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undercoverwizardninjaturtle · 6 years ago

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Windows: A ROTTMNT Fanfiction

Summary: Some of us are born different, sometimes it takes a special family member to understand you. Some of us are just that lucky. A Leo and Donnie centered Fanfction

Word Count: 4100

Pairings: None

Rating: Its just a family story, don’t worry

Windows

“MUMMY ATTACK!!”

The large lair immediately filled with the squeals of young children. The source of the chaos was the five-year-old with red stripes over his eyes, and a large blue t-shirt now charging after a laughing four-year-old who was waving his arms excitedly as he ran away, “NO one can escape a mummy attack!” Leo shouted grabbing at Mikey who only laughed louder and ran faster, even for a four-year-old.

A six-year-old, far larger than either of the two boys, leapt out from behind the recliner, scooping up the four-year-old and turning to Leo in a blur of red, “I’ll save you Mikey!!!” Raph pointed at Leo,” Get the mummy!!!!”

Leo threw his arms over his face as the giant mass suddenly fell on him, knocking all wind, life, and sense out of his body. Even if he had loss, he made sure to let out a over dramatic cough, “Foiled again!!!! Curse you Lou Jitsu!” before letting out a loud ‘bleh’ and letting his head roll off to the side with his eyes closed

“‘eo’s dead!” Mikey shrieked, Leo could feel his small hands shaking him in panic,” ‘e killed him!”

“Leo’s not dead.” Raph always ruined his fun,” He’s playing dead.”

“‘he is?” Leo could feel Mikey peer closer at his face, he had played dead long enough he still waited till Mikey was poking him in the face before bolting upright, his hands brought up like claws with a snarl, “I’m alive!!!” he declared

Mikey shrieked again, diving behind Raph’s legs. Before his light blue eyes peered around their oldest brother. Though Leo was laughing loudly Raph was giving him a frown, figures, “Leo don’t scare Mikey! He’s the baby!” Raph never knew how to play right

“Yeah! I’m da baby!” Mikey declared from his hiding location.

Despite his young age, Leo was more then adept at rolling his eyes, “it’s a game! You’re the one who wanted me to be the mummy. Next time ask Donnie.”

Raph frowned, not yet capable of a glare, “you know he doesn’t like that. He wanted to be alone.”

“He ALWAYS wants to be alone.” Sass was another one of Leo’s natural talents. But despite himself he looked over to the far side of the lair where a curtain lay over a doorway. A designated ‘quiet area’ that Dad had set up a few months ago. Raph was already walking over, his constant shadow Mikey was waddling after him. Raph poked his head past the curtain, “Donnie do you want to play with us?” as Leo expected, he didn’t get a response, “Ok but if you want to let us know” Raph ducked back out. Looking at Leo before smiling, “Come on! Let’s go play Jupiter Jim!”

Raph was already running off with Mikey. Mikey would have no problem playing whatever Raph wanted. But Leo found himself glaring at the curtain and sticking out his tongue before running after his brothers

(#)(#)(#)(#)

They played for a while after that, but eventually Mikey wanted to play with paint. Not in the mood for being painted pink, but as usual Raph was, he went and read through some of his Jupiter Jim comics. Until the smoke wafting from the kitchen signified dinner was ready. Thankfully Dad had only managed to burn the salad, somehow, and left the grilled cheese sandwich mostly undamaged. Leo had only ever known one dad, his Dad, so he often wondered if another Dads were as round or tired looking as his. Whenever their Dad wasn’t watching movies or playing with them, he was pouring over several books he had gotten from the ‘internet’. Most of the titles didn’t make sense to Leo, but he recognized one as a cooking book. Which had helped Dad’s food to go from, ‘tolerable’ to ‘tasty’ as he tore into his grilled cheese. Raph, of course, was into his third already. Mikey was savoring each bite with a wide grin on his face. Splinter’s sandwich was untouched mostly because he was too busy using it as a pillow. His black hair had started to resemble salt more then anything, and no amount of poking from Mikey could wake him up. Eventually Raph got sick of it, “Pop’s sleepy let him go!”

“Food is for eating not for sleeping,” Mikey said,

“Daddy’s tired Mikey, he’ll be ok.” But it was hard not to hear the pride in Raph’s’ voice. Leo knew Raph well enough to know he craved moments like this, since it meant he could be in charge for a bit. But Leo glared across the table towards a second occupant who wasn’t eating, “Why isn’t’ HE is eating then, he’s not sleeping”

The object of scrutiny didn’t look up from his book. Or look to the plate of plain bread by his hand. Donnie, unlike the others who liked to wear t-shirts and shorts, wore a giant purple hoodie that hung around his knees, the hood brought up over his head and eyes fixated on the pages of a book with words too complicated for Leo to understand.

“He’s not hungry.” Raph said, “he’s fine.”

“He’s boring.” Leo clarified. Sinking back into his seat and crossing his arms

With a giant snort Dad sat straight up, “It-wasn’t-my-donut!’” before blinking, seeming to recognize he wasn’t in a situation with a guilty pastry, “Um, right.” Picking up his sanwich and, despite the fur that must have been caught in it, devoured it in one bite, before looking t his sons., “Finally! I knew I could cook something edible.” With a proud look on his face, “WE will just not eat salad ever again.” Before looking over his sons,” did you all enjoy your dinner?””

“It was really good Pop!” Raph said happily, “It was really good!”

“Tasty!” Mikey agreed,

Despite how tired he looked, Splinter beamed happily,’ Ha! Take that Rupert Swaggart! There’s a new chef in town!” he looked around tile his eyes fell on the quiet son at the table. It was hard to see Dad’s face fall, “Purple, you didn’t eat breakfast. Are you really that unhungry?”

But, like when Leo had said something, Don didn’t look up from his book. Instead he slid off his chair and walked away from the table. Leo frowned and crossed his arms again. It was one thing to ignore him, and he REALLY hated being ignored, but Dad had made a good dinner!

Splinter, to celebrate not burning down the kitchen, gave each of his remaining sons a small bowl of vanilla ice cream. Missing out on ice-cream might have seemed like a punishment to Leo, but he had never seen Donnie even look at a bowl. So instead he ate his treat greedily, and watched Splinter scrub the ice-cream off Mikey’s’ face.

When dinner and desert was all cleaned up, Mikey and Raph went to watch some tv with Dad. Which seemed fine except that Leo wasn’t in the mood to hold still. Instead he thought of his comics. He hurried up to their shared bedroom to retrieve the next issue.

Their room was a usual mess, except for the bed for Don’s corner, so its surprised Leo to see Donnie sitting on the floor fiddling with something in his hands. IT surprised him more to see his Jupiter Jim comics strewed on the floor around him. One of the comics on his lap, “What are you doing?!” he asked

Don stared at him before looking back to his hand. Leo reached forward and snatched the comic off his lap,” These aren’t yours stupid!” he snapped, he quickly flipped through the pages to check for tears, “you can’t just take stuff that doesn’t belong to you Donnie!”

“Leo?” figured mother Raph would come to investigate, “What’s going on?”

“Donnie was touching my stuff!” Leo pointed, “Its my stuff! Not his!”

Raph looked over the scene, before looking back to Leo, “He’s just looking at its Leo. He’s not doing anything bad- “

“No! You always stand up for him but its’ my comics! He never plays with us, he refuses to do anything other then sit alone by himself.” He turned, looking to look at said brother, whose unreadable gaze was fixated on him, “You’re stupid, and I hate you.”

Donnie blinked at him, for the first time in his life Leo could see that Donnie’s eyes were light brown, and even if his face was still silent and stoic, his eyes had begun to tremble with tears. In a dash, Donnie darted out of the room, ducking underneath Raphie’s arms. “Donnie!” Raph shouted after him, before turning and glaring at Leo, “Y-You’re a bully Leo!” before running after their brother.

Leo squeezed his eyes shut before kneeling. Picking up his comics off the ground. It wasn’t his fault, Donnie shouldn’t have been touching his stuff! It wasn’t’ his fault.

He was picking up “Jupiter Jim #192 The Never-ending Tale” when he saw something where Donnie had been sitting. Seeing as he had been messing with his comics, he didn’t have a problem messing with Don’s stuff. But when he picked it up, he recognized a small stacking of Lego bricks This one was only a few bricks tall with a blue brick. He had taken some cloth, probably from some sparse clothing and made it into a blue strip around the brick. There were two block dots where the eyes should have been.

Leo sat down hard on the ground for a moment. Before shifting around the comics some more to find a second brick figure, clearly made to resemble Jupiter Jim, he even had found a plastic piece to use as a helmet….

(#)(#)(#)(#)

Donnie didn’t come out of his ‘quiet place’ for the rest of the night. And neither Raph or Mikey talked to him either not that he was really trying to either. Instead, after sitting alone thinking to himself, he wondered upstairs. His father was, surprisingly, still awake, and sitting at his desk. Even though their bedroom wasn’t’ the cleanest, it was nothing compared to the disaster of their fathers’ room, clothes strewn over the floor and stacks of boxes in the corner, there was even a sword sticking out of the wall, for some reason a sword sticking out of the wall. His father was sitting at his desk, piles of thick books by his desk. Some of them, most of them, had Lou Jitsu on the cover. But there were also a few extra thick books with children on the cover ‘one reading parenting for idiot’s and you’. It was some sort of weird textbook like Donnie was already reading. Leo was having a hard time reading the cover. But the book in Dad’s hands was a little bit easier to read. “A-Auti-sim?” He read out loud, “What’s that? Why are you reading that?”

Dad gave a small sigh, one sadder then Leo had ever heard from him,” I’m hoping it will help understand your brother.’ He set the book aside and turned in his seat, ‘You had a bad day Blue. You were very cruel to your brother today.”

“I-I’m sorry.”

“Did you apologize to Purple?”

“I-I.” he couldn’t lie. But his eyes started to burn, “He doesn’t talk, he doesn’t’ play he sits in that stupid room all day. He doesn’t even act like he feels anything. But=But he was messing with my comics…and and he made these” Leo stood on his tip toes and set them on Splinters desk. Splinter picked up the Jupiter Jim figurine, then the Little Leo, “I don’t get it Dad.”

“Some children, like Donnie, have difficulty communicating. They have sensory problems, and don’t know how to connect to others. But if they want to connect with someone…...sometimes they try to communicate in anyway they can.” He held the figurines out to him,

(#)(#)(#)(#)

Leo had never actually been in Donnie’s Quiet Area, but it was made for Donnie. It was covered in boxes of weird old electronic items that Splinter had collected for him over time. There was also a set of headphones lying by a fully purple blanket. Which is, of course, where he found his brother. Donnie was curled up on the blanket, headphones over his head. Even in the low light he could see his blood shot eyes and wondered how long he had spent crying. Probably all night since Donnie didn’t come to sleep in their room last night. The thought made his gut twist in guilt. Don took one look at him before rolling over onto his side, shell to him and hoodie over his head.

The five-year-old didn’t move closer, but sat down on the ground, if it wasn’t for his sweat pants the ground would have been a lot colder, “Hey Donnie.” He started, keeping his voice low. Now out of fear of their brothers hearing him. But it was called Donnie’s ‘Quiet Area’ for a reason, “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean what I said earlier….” He fiddled his thumbs together. He wasn’t’ sure if Donnie was even listening to him, “I don’t always understand what you need. Only what I want…” he reached into his pants pocket. He saw Don’s head tilt over his shoulder for a moment, probably fighting curiosity. Leo set the little Jupiter Jim figure on the ground, and the Little Leo besides it, “I think these are really cool. Did you make them?” Don was now looking at him fully before sitting up sliding the headphones off his head, “ I’m sorry I yelled at you. I didn’t know you were making anything so cool. “Leo reached back into his pants pocket, it wasn’t as clean as his, actually it was mostly just green and purple and marker marking where he had tried to replicate the detail Donnie had made, he set it by the little Leo, “See? Now Little Me won’t be lonely.”

Even though his expression is still unreadable something in him lights up. He immediately scoots closer and picks up the Little Donnie and looks over it, Leo took the opportunity to look around again, he didn’t realize before that the wires and electronics are organized. But in what way he didn’t know, “What else do you like to do in here?”

Don looks at him again, but nothing more. Leo almost thought for a moment that Donnie was asking him to leave but wondered if Donnie was asking something…. Leo got up and looked around the room before seeing a box shoved between two disassembled stereos. He moves closer and makes sure to look at Donnie before pulling it out. In it are more bricks of multiple colors, but scrubbed so clean Leo can smell the disinfect, he sits down again in front of his brother, “Show me how you play, and we’ll go from there alright?”

Its’ obvious Don is still wary of him, but he sorts out all the pieces by shape and color and slowly starts to build. At first Leo isn’t sure what he’s supposed to do but adjusts to Donnie’s subtle gestures and glances on what to put what piece where. Out of the corner of his eyes, Leo can see where Don has put up strange pictures on the walls, not in the typical sense of art, but it looked like he had drawn family members as cars. With Raph being a semi-truck and Splinter being a bug. Mikey was an airplane and Leo was, to his enjoyment, a racecar. He couldn’t help but wonder how many hours Donnie spent staring at the drawings…did he put them up because he missed them? Did it have something to do with what Splinter said about not being able to communicate even though they were less than a few feet away? But it wasn’t’ too long before a strange noise comes from Donnie, one that Raph always got when it got close to meal time. “are you hungry?” Don gives him a blank look again, “You haven’t eaten since last night, “Even then it had been just a few oyster crackers, “can I go get you a snack?” Donnie glances at his hands for a moment. It took Leo a little bit to catch on, “Oh you don’t want to get your hands dirty. I get that.” Not really, but he didn’t want to say that, “What if I go find a food that won’t make your hands dirty? Is that ok?”

Don sits up more, as though in trigged. Leo stood up and walked out of the room. But immediately realized his task was futile, a word he had heard in Lou Jitsu’s Child Development Movie called “Lou Jitsu vs Child Illiteracy”. He really couldn’t cook on his own, the Ice Cream bomb of Mikey’s’ third birthday party banned everyone from cooking till they were Atleast ten. But the long yellow fruit on the counter caught his attention, he was sure Donnie love bananas but wasn’t sure on how to make them…clean.

After a few mints of deep though he peeled the bananas and uses the back of a spoon to cut them into pieces into bowl. After that he grabbed a new spoon and hurried back to the Quiet Area, “Blue?” he stopped and turned to see his Dad looking at him from his recliner, ‘What are you doing?”

“Donnie’s hungry, he wants clean food.” He held the bowl up for his father to see.

“You- “Splinter looks surprised, not that Leo can blame him, “You got him to speak?”

“No, but I can tell he’s really hungry,”

“Oh, well um I’m very glad you figured out what he wanted to eat.” Splinter turned back to the tv. But again, Leo can feel something is off. There was a sadness coming off his father that he wasn’t sued to, it was the same sadness Leo had felt before when Dad had been reading that book. Was he sad he wasn’t able to help? Leo walked over to the chair, lowering his cheek onto the arm rest, “Donnie loves you Daddy.” He said, “Donnie loves all of us. He just doesn’t know how to tell us yet.”

Splinter looked back to him, again there’s something about him that makes Leo sad. But slowly his father smiles and gently rubs his scalp, “I know, and I love all you.”

Leo hurries back to don’s quiet area where Donnie is still waiting of him, sitting o up on his knees eagerly and looking at the bowl in Leos’ hands, “Clean food!” he sat down Nd held the bowl out, how’s this?” he asked

That time. Leo almost gets a full smile

(#)(#)(#)(#)

Ten years later

What a freaking Day.

Donnie glared at his broken self-cleaning-toothpick. Of course, Raph would use an experiment he knew nothing about. What part of personal space did no one understand?! He didn’t even use it as a toothpick, honestly, he didn’t want to know what he had used it for only that it had come back to him with the same consistency of molasses.

Knowing Raph, he had probably used it in a microwave to see what would happen.

“Back tot eh dork cave I see?”

The purple masked ninja groaned under his breath and glanced towards his door to see a familiar snarky Leo leaning against his circular doorway, grinning his usual grin,” find out what Raph did to your toothpick yet?”

“No and I don’t think I want to know.” It was a lost cause anyway, it was better just to start over. He pushed the destroyed device aside and laid his head on his desk with a loud moan. He could have flipped Leo off for chuckling like that but couldn’t find the energy to lift his head up

“Come on D, you were going to start over anyway. We both know it. Now get out here so we can watch a movie.”

Unfortunately, Leo was right, if only because every time he tried to use the tooth pick it tried to gain consciousness. He had never told Leo about ah problem, but like every other moment it seems like Leo can read him.

Another thing he had never told Leo was how grateful he was for that. His brothers didn’t have the memory he did, so his childhood wasn’t as clear to them as it was to them. But he could still remember when his bed rom was his ‘quiet place’ hiding back here for hours and working on whatever he wanted. His brothers, though eh had loved them, were often too loud and messy for him to handle. Now that he was older he understood what the problem had been, what was still the problem, but it had been like looking at his family through a window with them waving over occasionally to acknowledge him. He could see everything they were doing. But no matter how much he wanted to, he couldn’t reach them.

But one day, after being so cruel Donnie almost cried himself sick. Leo had approached the window. He had taken time to finally understand what he needed. For a while after that, Leo was his protector, his translator for the world. A way for his brothers to understand him and for him to understand them. They had become unofficial twins. A nickname he had hated as much as he loved it.

He truly believed Leo reaching out helped him learn to communicate better, how to deal with his sensory issues. Though those problems still lurked in the back of his mind, every once in an awhile, he still couldn’t handle loud noises and he still had problems talking to his brothers…

But that window had been opened.

Donnie looked at his desk, at the three brick figures that had been built so long ago and stood up, “Atta boy!” Leo cheered, turning to leave, “Now hurry- “Before he could stop himself, Donnie hugged his brother tight around the chest. Burying his face into his brother’s shoulder rand squeezing him for all dear life. He could feel his brothers shock by the fact he lost his footing for a few seconds before freezing up, even so his brothers’ arms came up around him back, cautiously returning the brace, “You ok? If it’s the tooth pick, I swear Raph didn’t drop it in the toilet- “

“Thank you.” He mumbled. Donnie felt Leo tilt his head more in his direction, probably unable to hear him. So, despite his already waning pride, he spoke louder, with a tighter hug, “Thank you for everything Leo.”

He half expected a sarcastic comment. Or maybe a bad joke. But instead Leo squeezed him back just as tightly, somehow a link that had existed since their childhood told Leo exactly what Donnie was talking about, “You’re my favorite twin Donnie.” He nuzzled his cheek against Don’s, “I’d do anything for you.”

“I know.” For a few moments the two just stood there, even when Raph walked by, gave off an emotional ‘aw’ and slunk away to not disturb them. Donnie finally drew away, but before he could fully release Leo, his brothers’ arms caught him around the chest again and squeezed tighter then before, “then its time for a movie!” eh declared, Hugging Donnie off his feet lifting him out of the room as Don squawked loudly,” LEO YOU NEANDERTHAL- “

“MOVIE MOVIE MOVIE!!!’ he chanted loudly, using his free arm to pump the air. Despite his embarrassment, and despite his brothers all collapsing in near laughter, he couldn’t hate Leo for embarrassing him. He got his revenge later by kicking Leo off the bean bag they had shared, before reluctantly letting Leo join him again.

He was his official twin

He could never stay mad at him

(#)(#)(#)(#)

I haven’t written anything here in a while, but this was a prompt from another website I thought would be fund to you, course it became personal for me for many reasons. But I hope you found it enjoyable 😊

#Rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rottmnt #tmnt 2018 #rottmnt fanfiction #tmnt fanfiction #leo #donnie #leo and donnie #leo and donnie centered fanfiction #brotherly fluff #nothing gross #just family #serioulsy #seriously #there that's how you spell it #ha!

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ineffablywriting · 6 years ago

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Passive Aggressive

Part: four

A one shot turned minific where Harry’s a bit of an asshole and all Jasmine really wants is for him to show her his world.

read part three here // send me your thoughts here!

It had been a month.

Harry hadn’t heard a word from Jazz for a month, yet he still jumped at the first ring of his phone, leapt out of bed at the slightest rattle of the front door. He woke up every morning reaching for a body that wasn’t beside him, in a bed that was smelling less and less like her each night.

On his really bad days, sometimes he pulls out the t-shirt of his that she used to wear to bed every night - she’d left it behind that night and Harry had spent the day curled on the couch when he’d found it. It still smelt like her and Harry worried one day that would fade too, so he keeps it carefully folded in the closet, waiting for the day Jazz comes home. Because she will come home, she has to. She has to.

