MariChat May Day 16: Flowers. Marinette teaches Chat about cake decorating, Chat makes an assumption, and Marinette gets creative with the frosting.
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"Princess?" Chat Noir poked his head in through the open skylight, expecting to see Marinette at her desk, but the room appeared empty. "Marinette, are you home?" Nothing. He was debating whether to let himself in or to just leave when the trap door opened, and Sabine's head appeared in the room.
"Ah, you are here! I thought I heard you, Chat Noir. Marinette is in the kitchen, come on in." She disappeared back down the stairs, but left the door open for him to follow her.
With a smile, he dropped into the room and followed Sabine down into the kitchen.
"Marinette, your stray is here." She dropped a kiss on her daughter's head, and went to their door. "I'll be downstairs, helping your father."
"Yes, maman," Marinette called absently, her attention focused on the cake in front of her. She flicked her eyes up at Chat as he sat at the end of the counter. "Hello, Kitty."
"Hello, Princess." He leaned forward to examine the partially decorated cake, and watched in fascination as little pink flowers appeared from the metal point as if by magic. "How are you doing that?"
Marinette straightened and blinked at the cake. "What, the frosting?"
"Yeah. How does that work," he asked, pointing to the bag in her hand.
"It's a piping bag, with a decorative tip on the end." She untwisted the end, to show the cone shape of the bag, and then added a scoop of the pink frosting to the wide end. "I load the frosting from this side, squeeze it down to the bottom like toothpaste, and then twist it to keep it tight. I control how much comes out by varying the pressure on the bag."
He watched her work a bit longer, still fascinated by the way the flowers appeared on the cake, spreading almost haphazardly over the top, and cascading down the side. "Can you make things other than flowers?"
She glanced up, caught the curious expression on his face, and smiled. "Of course. You can make almost anything, if you have the right frosting tip. You see how this one has a bunch of points?" He nodded, and she continued. "You can use it to make a flower by holding the tip straight out from the side of the cake and squeezing only a little bit. But if you change the angle, and move the tip horizontally along the surface as you squeeze, you can make a wave." She demonstrated by making a few of the waves around the base of the cake, then set the bag on the counter to take up a second bag that had been hidden on the other side of the cake. "This tip is just a plain circle, and it's small, so it's good for making details and doing lettering." She held the point over the center of one of her flowers, and a little bead of yellow appeared at the end. She deftly added little yellow centers to each of her flowers, and then wrote "good luck" in flowing script over the center of the cake.
He picked up the bag with the pink frosting, and squeezed it experimentally, leaving a ridged stripe along the edge of her bowl. "Can I try?"
"Sure! Here, come stand on this side." She stepped out of the way, and motioned for him to stand where she had been.
He looked from the little stripe that he'd made to her perfect flowers with surprise. "You want me to try it on your cake?"
"Why not," she giggled, taking his elbow and tugging him to stand in front of it. "I made this for fun, as a way to keep myself distracted."
"But I'll ruin it!"
"No you won't. You didn't actually make the frosting, so we know it's going to taste good no matter what it looks like." She flicked his bell playfully, and pointed at the bag in his hand. "Untwist it, and make sure your frosting is all pushed down, then re-twist it to make sure it's tight."
He frowned at the frosting bag in his hand, but did as she asked. He pushed too hard, and a glop of frosting fell from the tip onto the counter.
She giggled, and wiped it up with a finger. "Don't worry, I still do that sometimes, myself, especially when it's really full." She stuck the finger in her mouth, and hummed as she sucked the frosting from it, clearly oblivious to the fact that her innocent action made him think of things that were not innocent at all. "I love frosting," she said, smiling.
He cleared his throat, and returned his attention to the frosting bag, twisting it carefully until a bit of pink appeared at the end.
"Perfect! Now, try a flower. Hold it perpendicular to the cake, and squeeze gently."
He followed her instructions, and initially, it looked just like hers. But when he pulled his hand away, the frosting stuck to the tip and pulled the flower out into a cone that just flopped over. He scowled at it. "That looks nothing like a flower."
