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billyhargrovetrash · 7 years ago

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Sugar Cookies

After the incident with the door and the smoke and Belch almost running him over with his car, Mike biked home, headed straight for the cabinet in the kitchen with his grandma’s old cookbooks and pulled out the first one his hand landed on. The Dessert Collector, 3rd Edition. He stared at it for a moment, not quite seeing it, hands shaking, before putting it down on the counter and taking a deep breath and waiting for his breathing to even out before he opened the book to the back and looking through the recipes.

He was searching for sugar cookies. He’d never baked before in his life but his mom had used to make them all the time and Mike sometimes stopped in the bakery in town just to smell the nutmeg and remember his mom’s hand smoothing his hair down and cupping his cheek before tickling his belly until he giggled and twisted away from her questing fingers.

And Mike could have done any number of things to force the adrenaline from his system. There was still chores that needed to be done even if his grandpa had said he could be done after running the deliveries. The fields always needed to be checked for rocks or Winston Blackpool had said he would show Mike how to work on an engine. But Mike was desperate for his mother’s comfort and if this was the closest Mike could be to her, then he would bake.

Plus, people had liked Jessica Hanlon. She’d shown up to bake sales and church pitch-ins with her crumble cakes or lemon squares or blueberry cobbler and no one cared her skin was darker than everyone else’s. They didn’t care her hair was kinky or her lips were big. If she showed up at someone’s front door with a casserole after something bad happened in a family, it wasn’t a case of “That negro woman better get out of here” or worse. It was “Jessica Hanlon is so thoughtful, Oliver. We really should have the Hanlons over for dinner sometime.” She was sunshine and warmth and Mike had never seen anyone raise their voice or a hand to his mother.

Mike didn’t expect that to happen for him. He just wanted to feel closer to his mother and his best memories involved her baking while Mike watched wide-eyed, standing on tiptoes to peer over the counter and watch exactly how the cakes were made.

The first batch came out burned. The second batch looked good on the top but the bottom was just as burned as the first. His grandpa came in just as Mike was setting the third batch, and the best looking yet, on the cooling rack. He picked one up, bit into and promptly spit it back out onto the counter. Mike wilted and immediately took the cookie sheet to the trashcan to scrape the rest of the cookies in.

“Keep practicing, Mike,” his grandpa said, heading for the bathroom to get cleaned up. “Jessica’s were worse when she first started baking.”

Mike kept scraping the cookies into the trash but there was a small smile on his face now.

The second time he attempted sugar cookies, it was after a dressing down from his grandfather about staying out past the curfew. Mike had tried to explain it wasn’t actually his fault (which it wasn’t...Henry and his goons made Mike’s life a living hell whenever he set foot into town and that included making him stay out past curfew) but his grandfather hadn’t been willing to hear it.

So while his grandfather was in the study doing the books for the farm, Mike banged around in the kitchen, savagely hoping he was giving him a headache. A small part of him felt guilty for the thought but it wasn’t quite enough to make him stop being noisy.

It was only after his third time closing the oven door harder than necessary did his grandfather appear in the doorway to the kitchen, his scowl a heavy thundercloud on his face. He opened his mouth, ready to bellow, before looking at Mike who was watching him a calculated look of wide-eyed innocence. He let out a long gusty sigh.

“Keep the noise down in here or any mistakes I make will be coming out of your hide,” he finally growled before turning back around and stumping back to the study. Mike barely caught the mutter of, “Just like his mother” and grinned, somehow feeling lighter than he had ages.

This batch, while still nowhere near as good as his mom’s, was at least edible.

“Mike, you know I appreciate what you’ve been doing,” Leroy said, watching as Mike pulled mixing bowls and ingredients out of the cabinets. “And the men on the farm do, too. But do you think you could try something besides sugar cookies this time?” Mike frowned, considering. He had gotten good at them over the past few weeks but the men his grandfather hired to help out had also become his test subjects. Mike tended to judge how good his baking was by how fast the food disappeared and the past few times the cookies hadn’t lasted past a few hours.

“Alright,” Mike agreed and began flipping through the pages until he settled on sourdough bread. Instead of leaving, though, Leroy pulled up a chair at the kitchen table and sat down to watch Mike.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“What?” Mike faltered, looking up at his grandfather. “Why do you think there’s anything to talk about?” Leroy gave him an unimpressed look.

