The Twilight Twenty-Five
thetwilight25 dot com
Prompt: Desecrate
Main Character: Bella
Rating: T
Word Count: 496

Mrs. Hong's bakery is about ten degrees hotter than the street outside when Victoria and I walk through the plastic strips that curtain the door. It smells amazing though, like fresh bread and cinnamon and sticky-sweet icing.

"Jasmine!" That ridiculous boy is here and he's grinning and he looks so genuinely stoked to see me. It feels… nice. Really nice.

Victoria smirks and steps up to the counter to order her dad's gluten-free bread, leaving me with the stupid boy and his stupid smile.

"How's things?"

I twist my hands together and try not to blush. "Okay. You?"

"Not too shabby. Surf's been shit for the last couple days but." He pulls a lamington from its paper bag and holds it towards me. "Want some?"

I shake my head. "No, thanks."

He shrugs and takes a bite, demolishing half the slice.

"You don't eat cake?" At least, I think that's what he says. It's hard to tell with his mouth full of sponge cake and coconut.

A piece of shredded coconut lands on my top. I wrinkle my nose and flick it onto the floor. "I love cake," I say. "Just not lamingtons."

Thankfully, he clears his mouth before he speaks again. "That's sacrilegious. You know you could be kicked out of the country? The lamington is a national icon."

"So I'm told." I tuck my hair behind my ear, keeping my elbow close to my ribs. It's really hot in here and I'm sure I'm sweating. "I just don't like coconut."

"Next you'll be telling me you don't like Vegemite."

I cringe. Edward's eyes widen with pretend horror. "Get out!"

"I know."

"You know what?" Victoria appears beside me, a plastic bag in one hand and her change in the other.

"She doesn't like lamingtons. Or Vegemite."

"Oh, I know," Vic says. "Jasmine's a disgrace. An utter disgrace."

I roll my eyes at the both of them.

"You know," Victoria says, as we duck back outside, the plastic curtain snapping at our ankles, "I reckon we should start calling you Aladdin."

I can not believe she said that. I want to disappear through a crack in the pavement.

Edward, however, doesn't miss a beat. "Guess that makes you Rajah."

Victoria laughs and ruffles a hand through her curls. "I do have the hair for it." She makes a claw and a "rawr" noise.

"I'm going this way." Edward jerks a thumb over his shoulder. The opposite direction to the one we're going.

He takes a few backwards steps then stops. "Hey. You guys should come to Alec's thing on Saturday arvo."

"We've got hockey," I say. Beside me, Vic groans.

Edward tilts his head. "So come after."

"Yeah." I rub my thumb across my palm. It's slippery with sweat. "Okay."

"Sweet." Edward shoves the rest of his lamington into his mouth, waves, and heads off down the street.

"Sooo…"

"Shut up," I tell her.

Victoria lifts a hand, palm out. "Not saying a thing."

A lamington is a square of sponge cake rolled in melted chocolate and then in desiccated coconut.

The way you guys have taken to these characters is just brilliant. Thank you all so much! Shell x