So it had been a month and Jazz still wasn’t back and Harry was getting more and more restless by the day. Zayn had dropped by a couple of times to remind him of meetings and recording sessions he’d forgotten about, always with some homemade food because it was the only way he knew how to comfort him.

He remembers Zayn’s mum telling him one time that food could soothe an aching soul like nothing else. He supposes she was right, remembering nights when Jazz was curled up on the couch, a furrow between her brows as she chewed her lips trying to come up with an idea for an art project. He’d cook her something then, fretting about, making sure she was eating and taking care of herself because he knew sometimes she’d be so caught up in her art that she forgot to care for herself.

He sighs, glancing at the clock. He needs to go grocery shopping soon; he was running low on edible things and he’d promised Zayn he’d start looking after himself more. So with more reluctance than he cares to admit, he makes himself presentable enough to be seen in public and dawdles his way down to the small store he and Jazz frequented.

The bell above the door chimes as he walks in and Tom gives him a surprised hello from behind the counter. “Alright, lad?” he greets. “‘Aven’t seen you here for awhile. How’s the Princess doing?” he jokes.

“I, uh, yeah. She’s good. Been a bit busy is all,” Harry mumbles, unable to meet Tom’s eye. He shuffles around to the back of the store where the juice was located and grabs one without the juicy bits, his heart clenching at the thought of the juice he’d thrown out not two days ago, but he couldn’t stand the thought of Jazz coming home and finding the fridge empty.

“Harry?” Tom calls for his attention as he rings up his purchases. “You sure you’re alright, kid?”

“I messed up,” he blurts, unable to stand the curious but warm gaze of the middle aged store owner before him. “Jazz is gone. She left me,” he confesses. “I’d been so rude and distant lately and I...I took her for granted. All of it for granted. I don’t know if she’s coming back,” he admits in a whisper, almost hoping the slight breeze from the ceiling fan above him would carry it away.

“She’ll come back,” Tom says after a moment’s thought. “The way I see it, there’s no way she won’t. You don’t see the way she looks at you when you walk in here and head straight to the juice out the back. It’s like, well, I don’t even know how to describe it. But it’s exactly the same way you look at her when she insists that the strawberry gum she picks up is her favourite, all because she knows it’s your favourite; even though she’ll come back in the next day to buy the mint flavour.”

“You didn’t see her that night,” he shakes his head, refusing to let the glimmer of hope spark in his chest. “She… she didn’t look like herself. She didn’t look like Jazz. And I can’t help but think I did that.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Tom tells him, so certain with his words that harry almost believes him. “There’s no way she’s not coming back. That girl was almost as mad for you as you are for her. Do you remember that time you had row and you left for some press business?” he asks Harry, realising he’d have to try harder to make the young man in front of him listen to what he was saying. Harry nods reluctantly. “She’d come down here dressed in a shirt that was clearly too big for her and buy the biggest tub of your favourite mint choc chip ice cream with these sad eyes and chewed lips until the day you got back, and suddenly she was all smiles and laughter.”

Harry still looks troubled, making Tom shake his head again. “Just trust me, son,” he encourages him. “Give her some more time. And if that doesn’t work, chase her to the ends of this earth until it does.”

“There’s something I need to tell you,” Zayn confesses, collapsing onto the sofa beside Harry and handing him a bottle of water.

Harry glares at him. “Why are you in my flat? Again.”

“It’s not like I didn’t knock first. You just wouldn’t answer.”

“‘Cos I knew it was you,” Harry grumbles.

“And you won’t leave the house either,” Zayn ignores him and rolls his eyes. “It’s not healthy for you to lock yourself away. We’ve called and asked you to come out with us multiple times but you won’t ring any of us back, so.”

“What do you want, Zayn?” Harry sighs, dropping his head back on the couch and staring up at the ceiling.

“I spoke to Jazz,” Zayn says gently, carefully watching Harry from the corner of his eye. He stiffens, scrambling to sit upright to look over at Zayn. “Or, well, she spoke to me,” he admits guiltily. “She called me and couple days ago.”

“Days?” Harry asks looking like a kicked puppy and Zayn has to look away from him because he feels terrible but he’s also angry because Harry did this to himself. “And you’re only telling me now?”

“You wouldn’t answer my calls!” Zayn argues, suddenly defensive. He rubs at his face to calm himself down.

“Is she ok? Is she coming home?” Harry asks in quick succession.

“I -,” Zayn cuts off. “She’s fine. She’s coming back into town,” he pauses. “But she’s not coming home. Not how you think.”

“She doesn’t want to see me,” he nods glumly.

“I’m sorry, mate,” Zayn tells him. “I tried to get her to talk to you, but she doesn’t think she’s ready. I think she’s scared. She thinks you’re happier without her and -”

“What?!” Harry all but yells. “How can she think that? You told her I wasn’t, right? That I’m miserable?”

“Believe it or not, I did,” he confirms. “But she wouldn’t listen. Apparently you’re not the type to sit alone at home moping into an old t-shirt eating ice cream you don’t like and throwing out bottles of undrunk orange juice every other week,” he drawls dryly. “Despite the evidence,” he glances around the lounge in obvious distaste. “I thought I was messy,” he mutters under his breath.

“I just�� I don’t understand,” Harry moans. “I know I was distant and, fuck, a complete dick to her but,” he runs a hand through his hair in distress. “But I don’t know how to live without her Zayn. It’s like...like I’ve lost a limb. I can’t sleep in our damn bed anymore, my back feels like it’s aged twenty years because of the springy mattress in the guest room and the rest of the flat just feels empty. You have to tell her to come back, to come home.”

“I tried,” Zayn insists. “But you didn’t see her that night. You broke her heart,” Zayn tells him, trying and failing to keep the accusal out of his voice.

“What night?” he asks. “What are you talking about? Her birthday? I didn’t mean to forget. I just had so much on my mind,” he rattles off, not giving Zayn any chance to respond.

“You forgot her birthday?” Zayn asks, disbelief and disappointment clear in his tone.

“I didn’t mean to,” Harry whispers and Zayn doesn’t think he’s ever seen his friend look so small before. “I was talking about the night of the gallery,” he continues, deciding it might be best to just tell Harry what had happened rather than leaving him to guess. Zayn wasn’t sure he could listen to any other foolish things Harry may have done and still keep a level head. He’d spent the better part of the last month making sure Harry kept it together because he was his friend. But so was Jazz and it was becoming harder and harder not to whack Harry on the back of the head and yell at him about how much of an idiot he was and how he didn’t deserve someone like Jazz. All of which Zayn was sure he was already thinking himself, and if he wasn’t he would be after Zayn told him what they’d heard the night Jazz had packed up and left.

“The night of the gallery?” Harry asks, confused. “That was the night she left.”

“Yeah,” Zayn sighs, suddenly unable to look Harry in the eyes. “When you were stood with your knobhead friends talking about how you’d forgotten what it was like to be single and that it wasn’t too late for you to remember as he shoved you in the direction of a bunch of fit birds,” he says roughly, unable to keep the bitterness out.

“No,” Harry pales, which is a miracle since he didn’t have much colour in his cheeks in the first place. “She heard all of that?”

“And then when you didn’t come home that night either,” Zayn shrugs pointedly, making Harry’s gut churn with remorse and self hatred.

“I didn’t cheat on her, Z. I would never do that to anyone. I would never do that to her. I don’t know why I said those things that night,” he panics, tugging roughly at his hair. It was sitting limply on his head and Zayn found himself wondering vaguely when the last time Harry had showered was. “I can’t imagine not spending the rest of my life with her.”

“I can tell,” Zayn snorts a little, trying to lighten the mood because no matter how much he blamed Harry for what had happened, and how much he thought he was daft for treating Jazz so poorly, at the end of the day Harry was his friend, and he never wanted to see his friends hurt.

“When is she coming back?” Harry asks after a moments hesitation. “I-you can tell me that right?” He stutters almost desperately. And Zayn tries not to flinch at the raw pain in his voice.

“Next week. She’s coming back next week,” Zayn tells him bluntly.

“For her art show,” Harry continues, a memory igniting of the time Jazz had come home late covered in paint with her hands failing, eyes panicked but excitement clear in her smile as she’s told Harry about the biggest art exhibit she’s ever managed to book. “She still hadn’t finished painting,” he tells Zayn. “The-the night of-that night,” he stumbles over the phrasing of the sentence, still unable to come to terms with what he’d done. “That was a practice run. She wanted to do a couple of smaller shows with just friends and family and a smaller crowd before she let the general public and any art critics see her work. She was so excited for it.”

“She still is,” Zayn says. “She’s coming into town to finish some work, I think. She didn’t really tell me much, and I didn’t think to ask. I was just really happy to hear from her. To ask if she was ok,” he admits, Harry’s heart cracking and breaking with every word. “Sorry,” Zayn says, noticing the broken look in Harry’s eyes.

“Was she? Ok, I mean.”

“She was managing,” Zayn evades the question.

“Do you think she’ll ever forgive me?” Harry asks him.

“I don’t know, mate. I just know that she loved you more than anything in the world.”

Harry tries not to focus on the tense, but he couldn’t help it as the word continued to ring in his head while Zayn watched him worriedly.

Loved.

#passive aggressive #I was gonna write more before I posted this but honestly I want to hurt everyone sorry #harry styles fic #harry styles imagine #harry styles fanfic #harry styles #one direction fan fiction #hary imagine #harry imagine #harry styles 1dff #harry fic #harry fanfic #harry one shot #harry styles one shot #harry styles angst

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thewhiterabbit42 · 7 years ago

Text

Full Circle: Part 5

Full Circle Masterlist

Pairings: Gabriel x Reader

Warnings/Tags: Winchester sister!reader, angst, sarcasm, and a whole lot of ways to call someone a dick (among other things), violence

Word Count: 7,826

Summary: Gabriel isn’t the only thing from the past being brought back to life, and, once again, you find yourself smack dab in the middle of everything.

Author’s note: This chapter is tied with The Best Laid Plans as the favorite thing I’ve ever written. I had so much fun when I originally wrote it and, at the time, really got into the mind set. I actually didn’t end up changing much except for adding more names for Gabe to call Raphael, the conversations around which have made this chapter that much more precious to me.

All tags are at the end. If you have a line through your name, the tumblr Gods won’t let me tag you.

Special thanks to @sumara62, my wonderful beta who made it through 15 pages of dick references before being like, “Really?” and @blondecoffeecake for helping add to my repertoire of dick. You guys are the best.

***Please do not repost or copy my work to any other site without my written permission. Giving credit does NOT count. Reblogging is ok.***

<<Prev Chapter Part 5 Next Chapter>>

If Gabriel’s life were an autobiography, it would be called The Reason We Can't Have Nice Things: A Study in Daddy Issues or Why I Hope I’m Adopted. Because right now? There wasn't a single one of his family members he wasn't considering shanking, his father most of all.

Great. Fine. Wonderful. The man had brought him back. Gabriel would be sure to send Him an edible fruit arrangement the next time He was in town. Laced with the plague and made entirely of zombie fruit aka durian (aka what had his father been smoking when he decided anything consumable should naturally smell like rotting flesh?).

Why was Gabriel displeased one might ask?

It might have had something to do with being turned into shish kebab so his brothers could compare dick sizes. (If anything he should be the winner in that department since he was the only one with the cojones to stand up to them).

It might have had something to do with his father being unable to do anything other than stand around, dick in hand, while shit went sideways because He was, in fact, just standing around, dick in hand.

Maybe it was because the only being who gave a damn about Gabriel was a mother loving human who should hate his very existence after what he did to you and your brothers. (The father loather in both of you, however, had created quite the bonding experience).

Or maybe, just maybe, he couldn’t help but suspect there was some underlying motive to his sudden and fortuitous resurrection… like the fact that the heaven bus was on fire again and a fair number of his divine family was ready to drive it into the side of the earth.

Because it had worked out so well for the God squad the first time around.

When he found the earth was not, in fact, one giant smoking battlefield or a rage infested zombie land, he was impressed. He assumed your family had managed to put Lucifer back in time out, though he never would have guessed the how.

He also never would have guessed who Luce would end up with for roommates. He had been impressed with the creativity until he caught the look on your face. Heaviness clung to the darks of your eyes making them seem endless. He knew how cleverness could be a burden and it was like staring at his own reflection, enduring loneliness included.

He had initially hoped one of you had gotten a few good sac taps in on his behalf, but now he simply hoped you had for your own closure. Preferably before his brother was wearing yours, but it wasn’t like the sasquatch was going to feel much other than suffocating in his own body.

Gabriel made a mental note to avoid ever explaining that perk of being a vessel to you.

Fact check: being a vessel was terrible for the first thousand days or so. After that it just tickled.

However, he did have a lot to explain.

He knew he would end up here sooner or later. Well, not here here. He kind of understood his father having a blast from the past, considering the easiest way to pull his vessel to the present was to find the last place it had existed. Being cockblocked and dropped right where Lucifer iced him, however, was an extra special touch of douchiness, and there was only one being left with that much power (and that much douche).

What he didn’t know is that you would end up here with him and that was what had him close to popping a vessel (literally and figuratively speaking). It hadn’t been his choice to be resurrected in the middle of a shitstorm, but he had been the one to drag you into it. All because he had been impulsive, reckless, and unable to look past his own selfish desires.

There went his argument for being adopted.

He should have stayed away from you. Then again, if it was a cosmic coincidence you both showed up at the same place at the same time, he’d put himself in the cage with Lucifer, Michael, and the youngest Winchester and dance the lambada with all them. The only reason he’d come back to this funhouse of memories was to seal off the doors and windows just in case the rip in the time space continuum was a little more wormy and less like the snapshot he’d initially assessed.

The moment he spotted you, he should have just walked away. He could have. It wasn’t your grief that undid him.

Fact check: seeing your world bend beneath that weight did, however, do things to him he’d rather not think about.

He had only seen you this distraught on one other occasion. Famine had sunk its influence so deep inside you there was nothing other than a blinding need. For what, Gabriel had never found out. The urgency in your prayer (along with the fact it was just his name over and over again) suggested he might want to get his winged ass down there pronto. When he arrived, you’d been so consumed he’d had to put you to sleep before seeing your pain began to consume him.

Pain, though, was a timeless constant he could rationalize. So long as there was life, there would be suffering. What chance did he stand, however, against your guilt? It pushed against the indifference he had tried to maintain, unknowingly slipping within his walls undetected, until it touched against his own guarded feelings of responsibility.

Even then, Gabriel could have patched you up (emotionally), saw you out to your car, and went on to enjoy his limited existence at his own personal, completely conjured bunny ranch equipped with endless supplies of chocolate, whip cream, and other sensual sweets… along with eight different versions of what he called not yous. Those were women who had enough of your features for him to pretend, but not actual carbon copies.

Having no shame and being a super creep were definitely two different things.

Not to mention how creepy they were when he couldn’t get the personality traits down enough to not make a copy seem straight out of Invasion of the Body Snatchers… not that he’d ever tried or anything.

Fact check: Gabriel had tried once. For science.

However any illusion of leaving had been shattered in one simple statement.

Have that drink with me, Sheriff, and I will be.

Green had inked in around his vision and he didn’t have to read your thoughts to know what your plans were. The two of you were kindred spirits, your personalities sharing several different aspects. The main one was you liked pleasure in many forms and you weren’t ashamed to take it. Whether it was ordering every pie in the diner when caught in the time loop (and then watching Dean’s stomach explode when you made a pie eating contest out of it) or distracting yourself by seducing the local sheriff, you used your senses to feel good in the moment.

This moment, however, was wrong. You sought distraction in his absence, only he was standing right there, so close he had accidentally touched you when you stumbled back a bit (though he was still trying to figure out how that fluke had occurred considering he was pretty sure the only thing close enough had been his wing).

Fact check: the left one did tend to get a little handsy.

But that was besides the point. You were looking to get lost in a man from a generation whose idea of a good time was a cup of tea, an episode of Matlock, and a nap.

Despite the sheriff being apprehensive, Gabriel saw the flash of loneliness that pushed through the man’s gaze. It wouldn’t take much to get him to cave. Even if he put up a good fight, you were young, pretty, and way too smart for your own good. He wouldn’t stand a chance.

Neither did Gabriel when he began to imagine all the things the man would do to you, all the things you would let the sheriff do, and it would all be on his conscience, because it was technically his fault you went on grieving.

At least, that’s what he told himself. Admitting the first thing on his mind since getting a reboot was to make you his in every way he’d failed to before was a tad more insightful than he cared to be. The whole thing was enough to drive him to drink.

Fact check: while there was no driving, there was a whole lot of drink. The part about making the sheriff run circles and question his own sanity was just an added bonus.

He needed something to calm the clamor in his head, except it had just made him sloppy if he had missed his brother’s presence slipping into town. Regret and guilt weighed heavy on gold as he took in the mounting dread on your features. His weakness had brought you here, and it was up to him to see it did not take you down with him.

He wanted to tell you as much, but whether it was his own streak of daddy issues or the fact that even the most meaningful relationship he’d managed had ended with a good old-fashioned stabbing (thanks, Kali, always knew you were kind of a bitch), his words fell short as they tended to in these situations.

Touch, however, was something he managed to do well. Tips up knuckles drank in the skin along the side of your face, savoring the feel one last time. He channeled what reassurance he could into the gesture, hoping to calm the panic he felt buzzing through you so you would hear him when he told you to run. The command, however, became lost as his brother made his grand entrance, confirming he did, in fact, have the worst timing in the universe.

“Gabriel,” a deep voice boomed over the lingering echoes of thunder as the the silhouette of a man manifested in the center of fading light.

“Raphael,” Gabriel drawled, looking up at his brother. “This is an awkward surprise.”

“Someone’s clearly never heard of knocking,” you muttered, and he felt your relief in a momentary release of tension before everything tightened again. You slid off his lap, and the absence of your body rang cold as the sudden chill in the room rushed in to take the place of your warmth. He could see the gears in your mind turning, gaze appraising as you took in his brother’s stoic features.

Gabriel stepped forward, subtly placing himself between you and the entity who should henceforth be known as the giant dick for being the the biggest cockblock in creation.

“I am disappointed, brother,” The meter-long man-dong said, eyes flicking to Gabriel in obvious dismissal of your presence. “You must have heard what is happening.”

Oh, Gabriel had heard all right. Angel radio was a complete cluster these days. The last time it had been this chaotic was when he’d tricked Michael and Biggus Dickus into believing there was a demon incursion about to launch on heaven led by rogue angels… because was inciting the Crusades as a test of faith (and act of boredom) really necessary?

“Let me guess. Thing’s not going so well for you, bro?” A glimmer of a sardonic grin flashed across his casual mask, tone pushing the fringe of disdain as he arched a brow.

“No. But you already knew that, and yet your first inclination is to dally with this human.”

Apparently Gabriel wasn't the only one unimpressed with the situation.

“I get we’re a little behind the times right now, but what year are you stuck in? 1905?” He taunted.

“Watch your tone,” Cock McBlockins warned and Gabriel nearly rolled his eyes. He wondered if his father had meant to make all three of his brothers into prideful pricks with their own mini god complexes or if they had just naturally become those without anyone to challenge their authority.

“Or what, you’ll shiv me too?” He demanded. It wasn’t like he was bitter or anything, being put in this position again.

Fact check: he was plenty bitter and uber pissed.

If anyone asked, however, the official story was he just didn’t think Raphael had it in him to be such an ass about it.

“The only reason she continues drawing breath is because I will it,” the monstrous manpole informed him. The older archangel’s wings flared slightly in warning, his presence pushing against Gabriel’s as it wrestled for dominance within the room. The youngest pushed back, his own pride unwilling to back down so easily. To do so would be to show weakness, and his weakness had put you in enough danger already today.

Tips of fingers touched against his lower back, acting as pinpoints of pressure and shifting his focus back to you. If he had to guess, instinct spurred your touch, and perhaps the need for reassurance. There’s no way you could have perceived the pissing contest currently happening, but enough of something skittered across your radar to tip you off to the danger.

Or perhaps you were telling him to quit dicking around already and figure out an escape plan.

“What do you want?” Gabriel asked, backing down. The degenerate disco stick eyed him as if it were a trick a moment before that dark, baleful gaze slipped over his shoulder and landed on you.

“What is she to you?” Dickus Maximus demanded.

“I mean I was trying to have a bit of fun but somebody crashed that party,” he gave a dramatic look skyward as if asking if even his father could believe the nerve. “But really, what are any of them to us in the long run?”

“An incessant nuisance,” the dickasaurus rex said flatly.

