"This is delicious." Skylar said, talking with their mouth full of brownie. Still in the pieced together outfit from John and Emily, Skylar was leaning against the counter, half the still warm brownie John had given them still in their hand.
He was crouched, rummaging through the Tupperware cabinet, finding plenty of containers which would fit the leftover brownies, but none of the matching lids.
"This is sweet, so there is sugar in here?" Skylar licked all the sides of their corner piece. "And so many textures!"
Finally a clear lid clicked into place and John started to stand. Skylar's enthusiastic talking lead to chocolaty spittle landing on John's forehead.
"Ew!" It was wet as he ran the back of his head across his forehead, and while he couldn't see it, he could feel that he left a streak of the stuff behind. There was also a brown line across his hand now. "Skylar, don't talk with your mouth full."
"I'm sorry but-" Skylar watched another dark drop of spit fly from their mouth. They clamped their lips shut and continued chewing, but their lips parted again so they put their hand in front of their mouth to block any spittle escaping.
"It's a good thing we didn't take you out to eat in public." John said as he set the container to the side and grabbed a napkin. "You can keep your lips closed while you chew, in fact, that's the polite thing to do."
Skylar raised their eyebrows, but didn't dare speak until they swallowed. "Really?"
"Yeah." John turned his head to the side. "Your lower jaw can move up and down without pulling your lips open." John pointed to his chin as he demonstrated. Skylar leaned in close, and John forced his gaze straight ahead rather than attempt to stare at a blurry face. It was unnerving enough to have Skylar's face so close out of the corner of his eye.
“Okay,” Skylar nodded and leaned back. “Like this?” They pointed to their mouth and John turned to watch Skylar imitate them. Their lips just barely parted. Skylar groaned.
“You don’t have to open your mouth so wide to chew. At least, as long as you don’t take huge bites.”
Skylar tried again a couple times, without the brownie, keeping their lips not tightly pressed together, but closed so nothing could be seen or come out. After a nod from John, Skylar took a small bite of the brownie and slowly chewed. John observed, giving Skylar a thumbs up as they swallowed.
“Just remember to do that, and not try to talk with food in your mouth, and you’ll pass for a relatively polite human.” He smiled. “Which already sets you a couple notches above some other people.” Skylar furrowed their eyebrows and John laughed. Skylar started to fake a laugh, and the way their chest muscles fluttered felt ticklish so then they were really laughing as John put away the rest of the brownies.
Word count: 498
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