Like always, the ride on the Quinjet was boring, and while she was physically exhausted, Claire was antsy and bored. Her leg bounced up and down as she looked around for something to do. Her eyes landed to her bag on the floor under one of the chairs on the other side of the jet. She stood up and went over to her bag, opening it and pulling out her phone and earbuds. She wasn't sure what she was going to watch, but it would probably be what she watched whenever she was bored; John Mulaney's comedy specials on Netflix. She loved John Mulaney and was probably his biggest fan. She knew all his jokes and could quote them whenever she wanted, though she didn't want to brag.
Walking back to her seat next to Wanda, she plugged her earbuds in and opened up the Netflix app. Putting in the right earbud, she looked over to Wanda, holding out the left one. Wanda smiled and took it, putting it in her ear.
"What are you putting on?" Wanda asked, tilting her head curiously.
"John Mulaney," Claire answered.
"Who?" Claire froze and whipped her head towards Wanda.
"What did you just say?"
"I...don't know who that is," Wanda said.
"He's a comedian and he's really funny. Trust me, you'll like him." Wanda nodded, trusting her. Claire scrolled through her watchlist until she came to his third special: New in Town. Personally, she liked Comeback Kid the most, but if Wanda was going to watch, she needed to start with the first one.
The video started, and immediately, a parody of a '90s sitcom theme song started playing, introducing the show.
"New in town. John Mulaney's New in Town," John Mulaney popped into the frame with a hot dog, spilling mustard all over himself. "He's spilling mustard on his shirt. He's got some papers to deliver, but oh no!" The scene changed to a newspaper headline that reads, "John Mulaney is a Great Architect" and John made an "all right" motion with his fist. "He's successful, and he's got so many crazy friends! Ooh, new in town, John Mulaney's New in Town!" The shot changed to violet background and John Mulaney stepped foot on the stage, wearing a light gray suit. Claire was already laughing, while Wanda sat looking a little confused.
"Hi! Hi! Hello!" John greeted the crowd with a cartoonish grin on his face. The crowd cheered happily for him. When the audience calmed down a little, he spoke again. "Thank you very much. Thank you very much. That's so nice of you, I hope you're having a good week, thank you for being here! I, uh, am doing well myself. In a couple days I'm gonna turn 29 years old and I'm very excited about that. I was hoping, uh, by now that I would look older but that didn't happen."
Claire laughed along with the audience in the video.
"I don't look older, I just look worse, I think. Honestly, when I'm walking down the street, no one's ever like, 'Hey, look at that man!' I think they're just like 'Whoa! That tall child looks terrible!' He slowly turned his head with a shocked expression to pantomime someone looking at him walk by and Claire and the audience laughed. "'Get some rest, tall child! You can't keep burning the candle at both ends!'"
The video continued, and Claire roared and howled with laughter at each and every joke, but Wanda just watched her rather than the show, a dreamy glint in her eyes. The corners of her mouth turned upwards into a content smile as she studied Claire's face. When she laughed, her nose crinkled and her cheeks turned a bright pink. Her ears would wiggle just a little, barely noticeable if not paid attention to and her eyes would glow a deep violet. Her loose red curls bounced just the tiniest bit and every so often, she would snort while she laughed, which caused Wanda to smile more. Only once did Claire caught Wanda staring. Wanda looked down at the phone and watched the video, her cheeks turning a red.
"I always wanted to live in New York when I was a kid, I'm so excited that I get to live in New York. I saw New York City in a movie when I was a kid, it was called Home Alone 2: Lost in New York. It was a sequel to the movie Home Alone." The audience laughed and clapped. John Mulaney smiled as he continued the bit.
"This is my favorite joke," Claire said absentmindedly. Wanda kept her head down but glanced at Claire from the tops of her eyes. Claire bit her bottom lip as she smiled, listening to the joke and waiting to laugh. Wanda moved her eyes to her lips and gulped; her face heating up and turning a darker red as an image of Claire's lips on hers appeared in her mind. She inhaled sharply and shook her head; I do not want to kiss Claire.
"Now I live in New York and I'm psyched, but that is a stupid movie title." John Mulaney turned his head sharply. "Lost in New York? The streets are numbered. How'd you get lost in New York? I know it's kind of stupid to complain about a movie that came out 17 years ago, but I wasn't a comedian back then. So I have to do it now. I wish I'd been. I wish I'd been a Def Jam comic when that movie came out. I would have torn it to pieces! Be like, 'You seen this shit? You seen this Home Alone 2: Lost in New York shit? It's a grid system, motherfucker! Where you at? 24th and 5th? Where you wanna go? 35th and 6th? 11 up and 1 over, you simple bitch!!'"