“I was thinking more like a beautiful distraction,” Gabriel replied smoothly though it felt like he had a mouth full of sand. “But just a distraction, nonetheless… no offense sweetheart.” He turned, giving you a flashy-and completely false- apologetic smile for good measure.

He didn’t mean it. He might not be ready to admit you were more than a passing obsession, but on a visceral level he was hooked, his stomach suddenly a gymnastics Olympian as it somersaulted its way through a sudden bout of ire-tipped nerves.

If the USS Douche Canoe ruined this for him, everybody’s ship was going down, starting with the dickhead in front of him and heading straight to the top, where all the bullshit started.

“No offense, sweetheart, but I’m not looking to date a giant dick anytime soon,” sarcasm painted your words, streaking across lips in a smile you flashed that was just as insincere.

Gabriel took it as a good sign you hadn’t missed a beat with your response. Mostly because that was one less thing to worry about while he figured out how to get you out of there. There’d be plenty of time for doubt later if he survived. In fact, it was one of his favorite pastimes.

Fact check: it was nobody’s favorite pastime.

“Well, aren’t we just two peas in a pod,” he drawled, brows raising as he dropped his hands to his hips. “Humans, I tell you. Just when you think you’re the one using them, they’re actually using you.”

“I’ve asked myself many times what would I do should you choose deceit over honest discourse,” The dick with a dictionary began, his gaze drifting back to Gabriel’s. “I think I have my answer.”

The look in his eyes remained neutral, pushing beyond the fringes of weary into outright exhaustion, but it was that telltale half lift of lips, smirking smugly, that gave away the game plan. Unfortunately, that plan looked to be you.

With a snap, you disappeared from out of the side of Gabriel’s vision only to reappear in front of the increasingly annoying third wheel to the party. The contrast of the dark fingers wrapped around your pale throat was startling. Or, it could just be the fact his brother was definitely gripping that part of you quite snugly in warning.

“What weaknesses lay beneath, I wonder…” the wondrous one-eyed yogurt slinger mused, thumb dragging slowly across the surface of your throat. The movement was callous, insinuating no more than the danger you were in. Defiance darkened your eyes, your lips pulling back in silent snarl as if he’d touched you in a far different manner and it caught Gabriel off guard.

He looked more closely, peeling back the layers of atoms and energy until gossamer strands of grace glistened ethereal in the dim lighting. You were surrounded by it, wisps of it ghosting over your upper body as if seeking some sort of entrance. Anger crackled hot beneath his skin, causing his energy to spark slightly between the tips of his fingers.

How dare Raphael touch you that way.

He had no right to touch you with his grace. He had no business inside your mind, though by how he was concentrating on the area between your shoulders and waist he was after something much more integral.

Why he’d want a peek at your soul was beyond Gabriel, but it was a whole lot of nothing good for you.

“Stop,” He warned, clenching down hard and doing his best to reign in his temper. He was aware that this might not be anything other than a test (which he was clearly failing). If his brother was prodding for sore spots, boy had he found one, especially when Gabriel watched as the older archangel pushed his energy beneath your skin in a wholly ungentle way.

There was no stopping his fury as your features grew taut with pain, your torment pushing out your throat in a sudden cry as light emanated out from where the grace had entered. The ground beneath his feet began to tremble, tables and chairs beginning to clatter as they bounced around, skittering slowly across the floor.

“I said stop,” he repeated, the rumble growing louder as the entire building began to sway. Windows shattered around the room and Raphael was lucky he didn’t find himself on the receiving end of an incredibly angry smite. His brother exhaled a long, heavy sigh through his nose, withdrawing all his energy in a single instant and letting you drop to the floor.

“Who is she to you?” Disappointment wove through the gigantic pork sword’s words and Gabriel held back a snort. Like the asshat had any right to ask anything about you anymore.

“None of your business,” Gabriel hissed.

It was the wrong answer.

Apparently a good old fashioned ass kicking was next on the list, your body catching some serious air before it came slamming down on the top of the tables. Wood snapped beneath the force and you continued to roll across the floor a few feet from the impact.

Gabriel reached out with his grace, searching for the familiar, chaotic buzz that was often your mind. It was a much dimmer, snarling mass of tangled thoughts at the moment. Stay down he told you, hoping you were conscious enough to hear him.

You were and, as usual, you were intent on doing just the opposite of what you should be. You pushed yourself up, eyes flashing with determination as you appraised the situation. Keep him occupied you prayed, silently pulling yourself to your feet before slowly edging your way toward the back exit.

Good. Maybe you could sneak out while he and his brother got down to business.

“Would you like to gamble on what strike three means for her?”

“All right, all right,” he said, putting his hands up in surrender. “No need to pull a Lucifer and break everyone else’s toys when you don’t get your way. Besides, we all know what happens when you start throwing temper tantrums with the Winchesters around. Well, Michael does, anyway.”

He smiled widely, enjoying the way his remarks were beginning to get under Coitis Interruptis’ skin.

“But if you simply must know… she was the only one that gave two shits about me when everyone was trying to make me choose sides. It wasn’t about tradition or the greater good. It was about me. She believed in me to make the right decision because I was good enough,” he began, past pushing against present as a familiar slow burning anger flared back to life.

“So no. She’s not a distraction. She’s a friend. A good one, and she’s a good person who doesn’t deserve to be caught up in our bullshit again. So I’m asking you, as your brother, to leave her out of this.”

Three things became apparent as Gabriel stopped his rambling.

First, this was probably the most genuine interaction he’d had with cocksmiter number three since his father had left.

Second, because it was sincere, it didn’t even register on his brother’s bullshit detector which, in turn, sent it flying off the charts by the look he received.

Third, and most important, you had stopped. You were now just standing. In the middle of the room. Staring. Mouth parted slightly when really you needed to be moving - why the hell weren’t you still moving?

Gold snapped up to your gaze, flicking toward the door insistently. Keep going he urged when you simply looked conflicted. You hesitated another moment before continuing on.

Humans.

“I mean I know it’s a novel idea, but why don’t we try keeping the crazefest in the family, just this once?” He continued, aware of his brother’s unwavering stare. He was also aware of how close you were to the back door. Your hand reached for the handle, movements silent as you gave a push… only for nothing to happen.

Someone clearly had some control issues to work on.

“I will never understand your loyalty to these creatures,” the disdain dripping from the colossal cockmuffin’s words was palpable. “They are weak and flawed.”

“What did you say?” Gabriel demanded, eyes narrowing. Lucifer had said those very words… how had his brother known?

“Despite our differences, Gabriel, I came here to talk,” the humongous spawn hammer implored. “The rebel has gathered a surprising amount of support, though it is only a matter of time before he is defeated.”

“Well, sounds like you have it all figured out. Best of luck to you,” he said, taking a few steps back toward the front entrance. If he wasn't going to let you go, Gabriel could at least try and move the party. Thunder echoed overhead and the room suddenly leapt to life with a gathering energy just before a bolt of lightning pierced the ceiling. It struck right behind Gabriel’s back, stopping him in his tracks and scorching the floor.

Apparently he wasn't the only one with a penchant for theatrics.

“You’re either with me or against me.”

Gabriel had been wrong. His brother wasn't a giant dick. He was a whole bag of them.

“Well, when you put it that way,” Gabriel jeered, taking a step forward. “So, how do you want to do this? Should I just whip mine out? Do we compare sizes first?”

A familiar smell drifted under his nose, carrying hints of metal and life in its purest form. He glanced up to find you with your back against the door, hand obscured behind you and he had a fairly good idea what you were doing. The problem was if he did, then so did the massive heat-seeking moisture missile.

If you both lived through this, he and you were going to have a long, snarky chat about the limitations of humans, and the nearly limitless power of archangels and why the former didn't need to worry about saving the latter.

“Blood carries a very distinct smell,” Skippy McSexkiller announced, turning your way, dark eyes blazing bright against the insolence you were hastily painting across the door. “Yours especially.”

“It’s a wonder you’re not a hit with the ladies,” Gabriel taunted, trying to draw his attention. It didn’t work. “Hey, Raphie, can I call you Raphie?” That did the trick; the archangel paused momentarily, giving him a baleful look.

“I tire of your games, brother, and theirs.” Boy, did his brother look tired. Not just the soul weary I’ve-been-alive-since-the-dawn-of-time exhaustion that timeless beings tended to get from time to time. This was a whole other ballgame.

Gabriel, tell me how to do this without hurting you.

Apprehension filled your prayer as it floated to the forefront of his consciousness, and from the corner of his eyes he could see you were almost done. He found it awfully touching you didn’t want to blast his hide when he knew that if your brothers were there, he’d have been rocketed halfway to Texas by now.

Unfortunately, Scrote-totes MaGoo continued to designate the hotel as a no fly zone, leaving you both without a lot of options.

At least it would only hurt for a moment.

Fact check: it was only for a moment, but it also was a whole lot of hurt.

Catch you on the flip side, sweetheart.

“Human idioms,” the gigantic tube steak sighed and the easygoing mask Gabriel kept in place began to slip. “I’ll never understand your preference for them. Or why you’d think me fool enough to fall for your little trap.”

Panic sparked in Gabriel’s chest, skating across the thickening tension in the air before slamming into your system. You frantically finished the last symbol on the ward before bringing your hand down in the center. He braced himself, only the blast never came. He looked over to see the sigil had vanished.

Oh sweet bearded man with bad teeth but good religious messages. This was happening. His brother was looking at you like he was going to split every atom in your body no matter what his younger brother wanted and last Gabriel checked, that was not on his agenda.

“Hey douchebag,” he called out, pulling his blade from out of his jacket. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

The other archangel didn’t even bat an eye. He didn’t even give his younger sibling a courtesy snap. The only reason Gabriel felt the smite coming was because the air always tasted like it was burning the moment before it hit.

A bright, blinding light poured down through the ceiling. Every hair stood on edge, stretching upward toward the concentration of energy before everything suddenly released and the blast had his brains pushing down through his nostrils.

Fact check: Gabriel’s brain was not actually being forced out his nose, but it certainly felt like it.

The extreme downward pressure, however, was enough to immobilize his mind and force him down to his knees.

Apparently his brother was done dicking around.

“Was the pain you suffered earlier not tangible enough?” Raphael’s voice managed to push through the mental haze. “Perhaps you need a reminder of your own past.”

Gabriel’s eyes fluttered open, details around him fuzzy as he struggled to bring the world back into focus.

Your pain made for a great motivator.

He heard your cry go up and the visceral response that tore through him was enough to help him gather his wits. Your anguish was tangible even from across the room, tiny cuts and enlarged gashes singing in a discord of physical suffering that clashed with the previous chorus that rang from the very essence in your soul crying out.

He looked over to see you on your knees, red painting your torment in grisly splashes through your clothing. There were streaks across your legs, your right thigh practically saturated. It was harder to tell what was behind your sweater, but by the sheer smell of iron drifting across the room, there was a fair amount that had yet to show through. You cradled your left arm closer to your body, droplets trickling out from beneath the cuff of your coat, sliding steadily off tips of fingers with a steady pat, pat, pat.

“Is that why you brought me here?” Gabriel demanded, trying get the giant phallus turned back in his direction. “Because you want to remind me what happens if I choose the right side?”

Pat, pat, pat.

“There’s a certain symmetry. Beginning where you ended. Ending where you began, should it come to that.”

Pat, pat, pat.

He should have seen it sooner. After helping lock Auntie Amara away, the mammoth meat constrictor had been all about balance, about the universe having some sort of grand plan and synergy to it. After their father left, however, things began to become a little less about cosmic harmony and a little more obsessive-compulsive.

Pat, pat, pat.

“From where I’m standing? More like a certain douchiness,” he turned, spitting out a mouthful of red from the blood that trickled down the back of his throat.

“Enough!” Raphael roared. “I will not stand here and listen to your drivel while our home is under attack.”

Pat, pat, pat.

Your heart began to slow, the change in pace nearly imperceptible at first. For every beat you lost, his seemed to pick it up. You were bleeding out and while you had a little time, you were going to be drier than a fruitcake in February if he couldn’t get to you soon.

Good thing he had a trick or two up his sleeve.

“Heaven is burning, brother. Michael is locked away no different than Lucifer. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”

“It might if that was what this was really about, but we both know that’s not the case,” Gabriel said, slowly pulling himself to his feet.

“Paradise was within our grasp... until you betrayed us to the Winchesters and told them how to put Lucifer back.”

Fact check: the only betrayal being served was by Lucifer, who couldn’t help but turn everything into an ice cold fuckery of a dish.

“Then kill me,” he said, tossing his blade aside. Rather, his shadow twin did. He wasn’t that stupid… and you were beginning to look awfully pale. He appeared in front of you, crouching down until he was eye level with you. You hadn’t moved. He wasn’t sure you were able to by the number of wounds you had.

“I’d rather have you by my side,” his brother continued from across the room. He was vaguely aware his double had given one of the many pre-selected responses from his repertoire. Besides the fact it made things easier, he’d rather be focusing on you anyway. His hands tended to get a little less smitey when he did.

He had to be careful, though. If he released too much energy, Frodo Douchbaggins would be on him like nazgul on the one ring. He idly wondered if that made him Aragorn in this situation. Probably Eowyn. She did have the most fabulous hair out of all of them.

Fact check: Gabriel did have pretty fabulous hair.

Your eyes met his with something too shrouded for him to read. The pain was too prevalent and he wondered how much you were even able to think beyond it. Your lips parted as if to speak, and he held a finger up for you to be quiet before his gaze dropped down to the pool of blood on the floor.

This mess was as much his fault as the titanic flesh rod’s, and when this was all said and done,

Gabriel was going to go full Lorena Bobbitt and remove him from existence.

“This is your chance, Gabriel, to make up for your past indiscretions…”

The only thing he needed to make amends for was sitting right in front of him. The longer things dragged out, however, the less likely he’d get the chance.

Fact check: the chances one of you were getting fucked tonight were looking pretty good.

Bonus fact check: it wouldn’t nearly be as fun as either of you had planned.

Fingers drifted along the swollen contour of your cheek, tenderly stroking away the puffiness as he released his energy. He didn’t need to physically touch you in order to heal, but what did he have to lose anymore?

Your gaze drifted sideways, widening slightly in surprise and doubt slipped in through the cracks in his armor. Perhaps he’d been mistaken. Perhaps things were more one sided than he realized. Perhaps you had been the one with too much drink tonight.

He tried to focus on his brother droning on in the background, clamping down on his rising disappointment. Wank, wank, atonement. Wank, wank, duty. It was the same hackneyed setup where humanity became the punchline.

His family really needed to add some new jokes to their lineup.

You released a slow breath and his attention shifted back to you as you tried to move. The hand you raised was shaky, slowed by the damage he was still trying to undo. It was obvious you were struggling to even raise it this far, but it was far enough. Tips of fingers slipped beneath his coat, tentatively tracing along the partially undone line of buttons at the top of his shirt before settling your palm against his chest.

Your eyes settled in the same spot, narrowing intently. He’d seen you enough times to know it was the look you wore when ferreting out an answer in the middle of a clusterfuck of information. What you were seeking and what you found, were simply beyond him in that moment. You did find something, however, and it wasn’t the slow growing heaviness of finality Gabriel overtaking over him.

Despite the snarling mass of emotions he felt within you, your eyes began to brighten, shaking off some of their former weight. The intensity made him take a closer look. A slow burning ire had sparked somewhere along the way, determination causing the edges of your gaze to grow hard, keeping the flames contained. Your anger wasn’t surprising, but the fear that seemed to be fueling it was.

He wanted to reassure you that things would be fine, but what would be the point of lying? Besides, you’d just find something to break on him if he did. Though he imagined with the way things were going there might not be anything left to break by the end of the night.

Your brows drew together suddenly, a frown tugging at your lips. For a moment he thought Raphael might have caught on, but he could hear the prick yammering on while his shadow tossed well placed barbs and used misdirection to keep the conversation going.

Your eyes also never left Gabe’s, making the source of your displeasure rather clear. Or rather unclear, considering he hadn’t a clue what he could have done considering he hadn’t had the chance to open his mouth yet.

Then again, he had dragged you into this mess. Perhaps you were finally getting on the same page as the rest of the world in realizing what a giant fuck up he was.

Your hand clenched around his shirt and while he was surprised at how quickly your strength had returned, he was completely thrown for a loop when you yanked him forward, lips demanding as they moved over his. Passion won out over resignation as energy spiked down from your mouth straight into his chest, sparking outward back into your hand and continuing the loop.

Apparently, you were of the mind set that neither one of you had died yet.

You kept things brief because, unlike previous assumptions, you understood the importance of not dallying. When he looked at you again, the fear had melted away to promise - so much promise for so many, many things burned wickedly in your gaze.

If that wasn’t motivation to survive this disaster of a night, then he deserved to be put out of his misery.

Fact check: he most certainly was not dead already from the waist down.

Show time he decided, giving you a reassuring smirk before taking the place of his double once again. Not that he had a clue what to do still, but he did have a little hope, thanks to you.

“Let’s stop beating around the bush, hmmm?” Gabriel suggested. “I know what you’re really up to. This isn’t about heaven. This isn’t about family or atonement. This is about you just wanting it to be done. No matter the cost.”

“Yes,” his enormous deep-V-diver of a brother admitted. “I am tired, brother. So very tired and I know that you are, too. This is our chance to go back to our real home. If my cold heart still yearns for it, I know yours must as well.”

Ancient sentiments almost forgotten stirred deep beneath the surface and Gabriel’s confidence slipped. If how he looked on the surface mirrored what was going on internally, he would have been running around the room, flailing wildly as he attempted to outrun an imaginary wildfire.

These were not things he wanted to feel again. Not tonight. Not with Raphael. Not ever.

Fact check: he would rather douse himself with holy fire and do the hellfire rumba than go down that road again.

Keep him distracted.

Your prayer rang out as a lifeline, drawing him back from uncertain waters before he became lost in the riptide. He didn’t dare check to see what you were up to with how intently his brother’s stare was fixed upon him.

“Humans have a word for that you know,” he said, pity unknowingly softening his demeanor.

The Herculean skin flute gave a heavy sigh, weariness returning and casting shadows on his face far darker than before. “I am aware of it, and I suppose you’re right. We cannot go back. But we can still end this miserable existence for everyone.”

Every time it seemed like they were about to have a moment, twizzletits had to go and open that big mouth of his.

Gabriel sincerely hoped this wasn’t how everyone felt about him.

Fact check: it kind of was.

I’m going to tell you the same thing I told that big bro of ours,” Gabriel announced. “I love you, Raphael, you are my brother, but you are a great big bag of dicks.” He gave a dramatic pause, watching as fury erupted from his brother’s gaze.

“Actually, I lied. You’re an even bigger one for trivializing all the sacrifices made to stop this madness, mine included, by starting it all over again. What is it with all of you throwing a tantrum if you don’t get your way? For father’s sake, grow a pair! Sac up and move on! The world isn’t as terrible if you’d give it a chance to show you its beauty.”

“This world is no longer beautiful. It is full of ugliness, disappointment, flawed intentions, but most of all, it is filled with suffering. If you love them so much, would you not want their pain to end?”

Gabriel almost winced. The more he listened, the less he was certain his brother was, in fact, a bag of dicks. If anything, it sounded like the archangel needed to go out, drink a liquor store, get laid, then go on a world tour and take in the sights. He knew serving under Michael was no picnic, but he never imagined it would actually suck the soul out of someone.

“To live is to suffer,” Gabriel conceded, “But it’s also so much more than that. Yes, they’re flawed. They can be vicious and bloodthirsty, but how is that any different than us? Why can’t any of you see how much good is also in them? How much they try and more importantly forgive?”

Because forgiveness was not a staple at any of their Sunday dinners.

“I am tired of this life,” Raphael repeated, the lines suddenly evident across his vessel’s face. “And so very tired of all these games. I know where your heart truly lies.”

The part of Gabriel in question gave a stutter, past overlaying present in a terrifying way. It wasn’t so much the echo of Lucifer’s words that disturbed him so much as the fact that you were there, right where he’d been, body crouched low as you slowly crept in for the kill.

“I’m sorry.” The older archangel meant it. It didn’t make him any less of a fuck stick for what he was about to do.

Fact check: Raphael was definitely a big ol’ bag of dicks.

Desperation forced Gabriel’s hand and he leapt forward. Once again, his brother anticipated the move, deftly sidestepping the blade before grabbing him by the arm and throwing him into you. You nearly filleted him by mistake, your weapon catching him across his shoulder as you scrambled to get it out of the way.

So much for plan B.

Gabriel felt the telltale gathering of energy over his head and he had just enough time to throw you back before heaven’s energy came barreling down upon him. It didn't matter how old he got, he would never get used to the feeling of a smite. Though that might have been his brother’s goal by how many were sent down upon him. Wave after wave of energy crashed over him and he was certain this was it… until it suddenly wasn’t.

