Mens Sana in Corpore Sano

Eri followed Zoe and Vienna to the woman's house, it was modest but lovely, Eri really liked how cozy it looked. "Such a lovely home, Ms.Costa." Once they were inside, Eri left the bag she was carrying on the table as Vienna suggested before following her into the kitchen. "Thank you again, Ms.Costa... For everything." She said with a warm smile.

Once the group got to her house, Zoe could get more of a feel for the kind of person Vienna was. The house felt very...lived in, was the best way Zoe could describe it. Like it had seen its fair share of experiences. It almost felt similar to their home, and something about that made her uneasy. That wasn't her fault, and she knew that, but it was still a hard feeling to shake off.

She followed Eri's example and placed what they had on the bag, observing what she could. She noticed a few pictures that she could only assume were a younger Vienna, and a few people she didn't recognize. If she formerly ran things at that place, chances are she met quite a few people, and had connections in a number of places. She didn't want to suspect anyone, especially after they had been welcomed into a home when they had nowhere to go, but she wasn't going to make that mistake again.

"Yeah, this means a lot for the both of us. Without you, we'd be stuck on the streets. If there's anything I can help with around the place, don't hesitate to ask. And don't worry about my stamina; I can keep going for days if need be."

At Zoe's offer, Vienna paused for a moment just as they are about to step into the kitchen.  "Are you good with building repairs?  The rooftop could use a bit of patching up.  Ordinarily, I have someone fix it up monthly, but he is running lately due to a large project.  If not, it is OK.  It can still hold for a quite a while."  Her gaze lingers up at the roof for a moment longer.  

"I am sure there is something you can help with.  If there is anything you have question with, please let me know."  A warm smile was given to Zoe before she turned towards Eri.  "Mmm, is there any recipes that you want to make, dear?"  

The 3 of them stepped into the kitchen which had the same modest but simplistic functionality with a touch of home.  Aside that, one thing that was noticeable is that there were a lot of cabinets, cupboard and counters to store anything and to work on.  Everything looked well sorted but accessible ranging from towels to cooking utensil, to wooden cutlery.  It isn't precisely a cook's dream kitchen but it was close to it.

Zoe's unique early life had given her a lot of skills to use at various points. The memories surrounding them weren't entirely pleasant, but she was able to seperate the two. If she wasn't down in the pits fighting all kinds, she was above ground, running around the city frantically doing whatever odd jobs she could to earn money, and she was quick to learn and retain what she needed to make those positions reccuring projects.

Because of that, Zoe's face lit up at the offer. "That'd be great! I used to do all sorts of things like that, so I can get that done, no problem!" Internally, she was happy to be able to pay the woman back for opening things up to them. And it was something she had some experience with too, so that works out perfectly. "I'm pretty good with my hands, so if something comes up, let me know!"

As the group made their way into the kitchen, Zoe was still being as attentive as ever with noticing little details. The two might notice her ear twitch occasionally, a telltale sign of Zoe both absorbing her surroundings while also being lost in thought. It kept the same feeling that she had when they had entered the home, with a very comfy, relaxing feel to it all. Everything was very neat and organized, and it was easy for anyone to get exactly what they needed at any time. It said a lot about the person behind it all, without having to say a lot of words. For now, she tried to push down the memories of their home and focus on the now, but it was difficult.

She nudged Eri's shoulder a little playfully. "Something tells me you're going to have a lot of fun in here."

Eri was impressed by the house and the kitchen didn't disappoint either, the red kitsune's were sparkling, the kitchen was lovely and welcoming, it remind her of Zoe's apartment, her tail happily moving back and forwards. "Well... I only have the recipes from this book I found..." She looked into her pocket, pulling out a little book titled 'Cooking for beginners' "Doesn't have many recipes but they are easy to make." At the nudging, Eri's ears perked up and she looked at Zoe with a smile. "Yeah!" She replied while nodding.

"Hmm I'll tell you what. I will let you create the dish you want while I help you along the way." Vienna had caught the awe and eagerness from the red kitsune and decided to indulge her desire to cook. While Vienna knew she is the more skilled of the two, this wasn't about her; it was about Eri. She did take a moment to look at the recipes that the book had offered and recognized how the food there were made.

"If is not much to ask..." She started with a shy tone. "I-I'd like to learn new recipes... I-If that's okay with you, Ms.Costa." She wanted to learn more recipes so that way she could cook even more tasty types of food for Zoe.

