OTP Christmas 2015 | Day #5: Seasonal Food
Dec. 5th, 2015 08:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aftanithTitle: Seasonal Food
Fandom: Parabellum (original fiction)
Wordcount: 2322
Pairing(s): Stelian Frost/Sparrow | Stacey Katharos/Simon Ides/Nadia Sen
Prompt(s): OTP Christmas 2015 5. seasonal food
It was downright overwhelming, Sparrow decided as she took in the sight in front of her. The three of them--she, Simon, and Nadia--were standing in the doorway of the manor's dining room, eyeing the overflowing table with varying degrees of surprise; Nadia looked delighted, while Simon looked nearly as skeptical as Sparrow felt. The scent of sweetness filled the room, a mingled aroma of baked goods and frosting and so much sugar that she could feel her teeth rotting just by looking at it, and Frost stood a few feet away, watching her reaction as eagerly a child showing their parent the art project they'd poured their soul into.
"So, what'd you do wrong?" Simon asked, breaking the silence as he crossed his arms over his chest, everything about his expression and his posture utterly unimpressed. "Because this feels like a bribe."
Frost's grin faltered slightly, the skeptical lift of his brow threatening frustration. "You don't have to be here, you know."
Simon scoffed, and Sparrow jumped as she felt his hands settle onto her hips as he pushed her into the room so he could step past her, heading toward the table. "Sparrow wants me here," he said, eyes scanning the array. Amid the usual poinsettia centerpieces that had arrived a few days before was a veritable explosion of anything that could have remotely qualified as a "Beneficence food". There were at least a dozen different pastries and cakes, each rich-scented, lavishly decorated, and decked with icing and chocolate or strawberries or candies; there was a gorgeous glass vase stuffed full of candy canes and surrounded with little porcelain bowls of other candies of every shape and size and color from sugar plums to chocolate truffles; there were plates of little gingerbread men and cookies of all kinds--peanut butter, chocolate chip, chocolate, sugar, and more she didn't recognize--and several different kinds of fudge; and on each side of the table, there was a large gift basket wrapped in red- and green-tinted cellophane. Sparrow's mouth watered even as it made her a little sick.
"How much--?"
"No," Frost said sharply, turning to her with slightly narrowed eyes. "Don't even think about it."
She rolled her eyes but fell silent. "Alright, then. Why?"
"Why what?" he asked, and Nadia gave Sparrow an excited one-armed hug as she practically skipped past her, eyes on the food.
"It's not Beneficence yet; what is all this?"
"This," he said, pausing just a moment to grab an outraged Simon's wrist as he reached for a cookie, "is the first draft of the menu for the manor's annual party. And you all are going to tell me what you think."
"You realize we can't possibly eat all this. This is--" It was far too much.
"Spectacular!" Nadia interrupted, grinning back at Sparrow. She reached out to her, waving her hand insistently until Sparrow sighed and started forward. "Come on, if he wants to waste all this food on us, why bother complaining? I'd rather be eating anyway."
Simon scoffed, pulling his hand out of Frost's grip. "Can I touch now, Your Majesty?"
Frost nodded, apparently choosing to ignore the sarcasm. "Knock yourself out." He turned to Sparrow. "Think of it as your first gift this year: a veritable feast of the best deserts money can buy."
"Most expensive," she corrected, and she leaned forward to snatch a pale white cookie from a plate. "I don't even know what most of this stuff is, you know?"
"In that case," he said, "this will be educational and delicious."
A few feet away, Simon had seized a diminutive holiday plate from one of the two large stacks the center of the table, and he'd already begun piling it high with one of everything he could grab. Nadia leaned past him, her own plate in hand as she cut into a nearby cake with a massive silver knife, the dull, gleaming blade cleaving through its fluffy chocolate interior. Sparrow felt her stomach rumble, and she hesitated; already, she knew without a sliver of a doubt that she was going to overeat tonight. This was not a meal intended for moderation--it wasn't a meal at all, really, and certainly not one for just four people--and she'd never been one to hold back when it came to food specifically because until the Culling had turned her whole life around, she'd never had enough food to hold back from. But she'd never binged quite like this before.