By the time the world stopped spinning (and ringing… and twisting… and shouting…) Gabriel looked up to see his brother booting you across the floor like a soccer ball.

“What will it take for you to realize how weak and unworthy they are?” Raphael demanded, sending another burst down. Something popped inside his skull, though it was likely just his brain falling in on itself. There seemed to be enough of something leaking out his nose and down the back of his throat again.

There was another loud pop followed by more ringing in his ears, and for a minute he assumed he really had taken one too many smites to the head for his vessel to hold. When the sound continued, he realized the noise wasn’t coming from inside him, but from across the room. You had your gun drawn and trained on his brother as more shots peppered the silence, making the archangel’s vessel shake slightly with each bullet that pierced it.

He’d said it before and he’d say it again: you had the most abysmal sense of self-preservation, even for a Winchester.

Fact check: the above statement was completely true. Though scrambled as Gabriel’s mind was, he had the wherewithal to realize what you were doing was solely to draw fire away from him.

He shook his head, pity pushing through the lingering pain. How could his brother bear witness to this and still not be swayed?

“From where I’m standing? They’re more worthy than we are,” he said, smiling slightly as his eyes met yours. No one else was willing to step this far onto the wrong side of sane for him. Not his family. Not yours. It only reaffirmed his stance that you all deserved better than what his father had originally planned.

“She has ruined you,” Dickbag McFlaccidcock declared, tone insinuating if anyone were to be pitied, it should be Gabriel. Unfortunately, there was a reason for that.

Gabe watched as your hand began to shake, your eyes widening at the realization you were no longer in control of your weapon. Slowly, you began to turn it on yourself, your other hand coming up to try and alter its course without much luck.

He didn’t even get the chance to try and attack his brother before another blinding round of pain echoed through his skull.

“You will watch this,” the patron saint of douchbaggery insisted. “Because your foolishness is the reason she must die.”

A crushing weight bore down upon his shoulders, pinning him in place. Desperation clawed viscerally through his stomach, his wings shooting out to full length as he tried to break free from his brother’s grasp. The uber smiting he’d received, however, had stripped him of most of his strength. He was essentially leashed and there was nothing worse than feeling caged and helpless.

Except maybe watching the one good thing in his life be destroyed because of him.

“You want me to stand with you - fine. I’ll be your right hand man. The heavens will sing of our unstoppable duo - Gabriel and Raphael - or Raphael and Gabriel, whatever you prefer,” he begged, willing to say whatever his brother needed to hear if it meant buying you more time. He could worry about the finer points of how to dig himself out later.

“This is for your own good,” Raphael insisted.

It seemed his brother had half a brain after all, though his heart was clearly still AWOL.

No no no no no. Think, Gabriel, think, think, think...

Fuck, fuck, god damn, fucking fuck - think, y/n, think, think, think…

Your thoughts collided, bursting through the increasingly tense silence. Your mounting panic pushed through his battered mind, allowing him to unintentionally pick up on what was flying through yours. As usual, you were the only two in the room even remotely on the same page.

Fact check: that page was titled Now’s a Good Time to Panic.

The gun reached its destination against your temple, desperation hitting its peak as both your mantras came to a deafening halt.

“It’s not your fault, Gabe,” you told him, doing your best to hide your fear and failing miserably at it.

He nearly broke in that moment. Here you were, about to die because of him, and your final thought was to pardon him. It barely made a dent in his brother’s armor, and that’s when he realized just how lost the archangel had become.

Gabriel renewed his efforts, straining against his ethereal bonds. He clenched down on his jaw, so hard he might have heard a few of his teeth crack. It was the only way to keep his desperation from spilling out over his lips. The last thing you needed to see was him reduced to a babbling mess.

No, no, no, no, please, father, no…

“It’s ok,” you told him.

Fact check: things were so far from ok that Gabriel was certain no one would be leaving this room alive if you died.

You closed your eyes, but he had no choice but to watch. His heart hit a fever pitch, mirroring his own struggles to escape as it hammered away against his chest. There was nothing he could do and he dropped to his knees, everything shattering as reality bore down upon him.

He wasn’t strong enough. He couldn’t save you. You were going to die and it was all his fault.

“I’m sorry,” his voice wavered, thick with emotion.

Gabriel’s world came to a screeching halt as his brother forced you to pull the trigger.

Next Chapter>>

ALL the tags: @girl-next-door-writes @sumara62 @fand0maniac @feelmyroarrrr @omgreganlove @jannalionheart @baritonechick, @deaths-maiden @lucifer-in-leather @stone-met @the-moose-of-baskerville @summer-binging-spn @blondecoffeecake @raspberrypuddle @ourloveisforthelovely @deanxfuckingadorablexwinchester @crowley-you-sinnamon-roll @tistai @christinalibertymikaelson

Gabe Squad: @theblackenedsky @bloodstained-porcelain-doll @pepperwoodatnight @lacqueluster @samikitten @ludwigs-a-monster @a-vast-african-plain @onlyanothersocialcasualty @kazosa @cobrakai--1972

Full Circle: @melodyhiddleston @gabe-crowley-trash

#gabriel x reader #reader insert #Full Circle #Rabbit writes #trigger warning #ha. ha.#see what I did there?#... I'll just see myself out now

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nintendotreehouse · 7 years ago

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Splatfest Sweetalk Smackdown

Morgan Ritchie

Job title: Localization Producer

Favorite type of cake: Chinese-style sponge cake

Favorite weapon in Splatoon 2: Splattershot Jr

Eric Smith

Job title: Localization Producer

Favorite ice-cream flavor: Salted Caramel

Favorite weapon in Splatoon 2: Splat Dualies

Hey, I’m Eric Smith here with Morgan Ritchie from the Nintendo Treehouse. As the writers of the English text in the Splatoon series, Splatoon 2 is very near and dear to our hearts. We really wanted the first Splatfest of Splatoon 2 to be the best Splatfest ever, so we set about coming up with a theme that would capture the hearts and minds of Nintendo Switch owners everywhere. That didn’t really work out, so we did what we always do when we’re out of ideas—we slapped the haunted fax machine next to Reggie’s office until it spat out a piece of paper. The paper had a cupcake and an ice-cream cone on it, so we were like, “That’s a cool theme, I guess.” And here we are.

Morgan and I naturally disagreed about which of the two desserts is superior, so we’ve come to the Treehouse Log to argue our points, mostly because the rest of the office is sick of us yelling over our desks at each other. The following is an actual IM conversation that occurred on 7/10/2017.

------

Smitty

OK, Morg. Tell me how a stand-up guy like yourself ended up voting for Team Cake? In other words, where did your life go wrong?

Morg

I love cake! It's art. It's craft. There's a reason it's served at so many special occasions. It means something. It's anything and everything you want it to be. It can be light, fluffy, fruity, dense, bold, delicate, creamy, chocolatey, carroty, colorful, magical, transcendent! And it can't. Melt.

But please, I'd love to hear why you went Team Ice Cream.

Smitty

First of all, the only reason cake is served at special occasions instead of ice cream is because, as you said, it can't melt. Cake is valued more for its convenience than its flavor. We as a society settle for cake at weddings the way one might settle for a cheap, rented tuxedo with questionable frosting stains on the cummerbund. Humans are lazy—we don't want to put in the time or money to keep our dessert cold for the two hours it takes the bride and groom to recite vows that they definitely plagiarized from the Internet. Given unlimited resources, though, I think most people would prefer a wedding sundae over a slice of wedding cake, and I think the popularity vote in the upcoming Splatfest will reflect that. Have you ever been to a billionaire or superhero’s wedding? They totally serve ice cream instead of cake because they have the means to do so.

Morg

OK, wow. You seem pretty heated for someone who prefers frozen cream. Your insecurity is showing. Secondly, you think most people would prefer a "wedding sundae"… So wait, now ice cream on its own isn't good enough? It needs to be covered in chocolate sauce, nuts, and whipped cream?! Is that still ice cream? Are you Team Ice Cream or Team Sundae?! This is the problem with you ice-cream coneheads. It's never good enough for you on its own. You gotta put stuff on top of it, put it between two cookies, serve it on top of pie or with cake, or even MAKE A CAKE OUT OF IT! I mean seriously, ice-cream cake? Can't you just enjoy your frozen cream on its own? You had to make a cake out of it? I mean, that's fine because it gives me a loophole to enjoy some, but c'mon. Ice cream is always the bridesmaid, never the bride. Cake reigns supreme.

Smitty

(Way to keep the wedding theme going. Good stuff.) But let's get one thing straight—ice-cream cake is more ice cream than cake. And the irony of a filthy cake gobbler complaining about additional ingredients is richer than a mouthful of delicious gelato. The reason cake is slathered in frosting is because the cake itself is nearly unpalatable without a thick coating of sugar sauce to help choke it down. Cake is more flash than substance—chefs mold fondant into shapes and statues in order to make an otherwise dull dessert look appetizing. Red Velvet is basically just chocolate cake mixed with enough red food coloring to make anyone foolish enough to eat it cry tears of blood. And don’t even get me started on rice cakes. Ice cream on the other hand needs no such crutch. Its purity and versatility are its greatest strengths.

Yes, ice cream can do it all—it's incredible on its own, but you can also toss it in a cone, throw it in a sandwich, drop it in a glass of root beer, wrap it around a stick, or even freeze dry it and eat it in outer space. Feel like using a straw to get your ice-cream fix? Boom. Milkshake. Skipped breakfast and low on potassium? BLAM. Banana split. Need some probiotics? WHAM. Frozen yogurt. Ice cream can do anything, including stomp cake into the ground.

Morg

You lost me at frozen yogurt. I get that ice cream goes well with just about anything. It's like the ketchup of desserts. But cake stands alone, above, beyond. Picture a perfectly cut piece of your favorite cake. Picture it on a plate, the light catching it just so, refracting the moist, fluffy layers of baked goodness and rich layers of creamy, buttery frosting. Picture your fork carving off that first, perfectly proportioned bite. Picture that bite slowly floating toward your mouth, the awe, the anticipation, the glory of such a beautifully crafted piece of edible, delicious art. Cake arouses the senses. It inspires the imagination. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Cake is poetry. Cake is a time machine. Cake is perfection with room to write your name on it. Baking a good cake requires skill, precision, patience, and constant vigilance. The same qualities it takes to excel at Splatoon 2, in fact. On July 15th, a very special occasion indeed, ice cream will finally get served.

Smitty

*slow clap* See, this is the problem with you cake types. Instead of using cold, hard facts to argue your point, you have to sugarcoat the experience with flowery language, hiding the truth behind a deceitful wall of frosting. Anyone can use a few sexy words to make something sound appetizing. I could make a diaper pail sound like a buffet of indulgence if I wanted to. Each decadent diaper holding a new and exciting surprise with which to delight and seduce the senses. But that would be at odds with the no-nonsense elegance under which ice cream operates. Ice cream makes no excuses. It's cold, it's in your face, and it's not afraid to tell you when you've had too much. (That brain freeze is no joke.)

Morg

I've had enough of you, that's for sure. And to be honest, you should enjoy your ice cream while you can. Climate change favors cake. I think the one thing we can agree on is that we're excited about this Splatfest! How about this: let's end this thing with a few words of encouragement for our teammates.

Smitty

Team Cream—hear my plea. We owe it to our children and our children’s children to cultivate a world in which truth is not cast by the wayside in favor of convenience. We are on the right side of history, my friends! In order to avoid the darkest timeline, we MUST band around Marina, lending her our strength in her hour of need. We will not melt or fall flat. We will splat! LET’S GOOOO!

Morg

GL, HF, LET'S HAVE OUR CAKE, EAT IT TOO, AND CREAM THESE FOOLS!

—Morgan R. & Eric S.

#Splatoon #Nintendo Switch #Nintendo #Treehouse

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worryinglyinnocent · 7 years ago

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Fic: Love is a Layered Cake (2/10)

Summary: Summer has come, and with it, the Great British Bake-Off. Sheep farmer and spinner Rum Gold is one of ten contestants competing for the crown in the latest show. In addition to navigating the perils of televised baking, ridiculous challenges and his fellow bakers, he also has to contend with his undeniable crush on one of the judges, the beautiful and talented Belle French…

Rated: G

[Week One: Cake]

======

Week Two: Biscuits

In which Gold overdoes the orange, almost panics over caramel, and has an actual conversation with Belle.

Also, Archie considers the merits of edible flatpack.

Walking into the break room for the second weekend of filming was nowhere near as daunting as the first. Now that none of them had suffered the indignity of being booted out during the first week, everyone seemed more relaxed with each other, and Gold found that there was a much greater sense of community among the contestants. That his train had been on time helped, of course, and he was not the last to arrive. Emma and Elsa were already there and they waved him over to their little conference in the corner where they were ensconced with cups of tea and biscuits. Emma picked up a shortbread finger and dunked it in her tea, taking a bite and grimacing.

“Ugh. Do you think that they give us cheap biscuits today in the hope that it’ll inspire us produce better ones in the actual show?”

Gold laughed. “I’m not sure, but I doubt that my biscotti are going to be any better than that. So far all my attempts have produced something as dry as a bone that I fear for my aunt’s false teeth on, or they’ve sort of set to a cement like consistency that I can’t get off the baking sheet.”

“Yeah.” Emma raised an eyebrow. “That doesn’t sound promising. Still.” She put the half-eaten biscuit on her saucer. “Someone had better make shortbread tomorrow and it had better be better than this stuff. The food was really great last week.”

“Maybe they’re concerned about us all putting on weight during filming because we’re all eating so many cakes and biscuits,” Elsa mused. “I mean, I can’t really talk as I work for an ice cream factory and we get free samples of all the new flavours so it’s a bad week if I don’t have about five pints in my freezer. Or maybe they’re giving us bad refreshments now to try and make us all cranky and hope that someone throws their mixture at the fridge.”

“Or at another contestant,” Emma suggested. “I have to say, I’m not going to miss Killian.”

“The room does seem friendlier without him,” Gold agreed.

“Yes… I think he was just one of those hyper-masculine guys who’s so insecure in his manhood that he felt the need to assert the fact that even though he was baking in an apron, he was still a Man.” Gold could hear the capitalisation in Elsa’s voice and had to laugh as he took in the rest of the contestants. They’d been apart for a week, but it was clear that friendship groups were beginning to form. Mal and Regina had paired off, Archie and Lance… It seemed that like called to like, and Gold wondered precisely where he fitted in. Although Emma and Elsa appeared to have adopted him, he couldn’t say that he really had all that much in common with them.

“Good morning all.” Jefferson came over to the group and poured himself a cup of tea from the refreshment table. The man was once again wearing a waistcoat and ascot and Gold had to wonder if that was his normal mode of dress or if this was specifically for the cameras. Given Jefferson’s flamboyance and adventurous attitude that he had seen thus far, he was inclined to believe that it was the former. “Are we ready for another day of fun, frolic, flour, and avoiding unwelcome amorous attentions from the other contestants? I passed Zelena on my way in, Gold. She seemed to be having an argument with the make-up artist about her lipstick. Possibly something along the lines of there being too much of it.”

“Heaven help me,” Gold muttered. Would anyone notice if he spent the weekend hiding under the refreshment table here in the break room?

“Fear not, we’re all here to guard your honour. You’ve got to admire her persistence though. I wonder if she’ll make anything green this time? That matcha Swiss roll last week was really an eye-opener.”

“I ought to introduce her to my son,” Emma mused. “Henry went through a stage of refusing to eat anything that was green. It would have saved me a world of trouble if I’d had green cake that I could give him as a compromise.”

Elsa just raised an eyebrow, and the group fell back to their previous occupation of watching the other contestants as Astrid rushed around trying to organise them all. Zelena had made it into the room, evidently having won whatever argument she’d had with the make-up artist, since her bright red lips were immediately noticeable. The shade really didn’t suit her. Luckily, Astrid accosted her with a mic pack so she was unable to make a beeline over to Gold. He’d admire her persistence if it wasn’t so utterly terrifying. Over in the far corner, Regina and Mal were sharing a joke about something, giggling into their tea.

“You know, I really think that there might be something in that one,” Jefferson said. “We ought to start a betting pool on how long it’ll take us to have a competition romance.”

Gold just shook his head in good-natured despair. “They’ve known each other for two days, Jeff.”

“So? Do you not believe in love at first sight? Or at least lust at first sight? I think it’s very romantic. A perfect story to tell the family. You can’t get a ‘how did you two meet?’ tale more interesting than going head to head in a baking competition. Mind you, though, given Mal’s track record, it might be something of a whirlwind romance. Someone needs to tell them to exchange numbers sooner rather than later.”

“Jeff, you’re incorrigible,” Elsa scolded. “Besides, you never know. Mal’s biscuit-making skills might be legendary and she’ll wipe the floor with the rest of us.”

“As long as she doesn’t drop anything.”

Elsa sighed and rolled her eyes, and the topic of conversation was tactfully changed as Astrid came over to them.

“Good morning Astrid,” Jefferson said brightly as she attached his mic. “How’s Leroy today? I haven’t had the chance to say hello.”

“Oh, he’s all right, just nervous as usual. I was a bit worried last week; I thought someone might report us to Ofcom or something on account of a conflict of interests, but everything’s ok.” She glanced over her shoulder to where Leroy was talking to Lance and Archie, and she waved. He gave a little wave in return, and a light blush crept over his face and all the way over his bald head.

“He makes really good pies,” Astrid added, somewhat dreamily. “I hope he survives till pie week.”

She finished putting the mics on all of them and moved away to the next group, and they watched her go before Elsa could hold back her laughter no longer and burst into silent, shaking giggles. Gold took her teacup before she could upend it over herself and cause more mess before the baking had even begun.

“They’re just so sweet,” she said. “Leroy always looks so grumpy but then he sees Astrid and it’s like an angel’s come down from heaven. I really want him to survive to pie week too just so that I can see them celebrating together.”

“More than one romance!” Jefferson exclaimed. “This is going to be the season of matchmaking, as well as the season that started a trend for putting pineapple in carrot cake and wearing terrible lipstick. It’ll go down in history!”

“Well, yes, but Astrid and Leroy’s romance was already going on when the competition started. Regina and Mal met like star-crossed lovers,” Elsa said.

“I don’t like that word, star-crossed,” Jefferson said sagely. “It reminds me too much of Romeo and Juliet and in a baking competition, anything that reminds one of poison is a very bad idea. They’re both lovely ladies and I don’t want either of them dying from a fatal fondant fancy.”

Gold rolled his eyes. He supposed that contemplating the other contestants’ relationships with each other did at least give him something to do that wasn’t worrying whilst he waited for the day’s challenges to begin. He wasn’t looking forward to the day, if he was being brutally honest. He could bake biscuits. That wasn’t a problem. Biscuits had been one of the first things that his aunts had taught him how to make when he had been growing up on the farm with them. What he couldn’t make were the kinds of biscuits that he was being expected to make. Gold’s baking expertise had never really stretched to the exotic; he was not adventurous like Jefferson. Bread, pies, cakes, shortbread… Those kinds of things didn’t pose a problem. The more fiddly things did, and he’d be annoyed if he missed out on the chance to show what he was really capable of because he failed so early in the competition.

There was no more room to be worried, because the runners were ushering them all out of the break room and down towards the tent to begin the first challenge. It was show time again. Unfortunately, this time, Gold found himself right at the front of the tent, on the first workbench, and even though he knew that the cameras wouldn’t stay on him for long and once the challenge started, everyone’s attention would be focussed elsewhere, he couldn’t help feeling incredibly exposed here.

And of course, being at the front meant that he was that much closer to Belle. She was standing right by him, and as she had entered the tent, he had caught a waft of her floral perfume. She was wearing dark blue today, with a lacy pattern of spots, and to his intense embarrassment, she caught him staring at her. She smiled, mouthing a quick good luck as Ursula began to speak. She and Ella had been filming some last minute introductory footage whilst the bakers had been arriving, so they had not been in the reception room to calm any nerves. Gold was still in two minds as to just how calming an influence Ella actually was though, but he would have appreciated Ursula’s no-nonsense attitude.

“Good morning bakers, and welcome to biscuit week. For your signature challenge today, Belle and Granny would like you to make twenty-four biscotti.”

“They can be flavoured with anything you choose, any shape or style, but they must be identical,” Ella continued. “Granny, Belle, any sage words of advice before they begin?”

“Timing is crucial,” Belle said, but there was no urgency in her voice. “Biscotti are crisp and crunchy, made for being dipped in coffee, but they should be able to be eaten alone. The second bake is crucial to achieve the perfect texture.”

