"You really think that girl's Ned's ex?"

"Yeah, I do," he said without any shilly-shallying. "And that ain't no bitchy crosstown express, neither. You asked and I'm answerin'. But it don't matter if Pie Boy had a dozen exes swarming the place, because there's only one girlfriend who won't ever have ex in front of her title, and that's Dead Girl."

Olive Snook took a deep breath and finally nodded. "Guess I should wise up, huh?"

"Damn straight you better, 'specially if you want to figure out what that other girl was up to in this kitchen." He took a bite of his pie and parked himself on a convenient stool.

"What's cooking? And by cooking I don't mean cooking cooking, because Ned's got that covered with the pie and the ovens."

Emerson looks up, scowling. "Where's my pie, woman?"

"We're out of Rhubarb." Olive hooks one finger through the handle of the middle mug and tugs it over. "Ned's obsessing about Mince and Peppermint Cream and Pumpkin and Plum Pudding."

"Christmas," Emerson says scornfully. "Only good thing about Christmas is the increase in murders."

"Ow," Daniel said. "Ow, ow, ow." He tried sitting up, looked around in some confusion at the hospital room surrounding him, and sank back to the floor. "Usually it's a Waffle House," he murmured, and then, "Ow" as an afterthought.



"I'm so sorry," said the man standing across the room, nervously glancing at his watch. "This is all my fault. Well, not that you're here, and not in a Waffle House, which – well, I don't know whose fault that is. I don't understand that, to be perfectly honest. But the rest of it, which you don't actually know about, but I assure you is probably more confusing than not being in a Waffle House, is that--"



Daniel looked down at himself, and back up at the man. "Are you Tok'ra?" he broke in.



"No, I'm Ned," Ned said.

The man shook his head. "I have to tell you, I'm not one to hand out praise willy-nilly. But I'll give it where it's deserved, and this is some damn good pie." He offered his hand over the counter to shake, and Dean took it. "I know the guy who used to own this place. Your pie is almost as good as his, and that's sayin' something. Damn shame he had to go run off and live happily ever after, but that's a whole other story. Name's Emerson Cod."

"Oh hell no," Emerson said, which wasn't part of the speech he'd prepared in case this ever happened, but he'd allowed himself a certain latitude. (Improvised preamble. Cussing.)

size, length: 14mb AVI, 50secs
summary: kinetic typography video from a scene in Pushing Daises 1.01 - "Pie-Lette"
vid: 14mb avi or Imeem stream

"Our story is a bit dark, isn't it?" Chuck said. "I keep touching you, the closer we both are to death."

Song Title/Artist: Modern Nature - Sondre Lerche & Lillian Samdal
Summary: Childhood sweethearts and technicolor dreams.
Length/Format: 2.30, (Xvid, Stream)

Ned grows old; Chuck stays young. They never did get around that bit.

Lily is the type who puts on jewelry to play cards. Vivian never cares what the game is; she just keeps gambling until she wins or loses, content simply to reach the end of the contest.

You see, the narrator was the kind of person who would sneak a look at the last page of a book, and then smugly dole out hints about the ending to his friends.

The piemaker's second kiss was an event he only discussed with Digby — or with particularly finicky clumps of gluten in his dough, on quiet mornings when nobody else had yet opened the doors to the Pie Hole.

"I'm wearing tights," Chuck was telling Ned, with a daring little wink. "There's a reason I wore tights today."

"I'm just saying it's dangerous," said Ned, studiously avoiding her eyes.

"It's One Thousand and One Nights!"

"It's a Moroccan sex den," Ned replied, horrified.

They were actually both correct, although Emerson had actually lived there for exactly one-thousand, six-hundred, and twenty-two nights, not one thousand and one.

She was angry at him today, again, for a hesitation that wasn’t even a real hesitation, a fake push away from the conversation, the one that he’s not sure he ever wants to have.

It takes a bit to getting used to; new chance imposes over things like common sense and the irresistible pull of longing, which, she might add, was what got her into trouble in the first place – or monkeys, she’s not picky, you know, she’s your girl