if_inconvenient | (no subject)

"Yeah?" Tony is honestly and completely interested in this conversation. "Well, where's the nearest one?"

"I think the one I went to was in Modesto?" Cal says. "Uh. If there is one closer than that I don't know about it."

He did, in fact, look it up once. There was a pot-induced craving involved.

He takes another bite of his pizza, mostly for appearance's sake. Any appetite he had before is gone.

"We should totally go there sometime," Tony declares, making a gesture that includes himself, Sherlock, and Cal. "All three of us."

He is serious about his pizza.

"I'm not invited?" Obie asks with a smile. Tony laughs and shakes his head.

"One, you only eat pizza because you love me so much; two, you live on the wrong coast; three, after half an hour in a car with a bunch of teenagers you'd shoot yourself."

Nice try, though, Cal doesn't say.

"Sounds good," he says cheerfully. "I'm in."

This time the conversation allows for a look at Sherlock, under the guise of finding out his thoughts on a pizza trip.

"I suppose I could endure such a venture," he says dryly.

Tony provides a helpful translation: "That means yes."

Cal laughs.

"Yeah, I'm getting used to Sherlock speak," he says, his tone fond.

Even if he does occasionally wish he had a dictionary on him.

"I speak perfectly intelligible English."

"From the wrong century."

Cal thinks briefly of Milliways and says,

"It's not his fault the time machine was a little off."

It'll sound kind of random to Tony, he knows, but Sherlock will appreciate the reference.

He finishes his slice and takes the opportunity to not reach for another.

Sherlock puts his hand to his mouth to prevent himself from laughing pizza all over the table.

"Looks like you've figured out his sense of humour, too," says Obadiah. "Could you translate for the humans in the room?"

For that, Tony will give him the flattest look in the history of flat looks.

"Cool it."

"I was just—"

"And now you're just shutting up."

Obie raises his hands in surrender, still smiling gently. After a moment, Tony relaxes and goes back to his pizza.

So occasionally he does notice. Or occasionally he decides to let it bother him. Frankly Cal doesn't see what was worse about that than anything Obadiah's said to Sherlock so far, but - okay, fine. At least it was something.

"We were watching a time travel movie," he non-explains; he's still addressing Tony, not Obadiah, and adds a look that says We'll tell you the real story later. It's not a subtle look, but one designed to let Obadiah know, silently but clearly, that he is not included.

Hopefully Tony will pick the more innocuous Milliways-related translation.

"Oh, right."

He grins.

Tony is not, in fact, a terribly subtle person. He is just about up to the task of not immediately blabbing the existence of Milliways; also finding some way to not exclude Obie, who kind of can't know what the hell everyone is talking about, is beyond him.

Something was worse about that, judging by how Sherlock reacted—the disproportionate tension when Obadiah spoke, the disproportionate relaxation now that Tony has come to his defense.

Cal, focused mainly on Tony (and on telling Obadiah to go fuck himself with such discretion that even Violet would be proud), didn't really notice Sherlock's reaction. He does turn to Sherlock now, though, and say,

"If you don't mind, I think I'm officially out of excuses for putting off studying."

Let's get the hell out of here now.

"By all means."

He gets to his feet.

"Shall I see you out?"

"Sure." If Sherlock comes up with an excuse to leave with him between here and the front door, Cal would also be okay with that.

He gets up too, saying,

"It was nice to see you, Tony, thanks for the pizza."

Obadiah gets a neutrally polite,

"Mr Stane." Acknowledging his presence. Nothing more, nothing less.

"Yeah. Call me sometime, we'll all go to Uno, it'll be great."

Tony might have been a little more inclined to stick up for Obie a minute ago, but right now he is freshly reminded of what a jerk Obie can be sometimes. He doesn't say anything either way about how Cal kind of blew him off, and Obie just smiles so falsely that even Tony catches it.

Sherlock helpfully leads Cal into the other living room to pick up his DVDs.

"I've half a mind to go with you," he says quietly, when he is sure it won't be overheard.

Cal had completely forgotten about the DVDs. He finds that the tray of the DVD player has already slid out, reminding him to grab the disc and put it in its case. (Jarvis is helpful like that.)

As he does so, his movements are more stiffly controlled than they were a moment ago; the façade has fallen away again, unneeded with just Sherlock around, and the real Cal isn't so good at covering.

"You're more than welcome," he says, forgetting that that is, technically speaking, not true as far as his mother is concerned, "as long as you don't mind me smoking a bowl the size of my fucking head when we get there."

"No objections."

He also has half a mind to go a verbal round or two with Violet Chandler, just to work out his frustration, but he decides that would be an unproductive response and he might be better served by further stealth.

"Then it's a deal," Cal says. "We can say I needed help studying."

In case Sherlock feels the need to let Tony know he's leaving first.

"Perhaps not. Tony would no doubt make other assumptions."

In a better moment, that would no doubt serve to make Cal awkward for the next five minutes. But with worse on his mind, he just snorts and says,

"Okay, then let's go."