More than just cake - Lawliet x OC -

Pasta ai Funghi

I'm really not sure where this chapter came from. I just had an image in my mind, of Fay and her former boyfriend, in a kitchen, making pasta. And I do think it is important for the plot, so that you guys can see that Fay too has had to sacrifice things. And that she isn't perfect, she's flawed and broken in so many ways. It is important for this story, I think.

Ah, what do I know. I'd love to hear your thoughts, though. 

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She is 23 years old.

In the kitchen of her perfect, little apartment in Paris, she is sitting on a barstool and admiring the wonder that is her boyfriend, Césaire.

He's standing by the stove, wearing a pair of comfy, worn jeans and a fitting light blue T-shirt. Over them he has a funny apron, turning his frontside into one of a nude statue - a present she has bought for him on a mini vacation in Rome last summer.

Césaire is a dreamy looking guy. He is tall and lean, with a body of a male model and a face of an angel. His auburn hair is wavy and falls to his ears and forehead in a way that calls for Fay's fingers to brush it behind his ear. Fay loves the way he doesn't shave his face on weekends - the stubble makes him look ragged and hot. It's a real pleasure to feel it on her skin when they make love.

Sometimes Fay can't help but to wonder how on Earth a guy like that has fallen for her. She knows there's nothing special about her - or at least about the girl she pretends to be.

It's almost dinnertime, and he's making pasta ai funghi, Fay's favorite. He is like that. He loves pampering her, and one thing that Fay really loves about living with him, is the fact that she never, ever has to cook. She's already opened a bottle of Cava, though, and they are both sipping on it while he prepares the dinner, she watches him and they chat about their life, her work at the university, and the movies they have gone to see together.

Everything is perfectly normal. So normal, and so unbearably happy, that sometimes on days like this, Fay feels like she's suffocating.

On days like these, every little detail reminds her of L.

Like the way Césaire walks barefoot in the kitchen.

Or the way the wine tastes on her lips, the same as on the rooftop in Madrid so many years ago.

She looks at her boyfriend, feeling a pang of guilt in her heart, and takes another gulp of the wine. She knows all too well, that it isn't fair to him, that she still thinks about L.

But then again, what can she do about it? She can't just turn love off, like blowing off the candle flame. Her life is an ocean of secrets as it is, and her love for L is just the peak of the iceberg.

"Want to taste?" Césaire asks, and offers her a fork with a few spaghetti strings and a piece of porcino. "Enough salt? Not too much, I hope."

He speaks French with her - another thing about him, that makes her weak on the knees. She smiles, and opens her mouth so that he can feed her the small portion, and as always, the food is perfect.

Everything about him is so perfect, that it's almost scary.

"It's delicious." Fay says, and hops off the barstool.

"So, you want to set the table?"

"Sure." she replies, and gives him a quick kiss, brushing his lips with hers, before taking two plates from the cupboard, and lighting the candle on the table.