"That's the best joke!" Claire exclaimed as she roared with laughter, snorting loudly. Wanda laughed, a little from the joke, but more so from Claire. The audience laughed hard and applauded.
The Quinjet landed outside their current base of operations, otherwise known as their safe house in Greenville, Maine. Natasha rested the cloaked Quinjet behind their safe house and Claire paused the video, taking the earbuds out of her and Wanda's ears.
"We can finish in my room?" Claire asked her as she went to pick up her bag. Wanda smiled and nodded. "After you get your head taken care of, of course." Wanda had forgotten about her injury.
The two left the Quinjet and walked into the house, Claire leading Wanda into the bathroom just off the kitchen. Wanda looked at her reflection in the mirror. The wound had bled through the light fabric of Claire's makeshift bandage, staining it a dark red. Wanda sat down on the side of the bathtub and Claire grabbed a pair of scissors and carefully cut the bandage off her head and threw it in the trash. She then grabbed a washcloth and ran it under the sink before she moved to press it against Wanda's forehead to clean the wound and get rid of the blood stuck to her skin.
"FYI, this might hurt a bit," she said, turning around to face her and sitting down on the tub next to her on her right. Wanda turned her head to the right, giving Claire better access to the gash and looked into her purple eyes. Claire bit her lip again as she gingerly dabbed the wet cloth against the open wound. Wanda closed her eyes and flinched, hissing a little at the sudden pain. Claire reeled her hand back and looked at Wanda with apologetic eyes. "I'm sorry."
"It's fine. It just surprised me," Wanda said, her Sokovian voice assuring her. Wanda's cheeks burned a bright red as she cast her eyes downward, not looking at Claire. Though she couldn't see—or more like refused to see—Claire's face also turned a light red.
○○○
Both Wanda and Claire laughed as they continued their John Mulaney marathon. They sat curled up under a blanket on Claire's bed watching his other special, The Comeback Kid. Since it was late afternoon, the sun lit up the room in golden light. Wanda glanced at Claire and the image of the two of them kissing came back and she let out a little gasp as she moved subtly moved away from Claire.
"We had to get a dog trainer into the apartment because Petunia is a bad dog. We tell her that every day. We go, 'Hey, you're bad at being a dog.' So, the trainer came into the apartment. Sorry, didn't even walk into the apartment, walked into the threshold and went, 'Oh, okay.' Like she was an exorcist or something." Claire and Wanda laughed along with the audience. "She said, 'I see what the problem is.' She said, 'Petunia has become the alpha of the house.' And then she pointed at me, she said, 'You are no longer the alpha of the house.' And in the back of my head, I was like, 'I was never the alpha of the house.' I turned to my wife, I was like, 'Let's pretend. It'll be fun. Yes... My title of alpha, which I once had, how can I reclaim it? Because that was a thing that existed at one time.'"
"She said, 'You need to show dominance over your puppy.' These are things people say to me. I said, "How do I do that?" She said, 'Well, let me ask you this. Who eats dinner first, you or Petunia?' I was like, 'Petunia eats dinner first. She eats dinner at 5:00 p.m., 'cause she's a foot long and two years old.' She said, 'No, you need to eat dinner first. Because the king eats before anyone else eats.' Oh, yes, and what a mighty king I will be, eating dinner at 4:45 in the afternoon. 'Look upon your sovereign, Petunia, and tremble. My lands stretch across this entire one bedroom, and I eat dinner whenever I choose, as long as it works for the schedule of a dog.'"
Claire giggled and pulled the blanket up and closer to her neck, her hand brushing against Wanda's and both of them let out a gasp and retracted their hands as a surge of electricity flowed through their skin at the touch.
"What was that?" Wanda asked, a little fearful. Her green eyes were wide as she held her hand close to her body.
"It must've just been static. From the blanket," Claire responded with a frown.
"Oh."
"Yeah." The TV continued to play in the background, but neither of them acknowledged it. Theair became heavy and awkwardness settled in between them. The two mutually placed some distance between them and tried to focus on the show, but both oftheir minds were occupied with what the hell just happened. What the fucking hell was that?