"And then we went back to her place and…"

Sue groaned, resisting the urge to bang her head against the hard kitchen surface in front of her, and instead settling on adding an extra spoonful of sugar to her coffee. It had been a long few days, and whilst this story might have been the icing on the cake for her brother, she was still waiting for her cake, let alone the icing. Four days ago, the Fantastic Four had been completely established as heroes due to their public defeat of Victor von Doom. Since then, everything had been thrown into the air with more chaos than there had been when they were trying to keep their powers under wraps and in control.

"Johnny, can you just shut up, just for ten seconds?" She asked him tiredly.

She didn't have to look over her shoulder to see the grumpy expression forming on her brother's face, but it was there all the same. He hated having his stories interrupted, especially stories that made him out to look more successful than everyone else. "Just trying to tell a story." He mumbled loudly, glaring at the back of her head.

His glare stopped when she turned around, coffee mug in hand, and went to sit at the table. She chose a seat between Reed and Ben, putting her directly opposite the younger brother she had been snapping at all morning. "Well, I could really do without hearing about your love life." She told him sharply.

He smirked at her. "Jealous?"

"Shut up." She snapped back.

Finally, after too many hits, Johnny broke. "God, what's the matter with you today?" He complained dramatically. "You've told me to shut up more times than you usually do in a week, and we've only been up for ten minutes."

"She's missing female companionship." Ben explained over his coffee, which was in more of a bucket than a glass.

"What? "Johnny asked, as if Ben were taking some illegal substance.

"How do you know that?" Reed asked, also slightly curious about her mood.

"Yes, Ben, how do you know that?" Sue questioned, rather irritated that her mood had become the main breakfast discussion.

"Am I right?" Ben asked simply, looking directly at Sue.

Sue, however, laughed, drinking her coffee as if it were her reason for living. "That's ridiculous."

"But, am I right?" He repeated.

"Why does she need girlfriends?" Johnny asked, before Sue could deny it for a second time. "She's got us."

"That's exactly why." Ben told him.

Johnny frowned. "I don't get you."

Ben sighed, rolling his eyes. "She's living in the same place as her brother, and old friend whose ex-fiancée used to be one of her best friends, and her ex-boyfriend. Not to mention all that engagement crap with Victor…"

Reed, who had been drinking at the time, spluttered and choked on his coffee. A great deal of it ended up on the table before him, but he paid no attention to it. Wide eyed, he looked at Sue. "Engagement?!"

"There was no engagement." Sue explained tiredly.

"He proposed to you?!" Reed continued, clearly more traumatised by the whole idea than Sue had been at the time.

"Yeah, up in space, you didn't know about that?" Johnny piped up casually, shovelling more bacon into his mouth.

"No!" Reed cried out.

"Don't worry, he only did it to spite you." Sue assured him, patting his arm for a moment.

"But he proposed to you!"

"And clearly, I said no." She pointed out.

Johnny laughed to himself. "Man, no wonder he was so pissed off with the two of you."

"My point is…" Ben said loudly, getting their attention again. "Susie's not had a good female vent since all of that happened."

"Vent?" Reed asked.

Sue laughed again. "Okay, now you're just being stupid."

"Just vent, Susie, you'll feel better." Ben coaxed her.

She continued laughing, getting to her feet. "Okay. I'm leaving now." She told them. However, when she reached the kitchen door, she turned back, going to the table once again to rescue her coffee from where Johnny had been eyeing it invitingly. "And I'm taking this with me." She added, before leaving completely.

As soon as she was gone, Reed started up on his rant again. "He proposed to her!"

"Yeah." Johnny said, laughing at how much it was annoying him.

"I can't believe him!"

"I can't believe she said no." Johnny mused. Ben and Reed glared at him. "What? Just for the financial benefits." He added innocently.

Ben shook his head. "We've got to help her." He decided.

Johnny waved the idea off, taking the remainder of Sue's breakfast onto his own plate now it was clear that she wasn't coming back. "She's fine, just leave her to it." He told them. "She'll have a girly pamper thing and then she'll be fine."

Reed, however, had completely ignored Johnny's contribution. "What do we do?" He asked Ben.

"Well, do you guys know any of her girlfriends?" Ben asked, looking between the two.

"Other than Debbie? Reed asked, after realising that the shared list of friends between him and Sue hadn't been big to begin with, and had disappeared altogether when they had broken up.

Debbie, of course, was off limits. No one wanted to see Ben and Debbie in the same room again because of what it had done to Ben last time. "That's a no." Ben said instantly. "Johnny?"