“And that’s not going to make anyone more nervous than they already were,” Ursula said cheerily. “Well, there’s nothing left for us to say, except, on your marks.”

“Get set!”

“Bake!”

Gold got to work, pushing all thoughts of Belle and her perfume and her blue lacy dress out of his mind as he focussed on the task at hand. He was out of his comfort zone now. Not that baking to time pressure on national television on one of the country’s most beloved programmes was in his comfort zone to start with, but now he was feeling the pressure even more. At least being at the front he couldn’t be taken by surprise when the camera crews came around to talk to him. The two judges and the hosts were talking quietly amongst themselves at the front of the tent, no doubt allowing the bakers to get on with their work and get settled into the swing of it all before they started interrupting. Eventually though, the time came for them to begin mingling, and Belle caught his eye, smiling as she indicated that they were about to come over to him.

“So, Raymond,” she began, her gentle voice with its Australian lilt immediately setting him more at ease. “Tell us about the biscotti you’re making.”

“These are orange and hazelnut,” Gold said, trying his best to sound confident and like he knew exactly what he was doing. He had no idea what he was doing since these weren’t his forte, but before he had left the house that morning, Aunt Elvira had impressed upon him the importance of ‘fake it till you make it’, and it was a mantra that he was going to have to stick to. Granny quizzed him about how finely he was chopping his ingredients, and Ella made a pointed joke about nuts, but all in all it went remarkably well, and Gold breathed a sigh of relief once it was all over and the two judges moved away. He watched after them as they crossed the tent to go and speak to Elsa, who had managed to get herself covered in flour despite them only having been baking for about ten minutes. Surely it wasn’t possible for someone to be that messy? He shook his head, settling himself into his task. It was a difficult start to the week and he knew that he was going to have to concentrate. Ignore Belle and what she was doing, and concentrate on the ingredients. If he ended up making a complete dog’s dinner of it because he was too distracted by her then he would not be forgiven by anyone, especially not Elvira and Bae and certainly not himself.

The tension in the tent seemed to be higher today, with less laughter and joking going on between the contestants than there had been during the previous week’s signature challenge. This was a difficult challenge; Gold couldn’t think of anyone who would make biscotti on the regular, even the younger bakers, and no-one that he had become acquainted with had numbered biscuits among their specialities. Gold could bake biscuits, that wasn’t a problem, but he tended to stick to the tried and tested rustic shortbread recipes that had been passed down to him from his aunts. They weren’t exactly competition material, but he thought he had perfected a recipe that would wow the judges in the showstopper finale on Sunday. Even if he did do awfully today, there was always the hope that he could be salvaged on the morrow.

“Bakers, you have fifteen minutes remaining!” Ella yelled, almost giving Gold a heart attack since she was standing right next to him at the time. She leaned on his workbench, giving him a sage nod. “Everything all right, Mr Gold?”

He nodded, bending down to look in through the oven door at his biscuits. They didn’t seem to be doing all that much and with the oven light, it was hard to tell just how brown and crunchy they were. Looking around the tent, everyone else seemed to be having similar worries. Elsa was performing the classic oven watch, sitting on the floor with her cup of tea, and she gave him a wave. Gold returned it, realising that his fingernails were stained bright yellow from the orange rind. So much for trying to be impressive.

Time was still counting down, and Ursula and Ella continuing to remind them of that fact really wasn’t helping all that much. Gold arranged his biscuits, still a little bit too warm and not entirely crisp, on his plate and set it carefully on the end of his workbench, wiping his still-orange hands on his apron and taking a moment to look around at the others’ efforts. No-one appeared to have had any kind of disasters, and it was only then that he realised that he’d had Mal behind him for the entire time. She had been so quiet that he hadn’t noticed her; he’d become so used to her baking being littered with swearwords and exclamations of frustration. It was definitely a good thing if she had managed to get through one challenge without any kind of bad luck marring her bake. Her biscotti did look delectable, studded with rich chunks of amber praline and dipped in glossy dark chocolate. She gave him a smile as she caught him looking.

“I know,” she said, “I’m amazed that they’re all in one piece too. Maybe I ought to go into things expecting to fail more often.”

Ursula called time on the challenge and the clean-up began, the production team rushing in and around the bakers. Astrid even got the hoover out to clear up around Elsa’s station, and the younger woman just gave a self-deprecating shrug. She’d completed the challenge to time, even if there was sugar and flour all over the flooring around her.

Gold hadn’t noticed the previous week, but as the clean-up and the polished photography was taking place, Belle and Granny were wandering around the edge of the tent, taking a look at all the bakes and talking quietly amongst themselves, passing their initial judgements. It gave him a somewhat foreboding feeling; it was bad enough when they wandered the tent during the actual making time, but now that everything was complete and there was nothing that could be done to change the outcome, it was even more nerve-wracking.

At last the judging began in earnest, and Belle and Granny came over to his bench first. Gold wasn’t sure if getting it over with first was a good thing or whether it would make listening to everyone else get far better comments than him into something of a nightmare.

“Nice and uniform,” Granny said, giving an appreciative nod. “The colour is good on them too.” She tapped the end of one gently against the plate before snapping it in two and passing one half to Belle. “Not too dry.”

“What did you say the flavours were again?” Belle asked.

“Orange and hazelnut.”

Belle nodded. “I thought so. I think you’ve used a bit too much orange there, it drowns out in the more subtle taste of the hazelnut. All citrus fruits have the capacity to be very overpowering, you’ve really got to be careful with how you add them. But I agree with Granny that the texture is very good.”

Considering that the texture was the thing that he’d been having trouble with throughout all his practice attempts, Gold knew that he ought to be pleased with this praise, but a small part of him couldn’t help but be disappointed by Belle’s criticism of the flavours. As Elsa had said the week before, it was the taste that mattered when it came down to it, and he had failed Belle on taste. He tried to console himself with the compliments that he had received, but his stained fingernails still mocked him as the judges moved on to the rest of the bakers. The main criticism that most of them faced was either flavour balance or the biscuits being too soft or too hard. Regina received the most praise, and when the bakers were left to their own devices to sample each other’s creations, he could well see why. Her biscuits were made with almonds and dried apple, and the chewiness from the fruit added a wonderful texture in the middle of the crisp biscuit.

Too soon, they were being shepherded back to the house for their lunch break and some more pieces to camera in the grounds to tell their thoughts on how it had gone so far.

“I know you don’t like this bit,” Astrid said as she hurried Gold away from the reception room, handing him an umbrella where spots of light drizzle were beginning to come down around them outside. “But it’s a necessary evil.”

“I never know what to say,” Gold protested. “Everything always sounds so cliched when it comes into my head.”

“Well, to be honest, I imagine most of what everyone says sounds pretty cliched,” Astrid said, completely matter of fact about the whole thing. “I mean, none of you are professionals, and that’s the entire point really. Out of everyone here, it’s really only Ursula and Ella who are the professionals. I mean, Granny’s had enough experience throughout her career as a TV chef, but she’s a chef first and foremost. Same for Belle. She’s had her own cookery shows, but she’s spent far more time behind the camera than in front of it.” The younger woman stopped near a trickling stream in the house grounds and the Steadicam man, his camera wrapped in waterproofs against the inclement weather, began to record. Gold picked at his fingernails, clean now but still a reminder, and tried to think of something vaguely meaningful to say.

“Well, at least they didn’t turn into concrete,” he managed eventually. “And I’ll try not to drown my hazelnuts in future.”

As soon as his piece was over, he thought back over what he had said and groaned inwardly. Aunt Elvira was definitely not going to let him live that down.

With lunch over it was time for the technical challenge, and the bakers were ushered back down into the tent.

Gold looked down at the checkered cloth covering his work bench and wondered what fresh torture the judges had cooked up for them today. Like the previous week, he found himself directly in front of Zelena, and was uncomfortably aware of her eyes on him rather than on the presenters at the front of the tent, Belle and Granny having already been banished to their small pagoda to do their piece to camera.

"Good afternoon bakers. For your technical challenge this week, Belle and Granny would like you to make eighteen Florentines. You have an hour and fifteen minutes."

"On your marks."

"Get set."

"Bake!"

Gold pulled the cover off his allotted ingredients and tried not to groan. Anything involving sugar thermometers was far too complex for his skills. Caramel was something that he tended to avoid with a bargepole as much as possible, and he was already trying to come to terms with the fact that one of the challenges in later weeks was based entirely around caramel. He hadn't anticipated having to get to grips with it quite so soon. At least he had a vague idea what a Florentine was supposed to look like, even if he had never made one in his life before. A delicate biscuit made of caramel, nuts and dried fruit that bubbled into a lacy pattern, with chocolate on one side. In his head, he had the image of a perfect Florentine. Now all he had to do was make that image into a reality, which was going to be easier said than done. He looked at the sparse recipe that they had been given and set to work melting the ingredients for the caramel together. He knew that if Aunt Elvira was here, she'd be complaining about the effect that all the sugar and fruit and nuts would have on her teeth. On the other hand, he might be able to glue her jaws together to prevent her making inappropriate comments.

Seventy-five minutes to make eighteen perfect Florentines was not very long, especially considering Gold’s lack of experience in such matters, and once again he found himself wishing to be able to block out the noise of the rest of the tent. No-one was really talking – they couldn’t confer at any rate – but eleven pans of bubbling caramel could sound very loud in the tense silence that held court over the bakers as they tried to create something spectacular in their limited time. Towards the back of the tent, Gold could hear Ella and Ursula chatting to Mal, who was quite confident having come through the signature challenge with no baking mishaps and with genuine praise from the judges. Perhaps Elsa’s prediction of her legendary biscuit-making skills was actually coming to the fore now. Gold hoped that she did well having had such a poor start to her competition the previous week. If her bad luck could be passed on to Zelena, well, that would put the icing on the proverbial cake.

He swirled the boiling caramel around in the pan, waiting for it to thicken, and he was pulled from his reverie by a squeal from behind him. He looked over his shoulder, naturally wanting to ascertain what had happened but at the same time not wanting to take his eyes off the caramel for more than about thirty seconds in case it all went horribly wrong. Zelena was glaring at her saucepan full of bubbling sugar, cradling her left hand where a smear of sticky brown had evidently burned her.

“It’s getting above itself,” she said, holding out her hand to Gold for him to see the burn, and Gold glanced back at his own pan, inherent chivalry warring with competitive instinct, knowing that if he left his own work to go to Zelena’s aid then his caramel would surely be ruined. In the split second it took him to check the bubbling confection, he wondered if perhaps that was her aim all along, but surely no-one would burn themselves on boiling sugar on purpose to gain such a reaction.

Luckily, his intervention was not required. Astrid, always on the ball, came rushing over with a first aid kit before Gold could make a decision about what the hell to do with his own caramel, and soon the situation was in hand, with Astrid chatting along happily to Zelena as she rinsed off the caramel and applied a bandage.

“First injury of the season,” she said brightly. “I didn’t think that I was going to get the chance to use my first aid skills, to be honest, but I’m really glad that I took that course now. There you are, all fixed up.”

Gold had taken his caramel off the heat by this point and was pouring chopped nuts and fruit into it, creating the sticky, sickly sweet mixture that would form the basis of the biscuits, and he purposefully did not look over his shoulder, not wanting Zelena to distract him again. He tried to put the incident to the back of his mind and pass it off as a simple accident, but at the same time, there was something in her demeanour that he really didn’t trust. He began spooning the mixture out onto the supplied baking sheets. Zelena was lamenting the loss of her caramel and was trying to argue with the runners and presenters that because she’d had to take time out to see to her burn, she ought to get extra time on the end to make up for it. The debate continued for quite some time and became quite heated, with the other occupants of the tent all looking over at her with expressions that ranged from incredulity to being impressed at the woman’s audacity. In the end, Zelena did not receive any extra time and continued to grumble about the unfairness of it all until the judges called out that there were only twenty minutes to go.

Gold said nothing, just giving a little smile to himself that he hoped the cameras would not pick up on, purposefully becoming incredibly engrossed in the chocolate work on his Florentines and not paying any attention to the rest of the tent. As horrible as it was to wish injury and ill fortune on a fellow contestant, it really couldn’t have happened to a better person.

Ursula called time on the challenge, and Gold was able to breathe again. Now, to hope that beginner’s luck would prevail and he would not fall at this hurdle.

Belle knew that it was terrible to have favourites during the competition, and she would never admit to having favourites anywhere in the vicinity of a cameraman or a boom mic, but sitting in the pagoda with Granny having done their piece to camera about Granny’s signature Florentines, she thought that it was safe to indulge her thoughts a little. There was something about Gold that just made her want him to be safe throughout the competition. She wasn’t sure whether it was his quiet demeanour or the fact that he was so different from the rest of the contestants that had caught her eye. He was always so candid to the camera whenever it came around, and despite his mild manner, he was really very good at what he did. He seemed genuinely pleased with whatever praise was given to him, but he didn’t lack confidence in his abilities per se.

There was also that little smile in his eyes that just about reached the corner of his mouth when he glanced at her, then caught himself looking and hastily turned his attention back to whatever it was that he was doing. It was endearing, and Belle had to wonder what he was thinking when he looked at her like that. She certainly wouldn’t be adverse if his thoughts were wending in the direction that she thought they were. He was definitely the oldest man in the tent, but there was nothing wrong with older men. Experience worked wonders.

She shook herself crossly. She really shouldn’t be having these kinds of thoughts about one of the contestants. It was both highly unethical and just… She didn’t know anything about him for a start, he might be happily in a relationship. He might not be interested in women.

“What’s got into you?” Granny asked, a wry smile on her face as she watched Belle trying to exorcise the inappropriate thoughts from her head.

“Nothing, nothing. Just trying not to think of pink elephants, you know.”

“I have no idea why you’re trying not to think of pink elephants, but I do understand your predicament.”

“Well, they’re metaphorical pink elephants,” Belle muttered.

“I see.” Granny was silent for a few moments, and when she spoke again, Belle almost choked on her tea. “Have you got a crush on one of our esteemed contestants by any chance?”

Belle spluttered violently and Granny reached across the table to smack her on the back.

“You know, I’m going to take that as a sign of agreement,” she said. “There’s no harm in it. Personally I wouldn’t mind Lance giving me a fireman’s lift.”

“Lance is in the army. It’s Mal that’s the fire investigator.”

“Oh.” Granny considered this for a moment. “Well, to be honest I don’t think I’d mind her giving me a fireman’s lift either. So who have you got your eye on then?”

“Granny…” Belle buried her face in her hands. “Granny can we please not talk about this? It’s bad enough that I fancy one of them, don’t make it worse.”

“My dear, I’ve been judging this show with you for the past six years and I know that you’re a consummate professional who would never let your feelings get in the way of a fair game. To be honest I’m amazed that it’s taken you this long to feel a slight stirring in your loins. There’s generally always one for me. It was August last year. I had high hopes for Killian this time around. He had the dark hair and the scruffy beard and the leather, a bit of a lad. Such a shame he didn’t have the personality.”

“I think he tried to grab the arse of every woman in the tent,” Belle muttered. “We’re well shot of him, or else we’d have about seven lawsuits on our hands. One of them mine.”

“Well, we don’t have to worry about him anymore. So tell me. Who’s caught your eye?”

Belle sighed deeply. “Gold.”

“Ah, our resident mystery man. Hmm. I can see where you’re coming from, he’s got that certain something. Not my type though, so you’re safe.”

“Granny!”

“I’m teasing.” There was a twinkle in the other woman’s eye that made Belle wonder that she might not be teasing after all.

“Even if I was in a position to pursue him I know nothing about him, Granny!”

“Well, with any luck you’ll be seeing him every weekend for the next eight weeks so you’ve got plenty of time to get to know him, haven’t you? And think about it, time is of the essence. You’ve got no idea when he might be going home, so it makes sense to get in there quick and start that conversation as soon as possible. At the rate you’re going, you’ll never learn anything about him.”

“Granny! That would be… highly unethical. Or something like that.”

“You only live once, my girl,” Granny said sagely. “There’s nothing wrong with getting to know the contestants and engaging in a little small talk with them to put them at ease. He always looks so jumpy whenever we’re judging or we come round to talk whilst he’s baking. I think that talking to him in private might do wonders for his confidence. You’d be doing everyone a favour in the long run. You get to know more about your mystery man, your mystery man gets to know more about you, and we get a more camera-friendly contestant. We can’t lose!”

Belle sighed, it was clear that she wasn’t going to win this argument.

“You’re incorrigible.”

“You’ve worked with me for six seasons and not realised this?” Granny winked. “I might be old, but I’m not dead. Besides, you deserve someone special in your life. You don’t have all that much luck with love.”

Belle sighed. It was true. Her last two longterm relationships had not exactly ended in disaster – she was still on amicable terms with Will, at least, but they had been completely unworkable for various reasons, incompatibility being the main one. But for all the differences that she’d had with Will and with Gaston before him, she had enjoyed being part of a relationship and she had not sworn off men for all time like some of her friends did.

“How’s Ruby?” she asked presently to try and distract Granny from discussing her love life.

“She’s fine. She’s at a wedding this weekend up in Scotland.”

The mention of Scotland brought Belle’s thoughts full circle back to Gold, and she glanced over in the direction of the tent, then at her watch. The would be finishing up round about now, and soon the runners would come and get her and Granny. At least she knew that there was no danger of her showing any favouritism in this round, but she couldn’t help hoping that Gold hadn’t done too badly. He hadn’t fared well last week. Maybe his luck had changed.

Sure enough, Astrid came racing across the grass from the main tent and waved them over frantically. “We’re ready for you now. Oh dear, it’s been a drama fest in there and no mistake. We’ve had the first aid kits out and everything!”

Belle looked over at Granny, worried, and the older woman just raised her eyebrows, not at all concerned. It wasn’t the first time that they’d had injuries in the tent – one of the contestants in their second season had ended up going to the hospital after nearly severing his finger. Nevertheless, it really didn’t bode well for the rest of the competition.

They made their way down to the main tent and entered, looking at the bakers lined up in the middle of the tent. They always looked so forlorn, sitting there in a line like naughty pupils about to be scolded by the headteacher. She knew that the idea was to jumble them up so that it hopefully wouldn’t be obvious whose bakes were whose, but surely they could do that whilst sitting at their usual benches? Nevertheless, it was the format that had worked for them for the past few years, and there was no sense in changing it now.

Despite the attempts at anonymity, there were always a few instances where it was very clear whose bakes were whose and in this case, whose bakes were the worst. Belle immediately spotted the offering that would rank in last place, and on seeing Zelena’s bandaged hand, put two and two together. She wondered what had been going on in the tent whilst they had been banished from it, and decided that it was probably better for her not to know. Looking at the amount of chocolate adorning the front of Elsa’s apron, it was probably clear that the Florentines with a large abundance of the coating were hers. Still, this was a blind judging, not a guessing game. She and Granny went along the line, testing each of the biscuits in turn and pronouncing judgement on them. It was a close-run thing; a lot of them had made minor mistakes, but with the exception of Zelena’s burned caramel – well, Belle assumed that the burned ones were Zelena’s – they were all fairly close in quality. It was one of the tougher judgements that she’d had to make, and the production team were tapping their feet in frustration whilst she and Granny made up their minds.

They were right in thinking that Zelena’s were the burned ones, and from the mutinous look in the woman’s eyes as she claimed her offering, it was clear that she did not agree with their judgement. Or perhaps, she did agree with their judgement but didn’t agree with the fact that she’d had to present burned biscuits. As suspected, Elsa’s were the ones with an excess of chocolate. Mal had done well again, finishing third, behind Lance and Regina. Regina was definitely on a roll today, Belle thought. If she could keep up her winning streak into Sunday then she was a definite contender for Star Baker. Zelena wasn’t on thin ice yet; her biscotti had been very strong, just as her signature last week had been. As so often happened on the bake-off, it would all come down to the second day. Fortunes could change dramatically overnight.

The main cameras stopped rolling for the day and the production team began the process of packing up and getting the film footage sent off to post production, leaving the bakers, presenters and judges to chat amongst themselves whilst the final interviews of the day were filmed. Belle wanted to go over and talk to Gold whilst she had the chance. He had placed fifth in the technical, a great improvement from his performance in the previous week’s challenge, and she didn’t really think that he was in danger of being sent home the next day, but as Granny said, it was time to seize the day.