Just from Eri's expression, she could tell this would be good for her. A place to relax, where things were safe, and they could just have a moment to breathe. Clearly it was something they were missing from their li-

"Hehe... It's nothing... I just followed your steps... Big sis..."

And yet, she couldn't shake off that feeling. She knew this was different from then. She knew it, and yet she couldn't stop thinking about it. How much it all felt like that one day. When she failed. When they felt things that weren't real. The indecision was on her face for only a split second, growing ever so slightly pale, before she shook it off and tried not to face the other two.

"M-Miss Vienna, I'm gonna take a quick look at that roof. Where do you keep your tools..?"

It's not like that day, Zoe. You know this. Not every nice person is going to be like THEM. Dammit, you're smarter than this!

"Well if you want to learn something new.  We should start with something you can make anytime."  The elder shuffled over to a drawer and pulled it out before she pulled a cookbook from it.  Setting it on the table, she flipped through pages and pages of many of the different dishes but shifted slightly to the side so that the two foxes can see the book: One-Pot Beef with Broccoli, Black Bean–Stuffed Sweet Potatoes, Bowties & Broccoli, Sheet Pan Sausage & Veggies, Pesto Chicken Bake, Ground Turkey Skillet with Green Beans, BBQ Meatloaf & Veggie Dinner.

"So what dish would want to start on, Eri?"  She turned around and called to Zoe.   "Zoe, you too, dear.  Which of these would you like to try out when Eri makes them?" Vienna doesn't seem to have noticed Zoe's moment of being troubled.

Eri looked at the recipes, all of them sounded delicious and she couldn't pick one, so she turned to Zoe with a smile. "You choose Zoe, I'll make the one you choose."

Maya told me that you can't trust anyone, that doing so is the biggest risk of all. And she's right; look what happened because I let my guard down! And yet...is our entire life going to be that? Constantly looking over our shoulder, suspicious of everyone? I don't know if-

Zoe's rampaging thoughts were cut short at hearing Eri's voice address her. It was enough to make her jump slightly as it ripped her out of the torrent that was her mind right now.

"O-Oh, you're asking me? Well, let's see..." She had to admit a lot of them looked pretty delicious, especially considering their own experience with food. She took a moment to really look over the page and find one that jumped out at her, before pointing at one, the One-Pot Beef with Broccoli. "I'll admit, I do like beef...a lot...so if I had to pick one, that'd probably be it." It was the truth; just looking at it was making her a little hungry. And with Eri making it, it was bound to be even better.

But, she needed a moment to process things. "I'm gonna take a quick look at the roof in the meantime. Holler if you need me, okay?" She left the room before the two of them could answer, needing this silence for now to get her thoughts organized as she left the house and closed the door behind her.

Stop freaking out, already! This is not that incident over again! You're close enough to hear anything that's happening inside, and if worse comes to worst, then you do what you need to! So, just quit it already!

"Do not work yourself too hard and do not take too long!" Vienna called out to the leaving fox with a a hand next to her mouth. The elder had quite the set of lungs and a strong voice! The volume of her voice was surprisingly robust and loud for someone that had signs that she was showing her age moments ago.

Vienna turned towards Eri. "Eri, do you know how to cube beef and cut broccoli?" Her volume returned to the soft tone before.

Eri nodded, carefully gathering her hair into a ponytail. "I-I do, yeah."

Zoe heard the old woman's voice as she left, at a much higher decibel than she expected. She certainly had a pair of lungs on her, that's for sure. Closing the door behind her, she now had a moment to put things together and not let her thoughts get the better of her.

Alright, now you have to calm down. You're an adult in this scenario, regardless of how old you are. A solid, independent adult capable of making your own decisions in life. Even if those decisions are for Eri's sake.

As she thought, she noticed a ladder nearby the house, just what she was looking for. Picking it up with relative ease, she placed it on the side of the house and started climbing to see the damage.

You're capable of defending her. You know this. Maya knows this. Eri knows it, too. And even if this is a new land with new things, that fact doesn't change. You're going to give it all to keep her safe. No matter what.

As Zoe reached the top rung, she got a view of the roof to see the damage. A few of the shingles had come off of the roof, but the majority had seemed to be still on the roof itself, so that should make it easy. And the rest would do with some patch jobs. Nothing she couldn't handle.

Okay, so there was that one time that you were caught unprepared. And it might have messed with your head. A lot. But that was one time! And you learn from your mistakes! Just because two people lied to you doesn't mean everyone is going to...even if you're going to assume so until you learn otherwise for her sake.