He shook his head. "Trust me, the only ones I know are ones that are going to think I'm calling them way too late for all the wrong reasons."

"Right." Ben decided. "We'll just have to make do with what we've got then."

"Which is…?"

"Well, us." Ben shrugged.

"And what, exactly, are we doing?" Reed asked.

"Helping her vent." Ben revealed.

"How?" Johnny asked. Everyone fell into silence, which was all it took for Johnny to realise what Ben had in mind. "No." He said quickly, horror dawning on his face. "Oh, no. No. No. No."

"Come on, Johnny, she's your sister!" Ben pointed out.

"I don't care. I'm not doing it." He insisted.

"You mean…?" Reed said slowly.

"I mean, we get chocolate, coffee, chick flicks…and then we make her vent." Ben said.

Reed took this idea on board a lot easier than Johnny did. "Sounds easy enough."

"Easy? Are you kidding?" Johnny complained.

"No." They both said simply.

"Tell me you're kidding."

"We have to do this." Ben told him.

"Oh, no, we don't." Johnny said, now kicking up as much fuss as Reed had done about the proposal from Victor.

"Don't you want to help your sister?" Ben tested him.

Johnny shook his head. "Not if it means becoming a chick for the day."

"Come on, Johnny…" Reed tried to coax him.

This time, Johnny rounded on Reed. "Why are you so eager to listen to her talk about Victor?" He asked him.

"Because I'm pretty sure nothing she says about him will be good, and it will make up for the fact that no one bothered to tell me that he proposed to her."

"We'll need chocolate." Ben said, before the two could get into a real argument about Sue and romantic relationships.

"She left a bar in the refridgerator." Reed remembered.

"No…a big bar." Ben pointed out.

"I'll go to the store." Reed said, pushing out his chair.

"No, It's okay. I'll go." Johnny said, overly-generous as he quickly jumped out of his chair.

"No!" The other two said quickly.

"Why not?"

"Because if we let you leave, you won't come back." Reed pointed out.

Plan foiled, Johnny tried another attempt. "Well, don't let Reed go!" He said to Ben. "What does he know about woman and chocolate?"

Reed raised and eyebrow at him. "I dated your sister for four years, and I made a lot of mistakes in that time." He explained. "Chocolates are my specialty."

"I'll go with you then." Johnny offered.

"No!" Ben cried again. Whilst he would stay behind to argue, Reed quickly made his exit. "You'll stay here and help me." Ben ordered him.

"Help you what?"

"Pick the movie."

When Reed returned around thirty minutes later, Ben met him in the hall. "Got it?" He asked.

Reed opened up the bag he was holding, inviting Ben to look inside. "Biggest bar I could find, and a tub of mint ice cream."

Ben's eyebrows shot to the sky, rather impressed. "Whoa, this really is your specialty."

"Don't question the ex." Reed reminded him. "What movie did you guys pick?"

"Love Story." Ben said, nudging his thumb to the box that Johnny was holding.

"Nice choice." Reed complimented.

"But she dies at the end." Johnny pointed out.

"Making Susie feel better about herself." Ben explained.

Johnny frowned, clearly confused. "Because she's alive?"

Ben clapped him on the shoulder; something that Johnny wasn't ready to admit now hurt a lot more than when he used to do it. "See, now you're catching on."

Johnny groaned, looking to the sky for rescue for a moment, and then groaning again as the other two men walked past him, and he followed them. "You guys are worse than she is."

Outside of Sue's room, it had dawned on them that they didn't exactly plan on how they were going to get her to listen to them long enough to get into her bedroom. The door wasn't locked, but barging in, chocolate blazing, wasn't a good attempt.

"Come on, Susie…" Ben tempted.

"Honestly, Ben, I'm fine." Sue assured him from the other side of the door.

"You can talk to us." Ben pointed out.

"I appreciate that, but I don't need to talk, thank you."

"But-"

"Thank you, but I'm fine."

Ben went to speak again, but Reed held out a hand. "Stand aside, let the master work." He stepped right up to the door, speaking through it. "Sue, just hear us out, okay? We've got Love Story, chocolate, and ice cream. You want to open the door?"

There was silence, the shuffling of feet, and then the door creaked open a fraction, revealing Sue's scrutinising eyes. "Mint ice cream?" She tested.

Reed nodded. "Of course."

There was another silence…and then…

"…maybe I do need to talk a little."