#this headcanon is as serious as the bow cannon on a warship if that makes sense

[thesharkspajamas]

James and Angus play cricket - NO SPOILERS

@im-kikimon

Harriet: James' pallas cat daemon. Assume only James can hear her unless is specified as 'aloud'

Context: James and Lydia are staying with the Bells post season one (dw no spoilers here for the show or the books). James has discovered a love for baking with Helen and a talent for pipe icing. He and Lydia have agreed to help her ice 100ish cupcakes for a commission to the bakery. - I have actually posted a similar scene before if you want to read it, but it DOES CONTAIN SPOILERS for season 1.

This is also part of a larger chapter of a growing fic (~20k words) so some parts have been omitted/added to make it make sense, sorry if the flow is a bit off.

Anita is an OC, she's Helen's sister and is a foster parent. Helen rang her to get some advice about James and Lydia staying with them.

Some cricket terminology:

Whites: cricket is traditionally played in white trousers and t-shirt. This kit is often referred to as ‘cricket whites’ or just ‘whites’

Lad: young man - British slang

Guards: here it’s cricket terminology for where a batsman stands in relation to his stumps.

Stumps: the three sticks behind the batsman in cricket

Bails: little pieces of wood that sit on top of the stumps. If these are knocked off in the right circumstances then the batter is out. They indicate that the stumps have been hit.

James was up early on Sunday morning - hardly surprising as he’d been asleep by eight-thirty last night. He left a note on the chopping board and went for a run with Harriet trotting along beside him. 

His thoughts turned to everything he had to sort out, his obligations to the Beaufort name, supporting Lydia...

“But you’ve got cricket with Angus today. We haven’t played since summer,” Harriet interjected, “and we’ve got to ice the cupcakes for the party.”

Good old Harriet for not letting James get too deep in his own head. He was looking forward to both of those things, “Bet you’re looking forward to the cricket, might be some cricket balls.” He teased Harriet.

She stuck her tongue out at him. Harriet had scratched and gnawed four cricket balls beyond repair while James had been focussing on his bowling once, and since then all unattended cricket balls had had to stay in a zipped bag. She didn’t regret it: not her fault they were leather, and stitched, and ball shaped - like yarn, but better.

They passed a florist’s brimming with colourful blooms and James stopped to take it all in. This was (of course) research for his cupcake designs, not because he liked the look and smell of pretty flowers. 

A young woman came out to meet him, “Morning!” she greeted him cheerily.

“Morning,” James greeted politely, “what are these ones called?” He gently turned a large cluster of blue flowers towards her.

“Those are hydrangeas,” she smiled, “You shopping for anyone?”

“I’m decorating some cakes this afternoon and need some inspiration.” But, now he thought about it, some flowers might be nice for Helen and Ruby as a thanks for last night, and a live model was always better for drawing with - icing was probably the same. “Actually, could I make a bouquet?”

“Yeah, if you want to pick some out, bring them in and I’ll wrap them and arrange them for you. Take your time. I’m still setting up.”

Thank goodness for Apple Pay. James returned from his run with a gorgeous pink, white, blue and purple bunch of flowers. And a red rose for Ruby, just because.

He’d been out longer than he’d realised. He saw Helen clearing some space in a cupboard - “good morning, süßer, nice run?”, she smiled at him.

“Great. Thanks for your help last night.”

“Of course, süßer." held up the list of his and Lydia's favourite childhood foods they'd made last night, some of the baked goods had green stars next to them, “I was going to go food shopping this afternoon. I noticed I used to make quite a few of these at the bakery before we slimmed down. I’m happy to buy you some supermarket stuff, but I still have the original recipes if you’d like to try some at-home baking?”

James felt his eyes widen. “You made the brookies? And the apricot-honey things?” He couldn’t believe it, after his mum had stopped bringing them home from her commute, he’d never been able to find those again, and the Beaufort cooks had never got it just right. 

“I’d love that.” He said sincerely. Speaking of at-home baking…

He pulled the bouquet out from behind his back, “I passed the florist. The brief was pink, blue, white, and purple flowers, right?” he suddenly felt embarrassed; he’d never given a woman flowers before, even if she was Ruby’s mum.

“Oh they’re perfect! That’s very thoughtful of you.” Helen exclaimed and sniffed them. She didn’t mention the rose. “I think you and Angus are leaving for cricket at half-nine, but you’ll be back by one so we can do them after lunch?”

James nodded, “Would it be okay if we listened to some of the prescribed podcasts while we ice? Just as background..” he trailed off. ‘Idiot’, he thought, ‘this was supposed to be fun and here you are wanting to listen to-’

“-That’s a good idea.” Helen cut off his thoughts, “I hope you don’t mind but I called Anita again while you were out. I just wanted some more on how I could help with the preparation and school and stuff like that. She said that creative stuff like this is perfect for prep, listening without distraction might be pretty depressing.” Anita had also recommended positive enforcement of good behaviour, so she continued, “Well done for asking. I know it’s hard to ask for what you need.”

