A/N: Hey, everyone! This is going to be a Mystrade fic that could get a little smutty later, but, for right now, it's just an explanation of how they met and how their love began. I'm coauthoring this fic with the ever-awesome dapperasf (dot) tumblr (dot) com, so I'll indicate Dapper when she is writing and Byrd when it's me. Enjoy!
Dapper:
Gregory Lestrade possessed many skills; baking was not one of them. Anne was a brilliant baker; however, it wasn't really acceptable to call up your ex-wife and ask her to bake a cake, even if it was for her daughter's birthday. Oh, well. There were people who were paid to do that sort of thing, and that is mostly the reason Lestrade was late for work Tuesday morning. He had to stop by that little shop on the corner and place an order for a cake his youngest daughter's birthday.
. . .
Byrd:
But it wasn't really the cake order that made him so late to work. He didn't have to pick out anything at the store; he had pre-written the order before he left his home. What made Lestrade late to New Scotland Yard was a tall, handsome man who had just picked up his own delivery from the bakery.
"Oh no, I am so sorry, here let me help you," Lestrade was mortified as he bent down to pick up the box of cookies and sweets that he had knocked out of the other man's hands. He quickly bent down, scooping the mini cakes and other sweets back into the box, flushing from his complete lack of coordination. He grabbed the box and rose up on wobbly knees, noticing just how important looking the other man was. The poor soul was rubbing his temples in distress. The man let out a sigh and then ran a hand through his dark black hair. "Let me buy you another one, please."
"No, no," the other man put his hand out, catching Gregory by the shoulder, wincing, as if it were too much for him to even touch this other man. "Don't worry about it," the man let out another sigh.
Geez, he is really upset that I knocked over his cakes. I wish he would let me by him some new sweets. Greg voiced his thoughts aloud, imploring the other man, "Please, I'll buy you double what you had before, it was all my fault."
The other man slowly opened his eyes, studying Lestrade intently. "Fine," he eventually let out. "Here," the man pulled out a pen and notepad from beneath his suit jacket, turning toward the counter. The man proceeded to scribble something down, rip the sheet out of the mini notebook, then hand the sheet of paper to Lestrade. "Deliver what ever you purchase to this address in approximately thirty minutes. Ask for," the man, paused, cocking his head and thinking for a minute, "Ahh, yes, ask for Anthea. Well, then, I must be off."
"Wait, I-" but the mysterious man had all ready grabbed an umbrella by the front of the bakery and popped out the door. Greg ran outside, covering his head from the oncoming rain, yelling "hey, wait!" as the other man slid into a limo that quickly zoomed off.
Greg harrumphed and slowly trudged back indoors. This was not exactly what he had planned for by being a nice person. He definitely got the short end of the bargain, he decided. he sighed, then opened the white box to examine its contents. Two cream puffs. Five mini vanilla cakes, two eclairs, and six mini chocolate cakes. Geez, what kind of party is this chap throwing? He sighed, doing the math in his head. That means I now have to buy four cream puffs, ten mini vanilla cakes, four eclairs, and twelve mini chocolate cakes. Well, that man might not have heard you saying you would double his order.
But Greg glanced down at the now-soggy box of ruined treats and he knew that, whoever he was, this man was not someone to be displeased in the dessert department. Greg shook his head, all ready feeling nowhere near motivated enough to start the day, and shuffled toward the counter. After waving and whistling a few times, he finally got one of the waitress's attention.
"Yeah?" she smacked her gum, cocking a brow at him, seeing he all ready had one of the bakery's boxes, probably wondering what more he could possibly want to buy.
"Hi, I'd like to buy four cream puffs, ten mini vanilla cakes, two eclairs, and six mini chocolate cakes. Oh, and I'd also like to make a cake order.
The girl stared at him, indifferent.
"The regular-sized cake," he laughed a bit, trying to add some levity to the situation, but he just turned his laugh into a cough, then pulled his own notebook out from his pocket.
"The regular sized cake is actually a medium sized cake, really. I need it to be able to feed thirty people. I want it to have purple trim icing and blue icing on the, uh, rest of the cake?" he asked more than stated. Anne, usually unhelpful and distant, had actually bothered to email him directions for ordering the cake. Of course she couldn't be bothered to actually pick the bloody thing up, but, hey, something is better than nothing. He sighed, looking up at the still smacking young cashier, wondering if she had absorbed anything he had just said. "How much will that be, do you think?"
She rolled her eyes, then typed a few numbers onto a screen. "Your cake is going to be about seventy pounds."
His eyes bulged, his mind convincing himself more and more by the second that he should just make this cake himself and be done with it, what with a price like that. He sighed, knowing his cake would come out horrendous, if it didn't burn his house down first.
He hummed to himself, then finally said, "Okay, and how about the other sweets?"
The lady spent a good two minutes punching in numbers and scanning the screen in front of her. "That total comes to forty pounds."
Greg again dropped the white box, but it luckily fell on the counter this time. Unluckily, though, it slid onto his shirt from the counter on the open end of the box, and thus had cakes fall through and get icing all over his shirt.
Unfazed, the cashier continued, "so your grand total is one hundred and ten pounds. Cash or credit?" She held her hand out, just waiting for Lestrade to hurry up and pay her, then leave her to her own miserable existence.