It was at that moment that Zoe realized that she had come all this way without any tools. An amateur mistake. Zoe slid back down the ladder and looked around for something to work with.

And, think about it! Maya was the first thing you met when you hit the mainland, and even though you didn't have the best of introductions, now you're friends with her, with mutual interest! Just goes to show that you can't judge a book by it'-

She stopped in her tracks as the phrase rang in her head a little.

Yeah. You can't judge a book by its cover, alright. I can't afford to. Not anymore.

She tried to shake herself free of that and continued searching for a few tools.

"Very good. Now if you would, wear this over your head. We do not want any of our hair to fall into the food." Vienna slid open a drawer and pulled out a pair of hairnets, giving one to Eri. She stretched the one she had over her own hair, making sure none of the strands stray from the confinement. "After that, can you grab the cutting board and a cutting knife on the wall next to the counter over there? Then the colander a few feet to the left" Her hand points to the kitchen tools on the wall.

Next, she shuffled towards a tall white rectangular furniture, gripped the handle and pulled it open. Immediate a gush of frigid air wafted from the structure while the interior lit up. Inside were a good amount of assortment of frozen food: wrapped beef, vegetables, some cubed ice, a whole chicken, and some ice cream. She took the beef and some whole broccoli from the frozen storage and set it on the counter before she closed the door.

"Now one of the broccoli in the colander and sprinkle some salt over both of the broccoli and the beef, not for any flavor but to clean it. Do it for both broccoli and the beef. Rinse the beef to thaw it out." Vienna began to take out a few ingredients and seasoning to prepare another part of the meal.

Eri started to follow Vienna's instructions to the letter, grabbing the cutting board and the knife right after putting on the hairnet and started to cut the beef and the broccoli as she was asked and seasoning it. "L-Like this?" She carefully sprinkled the salt over the broccoli and the beef.

"It is better to do it whole before you cut it.  And remember, we are rubbing salt to clean it first, not to season it."  She had already caught what the young fox was doing and verbally corrected.  "After you do so, rinse it off.  Only then you cut them."  

While she continued to instruct Eri, she took out a few more tools and ingredients for herself: a measuring cup, a mixing bowl, soy sauce, honey, some clove of garlic, ginger, and sesame seeds.

"S-Sorry!" She apologized before following her instructions once more, this time rubbing salt instead of seasoning it. Once the beef and the broccoli were clean, Eri rinsed it off and proceeded to cut it, carefully and with precision.

Once she had everything ready, she took the beef and the broccoli to Vienna. "I-I'ts done, Ms.Costa. What do you want me to do now?"

While Eri was washing and cutting the beef and vegetables, Vienna was mixing some soy sauce, a little bit of honey, minced garlic, a tiny bit of ginger, and a small batch of sesame seed together inside a sauce mixer with a spoon. Her hand move in circular motions to mix all of the ingredients within the soy sauce. Once in a while, she took a moment to pause to see Eri finished on her side. She had to admit, despite Eri's initial mistake and low knowledge of recipes, her speed and precision of food preparation was admirable. With that talent, plus herbalism skills, the fox girl had potential.

"Very good, Eri. Now I want you to listen very closely. Take the wok near you and put it on the stove, on top of one of the metal coil. Do not touch it; intense heat comes from it." She emphasized her warning so Eri would fully understand. "After you do that, pour a small amount of olive oil. It is near the stove. Now turn one of the dial. Make sure that the picture on the dial has the circled filled in where the wok is." Vienna sets the sauce she was mixing aside to closely monitor Eri. She had no intention of having Eri accidentally burn herself, despite the abundance of methods of healing available.

Hammer in nails in hand, Zoe made her way back to the ladder on the other side of the house.

Okay, so, you probably should have made sure you had these things before you started working. But, what's done is done. There's no harm in it.

While Zoe outwardly was quiet as she made her way up the ladder, inwardly the torrent of her mind battered against itself.

It's okay to make mistakes every now and then. You know as well as anyone that no one's perfect. But...can you afford to? Even before you met Eri, one mistake could have cost you your life, and a few of them came close. And now, you've got more than just you to think about. You've got her, too.

Wordlessly, Zoe climbed to the top, surveying where to start.

And...all of that was a big mistake. It's not something you can ever forget, but trying to forget something and trying to move on are two very different things, here. Like, you know what you did was wrong, right? You convinced Eri that it was safe. You were so sure that they only wanted to help, that maybe people on the mainland were just...different, than what either of you were used to in your lives. In hindsight, that sounds silly to think out loud. What even were you thinking, really?

