When you have spare time

While the other students were busy far - very far - away from where his kitchen was, enough to give him peace and quiet, Francis had busied himself with his cooking. Every so often he'd glance out the window and notice students around about, but never near enough to the building for him to be concerned of a fiery ball smashing in through the window.

He'd stir in the last of the ingredients of his stew, and was now leaving it to simmer. It was on low, so he had more than enough time until the next stage of it. The roast was in the oven, baking so that it needed little of his attention at current. He'd taken off his plastic gloves now, having little more to cut and peel, and walked over to the counter that seperated his kitchen from the table, leaning against it. The pot-plant there reminded him of his abilities and he quickly rolled his sleeves down and replaced his handware with the silk ones from his pocket.

Oh well, at least now he could grab the nearest magazine or book to read. Taking the article off the counter he started flipping through that.

Lili's attention from her book was diverted when she noticed something. She was hungry. She rubbed her belly and looked at her watch. She had another one of her nightmares of the Chinese man, so she woke up in the middle of the night. Since it took time before she got back to sleep, she missed breakfeast.

She got up from the floor, put the book back in her backpack and went towards the kitchen. That's when she saw someone inside it. She hesitated. It wasn't very polite to disturb people. Her belly gave a strong counter-argument by growling loudly.

She took a breath and knocked on the door.

Someone was knocking to enter. Not something he had expected. Quickly putting that magazine down, Francis looked up. "You can come in." Most students just walked in, since there wasn't anything that he could do to lock them out, the door had to be easily opened to get into the kitchen.

It was at this time he glanced over at his work again. Only seconds had passed but he was surprised by the knock, he only worried that it had to do with his job. Maybe the professor or one of the teachers found out that he had accidentally touched the desert last night and wilted the entire thing? He was sure he made up for it quickly enough, but he didn't think it was something worth getting in trouble for. At least until now.

Lili opened the door and nodded her head in greeting towards the older man. She had seen glimps of him before around the kitchen, so she assumed he was a chef of some kind.

"S-sorry, sir, but I missed breakfeast, so I, well, though I could get a sandwich or something. If you're busy, I can wait until later." she stammered, starting to get shy since her brother had taught her to stay away from other people if she could.

Once again, her belly counter-argued, this time louder. She smelled the air and felt her mouth starting to water. It really smelled good...

Francis had immediately relaxed when he saw the student, not that he had shown any sort of change in his counterance. Although her request explained why that morning there had been left overs. "That explains that... I knew I didn't make too much." But with the students who walked in and out, asking for snacks in between meals, those left overs will be all gone by the end of the day, so he never worried of food going to waste. "You wouldn't be the only student who missed breakfast this morning. There's no need to apologise for it."

Taking off those silk gloves and shoving them into his pocket again, he only thought of how soon he had to use up another pair of those disposable gloves. Rolling his sleeves up before pulling out a pair from its box to wear, he glanced back at Lili when her stomach rumbled. "What did you want on your sandwich?" Since hardly knew the girl and didn't know if she were allowed to make her own snacks or not, he decided it was better to make it for her all the same.

"Well, let's see... There is nothing I exactly dislike... I like cheese I guess. Do you have any Swiss ones?" she asked.

Without thinking, she then answered the question he thought.

"And don't worry, I can make my own sandwich without help."

"If you insist." Since he already had plastic gloves on now, Francis decided to leave them on for now. It would only be a waste, especially as he hadn't used them yet. "There's some in the fridge. It's the one in the clear package."

Leaning back against the counter, he crossed his arms to keep them off anything and watched the student. She may have seem polite, but he had to be sure she wasn't trying to sneak off more food than her share. Or if she was successful in pinching something, he'd at least know who to blame when it came to an important ingredient missing to one of his planned dishes.

Lili felt a new mind entering the room as she moved towards the fridge, and looked around to see a boy, although he was probably old enough to be called a man, smile at her. He seemed friendly, and she couldn't hear any malicious thoughts either.

"Oh, hello, mister. And what's you're name?" she asked the student. Yes, that was a good word to use.

Another student was walking in, also not having eaten anything that morning - what were these students doing when breakfast came around? He hadn't been around long enough to know much of the classes here or even of how much work the students were given, but if they weren't sleeping in due to sneaking out to visit friends or playing on the computer than he certainly had to see someone about that. It was making his job harder.

"You might as well." He looked pointedly at Lili for the next part of his sentence. "She was just about to get something to eat too." Then he left his focus from her, glancing at the door before returning to watch both students. He wondered if someone else was going to come in soon, wanting food. "A few of you students had missed out on breakfast. Were some of you throwing a party last night and stayed up past lights out?" It was mostly a joke, even if they were it wasn't that Francis cared enough to bust them for it.

Ah well, the sooner they were done with getting the food they wanted the sooner he could go back to wasting time while waiting for the stew he was working on to boil. He shouldn't be so concerned about the food they were taking since he wasn't the one paying for it, yet some students here did have a horrible habit of emptying out tha fridge in one feeding. The last thing he needed was to find out just as he was preparing to cook that there was nothing for a meal.

(I STILL don't get classes, so I'm just gonna skim over that complicated crap)

Lili tried to ignore her fellow student's thoughts. After all, it was rude to peek into something as private as someone's mind. However, she found herself interested in these "patrols" he was thinking about and wanted to find out more.

"Oh, you know, science, mathematics, the usual things. My name is Lili Zwingli," she answered Alfred as she watched him walk away from her.