“You think I didn’t notice you only bake after you had a run in with the Bowers boy or after you and I have a fight?” Mike flushed and looked determinedly back at the flour he was carefully measuring out. “So. Do you want to talk about it?” Mike was quiet for a few minutes as he separated and measured out the rest of the ingredients.

“I asked Tina Pattison out today,” he said after a few minutes. His face was bright red, but Leroy only raised his eyebrows. “And she said no.” He tried not to feel upset but he had had a crush on Tina for months. They had grown up at the same church and been in the same Sunday school class and every now and then her family came over for supper. She had one of the prettiest smiles Mike had ever seen, looked beautiful in purple and could snap out a comeback faster than Sammy Walker could snap a rubber band across the room.

“Ah,” Leroy said. He was quiet for a few minutes while Mike worked. “This sort of thing happens, Mike.”

“I know,” Mike muttered. “I just...I really like her, Grandpa.”

“I know you do, boy, just hold on. Did I ever tell you how I met your grandmother?” Mike shook his head, pausing in his work to watch his grandfather. Leroy’s gaze was far away and he had a small smile on his face.

“I used to work in a train yard Bangor,” he began. “Loading and unloading the cars, that sort of thing. The first time I’d ever seen my Shirley, she was wearing a beautiful blue dress and was heading into the main office for her first day of work. Easily the prettiest woman I had ever laid eyes on and I knew I needed to talk to her.”

“What did you say?” Mike asked. It was rare his grandfather talked about his grandma. Mike had seen a few pictures but she had died before he was born. To his surprise, instead of spilling something romantic or something similar, Leroy began laughing.

“I whistled at her,” he told Mike. “Like she was one of the common girls on the corner at night.” Mike didn’t quite see how that was funny but he kept quiet. “And your grandma, she turns around, her head held high and she’s looking over the men in the yard and finally her eyes land on me. And anyone can see your grandma is madder than a hornet and she tells me in the iciest voice imaginable that I can take my whistle, shove it where the sun don’t shine and go to hell. Ooh, I thought winter had come early when she said that! But I knew then she was going to be the woman I married.” Mike huffed out a laugh.

“It doesn’t sound like she was real keen on the idea,” he said. Leroy laughed.

“She wasn’t at first,” he agreed. “It took me weeks to get her speak to me after that. I spent most of my wages bringing her flowers to make up for that damned whistle, but she was worth every penny then and after. There were times when I thought she’d leave for good. But only the good Lord knows how I managed to convince her to choose me in the end.” He looked at Mike, warmth shining from his face. “Mike, you’re young. I won’t tell you not to smart over Miss Pattison because I’ve been rejected a fair time or two and I know it stings. But when you the meet the one she’s going to be worth every moment you spend breaking your back for her because she’ll be there to help put you back together again.” He stood up to clap Mike on the back. Mike reached around to give him a brief one-armed hug.

“I’ll keep that in mind, Grandpa. But if it’s all the same to you, when I meet another girl I like, I don’t think I’ll ask you for advice on how to go about asking her out.”

Leroy roared with laughter, slapping his thigh.

“Worked out alright for me, Mikey,” he chuckled, wiping his eye. “But your daddy was the real romantic. If you’re anything like him when it comes to women, you’ll do just fine.” Mike grinned as his grandfather left the kitchen, the sting from Tina Pattison’s rejection not completely gone but softened a bit.

After Neibolt Street, Leroy bodily removed Mike from the kitchen. He didn’t know what was going on with his grandson and Mike was refusing to talk about it but if he had enough energy to cover the entire damn kitchen in breads, cookies pies and cobblers then he had enough energy to go help dig up potatoes. He expects whatever is bugging Mike will taper off in a few days but the weeks pass and Mike’s baking frenzy doesn’t slow down at all.

The only good thing that came out of it, that Leroy could see, was Mike improved by leaps and bounds, but he still refused to talk to Leroy about. Leroy shrugged it off. His friends hadn’t been coming around as much so Leroy figured it was a fight but Mike didn’t seem to be in any trouble that Leroy could tell so he left it alone.