The weight of a hammer was a familiar one in her hands, spinning it a little to get a feel for the amount she'd need to do it right. Taking one of the broken pieces of shingle that were still on the roof, Zoe moved it into one of the open spots, took a nail, and started hitting it a little, testing her own strength.

In a way, this was a wake-up call for you. Things aren't gonna be magically different for you despite being on a new continent. The world is still full of jerks who will use you, for everything you have, and then throw you away. The only major difference here is that people will make you like it, to the point where you won't even realize it until things are too late. Hell, if Eri hadn't pulled you out of bed and gotten you out earlier, you both might have ended up staying far longer than one night. In the state you were, you were this close to calling that thing..."Mom." If you had seen her again, chances are it would have been hard to fight not staying longer. Especially if you didn't know what was happening. It felt like the most natural thing in the world...she felt warm and comforting...and she smelled nice, to-

Zoe visibly shook her head as she just finished the first shingle, nailed in rather well. It wasn't her first time doing something like this, so she knew the basics. Four per shingle, shingle side down, etc. She wiped the sweat off of her brow, looking pretty satisfied that she could still remember how to do things. There was quite a few shingles left around, too. Must've been some storm.

Stop thinking about her, dammit! It doesn't matter how good she made you feel when none of it was real! Even if they made Eri feel like a family, none of it matters when it was all fake to begin with! You want to give her that feeling and have it actually come from the heart and not some drug, right?!? That "milk" crap...damn, just saying it brings back that taste...you'd never had anything like that, had you? You were used to water your entire life...man, that tasted good...

Zoe unconsciously licked her lips a little as she spaced out for a moment, the memories overtaking her as she sat on the roof, halfway through a thought but not quite there.

You remember it, right? That warm, comforting feeling...it doesn't hurt to just remember that feeling, right? It's not like you're going to go out and find more, or anything. Who cares if it was some sort of drug...it was the best feeling you'd eve-

Zoe's hand cracked across her cheek with an audible slap, snapping herself out of her self-induced trance. With a groan at her own mind, she got up and started towards the pile.

I'm not gonna let that happen again.

Eri nodded and grabbed the wok, placing it on the stove, the kitsune followed Vienna's instructions, pouring a bit of olive oil and turning the dial just as instructed. She was surprised, she had never see something like that. "W-Whoa..."

"Amazing isn't it? It allows the common-folk like me a relatively safe source of cooking heat. No magic required. No starting one first with wood." She commented happily as the oil started heating up, watching the amazed expression from the red haired girl. Some wisp of white steam was rising from the oil.

"Now after 30 seconds of waiting for the oil to heat up, pour all of the beef into it, then sprinkle a tiny bit of salt, some pepper and then use the wooden spatula to stir the beef and flavoring for a minute, then this pour this sauce, another minute of stirring, and finally the broccoli, then 3 minutes until the beef is brown. I will repeat when to pour the ingredient." The elder instructed, again monitoring her to make sure she didn't keep the beef cooking for too long. Each time Eri reached to a specific step, Vienna would repeat the instruction when it was time.

As Eri starts to cook the beef, it was giving a rather pleasant and slightly savory aroma, not too overpowering but enough that it would stir her appetite. The sauce Vienna made would add to the scent flavor that waft in the kitchen. The broccoli didn't add any scent but was a compliment to the meat that Eri was cooking.

Not only was the meal being created was aromatically appealing but the dish itself was looking very delicious. The sauce Vienna made gave the sauted beef a glaze look with some sesame seeds decorating its surface. The glazed sauce also lightly coated the broccoli giving it a unique slick texture. The green of the broccoli also complimented the brown of the beef.

Overall, Eri found herself creating a very delicious dinner.

Eri was actually amazed by the results of their cooking, the smell was so inviting that the kitsune had to try her best not to take a nibble before it was time to eat but Vienna surrly could her the kitsune's stomach growling slightly. "I'm done here, ms.Costa." She called the elder over, starting to get comfortable in her presence, she still remembered what happened last time someone invited them but she could feel it, this time, it was different.

Vienna looked over the dish for a few seconds ignoring the delicious scent. It was well made both on a culinary and presentation view. On a more critic based view, there were a few issues but were pretty minor and it was mostly her own failing to provide a bit more detail. But overall it was a successful dish. "Very good. I will get the dishes and the utensil and have this ready at the dining room. Please call for Zoe outside."

Eri nodded and headed outside of the house to look for Zoe, once outside, she started to climb the ladder Zoe used to get on the roof. "Zoe, food is ready!" She called.