With a little sigh and a half-formed notion of starting her pre-Culling exercise back up, Sparrow threw in the towel; after all, it wasn't like Frost would have let her turn this down anyway.
Sparrow leaned forward, bending her body over the tabletop while she reached for a plate of her own, and she scowled as she felt Frost's hand brush against her ass. "Eating," she hissed, smacking her hand backward blindly; she didn't manage to hit him, but he moved back anyway, laughing. Not particularly amused herself, she handed him a plate and brushed him aside. "Put food in your face and keep your hands to yourself, kay?"
"Yes, ma'am," he said, and somehow he managed to make the words sound just as suggestive as they did sarcastic.
Simon, who had by now dropped himself into a seat across from them, Nadia in the chair at his side, scoffed. "You know, there's some real irony in calling a woman half your age 'ma'am'."
"How old--"
"Sit," Sparrow interrupted, pointing toward Frost's usual seat. "Shut up. Eat."
Simon smirked in between bites of a sugary cookie that Sparrow couldn't wait to try for herself, and he cast a rather petty glance in Frost's direction as he sat down obediently, watching her with a rather amused grin of his own. "You have no idea how satisfying it is to have someone put him in his place for once."
Sparrow raised a brow as she moved to take her seat at Frost's side, opposite the table from Simon and Nadia. "Really?" she deadpanned. "I have no idea? You're sure about that?"
"Alright, fine. So you do have an idea. But believe me, I'm having just as much fun watching it as you are doing it."
Nadia popped the end of a chocolate-covered strawberry into her mouth, and it caught Simon's eye as surely as it caught Sparrows; but while Sparrow took it as her cue to reach across the table and take a little fruit for herself, Simon's gaze was fixed on his girlfriend's mouth as she sucked the sweet glaze from the surface of the berry. If Nadia noticed her audience, she pretended otherwise--and Sparrow was fairly sure at this point that she'd seen enough of Nadia's practiced obliviousness to know that Nadia was indeed faking at the moment--and stretched an arm out across the tabletop, her fingers crinkling the decorative cellophane of the wrapped-up gift basket off to Simon's right.
"What's in here?" she asked as she carefully lifted the wicker basket above the food and pulled it into her lap to inspect its contents.
Sparrow didn't trust Frost's barely-suppressed grin for a moment. "Candy," he answered. "Chocolate. A few other things."
Nadia's nimble fingers made quick work of the white-and-red striped ribbon tying the cellophane shut, and the material made a long, ongoing crinkling sound as she pulled it off the basket--and then proceeded to carefully fold it into a napkin-sized square while Simon and Sparrow stared at her in disbelief. "You realize that's the most obnoxious sound in the world, right?" Simon asked, reaching out to try snatching the offending noisemaker from her hands.
Nadia dodged easily, knocking his grasping hand away with her unoccupied one while she set the neatly folded wrap onto the table beside her plate. It crinkled again, trying to come undone the moment her fingers were no longer holding it, and she set her plate down on it firmly before looking back down at the basket. From her seat across the table, Sparrow was at such an angle that she couldn't see its contents where they rested in Nadia's lap, but Frost and Simon could. The three of them watched idly as Nadia rifled through it, tinfoil making tiny tinny sounds as she scooped wrapped chocolate truffles from inside and set them onto the table.
"You know," Frost said, his attention divided now between Nadia's ministrations and the slice of strawberry cake on his plate, "somebody spent a lot of time putting that basket together. Probably."
"Don't care," Nadia said with a little shrug, and Frost scoffed softly.
"These two are a bad influence on you," he observed, and Sparrow tried not to laugh as she saw Simon throw a glare at him over Nadia's shoulder. "You're supposed to be the sweet one, remember?"
Nadia scoffed, pausing her exploration of the basket to bring another strawberry to her lips. "Please. Sparrow's the sweetheart here."