“Holy shit, Homeschool,” Richie said when they met up three days after the sewers. “These are amazing!” Mike grinned sheepishly, ready to brush off the compliment as Richie being a little shit but then Bev chimed in.

“Seriously, Mike,” she said, taking another cookie and biting into it with a small groan of relish. Next to her, Ben choked on his own cookie. “Richie is right. Where did you learn to bake?”

“Uh, over the summer. I sort of taught myself,” Mike admitted. Richie’s eyes popped open.

“Are you serious? Do homeschooling courses include home ec? Mikey, can you sew, too? If I give you my socks -”

“Your socks a toxic hazard,” Stan cut across him. “Don’t do that Mike.” He shamelessly grabbed a handful of cookies, clutching them possessively and leaning away from Richie, who made a grab for one. “There’s an entire container full of them right there,” he hissed. “And I am injured!”

“So is Eddie and he’d share with me,” Richie shot back, making another try.

“No, I wouldn’t,” Eddie said.

“No, I don’t take home ec courses,” Mike interrupted, his tone a little defensive. He would not, however, admit to knowing how to sew to Richie in a million years. “My mom used to bake so I wanted to learn. Get closer to her, you know?” Everyone nodded.

“That’s really sweet, Mike,” Beverly smiled and Mike couldn’t help the bashful smile he gave her in return.

“But wait,” Richie said. “Didn’t you say -”

“Shut up, Richie!”

@stillreddie I know you didn’t ask for this but I really liked your headcanon about Mike and baking so I wrote something

#mike hanlon #the losers club #it 2017 #based off a headcanon I saw #by stillreddie

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its-complicated-isnt-it · 7 years ago

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I’ll Probably Never Do This Again, But

A - Age: yikes B - Birthplace: double yikes, but I’m in the United States C - Current Time: 7:40 pm D - Drink You Had Last: lemonade, yo E - Easiest Person To Talk To: I’m usually the person other people talk to, and I’m rather an “open book” so to speak. I guess I’d have to say my best friends F - Favorite Song: wowza, there’s a bunch. I’m going to go with Human by The Killers G - Grossest Memory: I once threw up twelve times in a row (the first time I ever truly craved death) H - Horror, Yes Or No: hell yeah, especially really shitty ones from the fifties I - In Love: sadly no J - Jealous of People?: oddly enough, no K - Killed Someone?: triple yikes, actually no. not even in video games because I suck L - Love At First Sight Or Should I Walk Past Again?: realistically I should say no, because I’ve never been in love, but why the hell not? yes. M - Middle Name: it’s real fucking generic kiddos, not cool at all N - Number Of Siblings: zero, woops I’m an only child; although my mother does like to jokingly say that she used to have seven others and I was the lone survivor because she liked me the most O - One Wish: oh man, I kind of want to say something really cliché like True Love, but I’ll go with “doing something that I love in the future”. that’s still pretty cliché. P - Person I Called Last: mi padre (my dad) Q - Question You’re Always Asked: I don’t want to sound egotistical but “Why are you so smart?” and “Who the fuck knows this many history facts?” is pretty frequent. R - Reasons To Smile: 1. existence is literally the best joke ever played on anybody. 2. resistance is futile 3. it’s kind of the best way to stick it to the man, and I’m a rebel 4. if you can’t smile at life then come talk to me because boy oh boy are humans funny S - Song You Last Sang: Rocket Man by Elton John, jammin’ out with my mates T - Time You Woke Up: sometime yesterday, quadruple yikes U - Universal Constant: scientifically it’s gravitational effects, but I find that if anything is possible, nothing is certain V - Vacation: Denmark! because I’m danish W - Worst Habit: a lot of times I’ll procrastinate working to read X - Xrays: I’ve had one before because I had pneumonia Y - Your Favorite Food: sushi! I fucking love rainbow rolls Z - Zodiac Sign: I’m an Aries

Thank you @littleflyingspider for tagging me!

You don’t have to do this, but here’s the people I’m tagging:

@eds2fannypacks @multifandomimaginings @stillreddie @beepbeep-trashmouth @madiz

and @lame-yellow hope this doesn't annoy you because I think you guys are awesome!

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