No Ordinary Love - G.Callen NCIS L.A

Chapter 4

Another Saturday that he found himself on route to his favorite café. He was early, but he had the whole day, not sure what to do with himself. And he just couldn't stay away.

Deja bumped into him when he entered and grinned. A glance at the clock revealed that he was late for breakfast and early for lunch. "Are we brunching now, Grisha?"

It still surprised him how easily his name rolled of her tongue. It made it so much easier to get used to. He shrugged and shook his head. "I've had breakfast. I could do with tea or something."

"Of course you could." She looked over to Jess, opened her mouth to say something then changed her mind. "Actually, I have a proposal."

"That sounds intriguing."

"I'm on my way to the farmer's market right now. Why don't you join me? I'll treat you to the best ice cream you've ever had."

How was he going to refuse? "Seriously?" Spending time with her outside of the café was not something he'd expected to do anytime soon. Especially not since she was the one suggesting it.

Deja rolled her eyes at him. "Seriously. What do you say? You'll have to do some heavy lifting for me, though. Just warning you up front so you can back out."

He didn't want to back out. "All right. That better be some amazing ice cream."

It will be," she assured him. Turning to Jess, she said: "Grisha is going with me to the market. Are you and Lindy going to be okay for the lunch crowd?" For a moment, she seemed hesitant about leaving them.

Jess nodded and almost shooed them out the door. "Go. Have fun. Nothing we can't handle."

And so Callen found himself on his way to the farmer's market for the first time in his life. He was actually fascinated by everything he saw. Deja explained about ingredients he never even heard about, he saw her interact with farmers about prices and quality and he found that she captivated him. She made him try new things. "Here," she said, handing him half a passion fruit. "How's that?"

Callen took a bite, and was surprised. "That is actually... fascinatingly tangy."

Smiling, she turned back to the farmer. "Can you bring two cases to Lindy? I think we're going to have passion fruit cheesecake at the café this week."

Halfway through the market, he had to ask. "You ever get tired talking about food?"

She looked up from selecting lettuce and seemed to weigh her words. "The short and simple answer is no."

"And the long and complicated answer?" he probed.

"It would still be no. I love food. I love the process of cooking food that's honest and homemade, I love talking to the farmers about what they recommend I do with what I buy. I think it's important to know where your food comes from, because you feed and nurture yourself with it. Food is too important to stop talking about, you know? Besides, is there a better way to pass the time with eating, or talking about food?"

He had never thought about it that way. Eating was a way of surviving, not necessarily something to enjoy and take time for. Maybe he'd have to adjust his opinion about food. Everything he'd had so far, made by both Deja and Lindy, he'd enjoyed. He felt better, even when he would never admit that to anyone out loud.

"Wasn't food a thing in your family?" Deja asked, as they strolled on.

Nobody had ever asked him that. How much could he possibly reveal to her about his past? How much did he want to share with her? "Not really. The earliest memories I have are with my mother and sister at the beach and around the kitchen table. But my mother died when I was little, and my sister and I got split up into different foster homes and families, so there was never a real family to enjoy food with."

"I'm sorry."

Callen shrugged. He'd learned to deal with most of it. Deja looked at him with that same compassionate and kind look he remembered from their second meeting. "Don't be. I'm all right."

She halted. "Is that why you had such an emotional reaction to the borsjstj? You said something about it remembering you of your mother..."

Callen stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans. He could barely look at her. "Yeah... Well, like I said. It was years since I had proper borsjstj, and just the smell and taste made that the few memories I have of my mother came flooding back."

Deja didn't respond, and when Callen finally looked up at her, she looked guilty. He shrugged. "You don't have to look so guilty, Dee," he said, the nickname coming out as if he always used it. "I should be thanking you, in fact. I remembered things that I thought I'd forgotten a long time ago. And I remembered how great my mother was, what she looked like." He cleared his throat. "I spent half my life being afraid of those memories, but I'm not anymore. The whole thing learned that I should treasure them."

He was unprepared for the hug she gave him. She wrapped her arms around him and held tight. For a moment, Callen hesitated, physical contact not being one of his strong points. But as she held on, he wrapped his arms around her, savoring the contact. Eventually, she stepped back, not saying anything for a while. "You should," she said. "You should treasure all the memories you have. They're so important."

This conversation needed to get back to safer ground. "You have important memories?"

"They all are. Most of them are from our holidays in Spain, with my mother's family, sitting at a large table, eating, drinking, laughing. In our family, food equals quality time and quality time equals food." She gestured around her. "Maybe that's one of the reasons food is so important to me, as well."

He could imagine that. He had never been part of a family like that, and maybe he would never be. It had been the perfect picture of a family when he was a kid. Sitting around the table, laughing about nothing. Just being together. He saw it when he had dinner with the whole team, and it made him feel like he at least belonged somewhere.

Deja, sensing that she hit a nerve, shifted the conversation back to food and ingredients. She told him about her dream of doing something with food, of how she met Lindy in college and the things they'd done before opening the café. "Sometimes I still have to pinch myself when I look around our place. I'm secretly very proud of us."

"You can be openly proud, you know. You've accomplished something really great. I'm starting to recognize faces of people that come by often, like me. Returning customers are a good thing."

Handing him the basket she'd brought, Deja shook her head at him. "You're an exception. I should ask you to join me for dinner upstairs next time; I'm almost feeling sorry for all the money we're costing you."

He shrugged. "I should've learned how to cook, then we wouldn't have that problem. And upstairs?"

His question didn't even reach her ears. "You don't know how to cook?"

"Dee, I just told you that I spent my childhood going from foster home to foster home. And it's not like my job leaves me time for taking courses."

Deja cocked her head to the side. "What is it that you do anyway?"

"Government job." The cut and dry answer.

She caught on. "Ah. So not something you can share."

"Nope."

"But you've never learned to cook," she went back to the original topic of conversation.

"I haven't."

"Don't you think it's time to learn? Or are you afraid that you might discover a hidden talent?"

That made him laugh out loud. "I've got many talents, Dee, but I'm fairly sure cooking isn't one of them."

"We'll see." They'd reached the end of the market, and judging by the overloaded basket Callen was carrying, Deja had everything she needed. "Are you still okay carrying that thing? It must be heavy."

"It's all right. Where is that ice cream you promised, though?"

"Oh, your ice cream! Of course! So sorry, Grisha. This way!" Without thinking, she took his hand and dragged him along. Callen couldn't say he minded.