Sparrow blinked, tempted for a moment to question that--and then decided against it. Nadia had given her the nickname months ago, and if she hadn't been able to get a satisfactory answer then, she doubted she was going to get one now. "Flatterer," she said instead, her eyes narrowing in on the cake Frost was cutting. She didn't know what it was--pure white and fluffy and filled with what looked like candy pieces--but it looked delicious nonetheless. He caught her looking after a moment, and with a word, he offered her the first piece before going back to cut another for himself. "Thanks."
"Of co--"
"Hey, whoa, wait a minute!" Simon interrupted, his eyes widening slightly as he leaned forward and snatched something from the basket in spite of Nadia's protesting yelp.
"Why can't I ever seem to finish a sentence with you around, Simon?" Frost asked, and the question went entirely ignored as both women turned curious eyes to the little bottle Simon was holding in his hand.
"Frost," Simon said in the kind of voice one would assume when talking to a child, "just because peppermint lube is edible, that doesn't mean it's food."
Nadia cackled, snatching the bottle from Simon's hands. "You're serious?" she asked, squinting slight as she ready the swirly print of the prissy luxury label. She laughed again, and looked up at Frost. "Yup, you're serious. What are we supposed to be doing with this, exactly, Frost?"
Simon wrenched the bottle back from her and raised a brow in Frost's direction. "I hope this is for you two," he said, nodding across the table.
Sparrow thought she had left blushing behind months ago; apparently not. Impatient and more than a bit embarrassed, she held an arm out, reaching for the bottle. "Let me see that." Simon handed it over willingly, and while she was inspecting the label, Frost seemed to finally find his voice.
"That is for me," he said, and a quick glance in his direction proved he was staring at Simon with a slight frown. "And whoever decides to join me."
Simon's challenging expression sank into something more sullen even as Nadia seemed to brighten beside him. Sparrow bit the inside of her cheek, trying to contain her sudden urge to laugh. She failed, a derisive snicker--it wasn't a giggle--sneaking past her lips, and three heads turned in her direction. "And what's your plan if nobody shows up?"
"Well," Simon said, giving Sparrow a much more appreciative grin than before, "since the thing was in his little gourmet gift basket, I'd wager he plans to eat it."
Frost sighed exasperatedly, leaning back in his chair as Sparrow tossed the bottle of lube back to Nadia. "You're insufferable, you know that?"
"I try." Sparrow watched Nadia turn the bottle over in her hands with a contemplative expression, and Sparrow frowned. She knew that look; Nadia was considering it. Catching Sparrow's expression, Frost followed her gaze, his smile returning as he seemed to come to the same conclusion as she had, and yet when Simon caught up with them a moment later, he fell back into his scowl. "Absolutely not," he said. "There isn't a thing in the world you can say that'll persuade me to spend my night licking peppermint lube off Frost's dick. Not fucking happening, Nadia. Not even for you."
The other woman was clearly trying to suppress a grin. "Well, he didn't say that's what he was inviting us up for."
"It was certainly implied."
Sparrow watched the two of them for a moment, uncertain. Last night, the four of them had been together for the first time in... what, a month or two? And before that, it had been even longer since they'd been together, in spite of Frost's attempts to persuade them all otherwise. Most of the time, the resistance that she and Simon seemed to share toward the idea was enough to sway Frost, but now it seemed that Nadia was--that she was on his side, more or less, and that was far from what she'd been expecting. Nadia was genuinely considering this for the second time in as many days, and Sparrow truly did not know what to make of that.
She licked her lips, hesitant, and made her decision. "We could... try something else instead, then."
Simon's gaze snapped to hers, and she shifted uncomfortably as his eyes narrowed again. He had clearly expected her to be on his side, as she normally was, but... but if Nadia wanted Frost--well, half of Sparrow's reasoning went right out the window. Simon stared at her for a moment longer before he turned to Frost, his expression just shy of a glare. "Fine," he said, practically spitting the word. "Hope you like the taste of peppermint."
Frost didn't even try suppressing his grin this time. "I wouldn't have invited you if I didn't, Simon."