Unfortunately, the man seemed to have disappeared. Or perhaps he was hiding; he was very good at doing that when he didn’t want the cameras to find him. She glanced across at Zelena, who was talking to Mal and Regina and perhaps not registering that she was something of a third wheel in their conversation. Perhaps Gold wasn’t hiding from the cameras after all. Belle sighed. As a judge and a voice of reason on the show, she really ought to step in, as tedious as listening to the woman could be sometimes. Just as she couldn’t show favouritism, she couldn’t show any negative bias either, and she went over to the trio, seamlessly extricating Zelena from the conversation much to Mal and Regina’s relief. Zelena, glad of a more captive audience, immediately launched into a rant about the unfairness of the entire situation, and Belle listened carefully, nodding in all the right places even if she was only taking half of what was said in. Presently she saw Gold in the corner by the fridge-freezer, getting his mic taken off. Their eyes met across the tent and he gave a little smile, but then Belle’s attention was, by necessity, drawn back towards Zelena, and the quiet little sheep farmer was gone from her sight.

Still. Tomorrow was another day.

“Green icing.”

Gold looked up from his cup of coffee to find Jefferson pointing a slice of melon at Zelena, who was helping herself from the morning fruit platter, blissfully unaware of Jefferson’s observations.

“Pardon?”

“Green icing,” Jefferson repeated. “I’m telling you, she’s going to use green icing. She’s definitely got some kind of green thing going on. She always wears green and without fail she’s included green in her bakes so far. Her Swiss roll was green and she had green pistachios in her biscotti. Ergo, green icing.”

Gold pondered the hypothesis, thinking back to their similar conversation the previous day on the subject.

“You know, I really don’t think that baked goods ought to be green,” he said. “It just seems such an unnatural colour for cake.”

“Yes. I mean, matcha tea and pistachios are both naturally green substances, but at the same time…baking with any kind of bright colour looks a bit odd because you’re always going to have the brown top where it’s been baked. Like when I tried to make a rainbow layer cake for my daughter’s birthday. It was a masterpiece of engineering even if I do say so myself, and the kids were completely hyperactive on e-numbers and food colouring additives for about three weeks afterwards, but my word, the amount of time that I spent trying to cut the brown crust off all these layers… I could have created an entirely new cake with them. In fact I did make a rainbow sponge pudding laced with enough Cointreau to knock out all the supervising adults.” He gave a happy sigh. “That was definitely one of the more successful parties I pulled off for Grace.” He looked over at Gold. “What about you? You have a son, right?”

Gold nodded. “Yes. He’s never been into rainbow cakes though. Chocolate usually does him. I’ve never been a particularly exciting baker.”

“Well, exciting isn’t everything. If you can’t do the basics right then you’ve got nothing to work off.”

Gold got the feeling that for all his eccentricity, Jefferson could do the basics very well indeed.

They were prevented from any further discussion of either basic baking techniques or Zelena’s predilection for the colour green when Ella came into the room and flopped onto the sofa beside them, reaching across Gold for the plate of pastries and tipping three croissants into her handbag. She looked at him over the top of her sunglasses and winked, and Gold wasn’t sure whether to give in to the instinct telling him to be extremely scared. He also didn’t know whether to give in to the instinct telling him that Ella was not in fact at all hungover and this was all an act, either to make the contestants feel slightly better about their own woes or for some other unknown deeper reason. She started eating one of the croissants and brushed the crumbs from her fur stole.

“So, I trust that we can expect great things from you today,” she said. “Jefferson, I hope you’re in good shape to defend your star baker crown.”

“I wear it with honour and will defend it to the last,” Jefferson said with a bow. Gold wondered if he’d accidentally stepped into an alternate universe, and he made to get up and leave the two of them to it, but Ella pulled him back down onto the sofa beside her.

“Don’t give her any opportunity,” she muttered out of the corner of her mouth. “Since she’s already shown herself capable of self-injury in an attempt to get your attention, I dread to think what she might do with sharp fruit knives in the vicinity.”

Gold looked at Ella, alarmed, and she simply raised a perfectly painted eyebrow. “Just calling it how I see it, darling. You’re not the only one slightly unnerved by her singular fixation towards you, and we’re all looking out for you. As much as Ursula and I like to encourage the odd romance or rivalry, neither of us want to see the show caught up in stalking allegations.”

“I don’t think that she’d go that far,” Gold said, but as soon as the words were out of his mouth, he caught Zelena’s eye and her too bright, too wide smile, and he began to rethink the confidence of that statement.

“Well, better safe than sorry.” Ella grabbed the second croissant and started on it. “I have to get stocked up or I’ll be stealing everyone’s biscuits before they’ve had chance to be judged,” she muttered. “I don’t know how Ursula does it. She has her cornflakes in the morning and she’s fine till noon and wouldn’t dream of snaffling a brandy snap. I, on the other hand, only have to smell the sugar and I start salivating and seriously considering braining one of the contestants with a stand mixer to get at what they’re making.”

“Ah, the trials of having a sweet tooth in the middle of a baking competition,” Jefferson said. “You’ll be all right once we move onto bread.”

Ella snorted. “I wouldn’t count on it.”

With Ella’s foreboding presence beside him on the sofa, Zelena did not come over to Gold throughout their time in the break room together. As glad as he was for the intervention, Gold didn’t really know what to make of it, because he couldn’t rely on subtle bodyguards all the time. He was definitely going to have to keep his wits about him if he was going to avoid her for the rest of the competition.

The runners appeared with the mics and the day began to get started in earnest. All too soon, the contestants were making their way down to the Tent of Destiny, as Gold had taken to calling it, and he was pleased to find himself at the back of the group this time, behind Regina. Considering the precision that was going to have to go into the showstopper, he was very grateful for being able to hide away with as few distractions as possible.

"Good morning bakers," Ella said brightly, betraying nothing of her earlier hangover. "Welcome to the second day of biscuit week and your showstopper challenge. Today, Granny and Belle would like you to make thirty-six biscuits of your choice. To make matters slightly more interesting, these must be presented in a box made from a different type of biscuit."

"And the box must have a lid!" Ursula added.

"You have four hours for this challenge. On your marks."

"Get set."

"Bake!"

They were off, and Gold focussed his attention on the ingredients in front of him, measuring everything out. The box would have to be made first, to give the biscuits time to cool before assembly, and then the contents of the box could be made. The heavy scents of ginger and treacle were soon filling the air; it was clear that most of the bakers had opted to use gingerbread as the basis for their boxes as it was a sturdy material for building things out of. Gold tried not to worry about losing points for unoriginality and focussed on making the best gingerbread that he could. He’d opted to make a square box with a sloping lid, hopefully evocative of a gingerbread house if he got it right. And if it didn’t collapse on him like some of his earlier attempts had done. He’d managed to wake up the dogs at three in the morning when he had been unable to sleep and practising in his desperation, and he’d dropped the carefully crafted roof and then had to stop the dogs from eating the sugar-filled chunks all over the kitchen floor.

The biscuits to go inside the box were less of a problem, those he could make in his sleep – and Aunt Elvira had more than once claimed that he had indeed made them whilst sleepwalking, something that Gold always took with a pinch of salt. He was keeping his eyes open for the judges and presenters coming around, and he saw Ursula give him a little surreptitious wave as they approached his bench. She did it with all the contestants, letting them know that they were about to be accosted and giving them a few seconds to prepare. Obviously, it wasn’t quite as effective if whoever she was waving to was too caught up in their baking to notice, but at least she tried.

The cameras approached, and after the necessary pleasantries were exchanged, Granny got straight down to business.

"So, Raymond, tell us about your biscuits."

"The box will be made of spiced gingerbread," Gold began. "I'm gluing it all together with icing."

Belle nodded. "A nice sturdy classic. What about inside?"

"I'm making shortbread." He paused. "A bit stereotypical I know, for a Scotsman, but it's a family recipe and it's never let me down yet."

"Are you adding any kind of flavourings to the shortbread?" Granny asked.

"No. I like it to be able to speak for itself."

"Fair enough."

Perhaps he wasn't being adventurous enough, but Gold stood firm to his decision. Aunt Elvira's recipe was tried and tested and had never been written down in all its years of being made, and he couldn't start tampering with the ingredients and trying to make it more exotic now. As long as it was crisp and buttery, then it didn't need any further adornment. That was what he kept telling himself at least.

The time kept rolling on, with the presenters and judges hovering around the tent and the cameramen moving between the benches like black-clad ghosts, years of experience of filming the show telling them exactly where to go and where to steer clear of. The shortbread was cooling, the box was holding together and the lid didn’t seem to be on the verge of collapsing any time soon. Their four hours were almost up; a few of the runners had already started washing things up at the back of the tent out of view of the cameras, and Gold took advantage of a natural pause whilst holding two gluing pieces of gingerbread together to glance around the tent and look at everyone else’s confections. Zelena’s was, thankfully, not green; she seemed to have taken the opposite tack to the rest of the tent and had made her box and biscuits savoury. However much he might dislike her as a person, Gold did have to admire her ingenuity. Jefferson had made a round box, although Gold didn’t have the energy to try and work out quite how he’d managed it. Emma was dipping cookies in chocolate, and all that could be seen of Regina was her hands and the top of her head where she was icing her box on an eye level with her bench. It was as if everyone’s creativity had been amped up to eleven on this challenge; it seemed far more high-end than the previous week’s had been.

“This is never going to work.”

Gold looked across at Archie, who was covered in icing to his elbows and was holding several pieces of gingerbread.

“Constructional difficulties?” he asked. The red-headed psychologist nodded forlornly.

“I’m never going to get it built in time, it just won’t stick together. This is the third batch of icing I’ve made and it’s way too runny. The first batch was practically water, then I added more sugar, and now I don’t know what to make of it.” He sighed. “It’s really not been my week. Do you think the judges will accept a deconstruction? A modern art box. The only trouble now is that all the panels look so messy where they’re covered in icing. I knew that I should have gone into architecture instead of psychology.”

“Give me a minute to finish up here and I’ll come help you scrape the icing off,” Elsa said, sandwiching macaroons together. “Although given my track record, you’re probably better off without my intervention.”

“No, I think any help at all would be useful at this stage in the proceedings.”

In the end, they ended up with four of them around Archie’s bench, including Ursula, who was known to take pity on struggling contestants and provide motivational speeches even if she couldn’t do much in the way of helping the culinary line. Gold would have offered a hand as well, but he was running down to the wire with his own decorating and ultimately that was more important. He continued to glance around the tent as he finished piping the lid. There were some truly miraculous feats of biscuit engineering going on.

The last few lines came out wonky, but there was nothing that could be done to rectify that, and Ella called time on the event. There was nothing more to be done, and it was time for the judges to make their critiques. Well, almost time. The runners continued to clean up around them, exercising the utmost tact and care when clearing surfaces around the somewhat precarious builds, so naturally the entire process took a lot longer than it had before. The judging table was set up at the front, and Gold could only wait anxiously for his turn in the spotlight. Being at the back of the tent, he had already worked out that he was going to be the last up there, and the nervous anticipation was already making him too jittery to concentrate on anyone else’s bakes. Regina, Jefferson and Zelena were all praised highly; Elsa and Rory didn’t come out so well. Archie was the next to brave the walk.

“Well, it’s certainly different,” Belle said optimistically.

“It’s a flatpack box,” Archie said. “From IKEA, you have to build it yourself.”

Granny chuckled. “Well, hopefully it’ll taste good despite its somewhat unusual form.”

They sampled the box and the biscuits that would have been in it, and Gold saw Belle worry her bottom lip between her teeth.

“It was an incredibly good attempt,” she said, trying to mediate what she was about to say, “but all the icing on the gingerbread has made it quite moist and chewy, not crisp like it should be. That might be one of the reasons why it didn’t hold together. And because there’s so much sugar smeared over it, that masks the taste somewhat.”

Gold cringed. Even though it wasn’t his own bake being criticised, it still wasn’t nice to hear. Archie seemed to take the comments in good grace though, and the judging continued until only Gold was left to present. It took him a little while to make his way up to the table, balancing the delicate ensemble with only one hand, and he was certain that he could have heard a pin drop in the tent.

“Well, this is very neatly presented,” Granny began, “and the shape shows some innovation with the roof rather than a flat lid. Let’s see how it tastes.”

Belle took one of the biscuits out of the box and snapped it delicately, a smile breaking over her face. "I can already see that's perfect shortbread texture. It's not too crumbly but not hard either." She took a bite, and her smile grew ever wider. "And it melts in the mouth, just like shortbread should. You can taste the butter. Like you said, it speaks for itself."

Gold smiled. “Can’t go wrong with family recipes.”

“Not with shortbread, you can’t.” She broke off a piece of the gingerbread box and nodded. “The flavour’s good, nice and strong, and it pairs well with the plainer biscuits inside. Little bit chewy though. I think you probably took it out of the oven a bit too early in the hope of making sure it was cool enough to work with.”

Granny agreed with Belle’s sentiments, but added that she couldn’t really taste any of the other spices he’d put into the gingerbread, and Gold sighed. It was typical that yesterday his flavours had been too strong and today they weren’t strong enough. Hopefully by the end of the run he’d have mastered the balance.

With all the bakes now sampled, the judges went away to consider their verdict and the contestants were left to their own devices for a little while. With most of the clean-up having already been done, there wasn’t a lot for them to do except talk amongst themselves. Lance and Mal were consoling Archie, the three of them coming up with propositions for edible flatpack, attempting to revolutionise IKEA’s business model, and Gold watched them for a while, staying at his Emma sat down on Gold's bench, grabbing one of his shortbreads out of his box and offering him one of her own cookies.

"Now this is what I call proper shortbread," she said. "Why couldn't they have served us this yesterday?" She gave an appreciative grunt, closing her eyes as she swallowed. "That's the stuff. God bless your Aunt Elvira."

Gold laughed. "I'll tell her that she's got a fan."

“She’s amazing. I’d like to meet her.”

Gold raised an eyebrow. “No, you wouldn’t. I’m dreading her coming to the finale.”

“She can’t be that bad, surely?”

“You’ve never met my Aunt Elvira.”

Emma shrugged her acceptance and looked longingly at the shortbread as Gold began to pack it away into airtight containers ready for the journey back to Scotland in the evening. He’d seen the look on Bae’s face often enough to recognise it for what it was and held out the container to her.

“Take one for the road.”

“Thank you!” She began to munch, looking around the tent at their fellows. “Well, I think we’re safe,” she said. “Probably not star baker, but I don’t think we’ll be going home.”

“Hmm.” Gold looked over at Archie; most of the rest of the tent seemed to be thinking along the same lines, that the results this week were something of a foregone conclusion. Still, stranger things had happened. Ruined bakes did not always lose out on presentation if the tastes and textures were good enough to make up for it, but Belle and Granny’s judgement of Archie’s gingerbread hadn’t exactly been the highest of praises.

“And unfortunately, I don’t think we’ll be getting rid of Zelena either,” Emma muttered. “I’m seriously considering offering to do something in my capacity as an officer of the law.”

“I don’t think she’s done anything illegal yet.”

“Yeah, well, if she follows you home, call me.”

The tent had been rearranged and the runners were ushering them back to the centre to take their places for the grand announcement. The moment of truth was about to arrive.

Belle sighed. Choosing bakers to go home was never a pleasant task, unless they had a contestant like Killian who really did not endear himself to anyone on a personal level. Archie was a sweet man and he was a good baker, but both this week and last week he had failed to make the grade, and there was no real room for sentimentality now. The contestants were being judged on their baking skills, not their personalities, and that sometimes meant that even the nicest of people had to go. It was clear that Archie wasn’t going to be coming back next week, but she hoped that he wouldn’t be discouraged and would continue to bake, even if he never touched gingerbread again.

At the other end of the scale, again the choice was clear. Regina had been the most consistent baker across all three challenges, coming first in both signature and technical with a strong showstopper as well. Belle felt that Mal deserved some kind of credit for having made such a marked improvement from her first disastrous week. Maybe it was just that cake really wasn’t one of her strong points. All the same, Belle was very happy to see her safely through to the next round and she hoped that she would continue to improve in skill and confidence.

“Ready?” Granny asked. Belle nodded. It was probably the least time that they had taken to come to a decision in the history of the show, and as they passed the results on to the presenters, she could see that the folks in the tent were surprised to see them coming back in so soon after they had left it to go and make their minds up. There was an awkward pause whilst the runners continued to get everything set up for the announcement, and Belle cast her eyes over the eleven, soon to be ten, bakers. She didn’t really want to say goodbye to any of them, except perhaps Zelena, but again – it was a baking competition, not a personality contest. She caught a glimpse of the bandage wrapped around Zelena’s hand and frowned. Ella and Ursula were both convinced that the burn had been self-inflicted, but no-one had had chance to review the recorded footage yet, and there was always the likely possibility that none of the cameras had picked up the incident. If it was anything other than an accident, then it marked the beginning of what could possibly become a worrying trend. Belle had never known bakers intentionally self-sabotage, or sabotage anyone else’s bakes. The show had always inspired a sense of community and togetherness – Archie’s mishaps today, with everyone pitching in to try and salvage his creation, were a case in point.

“Well done bakers for surviving another fraught week of flour and sugar getting everywhere and performing marvellous feats of biscuit architecture,” Ursula began. “It gives me great pleasure to announce that our second star baker of the season, with perfect Florentines and a beautifully built box, is Regina.”

There was a round of polite applause and Regina’s face lit up with happiness. It was good to see her smiling like that; Belle had noticed that whenever she was baking she was always the picture of fierce concentration, which showed in the delicacy and preciseness of her finished works. She ought to be proud of herself, she had definitely earned it.

“Unfortunately,” Ella continued, “we have to say goodbye to one of your number. The baker who will not be coming with us next week is Archie.”

“Oh well. I think that was a bit of a foregone conclusion, wasn’t it?” He shrugged, and slipped off his stool to accept the hugs and well wishes of the presenters and his fellow bakers. Belle was really sorry to see him go, and in a way it was comforting that everyone else shared her sentiments. He had gone through a lot, but ultimately he hadn’t been able to pull it back from the brink.

The runners eventually started pulling people away for the final interviews of the day, and the contestants broke off into their usual groups, some of them congratulating Regina, some of them consoling Archie, some of them moving away from the throng of people to do their own thing and get ready to leave the tent and make their journeys back home to wherever they dwelt. Gold was one of those. She couldn’t really blame him wanting to get away as soon as possible, knowing how far he had to go to get home and the work that no doubt awaited him once he got there. He was gathering his things together at his workbench, ready to go back to the break room and collect his coat from the runners.

Well, it was now or never, Belle thought. Granny had advised her to make the most of the coming weekends to get to know Gold, so that was what she was going to do. He might be going home next weekend and then it would be an opportunity wasted. The other contestants seemed to be pairing off with each other; why shouldn’t she show an interest in the loner? It would just be a friendly chat, that was all, to make him feel more at ease. He was nervous in front of the cameras; she had noticed that last week and he hadn’t got any more used to them since. She would just reassure him that he’d done well, congratulate him on his bakes, and that would, hopefully, segue naturally into a conversation about… well… something.

“Hi there.”

Gold looked up from packing his personal items back into their box and smiled.

“Hi. How are you?”

“Feeling very full of biscuits, but other than that I’m doing all right. What about you?”

“Same. And relieved to be coming back next week. My son would have despaired if I’d got kicked out.”

The news that he had a son was a slight setback to Belle’s mental image of him as available, but glancing down she saw that he did not wear a ring. Not that that was really an indicator of anything – he and his son’s mother might not be married and even if they were, he might not wear a ring out of habit from his line of work. Wouldn’t do to have a sheep eat it by accident.

“How old is he?” she asked.

“Fourteen. He’s the one who first got me involved with this, actually, he applied on my behalf and by the time I realised what he’d done it was too late for me to back out. I think he’s pretty excited about having his dad on the TV but at the same time I think he’s worried that I’ll somehow damage his street cred.”

“I don’t think so,” Belle said. “We’re one of the most popular shows on terrestrial TV; even if you do go out next week, you’ll still be a little bit famous and I’m sure your neighbours will want your autograph.”

“My aunt’s already got me to sign one of her tea cosies for her to flog on Ebay once the series has aired,” Gold admitted, and Belle had to laugh at the image.

“You’d best make sure that you win then; it’ll double in value.”

Gold laughed, and it was good to see him relaxed away from the cameras. He offered her a biscuit and she took it even though she’d eaten more than enough biscuits for one day. The shortbread melted on her tongue.

“Your aunt’s recipe?”

“Yes. I’ll tell my aunt that you enjoyed it, she’ll be thrilled.”

“Thrilled enough to tell me the recipe?” Belle hedged.

“Oh no. Top secret and only to be handed down to those who bear the Gold name. You have to go through several learning rituals before you’re accepted into the higher echelons of those who know the mystic secrets of our shortbread.”

