Hello everyone! The peas are back!

This is the first new thing we've done in quite some time, but our old stuff is not forgotten either. We just wanted to write a Halloween treat, although it isn't specifically Halloweeny!

We'll warn you now, this is typically pea!silly...as in bonkers, AU etc etc. We saw an article about...certain underwear...and all will become very clear as you read on (ch2 and 3 especially). All we'll say for now is that this underwear does exist and when we saw an article about it, naturally we did the pea thing and went "Ruth and Harry!" (and yes, we're aware we've written about poor Ruth's undies before...this fic is unrelated).

Oh, and the time frame for this story is non-specific; anywhere after late S4 I suppose.

The title belongs to Mr Vandros and Change.

No copyright infringement intended; we don't own anything, we're just having fun!

On a typical sort of day, it mattered not one jot what underwear Ruth Evershed wore. You see, when you're single and approaching forty, it really doesn't matter whether your pants match your bra, whether that once-cute lace is greyed and a little frayed, or whether everything has gone just a little baggy…at least that's normally how she rationalised it to herself when, each morning, she threw on the first thing that came to had when she dressed at half past five.

This morning, she could tell that wash day was long overdue; all her comfy M&S briefs and bras were nowhere to be seen, except for a telltale strap peeping 'hello' out of her laundry hamper. Even some of the most frightfully old 'they'll-do if they have to' pieces of her underwear drawer also seemed to be missing, too. Resentfully, she tugged the drawer right out and resigned herself to her challenge; to pick out something wearable from the remaining selection. The trouble was, unlike her normal slap-dash, lucky dip approach, the remaining selection of smalls were not exactly to her requirements. The thong, for example, that she fished out first and threw back, was not going to see her comfortably through two commutes and a day racing around the Grid; in fact, in Ruth's opinion, thongs generally never saw anyone comfortably through any occasion and therefore this particular item had lived almost all of its life inside a drawer. Equally unappealing was the prospect of the choice of 3 pairs of French knickers; more attractive, yes, and certainly more comfortable than a thong, but not something she intended having to sit in all day when she was used to such sensible, practical pants. In fact, after all that, she decided that perhaps it was less of a challenge that she anticipated, as only one candidate was left – a small, but not ridiculously so, pair of white, lace pants she could vaguely once remember being presented with as a gift from a friend. Result 1; only a bra left to find.

She looked in the small drawer above the one she had just ransacked, and desperately begin flinging aside an assortment of vests and a stray bikini top. What remained, after the raid, was a dismal sight indeed; the inevitable 'double-boob- effect strapless bra, the bra which had an awkward habit of unhooking itself and the matching partner to the pants she held in her hand. Hmpf.

She placed the offending items on the bed; both were smaller and more fancy than anything she would ever put on for anything other than the most special of occasions, and she couldn't remember the last time that had happened! Perhaps the friend who had gifted her the underwear was right; her love life did need a kickstart. Nevertheless, short of a miracle awaiting her in her kitchen, such as Fidget having learned to do laundry, she was going to have to resort to wearing them. She glanced quickly at the alarm clock on her bedside table, emitted a high pitched shriek of panic, and grabbed the offending underwear of the bed and started putting them on.

She had just enough time to throw a blouse and skirt ensemble over the top before she was racing downstairs, trying to find her house keys, handbag and feed the cats all at the same time. Totally flustered and cursing fluently, she chucked on her coat and raced out of the door, no longer thinking about anything other than being late for her bus.

She was no less flustered by the time she arrived at the Grid, having missed one bus by minutes and the having to endure the ride from hell after being accosted by the obligatory bus-weirdo she always seemed to attract no matter where she went. With seconds to spare, she ploughed somewhat clumsily into the Forgery Suite and practically dumped herself into the seat.

"Sorry," she said, breathlessly, as she saw Harry's face come in to her view.

"Nice of you to join us, Ruth," he murmured, a teasing lilt to his voice as he spoke, and she could see him trying to suppress a smile as he watched her puff and pant in her seat. Their eyes met for a brief moment and, ridiculously, her heart began to beat even faster than it had been a second earlier. Someone, quite possibly Zaf, cleared their throat loudly and Ruth skittishly tore her eyes away from the warm brown ones she had been gazing into and busied herself with opening her notebook.

"Let's get it over with then, Malcolm," Harry growled at the mild mannered techie, "I'm waiting with baited breath to hear the findings of this report."

Zaf didn't bother hiding his snigger at the comment and a uncomfortable, yet slightly put-out, Malcom started his presentation. "As you know I've been asked to look back over the last three months and assess whether or not, as a section, we have been meeting certain Government targets and criteria..." he began, enthusiastically, and clicked on the overhead projector. "As you can see from the pie chart there are a number of areas in which we can improve..."

"Oh joy," she heard Harry mutter and had to bite down sharply on her bottom lip to keep from giggling. When she felt suitably in control, she snuck a glance at him and almost laughed out loud at the look of outright boredom on his face. It was clearly not a meeting he was intending to even pay attention to, let alone enjoy. She secretly liked the dull meetings, not for their subject matter, but for the time it gave her to sneakily study the man sat to her right. There was nothing dull about watching him as he dragged a large hand over his face in an effort to stay awake, or watching him fiddle with his tie or pen as his mind wandered. When his soft gaze met hers, she realised she had been caught out and, blushing lightly, she schooled her thoughts to somewhere more appropriate and tried to focus on what Malcolm was saying.

"Now, if we look at the number of incidents for August in contrast to those in Septemeber..." he was saying and she could see that everyone was beginning to glaze over with total disinterest until, all of a sudden, the lights flickered and then they were plunged into darkness.

Another chapter tomorrow if you're nice and leave us a review :P :)

xx