The other man just sneered.
Fandom: Parabellum (original fiction)
Wordcount: 2322
Pairing(s): Stelian Frost/Sparrow | Stacey Katharos/Simon Ides/Nadia Sen
Prompt(s): OTP Christmas 2015 5. seasonal food
It was downright overwhelming, Sparrow decided as she took in the sight in front of her. The three of them--she, Simon, and Nadia--were standing in the doorway of the manor's dining room, eyeing the overflowing table with varying degrees of surprise; Nadia looked delighted, while Simon looked nearly as skeptical as Sparrow felt. The scent of sweetness filled the room, a mingled aroma of baked goods and frosting and so much sugar that she could feel her teeth rotting just by looking at it, and Frost stood a few feet away, watching her reaction as eagerly a child showing their parent the art project they'd poured their soul into.
"So, what'd you do wrong?" Simon asked, breaking the silence as he crossed his arms over his chest, everything about his expression and his posture utterly unimpressed. "Because this feels like a bribe."
Frost's grin faltered slightly, the skeptical lift of his brow threatening frustration. "You don't have to be here, you know."
Simon scoffed, and Sparrow jumped as she felt his hands settle onto her hips as he pushed her into the room so he could step past her, heading toward the table. "Sparrow wants me here," he said, eyes scanning the array. Amid the usual poinsettia centerpieces that had arrived a few days before was a veritable explosion of anything that could have remotely qualified as a "Beneficence food". There were at least a dozen different pastries and cakes, each rich-scented, lavishly decorated, and decked with icing and chocolate or strawberries or candies; there was a gorgeous glass vase stuffed full of candy canes and surrounded with little porcelain bowls of other candies of every shape and size and color from sugar plums to chocolate truffles; there were plates of little gingerbread men and cookies of all kinds--peanut butter, chocolate chip, chocolate, sugar, and more she didn't recognize--and several different kinds of fudge; and on each side of the table, there was a large gift basket wrapped in red- and green-tinted cellophane. Sparrow's mouth watered even as it made her a little sick.
"How much--?"
"No," Frost said sharply, turning to her with slightly narrowed eyes. "Don't even think about it."
She rolled her eyes but fell silent. "Alright, then. Why?"
"Why what?" he asked, and Nadia gave Sparrow an excited one-armed hug as she practically skipped past her, eyes on the food.
"It's not Beneficence yet; what is all this?"
"This," he said, pausing just a moment to grab an outraged Simon's wrist as he reached for a cookie, "is the first draft of the menu for the manor's annual party. And you all are going to tell me what you think."
"You realize we can't possibly eat all this. This is--" It was far too much.
"Spectacular!" Nadia interrupted, grinning back at Sparrow. She reached out to her, waving her hand insistently until Sparrow sighed and started forward. "Come on, if he wants to waste all this food on us, why bother complaining? I'd rather be eating anyway."
Simon scoffed, pulling his hand out of Frost's grip. "Can I touch now, Your Majesty?"
Frost nodded, apparently choosing to ignore the sarcasm. "Knock yourself out." He turned to Sparrow. "Think of it as your first gift this year: a veritable feast of the best deserts money can buy."
"Most expensive," she corrected, and she leaned forward to snatch a pale white cookie from a plate. "I don't even know what most of this stuff is, you know?"
"In that case," he said, "this will be educational and delicious."
A few feet away, Simon had seized a diminutive holiday plate from one of the two large stacks the center of the table, and he'd already begun piling it high with one of everything he could grab. Nadia leaned past him, her own plate in hand as she cut into a nearby cake with a massive silver knife, the dull, gleaming blade cleaving through its fluffy chocolate interior. Sparrow felt her stomach rumble, and she hesitated; already, she knew without a sliver of a doubt that she was going to overeat tonight. This was not a meal intended for moderation--it wasn't a meal at all, really, and certainly not one for just four people--and she'd never been one to hold back when it came to food specifically because until the Culling had turned her whole life around, she'd never had enough food to hold back from. But she'd never binged quite like this before.
