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A Story About A Shower

"Are you... cleaning my shower?"

Mick glanced up from where he was, in fact, cleaning Jet's shower. And despite the efforts he was making, he wasn't sure it'd truly ever be clean. Not with the layers of grease and oil and everything else that Jet apparently brought home on a daily basis.

"Mmmhmmm..."

"Why?" Jet was staring from the bathroom doorway.

"Because I was going to use it," Mick replied. He set down the sponge he'd been using - a total loss already - and stood, stretching a bit before smiling.

Jet was still staring.

"I went and used a gym shower," Mick added.

Jet didn't move.

"Because yours was terrifying," Mick continued. "I've gotten it down to 'rather disgusting', for the record, and may get it to 'kinda gross' if I can work on it for another hour or so. When's the last time you cleaned it?"

"Cleaned it?" Jet gave him a bit of a funny look.

Mick winced. He knew that look of Jet's. That was the look that said Jet had never considered such a thing to be amongst the tasks a normal human performs on a regular basis.

"Doesn't it kinda clean itself a bit every time I shower?" Jet questioned. "I mean, I guess it had a few spots..."

"How often did you clean your dorm shower?" Mick regretted the question immediately. He shouldn't have asked. But he'd never thought to use Jet's dorm shower. And he rarely used Jet's dorm bathroom because Jet had special permission to be wherever he was anyway and...

"Don't answer that," Mick said quickly, before Jet could open his mouth. "Just let me keep cleaning."

"Should I be doing something?" Jet asked, glancing around the small bathroom.

"No, not really," Mick replied, shaking his head. He'd tied his hair up into a lumpy ponytail that was at least keeping it from touching the tile. "I can clear out if you need to piss--"

Jet shook his head and turned, though all he did was take off his jacket - a staff jacket now, finally. As Mick settled back to scrubbing, Jet settled back in the doorway.

"I got to help set up a flag course today for the First Years."

"That's sort of cruel," Mick replied, spraying a bit more cleaner on particularly stubborn stain. "Did Ash help you?"

"No. I didn't see her at all today, actually," Jet replied. Mick heard the sound of the medicine cabinet opening. "I should probably sort this stuff, huh? And maybe clean the sink?"

"You don't have to." Mick was thankful for the general resistance and resilliance of his uniform pants. He had no idea exactly what they were made from, but they kept him dry and he wasn't too terribly afraid of the strange slimy brown goo he kept getting his knees in.

"But I should." There was a bit of noise including rattling that Mick thought was pills. "Hey Mick, how often do you clean your shower?"

"Twice a month. Only takes a few minutes."

"I don't think I'm ever going to be any good at this." Mick heard Jet's punctuating sigh. One of the bottles went into the garbage.

"Nice try." Mick smiled at the tile wall. Even if Jet didn't know what he was trying to do, Mick did. "But this is the first and last free shower cleaning you get."

"I didn't mean--"

"Mmmhmm..."

"I didn't!"

Mick chuckled.

"Mick!"

Jet was quiet for a long moment, though Mick could tell that he hadn't moved from in front of the sink. Well, unless that wasn't Jet's shadow across one section of tile and instead something that needed more scrubbing.

"Thank you," Jet said finally.

"Full tune up on Akhlys?" Mick questioned, though it really wasn't a question. "And can you toss me a new sponge? I think some of this goo literally ate the last one."

"Mick!"

A clean sponge came flying from Jet's general direction and landed almost perfectly where Mick needed it.

"Fine," Jet said, this time finally turning to go. "I'm going to go get us dinner."

Mick smiled. Though he still didn't think that he'd truly won.