“Sounds exciting.”

“It’s also a load of bollocks that I just made up to sound impressive,” Gold said, looking sheepish. “She’d probably give you the recipe if you asked in person.”

“Well no matter what happens you can bring your family to the grand finale. Maybe I can meet your aunt then. She sounds like a character.”

“She definitely is.” Gold paused, and for a while it looked like he was going to say something else, but he didn’t and the silence started to get awkward between them.

“I should probably get going,” he said quickly, and Belle could tell that he was embarrassed, light colour in his cheeks and his hands fumbling over the things in his box. “I promised I’d be home for evening herding.”

“Yes, yes, I understand. Trains to catch.” Gold nodded and made to move past her out of the tent, pausing.

“It’s been nice talking to you, Belle. I hope we get to do it again.”

Belle smiled. “I’ll make sure that we do.”

The train had been delayed on the way home and Gold had only had enough time to rush in, dump his things and get changed before going out to get the sheep in, so it was a while before Bae could grill him for information about how it had all gone.

“I didn’t get kicked out,” he said, accepting the very large mug of tea that Aunt Elvira brought over to him. “And I did slightly better in the technical.”

“Great! You’ll wipe the floor with them next week, we all know what you’re best at. Speaking of, we’re out of bread again.”

Gold raised an incredulous eyebrow at his son. “What do you do, inhale the stuff?”

“I’m a growing teenager!” Bae protested. “I need the energy!”

“If you have any more energy you’ll be bouncing off the walls,” Aunt Elvira commented sagely. “Made any new friends, Rum?”

“Not this week. Still getting to know everyone really, there are quite a few of us. I reckon we’ve already got one on-screen romance though.”

“Oooh, really? That’s exciting. But what’s more exciting is you. Did you speak to Belle? I mean properly, rather than on camera. And did you string words together in a coherent sentence or did you just sort of gabble at her like a star struck, love struck idiot?”

Yes, I had a conversation with Belle that consisted of actual words and fully-formed sentences.”

“Excellent! Progress has been made!” Aunt Elvira and Bae exchanged a high five and Gold watched them from over the top of his mug with tired eyes.

“You do realise I’m doing this to win a baking competition, not to find love.”

“I know, I know. But if you do happen to find love at the same time, then that kills two birds with one stone.”

Gold rolled his eyes and continued to drink his tea. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with you two. God help me when I bring you to the finale.”

“We’ll be on our best behaviour,” Bae promised. “But until that time, we’re going to tease you mercilessly, because we can.”

Gold shook his head in despair, but at the same time, something deep inside had reared its head, taking a look around at the outside world and deciding that it liked what it saw. True he’d had a crush on Belle French since the first series of the bake-off, but he’d never really given it all that much thought. It was just one of those things, something unattainable and far off. Safe, since he would never have the ability to act on it. Suddenly though, the ability to act on it had been granted, and he didn’t know what to do with it.

Logic told him that nothing could come of it. His feelings might have intensified since meeting Belle in the flesh, but she was still as unattainable as ever. It would be disingenuous for her to harbour those kinds of feelings towards one of the contestants she held power over.

But after the competition… A feeling of hope, something that Gold was not altogether well acquainted with, was beginning to make itself know. Throughout these next couple of months, nothing would happen, but they could still talk, get to know each other in an entirely innocent way. And after it was all over, well, who knew what might happen?

=====

Coming up next time: The bakers tackle bread, Gold unleashes his secret weapon, and Ella is up to her usual mischief…

=====

Hazelnut and orange biscotti recipe here

Florentines recipe here

#rumbelle fic #rumbelle #Belle French #Mr Gold #spinner!Rum #GBBO AU #Fic: Love is a Layered Cake

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sevensity · 8 years ago

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Hiya! Can I request RFA/Saeran+MC going grocery shopping together? Could you also include which aisle they would spend the longest time in? I hope that's not too much >.

Here ya go! Grocery shopping is nice because there’s a lot of food and I’m quite fond of that stuff.

YOOᔕᑌᑎG:

Ok but this boy knows what’s up

He’s been to the grocery store so many times, he canprobably finish all his shopping with his eyes closed (or at least one of themclosed if you know what I mean hahahhaha sorry)

He’s like those moms who are into super couponing probablybecause his own mom was too

He has a whole binder full of coupons waiting to beused, and he’s categorized them all according to types and %off.

Even if you’ve been grocery shopping before, goingwith Yoosung is a whole other deal

Jeez is it intense

Though who knew browsing the vegetable aisle with this boy byyour side would prove to be such an enlightening experience?

Unless you tell him you already know most of the stuff he’s saying, Yoosung will not hesitate to stop in front of every single thing and tell you about its various uses in cooking, or just life in general

And by every single thing I mean every single damn thing, even if it’s considered elementary knowledge

“This is a banana—“

“I know Yoosung,I know.”

He’ll also teach you really simple recipes while youload up your cart with food

“If you have trouble sleeping, heat up some milk andsprinkle some powdered nutmeg into it!” actually very comforting imo

“For really brown bananas, if you don’t want to eatthem or can’t use them at the moment, put them in the freezer and you can makeyummy banana bread with them later!”

“If you ever slice apples and want to prevent themfrom turning brown, just dip them in a bit of lemon juice!”

Thank you Yoosung Sensei

Every time you go grocery shopping together, you knowyou’ll return home feeling like you just took an intensive nutrition class

Spends longest time in:

Literally everywhere????

The only aisle he doesn’t really visit is the liquor aisle, but other than that he’ll spend the same amount of time in each place. Occasionally he will steer clear of the milk section after remembering some, ah, unpleasant memories

ᘔEᑎ:

Okay so he’s not quite a dolt when it comes to grocery shopping that’s for sure, like he knows about the basics, and of course he’s a beer expert

Though he is nowhere close to being on Yoosung’s Godly Grocery level

and Zen will never admit that he doesn’t know jack shit about what he buys most of the time

He’ll try to seem knowledgeable just for you, and he does want you to eat healthy (”Fruits and vegetable ares good for the skin! Though my skin is already amazing enough.” thank you zen that makes me feel so much better about myself)

But he’s not sure what to do with 90% of the stuff he puts in your cart

When you guys go home, he’ll sneak a phone call to Yoosung, list all the items that he bought, and Yoosung in turn will teach him a few possible recipes

Tbh usually such a phone call would sound like some shady drug dealing cuz it starts all like:

“Hey, Yoosung,” Zen casts a wary eye around before whispering, “I’ve got new goods. Can you hook me up with some plans?”

But it’s okay, you’ll relax once you hear them talking about the properties of lettuce

“Zen, let me get this straight. You bought a whole octopus…without actually knowing how to cook it?!”

“Uh, yeah.”

“WHY?!”

“Well, I can’t be her knight in shining armor if I don’t know how to deal with a mere octopus!”

When Seven hears about this, he’s all like “move aside fabled evil dragon, the princess in the tower is now guarded by a wriggling, squishy octopus. How will Zen slay the mighty beast?”

Spends longest time in:

Cosmetics aisle! And I mean spends a loooooooooooooOOOng time. He wants you to try stuff on. Then he wants you to give him a makeover. Then he wants to take pictures. Then he finds new products to try. The infernal cycle begins again.

ᒍᗩEᕼEE:

She never really had any time to go grocery shopping before, and soshe would just buy her meals from the convenience store

So the first time you went shopping together, oh boy was this girl lost

Although she knows all the fruits and vegetables and different types of meat, so the basics, she just doesn’t know what to buy because there are so many choices??

She just wants to buy everything and try it all

And so she does

You’re zooming around all the aisles, and soon each of you have your own cart chock full of food

In the end, two end up buying too much and invite Yoosung over to help y’all cook

“Okay, I get that you wanted to buy a lot to get variety, but that does not explain why you had to buy 10 packs of meat and a total of 5 types of squash,” says Yoosung, mildly exasperated.

Spends the longest time in:

The bakery section! She likes to look at their desserts to get inspiration, and will sometimes by those that catch her fancy. Although she also does spend a lot of time in the coffee section, however, there usually isn’t a lot of variety so she tends to be a bit disappointed.

ᒍᑌᗰIᑎ:

h a H

Jumin Han grocery shopping?

“Why go to the grocery store when the grocery store could come to you?”

babe PLS

“If you really want to make food yourself, why don’t you just order the ingredients online?”

Because grocery shopping is fun? sometimes

If you’re so insistent about going to the store, he’s 100% down to open one someplace in the building just for you.

Once you turn down all his extravagant ideas and manage to drag his fine ass to the store, Jumin is frowning.

Just like Yoosung, he’ll stop in front of every product there is. But this time, he’ll talk about them from a business perspective.

“If a watermelon costs this much for one pound, then for it to be of a profitable price, the amount of edible watermelon must be equal to—”

“Jumin we’ve been standing here for ten minutes.”

He’ll still occasionally stop to calculate the price per consumable unit though

Mutters to himself the whole time

But he proves to be immensely useful

You’re comparing two types of dumplings, different companies, slightly different prices

“Jumin, which one comes out to be the best buy?”

Hoooooooh he’ll go all out

He compares approximate size of dumplings, nutritional values, price per unit, reputability of manufacturer, you name it

So when you go grocery shopping, always bring yourself a Jumin Han to buy the best products in the store

Also because this rich boy is really cute when he wanders around, a little crease between his eyebrows, whispering equations to himself under his breath as he trails behind you like a little kid

Spends longest time in:

Pet food aisle, duhh. Would never dare feed Elly ‘commoner cat food’, though he’ll consider it if you make some brand suggestions. On a side note I feel like Jumin has tried Elly’s food before, especially if it’s something she seems to really like. “Maybe I can replicate this taste but make it something safe for humans to eat?”

ᔕᗩEYOᑌᑎG:

asifdj;aslkdfjaslk;gja;lkdgj

cOme ON iT’S SAYOUNG WE ALREADY KNOW IT’LL BE A MESS

First of all, you guys are never both walking. Either you’re in the cart and he pushes, or the other way around.

Here’s the thing though, he’s not so much in the cart as under it

I saw a picture of this but I can’t find it… you know how there’s usually a rack beneath the cart? Yeah, he just lies down on that.

If you leave him under the cart and wander too far away, he will yell “MArcO!” until you answer “polo” in an equally loud manner

This has gotten you kicked out more than a couple of times

“What do you mean soda and chips aren’t enough to sustain the human body?”

“What’s a vegetable?”

It’s like, he knows of the stuff, but he’s never seen any in person

“Wow…that’s…is that really an orange? In flesh????”

“This is edible?” he says, holding a pack of shrimp in his hands

While in the frozen food section: “I wonder what would happen if we blended a pizza, and then used that pizza to make pizza sauce for another pizza? Like…pizzaception.”

you guys actually tried doing that but regretted it because that shit was disgusting

Food puns

He will try to be more serious if you tell him, but why would you?

Saeyoung makes grocery shopping seem like an adventure

Spends longest time in:

I mean when he’s under the cart he doesn’t really have a choice so he’ll chill there and contemplate whether or not he should lick the floor while you get the food. However, if he’s the one pushing you, you bet he’ll head straight to the snack section. That’s his turf. Will glower at those who dare approach his precious chips. “So um Saeyoung are we just gonna wait around here and chase people away all day or…?”

ᔕᗩEᖇᗩᑎ:

He’s the type of kid that has absolutely no idea about anything

He’ll point at a cabbage and call it a cucumber

He says carrots grow on trees

You get a lot of stares because he calls everything by the wrong name with so much confidence

The baby is super proud of himself and you don’t have the heart to tell him he’s wrong

That changes when Yoosung goes shopping with him once though. Yoosung almost cried when Saeran asked him what this weird, round white thing was called (answer: an oinion. HAH SAERAN IS LIKE AN ONION, HE HAS LAYERS HAHAHAHAHHA I’M SO FUNNY)

Yoosung lowkey kidnaps Saeran and they have a study session together where Saeran learns about the marvelous world of fresh produce

But once you go back to the store together after he studied hard, it’s so precious

Saeran correctly identifies most of the stuff, but after every time he names something, he’ll glance at you, as if waiting for your approval

once you give him a tiny nod, a smile playing around your lips, his eyes will just light the fuck up and ;sdfja;lskdfjaslkdfja the baby bean is gonna blush a lil’ because w oW he did it???

Saeran reverts back to a toddler when y’all go to the store, you better hold his hand or he’ll wander off and get lost in another dimension

Spends longest time in:

ya, the ice cream section. you can get ice cream on a stick?? w h at???? a pre made ice cream cone???? w HA t??? I CAN BUY TWO LITERS BUCKETS OF ICE CREAM??? W H AT?!??!??!?! It’s a Saeran heaven and half the bill goes to his own, full cart of ice cream.

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underimagines · 8 years ago

Text

Let's talk about headcanons about Food

Now, Mod Sync here is a decent enough cook. Put a recipe in front of me and I’ll be able to cook almost anything, and I can cook some things from just memory. I was making omelettes and looking up recipes and I wondered “What about the Undertale cast? What do they eat outside the game?” So, here are some things I’ve thought up about the main four!

If anyone remembers the Anniversary Q&A that happened (oh, who am I kidding, of course you guys do), then we know some things about that already. HOWEVER, I’m only going to partially use this info here. These are headcanons after all, so I don’t have to quite follow canon.

Now, if you wish to continue, I shall leave these under a Read more, because this is gonna get wordy and also for you guys who are avoiding food for whatever reason. Also will include some other AUs.

Undertale Cast

Sans, without a doubt, loves anything greasy and fried. Pub food in partcular; burgers and fries are his go-to faves obviously, but also cheese sticks, stuffed potato skins, fried pickled, and so on. Hot pockets and mini pizza bites become a staple in his diet once on the surface. Anything he can pop in the microwave real quick. Also, mac and cheese with all the ketchup.

On the healthier side of things; He’s also very fond of anything with a large amount of tomatoes. Tomato soup with grilled cheese, sun dried Tomato slices, and many, many Italian dishes, though Papyrus has to sort of make him eat it. Except V8 juice. That shit is nasty.

Cooking-wise, he’s decent. He can make a number of different quiche by heart, and anything simple. He’ll need a recipe for anything else, and if it get’s too complicated, he’ll opt-out. Too lazy for anything fancy, leave that to his bro.

Papyrus is head of the kitchen in the Bros’ house. Strangely (or not so much) though, he’s the opposite of Sans; Paps is perfectly capable of making beautiful, complex dishes you’d see at a five-star restaurant. He likes the challenge. He could easily make Boeuf Bourguignon, Coq Au Vin, Backed Alaska, Curry from scratch, etc. But, when it comes to simpler things like Spaghetti, he’s thrown off. In his head, it’s too simple, so he adds things that the recipe doesn’t call for, thinking it will be better like his more complex ones. But…. yeah, the things he adds aren’t always even edible in general.

At the same time, he’s very fond of simple dishes. His favorite food is Oatmeal, an extremely simple dish to make for most. He has a cheese sandwich and an apple for lunch. Maybe he likes these because they’re so hard for him to make, like complex dishes are to normal people. I’d garner that the quiche Sans makes was another thing Paps favored but couldn’t make, so Sans made it for him sometimes.

Aside from Italian, Paps would like fruit salad or salads in general, yogurt parfaits, cheese omelettes; simple, healthy things. He hates greasy foods, but he’s not above taking candy from the Inn lady, so he’s definitely got at least an ‘All things in moderation’ mentality.

Undyne is an odd ball here. We know that, similar to Sans, she’s fond of greasy foods, a call noting that she likes Grillby’s cheese fries. She also has soda and hot chocolate as choices when you hang out with her. It’s not a far stretch to say Undyne likes junk food. However, as an apparent fitness nut -stemming from needing to stay strong as Captain of the Guard- I’m sure Undyne knows that too much junk food is bad for her. However, there is one thing I can garner off her personality and one particular physical trait of hers that can tell me about what she might eat: her teeth.

Undyne’s teeth are pointed. Meaning her teeth are sharp. I would go as far as saying that if Undyne is any particular kind of fish, it’s a Piranha. And what do Piranha like? Meat. Undyne, without a doubt, would love meat and grilling. Anything at all. Fish, Chicken, Hotdogs, Veggies, Kabobs, anything she can stick on a grill.

Seafood is another thing entirely. I’d think seafood is more on the side of comfort food for her. Clam chowder in particular. It stems from a headcanon of mine about Undyne’s family, I’ll talk about it later if you guys want. Sushi is definitely a thing she can get behind, though may take a bit for her to build up to Sashimi.

Tea was another thing in the choices at your hang out. It stemmed from her time while training with Asgore, and she keeps some around. I think she drinks it when she’s stressed. It helps her relax and think.

Alphys is another junk food lover, but only because she’s busy with other things and doesn’t have the time to cook. Cup Ramen is her go-to, but she’s got some other stuff stored away. Finger things she can eat with one hand and type with the other. On the surface, Undyne gets her to start eating grapes or trail mix instead.

On actual cooked foods, she’s fond of anything hearty; stews and thick soups, stir-fry, and anything served in a skillet. Also, of course she’s into oriental food. The first time she tries REAL ramen, she’s in heaven. She loves noodle dishes and once again, soups. Oddly, she has an extremely high spice tolerance, easily popping whole habaneros an a snack. Undyne refuses to kiss her after she has been.

Alphys herself is fairly decent at cooking. She learns to make a number of Japanese dishes once on the surface; onigiri, bento boxes, and her own sushi and ramen.

(I haven’t come up with any more than the skelebros of other AUs at the moment. Might do another post at a later date about with other characters if it is wanted.)

Underfell Skelebros

Sans, again, loves greasy pub food. He loves anything with a kick too. Jalapeño bites and pepper jack cheese are a constant. He also loves foods with layers or can have lots of toppings; pizzas with everything on them, subs and hotdogs piled high, and obviously his bro’s lasagna. (Don’t let him near a Cincinnati three-way, you will never hear the end of all the perverse jokes if you do.) He’s also fond of Cajun and Creole cooking.

On actual food, one of the few leafy greens Papyrus can get Sans to eat that he likes are Mustard greens, so more often than not, Paps will sauté some up as a side to whatever he’s cooked to get Sans to eat something relatively healthy. Otherwise, it’s limited to whatever Paps can sneak into a dish. Strangely, Sans is also fond of Southern style Sweet tea, even though he doesn’t care for sweet things otherwise.

Sans is an ok cook, but prefers not to if he doesn’t have to. If it isn’t microwaveable, it better be simple, or he’s gonna need a lot of motivation to make anything with more than 4 steps.

Papyrus is a literal Master Chef. He’d put Gorden Ramsey to shame. Paps can take almost anything and make it taste good. It’s the reason Sans eats anything healthy at all. Unlike UT!Paps, he can actually cook simple things too. It’s something besides his strength that he prides himself in.

On his own diet, he does love his lasagna, but also anything you can make in a casserole dish. He’s not overly picky, aside from keeping his own food to a tolerable spice level unlike his brother, but he does favor things that can last for a while and be reheated. In a world like Underfell, sometimes there are days were it’s just not safe to go out, so having a lot of leftovers can be helpful when stuck inside. So casseroles, stews, anything that can sit in the fridge and not taste bad after a day or two.

On another note, he’s fond of breads and baked goods. He makes some hella good garlic bread, and always has dinner rolls or biscuits or whatever ready as a side. Just don’t tell Sans how much he loves Monkey Bread, it’s one of the extreme few things he indulges in.

Underswap Skelebros

Sans our little taco man. Yes, he loves Mexican food. No, it’s not the only thing he cooks. No, his food isn’t that bad. He has a tendency of burning things because he gets distracted, but he knows better than to put inedible things in his food. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t get a little… creative with his cooking, but at least they’re all things that are supposed to be edible.

Through his love of Mexican food, he has a decent spice tolerance, and, though Tacos are his fave, he’s very fond of rice dishes as well. And black bean soup. He makes some fine salsa and guacamole from scratch too.

On the other hand, he’s not really picky. He’ll try anything once. He’s pretty fond of most any beef and chicken dishes. Though Paps has forbidden him from straight sugar and coffee, Sans can wip up some damn good sweets, like Mexican brownies and chocolate filled Churros. At least that way, Paps won’t drink straight honey while still getting his sugar fix.

Papyrus, on the other hand, is practically a sugar addict. He loooooves everything sweet. Candy, pastries, ice cream, anything with sugar. He’s Muffet’s taste tester if she’s making something new. Aside from honey, he’s particularly fond of chocolate in general and fruit fillings.