With a little sigh and a half-formed notion of starting her pre-Culling exercise back up, Sparrow threw in the towel; after all, it wasn't like Frost would have let her turn this down anyway.
Sparrow leaned forward, bending her body over the tabletop while she reached for a plate of her own, and she scowled as she felt Frost's hand brush against her ass. "Eating," she hissed, smacking her hand backward blindly; she didn't manage to hit him, but he moved back anyway, laughing. Not particularly amused herself, she handed him a plate and brushed him aside. "Put food in your face and keep your hands to yourself, kay?"
"Yes, ma'am," he said, and somehow he managed to make the words sound just as suggestive as they did sarcastic.
Simon, who had by now dropped himself into a seat across from them, Nadia in the chair at his side, scoffed. "You know, there's some real irony in calling a woman half your age 'ma'am'."
"How old--"
"Sit," Sparrow interrupted, pointing toward Frost's usual seat. "Shut up. Eat."
Simon smirked in between bites of a sugary cookie that Sparrow couldn't wait to try for herself, and he cast a rather petty glance in Frost's direction as he sat down obediently, watching her with a rather amused grin of his own. "You have no idea how satisfying it is to have someone put him in his place for once."
Sparrow raised a brow as she moved to take her seat at Frost's side, opposite the table from Simon and Nadia. "Really?" she deadpanned. "I have no idea? You're sure about that?"
"Alright, fine. So you do have an idea. But believe me, I'm having just as much fun watching it as you are doing it."
Nadia popped the end of a chocolate-covered strawberry into her mouth, and it caught Simon's eye as surely as it caught Sparrows; but while Sparrow took it as her cue to reach across the table and take a little fruit for herself, Simon's gaze was fixed on his girlfriend's mouth as she sucked the sweet glaze from the surface of the berry. If Nadia noticed her audience, she pretended otherwise--and Sparrow was fairly sure at this point that she'd seen enough of Nadia's practiced obliviousness to know that Nadia was indeed faking at the moment--and stretched an arm out across the tabletop, her fingers crinkling the decorative cellophane of the wrapped-up gift basket off to Simon's right.
"What's in here?" she asked as she carefully lifted the wicker basket above the food and pulled it into her lap to inspect its contents.
Sparrow didn't trust Frost's barely-suppressed grin for a moment. "Candy," he answered. "Chocolate. A few other things."
Nadia's nimble fingers made quick work of the white-and-red striped ribbon tying the cellophane shut, and the material made a long, ongoing crinkling sound as she pulled it off the basket--and then proceeded to carefully fold it into a napkin-sized square while Simon and Sparrow stared at her in disbelief. "You realize that's the most obnoxious sound in the world, right?" Simon asked, reaching out to try snatching the offending noisemaker from her hands.
Nadia dodged easily, knocking his grasping hand away with her unoccupied one while she set the neatly folded wrap onto the table beside her plate. It crinkled again, trying to come undone the moment her fingers were no longer holding it, and she set her plate down on it firmly before looking back down at the basket. From her seat across the table, Sparrow was at such an angle that she couldn't see its contents where they rested in Nadia's lap, but Frost and Simon could. The three of them watched idly as Nadia rifled through it, tinfoil making tiny tinny sounds as she scooped wrapped chocolate truffles from inside and set them onto the table.
"You know," Frost said, his attention divided now between Nadia's ministrations and the slice of strawberry cake on his plate, "somebody spent a lot of time putting that basket together. Probably."
"Don't care," Nadia said with a little shrug, and Frost scoffed softly.
"These two are a bad influence on you," he observed, and Sparrow tried not to laugh as she saw Simon throw a glare at him over Nadia's shoulder. "You're supposed to be the sweet one, remember?"
Nadia scoffed, pausing her exploration of the basket to bring another strawberry to her lips. "Please. Sparrow's the sweetheart here."
