Flail watched how Ken talked to her and patted her arm.
"So was Stacey being serious before when she said a guy should hug and kiss a crying girl?" he asked. "Because that sounds to me more like a recipe to getting beaten up."
Stacey and Ken laughed at him.
"Depends," Stacey said, wiping her eyes. "Depends on closeness. Relationship. Pat back. Pat hand. Give tissue. Listen them. Enough."
"You have to show you're listening," Ken added, "but this sort of comforting only really works for those more reasonable girls. If it's someone unreasonable, you can either ignore them or give them a tissue and then get lost. No point entertaining tantrums if they're supposed to be grown up. If it's a schemer, just stay the heck away, man."
"Got it," said Flail, nodding. "I think. Maybe if I come across a crying girl, I'll call you for your advice, Stacey. You're the only girl I can talk to to help me with any girl problems."
Stacey coughed and shook her head.
"Calmed down now?" Ken patted her arm, passing her a cup of her thickened water.
Stacey made a face at the thick water but took a careful mouthful and an even more careful swallow.
"Yes," Stacey replied. "Better."
At that moment, someone knocked on the door and Stacey gestured for Miao to open in.
Elsa and Anna walked in, carrying bags of delicious smelling hot food.
Another two tables on wheels were pushed into the room. The food was unpacked onto the tables.
Grilled steak with chips, gravy and roasted vegetables for the boys. Vegetable mash, potato mash and meat paste for Stacey. A thick tomato soup was added on the side for all of them, as well as a thick shake of unknown flavour.
Stacey could only look enviously between her food and the boy's food.
"Wow," the boys gave Stacey pitying looks. They sniffed at her food. "It still smells good though," they tried to encourage her.
"Let's do a salute with our food before we dig in," Ken suggested.
The boys cut a piece of thick juicy steak each and held it up on their forks. Stacey pursed her lips and held up a spoonful of meat paste with her more steady left hand. All three touched their food together.
"Salute!" called the boys.
"Cheers," said Stacey in a grumpy voice.
"Cheers?" asked Flail, eating his piece of meat. He licked the meat paste that had gotten onto his fork. "I like the sound of that better. Let's use that from now on, Ken. It's a much better salute than saying 'salute'. Hey, Stacey, your meat paste doesn't taste too bad. It actually tastes like real meat."
Ken tasted the meat paste on his piece of steak and tilted his head. With a quizzical look, he ate his piece of steak. A light beamed.
"They grilled a steak and then blended it into meat paste for you, Stacey," he looked between the two dishes. "I think they added something extra to your meat paste though," he said in thought and tasted the gravy. His eyes lit up once more. "Stacey," Ken said, "your meat paste is a steak blended with gravy. It's good. You should try it."
Stacey tasted a bit of the meat paste off the end of her spoon. She frowned and tried a bit more. Now that Ken had mentioned it, she could taste it. There was a bit of that charred flavour that came from a good grilled steak, as well as the taste of a herb filled gravy. She blinked at her spoon, looking at the meat paste.
It looked like Thieren had gone through a lot of trouble for her again. She hated to admit it, but that man had truly done much more than he needed to for her. More than she'd expected.
Stacey took another spoonful and ate it slowly, remembering to be careful with her swallow. She savoured the taste and tried the vegetable mash thoughtfully.
Seeing her eating, the boys cheerfully dug into their food. She noticed Ken nudge Flail every now and then to slow down so that they could keep pace with her. Although she pretended not to notice, she couldn't help smiling at that. It was almost as if Endo was still there with them with the way Ken needed to take care of Flail. Perhaps the loss of a leg had drastically affected Flail's self esteem. Maybe that was why he was so different now.
The thought made her eyes blur, but Stacey ignored her tears to keep eating. It turned out that eating mush wasn't as tasteless as cardboard anymore. Not now she was eating with her friends. It was nice to be able to taste her food again.
Ken reached over to dab her eyes dry and patted her hand. Flail took her spoon to scoop a bit of vegetables, potato and meat altogether. He got her to try different flavour combinations, even making up a little rap about it that made them all laugh.
Ken let her try to cut his steak for fun. He got splashed with gravy and bits of his vegetables when the steak slipped.
"Sorry, sorry," Stacey apologised.
Flail suddenly jumped up, left the room and came back with two guitars and sheets of paper. He pushed his food aside and mumbled to himself, strumming chords and muttering under his breath. Although Stacey didn't know what had hit him, his musical side had obviously been inspired by something.
When Ken came back from cleaning himself up in the bathroom, he looked over Ken's shoulder. He then joined Flail in scribbling on the same sheet and arguing with him over what chord should come next.
"D sharp minor two," Stacey cut into their argument, peering at the upside down sheet.
"What was that?" Flail looked up.
"She names chords differently from us, remember?" Ken knocked a fist on Flail's head. "She's saying it's the subtonic minor with the tonic involved. Basically in the key we're in, it's this," Ken used Tadpole to explain further and played the chord on his guitar.
"Oh. Stacey, you need to be clearer," Flail grumbled, playing the chord. "Man, that sounds weird. Don't you think it sounds weird? Really weird. Doesn't that sound weird to you?"
"Play it with the other chords, you dong," Ken shook his head and played the whole section. "Listen."
"Hey, wow. Stacey, you are still the maestro. I'm sorry I ever doubted you," Flail bowed over his guitar to Stacey. "I forgot how good you are at music. Here, eat a bit more while you listen to this next part. What do you think of this?"
The trio put their heads together, writing a new song with its music and different vocal parts. Flail had written a whole rap section, starting the song off with a real hip-hop vibe. They transitioned to a pop style and then rock and roll and back again. They worded and reworded lyrics, then cut and moved sections repeatedly, trying to find the best mix. In between, they continued eating and drinking or forcing Stacey to eat another spoonful.