Torchwood: Fanfic: Shop til you drop

[m_findlow]

Title: Shop til you drop
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,577 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for m_findlow's prompt "Any, any, late night grocery run" at fic_promptly
Summary: The modern supermarket is a brave new experience for Jack

Jack knew he should never take Ianto for granted, but it never made itself more apparent than when he wasn't around. He'd been stuck in bed at home for over a week now. Owen said it was some kind of alien fever, but that he'd be fine. Rest was all there was for it, and a lot of it.

They'd managed reasonably well so far, having each picked up a small portion of his workload, and shelving any projects that required Ianto's more specialised research skills.

Jack was quite pleased with how things were going so far. He'd never be able to say that they could get along without the efficient young man, but they hadn't made a complete hash of things either.

Jack had done his last rounds for the night, feeding residents and setting the dishwasher on. It wasn't anything he hadn't done in the past, but it had still been a long while since he'd had to make a regular routine of it. Let it not be said that the place would completely fall apart without Ianto here. Jack had that much pride at least.

He popped open the biscuit tin for a last little snack before heading home to bed himself, only to find the tin empty. What? How had that happened? Then he remembered. Thursday was grocery day. No one had been to the shops since Ianto had come down with the fever. A quick look in the fridge confirmed his suspicions. It was practically bare.

Damn. How had they forgotten that?He supposed it didn't matter in the end. Someone was going to have to do it, so it might as well be him.

He went downstairs and rifled around Ianto's desk, looking for a list. He was sure Ianto kept a list. He kept a list for everything. Unable to find it, he stood up and looked around, realising he was going to have to wing it. A quick scan of the cupboards and fridge left him little better informed as to what should have been there. It was easy to take those sorts of things for granted. He was just so used to them always being fully stocked. Setting aside the problem, he grabbed his keys and his coat. It's just groceries,he thought. How hard could it be?

At ten o'clock at night he expected the supermarket car park to be empty. Instead it was more than half full. Was there some kind of flash sale on? Maybe they did late night discounts. He hadn't been grocery shopping for years. He was just so used to everything being provided, or just picking up food ready made. Stand tall, Jack. It's a brave new world out there.

Stepping through the brightly lit doors was indeed like stepping into another world. There was hustle and bustle everywhere, the sound of tinny pop music filtering from overhead, interrupted constantly by coded messages for staff, and brightly coloured signage plastered here there and everywhere.

He picked out a trolley from the trolley bay and began trundlung it into the store. He probably didn't need it, but it felt like a protective barrier between him and whatever this place threw at him. He might have been Captain Jack Harkness, but he still felt like a fish out of water.

Without a list in mind, he simply started in the first aisle, wandering down it, trying to spot something they might need. There was just so much stuff! It wasn't like the shops he remembered from days gone by, small little one room places that had one of everything and anything unusual having to be ordered in, the shopkeeper knowing your regular shop by heart. The only time he stepped inside a supermarket these days was when the aliens turned up here first. Ninety-nine percent of the time, they weren't stopping by to pick up fish fingers and fresh milk.

The first aisle was a bust, but the second showed more promise. In it he found a plethora of sweet biscuits; too many to choose from. All his favourites and a dozen more that looked very tempting indeed. He piled them high into the trolley, and had ten packs before he knew what had happened. Looking down he realised that perhaps that was a bit too much, and put two of them back, then grabbed an extra pack of chocolate hobnobs, just in case.

He added milk and long life juice to the trolley, pausing for a moment to try and remember if they bought the large milk or the small one, erring on the side of caution and simply buying the large one. In the bakery section, he debated bread. Who knew there were so many kinds of bread? White, wholemeal, with seeds, without seeds, gluten free, soy, chia, sandwich loaf, toast loaf, cafe style, whatever that was... He grabbed one of each, making a mental note to stock up on cans of tuna, cheese and ham. They'd be eating a lot of sandwiches at this rate. Oh, and peanut butter. Don't forget that.

He got distracted in the aisle with the magazines and the DVDs, stopping for a long time to catch up on trashy celebrity gossip, before one of the staff asked him if he thought this was a library. He dropped two of them in the trolley. Ianto might get bored, he figured, and there was a story about some Kardashian that he hadn't finished reading yet.

He spied the row of sauces and condiments, adding a large bottle of tomato sauce to his cache. Ianto was always complaining that Jack ruined everything by drowning it in sauce whenever he brought back lunch for them.

'I'm not wasting fifty pence on every one of those little sachets of sauce, Jack. Not when you use about ten of them on one pastie.'

It wasn't his fault he thought everything tasted better with sauce.

The junk food aisle almost sent him undone. Lollies and chips and chocolate as far as the eye could see. Now he knew why Ianto never took him along shopping. It was all he could do to walk away with just a handful of blocks of extra dark chocolate. Myf had been a right nuisance since Ianto had been gone, playing up and knowing she could get away with it. Perhaps if he bribed her with some chocolate, that might settle her down. It was probably on Ianto's list anyway. The list he couldn't find.

He trawled the aisles up and down, picking up various items, marveling at the endless variety of others. Things had changed a lot since he'd last ever had to dedicate himself to such domestic duties.

The thing that caught him most off guard was the apparent cases of what he'd describe as "trolley rage". People having a go at others for blocking the aisle, parking trolleys in front of where they wanted to reach items, or just generally annoyed at the relative speed their fellow shoppers moved about at. He'd seen plenty of road rage, and was a culprit on more than one occasion himself, but that took him totally by surprise. It was only groceries, not the end of the world! Still, there wasn't much he could do to stop people from grumbling at his apparent slow pace. Even with his coat, it was hard to look flashy, heroic, and a force to be reckoned with, pushing a shopping trolley.

He was nearing the checkout when the thought struck him that they needed stuff at home too. He returned to stock up on several boxes of tissues and a few cans of pre-made soup. Ianto had barely eaten a thing in days, but maybe if Jack warmed him up some soup, he might be able to coax him to eat. And the tissues would come in very handy. Now all they needed was a bigger waste basket to fit all the used ones Ianto was going through.

Satisfied that he must have covered off on all the essentials, he made his way to the checkout and the disenchanted teenager working the till.

'That'll be ten p per plastic bag, or you can buy the recyclable ones for a pound,' she intoned.

Bloody hell, they charged you for the bags to put them in as well!

By the time he got everything loaded and unloaded from the car and put away back at the hub, it was past midnight. How the hell did Ianto do it? Usually he was in and out in half and hour. There must be some special technique, he decided. A list probably helped matters.

Taking what little provisions were left back home with him, he was surprised to find Ianto dozing on their sofa, curled under a blanket, the television humming quietly in the background. He should have been tucked up in bed. Maybe he was beginning to feel better.

'What're you doing out here?' Jack asked.

'Was waiting for you,' Ianto replied tiredly. 'Late night?'

'Had to pick up groceries,' he said. 'I don't know how you do it. The supermarket is crazy this time of night!'

'That's why I order online,' Ianto replied. 'Then all I have to do is pick it up. You should've found our standing order on the computer. All you had to do was send it and specify the pick up date and time.'

Oh. So that was the secret. He knew there was a list. Somewhere.

Comments

[bk_forever]

Poor Jack! Having been in the supermarket today, I sympathise. So much choice! I tried to stick with my list, but I ended up with extras anyway. It's so much easier just handing a list to my friend who usually does my shopping. I spend way less that way.

Ianto is so much smarter!