Sparrow blinked, tempted for a moment to question that--and then decided against it. Nadia had given her the nickname months ago, and if she hadn't been able to get a satisfactory answer then, she doubted she was going to get one now. "Flatterer," she said instead, her eyes narrowing in on the cake Frost was cutting. She didn't know what it was--pure white and fluffy and filled with what looked like candy pieces--but it looked delicious nonetheless. He caught her looking after a moment, and with a word, he offered her the first piece before going back to cut another for himself. "Thanks."
"Of co--"
"Hey, whoa, wait a minute!" Simon interrupted, his eyes widening slightly as he leaned forward and snatched something from the basket in spite of Nadia's protesting yelp.
"Why can't I ever seem to finish a sentence with you around, Simon?" Frost asked, and the question went entirely ignored as both women turned curious eyes to the little bottle Simon was holding in his hand.
"Frost," Simon said in the kind of voice one would assume when talking to a child, "just because peppermint lube is edible, that doesn't mean it's food."
Nadia cackled, snatching the bottle from Simon's hands. "You're serious?" she asked, squinting slight as she ready the swirly print of the prissy luxury label. She laughed again, and looked up at Frost. "Yup, you're serious. What are we supposed to be doing with this, exactly, Frost?"
Simon wrenched the bottle back from her and raised a brow in Frost's direction. "I hope this is for you two," he said, nodding across the table.
Sparrow thought she had left blushing behind months ago; apparently not. Impatient and more than a bit embarrassed, she held an arm out, reaching for the bottle. "Let me see that." Simon handed it over willingly, and while she was inspecting the label, Frost seemed to finally find his voice.
"That is for me," he said, and a quick glance in his direction proved he was staring at Simon with a slight frown. "And whoever decides to join me."
Simon's challenging expression sank into something more sullen even as Nadia seemed to brighten beside him. Sparrow bit the inside of her cheek, trying to contain her sudden urge to laugh. She failed, a derisive snicker--it wasn't a giggle--sneaking past her lips, and three heads turned in her direction. "And what's your plan if nobody shows up?"
"Well," Simon said, giving Sparrow a much more appreciative grin than before, "since the thing was in his little gourmet gift basket, I'd wager he plans to eat it."
Frost sighed exasperatedly, leaning back in his chair as Sparrow tossed the bottle of lube back to Nadia. "You're insufferable, you know that?"
"I try." Sparrow watched Nadia turn the bottle over in her hands with a contemplative expression, and Sparrow frowned. She knew that look; Nadia was considering it. Catching Sparrow's expression, Frost followed her gaze, his smile returning as he seemed to come to the same conclusion as she had, and yet when Simon caught up with them a moment later, he fell back into his scowl. "Absolutely not," he said. "There isn't a thing in the world you can say that'll persuade me to spend my night licking peppermint lube off Frost's dick. Not fucking happening, Nadia. Not even for you."
The other woman was clearly trying to suppress a grin. "Well, he didn't say that's what he was inviting us up for."
"It was certainly implied."
Sparrow watched the two of them for a moment, uncertain. Last night, the four of them had been together for the first time in... what, a month or two? And before that, it had been even longer since they'd been together, in spite of Frost's attempts to persuade them all otherwise. Most of the time, the resistance that she and Simon seemed to share toward the idea was enough to sway Frost, but now it seemed that Nadia was--that she was on his side, more or less, and that was far from what she'd been expecting. Nadia was genuinely considering this for the second time in as many days, and Sparrow truly did not know what to make of that.
She licked her lips, hesitant, and made her decision. "We could... try something else instead, then."
Simon's gaze snapped to hers, and she shifted uncomfortably as his eyes narrowed again. He had clearly expected her to be on his side, as she normally was, but... but if Nadia wanted Frost--well, half of Sparrow's reasoning went right out the window. Simon stared at her for a moment longer before he turned to Frost, his expression just shy of a glare. "Fine," he said, practically spitting the word. "Hope you like the taste of peppermint."
Frost didn't even try suppressing his grin this time. "I wouldn't have invited you if I didn't, Simon."
The other man just sneered.
© 2015 A.F. Tanith