On the normal food side, he’s not as fond of spicy things as Sans, so Sans usually holds back on Pap’s food when it comes to spice. He also isn’t fond of complicated dishes unless it’s sweets. He likes simple things; sandwiches, salads, rice, anything you can throw together real quick or pop in the microwave. It’s not that he won’t eat healthy, it’s just it tends to be disproportionate to the amount of sweets he eats.

This also shows in his cooking. If it isn’t simple, he’s gonna have trouble. He’s not bad, he just gets a little nervous and that can lead to being a little clumsy. He’d rather Sans do the cooking, or at least keep an eye on things if it��s something he needs a recipe for.

#Undertale #Underfell #Underswap #sans #papyrus #Undyne #Alphys #headcanons #food #mod sync #I'm still working out Swapfell so their not on here even though I want them to be #long post #extremely so #queued post #rip mobile users

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consulting-celiac-in-the-tardis · 8 years ago

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5 Surprising Facts No One Tell You About Eating Gluten Free

New blog post! I like to say that when celiac disease joined the family, I got several new birthdays as well. My date of diagnosis in May, which is, ironically enough, Celiac Awareness Month. And now National Gluten Free Day.

So no day seemed more fitting than today to share a post I've been contemplating for awhile: the secrets about eating gluten free that you don't realize until you're a few years in.

Do you know everything about eating gluten free? Find out by learning 5 facts no one tells you about eating gluten free!

1. Your taste buds will change.

Now, I'm not saying that after hating strawberries for 20 years, you'll go gluten free and suddenly crave pints of strawberry ice cream. However, I'm still amazed my how much my taste buds have adapted to gluten free products.

For instance, a few weeks after I was diagnosed, my family had a craving for chocolate chip cookies so we decided to experiment with King Arthur's cookie mix. Our conclusion? They were OK...but definitely nothing to write home (or the blog) about. Flash forward two years and my mom ended up using the same cookie mix (without realizing at the time). Those treats disappeared within days, and we couldn't stop raving about how sweet and chewy they tasted - and how they didn't have the funky aftertaste gluten free baked goods are often known for.

Basically, the old saying, "Out of sight, out of mind" gets a gluten free update of "Out of mouth, out of mind" to describe changing taste buds. After not tasting "normal" chocolate chip cookies for 2+ years, my mom and I could no longer compare these GF cookies to our precious gluten-filled favorites. And when gluten was out of the running, these GF cookies easily took the win!

I also learned nice cream always makes cookies better!

What does that mean for you? Basically, eating gluten free gets better with time. Your taste buds will forget what gluten tastes like (though, full disclosure, you may still have gluten cravings from time to time) and you'll be able to discover how good gluten free can taste.

2. Just because a food is gluten free doesn't mean it will agree with your stomach.

As a celiac, I'm often hit with a variety of worried questions when my stomach throws me for a loop: Was it gluten? Or just an upset stomach? Or something else? Web MD has nothing on my brutal self analysis!

However, if you don't feel 100% awesome even while following a strict, cross-contamination-free gluten free diet, you aren't crazy. One of the challenges of gluten free baking and cooking is that, without wheat, chefs need to experiment with different, unique ingredient substitutes. These can include products like xanthan gum, psyllium husk, flax seeds, and so much more.

While these ingredients are great in that they can keep your gluten free muffin from baking like a hockey puck, people can also experience intolerances to these ingredients - intolerances that often surprise them because they've been living for XYZ years and "never had a problem." However, they might have never eaten these ingredients (at all or on such a wide scale) before going gluten free!

All the questions...

My biggest piece of advice? Follow your gut. The feeling that something was wrong may have been what led to your celiac diagnosis, and that feeling could help you feel healthier on a gluten free diet. People who eat gluten probably don't love every single gluten-containing product or meal. Gluten free eaters have the same right!

3. Eating gluten free can be as simple or as complex as you want - and no celiac's diet is exactly the same.

I still remember the mixed emotions when I got that phone call from my doctor: Yay! I'm not crazy and something really is wrong with me. But a gluten free diet? What even is gluten?

The truth is, entirely transforming your diet is hard. While time has made following a strict GF diet easier, there are still moments where I hate how "complicated" my eating has to be. Really, though, eating gluten free can be as easy or as complex as you want/need.

What am I talking about? Let's say that you don't know how to cook that much, you have a busy job and you have a large family to take care of. Food is the last thing on your mind. You can still eat the diet your body needs, though, by following KISS: keep it simple, stupid. Rely on naturally gluten free foods like brown rice, potatoes, fruits, vegetables, meats and dairy (while watching out for cross contamination). Use pre-made meals from companies like Udi's or processed products like Tinkyada rice pasta. Your diet doesn't have to be any more high-maintenance than that.

No gluten, no problem.

On the other hand, maybe you're a foodie whose crushed at the thought of needing to follow a limited diet. All you have to do is avoid gluten - everything else is fair game! You can make anything from comfort foods like chicken pot pie to homemade granola to fancy sauces to unique twists on old favorite foods (like an enchilada-stuffed spaghetti squash). When people ask what you can eat on a GF diet, you can honestly answer: "Anything - as long as it's gluten free."

The choice of what your GF diet looks like is entirely in your control. My mom and I are both gluten free, but are daily meals look very different. I start the day off with a big smoothie; she prefers buckwheat flakes with a little banana and honey. She eats a sandwich every day; I rarely eat bread. Neither diet is "better" than the other - you just need to find the unique combination that works for you!

4. You need to be more aware of nutritional risks, like vitamin deficiencies or arsenic poisoning.

You've probably heard the old saying, "You are what you eat." When it comes to a gluten free diet, this phrase means you need to pay extra attention to what fills your plate every day. The truth is, gluten free definitely doesn't equate with "healthier" or "free of bad ingredients." In fact, gluten free foods often have more sugar, sodium and calories than their gluten-filled counterparts. Not only that, but many gluten free products aren't fortified with nutrients (like folic aid and iron), which means you may have to work harder to get all of the vitamins you need.

As crazy as it sounds, you also need to watch your arsenic levels. After all, when you scan the ingredients of your favorite gluten free cereal, bread or baked good, what word often pops up? Rice. And that rice can add up fast: a 2014 study found that men and women with celiac disease had arsenic levels almost ten times higher than the suggested amount.

See the main ingredient in both of those cereals?

Before you start analyzing everything you eat, though, remember that all of these risks are relative. Only you know how much rice-containing products you actually eat or whether you enjoy a balanced (and nutrition-packed) diet. Need some tips for success? Embrace naturally gluten free foods (like the ones I listed earlier), read your product labels to check for added vitamins, and be aware of how much rice you're eating - or how little vitamins you're getting. You're as healthy as you're willing to work for.

5. A gluten free diet can be just as delicious as a "normal" diet...once you find the right brands and products.

Okay, maybe some kind soul did tell you this. Maybe it was the nutritionist who met with you at the hospital, or maybe it was your mother, comforting you as everyone else enjoyed Papa John's. However, it may take some time and experimentation for you to believe this piece of wisdom - but I can attest that it's true.

In the three years since my celiac diagnosis, I've:

Eaten more pieces of bland, falling-apart, nasty-after-taste bread than I can count...but recently tasted the best GF roll in my life, thanks to Beyond the Breadbox.

Cried over not having any GF tortillas in the house...but fallen in love with Food for Life's rice tortillas

Missed out on enjoying countless birthday cakes or cookies handed out in class...but have gone steady with Pamela's Chocolate Cake mix

Cried a couple times in restaurants (most famously, at this Outback) when chefs said they understood "gluten free" yet obviously didn't...but have also enjoyed some of the best meals EVER when eating out (that also just happened to be gluten free)

If I've learned one thing in the trial and error process of thriving with a gluten free diet, it's that trial and error is a necessary right of passage. You learn what products are definitely worth the money, and which to avoid. And that moment you bite into something and it tastes 1000X better than you ever expected? Honestly, it'll blow your mind.

All that raw, vegan, gluten free goodness!

In my three years, I've found a handful of companies I consider my edible BFFs - and you can find the list here. However, I also know that every gluten free eater's taste buds is different...and that each person needs to discover some of their own favorite foods.

When you're diagnosed with celiac disease, you may initially focus on everything you're losing. The freedom to eat anything you want. The gluten-filled foods you've grown up loving. Even being able to kiss a cute certain someone without giving him or her a toothbrush first.

However, National Gluten Free Day is also the perfect time to celebrate everything you gain with a restricted diet, like: the motivation to learn how to cook or experiment in the kitchen; the chance to try out different products and companies; and, of course, the pride that emerges when you realize one day, "Wow! I'm actually kicking some gluten free butt!"

Everyone's gluten free journey is unique, but from one celiac to any other diet-restricted foodies, I hope knowing these five, little-known facts about eating GF will make your trip easier.

And if it helps make you life tastier too? Well, that's just a bonus.

Did you know that it's National Gluten Free Day? Are there any other GF "secrets" you learned down the road? I can't wait to hear them!

via Blogger http://ift.tt/2i5tleg

#Blogger #college #celiac #gluten free #coeliac #celiacs #paleo #primal #foodporn #foodart

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juniorformulamotorsport · 4 years ago

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May 2020 – Recipes (Scones, Cheese Scones, Canelés, Lemon Drizzle Cake With Edible Flowers, Runebergintorttu)

I should probably call this the Great Lockdown Bakeoff (or something). I’m sure it’s a pretty common theme (certainly it would seem to be if you look at how damn hard it has been to lay hands on flour, yeast, eggs or icing sugar at various times during the Covid-19 lockdown. Whether it’s just a UK thing or not, I can’t say, but having found a number of sources for dried goods and for that matter eggs, I’ve been going off on experimental baking sessions ever since March 16th when I was ordered to work from home for the foreseeable future. A week before it all kicked off I had stocked up on bread mixes so the first thing after the great banana bread production line and the lemon, blueberry and almond cake were a number of loaves of bread at a stage when there didn’t seem to be any available in the shops.

There were a couple of ciabattas that got a tad too burned on the top and a linseed loaf that didn’t. As soon as the local baker’s shop reopened, and I’d found a source of flour (a company called Wellocks, which supplies restaurants during normal times, but which now does “Wellocks at Home” as well, delivering fruit, vegetables and a number of essentials to your door in certain areas, while donating a portion of their profits to one of the charities set up to support the hospitality industry) it was on to try other things. Over the years my stunning inability to make scones has been a source of some surprise, because I’m a very competent cook normally, but they never, ever come out right. They don’t rise, they are solid as a rock and while Lynne locally eat them, I’m pretty sure she doesn’t enjoy them as much as I would hope. So, back to the drawing board… Anyone who knows me as a cook will know I’ve a tendency to resort to Felicity Cloake’s splendid “How to make the perfect…” series in The Guardian newspaper and website. The deal is she does a barrelload of reseach, finds the most likely recipes from chefs she trusts,and the experiments to create the ultimate version of the recipe. Surely she would have done scones? Well, yes, she has, and cheese scones too. I decided not to get clever on my first attempt to solve the issue so I stuck to the plain scones recipe. She recommends “00” flour, and part butter, part lard. Also, do not under any circumstances roll the dough, just press it flat by hand. I did exactly as I was told, and lo-and-behold I had scones that rose, that were soft and crumbly in the middle, and that made the ideal base for jam and clotted cream (or clotted cream and jam depending on your stance on such things!)

Plain Scones

Serves: 6 Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

350g superfine “00” flour, sifted, plus extra for dusting

1 heaped teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

2 heaped teaspoons cream of tartar

1 pinch of salt

50g chilled butter, plus extra to grease

50g chilled lard

130mls full fat milk, plus 1 tablespoon to glaze

Preheat the oven to 210C. Grease two baking trays.

Method:

Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and cream of tartar into a bowl with a pinch of salt. Rub the fats into the flour mix, working as quickly and lighty as possible with cold hands.

Add the milk and stir the mix together to give a soft, bread-like dough. On a floured board, very gently roll or press the dough to a thickness of 2.5cm and cut into rounds with a 7cm cutter being careful not to twist the cutter.

Place on the prepared trays, brush with milk and bake for 15 minutes until lightly golden and well risen. Remove from the oven and lift on to a wire rack to cool. Eat as soon as possible (you will have no trouble with this stage let me tell you!).

Did they work? They most certainly did!

You can adjust the recipe to get a sweeter scone by adding 25g of caster sugar to the dough. Leave everything else as it is. The results, a week later, came out just as good, proving that the first attempt was not a fluke.

Just for good measure I also made the cheese scones that Felicity describes. We had some leftover cheese and Lynne had expressed a wish for me to try cheese scones. So cheese scones it was.

Cheese Scones

Serves: 12 Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

450g plain flour (I swapped it for the super-fine “00” flour again and would recommend you do the same)

6 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp English mustard powder (optional)

100g cold butter (again, I used 50g butter, 50g lard)

250g strong hard cheese like mature red leicester or cheddar

2 tbsp finely chopped chives (optional)

120ml cold milk

120ml cold water

1 egg, beaten with a splash of milk

Method:

Heat the oven to 220C. Put the flour, baking powder, salt and mustard powder into a large mixing bowl and whisk together until smooth and well combined.

Grate in the butter (butter and lard), then rub it in with your fingertips until it looks like wet sand.

Finely grate in 225g cheese, add the chives, and then stir to combine. Mix in the milk and water until the dough just comes away from the edge of the bowl; don’t handle it any more than is necessary. Tip on to a very lightly floured surface and flatten into a rectangle about 2.5cm high. Cut out with a fluted cutter (about 6cm wide for 12 scones), reshaping as necessary while handling the dough as little as possible.

Put on a baking tray and brush the egg and milk mixture. Grate the remaining cheese over the top and bake for about 12 minutes until golden. Allow to cool slightly on a rack before splitting open.

These too worked like a dream. I can probably never make them quite the same a second time, because I used a load of leftover cheese, three different types. As you can see, they looked very tempting.

I was so impressed by the success of these two recipes that I promptly bought the book (Completely Perfect, 120 Essential Recipes for Every Cook) and would recommend you all do the same. It’s been very successful for tartiflette, and for cauliflower cheese so far, so it’s more than paid its dues.

Anyway having finally, at the age of 61, conquered the mighty scone, what next? Well, when we were in Bordeaux in 2018 we discovered the town’s signature bake, the canelé, described by Wikipedia as “a small French pastry flavored with rum and vanilla with a soft and tender custard center and a dark, thick caramelized crust. It takes the shape of a small, striated cylinder up to five centimeters in height with a depression at the top. A specialty of the Bordeaux region of France, today it is widely available in pâtisseries in France and abroad.” In a fit of what might then have been over-enthusiasm I bought half a dozen of the moulds (striated or otherwise), because they were tiny and pretty and I figured I’d give making my own a go. Two tear’s later that opportunity had come.

I wasn’t sure it was going to be that simple, but I gathered the ingredients together and had a go, using a recipe from the Great British Chefs website, ironically written by a Frenchman, Pascal Aussignac, who is the man behind a restaurant group I like very much in London, the Gascon Connection. It looked easy enough. What could possibly go wrong?

Canelés

Serves: 6 Time: 2 hours 15 minutes

Ingredients:

1 vanilla pod

500ml of whole milk

50g of butter

4 eggs

250g of icing sugar

4 tbsp of dark rum

100g of plain flour, sifted

butter for greasing, softened

Method:

Split the vanilla pod sideways and scrape the seeds free of the pod. Scald the milk with the vanilla pod and seeds. Mix in the butter, stirring all the time until it melts. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.

Separate 2 of the eggs. In a bowl, beat 2 whole eggs, 2 egg yolks, the icing sugar, rum and flour to a thick batter. Strain the buttery milk onto the batter and beat together until smooth. Chill in the fridge for an hour.

Preheat the oven to 200°C/gas mark 6.

Brush the insides of the moulds or tray with the softened butter and pour in the chilled mixture almost to the top.

Bake the canelés for 15 minutes, then turn the temperature down to 190°C/gas mark 5. Bake for another 30 minutes or until the cakes are crisp on the outside. Remove from the oven and cool for 5 minutes before turning them out and serving.

I didn’t have enough moulds so I improvised with some bigger tins that I hoped would work. These were not wholly successful, and the mixture oozed and the stuck. I got one out easily, but the other three really weren’t pretty. The ones in the proper moulds, though, were another matter and slipped happily from their moulds, and were demolished in less than 24 hours with a coffee or two. I was sufficiently impressed that I bought some more moulds so I can practice.

Finding myself with several lemons excess to requirements again, I moved on to make a lemon drizzle cake. I particularly likes the recipe I found for this on the Great British Chef’s site as well, this one by Karen Burns-Booth. Ok, I didn’t have any edible flowers handy, so I used small gold cake decoration balls instead, but it still tasted good and it disappeared very quickly.

Lemon Drizzle Cake With Edible Flowers

Ingredients:

Cake:

225g of unsalted butter, softened

225g of self-raising flour

1 tsp baking powder

225g of caster sugar

2 lemons, large, zested, juice saved for drizzle

4 large eggs

1 dash of milk, for mixing

Lemon drizzle:

175g of caster sugar

Edible flowers

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4. Grease and line a 450g (1lb) loaf tin with a piece of baking paper and some softened butter, or cake release spray.

Place all of the cake ingredients, except the milk, into a large mixing bowl and beat with a hand-held mixer, or use a food mixer. Beat for 2 minutes, then add some milk to give a soft dropping consistency.

Spoon the cake mixture into the prepared tin and bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes, or until well risen and golden brown.

Allow the cake to cool in the tin for a few minutes and then gently turn it out onto a wire rack with a plate underneath it.

Make the drizzle topping by mixing the sugar and reserved lemon juice together to make a runny, thick syrup, then spoon the mixture over the warm cake. Any drizzle that falls onto the plate can be spooned back on to the cake.

Arrange the flowers on top of the cake whilst the drizzle is warm – as it cools and hardens, it will act as a glue for the flowers and they won’t fall off. Allow to cool completely before cutting into slices and serving with tea or coffee.

The final experiment of week was a Runeberg cake, a speciality from Finland. They are a cylindrical cake (another one) and are named for the man regarded as the national poet of Finland, Johan Ludvig Runeberg (1804-1877). Every year on and around his birthday, 5th February, these cakes are sold all over Finland and are hugely popular. It wasn’t February. I wasn’t in Finland but I was going to do them anyway, especially as I now had the larger canelé moulds which would do nicely for these as well. I was especially keen to give them a try because we had them in 2016 during our Finnish road trip, sitting in a shady courtyard café in Porvoo.

Digging around for a recipe, I should probably not have been surprised to find one on by Bronte Aurell, who owns the very fine (and very funny if you subscribe to their newsletter) Scandikitchen shop and café website. It looked pretty simple so I set to.

Runebergintorttu – Runeberg Cakes

Serves: 8 Time:

Ingredients:

125 g softened butter

80 g caster sugar

1 egg plus 1 egg yolk

50 g ground almond

100 g plain flour

50 g Leksands crispbread finely ground, or other dry breadcrumbs

1 tsp ground cardamom

1 tsp vanilla sugar

1 tsp baking powder

pinch of salt

100 ml cream (I used double because I had some leftover)

50 ml water or orange juice

Topping and filling:

Raspberry jam 1 tsp per cake

Icing sugar

Amaretto (optional)

Equipment:

Baking tin: Cylinder 5 cm x 5 cm holes or similar sized muffin or other shapes.

Instructions:

Turn the oven to 180C.

Whisk the butter and sugar until fluffy, the add the egg and egg yolk and mix again until completely combined.

In a bowl, add dry ingredients except the crispbread breadcrumbs – and then sift into the egg mixture – add the breadcrumbs and cream and fold again until smooth. Add 50ml of juice or water and mix – the mixture will still be quite thick.

Lightly butter the cylinder baking tins and then fill just over half with mixture. If you use tins with holes around 5cm x 5cm, you will get 8 cakes from this batch. Bake for around 12-15 minutes or until done – the little cakes will rise quite a bit during baking.

Remove from the oven. Brush the most level ends of the cakes with a bit of Amaretto, for extra flavour.

Level out any wonkiness so the cakes can stand. Cut a hole in the middle to fit approx. 1 tsp jam into each.

Mix the icing sugar with a bit of hot water until you have a thick paste. Put it into a plastic bag and snip off the corner and pipe a line around the jam. Leave to dry.

I used to believe I wasn’t very good at baking. It’s a pleasure to find I’m actually not bad at all.

Food 2020 – Recipes (Scones, Cheese Scones, Canelés, Lemon Drizzle Cake With Edible Flowers, Runebergintorttu) May 2020 - Recipes (Scones, Cheese Scones, Canelés, Lemon Drizzle Cake With Edible Flowers, Runebergintorttu) I should probably call this the Great Lockdown Bakeoff (or something).

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