Title: Good Basic
Fandom: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Characters: Jemma Simmons, Phil Coulson
Rating: G
Wordcount: 400
Content notes: no warnings apply; spoilers for S2 Ep03.
Author notes: This one is for 2ndskin.
Summary: Coulson knows why Simmons chose this assignment.



Alone and undercover is fine so long as Jemma doesn't think about what she's left behind. She chose the Hydra assignment because she couldn't bear to be around Fitz the way he is now, to see him so changed and to know the change irrevocable. She'd said she felt she was making him worse, but that was only half the story, and Coulson knew it. Not much he doesn't see through.

She dreams sometimes of being back on the Bus, and wakes up crying. Days like that, the cobwebs of the dream cling to her and she stays up too late, not wanting to fall asleep again in case she falls back into it.

Finding Coulson in her apartment is like a twist on the dream, though he plays it like something out of a cheesy movie to make her smile.

“Did you think I wouldn't find out?” Flinging the fridge door wide accusingly: “What kind of a diet do you call this?”

Oh, I don't know, how about the Lone Spy Diet? She doesn't say it, but maybe it shows in her face anyway.

Brown bag of groceries in his arms: the evidence of his thought and preparation makes her eyes sting. She won't cry in front of him. Not now, not ever.

He pulls out the ingredients one after another, naming them with quiet pride. “It's basic, but I do good basic.”

She can't remember the last time someone else cooked for her. She and Fitz cooked together as students, inventing bizarre concoctions, experiments in practical chemistry. The time Fitz made his own variation on haggis passed straight into Academy legend, and not just because they had to redecorate the entire kitchen afterwards.

Something that could be a laugh or a sob is pushing up into her throat. She turns away and pulls a beer out of the fridge.

“Drink, sir?”

“Thank you.” He rolls up his sleeves and puts the apron on, smoothing out its stiff folds.

He seems remarkably at home in the kitchen, though she’s never seen him cook. And he's right: he does do good basic.

She eats at first to please him, to show she's OK, and then with increasing appetite, feeling the warmth of the food and its meaning spread through her body. Just for a while, and for the first time since she moved in, this temporary lodging feels like home.