James felt his cheeks heat, “I’ll go and shower”, and beat a hasty retreat. He still had the rose for Ruby. He should be able to catch her before she left for her shift.

Percy and the Range Rover arrived right on time. Percy handed James his Maxton Hall cricket whites, “Good morning, sir. Your cricket bag is in the boot.”

“Thanks Percy,” James ran back inside to change while Percy loaded Angus and the chair into the car. James had just jumped in the shower when Harriet reminded him that he didn’t have any other sports wear besides his (now-stinky and sweaty) running kit. A quick call to Percy had remedied that.

James got into the car.

“I saw Ruby looking very happy this morning, that got anything to do with you?” Angus smirked as he handed James a tupperware of sandwiches. Neither he nor Helen had seen James eat that morning so Helen made something just in case…

“Oh thank you”, James took the food. He hadn’t realised how hungry he was. “I popped by the florist this morning on a run. They had some roses, and, well, turns out Ruby likes roses.” He shrugged, he’d picked it up on a whim, really. No real thought behind it.

He looked out the window and ate the sandwiches, trying to avoid more questioning. ‘It wasn’t that big of a deal’, he thought. ‘It’s just a flower.’

“It’s cute though,” Harriet teased him aloud from her seat. She loved Range Rover heated seats - they were so much better than the Merc’s.

“You’re such a girl.” James teased her back. It was an inside joke between them.

He missed Percy and Angus stifling their laughter in the front seats.

…

A few Adidas-track-suited local boys decided that James was an easy target in his pristine Maxton Hall whites and expensive kit, “Hey posh boy! Wrong club innit?”, “The fuck you doin’ere?” Their jibes echoed around the sports hall.

“He’s with me, lads.” Angus interjected firmly. “He plays the same cricket we do. Josh, Wills, pad up. We’re working on guards today.”

Jams was impressed by how quickly they fell in line under Angus, and the session continued calmly with only the occasional jibe. He’d rarely experienced this sort of bullying - what with his expensive private school education and closely engineered circle of friends - but  he ignored it easily thanks to his father’s training in Beaufort Nonchalance.

Cricket was one of the very few things he and Mortimer had bonded over. Mortimer had had some nets permanently constructed at the mansion so they could practise year round: the result was that James was seriously good at cricket.

When it was time to go into the nets, James warmed himself up slowly; starting with some basic and slow ones, then gradually getting faster, spinning more. He was fast outstripping Josh and Wills as batsmen, watching them get frustrated as they missed and had to right the stumps every time (they’d given up on bails). 

James let rip: alternating fast bowling with different spins, watching as their frustration boiled over.

Angus called it after Josh swore and flinched away from a particularly fast one, “Alright,” He flashed a torch he kept in his pocket until he had everyone’s attention. “Let’s switch batters. James and Callum, pad up!” He made a batting motion with his hands. 

James and a ginger lad jogged over to the kit pile where Harriet was lounging about with the other daemons. It took James a moment to recognise her in the form of an Italian Greyhound. He narrowed his eyes at her and she privately replied, “If I’m fetching cricket balls, I’m doing it comfortably.”

James shrugged, ‘good paparazzi cover’ he guessed, and turned to the ginger boy.

Angus saw them shake hands. Callum was seventeen, basically deaf, and didn’t have many close friends at the club on account of going to a special school. He also knew that Callum liked spending time with people without necessarily talking to them - on account of the extra effort it took to make out conversation with hearing aids - perfect for James.

He overheard Josh and William muttering as they left the nets, “crazy fucker”, “what the fuck is a player like that doin ‘ere?” Angus let them go, he figured they’d learned their lesson.

To absolutely no-one's surprise, James’ batting was also excellent. One of the boys’ dads who stuck around to help sidled up to Angus, “With a player like that, we might just win the league. Where'd you find him?”

Angus didn’t take his eyes off the nets, “He’s one of Ruby’s schoolmates, he’s staying with us for a while.”

“Maxton Hall,” the father read the crest of James’ bag, “that the posh one up the road?”

Angus saw the ‘how do you afford that?’ question coming and shut it down quickly. “Yeah, Ruby’s on scholarship. I dunno if we’ll be able to keep him, but the other lads are copying him, so however long we do get him, we’ll see some permanent improvement.”

It was true: Josh and Will aside, the other boys had watched James’ bowls intently, and they’d all been chatting with him in the queue. It seemed that James fitted into this little club quite nicely.