"Try again, but this time, push the tip into to the flower ever so slightly before you pull your hand away." He nodded and tried it again, and this time the frosting stuck only a little bit. "There, see? It just takes practice." She moved around to sit at the end of the counter, and sat with her chin propped in her hands.
His flowers weren't perfect, but at least they were recognizable and he did seem to be improving. He glanced at her, a question on his lips, but he shut his mouth when he saw the tense set of her shoulders, and the agitated drumming of her fingers on the counter. His heart sank, and he set the bag down carefully. "I'm sorry, Mari. I knew I was going to mess up your cake. You shouldn't have let me mess with it."
Her fingers stilled, and she blinked at him. "Huh?"
"My flowers aren't as good as yours. I ruined it, and now you're upset, but you're too polite to tell me."
Her confused look only deepened. "What are you talking about Chaton? Of course your flowers aren't as good as mine, I've been doing this since I was big enough to hold a piping bag, and you literally just learned." She nudged the bag towards his hand. "Why don't you finish it? It looks like you've got a handle on the flowers, you should try doing the scrollwork around the bottom."
"You mean the waves?"
"Mm-hmm!"
"You know it's going to look like it was done by a three year old."
"Are you having fun with it?"
"Well, yeah."
"Then you should keep going." She nudged the frosting again. "I told you, this was just for fun. It doesn't matter what it looks like."
"But, if you're not upset about the cake, then what's wrong?"
"Oh, nothing, really." She sighed, and picked up the yellow frosting to squeeze some onto each of the fingers on her left hand, making a different design on each. "I registered for a summer internship with Gabriel, but they only accept two students each year. They're supposed to announce their picks tomorrow morning, and I'm a nervous wreck." She examined her work for a moment, then stuck her thumb in her mouth to lick off the yellow heart she'd drawn there.
"Oh." The sight of her lips wrapped around her thumb had shorted out his brain, so it took an moment to process her words. She didn't seem to notice. "That makes a lot more sense than—" He shook his head and laughed humorlessly. "I should have known you wouldn't get upset with me over something like this. I'm, uh, kind of used to people expecting me to be perfect."
She rolled her eyes, and licked the star off of her pinky without noticing his arrested expression. "That's ridiculous. No one is perfect." She licked the flower from her ring finger, her pink tongue curling around her fingertip as she swept the frosting into her mouth and he stared.
Nothing more had happened since that too-brief kiss last week, but he wanted it to. He'd been hard pressed to think of much else over the last week. Now, she was sitting in front of him, innocently enjoying a bit of frosting, and it was utter torment.
Marinette eyed her two remaining fingers, and licked the clover from her index finger. She hummed her enjoyment, completely missing his strangled whimper. She smacked her lips and lifted her hand to lick away the last of the treat, but he'd had enough. His hand shot out to grip her wrist, and her startled eyes shot to his.
"Merde, Marinette. That wasn't even intentional, was it?"
Her eyes widened at the husky timbre of his voice, and she frowned in confusion. "What?"
He stepped closer to her with a smirk tugging at one corner of his mouth, and indicated the frosting on her hand with a tilt of his head. "Weren't you going to offer me any, Princess?"
"Oh," she breathed, as he drew her hand to his mouth and slowly sucked the sweet yellow paw print from her skin, shifting his hand to hold her palm, rather than her wrist. Her finger slid from his mouth with a soft pop, and he leaned forward in the hopes of claiming another kiss.
A door closed firmly, and they sprang apart with matching blushes. He cleared his throat awkwardly, and picked up the pink frosting to attempt the scrolls at the bottom of the cake, hoping that they hadn't been caught.
Sabine bustled into the kitchen with two baguettes from the bakery below, and a bright smile for the two at the counter. "Marinette makes wonderful frosting, doesn't she, Chat?" They both choked on air, and she chuckled knowingly. "I suggest, though, that if you want more, you have it with the cake."
I'm not sure how I feel about this one; I'm worried that I spent too much time on the teaching stuff. Thoughts?