels for them. Apparently napkins are BYO in ‘Fleet short-term housing.
“Lordy, that’s a good sandwich.”
“As good as your dad’s?”
“Not quite, but he never had to contend with starbase 'maters so I think he'd have appreciated the effort.”
When they're finished, Jim gets up to clear the plates. He should get started on the kitchen too, it’s a mess, and Bones will bitch if the heirloom skillet is left sitting overnight. But he hasn’t had Bones to himself like this, sated and relaxed, in ages.
Jim leans down to give Bones a kiss, the fresh stubble along his jaw a pleasant scrape on Jim’s lips. Bones turns to face him, hazel eyes hungry, so, no, not sated just yet. There’s a fleck of mayo at the corner of his lips that Jim wipes away with his thumb - definitely gross outside a sandwich - before moving in for a real kiss, lazy and warm.
“It’s a good thing you’re a good kisser because you’re a terrible prep cook.”
“C’mon, Chef, dessert’s on me.”