in the end ~ d. malfoy

Chapter Fifty-Two

August 2016

TO SAY THAT DIANA'S BAKING SKILLS ARE NONEXISTENT is an understatement.

To be fair, she shouldn't have expected anything else of herself. Narcissa never taught her how to cook, the older witch relying on the efforts of house elves and magic to sustain herself throughout the day. She's never seen her mother fry an egg or whisk some cream, the elves usually shooing her out of the Manor's kitchen before mealtimes. Even on the occasions she's visited Maya's place, Nandini had her hands too full to cook for them all, usually ordering takeout from the diverse array of restaurants that decorated their Queens neighborhood. She remembers many evenings curled up on their worn couch, clasping pot stickers with chopsticks or scooping up ice cream with a spoon, a random Netflix show playing in the background as the city light glimmers from the windows outside. Point being, Diana has zero clue what to do with herself in a kitchen, which makes this idea all the more daunting.

"Fuck!" she curses, as the clattering sound of a spoon hitting the ground echoes throughout the room. It's around 7 in the morning in Ottery St. Catchpole, the sun beginning to rise outside the large bay windows, painting the sky with a pink glow. Xenophilius left earlier for a sunrise trip into town to pick up a few things, promising to bring back breakfast supplies later. However, Diana has a different plan in mind.

These past few days with Luna have been something out of a dream; sunlit mornings reading The Tales of Beedle & Bard, balmy evenings swimming at Salterton Beach, sweltering afternoons with ice cream in the town square, they've almost made Diana forget about the responsibilities of her old life. She feels truly safe for the first time in years, wrapped in a tranquil cocoon with the Ravenclaw witch. So now she's here, her hands in a bowl of butter and flour, trying to make semi-decent raspberry scones in a show of gratitude.

Though with the way they're going to turn out, Luna will probably think Diana's trying to poison her instead.

Diana groans, frustrated, glancing at the flour mixture in the bowl. The cookbook asks her to mix the butter and flour by hand until it's a "breadcrumb-like" texture, but her recreation looks as though it's the chopped-up remains of the Parthenon. She sighs, adding in the milk and eggs anyway and mixing them in with a nearby spatula, until it mostly resembles the pale dough-like substance pictured in the cookbook, before adding in the raspberries. However, when Diana tries to stir in the fruit, her spatula crushes most of the delicate berries, resulting in splotches of red that look as though the dough has been stabbed violently.

Oh well. At least it'll be pink if she mixes the whole thing.

"What're you up to this early in the morning?" Luna's sleepy voice mutters from behind her. The shorter witch's arms wrap around her waist, head not quite reaching over Diana's shoulder. The contact sends a flurry of butterflies into Diana's stomach, a furious blush cascading across her cheeks, deepening even more so once Luna places a kiss on the back of her neck.

Good God, she is absolutely whipped for this girl.

"Baking, " She replies, trying to sound as unflustered as possible.

"I didn't know that was a hobby of yours, " Luna peeks over the side of her shoulder, eyes brightening as she spots the mixture in the bowl, "Are those . . . . scones?"

"Yeah, " Diana sighs, a weight dropping into her chest, "They're not that great, though. The dough doesn't look like what's in there, "

"Since when are you a stickler for recipes?" Luna laughs, the lilting sound music to Diana's ears, "Besides, the cookbook isn't super accurate. The dough looks just like my mum's, "